Venzone
Two earthquakes broke the medieval centre in 1976. Residents rebuilt it in place, cataloguing 8,000 shaped stones from the cathedral alone.
Venzone, Friuli-Venezia Giulia. Fulvio Bacchia, CC BY-SA 3.0. Cropped for layout.
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Why it is worth the drive
The earthquakes of 6 May and 15 September 1976 killed forty-seven people in Venzone and reduced much of the medieval centre to rubble. A petition signed by 645 residents backed reconstruction 'where it was and as it was'. For the cathedral alone, 8,000 shaped stones were catalogued before surviving originals were returned to their former positions; the work finished in 1995.
Five naturally preserved bodies can now be visited in the crypt of the cemetery chapel of San Michele. The oldest, known as the Hunchback, was discovered in 1647; fifteen of the twenty-one bodies then held in the chapel were recovered intact after the 1976 earthquake.
Getting there
Trieste (TRS) is about a hundred kilometres by road. Venzone has a station on the Udine-Tarvisio line; check the current rail timetable before travelling.
The honest part
The mummies are in a small crypt, not a large museum display. Published opening hours and festival dates can change, and rail engineering works can alter the journey, so verify all three close to travel.
SourcesIstat · Venzone Turismo · PromoTurismoFVG · Comune di Venzone5
- Istat · 1 January 2026 (provisional)
Evidence note. Italy, Sourced uses the municipality-level total in Istat's provisional 2026 population dataset.
- Venzone Turismo · accessed 13 September 2026
Evidence note. The local tourism body documents the two destructive earthquake dates, forty-seven deaths, the 645-signature petition, cataloguing of 8,000 cathedral stones and completion in 1995.
- Venzone Turismo · accessed 13 September 2026
Evidence note. The current visitor page records five bodies on display, the 1647 discovery and recovery of fifteen bodies after the 1976 earthquake.
- PromoTurismoFVG · accessed 13 September 2026
Evidence note. The regional tourism authority describes the anastylosis reconstruction, Venzone's 1965 national-monument status and the natural preservation of the mummies.
- Comune di Venzone · accessed 13 September 2026
Evidence note. The municipality keeps dated event records; the former claim that the Pumpkin Festival was cancelled in both 2024 and 2025 was not supported and has been removed.