SULMONA (anc. Sulmo), a city of the Abruzzi, Italy. Pop. (1931), 15,572 (town), 21,076 (commune). Sulmona is situated at a height of 1,322 ft. above the sea on the Gizio, a tributary of the Pescara, which supplies water-power to its paper-mills, fulling-mills and copper-works. Its cathedral of San Panfilo has a 14th-century portal, and an iith-century crypt. S. Maria della Tomba is a good Gothic church. S. Francesco della Scarpa occupies the site of an older and larger church, the Romanesque portal of which still stands at the end of the Corso Ovidio, and forms the entrance to the market. Opposite is a picturesque aqueduct of 1256 with pointed arches, which supplies the Renaissance Fontana del Vecchio (I474)• S. Agostino has a good Gothic portal. The Palazzo dell' Annunziata, begun in 1320, shows an interesting and successful mixture of Gothic and Renaissance styles. In the court of the grammar school is a
fine 5th-century statue of Ovid, the most celebrated native of the town, whose memory is preserved among the peasants in songs and folk-lore, and outside is a good monument to him by Ettore Ferrari (1925). The Porta Napoli is an interesting gate of the 14th century. Innocent VII. was a native of the town. In the vicinity of the town is Monte Morrone where Pietro da Morrone lived as a hermit and founded a monastery for his hermits, who after his elevation to the papacy as Celestine V. (1294) took the name of Celestines ; the monastery (S. Spirito) is now a prison.
Sulmo was devastated by Hannibal (2I1 B.C.). It was famous fot its ironsmiths. Charles V. bestowed it on Charles Launoy, who had captured Francis I. at the battle of Pavia. The town has suffered much from earthquakes.