Marche · Ascoli Piceno
Monteprandone
A hilltop borgo above the lower Tronto valley, its walled center climbing toward a summit church with a view to the Adriatic.
- Best time
- Apr–Oct
- By car
- 58 min from Pescara
- By train
- Station in the comune
- Population
- 12,896
Known for
SAN GIACOMO
Born in Monteprandone in 1393, Franciscan preacher and Marche peacemaker, founder of the 1449 convent and returned to its sanctuary in 2001.
CODICI
Eighteen manuscript volumes written by San Giacomo della Marca for the convent library, kept today in the Civic Museum of Codes.
TRONTO VALLEY
Hilltop position at 266 meters above the lower Tronto, five kilometers from the Adriatic and twenty from Ascoli Piceno.
When to visit
Best · Apr–Oct
- J11°
- F13°
- M14°
- A16°
- M21°
- J26°
- J29°
- A30°
- S25°
- O20°
- N15°
- D12°
- Best
- Hot or crowded
- Quiet
- Mostly closed
Daytime averages, 2020–2024. Weather data by Open-Meteo.com.
The festa: Giacomo della Marca, 28 November
Why come
Monteprandone sits on a hill above the left bank of the lower Tronto valley, twenty kilometers northeast of Ascoli Piceno and five from the Adriatic at San Benedetto. Tradition traces the founding to the ninth century and a knight from Charlemagne's court named Prandone, who built the first castle. A papal bull of 13 May 1323 granted the village in perpetual fief to Ascoli Piceno.
The walled center still shows this layered history: gates and stepped streets rise from the valley floor toward the summit, where the parish church stands over the plain and the sea beyond it. The convent that anchors the town's fame sits within reach of that same climb, and the manuscripts once written for its friars now rest in a museum built to hold them. Upper and lower, castle-born and papally governed, the town's shape still traces the fief it became in 1323 and the hill it was built to defend.
The Sunday letter
Monteprandone is on our list. Its letter is still to come.
We are writing about all 1,000 of these towns, one at a time, in a free letter every Sunday: the photo, the food, the festa. That is our mission. Sign up and you will be there when Monteprandone comes up. By Peter & Sophia, from Pietrasanta.
Read on
Monteprandone in our articles
The best hill towns in the province of Ascoli Piceno6 towns, Monteprandone among them.
The prettiest villages you can reach by train within 90 minutes of Pescara6 towns, Monteprandone among them.
The best hidden hill towns you can reach by train in Marche10 towns, Monteprandone among them.
Every town in our catalogue you can reach by train, all of them, by region452 towns, Monteprandone among them.
How to get there
From Ancona / Pescara (AOI), about 1h 19m by car.
Rimini (RMI) is about 2h 23m away.
By car from the centre of Pescara 58 minutes or Ancona 1h 15m.
There is a railway station in the comune, so you can arrive without a car.
Coming by train into Pescara Centrale? Monteprandone is about 56 minutes away by road.
What to see
Santuario di Santa Maria delle Grazie e San Giacomo della Marca
The convent stands where its founder placed it, the body brought back in 2001 kept within walls that also hold paintings by Vincenzo Pagani and Cola dell'Amatrice.
Museo Civico dei Codici di San Giacomo della Marca
The volumes are shelved together in the civic museum, pages once meant for the friars and scholars of the convent now under glass for anyone to see.
Centro storico di Monteprandone
Walled hill village above the Tronto valley, with surviving gates and stepped streets that climb to the church of San Nicolò di Bari at the summit.
Chiesa di San Nicolò di Bari
Parish church at the top of the borgo, holding fifteenth-century works tied to the Della Marca convent and a panorama over the Tronto plain to the Adriatic.
The slow-trip planner
Building a trip? Find where Monteprandone fits in a slow Italy circuit.
Answer five questions. We will shape a geographically coherent slow trip from the 1,000 Italian towns most travelers skip. Yours to save and share.
Through the year
What happens here
Feasts and festivals that come back year after year. We give the month rather than the date, because the date moves and the month rarely does. Check with the source before you plan a journey around one.
Festa di Sant'Anna e Sagra degli Spinosinipatron saint's feast
usually held in August. lemarche.it
Living here
- Population 12,896
- Commuter belti
- Pharmacy in town
- High school within a 30-minute drive
- Train station in the comune
- Nearest airport Ancona / Pescara, 1 h 19 min drive
- Regional capital Ancona, 1 h 14 min drive
Common questions
- What is Monteprandone known for?
- Monteprandone is a hilltop borgo at 266 meters above the lower Tronto valley, its walled center climbing toward a summit church with a view to the Adriatic.
- Where is Monteprandone?
- Monteprandone is a comune in the province of Ascoli Piceno, in Marche.
- What is the nearest airport to Monteprandone?
- Ancona / Pescara (AOI), about 1h 19m by car.
- Can you get to Monteprandone without a car?
- Yes. There is a railway station in the comune, so you can arrive by train.
- How long is the drive from Pescara to Monteprandone?
- About 58 minutes by car.
- When is the best time to visit Monteprandone?
- Best in Apr–Oct. August is the warmest month, averaging 30 degrees, and May the wettest, with about 13 rain days.
- Is there a sagra or a festival in Monteprandone?
- Yes. Festa di Sant'Anna e Sagra degli Spinosini. August is when the first of them falls.
- Which other towns are like Monteprandone?
- Magione, Assisi and Fiesole.
- How many people live in Monteprandone?
- 12,896 at the 2023 count.
Tags & datadesignations · numbers · sources
Recognised as
The numbers
- Elevation: 266 m
- Population: 12,896
- Surface area: 26.38 km²
These figures were compiled from public directories: ISTAT, OpenStreetMap and Wikidata, and from the official listings of the guides named on this page. Town details change; verify with official sources before you travel.
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