Allifae romana
Alife (CE)
Hidden gemHistory & archaeology
The story
At Alife the Roman walls still gird the town almost intact: two kilometres of ramparts, corner towers and the grid of cardo and decumano still lying beneath today's streets.
Access
Walls free; sites with hours
More gems in Alife
History & archaeologyAlife (mura romane e criptoportico)
Alife
A perfect rectangle of Roman walls with evenly spaced towers and, underground, the U-shaped Augustan cryptoporticus: vaulted galleries guarding a mystery never solved.
- History & archaeology
Museo Archeologico dell'Antica Allifae
Alife (CE)
From prehistory to Rome, the objects of the Matese peoples: a fourth-style fresco and black-and-white geometric mosaics torn from the domus of ancient Allifae.
More gems: History & archaeology
History & archaeologyStatua del Nilo ("Corpo di Napoli")
Largo Corpo di Napoli
A river god reclining for centuries in a quiet square, whom Neapolitans call the Corpo di Napoli: he leans his bearded head among putti and a sphinx.
History & archaeologyCappella Pontano
Decumani
A small Renaissance temple on the decumanus, which the humanist Pontano had raised for his lost wife, still lined inside with Latin inscriptions dictated by his grief.
- History & archaeology
Sedile di Nilo
Decumani
On the corner of a small Spaccanapoli square survives the seat of the old Nilo quarter, where the nobles once gathered before the sedili of Naples vanished.
History & archaeologyPort'Alba
Napoli
A seventeenth-century arch cut into the walls leads to the booksellers' street, where stalls of second-hand volumes pile up among yellowed pages and the shade of the old city.
History & archaeologyPorta Capuana
zona Garibaldi
Between two cylindrical towers an arch of white marble opens like a Renaissance triumph, the old city gate facing the road to Capua.
- History & archaeology
MANN — Museo Archeologico Nazionale
P.za Museo
One of the world's great archaeological museums: here the Toro Farnese, the mosaics of Pompeii and the Gabinetto Segreto tell the whole ancient Mediterranean in a single visit.