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There are two popular traditions which attempt to explain the origin of the name Cervaro: one tells of a white fawn (cervo) which would graze on mount Pesculum and which is now part of the town coat of arms. Another is tied to the word Acerba Ara, which stands for the sepulchre of the young Roman patrician Tertullo defender of the city, who was killed by the Goths in the 6th century. Then in the Middle Ages, the late Abbot of Montecassino Petronace had a castle built to defend the town which was called Castrum Cerbari. Destroyed during the battle of Cassino in 1943-44, the city was reconstructed with modern urban criteria.

 

From here one can take an alternative path to reach the National Park of Abruzzo, following the main road Cervaro - Viticuso, along which at the entrance of a gorge at the foot of mount Aquilone, the Sanctuary of the Madonna of Piternis stands. The church, consecrated in 1408, rose around a small niche dating back to 1000 AD and on the site of the apparition of the Virgin to a peasant woman of Cervaro: an event, maybe the first of its kind in Italy, documented in the archives of Montecassino. The saying In piternis is a dialectal abbreviation of "in sempiternis grati" (eternally grateful).