Torre Le Nocelle

The name says what the village was: a tower. In the Middle Ages Torre Le Nocelle served as lookout and bulwark for the neighbouring fiefs of Montefusco and Montemiletto, and from 1280 the documents call it Turrecella, the little tower; from 1412 onwards it becomes Torre di Montefuscolo, because it was one of the castles that made a crown around the barony of Montefusco. The watchtower is gone, but the bell tower of the sanctuary of San Ciriaco — detached from the church and built some ten years after it — probably stands on its foundations: the village put its bells where it used to keep its sentries. Earlier still there was the Roman world: objects and ruins in the Viticeto district, the remains of an aqueduct along the river Calore, and three columns of cipollino marble that come from a pagan temple and today stand inside the sanctuary.

That sanctuary, dedicated to saint Cyriacus, is the most important in Italy among those named after this saint. Modern history begins in 1806, when Joachim Murat applies the Napoleonic law abolishing feudal tenure, removes the Caracciolo from the government of Avellino and expropriates the religious bodies; Avellino becomes the capital of Principato Ultra, and in 1810 Torre Le Nocelle quarrels with the prince of Montemiletto over the possession of Starse and of the Bosco Faiano. Then comes September of 1860, and here the unification of Italy is seen close up and is not a pretty sight: the pro-Bourbon reactionaries unleash a violent reaction that turns into a massacre of pro-Garibaldi liberals, and the same thing happens at Montemiletto. Today the village lives on olives: the extra virgin oil is the one with the Irpinia — Colline dell'Ufita denomination.