L'Aquila is a city and comune in central Italy. It is the capital city of both the Abruzzo region and of the Province of L'Aquila. As of 2023, it has a population of 69,558 inhabitants. Laid out within medieval walls on a hill in the wide valley of the Aterno river, it is surrounded by the Apennine Mountains, with the Gran Sasso d'Italia to the north-east.
The province of L'Aquila is the largest, most mountainous and least densely populated province of the Abruzzo region of Italy. It comprises about half the landmass of Abruzzo and occupies the western part of the region. It has borders with the provinces of Teramo to the north, Pescara and Chieti to the east, Isernia to the south and Frosinone, Rome and Rieti to the west. Its capital is the city of L'Aquila.
Fossa is a comune and town in the province of L'Aquila in the Abruzzo region of southern Italy. Bernardino of Fossa was born in the town. The 2009 L'Aquila earthquake contributed to the collapse of a bridge in Fossa, and caused extensive damage to the residential buildings in the town. The town was the epicentre of a major aftershock 5.4 Mw on April 7, 2009.
Poggio Picenze is a comune and town in the province of L'Aquila in the Abruzzo region of Italy. Poggio Picenze is a small city with about 1,000 inhabitants. Located on Italy's Highway 17, it is 14 kilometres (9 mi) from the Abruzzese Apennines and about 12 kilometres (7 mi) from the city of L'Aquila. It sits 760 metres (2,490 ft) above sea level and overlooks the Aquila basin. It is also part of the mountain community of Campo Imperatore-Piana Navelli.
The 1138 Aleppo earthquake was among the deadliest earthquakes in history. Its name was taken from the city of Aleppo, in northern Syria, where the most casualties were sustained. The earthquake also caused damage and chaos to many other places in the area around Aleppo. The quake occurred on 11 October 1138 and was preceded by a smaller quake on the 10th. It is frequently listed as the third deadliest earthquake in history, following on from the Shensi and Tangshan earthquakes in China. However, the figure of 230,000 deaths reported by Ibn Taghribirdi in the fifteenth century is most likely based on a historical conflation of this earthquake with earthquakes in November 1137 on the Jazira plain and the large seismic event of 30 September 1139 in the Transcaucasian city of Ganja.
The Catalan earthquake of 2 February 1428, known in Catalan as the terratrèmol de la candelera because it took place during Candlemas, struck the Principality of Catalonia, especially Roussillon, with an epicentre near Camprodon. The earthquake was one of a series of related seismic events that shook Catalonia in a single year. Beginning on 23 February 1427, tremors were felt in March, April, 15 May at Olot, June, and December. They caused relatively minor visible damage to property, notably to the monastery of Amer; but they probably caused severe weakening of building infrastructure. This would account for the massive and widespread destruction that accompanied the subsequent 1428 quake.
An earthquake, rated at IX (Violent) on the Mercalli intensity scale, struck northern Italy and Germany on 3 January 1117. The epicentre of the first shock was near Verona, the city which suffered the most damage. The outer wall of the Verona Arena partially collapsed, and the standing portion was damaged in a later earthquake of 1183. After the first shock of 3 January, seismic activity persisted for months, striking on 12 January 4 June, 1 July 1 October, and 30 December.
An earthquake occurred in the region of Abruzzo, in central Italy, at 03:32 CEST on 6 April 2009. It was rated 5.8 or 5.9 on the Richter magnitude scale and 6.3 on the moment magnitude scale; its epicentre was near L'Aquila, the capital of Abruzzo, which together with surrounding villages suffered the most damage. There were several thousand foreshocks and aftershocks since December 2008, more than thirty of which had a Richter magnitude greater than 3.5.
The 1703 Apennine earthquakes were a sequence of three earthquakes of magnitude ≥6 that occurred in the central Apennines of Italy, over a period of 19 days. The epicenters were near Norcia, Montereale and L'Aquila, showing a southwards progression over about 36 kilometres (22 mi). These events involved all of the known active faults between Norcia and L'Aquila. A total of about 10,000 people are estimated to have died as a result of these earthquakes, although because of the overlap in areas affected by the three events, casualty numbers remain highly uncertain.
