Marmentino

An old legend, born towards the end of the fifteenth century, tells that in October 1166 pope Alexander the Third crossed these mountains: an exile from Rome, a supporter of the free communes, pressed by the men of Frederick Barbarossa and contested by four antipopes. Most historians have rejected it for want of certain and concordant proof — one of them wrote as much three centuries ago — and yet, as the source itself observes, the legend turns up again in three geographical areas far apart from one another, and that is surprising. Marmentino has its own piece of the story: on the nineteenth of April 1545 the rector of the village, who was also archpriest of the cathedral of Brescia, found the relics believed to have been given by the fleeing pope and placed them beneath the high altar of the church of Santi Cosma e Damiano.

That church had known bad times before. A document of the nineteenth of September 1240 records that it was in a disastrous financial state because the rectors, through negligence, had run up a good many debts; and the man sent to put things right ordered that all the movable goods of the church be sold — sheep, oxen, cows, pigs and hay — so that the proceeds might settle what was owed. In 1281 neighbouring Bovegno took Marmentino to court because it refused to pay its share for the upkeep of the mother church it depended on. In 1610 a Venetian official wrote that the people here lived off their animals or went to cut charcoal wood in the neighbouring lands, and were for the most part poor. From the middle of the nineteenth century the men left as miners and worked in practically every corner of the planet. In the coat of arms there is a dog, adopted in 1958 to recall the village's loyalty to Venice, with three stars for its three hamlets: it was used without any grant at all until 2008, when it became official and the plain dog turned into a greyhound. And among the places of interest the entry on the comune lists the village shop, which sells food and soap and paper and stands next to the bus stop.