Anversa degli Abruzzi

Anversa degli Abruzzi sits at 604 meters on a spur above the Sagittario Gorges, in the upper Sagittario valley between the Peligna plain and the national park. The Normans built a castle here in the 12th century to control the southern approach to the plain. The Counts of Sangro held it from the mid-1100s until the 1400s, when Antonio di Sangro rebuilt the fortification into its current form.

Gabriele D'Annunzio set La Fiaccola sotto il moggio here in 1905, drawing on the Di Sangro family for his four-act tragedy, which he called the most perfect of his plays. The Riserva delle Gole del Sagittario, a 400-hectare nature reserve below the town, protects limestone canyons carved by the river and shelters wolves and Marsican bears. Population has fallen from 1,934 in 1901 to about 300. The local craft is ceramic: the pignata, a cooking pot, and the cucù, a clay whistle.