A visit to Viterbo’s San Pellegrino district is like a trip back in time: you might feel just like the characters in “Nothing Left to Do but Cry”, catapulted from the end of the 20th to the end of the 15th century. Walking along the narrow alleys between San Pellegrino’s houses, you might think the Middle Ages never ended.

Once known as Borgolungo, San Pellegrino developed in the second half of the 11th century and become the charming destination we know today in the 1200s. Its architectural physiognomy, both sacred and civil, was deeply inspired by Cistercian style, “imported” in the area by monks coming from Pontigny, a town in Bourgogne that is home to one of the first four abbeys of the order of Cîteaux.