Sparkling in the april sunlight, in company with crowds of tourists, the central parts of historic L’Aquila looks to a casual visitor to be vigorous. As the location where northern wool merchants came to buy, and Abruzzo wool producers cane to sell, L’Aquila was the centre of the Italian wool trade for centuries.
Somewhat out of town, the basilica of Santa Maria di Colmaggio is a medieval gem. A massive job of restoration has its facade, building structure, frescoes and papal burial chapel looking splendid. Besides its role in papal history ( check wikipedia for the reluctant pope Celestino V) it was important as the start of one of the Tratturi routes down which for centuries until the 19th c, every autum shepherds from Abruzzo villages drove mobs of thousands of sheep from the mountains of Abruzzo to the plains of Puglia. And every spring, back again. This process called transhumanza, the width of the tracks ( about 60 metres) and how the shephers were to be treated by trackside communities, was regulated by the then kingdom of the two sicilies. While the men were gone over winter the women and children in the villages were left to maintain their homes, restuff mattresses with leftover wool, preserve and store food, etc. A hard life in a hard environment. Ended after the unification of italy, the loss of the wool trade and transumanza was one factor leading to the depopulation of the Abruzzo and migration to countries as far away as Argentina and Australia.
