Unspoiled Calabria, the hidden gem of Southern Italy

One of the most neglected destinations in Italy is Calabria, the “toe” of the boot. But things are changing as tourists discover the remarkable beauty of the rugged hill towns, Mediterranean influenced cuisine and travel bargains the south affords. Greek influences are felt here and a dialect of the language is still spoken in some areas.

In summer the little lanes that run through the towns and the beautiful beaches on the Tyrrhenian and Ionian Seas get a lot of European tourists and recently Americans have been discovering their charms.

With more and more restaurants in America featuring the tasty foods of Calabria, gastronomic tourism is becoming more important as well. Cuisine changes with the land in this area, depending on what the earth provides and tradition demands.

The stigma thrust on the south by the wealthier north as a land of peasants, has preserved the area and its agricultural economy and the new rush of tourism is bringing money and new self-esteem to its inhabitants. Many Americans trace their family roots to this part of Italy; where over the last 150 years poverty and internecine warfare forced Italians to leave the “old Country,” fleeing to America.

Lying on the tip of the toe, Calabria offers dramatic landscapes as you cross from the Ionian Sea on the south over the high Apennine ridge, where you can encounter snow in winter, and descend to the Tyrrhenian Sea side and view the steep coastline that shelters little fishing villages, like Scilla and Bagnara.

Scilla is a unique spot that CNN added to its list of the most beautiful villages in Italy, a seaside tourist destination capable of attracting writers, poets and artists from all over the world.

The origins of Scilla are linked to Greek mythology. Legend has it that Scylla, an extraordinarily beautiful nymph, was transformed by the sorceress Circe, her rival in love, into a frightful sea monster with six dog-heads. From that moment on Scylla lived in the Strait of Messina, on the opposite side from the Sicilian monster Charybdis, and as soon as she saw sailors coming close to her side, she would devour them without mercy.

In Homer’s Odyssey, Ulysses is warned of the dangers of the two by the sorceress Circe.

The seaside resort town of Crotone is one of the oldest cities of Europe. Founded by the ancient Greeks in 710 BC, it was for a long time one of the most flourishing cities of Magna Graecia, name given by the Romans to the Greek colonies of Southern Italy.

The city of Reggio Calabria is the largest in the area and is home to the most important Archaeological Museum dedicated to Magna Graecia of the entire Italian peninsula. Inside the Museum there are the very famous Riace Bronzes. The two statues, found on August 16, 1972 near Riace, in the province of Reggio Calabria, are considered among the most significant sculptural masterpieces of Greek art, and among the direct testimonies of the great master sculptors of the classical age.

Reggio Calabria has a lovely promenade facing the Strait of Messina that many consider the most beautiful in Italy. Just two and a half miles across the Strait is the island of Sicily.

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Mediterranean sea and olive trees in Badolato, Calabria, southern Italy

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Finding the treasures of the goddess Hera at Capo Colonna, Crotone (Calabria, southern Italy)

With modern life increasingly dominated by technology, holidays are becoming one of the rare chances to spend time immersed in nature, when we can try to look at the world around us rather than computer screens.

Calabria, with its wild landscapes and panoramic views of the Mediterranean sea, is an ideal place to reestablish a connection with the natural, simple side of life and enjoy the vibrant colours of wild flowers and cacti while listening out to the sounds of insects, birds and animals.

One of the best places to experience the natural beauty of this southern Italian region is at Capo Colonna, a promontory known as Capo Lacinio in antiquity, which is about 13 km south of Crotone in eastern Calabria. This is the site of one of the most important sanctuaries in Magna Graecia, the area of southern Italy colonized and populated by Greek settlers from the eighth century BC.  It was dedicated to the goddess Hera, wife of Zeus and queen of the Gods, who was venerated here as the protector of women, as well as a type of Mother Nature, the protector of animals and of sea travel, and a sort of liberator.

A grand temple to Hera Lacinia stood on the site from around the fifth century BC. From their boats, sailors would have had a view of the eastern side of the temple and its six columns. Unfortunately, it was demolished in the 16th century AD so its materials could be used for the construction of various buildings in Crotone. The sanctuary was further pillaged in the 18th century.

