Aosta
Discover Aosta
A concise introduction to Aosta, its geography, history and culture.
Introduction
Aosta sits at 583 metres where the Buthier joins the Dora Baltea, with roughly thirty-four thousand inhabitants, in a valley closed by Mont Blanc, the Matterhorn, Monte Rosa and Gran Paradiso.
The city was founded as Augusta Praetoria Salassorum in 25 BC, and the Roman grid, the walls, the Porta Praetoria, the theatre facade, the forum cryptoporticus and the Arch of Augustus all survive in the modern street plan.
The collegiate church of Sant'Orso holds an eleventh-century fresco cycle hidden in its roof space and a Romanesque cloister of 1133 with forty carved capitals.
Aosta is the capital of Italy's smallest and least populous region, which has been autonomous since 1948 and in which French is co-official.
The Fiera di Sant'Orso, held on 30 and 31 January, is one of the oldest documented craft fairs in Europe.