March of Ancona

The March of Ancona (Italian: Marca Anconitana or Anconetana) was a frontier march centred on the city of Ancona and later Macerata in the Middle Ages.[1] Its name is preserved as an Italian region today, the Marche, and it corresponds to almost the entire modern region and not just the Province of Ancona.

The march in a map of 1564 by Vincenzo Luchino.

The papal standard of Ancona.

Originally part of Imperial Italy, the march was created around 1100 out of the north of the March of Fermo and the southern Pentapolis.[2] At first this new march took the name of its first holder: marca Guarnerii or march of Werner.[3] There were disputes between the Empire and the Church over rights and jurisdiction in the March. In 1173, an imperial army under Christian of Mainz invaded the March against pro-papal resistance led by Countess Boltruda Frangipani. In 1177, Pope Alexander III referred to it as "partly belonging to the empire but largely to the church".[4]

The march was acquired by the Papal States during the pontificate of Innocent III in the year 1198. It was initially governed by a papal nominee called a rector. The rector of Ancona, like the rectors of the other papal provinces, was under the authority of a general rector reporting directly to the pope. Under the papacy, the March had three towns of over 10,000 people: Ancona, Ascoli Piceno and Fermo.[5]

The province was reorganized by the Constitutiones Sanctæ Matris Ecclesiæ in 1357. The march followed the Adriatic as far north as Urbino and contained the cities of Loreto, Camerino, Fermo, Macerata, Osimo, San Severino, and Tolentino

According to Paul Sabatier's biography of St. Francis of Assisi, "The Road to Assisi", the March of Ancona became the home of the spiritual Franciscans after Francis' death.