Nona, Piccini's birthplace, now a hamlet of Vilminore di Scalve in the province of Bergamo, is a charming mountain village in the Scalve Valley, which has its strongholds in the Presolana massif in the Orobie Prealps, bordering Bergamo with the Seriana Valley, and in the Dolomite Pizzo Camino, bordering the middle Camonica Valley. In the 1666 census, when the Scalve sculptor lived, the village of Nona was called Annona, a toponym whose probable Latin origin refers to the presence, on site, of a supply warehouse intended for workers and laborers from the nearby Manina mines. The Piccini family was part of the Neighborhood Association of Nona, a district that at the time had about a hundred residents. In December 1725 Gio Gioseppe Piccini “…finished living in his homeland of Nona, where he had almost always made his home, and was buried in that parish church, which had been so beautified by his excellent works.”
The portal with stone frame reassembled in a structure near the original site
The site today
The Piccini family coat of arms engraved on the stone frame of the door and shown on the family tree
Extract of current map with clearly visible location of the house site
The site where the house stood; now ruins
Aerial photo of Nona showing the identification of the site where the house once stood
