Monte Rinaldo

The town stands on a buttress at 485 meters above sea level and its history has its roots in the Roman period, evidence of which can be identified in the grandiose temple that came to light in its territory in the locality “La Cuma” together with the many traces of Roman villas, still largely unexplored. Later, in the Lombard age, its location made possible a development in agricultural-commercial activities certainly uncommon for the time. From the ruins of the Roman settlement, located in the vicinity of the Indigo, sprang the fortified centers of the territory dating back to the 6th century, in the period of the Gothic and Lombard invasions.

After the Picenian settlement and the Roman conquests of the territory, however, the history of the settlement was intertwined with that of nearby Monsampietro Morico, when the Apulian Norman count Malugero Melo, son of Drogone d’Altavilla, reached these lands where he married a certain Mòrica. Three sons were born of the marriage, and to the one named Rinaldo, by the way an illegitimate son, the count entrusted a castle located in the present municipal territory of Monte Rinaldo.
Such an account can be traced back to the feudal rule of the Frankish era. The territory of Monte Rinaldo, considered “frontier,” in the Middle Ages was disputed by the Duchy of Fermo, the city of Ascoli and the Farfense Abbey of nearby Santa Vittoria.
The castles of Bucchiano and Montorso, which around 1000 were already in these vast territories, date from this period.

The first document that explicitly names “Monte Rainaldi” is the Rainberga donation of 1032, by which the abbess of a monastery in Petritoli donates the castle and that of “Vecciano” to the Abbey of Monatecassino.
Notably, in 1307 the castle of “Vecciano,” to be understood Bucchiano, was attacked and fought over by nearby Montelparo, whose population sided with the Pontiff.

Monte Rinaldo, like other towns, in the second half of the 13th century, depended on Fermo, and to Fermo passed in 1333 the important for the time castle of Bucchiano, later destroyed in 1378 by Fucaporo, tyrant of Fermo.
Since disputes and consequent armed clashes were almost always originated over questions concerning boundaries, these were definitively established in 1539 by Mario Favonio of Spoleto, auditor of Cardinal Carpi. Thereafter, the town experienced the vicissitudes of the other municipalities in the area, with the rule of the Papal States, the invasion of the French and the Napoleonic invasion, which destined it to become part of the Department of Tronto, dependent on the Canton of S. Vittoria, until the Papal Restoration and the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy by Victor Emmanuel II in 1861.

Monuments and Churches

• Archaeological Area “La Cuma”
• Belvedere Via Roma
• Castello di Bucchiano
• Chiesa SS. Sacramento e Rosario: costruita nella metà del Settecento e in stile barocco, conserva un notevole crocefisso che secondo la tradizione venne ritrovato dopo la distruzione della rocca di Bucchiano e al centro dell’abside una favolosa tela.
• Chiesa SS. Leonardo e Flaviano
• Church of the Crucifix
• Chiesa di S. Maria in Montorso: oggi in decadenza, conserva affreschi del quattrocento.
• Chiesa della Madonna della Neve, sita in località Cuma.
• Fonte San Flaviano
• Civic Archaeological Museum
• Palazzo Giustiniani
• Piazza Umberto I
• Torre dell’orologio