The name of Jenne has been argued over for centuries. Some derive it from the Latin Janua, the gate, for the way it commands the Aniene valley; some from Genna, a cold place; and some from Gehenna, that is the gates of hell. This last is the explanation that convinces most, and it has two footholds: the deep karst caves at the foot of Monte Pratiglio, which people here call the caves of the Inferniglio, and above all the first written mention of the place, a parchment of pope Leo IX assigning to the abbey of Subiaco a territory called Fundus Gehenna. Shortly after, around 1052, abbot Umberto had a marble slab set before Santa Scolastica listing the monastery's holdings: among them, Castrum Jennarorum.
A pope came from this village: Rinaldo of the counts of Jenne, who took the throne as Alexander IV. At the Inferniglio, where the Aniene slows into a basin, the Benedictines built a mill in the eleventh century: what remains of it is the grinding room and the chamber they called the hell of the gaoler. Then there is the municipal mill, from the early nineteen hundreds, which still opens on the first Monday of every month. Above the village, at fourteen hundred metres, spreads the karst plateau of the Fondi di Jenne: people used to climb up there to farm and to graze, making the most of the south-facing slope.
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📅 Every year, on 16 August, with the fair on the 17th
On 16 August Jenne, a municipality of 398 inhabitants in the metropolitan city of Rome, celebrates its patron San Rocco; the next day the goods and livestock fair is held.
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 Jenne, but an easy day trip away.
