Francica

Francica was founded in the time of the Normans, who had their capital at Mileto, on the ridge opposite, and the name comes from a detachment of Gauls — or Franks — that was quartered here. The man who tells how it came about was born here: Gabriele Barrio, the author of the De Antiquitate et situ Calabriae, came into the world at Francica around 1510, and according to him, and to the notes of Tommaso Aceti, the citadel was the result of several villages that had huddled together on the height to be safe from raids. Three rivers marked out the territory: the Scotopeto, today a trickle, divided it from Mileto; the Mesima from Soriano; the Cocaracio from Hipponium, that is Vibo Valentia. In 1500, at the place called Campo, a pitched battle was fought in which the anti-French League — Spain, the Habsburgs, Milan and Venice — beat the troops of Louis XII.

From that period on the villages round about began to empty, and today's town is made partly of them. They were called Pinguado, or Pungadi, destroyed by the earthquake of 1908, where the perimeter walls of its old church's bell tower can still be seen; Mutario, which today is Mutari; Clamista, «almost hanging», of which not even the site is known any more; Scassaris; and Costantino, which on the contrary made it and is today San Costantino Calabro, a comune of its own. Of the vanished ones there remained, as witness, the ruined little churches dedicated to saints Theodore, Paul, Blaise, Andrew, Peter and John, and, near the citadel, that of the Blessed Mary, which pope Callixtus II had consecrated in 1120. Today Francica carries the title of City of Oil, for the quantity of olive oil produced here.