INTRODUCTION TO THE MEDIEVAL PERIOD A historical centre of a city is the result of the house, life and work stratification of the people who lived there; going along its streets means to reconstruct the traces of the past surviving the changes of time. To get to Cividate build-up areas from the state road, you cross the bridge on the Oglio river, then you ought to walk through the town centre, discovering courtyards, ancient portals, picturesque views which clearly restore the atmosphere of its history. The present centre of Cividate is inserted into the house grid of the ancient Civitas Camunnorum, the political, administrative and religious fulcrum, for the whole Camonica Valley in the Roman Age. Its central role goes on to the early Middle Ages with the foundation of the parish church which, successively, became part of a castle. After the eleventh century, the parish church and S. Stefano church were rebuilt in Romanesque style and the creation of a fortified complex by powerful families prove the vitality of this medieval village. New houses were built in the fifteenth century, sometimes with arcades and balconies and since then, the fabric of the city has been rarely subject to alteration till last century expansion. Cividate retains an extraordinary historical and artistic heritage, evidence of the past millenniums and it is a place full of memories of our country.