The Castle of Fumone (FR) was famous as a fortress in the Middle Ages when it served as a stronghold during the siege of King Heinrich VI of Germany and as a place of imprisonment for Pope Celestine V, locked up by his successor Pope Boniface VII after resigning from the Papacy.
Situated in a strategic position between the Enrici and Lepini mountains, its highest point reaches 793m above sea level allowing for a view of the entire Valley del Sacco and the via Latina, which once linked Rome with Naples. The place was inhabited by the Ernici and later the Romans who used it as a control post. A determinant of the area’s toponomy was the use of smoke signals to raise the alarm on spotting an approaching enemy: “if there is smoke (fumo) in Fumone, all Campania trembles”.
A legend recounts that Fumone is haunted by the ghost of Marquis Francesco Longhi, son of Duchess Emilia Caetani, who died at the age of 3 in 1851. The boy was rumoured to have been poisoned with arsenic by his seven sisters for his inheritance of the entire family fortune would have forced the girls into arranged marriages or convents.
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