Abruzzo · L'Aquila
Scurcola Marsicana
At 700 meters below Monte San Nicola, the field where a medieval battle ended Swabian power in southern Italy.
Known for
BATTLE OF 1268
Charles of Anjou defeated Conradin of Hohenstaufen on the Piani Palentini on 23 August 1268, a battle cited in Dante's Inferno.
ABBAZIA DELLA VITTORIA
Cistercian abbey founded by Charles in 1274 and consecrated in 1278, built to commemorate the victory and house monks from Burgundy.
FESTONE
Annual August procession reenacting the Madonna della Vittoria tradition that grew up around the medieval abbey.
When to visit
Best · May–Oct
- J
- F
- M
- A
- M
- J
- J
- A
- S
- O
- N
- D
- Best
- Hot or crowded
- Quiet
- Mostly closed
The festa: Antonio di Padova, 13 June
Why come
Scurcola Marsicana sits on the western rim of what was once the Fucine lake. The earliest finds in the area date to the ninth and eighth centuries BC; the toponym is Lombard and shows up around 1150, long before the events that made the place known. The village and its castle sit on the hill, the abbey and the battlefield lie on the plain below, and the mountain rises behind the whole arrangement: high ground, open ground, and the ruin that commemorates what happened on the open ground, all within sight of one another on the plain.
The other layer of history is darker: after Italian unification in 1861, Piedmontese troops carried out a massacre of the local population. The commune has 2,670 residents today, and the Festone every August reenacts the Madonna della Vittoria tradition. A small town, then, built around a plain that settled a dynastic war, with a second, more recent violence folded into the same small territory without any monument to answer it.
The Sunday letter
We haven’t written Scurcola Marsicana’s letter yet.
One town every Sunday, with the photo, the food, the festa. Be there when this one comes up. Free, by Peter & Sophia from Pietrasanta.
What to see
Ex Abbazia di Santa Maria della Vittoria
Now ruined but still readable: broken walls and arches standing in the open plain, the clearest physical trace left of the 1268 victory and the monks who once held the site.
Castello Orsini
Medieval fortress on the hill above the village, later passed to the Colonna family with the rest of the marquisate.
Piani Palentini
The wide plain stretches flat in front of the village, open ground with little to break the sightline, the kind of terrain that explains why an army would meet another here rather than in the hills.
Monte San Nicola
Apennine peak of about 1,265 meters above Scurcola, with a marked trail leading from the village to the summit.
The slow-trip planner
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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.
Sagra della Coda alla Vaccinarafood festival
usually held in August. Sagre in Abruzzo
Living here
- Population 2,670
- Commuter belti
- Pharmacy in town
- High school within a 30-minute drive
- Train station in the comune
- Nearest airport Rome, 1 h 52 min drive
- Regional capital L'Aquila, 36 min drive
Tags & datadesignations · numbers · sources
Recognised as
The numbers
- Elevation: 700 m
- Population: 2,670
- Surface area: 30.38 km²
These figures were compiled from public directories — ISTAT, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata — and from the official listings of the guides named on this page. Town details change; verify with official sources before you travel.
Close by
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