Formerly, bad blood used to run between Foce’s Castle and the City of Amelia. Fires, skirmishes and rebellions went on for centuries – be it for the Guelph faith of the one or due to the authoritarian nature of the other – whatever the reason, ‘Castellani’ and ‘Amerini’ simply couldn’t stand each other.
A great valley marked the border between the two contenders, and right in this land of oaks and fields, on an unknown date, La Gabelletta was founded. Some sources attest that in the 1400’s the elders of the city of Amelia let contractors collect the taxes “of weights and measures” for the subsequent year, and who can say if some willing citizen might have decided to settle in those middle lands to gain some profit from foreigners who needed to pay a transit tax if they wanted to sell their goods. Who knows?
Family tales, passed from one generation to the next, tell of a child abandoned on the roadside, wearing embroidered garments and with beautiful blue eyes, who was brought up by a household of humble charcoal miners. When he grew up, he came back to the place where he had been abandoned, and decided he would build his house right in that spot and he would oblige anyone who passed there to leave an offering to repay for the injustices he suffered. It is also told that along the road there were two different places where he might have made his dream come true. So, not knowing which one he should choose, he started exploring the valley palm by palm, until he found, just in front of the forest, over the “Cavern of fairies” lapped by the impetuous “River of witches”, some antique Roman ruins. He decided that, in that magical middle-land, he – a man without a past – would build his own story, the story of La Gabelletta.
What is certain is that in the 18th century a descendant of the baby with beautiful blue eyes decided to accommodate travelers instead of taxing them – maybe because transit taxes had been abolished. The name remained the same, but a new story, a story of hospitality and acceptance, of simple but high quality cuisine, began. A story that is still being told today.
The story of La Gabelletta.
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