Erbusco

The name is disputed: some derive Erbusco from the Lombard der büsche, the little wood, others from a Latin compound of herba and buscum. Long before, on the western spur of Monte Orfano, the Etruscans built a military stronghold that later peoples, the Romans above all, are said to have used.

The old centre grew inside a fortified enclosure: past the drawbridge, now roofed with a barrel vault, stands the pieve of Santa Maria, whose apse is one of the finest pieces of Romanesque work in the Brescia area. Its flanks are built of salvaged material, terracotta tiles and plutei of Lombard date, and in 1455 the church passed to the Ospedale Maggiore of Brescia, which walled its churchyard. The arms carry a blue five-petalled flower, on municipal papers since the later nineteenth century; Erbusco holds the title of Città.