Leaving the state road 372 (Caianello-Benevento highway) we head towards the town of Ponte (BN). After a few meters we arrive at the bridge over the river Calore that divides the territory of Ponte from that of Torrecuso. The current bridge replaced the previous one destroyed by the Germans during the Second World War. It was built by Ferdinand II of Bourbon on a particularly innovative project of the famous engineer Giustino Fiocca and it was named after Maria Teresa of Austria, the second wife of the sovereign.
Continuing, immediately on the right there is the parish church. It was built by brothers Domenico and Renato Ocone based on a design of architect Don Mario Alciati, a Salesian priest, and it was dedicated to S. Generosa Martyr, in memory of their mother Generosa Orsillo. The church was consecrated and opened for worship in February 1966. Above the main door stands a statue of the patron, Saint Generosa Martyr, an African Saint who lived in Carthage where she was martyred in 180 AD.
We continue and at the crossroads we turn left and take Via Stazione. After a few meters, on the right there is the Ponte-Casalduni railway station, inaugurated on the 15th of March 1868 when the new line between Caserta and Benevento was opened. It has always been an important reference point both for users of the Vitulanese Valley and for those of the surrounding towns bound for Naples and Rome.
Still continuing on via Stazione, after about three hundred meters, we arrive at the bridge over the Alenta stream. In this same place, already in the Roman period, there was an impressive stone bridge through which the ancient Via Latina, which connected Rome with Benevento, crossed the Alenta. This bridge then gave rise to the name of the town (in Italian “ponte” means bridge). The place, which was originally called Ponte S. Anastasia, firstly changed its name to Castel Ponte S. Anastasia, then to Castel Ponte and finally to Ponte. Nowadays, only a block of stone remains of the ancient bridge, symbolically placed in an area close to the current one.
Immediately after the bridge we turn right and take Via Santa Anastasia, after passing under the railway bridge, on the left we immediately find the ancient Abbey of S. Anastasia. It was built in the 9th century on the edge of the ancient Via Latina by a community of Benedictine monks, on the ruins of a large Roman villa. Thanks to the industriousness of these monks, who following the rule of their order “ora et labora” alternated work with prayer, the first inhabited nucleus was formed around the monastery. Between the end of the 10th and the beginning of the 11th century, the castle was built and inside its walls this first community of Ponte was moved. The monks remained in this place until the early 17th century and then abandoned it definitively.
We continue for a few meters and at the crossroads we turn left and take Via Francigena. This road develops on the route followed by pilgrims who, in the Middle Ages, starting from Rome and passing through Cassino, Telese and Ponte, arrived in Benevento where the remains of the Apostle Bartholomew were kept. From here, they continued to Puglia where some stopped at the sanctuary of Saint Michael Archangel on the Gargano, others embarked for the Holy Land. Continuing along this road, after about a kilometer you arrive at the “Sciore” farm.