L’Alba senza tramonto. Alba Fucens antica, medievale, moderna: un “palinsesto” storico-architettonico e paesaggistico.

Alba Fucens, today the hamlet of Massa d'Alba, province of L’Aquila, was an ancient Roman city, founded in the 4th century BC. Surrounded by a landscape of “natural and unlimited grandeur” (Brandi 1957), the settlement remains were the subject of picturesque representations as early as the 19th century, but have received study and systematic archaeological excavation only since World War II. After the abandonment of the Roman colony, exposed to Barbarian attacks, medieval Alba (literally “dawn”) rose in the 11th century on the nearby hill, facing the current archaeological site. The settlement is dominated by the monumental Orsini-Colonna castle, in counterpoint to the beautiful Church of San Pietro, build on the Italic-Roman Temple of Apollo, and reconstructed after the earthquake of 1915. The architectural facies of the medieval village is depicted in poetic relationship with the landscape in the views of Edward Lear, admirer of the ''Abruzzo picturesque". These, along with vintage photos, provide the original image of the settlement, destroyed by the earthquake of 1915 and rebuilt, with disarming homogeneity among the little anti-seismic houses, almost in continuity with the Roman ruins. Alba Fucens is a charming historical, architectural and landscape “palimpsest”, the result of little known ancient and modern stages, still waiting to be interpreted and enhanced.