There is a written photograph of this village: the apprezzo of 1638, the survey made before the fief passed to the Carafa. It records that Castelvenere «is built on flat ground, very strong in its walls, with ditches all round», that it is entered from the west through a gate with a drawbridge, and that inside there is «a fine straight street, of convenient width, divided into alleys on one side and the other». The fief was valued at ten thousand five hundred and twenty ducats. In 1532 it counted thirty-six families; by the end of the century, seventy.
In 1898 a dig brought to light a pile dwelling: twenty-five metres long, fourteen wide, resting on ninety-nine posts driven vertically into the ground, with mouflon bones and Iron Age flint points. The following year, on that very spot, the church of the Madonna della Seggiola was designed. Under via Mulino run the tufa cellars instead, cut in the Renaissance to quarry grey tufa and later widened to hold wine: legend says the witches used to meet down there. Wine has remained the village's trade, with the local Camaiola grape, «the barbera that is not barbera».
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📅 Every year, on 19 February
Castelvenere celebrates Saint Barbatus, bishop of Benevento, on 19 February: according to tradition, the saint was born here in 602.
📅 Every year, on 8 May, «San Barbato di penitenza»
Castelvenere celebrates its patron Saint Barbatus a second time on 8 May, with the observance known as «San Barbato di penitenza».
Straight-line distances from the town centre. Tap a point to open its page.
The closest destinations covered by our editors, with straight-line distance.
Outside Castelvenere, but an easy day trip away.
