History
A chronicle, a tradition, a leaving.
We mark what is a document and what is a reading of a document. The mountain is older than both.
Samnite country
There is no document that pins the first house on this hill. Livy writes of a fierce mountain people in northern Campania — the Montesi, in later local reading, a root of the name Matese. Gallesi progenitors fought with the Pentri Samnites in the wars with Rome. After the conquest the country entered the first Augustan region. A rock-cut road from the Volturno plain over Monte Pesco Rosso and the Fosso dei Maragoni is presumed, not proven. After Rome, the position of the valley kept the worst of the invasions at a distance — that is the local claim, and geography makes it plausible.
Feudal notes
From 1239 the fief is under Giovanni di Guglielmo di Prata. From 1329 to 1576 it belongs to the Baronia di Prata, passing through Capuano, Sanfromondo, Pandone, Mobel, Rota, Villani, Carafa, De Cordenis. In 1649 it is a marchesato under the Mastullo. The 1741 catasto onciario names Prince Giovanni Pignatelli of Monteroduni as useful possessor; the Pignatelli hold until the abolition of feudalism in 1806. Between 1806 and 1815 ecclesiastical goods go into the demanio and then into private hands. Around 1802 the population is given as about 1,500.
Brigands, a band, a border that moved
In 1860–61 the Matese shook with brigand insurrection. At Campo Figliuolo, in this territory, insurgents defeated a company of bersaglieri. In April 1877 the Banda del Matese — Carlo Cafiero, Errico Malatesta, Pietro Cesare Ceccarelli among them — occupied Letino, then Gallo on the 8th, and burned municipal records as a gesture. Troops took them on the 12th at Masseria Concetta near Letino. These are documented political facts, not folklore, and they are not a brand.
On 2 January 1927, with the Province of Caserta suppressed, Gallo passed to Campobasso. It returned to Caserta on 11 June 1945. The mountain did not move. The paperwork did.
The emigration century
The 1861 census: 2,015. The 1921 census: 3,417 — the documented peak. Then the leaving, which is a century, not a year. 2001: 761. 2018: 533. Recent ISTAT counts sit in the mid-four-hundreds. The names went to the Bronx, to Rhode Island, to Canada. The chair stayed. Read that thread on Names & diaspora, and the feeling of coming back in The first night back.
From the book
“The history is not a straight road from old Italy to new America. It is crossings.”
The documents are here. The chairs that stayed are in the book.
Read the opening chapter