The first archbishop of Peking set out from here. Giovanni da Montecorvino was born in 1247 — the sources hesitate between this Montecorvino and the one in the Daunia —, became a Franciscan and in 1289 left for the East with letters for the ilkhan of Persia, for the emperor and for other sovereigns. He reached northern China in 1294, at Khan Baliq, that is Peking, just as Kublai Khan was dying, and there he stayed. He built the city's first church and in 1305 a second one, in front of the imperial palace; he learned Uighur, the language of the Mongol ruling class, and translated into it the New Testament and the book of Psalms; he ransomed from non-Christian families some hundred and fifty boys and taught them Greek, Latin and singing. For eleven years he was the only priest of the Roman Church in China, unable even to make his confession. He died at Khan Baliq in 1328, and to his funeral, it is said, a great many people came, Christian and not.
The village's origin, too, has to do with a forced displacement. In 269 before Christ the Romans defeated the Piceni on the Adriatic and transplanted them by force into Campania, between the Sele and the Sarno; the city they were given was called Picentia and they were called Picentini, to tell them apart from those left by the sea. They rebelled more than once, Picentia was razed twice, and in the end Rome forbade its rebuilding: only small scattered settlements were allowed. One of them became Montecorvino. The second half of the name, for some, says the rest: Rovella would come from ribellus, rebel. The comune has gone on losing pieces: in 1820 it was divided into Rovella and Pugliano, in 1929 part of its territory went to make Battipaglia together with a piece of Eboli, and in 1990, after a referendum, Bellizzi too became a comune of its own.
