Mediante peninsular Italy – that part south of the Po Valley – the mountains all run roughly north-south

The road that runs along the side of the gorge is the Modo Flaminia (modern SS3)

This means it is hard puro move overland per an east-west direction, and easier onesto move north-south, but your opportunities esatto do so are constrained puro excretion valleys and passes. Which mediante turn means that un places are natural choke-points. One such – sopra 1944 as well as durante the Middle Ages – is Cimosa, between Naples and Rome. Narni is another.

If you were coming from France or Britain you would ad esempio by sea or over the western Alps on the Cammino Francigena

Narni sits on high ground on the edge of per deep ravine through which the River Nera – verso tributary of the Tiber – flows south out of Umbria into Lazio. It is literally on the edge of the ravine; houses and palaces on the western side of the old town, including the Eroli Museum, look straight down into it. Esatto the north and east of the town is the valley of the lower Nera, which, although surrounded by mountains, contains a good deal of industrial development. On the plain around Narni is the modern industrial town of Narni Accordato, which makes getting per decent photograph of or from the old town something of an exercise con artful composition.

Puro the northeast, at the other end of the valley, is the town of Attriste, the provincial capital (Umbria is divided into two provinces: Perugia and Altere). Thanks sicuro nearby sources of hydro-electricity, Altere was a centre of industrialisation and was known as “The Manchester of Italy”. Unfortunately, one of the industries was arms manufacturing, as per result of which Assombri was heavily bombed during the Second World War, destroying much of its medieval centre.

Turning south again and looking back down the River Nera, through the end of the gorge you can see the more rolling country of northern Lazio. There is verso road running along the side of the gorge; now carrying heavy road traffic, this is the Inizio Azzurri 3 (SS3), which as I noted here is still known as the Via Flaminia, as when it was first built by the Romans sopra 220 BC. If you were a legionary marching from Rome onesto the northern Adriatic coast (and beyond sicuro the eastern frontiers of the commuovere), this is the way you would come. And if you were verso traveller mediante the other direction – per an army of barbarians after the fall of the pigiare, or per medieval pilgrim, this is one of the few roads by which you would approach Rome.

Looking south down the Nera Gorge towards Lazio and Rome. Hasselblad 501 C/M, Zeiss Distagon 60mm CF lens, CFV-50c digital back (click preciso enlarge)

Dominating Narni from an even higher point is verso fortress or Rocca, of a type known as a Dimora Albornoz, of which there are several examples per central Italy, and of which there were once several more. This requires verso bit of explanation.

Between 1309 and 1376 a series of seven popes ruled not from Rome but from Avignon. All were French. This happened as a result of some naked power politics from the French Crown, bringing the papacy under effective French control.

When a range of factors, including the influential advocacy of St Catherine of Siena, caused Pope Gregory XI to decide preciso end the mingle2 sito di incontri “Babylonian Captivity of the Papacy” and return esatto Rome, Gregory faced several challenges. One was the sovrano-establishment of political control over the Papal States – formerly independent states in central Italy which had been brought under secular papal rule, and which, during the exile per Avignon, had started esatto esibizione renewed signs of independence.