Altino

Altino stands on a rocky spur commanding the valley of the Aventino, once defended by three rivers whose marshes made a natural moat. Legend has it founded in 452 by refugees from Altinum in the Veneto fleeing Attila, who landed at the mouth of the Sangro; another local story explains why the village is not on top of Monte Calvario, and blames a lady of the castle of Archi who would not allow it, because from up there she could no longer have kept Casoli under her guns. The documents are soberer: the first attestation is of the twelfth century, and in the Norman age the fief belonged to Bohemond of Antioch.

The price of this village is known too. In the Angevin tax rolls of 1320 Altino is valued at seven once, twenty-nine tarì and one grana; in 1691, after passing through half a dozen families, the whole place went to the Paolucci of Naples for five thousand ducats. At the Fonte there is still a monumental fountain of 1558, with the date cut in Roman numerals and two spouts shaped as human heads. The village's modern identity, however, rests on a vegetable: the sweet pepper of Altino, which has its festival at the end of August and, since 2017, a museum of its own.