Key to Umbria: Spoleto
 


Medieval Walls and Gates


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Plan

Walk III follows a route that is confined by the walls of the Medieval city. 

Medieval Walls (1297) 

These walls were built to enclose three new suburbs:

  1. ✴Borgo San Gregorio;

  2. ✴Borgo San Matteo; and

  3. ✴Borgo di Monterone.

The stretch of the walls illustrated here is in Via delle Murelle, between Porta Ponzianino and Porta San Gregorio.


Porta Ponzianino (13th century) 

This gate stands at the only point at which the Roman and medieval circuits of walls coincided.   There must have been a Roman gate here that led to a bridge across the Tessino.   It was through its successor that an army under the Emperor Frederick I swept in 1155 to sack the recalcitrant city.

The remains illustrated here (in Via della Ponzianino, in the wall of number 55 and in that of the house opposite) seem to belong to a gate that was built at the time of the new city walls in the 13th century.

Porta San Gregorio (1945) 

This has been the main entrance to the city since 1297. 

Pope Leo XII rebuilt the gate in 1825, after which it was called Porta Leonina.  It was bombed in 1944 and and took on its present unlovely appearance shortly thereafter.



Porta San Matteo (1297)

This gate still retains its original wooden doors.  The inscription on the left on the inner side of the gate records that the papal governor, Cardinal Giambattista Rubini restored Via Madonna di Loreto in 1673 (see Walk IV): this important processional route started here and led under a covered arcade to Santa Maria di Loreto.




Porta Monterone (1297)

This gate is also known as Porta Romana, because it marks the point at which the road from Rome enters the city. 

[Arms of the city?]






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