Barbarasa tower
The Barbarasa family was one of the leading families in Terni in the 15th and 16th centuries and counted among its members priors, general councillors and local dignitaries, in essence city administrators as well as a canon of the Cathedral, Giulio Barbarasa. A powerful family, therefore, especially from a financial point of view, so that the tower-house they built (although the earliest structures of the building are traced back to the 13th century) was meant to be sign of their power. The tower, believed to be a construction built to defend the city, was without doubt a "watchtower" to defend the Barbarasa property, which bordered that of the Spada family.
In the city’s history, the Barbarasa Tower is remembered above all for an episode related to the plague that also struck Terni in the late 17th century. On hearing the news of the spreading epidemic in south-central Italy, the city council decided to put soldiers at the city gates to prevent foreigners from entering.
In the meantime, church services were held in the Cathedral and St Valentine. A leper hospital was opened in the convent of the Grazie, outside the city, to give shelter to those who came from suspected areas. Inns and other meeting places were closed; vagrants and beggars were banned from moving from place to place. Part of the city walls near Porta Romana, which had collapsed due to neglect, were also rebuilt.
However, the preventive measures were to no avail. The first cases of bubonic plague were registered in the early summer of 1656 in the Cathedral district. A year later, in June 1657, seeing as the situation was still serious, the bishop Sebastiano Gentili organised a large procession through the city streets and at the end, climbed to the top of the Barbarasa tower, the tallest building in Terni, carrying a relic of Precious blood with him. From there he prayed for divine protection and blessed the city. All this is commemorated on a plaque placed halfway up the tower, on the initiative of the owner of the tower at that time, Felix Barbarasa.
The tower is still inhabited today.
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