Almenno San Bartolomeo

The comune was called Lemine and covered far more ground than now: it existed by the mid-twelfth century, and in 1220 a settlement gave it the bishop's feudal rights. The Guelph and Ghibelline quarrel broke it in two, the upper part siding with the Valle Imagna, the lower with Bergamo, and a deed of 1393 split Lemine into Almenno Inferiore and Almenno Superiore. Under Venice, lower Lemine, which had sided against the Republic, was destroyed in reprisal in 1443; the upper half won privileges, a vicariate and its own statutes. A deed of division of 1601 finally parted Almenno San Bartolomeo from Almenno San Salvatore.

In the Agro del Romanico, east of the village, stands the Rotonda di San Tomè, of the early twelfth century: three tapering cylinders on one axis, eight columns inside and as many in the gallery above. Wood has a museum here, founded in 1987 by the craftsman Costantino Sana, whose firm made fittings for big shipping companies; the exhibits include a wooden car and the wooden aeroplane of the Bergamo airman Antonio Locatelli in the First World War.