THE TRUE STORY
OF THE BRICK ROAD
of Carla Gambacorta
The present-day Patron of Assisi road -- which in the commune of Assisi's 1469 Statutes is referred to as "that which goes from the city to Santa maria degli Angeli", more familiar to us today as the rectilinear -- is the old brick road, once again of interest today. But what part did this road play in Assisi's ancient network of roads? Arnoldo Fortini, in his New Life of Saint Francis has given us a description of what most likely were the streets which made up 13th century Assisi's territory. We find the so-called Old Road emerges, among the principle routes in the plain, connecting Perugia to Foligno and passing in front of the Porziuncola; whereas the following roads descended from Assisi: The Street of the Porziuncola, which went from the Saint Peter city gate to the Porziuncola and the River Topino; the Street of Valecchie from Assisi to Valecchie and the River Topino (interesecting the Old Road), the Street of the Arches which went from Assisi to Castelnuovo, the River Topino, and Collemancio; the Gloomy Road of Saint Petrignano which went from Assisi to Petrignano and Cannara; in addition, we find the Road of the Thorn, which led to San Damiano, to The Thorn and to the Ose Torrent; and last, more or less perpendicular to these roads, there was the Franciscan Road, which went from St. Salvatore to The Walls (the present-day Gualdi house) and to the Church of the Holy Trinity (between Rivotorto and Capodacqua). In the context of these roads, then, the Road of the Porziuncola had no particulart importance, at least not until the death of St. Francis. Much interesting information (upon which we based our rapid study) is provided by Francesco Santucci (The 'brick road' from Assisi to Santa Maria degli Angeli (Sections XV-XVIII) in "Acts of the Propertian Academy, VI, n.16, 1988") which, drawing upon historical and archival sources, reconstructs for us this road's rather singular history. In fact, during the 14th and 15th centuries, many bequests were left for the paving and repair of this road which became more and more important in the context of the Franciscan itineraries, precisely because it was traveled along by numerous pilgrims, foreign as well as Italian, who wished to visit the Porziuncola, a place profoundly loved by Francis, and the Basilica, constructed in his honor. To make the traveling along it more comfortable. it was necessary, therefore, to pave the road with bricks. Not only devout citizens, but indeed the Priors of the city, the Franciscans, and Pope Pius II (and, subsequently, Innocence VIII) as well, took an interest in the fortunes of the sacred road, and it was decided that rents received on the day of the Pardon from the shops in the piazza of Santa Maria degli Angeli would also be used for its maintenance. Testimony, too, to the profound interest in this road, is, in 1667, the so-called "great planting of the elms' intended to offer shade to its travelers. There are few traces left today of this generous intitiative on the part of a woman from Assisi who lived in Rome, Benedetta Galeotti. The elms were planted on both sides of the road with the help, too, of moneys from other benefactors, and many decrees were issued to protect these trees (and above all their leaves which in certain months of the year were fodder for the cattle); the penalty for any infraction was a fine of a great many scudi. But in 1743, during the passage of the Spanish troops, the greater part of the elms were chopped down for wood. And that's not all: the community of Assisi claimed for itself nothing less than the right to sell the remaining elm wood, as if the trees were its property; this elicited the disapproval - expressed by the Holy Congregation of Good Government - of many devout citizens. In 1747, to make up for what had happened, two rows of black mulberry trees were planted, but not without polemics on the part of the owners of the lands which bordered the road. The latter, in fact, feared damage to planted fields on the part of dogs and pigs who, in their desire to eat the mulberries, would trample these same planted fields. It addition it was claimed that the mulberry trees would not provide the shade which the elms had afforded and hence the very benefit for which the project had been realized a century earlier. The old road was paved in the middle with stones and bricks and somewhat raised for the sake of pedestrians, while its two sides, wide but lower, were for calashes and animals to travel along; it was also provided with, among the very few remaining elms and black mulberries, the pipes necessary for the drainage of rain-water. One stretch of the old bricks which made up the road resurfaced in 1989 in Santa Maria degli Angeli, in the course of repair works on some roads. What we get a sense of, from all that history tells us about the brick road, is the profound respect for this road which connected two extraordinary Franciscan places, and for those who traveled along it. Indeed, a Bishop's notification in 1743 goes so far as to prohibit, Santucci tells us, the playing of "figure" and "spinning disk" along the road which goes from the St. Francis city gate to the Madonna degli Angeli, so that the piety of the Faithful, who were going to the Sanctuaries, would not be disturbed. So that the piety of the faithful would not be disturbed.