Nowadays all that remains of the temple is one single Doric column, measuring 8.35 metres in height.  Nevertheless, the surrounding land and views of the sea still reflect the sacred nature of this site that may have originally inspired the idea for a sanctuary here.

The most outstanding piece is a glistening gold diadem, or tiara, shaped out of a band of gold leaf and decorated with both a braid pattern and foliage garland. It is believed to have undergone two phases of work between the sixth and fifth centuries BC, and likely crowned a representation of Hera within the sanctuary. Interestingly, coins used in Crotone from the fourth century portrayed a crowned head of Hera.

To this day, the diadem still maintains its golden glow and is quite a treat to stumble upon in the museum.

The gifts left to Hera that were found in the sanctuary also include a set of intriguing bronze ornaments that are sculpted into three female mythological figures: the Siren, the Seated Sphinx, and the Winged Gorgon.

Before heading to Capo Colonna, visitors to the area can discover more about its stories at the Archaeological Museum in Crotone. Excavations begun by the archaeologist Paolo Orsi in 1910 uncovered a treasure trove of gold, silver and bronze votive offerings to the goddess, which provide insight into the people and traditions of the time.

A Siren was one of several sea nymphs in classical mythology, which was part-woman and part-bird. They seduced seamen and lured them to shipwreck. The bronze siren found in the sanctuary of Hera dates to the middle of the sixth century BC.

The Sphinx was a winged monster in mythology, with a woman’s head and a lion’s body. She would kill anyone who was unable to answer her riddle. The Sphinx found here probably once adorned a container such as a cauldron and is dated to around 540 BC.

The Winged Gorgon, which dates to a similar time, is an especially interesting and unique piece. It is running to the left and grinning while sticking its tongue out, a pose associated with this female creature of the underworld.

Among other offerings left to the goddess, I found a bronze ship linked to the ancient Nuragic civilization of Sardinia, made in the seventh century BC. This ornament, depicting a typical Sardinian ship, portrays two carts drawn by a pair of oxen on both sides, and two doves on flagpoles. It is the first of its kind discovered in southern Italy and highlights the importance of the sanctuary of Hera, to which someone felt compelled to donate such a beautiful and rare gift.

This sculpture of a horse was also found, one of the first discovered in Calabria which resembles the Greek geometric style. Dating to the 7th century BC, it points to close and regular relations between the sanctuary of Hera and other sanctuaries in Greece.

Centres of worship such as the sanctuary of Hera developed on the edges of the settlement of Crotone, one of the most important cities in Magna Graecia, and were considered signs of divine protection. Religious sanctuaries were focal points for local inhabitants and became a meeting place for Greek travellers and indigenous people.

In the near-by museum on the site of Capo Colonna, there are further remains of the temple to see, such as this female head, discovered in 1972, which was probably from a sculpture on its roof.

The natural area around the temple was viewed as a sacred forest, according to several ancient accounts. Since a plan was launched in the 1980s to turn the area into a protected archeological park, a new group of trees have been planted along the road towards the sanctuary. The surroundings are covered in wild poppies and other bright flowers, which create wonderful contrasts with the azure and turquoise waters of the sea.

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Olive trees, vineyards, Mediterranean scrub, millennial traditions, sweet hills and impervious peaks, the sea that connected Greece and Italy more than 2.000 years ago, two languages (one of which is lost in history and still exists only here). Old Calabria, the undiscovered gem of Southern Italy.

Photos by @calabreeze and @trasparenzacalabrese

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The Torre Marrana of Ricadi, Calabria, Italy

Many historical towers can be seen along the coast of Calabria. These towers were built in the past as a defence against Saracen and Turkish attacks.

Torre Marrana is located in the municipality of Ricadi, on the Thyrrenian coast. Marrano was a pejorative word used during the late Middle Ages in Italy to define “the wicked Moors”, who invaded the coast of Southern Italy in order to conquer.

