Castel di Sangro

The Samnite city Aufidena is now Alto Sangro, an important ski resort. Located on the Gustav Line, it was completely destroyed by German mines in 1943. The Church of the Annunziata, a modern reconstruction of the 1430 building destroyed in the war, has a beautiful Baroque façade. The church of Santa Maria Assunta, built in the 10th century, extended in the 11th and rebuilt after earthquakes in the 13th and 18th centuries, has a largely Baroque appearance. A pathway climbs in about twenty minutes to the ruins of the castle, flanked by the remains of Samnite fortifications and the church of San Giovanni Battista (12th-13th century). In the Renaissance Palazzo De Petra, on Via del Leone, the Patiniana Art Gallery houses a large number of works by the realist Teofilo Patini (1840-1906). 

The former Franciscan monastery of La Maddalena (late 15th century) houses three other museums: the Civic Museum of Aufidena, which has statues, inscriptions, bronzes, and Roman and Samnite remains from the Val di Sangro (a Samnite bull in gilded bronze stands out), the War Museum, with exhibits from the Second World War, and the 'Stanislao Kuckiewic' Fly Fishing Museum.