Asolo Culture

The literary thread runs through everything. Bembo's Gli Asolani made the town a byword for civilised leisure; Browning's asolare -- "to amuse oneself at random" -- is a word that exists in English because of this hill.

Eleonora Duse is the other presence. The most celebrated Italian actress of her generation, Ibsen's and D'Annunzio's interpreter, she retreated here and asked to be buried in the small cemetery below the town, where her grave faces the hills.

Freya Stark lived in Asolo on and off for seventy years between journeys through Arabia, Persia and Turkey, and died here in 1993 at a hundred. Her house and her library remain a local point of pride.

The antiques market, on the second weekend of each month, fills the arcaded streets and is a serious trade rather than a bric-a-brac stall.

Food is Trevigiano with one local sweet: pinza, a dense cake of apple, dried figs and currants, traditionally eaten around Epiphany.