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The breathtaking view of the Mediterranean sea from Capo Vaticano, Calabria, southern Italy

Searching for Ancestors in Old Calabria (Southern Italy)

By Lescaret

ND and I traveled to Lamezia Terme in the company of Miriam and Domenico, a young Italian couple in their mid twenties who live in the small village of San Floro where they raise silkworms. We arranged a day of exploration in Nicastro and Decollatura, the towns of ND’s ancestors on her father’s side. We were on a quest to discover what we could of ND’s great grandfather Vincenzo DiCello, her great grandmother Rosa Perri, and her great great grandfather, Salvatore DiCello.

Nicastro was once its own village but has since been absorbed into the greater sprawl of Lamezia Terme, though “old Nicastro” still exists higher up the foothills of the southern Sila Mountains. We go first to the City Hall where Miriam has already arranged for us to view Vincenzo’s 1886 birth certificate.

In a nondescript office on the second floor, a helpful records keeper brings out a huge old ledger book and lays it on the counter for us to examine. The birth certificate is written in beautiful flowing script of a style no longer seen and reveals that Salvatore was a farmer and that young Vincenzo was born at home on a street in old Nicastro.

Getting closer to the old neighborhood, we ask a pedestrian for clarification on how to find Via Casalnuevo.

The neighborhood is an Escher-like labyrinth of two and three hundred year old houses of stone, tile, crumbling mortar, little windows and weathered wooden doors. The aura of Medieval time suffuses everything. I imagine myself wrapped in a sackcloth parading through the byways swinging a smoking censor, intoning plainsong.

Eventually, we pinpoint a few houses on what is now Via Niola and conclude that this is Vincenzo’s block. The birth certificate had referenced # 3 but as we stand there deliberating which house is which, an old woman emerges from # 9 and Miriam starts talking with her. Then a man appears from around the corner and a lively conversation ensues. Though neither can say for certain if this street was indeed Via Casalnuevo, in our hearts we accept that it is.

Far above, crowning the neighborhood hillside, are the ruins of a Norman castle (circa 1500) that exists in the same state of decay as when Vincenzo lived here. We marvel at the thought that these 116 years later our eyes take in essentially the same sight as Vincenzo’s eyes (“nothing changes here,” Miriam declares). Could such images and perceived phenomena be somehow passed down through DNA or through some heretofore scientifically unknown means? Could ND in some way possess the “knowledge” of this place by having descended from the blood and sinew of her great grandfather? We gaze around with hungry imagination trying to absorb this place that in ways we don’t really understand must be part of ND, and she part of it.

[…]

Then it’s on to Decollatura, a commune (as such places are known in Italy), sort of an amalgam of little hamlets high in the Sila Mountains. Decollatura is the birthplace of Rosa Perri, ND’s great grandmother, an ancestor about whom ND knows almost nothing. 

Before meandering the town in search of the old streets where Rosa Perri resided, we go to the Hotel Caligiuri which has a restaurant offering a “menu tipico a base di funghi.” We are in the heartland of porcini mushrooms. The restaurant includes mushrooms in every dish. We eat porcini carpaccio, porcini risotto, tortellini in a porcini mushroom cream sauce, a thick bean soup with chunks of mushrooms.

From one of the side streets steps an old wrinkled Italian woman who could have emerged from one of the old B&W photographs that we saw earlier in the day, except she’s in color; a blue and white cotton dress, a gray sweater, worn black shoes. Her silvery white hair frames a weathered face with deep set, cautiously suspicious eyes.

Beause we’re seeking any scrap of information about the Perri family, Miriam engages her in conversation. This sets off a spirited exchange in Italian and quickly involves another elderly signora making her way up the street with the aid of a cane, and then still another woman who peers out from a house twenty or so yards up the street wondering what the commotion is. Soon the women are shouting to each other in earnest discourse, an enthusiastic musical banter like course old cellos played with worn bows.

We move around the corner and another wizened matriarch appears and happily offers her old wisdom to the dialog. She’s dressed all in black with a green apron tied around her stout waist and her eyes twinkle with mischief.

