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Home > Travel Italy > Italy Destinations > Orvieto
Orvieto
Italy, officially the Italian Republic is a Southern European country. It comprises the Po River valley, the Italian Peninsula and the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia. It is shaped like a boot and for this reason Italians commonly call it lo Stivale, the boot, or due to its prevalent peninsular geographical nature, la Penisola, the Peninsula. Italy is called, Il Belpaese, Italian for beautiful country by its inhabitants, due to the beauty and variety of its landscapes and for having the world's largest artistic patrimony; the country is home to the greatest number of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Rome is its Capital city and incidentally its largest city as well.
Orvieto is a city in southwestern Umbria, a region of central Italy, bordered by Tuscany to the west, the Marche to the east and Lazio to the south, situated on the flat summit of a large butte of volcanic tufa. Province is Terni. The site of the city is among the most dramatic in Europe, rising above the almost-vertical faces of tufa cliffs that are completed by defensive walls built of the same stone. It is situated at a height of 325 meters, Orvieto has a population of 20,841 within an area of 281 square kilometers and has a population density of 74 inhabitants per square kilometer.
Orvieto was a major center of Etruscan civilization, the Archaeological Museum houses some of the Etruscan artifacts that have been recovered in the immediate neighborhood. The episcopal see was transferred from Bolsena, and consuls governed under a feudal oath of fealty to the bishop until 1860.
The main sights of Orvieto are its Gothic cathedral, or duomo. The church is striped in white travertine and greenish-black basalt in narrow bands; its design has often been attributed to Arnolfo di Cambio, but the prevailing modern opinion is that its master mason was an obscure monk named Fra' Bevignate from Perugia. Orvieto is also home to Etruscan ruins and the remnants of a wall that enclosed the city more than 2000 years ago. At the foot of the butte, surrounded by peach and apple trees and a vineyard, the Etruscan necropolis of Crocefisso di Tufo counts a hundred or so chamber tombs laid along a rectangular street grid.
As it is often regarded as among the most beautiful parts of Italy, it is one of the most visited places amongst the most die-hard travelers the world over.
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