Orvieto and Bethlehem

Country: Italy
Date of Agreement: 18 February 1996
Name of Mayor: Stefano Cimicchi
Tel: 0039 763 3061
Fax: 0039 763 343622
Address: Commune di Orvieto, Via Garibaldi 8, 05018 Orvieto

Orvieto , is a town, in the Terni province, in the Umbria region of central Italy. The town is situated on an isolated rock on the Paglia River opposite the mouth of the Chiana River. An Etruscan and later a Roman city (in late Roman times it was called Urbs Vetus, from which its Italian name is derived), Orvieto was the seat of a Lombard duchy and of a Tuscan countship before becoming an independent commune in the 12th century. After much civil conflict and strife with neighbouring cities, the town passed under the dominion of the papacy in 1448.

Its cathedral, one of the most celebrated in Italy, was begun in 1290 to commemorate the miracle at Bolsena, a town just to the southwest, where in 1263 a priest witnessed the miraculous appearance of drops of blood on a Host that he was consecrating; a large silver shrine in the Cappella (chapel) del Corporale contains the Holy Corporal (linen altar cloth) from Bolsena. The cathedral is richly decorated with the work of many medieval sculptors and painters, notably the frescoes by Luca Signorelli and Fra Angelico in the Cappella Nuova.

The town's many fine 13th-century houses and palaces include the episcopal palace, the Palazzo del Popolo, and the Palazzo dei Papi, the last of which contains the civic museum with many works of art and a collection of antiquities from the nearby Etruscan necropolis of Volsinii. Also notable architecturally are the churches of S. Andrea (11 th- 12th centuries) and S. Domenico (1233-64), the old fortress (1364), which has been converted into public gardens; and the disused St. Patrick's Well, or Pozzo di S. Patrizio (1527-40). A major civil engineering program to consolidate the foundations of the City's buildings was undertaken.

Orvieto is an agricultural centre noted for its white wine. Its wine tradition stems from a delicate semi-sweet vintage, aged in tufa cliffs; growing markets for dry wines led to Cathedral of Orvieto, Italy production of an additional dry Orvieto. The town's handicraft industries are represented by wrought iron, ceramics, and lace. It is linked to Rome and Florence (via Arezzo) by rail and road.