At the census of 2001 San Pancrazio turned out to be the comune with the highest proportion of German mother-tongue inhabitants in the whole of South Tyrol: fewer than two people in a thousand declared another first language. Ten years later the share had fallen a little and the record had passed to Martello. From this village, which is the first you meet as you turn into the Val d'Ultimo from Merano, came Blasius Marsoner, poet, historian and translator of Dante's Commedia. The name, on the other hand, is the patron's: it appears in 1098 as ecclesia S. Pancracii in Ultun, then as S. Pangraz in 1440 and S. Pankraz in 1470.
On the arms adopted in 1968 there is a tower: it is the one of castel d'Ultimo, the Eschenloch, built in the twelfth century by the counts of Ultimo, whose ruins stand on the top of a hill with the tower left alone. The parish church has a bell tower 56 metres high; the church of Sant'Elena, first mentioned in 1338, stands on a rise at 1550 metres and can be seen from far off. The valley is full of old masi, almost all with medieval roots, and one of them, the Beckenchristlhof, has been studied by archaeologists. And then there is a house they call the Häusl am Stein, the house on the rock: it was saved from the flood of 1882 because it had been built upon a block of stone.
Straight-line distances from the town centre. Tap a point to open its page.
Near San Pancrazio
The closest destinations covered by our editors, with straight-line distance.
Places to see within 25 km
Outside San Pancrazio, but an easy day trip away.