Discover Umbria 2026-27

Assisi, the city of St Francis.

The City of Peace is one of those destinations to visit at least once in a lifetime, being one of the most famous and best-loved places of Christianity in the world, a spiritual and at the same time cultural centre that is truly unique. The city of St Francis and St Clare lies on the north-western slope of Mount Subasio, in the province of Perugia.

Its centre is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, as are the Papal Basilica of St Francis, the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli and the other Franciscan sites. Assisi is there to be discovered! The magnificent Basilica of St Francis, one of the greatest sanctuaries of Christianity, consecrated in 1253 and completed in 1367, consists of the Lower Basilica, the Upper Basilica and the crypt where the Saint’s remains lie. The churches are also considered a treasure of Italian art and preserve a cycle of thirteenth- and fourteenth-century frescoes by the greatest painters of the age, first among them Giotto.

Passignano sul Trasimeno is a village that retraces the history of the Etruscans and Romans, where all is quiet and the narrow lanes look like settings from a fantasy film. Its fortress dominates the village and, once at the top, a terrace over the lake leaves everyone breathless. The town developed in the modern era, between the 1500s and 1600s, while the evocative historic centre around the Rocca is of medieval origin and has its roots in even earlier times. The village presents itself as a small fishing village stretching towards the shores of the lake and dominated by the Rocca above. Thanks to its lakeside promenades and bathing beaches, it is, together with Castiglione del Lago, an ideal place to enjoy Trasimeno to the full. The medieval Rocca of Passignano sul Trasimeno dominates the landscape, standing out above the village in its elevated position. The oldest core of Passignano is enclosed by the circuit of medieval walls, which bear witness to the development of the town as it was transformed from a small farming village during the Roman Empire into a castle and fortress in the medieval period, when it was long contested between Arezzo, Perugia and Florence. After a relaxing stroll along the lakeside and a wander through the village, a visit to the Rocca is a must. You will experience a real journey into the past, immersing yourself in local life too thanks to the small Boat Museum housed inside it. And enjoy the breathtaking view from the top of the more than 30-metre-high Tower! You can admire the spectacle of the lake and its islands.

Corciano, a magical village in Umbria.

With its evocative stone lanes, Corciano is a perfectly preserved medieval village. A unique experience both for nature lovers and for art enthusiasts. Nestled among the green hills of Umbria, the village of Corciano may appear at first sight like an enchanted kingdom from another dimension. Yet it is not fairies and elves who populate it, but human beings who will make you feel at home with their memorable welcome. The town stands at 408 metres above sea level on a hill known as Sant’Agostino, owing to the presence of an Augustinian complex, the only one in the Umbria region, made up of a large ancient church dating from the twelfth century and a convent. Following the path lets you immerse yourself in an oasis of peace and spirituality, heightened by the silence of nature which, with its beauty, accompanies us in the footsteps of the pilgrims of old. Olive groves and vineyards stretch out before our eyes, a natural setting that opens the heart and makes us feel part of a single great breath. The heart of the town is a spiral of concentric lanes in the midst of which rises the thirteenth-century tower. The fortified historic centre can be entered through Porta Santa Maria to the south, with the imposing Torrione beside it, or Porta San Francesco to the north, after which you are plunged into a rise and fall of winding alleys, houses in limestone and travertine, delightful hanging gardens and stairways carved into the rock: a breathtaking sight. Corciano’s historical and artistic attractions are many. The Palazzo Comunale, once the residence of the Dukes Della Corgna, houses the Council Chamber with beautiful decorations on its wooden ceiling by the Zuccari. Not to be missed, too, are the Palazzo dei Priori e della Mercanzia and the circular well carved with the town’s coat of arms. Corciano also has a castle, documented since the twelfth century, around which the core of the town developed. The Church of Santa Maria Assunta dates from the thirteenth century and is Corciano’s principal religious building.

The village of Bevagna.

Perhaps it is the evocative medieval atmosphere, the palaces from another age, the artisan workshops, but Bevagna has an undeniable charm that wins the visitor over at once. The small town lying in the Umbrian Valley is a precious treasure chest with its monuments, stone houses and paved lanes that reveal a piece of history at every corner. Defended by a circuit of medieval walls with six gates, Bevagna preserves traces of ancient Mevania in the remains of the Roman theatre, the baths and the temple, which peep out here and there among the medieval buildings, from an age that strongly shaped the appearance of this characteristic village suspended in an eternal Middle Ages. To step back in time, you need only sit in the scenic Piazza Silvestri with its thirteenth-century Palazzo dei Consoli and the Romanesque churches of San Silvestro and San Michele, or go shopping in the medieval workshops – the paper mill, the silk mill, the candle works – where master craftsmen work with techniques from a thousand years ago. Around the historic centre of Bevagna.

