Villa Santa Maria - Villa Santa Maria

Disambiguation - For toponyms of identical name, see Villa Santa Maria (disambiguation).

Villa Santa Maria is a center ofAbruzzo.

To know

The characteristic rock that dominates e protectscommonly called Penna, in the Middle Ages it constituted a sort of defensive apparatus; according to popular legends and rumors, this rock of several meters in length and height seems to have inspired terror to the assailants, mainly gypsies and brigands, but in the 13th and 18th centuries also Ottomans and Saracens, who forced the inhabitants to move from the locality of Madonna to Basilica in a perched position protected by the Pen, as if this rock were a wall of a natural castle.

Geographical notes

In the middle Valle del Sangro, it is 12 km from Bomb, 21 from Roccascalegna, 25 from Atessa, 31 from Casoli, 33 from Lama dei Peligni, 39 from Roccaraso, 39 from They launch, 67 from Chieti.

Background

Some archaeological finds found around the town attest that the Medio Sangro area near the town was already inhabited in the Italic era (probably by people of Frentana lineage). During the barbarian and Ottoman invasions it was repeatedly invaded, which forced people to take refuge behind the rock commonly called "La Penna". In fact, the original place was near the church of the Madonna in the Basilica. Later it was a fief of various families, but the highlight is with the family of the Caracciolo Princes (XVI century) who built the castle. The houses in the Congrega area were built between the 18th and 19th centuries.

During the Second World War there were some families of foreign Jewish refugees in forced domicile in the village, who fraternized with the local population. Upon the arrival of the German troops in 1943, the mayor Roberto Castracane flatly denied that Jews were still present in the village despite being aware that at least one family of them, the Steinbergs, was hidden with the Piccone family. As soon as - after a month - the German troops left the country, the Steinberg family was led through the lines to join the Allies. For this commitment of solidarity, on April 16, 1978, the Yad Vashem Institute in Jerusalem awarded Roberto Castracane the high honor of the Righteous among the Nations.

On the face of the mountain there is the inscription "DUX" in honor of Mussolini; during the Second World War a partisan tried to remove the inscription but Nazi soldiers killed him before he could do the deed. In July 2019 the writing was cleaned up and is again visible from all over the country.

How to orient yourself

Neighborhoods

Its municipal territory also includes the inhabited centers of Contrada Madonna in Basilica, I Pagliai, Montebello and Villa Santa Maria Stazione.

How to get

By plane

• Pescara airport (Abruzzo International Airport), Via Tiburtina (Pescara) (Km 229.10), ☎ 39 085 4324201. 

By car

• Val di Sangro motorway tollbooth on the Adriatic motorway.
• It is not far from the former state road 652 at the bottom of the Sangro valley

By bus

• Bus lines managed by ARPA - Abruzzesi regional public bus lines [1]

How to get around

What see

• Church of San Nicola di Bari. The church was built before 1816, when it was restored in Romanesque style; the interior was remodeled several times, to the point that nothing remains of the ancient style, replaced by the baroque. The restorations were completed in 1826. The large fresco on the vault of the nave, the choir and the bell tower seem to relate to the nineteenth century reworking.

The classical Romanesque façade is in travertine from the Marche. Above the entrance there is a polychrome mosaic lunette depicting the Eucharist. In the center there is the Madonna with two saints venerated at Villa Santa Maria on either side: San Francesco Caracciolo and San Nicola di Bari, the patron saint of Villa Santa Maria, in the act of protection of the parish itself; a triangular tympanum ends the whole. The roof is gabled and above the apse there is an octagonal dome with a canopy with eight segments. The roof of the bell tower is domed.

The church has a single nave with a barrel vaulted ceiling and a dome (near the apse). On the sides of the nave there are three chapels on each side. The altar is made of marbled plaster. The choir loft protrudes above the entrance door; there are also a pulpit and a wooden baptistery enclosed within an iron grate.

The paintings in this church were made in 1844 by Francesco Maria De Benedictis in a classicist-inspired style: "The Last Supper", "The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple" and "Christ chases the merchants from the Temple" respectively located on the wall at the bottom and on the side walls of the central altar. The Last Supper is a copy of the famous work of Leonardo da Vinci with a single variation: the addition of an evanescent landscape that can be glimpsed beyond on the back wall.

On the vault there is a fresco by D'Agostino that refers to the Venetian school of the '700 and represents the Triumph in the sky of San Nicola di Bari.