Apparently we’re standing on the very block in whose houses the Perri families lived (“Perri Lane” I think). A voice shouts down from a wrought iron balcony three stories above us; a very rotund woman seemingly missing a few teeth proffers her opinion on the colloquy taking place below.

Eventually, a middle-aged man, studious in glasses, appears and joins the conversation. His voice is soft and intelligent and though much of what he says goes untranslated by Miriam we do learn that all of the Perris are gone now, either passed away or long since departed during the three great waves of emigration that took so many Calabrians away to America and Australia. The man had studied this, it seemed; the first dispersal came at the end of the 19th century with tens of thousands heading to the United States (ND’s great grandfather had been part of this one); a second one took place soon after, in the first ten years of the 20th century; and a third great departure, with many going to Australia, took place in the 1930s.

This last fact, about emigration to Australia, explains why the first two women we spoke with kept thinking that ND and I were from Australia even though Miriam explained that actually we were from the United States. To these two ancient and venerable Calabrese matriarchs, the distinction didn’t matter; Australia or America, there was really no difference, both were a world away from Perri Lane.

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Locri, Calabria, Italy

Locri Epizefiri (Greek Λοκροί Ἐπιζεφύριοι; from the plural of Λοκρός, Lokros, “a Locrian” and ἐπί epi, “on”, Ζέφυρος (Zephyros), West Wind, thus “The Western Locrians”) was founded about 680 BC on the Italian shore of the Ionian Sea, near modern Capo Zefirio, in Southern Italy’s Calabria, by the Locrians, apparently by Opuntii (East Locrians) from the city of Opus, but including Ozolae (West Locrians) and Lacedaemonians.

Due to fierce winds at an original settlement, the settlers moved to the present site. After a century, a defensive wall was built. Outside the city there are several necropoleis, some of which are very large.

Locris was the site of two great sanctuaries, that of Persephone and of Aphrodite. Perhaps uniquely, Persephone was worshiped as protector of marriage and childbirth, a role usually assumed by Hera, and Diodorus Siculus knew the temple there as the most illustrious in Italy.

In the early centuries Locris was allied with Sparta, and later with Syracuse. It founded two colonies of its own, Hipponion and Medma.

During the 5th century BC, votive pinakes in terracotta were often dedicated as offerings to the goddess, made in series and painted with bright colors, animated by scenes connected to the myth of Persephone. Many of these pinakes are now on display in the National Museum of Magna Græcia in Reggio Calabria. Locrian pinakes represent one of the most significant categories of objects from Magna Graecia, both as documents of religious practice and as works of art. In the iconography of votive plaques at Locri, her abduction and marriage to Hades served as an emblem of the marital state, children at Locri were dedicated to Persephone, and maidens about to be wed brought their peplos to be blessed.

During the Pyrrhic Wars (280-275 BC) fought between Pyrrhus of Epirus and Rome, Locris accepted a Roman garrison and fought against the Epirote king. However, the city changed sides numerous times during the war. Bronze tablets from the treasury of its Olympeum, a temple to Zeus, record payments to a ‘king’, generally thought to be Pyrrhus. Despite this, Pyrrhus plundered the temple of Persephone at Locris before his return to Epirus, an event which would live on in the memory of the Greeks of Italy. At the end of the war, perhaps to allay fears about its loyalty, Locris minted coins depicting a seated Rome being crowned by 'Pistis’, a goddess personifying good faith and loyalty, and returned to the Roman fold.

The city was abandoned in the 5th century AD. The town was finally destroyed by the Saracens in 915. The survivors fled inland about 10 kilometres (6 mi) to the town Gerace on the slopes of the Aspromonte.

Today, the modern town of Locri boasts a National Museum and an Archaeological Park, etirely dedicated to the ancient Greek city. The museum preserves the most important findings of the time, such as vases, pinakes, tools used in everyday life, architectural remains from the various excavation area.

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Belvedere Marittimo, Calabria, Italy

Photos by Aaron Peterson

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