The heart of the old village, Piazza Silvestri, with its harmoniously irregular shape, is considered one of the most beautiful medieval squares in Umbria. The nineteenth-century fountain at its centre and the Roman column with a Corinthian capital underline its unusual scenic quality. The most important civil and religious buildings look onto the square. On one side, the Gothic Palazzo dei Consoli (1270), with a loggia on the ground floor covered by cross vaults, two rows of mullioned windows and a broad staircase leading inside, where the nineteenth-century Teatro Torti is housed. Beside it, the church of San Silvestro, a Romanesque gem dating from 1195 with an unfinished façade crowned by a three-light window and two two-light windows, is joined to the Palazzo by a wide vault.

Acquasparta, a village to be explored, one of the most beautiful villages in Italy, set in some of the loveliest landscapes of Umbria. Here we are in Acquasparta, a thoroughly medieval pearl with intact and priceless treasures, visited every year by thousands of Italian and foreign tourists. A welcoming, easy-going town, truly in every season, like other Umbrian gems. A veritable home of slow tourism, with history, art and good food. One last curiosity: this was the seat of the first Accademia dei Lincei (at Palazzo Cesi), frequented by none other than Galileo Galilei. A small village, with an area of just 80 square kilometres, home to a little under 5,000 inhabitants between the centre and its hamlets. Its history and geography speak of a town that is visitor-friendly and full of character, even though this is not one of the most fashionable areas of the region. Acquasparta nevertheless sits in a commanding position, in the valley of the River Naia, between the hills and the adjacent Martani mountain chain, at an average altitude of around 350 metres above sea level. The views of the town and the surrounding countryside are certainly a fine ingredient for a holiday, given the many historic buildings, the medieval streets and a landscape rich both in vegetation and in springs of curative waters. Waters known also, if not above all, for their mineral springs. In short, a town abounding in pure springs and wellbeing, which nonetheless also has an eye for a good glass of wine, grown with excellent results along the area’s supply chains. In essence, this village – among the élite of Italy’s most beautiful villages – is a perfect example of slow tourism, tranquillity and fresh air, as they say. For a dip into history, on tiptoe.

The Roman Cisterns of Amelia.

Of Amelia’s Roman period there remain the imposing cisterns, made up of ten chambers beneath Piazza Matteotti, the site of the ancient forum, the remains of bath buildings, a mausoleum along the ancient Via Vejetana and a considerable number of inscriptions. The imposing Roman Cisterns of Amelia, a Roman hydraulic work dating from the first century AD, were built when the town became a Roman municipium and thus acquired all the urban elements typical of “Romanisation”: a road network, a town forum, public and private buildings, a water supply system. Observing the grandiose complex of cisterns that exists beneath Piazza Matteotti, it can be supposed that these supply systems were fed by rainwater. The cisterns consist of ten large chambers used for collecting and storing water for use in the baths, for drinking and for supplying the fountains. Such structures have always been characterised by one or more interconnected watertight chambers, equipped with water collection channels, settling basins, inlet and outlet channels, spouts, ventilation shafts and draw wells. The ten chambers measure on average about 19 metres in length and 5 in height. Each chamber is built with a perimeter retaining wall made using the opus incertum technique (irregularly shaped blocks of stone or tufa) and an inner facing in opus reticulatum (square-based stone blocks arranged in a “net” pattern). Water was collected in the Cisterns through small shafts into which the rainwater accumulated in the square above was channelled. The population could draw water from wells located at various points in the town: there were two types, public ones, situated in the square or along the street, and private ones, placed inside courtyards or in the cellars of houses. The normal outflow of water during the periodic emptying of the cisterns for cleaning and maintenance was guaranteed by the 122-centimetre difference in level between the first chamber and the ninth. The last chamber, by contrast, was set on a reverse gradient to ensure that, during the emptying phases, a quantity of water remained sufficient to complete the cleaning operations.