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Guardea (Terni province)

A town of SW Umbria: 42°37.4N, 12°18E. Altitude: 387 m. Population in 2003: 1800.

[A long brick-paved piazza with a small stone church in the background, and along the right side, a stuccoed rectangular building with one low story over an arcaded porch, six bays of which are visible. It is the main square of Guardea, Umbria (central Italy).]

The main square of Guardea.

Guardea is a small farm center on the old road from Orvieto (roughly 25 km northwest) to Lugnano in Teverina and Amelia (9 km and 20 km southeast, respectively).

Although of relatively modern appearance, the town dates to the end of the Middle Ages: its much older predecessor Guardege, now known as Guardea Vecchia, was abandoned in the 17c and most of it now lies buried on a hilltop about 1 km east.

Guardea is locally known for its ceramics, produced according to 13c patterns and techniques; beekeeping and herbalism are also alive and well here. The area has a number of caves, accessible only to speleologists; and a Camaldolese hermitage founded in the Middle Ages.

A proper website will eventually appear here, since I've been to Guardea, if briefly. In the meanwhile, you might find it useful to read the brief section in the July 22, 2000 entry of my diary; for further (and much better) information, see the websites linked in the navigation bar at the bottom of this page.

Frazioni

Most of the comuni in Umbria include in their territories some smaller towns and hamlets, of a few hundred inhabitants if that, with a certain administrative identity of their own: as elsewhere in Italy, these are referred to as the frazioni of the comune. In the case of Guardea, there is just one frazione, and I haven't been there. Any link is therefore offsite:

Frattuccia

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