Monte Santa Maria Tiberina

Monte Santa Maria Tiberina stands at 688 meters on the summit of the mountain that gives it its name, on the Umbria-Tuscany border above the Upper Tiber valley, forty kilometers north of Perugia. From the eleventh century the territory was a fief of the Marquis Bourbon del Monte, descendants of the Frankish Marquis del Colle who conquered much of the Upper Tiber. The Bourbon del Monte marquisate became an imperial fief in 1250 and stayed one until 1815, six and a half centuries of de facto independence from both Florence and Rome, the longest-running noble enclave in central Italy. The Palazzo Bourbon del Monte in Piazza Castello, begun in 1564 by Bartolomeo and continued by his son Gianbattista, holds the family seat and now the municipal museum. The medieval walls still ring the borgo. Beyond them the slopes are chestnut woods, sweet chestnuts and pasture, the basis of the town's Città del Castagno membership.