Fiumalbo lies in the high Modena Apennines, in a basin closed off by Monte Cimone — 2165 metres — and by the Abetone pass, at the meeting of two streams that frame the old centre. On the walls of the older houses you can see the margolfe: heads carved in stone, traced back to the warlike Celtic peoples who used to display the severed heads of their enemies on their dwellings. The name comes from Flumen album, the white river, and the village appears in a deed of 1038, when marquis Bonifacio di Canossa — Matilda's father — handed over to the bishop of Modena the fortress called Fiumalbo.
In 1936 part of the municipal territory, together with part of Cutigliano's, went to form the new comune of Abetone. Earlier still, at the start of the twentieth century, people left from here: in the Dawson mine disaster in New Mexico, in 1913, of the 146 Italian miners who died 17 came from Fiumalbo. The dialect is a studied case, because it sits at the crossing point between Emilian and Tuscan — or perhaps, others say, it is simply an Emilian that stayed archaic. Since 1958 the village has staged a living nativity through streets lit by torches, with the old trades and a baby Jesus born that same year.
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📅 Every year, on 23 and 24 August
On 23 and 24 August Fiumalbo, a municipality of 1,304 inhabitants in the province of Modena, celebrates its patron San Bartolomeo with the village lit by candles and a procession.
Cooked grape must and wine vinegar aged in wooden barrels: Aceto Balsamico di Modena has held Protected Geographical Indication status since 2009.
Read more →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 Fiumalbo, but an easy day trip away.
