A notable city of art, an undiscovered central Italian gem. The whole city, gathered on undulating hills, is a storehouse of domestic architecture of seven centuries. Overlooking the principal piazza are the 15thC town hall, the towered 12thC Palazzo del Podestà, and the medieval and 18thC prefecture. Palazzo Chigi, one block south, Palazzo Farnese, south again, and the Papal Palace (13thC Gothic, brilliantly restored) must not be missed; nor the graceful churches of Sant’Angelo, Santa Maria della Salute and the duomo, all part of the central complex.

The medieval quarter has houses and shops of curious trades still intact. Near Santa Maria della Verità, 0.5 km east beside a railway, is a handsome civic museum. Follow the railway 0.5 km north and you come to the Santa Rosa Sanctuary where Rosa’s body and her ‘Machine’ are kept. The ‘Machine’ is a top-heavy pillar 30 m high, newly-decorated every year and festooned in coloured lights. Every September, a force of strong men carry it through the streets and, for a climax, run full tilt with it up the steep street back to the sanctuary.

Though an Etruscan city, crucial to the old civilization’s economy and defence, Viterbo preserves only fragments of the original walls in Piazza Duomo. Off Route 2, 9 km south-west, at Castel d’Asso, are 70 tombs with monumental facades, dating back to the 4thC BC. Nothing inside − art thieves got here before the authorities did. But stroll the narrow tufa-cut lane between them and, where it opens on olive-groves, you will feel you are really in tune with those shadowy folk of long ago.