The history of Deruta

The origins of Deruta are still in part obscure, as shown by the various names that it has taken over time: Ruto, Ruta, Rupto, Direpta, Diruta, which means "ruined".

The name Deruta appears to derive from the last in the list. Certainly it has deep-rooted ties with Perugia, whose southern bulwark it has always been, out towards Todi. The fortified appearance is a surviving testimony of this role.

In the thirteenth century Deruta had its own Statute, followed in 1465 by a new document in the vernacular. A series of outbreaks of plague in the mid-1400s wiped out the population and even brought about a reduction in the town's fortified walls. During the Salt War (1540), Deruta took sides against the Pope and was pillaged and destroyed. When Perugia became subject to the Church, Deruta also enjoyed a long period of peace. This was precisely the time when manufacturing of artistic majolica developed and took Deruta into the international limelight.

All about Deruta: the majolica town

The town is located about 15 kilometres south of Perugia on a hillock that overlooks the Tiber Valley. The old village is set against the historic fortifications and three gates in this traditional defence system lead into the old centre. The civic towers loom above the walls, together with the bell tower of the Gothic-style San Francesco church, consecrated in 1388.

Central, square-plan Piazza dei Consoli opens with a handsome fountain (1848) and continues with Palazzo Comunale, which houses the municipal picture gallery. This boasts an important collection of paintings from the churches of San Francesco, Sant'Antonio and the San Giacomo hospital. The most interesting nucleus comprises a part of the Lione Pascoli collection. There are also works by Alunno, Perugino, Baciccio and a Guido Reni.

Further on, next to the church, there is the former convent of San Francesco, which houses the Regional Museum of Ceramics since 1998. Here a wealth of materials and culture are to be seen, classified in chronological order from the Middle Ages to 1930. This is an especially qualifying and significant itinerary, with thematic inserts that go from flooring to great ceremonial dishes, from loving goblets to tableware, fruit bowls, salt-cellars, tankards and pharmacists' vases.

Ancient Via Tiberina, at the lower edge of Deruta, is the location where the new town developed, especially in the 1950s, with numerous craft workshops for producing artistic majolica, which is the craft most of Deruta's inhabitants are involved in, even today.