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Gubbio, town and comune (township) in the far northeastern part of the Province of Perugia, (Umbria). Its population in 2003 was 16,800; it clings to the first slope of Mt. Ingino, a small mountain of the Apennine range.

The city's origins are very ancient: as Ikuvium, it was an important town of the ancient Umbrian people in pre-Roman times, and is famous for the discovery there of the Eugubine Tables, a set of bronze tablets, which together constitute the largest surviving text in ancient Umbrian. After the Roman conquest in the 2nd century BC — it kept its name with only a slight change (Iguvium) — the city remained important, as attested by its Roman theater, the second-largest surviving in the world.

The historical center of Gubbio is of concentratedly medieval aspect: it is an austere-looking town of dark grey stone, narrow streets, and Gothic architecture.

A fair number of the houses in Gubbio date to the 14th and 15th centuries, the dwellings of wealthy merchants; they often have a second door fronting on the street, usually just a few inches from the main entrance, narrower, and a foot or so above the actual street level: this type of door is called a porta dei morti (door of the dead) because it is commonly stated that it was used only for removing the bodies of any who might have died inside the house. This is almost certainly false, but there is no firm agreement on the true purpose of the secondary doors.

Gubbio is known thruout Italy for the Corsa dei Ceri, a spectacular race held every year on May 15, in which three teams, devoted to S. Ubaldo (the patron of Gubbio), S. Giorgio, and S. Antonio, run thru throngs of cheering supporters and tourists, up much of the mountain from the main square in front of the Palazzo dei Consoli to the church of S. Ubaldo, each team carrying a statue of their saint mounted on a "candle" (It. cera") 5 meters (16 feet) tall and weighing over 400 kilograms (about 900 pounds). The race has strong devotional, civic, and historical overtones and is one of the best-known folklore manifestations in Italy; the Cere were chosen as the heraldic emblem on the coat of arms of Umbria as a modern administrative region.

Monuments

• Roman Theater
• Roman Mausoleum (sometimes said to be of Pomponius Graecinus, but on no satisfactory grounds)
• Palazzo dei Consoli, housing the museum with the Eugubine Tables
• Duomo
• church of S. Francesco

External links

• Official Site
• Festa dei Ceri
• Bill Thayer's site

• Cities in Italy
• Hilltowns of Umbria