Villa d'Ogna

There are three explanations of the name Ogna, and a legend. The legend says the village was founded by the Huns: a group sent by Alaric to work in the iron mines is supposed to have stopped at the mouth of the stream, and in certain documents the place is written Villa humnia, the villa of the Huns. The other two are more prosaic: from the Latin onus, the customs duty, because this was the compulsory way up into the upper Val Seriana and in the fifteenth century there was a customs post in the square at Ogna; or from Alnia, the stream of the alders.

Of the long history of this stretch of valley one detail says a great deal: Lombard law remained in fact in force in the customs of the people here until 1491, seven centuries after the Lombards. The village, meanwhile, had been enfeoffed in 1026 to the bishop of Bergamo, and in the thirteenth century Ogna and Villa ended up inside the territory of Clusone, which was richer. Along the stream, later, came the forges — making above all nails — and the paper mills, whose paper was reckoned good.