Vermiglioli has also traced the origins of the Volumnian family who, it seems, were well known in the Roman times, and constantly mentioned by the Roman writers. One of the Volumnii is known to have been the writer of tragedies (these were probably written in Latin). There was an Etruscan divinity called Volumnus or Volumna. The family was important throughout Etruria. It may have started in Perugia certainly its chief necropolis seems to have been here. [110] The group of sarcophagi in this chamber has apparently never been touched. [111] The sarcophagi do not belong to the early period of Etruscan art, but to the times of the Roman occupation 200 or 300 B.C. [112] The Medusa was used by the Etruscans as a sort of spell to keep off evil influences and bad people from their dead. The dead, it seems, never left their graves but hovered always round the place where their ashes were preserved. [113] In 1155 Frederick Barbarossa besieged Gubbio, but the Bishop of the city--Ubaldo--pleaded in such passionate terms for her deliverance, that the Emperor renounced the siege. Since then the holy Bishop is worshipped with almost barbaric rites in the city. On his feast-day (May 15) his image, and those of the two other patron Saints of the town, are carried in a weird and almost horrible procession from midday until night-fall through the streets. They are mounted on immense candelabra--_ceri_--of extraordinary shape, and weighing each several tons. The young men of the town, dressed in white shirts and trousers and coloured caps, and staggering, half mad with wine and weariness, bear them upon their shoulders at a half trot. At nightfall they make a final rush with these Umbrian juggernauts up the mountain side to the chapel of the Saint, and there the _ceri_ remain in peace for the remainder of the year, till fetched for the same barbaric performance the following May. For a full and most interesting account of this ceremony we must refer the reader to Mr Bower's delightful book on the "Ceri of Gubbio." [114] Ottaviano Nelli, born sometime towards the end of the fourteenth century, son of Martino Nelli and a native of Gubbio. He was one of the very earliest masters of the Umbrian school of painting, following close and copying without ambition the work of the Sienese. The fresco in S. Maria Nuova at Gubbio is considered his masterpiece. It strives towards beautiful colouring and sentiment rather than correct drawing. [115] Spello was at one time a Roman colony. The Roman gate _Porta Veneris_ is well preserved. A little to the left of the town, outside its present walls, are the remains of its old theatre. The town is also connected with the mythical history of Orlando, and a long inscription on the walls records the facts minutely. [116] _Albergo della Posta_--a really admirable inn.