Gualdo Tadino
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Gualdo Tadino, (Latin: Tadinum, later Taginae) an ancient town of Italy, in the province of Perugia in northeastern Umbria, at 43°14N 12°47E, at 536 meters (1759 ft) above sea-level on the lower flanks of Mt. Penna, a mountain of the Apennines. It is 47 km (29 mi) NE of Perugia and 30 km (19 mi) SE of Gubbio. Its population in 2003 stood at 15,200.
Gualdo has a long history and was once a Roman town on the Via Flaminia. In 552, the Byzantine general Narses briefly restored Italy to the empire by defeating the Ostrogoth king Baduila in what is now known as the Battle of Taginae, the exact site of which is not known, but thought by most scholars to be a few kilometers from the town, in the plain to the west at a place called Taino: this suspicion may have received confirmation in 2004.
The ancient city survived that war, only to be destroyed in a later war at the instigation of the Holy Roman Empire Otto III in 966. It was later rebuilt, only to be destroyed a second time by fire in 1237. Finally, the Emperor Frederick II ordered the city rebuilt for a third time in 1239, and it is this incarnation which survives today.
The city had been known in the Middle Ages as a center of ceramic ware; in the late 20th century, the ceramic industry was revived, and today Gualdo is an important center for the manufacture of industrial ceramics and bathroom fittings.
External links
- Il Rosone (http://www.gualdotadino.org/)
- Bill Thayer's site (http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Places/Europe/Italy/Umbria/Perugia/Gualdo_Tadino/Gualdo_Tadino/home.html)
- possible excavations at Taino (http://www.protadino.it/20040919/08archeolog04.html)it:Gualdo Tadino