Atri - San Nicola di Bari

Atri was known as Hadria, when the Romans founded a colony here in 282BC. Actually Roman emperor Hadrian's family originally derived from this place. After the fall of the Roman Imperium, the Lombards established hegemony over the area in the 6th century and Atri got annexed to the Duchy of Spoleto. The Lombards were displaced by the Normans, whose noble House of Acquaviva family ruled the town from about 1393, before merging their lands into the Kingdom of Naples in 1757.

The church of St. Nicholas di Bari was first mentioned in 1181 in a bull of Pope Lucius III. The construction of the church, therefore, goes around the second half of the 12th century. Today`s church is the result of a reconstruction that took place in 1256.