San Gregorio is a village in the Abruzzo region of central Italy. It is a frazione of the comune of L'Aquila. It sits 584 meters above sea level at the base of Monte Manicola. The village of San Gregorio is 12.11 kilometers from the town of L'Aquila, of which it is considered a suburb community. Italy's SS17 Highway is its main transportation artery. The village sits near an active earthquake fault zone in the Valley of the Aterno-Pescara.
The 557 Constantinople earthquake took place on the night of December 14. This earthquake, described in the works of Agathias, John Malalas, and Theophanes the Confessor, caused great damage to Constantinople, then capital of the Byzantine Empire in a region frequently afflicted with earthquakes. More minor quakes had preceded the large event, including two in April and October respectively. The main quake in December was of unparalleled ferocity, and "almost completely razed" the city. It caused damage to the Hagia Sophia which contributed to the collapse of its dome the next year, as well as damaging the walls of Constantinople to the extent that Hun invaders were able to penetrate it with ease the following season.
The 1570 Ferrara earthquake struck the Italian city of Ferrara on November 16 and 17, 1570. After the initial shocks, a sequence of aftershocks continued for four years, with over 2,000 in the period from November 1570 to February 1571.
The 1920 Garfagnana earthquake occurred on 7 September in Garfagnana and Lunigiana, both agricultural areas in the Italian Tuscany region. The quake hypocenter was located 14 kilometres (8.7 mi) beneath Villa Collemandina. The maximum felt intensity was rated as X (Extreme) on the Mercalli intensity scale, and 6.6 on the Richter magnitude scale. It was one of the most destructive seismic events recorded in the Apenninic region in the twentieth century. Due to good news coverage, availability of official documents on the damage and abundance of recordings from surveillance stations throughout Europe, it was regarded as a first-rate case study to improve knowledge of tectonics and macroseismic analysis.
The 1930 Senigallia earthquake struck the city of Senigallia in central Italy on 30 October. It occurred just a few months after the destructive 1930 Irpinia earthquake, which had caused over 1,400 casualties in the southern part of the country.
The 1936 Cansiglio earthquake occurred on 18 October in the region between the provinces of Belluno, Treviso and Pordenone, in northern Italy. It caused 19 deaths and an unknown number of injuries.
The 1873 Alpago earthquake occurred near the Italian city of Belluno on 29 June in the geologically active Alpago Valley of the Veneto region; the zone is rated as two on a four-degree risk scale. The 6.3 magnitude quake was rated as IX–X (Violent–Extreme) on the Mercalli intensity scale. Intensities greater than VII were confined to the provinces of Belluno, Treviso and Pordenone.
The 1639 Amatrice earthquake occurred on 7 October near Amatrice, in the upper valley of the river Tronto, at the time part of the Kingdom of Naples, now Italy.
On 9 September 1349, an earthquake sequence began in Italy's Apennine Mountains that severely affected the regions of Molise, Latium and Abruzzo. Probably four moderate-large earthquakes devastated towns and villages across the central Italian Peninsula, with damage even reported in Rome. These earthquakes originated from the Apennine fold and thrust belt fault network, with the first and most destructive shock's epicenter originating from the north-west Campania region. Paleoseismological data gathered from scarping, fault length, and collapsed sections of Venafro's Roman aqueduct indicates the epicenter of the main shock was likely along the Aquae Iuliae fault. The fault suspected of causing this earthquake occurred on the Aqua Iuliae fault along the Molise-Campania border.
On December 5, 1456, the largest earthquake to occur on the Italian Peninsula struck the Kingdom of Naples. The earthquake had an estimated moment magnitude of Mw 7.19–7.4, and was centred near the town of Pontelandolfo in the present-day Province of Benevento, southern Italy. Earning a level of XI (Extreme) on the Modified Mercalli intensity scale, the earthquake caused widespread destruction in central and southern Italy. Estimates of the death toll range greatly with as many as 70,000 deaths reported. It was followed by two strong Mw 7.0 and 6.0 earthquakes to the north on December 30. The earthquake sequence is considered the largest in Italian history, and one of the most studied.
An earthquake originating in the Central Apennines was felt in Rome and Spoleto on 29 April 801. It is reported in two independent contemporary sources, Einhard's Royal Frankish Annals and the Liber Pontificalis. The information provided by the written sources has been augmented by archaeology.