The side chapels house the eponymous statues of the chapel; the statue of San Giuseppe dating back to the seventeenth century has "conocchie" attributable to the Neapolitan devotional iconography. In the apse there are other statues of San Nicola di Bari and San Rocco while the walls are adorned with three canvases. : Furthermore, under the altar of the Addolorata there is the statue of the dead Christ. They are works that recall the seventeenth-eighteenth century epic of the Neapolitan nativity scene; in fact the wooden statues have been replaced with other statues, always wooden but hollow inside, just like many statuettes for the crib, to be transported in the processions. They are works of expert local artisans.

Among the minor works there is a wooden crucifix from the first half of the sixteenth century restored several times over time. 

• 41.95249914.356281 Church of the Madonna in Basilica, via Congrega (in the homonymous district). It is believed that the church is located in the place where the original nucleus of the town was. The first mention of the church is from 703 when it is mentioned in Chronicon Volturnense; the sacred building with the adjoining Benedictine convent was located in an uninhabited area full of woods. The presence of the religious settlement led over time to the formation of an inhabited nucleus in the area currently known as Macerine. Following the suppression laws of 1810 the monastery was deprived of the right of feudal tax collection, which caused its abandonment. The Benedictines moved to Atessa in the church of San Pasquale taking with him the archive that otherwise would have been lost.

Of the early medieval church, some granite column shafts remain, other columns were incorporated into the pillars which appear contemporary to the rest of the building. Access is allowed by a brick portal surmounted by a triangular tympanum of eighteenth-century style. The bell tower, located near the apse, has been remodeled.

The whole of the construction clearly shows various successive phases that brought the church to the current overall style which goes back to the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century Baroque. The dome has a hemispherical cap without a drum with a lantern incorporated into the roof. The facade is salient.

The interior has three naves with three chapels on the right and one on the left which houses the tombs of two members of the noble Castracane family.

The church preserves a large picture gallery. 

• Church of the Madonna del Rosario (Madonna of the Congrega). It dominates the town from the top of a rocky spur; it is also called of the Congrega because it is entrusted to a brotherhood. The exterior is in Abruzzo rural neo-Romanesque style (local stone) while the interior is baroque.

The façade has a flat termination with shoe buttresses on the back and on the left side; the only ornament of the facade is the portal with a broken curvilinear tympanum. Although a plaque on the left side of the church mentions the date of 1639, the complex seems to belong to the second half of the 18th century. It has a quadrangular bell tower joined to the church on the right side.

The interior consists of a single nave, with the typical of the brotherhoods, with the upper floor intended for religious functions and meetings of the Congrega and an underground level that was intended for the burial of the brothers, which was accessed from the apse area.

The vault is a double barrel with lunettes. The altar of the apse is in polychrome marbled stucco and the floor is in brick squares. There Madonna of the Rosary behind the main altar is by Nicola Ranieri di Guardiagrele.

There Immaculate Madonna with Saints of a minor altar is due to Pietro de Marinis and Francesco Colecchia. 

• Church of Santa Maria delle Grazie. The travertine façade, finished at the top by a triangular crowning, is in modern form from 1969, but the church already existed in the eighteenth century. The interior is a classroom decorated with trusses. On the sides there are light recesses host three altars which correspond to three protrusions on the outside. In the three altars there are paintings by Mauro Carbonetta, Nicola Finamore, Emilio di Franco, Manuela di Paolo, Alice Pellegrini from 2000; the hall ends with a hemispherical apse.

In a small shrine of the apse there is a wooden statue of the Our Lady of Grace built at the end of the 15th century. The main altar is in marbled stucco. The bell tower has a square plan. In the square next to the bell tower there was a social yard where the wheat of Villa Santa Maria was harvested. 

• Church of Sant'Antonio abate. In the early years of the twentieth century, two shafts of granite columns that belonged to the convent of Santa Maria in Basilica were placed on the base of the church, with the intention of modifying the facade. However, the appearance remained bare. The travertine façade is simple and in neo-Romanesque style. Two pilasters are placed at the corners and two cornices divide the facade horizontally into three parts. Above the second frame there is a lunette. The portal has a pointed arch.

The interior has a single square nave in a simple but at the same time eclectic neoclassical style. On the sides there are recesses. The vault is a barrel vault with a pseudo-dome. The church preserves paintings by the artist Casoli Candeloro from 1967, statues of Sant'Antonio Abate, San Vito martyr and San Camillo de Lellis and a plaque engraved with the date of 1646. The altar is in marbled stucco.

On January 16, on the occasion of the feast of the titular saint of the church, a bonfire is lit with the town's Christmas trees in the churchyard; with the embers made the sausages are cooked and distributed to the people who came to the party. 

