Montello (hill)

Montello is a hill in the province of Treviso, Veneto, northern Italy, and the site of a World War I battle.

Several local roads in the general north-south direction connect this "dorsal spine" of the Montello to the two main alternative routes around the hill, either along on its southern margin (comprised by Stradone del Bosco, Via Fra Giocondo, Via Pedemontana, Via Francesco Baracca, Via Arditi, Via Armando Diaz) or along the northern margin (the Panoramic Road, comprised by Via Gabriele d'Annunzio, Via Nord Montello, Via Riviera Piave, Via Decima Armata).

The oaks and chestnut trees that covered Montello since antiquity used to be a major source of timber for the region, especially for the shipyards and building foundations of Venice.

Due to its strategic importance, the Republic of Venice assumed the ownership of the hill, and declared it off-limits to the local population.

Deprived of their homes and their main source of income, the hunters and woodsmen of Montello became a class of landless, homeless and jobless miserables, the bisnenti (the 'twice have-nots'), who survived on odd jobs and occasionally crimes.