The sun sets everywhere, but in few more evocative settings than in the centre of the territory of the Vestini Cismontani, below the shoulder of the highest mountain in peninsular Italy, the Gran Sasso. Whether the Vestini and the Sabini were friends or enemies in antiquity is not given to us to know; but behind this magnificent volume stand the Centro di Studi Sallustiani, whose eponym came from Sabine Amiternum, the Deputazione Abruzzese and the tiny Comune di Prata d'Ansidonia, the nearest to ancient Peltuinum, as well as other local entities. It includes an account of the Protostoria of the area, including a new analysis of the context to which the Capestrano warrior belongs (a chapter and appendix by V. D'Ercole), the literary and epigraphical sources for the area (M. Buonocore), its linguistic history (P. Poccetti), what was certainly one of the main economic resources of the area, transhumant flocks (S. Segenni, again with an appendix) and the Middle Ages, with a chapter by the doyen of the medieval history of central Italy, C. Why should an ancient historian pay attention? Well, it is the later history of the area that might provide a clue as to how such a mountainous environment nurtured troops that fought against, then for Rome, with families controlling long and tortuous strips of land from valley bottom, past their high and inaccessible villages, to the edge of the mountain pastures. The volume is a rich tribute to the care for the paese that is one of the defining features of Italian culture.