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Giove (Terni province)

A town of central Umbria: 42°30.4N, 12°20E. Altitude: 292 m. Population in 2003: 1800.

[image ALT: The outer wall of a large four-story building takes up the left half of the picture. It is pierced by many rectangular windows each edged in stone, and fronts on a small street that leads to a stuccoed church with a belfry in the background. It is a view of the castle and the parish church of Giove, Umbria (central Italy).]

Along the side of the Castello: a view of the parish church of S. Maria Assunta

Giove is a medieval village 13 km southwest of Amelia; on a ridge above the E bank of the Tiber valley it lies between Attigliano (6 km northwest) and Penna in Teverina (8 km southeast). In Roman times it was in a heavily populated area with an important river port at nearby S. Valentino, and there have been many archaeological finds in the area. With the collapse of the Roman empire, though, the need for safety led to the foundation of the town on defendable high ground.

The present 16c castello, replacing a medieval fortress that once belonged to the Colonna family is, possibly for very good reasons, not open to the public.

You may see various sources claim that the town owes its name to Jupiter (Jove), but this is not true. Not a trace of the putative temple of Jupiter has ever been found, nor is there any record of such a name in the area in Antiquity — but in the Middle Ages the town was called Jugo, which means "ridge" or "hill". . . .

A proper website will eventually appear here, since I've been to Giove, if briefly. In the meanwhile, you might find it useful to read the brief section in the July 20, 2000 entry of my diary, with one more photo; for further (and better) information, see the websites linked in the navigation bar at the bottom of this page.

Frazioni

Giove is one of the 8 or 9 comuni in Umbria that have no dependent towns with enough of an administrative identity to be a frazione.

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