Fiumalbo

Fiumalbo sits at 935 meters in the upper Frignano, at the confluence of the Rio Acquicciola and the Rio delle Pozze, which join here to form the Scoltenna. The village is the last Modenese commune before the Tuscan border at the Foce a Giovo pass, and the territory rises from 800 meters at the river to the 2,165 meters of Monte Cimone, the highest peak in the northern Apennines. The medieval centro storico is built almost entirely in local sandstone, the houses packed tight along the narrow streets that drop from the parish church of San Bartolomeo to the river.

The town has been documented for almost a thousand years; the older history is lost. The Oratorio dei Bianchi, the small fifteenth-century lay-confraternity oratory with its painted wooden ceiling, is the artistic anchor of the village. Population 1,175. The municipality falls inside the Parco del Frignano and holds Borghi più belli and Bandiera Arancione status.