National Gallery of Umbria

The National Gallery of Umbria fills the upper floors of the Palazzo dei Priori, the fortress-like Gothic town hall that has loomed over Perugia's main street since the 1290s. You climb from a medieval council chamber into eight centuries of Umbrian art.

This is Perugino country. Pietro Vannucci, called Perugino, was the region's own master and Raphael's teacher, and the gallery holds the richest gathering of his soft, serene altarpieces to be found anywhere. Around him the rooms run from gold-ground panels by Duccio and Gentile da Fabriano to a small, luminous polyptych of Saint Anthony by Piero della Francesca, crowned by a startling painted Annunciation set in deep false perspective.

Much of the collection was made for churches a short walk away, and Piero's polyptych, in Room 13, is the panel most visitors climb the stairs to find.