The Downy Oak of Porta Cappuccini

Assisi stops at this oak. Walk out through Porta Cappuccini, the highest of the town's medieval gates, and the paving gives way to a dirt track toward Fontemaggio and the Eremo delle Carceri. The downy oak stands at that fork, marking the line where the walled town ends and Monte Subasio begins, which is why the town calls it simply la cerqua di Porta Cappuccini, the oak of the Capuchin gate. Italy's national register measures it at 4.8 metres round and 21 metres tall. Two other surveys give 5 metres and 25 metres, which is what happens when a living tree is measured years apart rather than a sign that anyone got it wrong. Downy oak is the dry-hillside oak of central Italy and it is usually cut for firewood long before it reaches anything like this size. This one was left, standing over the old walking route that pilgrims still take up to the hermitage where Francis withdrew to pray. The tree sits inside a private orchard, so the view is from the path rather than from under the crown. For a tree this wide that is the better vantage anyway, and the path is public. Nobody has recorded an age for it. Italy's register does not carry one and neither do the local sources. If you know, tell us.