• Church of the Madonna delle Grazie (in the locality of Le Valli). 
• Spaventa Palace. The Spaventa palace is located in the church of Sant'Antonio Abate. it was built in the thirties where there was a mill or an oil mill. The facade is between the liberty style and the eclectic. The building has two floors. On the ground floor there are three doors. On the first floor there are three windows with a balustrade of balconies with columns sloping upwards, on the sides of the windows ending with an arched decoration above the windows. The windows are embellished with stucco decorations on the sides of the columns depicting female figures holding festoons of flower garlands. 
• Palazzo Di Cicco. Next to the church of San Nicola there is the Di Cicco palace. The facade is narrow. Above the main entrance a balcony with window is surmounted by a lunette. The other windows on the right side of the building with respect to the main facade are aedicule with a triangular or lunette-shaped tympanum above. 
• Castracane Palace, intersection via Mercato-via Sangrina-via Congrega.. 
• Museum of cooks, via Roma. 
• Source Cillo. 
• Old fountain, Corso Umberto I. The fountain was built at the beginning of the twentieth century. The bas-relief placed on the crowning was added in 1926 due to a fascist provision that obliged to insert one's symbol in state works. In fact, the bas-relief depicts two lions holding a bundle. The beam was destroyed after the fall of the fascist regime. The fountain is placed close to a retaining wall in a pedestrian square. The body is made of limestone with an entablature with classic moldings. A central basin drains the water into two lateral drinking troughs similar to the central body. 

Events and parties

• Review of the Chefs of Sangro. the second Sunday of October. 
• Feast of Our Lady of Grace. at the beginning of July. 
• feast of the Madonna in the Basilica. 9-10-11 August. 

In addition, fairs are held on the following dates:

• March 25
• first Sunday of May
• first week of October, during the Sangro cooks review. The event takes place from the first Sunday of October for three days on the occasion of the feast of San Francesco Caracciolo.
• November 1st
• 6 December during the patronal feast (San Nicola di Bari)

What to do

Shopping

The local economy is mainly based on food and wine and on the presence of the professional hotel institute. liqueur factories very renowned in Italy and abroad, producers of Villese punch, Centerbe, Villese amaro, and gentian and licorice liqueurs.

How to have fun

Where to eat

Average prices

• 41.9466914.3500561 Hotel restaurant Santa Maria, Piazza Guglielmo Marconi, 19, ☎ 39 0872 944417. 
• Baruffal farmhouse, Contrada Selva Piane, ☎ 39 0872 944142. 
• La Casetta farmhouse, Contrada Poggio 11, ☎ 39 0872 944982. 
• Olimpo farmhouse, Contrada Montebello 4, ☎ 39 0872 940425. 
• Le Ginestre restaurant, Contrada Poggio 24, ☎ 39 0872 944206. 
• Belvedere Pizzeria Restaurant, Victory Avenue 8, ☎ 39 0872 940100. 
• Trattoria L'Onofrio, Marconi Square 1, ☎ 39 0872 940148. 

Where stay

Average prices

• B&B I Pagliai, Contrada Pagliai, snc, ☎ 39 0872 944554, 39 0872 944328. 
• Pietraspaccata Tourist Village, Via Lake (Contrada Pietraspaccata), ☎ 39 0872 944984. 

Safety

Pharmacy

• 41.95047814.3504271 Flour, Corso Umberto I 18 / a, ☎ 39 0872 940342. 

How to keep in touch

Post office

• Italian post, Corso Umberto I 22, ☎ 39 0872 944424, fax: 39 0872 940310. 

Around

• Bomb - The neighbour lake of Bomba, from whose southern shore you can enjoy a view of the Maiella, it offers tourist services such as camping, restaurants and farmhouses. Of artificial origin, the lake mirror over time has become of environmental interest.
• Atessa - The inhabited area winds on the top of a relief with a crescent-shaped plan. It boasts a historic center with city walls and gates dotted with numerous ancient churches.
• Castel di Sangro - It was a Roman city, then a fief of the Borrellos; the ruins of the medieval castle and the nearby megalithic walls testify to the past greatness of port of Abruzzo.
• Roccaraso - Its ski facilities, belonging to the Alto Sangro ski area, make it one of the major mountain tourist resorts of the entire Apennines.
• Roccascalegna - Its castle, located on the top of a rocky ledge like an eagle's nest, dominates the town; the small village, made up of a few low houses, develops at the foot of the fortress.

Other projects

• Wikipedia contains an entry concerning Villa Santa Maria
• Commons contains images or other files on Villa Santa Maria

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