Viterbo is an ancient city and comune in the Lazio region of central italy, the capital of the province of Viterbo. It is approximately 80 driving / 80 walking kilometers (50/50 mi) north of GRA (rome) on the Via Cassia, and it is surrounded by the Monti Cimini and Monti Volsini. The historic center of the city is surrounded by medieval walls, still intact, built during the 11th and 12th centuries. Entrance to the walled center of the city is through ancient gates. Apart from agriculture, the main resources of Viterbo's area are pottery, marble, and wood. The town also hosts the Italian gold reserves, an important Academy of Fine Arts, and the University of Tuscia, and is located in a wide thermal area, attracting many tourist from the whole central italy.



Main sights

• The Palazzo Comunale (begun 1460), Palazzo del Podestà (1264) and Palazzo della Prefettura (rebuilt 1771) on the central square Piazza del Plebiscito. The Palazzo Comunale houses a series of sixteenth century and Baroque frescoes by Tarquinio Ligustri, Bartolomeo Cavarozzi and others.
• The small Gothic church of Santa Maria della Salute, which has a rich portal.
• The Romanesque Chiesa del Gesù (eleventh century). Here the sons of Simon de Montfort stabbed to death Henry of Almain, son of Richard of Cornwall.
• The Palazzo Farnese (fourteenth-fifteenth century), where Alessandro Farnese, the future Pope Paulus III, lived in his youth together with his beautiful sister, Giulia Farnese.
• The Rocca (castle).
• The Romanesque churches of Santa Maria Nuova (twelfth century), San Sisto (second half of the ninth century), and San Giovanni in Zoccoli (eleventh century). The Palazzo degli Alessandri in the old district, a typical patrician house of Middle Ages Viterbo.
• The Fontana Grande, begun in 1206.
• The Gothic church of San Francesco, built over a pre-existing Lombard fortress. It has a single nave with Latin cross plan. It houses the sepulchre of Pope Adrian V, who died in Viterbo on August 17, 1276, considered the first monument by Arnolfo di Cambio.