Montemonaco, in the upper Aso valley, rises to 988 metres above sea level and is the highest municipality in the Piceno area. Probably founded by a group of Benedictine monks in the eighth century, Montemonaco is a small fortified village deep in the Monti Sibillini National Park, whose history is often a mixture of legend and reality.

Within the fortified walls there are the fifteenth-century church of San Biagio and the sixteenth-century church of San Benedetto with a monumental portal.

The list of churches continues outside the centre, in the hamlets of Isola San Biagio and Vallegrascia, with two of the most beautiful rural churches of the Marche, San Giorgio all’Isola and San Lorenzo in Vallegrascia.

San Giorgio all’Isola is a Romanesque church founded by Benedictine monks in the ninth century, whose belfry was probably once a watch tower. The church interior has two aisles and sixteenth-century frescoes.

San Lorenzo in Vallegrascia is a small church with a tripartite sandstone apse, made by Farfa monks in the twelfth century. Inside, in addition to capitals with floral and animal motifs that decorate the crypt pillars, two carved sandstone slabs, dating from the twelfth century, represent the struggle between good and evil.

Montemonaco is also a land of mystery and legends linked to a cave on the peak of Mount Sibilla that the 1410 novel Guerin Meschino by Andrea de Barberino and the travel stories of Antoine de La Sale (Le paradis de la Reine Sybille, 1447 ) describe as the access to the underground kingdom of the Sibyl, a woman with divinatory powers, a fay for some and devil for others.

Today, access to the cave is completely closed following a landslide in 1955, but in Montemonaco itself, inside Villa Curi, visitors will find a museum dedicated to the Sibyl’s cave, which uses artworks, antique books, scrolls and even a water slide that mimics the path that led to the legendary cavern to describe the charm of a continuous interweaving of art, history, literature, myths, legends and magic.

Villa Curi is also home to the municipal historical archives, which contain a scroll dated 1452, which documents the excommunication (later revoked ) of the priors and the entire community of Montemonaco for hosting knights who practiced alchemy and accompanying them to the Lake of the Sibyl (better known as the Lake Pilato).