Ponte Fabio Massimo (Ponte del Diavolo)
Faicchio (BN)
KnownHistory & archaeology
The story
The bridge that legend has Fabius Maximus the Delayer cross as he chased Hannibal, and that the locals call the Devil's Bridge: below, the Titerno carves a dark gorge; the polygonal-work foundations are older than Rome.
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More gems in Faicchio
◆ CastlesCastello di Faicchio
Faicchio (BN)
On a rocky spur above the Titerno valley, the ducal castle of Faicchio watches over the village with its Norman towers reworked through the centuries.
◆ Sacred artGrotta di San Michele (Faicchio)
Faicchio (BN)
On Monte Monaco di Gioia a natural cavity preserves the Lombard cult of the archangel, with frescoes of Byzantine flavour faded by damp and a silence that tastes of rock.
◆ History & archaeologyMonte Acero e la cinta megalitica sannitica
Faicchio (BN)
Three kilometres of polygonal blocks, dry-laid and interlocked, have ringed the summit for twenty-six centuries, and no one up there will ask you for a ticket: from the Samnite arx the gaze plunges over the whole Valle Telesina.
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 & archaeologySedile 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 & archaeologyReal Albergo dei Poveri
P.za Carlo III
An eighteenth-century colossus willed by Charles of Bourbon to shelter the poor of the Kingdom: a façade running more than three hundred metres, among the largest historic buildings in Europe.