The Historical centre of Monte San Pietrangeli: a 6-stop itinerary to discover its treasures

Monte San Pietrangeli has everything you would expect from a small ancient village: walls, churches, squares and beautiful buildings. And this place does not owe its beauty only to this. If inside the walls the village is like a treasure chest full of art treasures, even outside the historic center there is no shortage of good reasons to visit it.

The historic fountains, for example, such as Fonte Corfano or Fonte Coppione are a fascinating testimony to the skill of local craftsmen between the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. There are also many activities that make the village lively and interesting in every season. From sports fields a stone's throw from the center, to patronal feasts like the famous Good Friday or the festivals, there is always something to do here, as in the rest of the Marca Fermana. Trekking lovers, for example, will not be disappointed and there are also fascinating rural churches to discover or magnificent abbeys like the one in Fiastra.

You'll be really spoiled for choice, but now let's leave for this incredible six stops itinerary in the most ancient heart of Monte San Pietrangeli.

Monte San Pietrangeli is definitely worth visiting on foot, to be able to calmly admire its monuments, but also to immerse ourselves in its quiet and welcoming atmospheres. The first thing to do, therefore, is to leave the car, or even the camper, in the designated parking area one kilometer from Largo Valadier, where our itinerary begins.

Having admired from the outside the majesty of the fourteenth-century walls that still surround the center, we visit the church of San Lorenzo and San Biagio, also known as Collegiata, a nineteenth-century artwork by the architect Valadier. Its tall bell tower and neoclassical façade, with columns and tympanum, immediately strike us and the interior is no exception. Three naves, Ionic columns and decorations by Pietro Lucchi welcome us, together with the magnificently frescoed vaults by Pietro Fontana.
This artist, native of the village and therefore particularly loved, is also the author of the two clay lions that symbolically mark the entrance to the village. From here we take a short, slightly uphill ramp, Via Sant’Antonio, then pass the elegant Palazzo Fontana and Palazzo Barbarossa and continue towards the second stop.

Just a few minutes walk, and via Sant’Antonio turns into Via Roma, the main street of the center. Right here there's the bronze bust of Luigi Fontana, of whom we will soon discover many other works. Our walk along the street will lead us to discover other elegant buildings, shops selling typical products and some of the most important monuments of the village. The first is just a stone’s throw away, it is the Civic Tower.

Via Roma, in fact, opens on the right into a small square where there is a beautiful square stone tower, surmounted by a bell tower that houses two historiated bells. On the facades of the tower we can admire two clocks and a sundial, while in the base there is a fourteenth-century portal. The Civic Tower is in fact very old and is one of the few testimonies of the medieval village that survived the wars and sieges of the 16th century.
There is a chapel inside, with fragments of Renaissance frescoes, which can be visited during guided tours but also when the adjacent theatre, once Palace of the Priors, is in operation, since it shares the same entrance with the Civic Tower.

Just a few steps beyond the Tower, there is the main square of the village. Two other very important monuments welcome us right at its entrance. On the right is the San Giovanni Cultural Center, housed in a beautiful and austere Renaissance church. Many activities take place here and one of the treasures of Monte San Pietrangeli is currently kept: the polyptych attributed to Giuliano da Fano.

Right in front is the Palazzo Comunale, an elegant eighteenth-century building, with two arched entrances, whose facade was modernized and embellished by Luigi Fontana in 1898. Inside we'll get to see several works by another important local artist, Luigi Quadrini and an image of the Virgin by Veneziano. The Palazzo Comunale is also a fundamental stop for the various historical testimonies that it contains in its elegant rooms. In fact, there are cartouches and documents such as papal parchments, a fifteenth-century statute and a funerary urn that dates back to the first century BC when Roman troops inhabited the area.

Before continuing on to the fourth stop on our itinerary, let's take a break and choose one of the many local culinary specialties. Maybe some excellent homemade pasta accompanied by a local wine. There is a wide choice in the Marche, so much so that Monte San Pietrangeli also hosts a themed event every September.

Once refreshed, we can continue along the alleys perpendicular to the main street. Via Roma, in fact, crosses the entire center but immediately after Piazza Umberto I is cut transversally by Traversa degli Agli on the right, and Via Luigi Fontana on the left. Here is also the birthplace of Don Murri, politician and religious man, another illustrious son of the village. Both alleys lead to what were once two of the ancient gates of the city, Porta da Bora and Porta da Sole respectively. It's absolutely worth making a detour in both directions to look out from the panoramic terraces and enjoy the wonderful views of the hills of the Marca Fermana.

We return to Via Roma to walk a few more minutes among beautiful buildings with wooden shutters and wrought iron balconies, and thus reach the oldest part of the village. Here, already in the 11th century the monks of Ferentillo built a convent that over the centuries underwent various vicissitudes. It was transformed in the 16th century by the invaders of Fermo into a fortress, but also promptly demolished by the inhabitants of Monte San Pietrangeli who wanted independence. The building definitively returned to being a convent in 1536, when the village became free again with the help of the Pope.

We can visit the interior of the franciscan complex starting from the neoclassical church, full of eighteenth-century works. From the wooden choir to the organ by Gaetano Callido, an artist of the Venetian school, from the frescoes to the elegant white marbles. Let's move  outside, now, to visit the oasis of peace and silence that is the cloister at the foot of the bell tower. On two sides of the cloister there is a portico, here we can stop to rest a bit under its cross vaults.
Finally, let's go back to the street. Right behind the convent, on Via Matteotti, there is a gate with elegant wrought iron scrolls that gives access to the Parco della Rimembranza. Inside, among trees and stone benches, there is a monument dedicated to the memory of the victims of the two world wars.

For the last stop on our tour of Monte San Pietrangeli, we continue along Via Matteotti until we arrive just outside the walls. Here we find the church of Santa Maria Desolata, like many other buildings in the village, also completely covered in bricks.

Inside, in its a single nave, we can admire the Assumption of the Virgin along with other works by Oscar Marziali, another great local artist. The noteworthy altarpiece from the early 19th century, is instead made by Alessandro Ricci, an artist from Fermo, and represents the Mother of Sorrow. Behind the church, finally, there is a bell tower with a graceful hemispherical dome.
Our itinerary unfortunately ends here, but every corner of Monte San Pietrangeli tells fascinating stories. We leave the village, but with the promise to come back to discover its beauty.