Welcome to Umbria Italy
Umbria is a region of Central Italy, bordered by Tuscany to the west,
the Marche to the east and Lazio to the south. This region is mostly
hilly or mountainous. Its relief is dominated by the Apennines to the
east — accounting for the highest point in the region at the summit
of Monte Vettore on the border of the Marche (2476 m = 8123 ft) — and
the Tiber valley basin, accounting for the lowest point at Attigliano
(96 m = 315 ft).
Umbria is divided in two provinces:
Provinces of Umbria
The Tiber forms the approximate border with the Lazio; although
the remainder of its course northwards from its source just over
the Tuscan border does lie in Umbria, the river is mercurial and
thus over the centuries very few towns have been situated on it:
the Tiber itself thus is not a major factor in the history and human
geography of Umbria.
The same cannot be said of the Tiber's three
principal tributaries, each flowing in a generally southward course:
they are responsible for much of the landscape of Umbria. Most of
the course of the Chiascio takes it through relatively uninhabited
areas until Bastia Umbra, and about 10 km later it flows into the
Tiber at Torgiano. The Topino, cleaving the Apennines with passes
that in Antiquity made the Via Flaminia possible and the main successor
roads even today, makes a sharp turn at Foligno to flow NW for a
few miles before joining the Chiascio below Bettona. The third river
system is that of the Nera, flowing into the Tiber much further south,
at Terni: its valley, called the Valnerina, is widely considered
by Umbrians the most scenic area of Umbria. While the Nera flows
more or less in isolation between rather high mountains, the lower
course of the Chiascio-Topino basin widens out into a fairly large
floodplain, which in Antiquity was actually a pair of shallow, interlocking,
swamp-like lakes, the Lacus Clitorius and the Lacus Umber. They were
drained a first time by the Romans over a span of several hundred
years, but an earthquake in the 4th century and the political collapse
of the Roman Empire resulted in the reflooding of the basin, which
was drained a second time over a span of five hundred years: Benedictine
monks from various abbeys in the region started the process in the
13th century, and it was completed on the private initiative of an
engineer from Foligno in the 18th century. In tourist literature
one sometimes sees Umbria called il cuor verde d'Italia (the green
heart of Italy). The phrase, taken from a poem by Giosuè Carducci — the
subject of which is not Umbria but rather a specific small place
in it, the source of the Clitunno river, treasured since Antiquity
as a beauty spot — is to a certain extent appropriate since
the modern administrative region is the only one to have neither
a coast nor a border with a foreign country, and, except for August
and September, is notoriously green.
Searching for Property in Umbria
Umbria offers many different types of property from Village houses
to high mountain retreats, to find the best property for you think
about what recreational activties you would like to explore and their
relation to the area which your chosen property situated. View all property
for sale in Umbria.
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