The Castle of Cellino Attanasio was built in the fourteenth century by the will of the Dukes of Acquaviva, for purely defensive purposes to protect the town and the surrounding area. Today there are only a few vestiges of the beautiful manor, such as some features of the mighty perimeter walls, characterized by cylindrical towers surmounted by an appreciable Gothic crenellation and a Ghibelline-type battlements built in the 20th century.
Castello di Cellino Attanasio History
The village of Cellino Attanasio was considered of great strategic importance by the Acquaviva family because it offered an excellent defense and it is precisely for this reason that Giosia d'Acquaviva chose the country to defend himself from the attack of Matteo di Capua, who served the king of Naples in 1462 he besieged Teramo and the surrounding territory for a long time, destroying the former fortified walls.
The construction of the walls dates back to the end of the fifteenth century, with the construction of the new walls supported by Giulio Antonio Acquaviva, recalled to the possession of the feud in 1463, and were probably concluded by the successor Andrea Matteo III in 1480. The massive tower shaped like a brick cylinder, typical of the coast of the Marches, the remains of a second tower and a poor stretch of walls constitute what remains of the old defense wall that surrounded the village tramano, placed in a predominant position on the south side of the slope hilly between the Piomba and Vomano rivers.
To a more ancient circle of walls probably belonged two imposing towers with a square plan, with stone walls: one was incorporated in the parish complex of Santa Maria la Nova, on which was later built the bell tower of the temple; while the other was incorporated into the apse of the Church of San Francesco.
A section of stone masonry has been saved, completed by a brick-shaped parallelepiped merlons, built during the renovation of the early twentieth century, and two defensive towers. One of the massive, brick-like, cylindrical towers does not have the shoe and shows posterior uses of pontoon holes with a slot to shoot with the harquebus and louvre to shoot arrows.
The other remaining flanking tower, cylindrical in shape and partly in ruins, is made of very thick sack masonry, with brick facing and remains of corbels. In the area above the tower, called the fortress, stood the fortified residence of the Acquaviva family, but today it has disappeared. First property of the Abbey of San Giovanni in Venere, at the end of the fourteenth century it went to Acquaviva di Atri who owned the fief until Cellino was ceded to Fabrizio Colonna, at the end of the fifteenth century.