Prehistoric and archaeological sites in Italy
Nuraghe Nieddu
Nuraghe Nieddu is the best preserved nuraghe (main type of ancient megalithic edifice found in Sardinia) in the region. The single tower nuraghe is 11m high and dates probably from the second millenium BCE.
Founded: 1800-1400 BCE |
Location:
Codrongianos, Italy
Lu Brandali Archaeological Site
The Lu Brandali site was discovered in the late 1960s by a young graduate Michele Careddu. It consists of a giants’ tomb, a nuragic village (seven huts have been excavated out of the 35 that exist and are still buried underground) and a nuragic tower.
Founded: 1400-1000 BCE |
Location:
Santa Teresa Gallura, Italy
Paludi Archaelogical Park
Castiglione di Paludi archaelogical park is a good sample of Magna Graecia ancient state architecture . It was in use from 9th to 3rd centuries BCE. The site comprises of remains of theatre, two round towers, houses and cemetery.
Founded: 9th century BCE |
Location:
Paludi, Italy
Varignano Roman Villa
Varignano Roman Villa is an ancient Roman residence in Varignano, now a frazione of the town of Porto Venere. Its site is marked by an archaeological museum. Its first construction phase dates to the 1st century BCE and it mainly consisted of a house surrounded by a farm linked to olive oil production. The site is beside the Seno del Varignano Vecchio, overlooking the sea, near the santuario delle Grazie and, to the nort ...
Founded: 1st century BCE |
Location:
Porto Venere, Italy
Casmenae
Casmenae or Kasmenai was an ancient Greek colony located on the Hyblaean Mountains, founded in 644 BC by the Syracusans at a strategic position for the control of central Sicily. It was also intended as a military forward-position on the Via Selinuntina road that connected Syracuse to Akragas (modern-day Agrigento) - also on that road were Gela and Akrillai to Casmene"s west and Akrai to its east. Destroyed b ...
Founded: 644 BCE |
Location:
Buscemi, Italy
Colonne di San Basilio
The Colonne di San Basilio (Columns of St Basil) are an ancient Greek structure, which take their name from the mountain of San Basilio where they are located, in the territory of Lentini. The summit of the mountain shows trances of ancient settlement from the prehistoric period, with clear traces of the postholes of a hut, probably belonging to the Casteluccio culture. A little way away is the imposing structure ...
Founded: 5th century BC |
Location:
Lentini, Italy
Gibil Gabib
Gibil Gabib is an archaeological site located about 5 km south of Caltanissetta, on a 615-metre-high mountain. Excavations were first undertaken in the area in the middle of the 19th century and were reprised with great enthusiasm in the 1950s by the archaeologist Dinu Adameșteanu. They came to an end in 1984. In those undertaken in the middle of the 20th century, remains dating to the 6th century BC were brought to li ...
Founded: 6th century BCE |
Location:
Caltanissetta, Italy
Sabucina
The archaeological park of Sabucina contains settlements ranging from the Bronze Age (20th-16th century BC) to the Roman period. The original village has securely pre-Greek origins, it was constructed by the Sicans, who took advantage of the dominant position of the mountain over the Salso river valley. The first phase of the Greek settlement came in the 7th century. The centre consisted of rectangular habitations, wi ...
Founded: 2300 BCE |
Location:
Caltanissetta, Italy
Mount Bonifato Archaeological site
The Archaeological site of Mount Bonifato is located in Alcamo. According to Licofrone of Alexandria, there was a village called Longuro on Mount Bonifato of Alcamo in ancient times. This settlement had been founded by a colony of Greeks who had escaped from Troy. The archeological site was probably inhabited from the 7th century BCE to the 12th century AD. From the 6th century BCE Mount Bonifato very probably had the st ...
Founded: 7th century BCE |
Location:
Alcamo, Italy
Vassallaggi
Vassallaggi is a Sicilian prehistoric Bronze Age archaeological site which had a later flourishing after the 7th century BC as a phrourion (fortress). The site is located in the middle of the Salso river valley, at 704 m above sea level, in a strategic location for communication between the southern coast of Sicily and the northern part of the island. The site first developed in the Bronze Age (18th-14th centuries BC), f ...
Founded: 1700-1300 BCE |
Location:
San Cataldo, Italy
Hippana
Hippana was an ancient town of Sicily, mentioned by Polybius as being taken by assault by the Romans in the First Punic War, 260 BCE. Diodorus, in relating the events of the same campaign, mentions the capture of a town called 'Sittana', for which we should in all probability read 'Hippana'. It sat astride the main road from Panormus (modern Palermo) to Agrigentum (modern Agrigento) upon Monte dei Cava ...
Founded: 7th century BCE |
Location:
Prizzi, Italy
Tauriana Archaeological Park
Tauriana or Taureana is an ancient city of the Bruttii which was located in the southern part of Calabria, in present Taurianova. The city, which stood on the south bank of the river Metauros (probably Petrace), marked the border of the territory of Reggio Calabria on the Tyrrhenian coast north-west, which began more than that of Locri. Later Roman and later Byzantine Tauriana was destroyed by the Saracens in the middl ...
Founded: 4th century BCE |
Location:
Palmi, Italy
Timpone della Motta
The Timpone della Motta is a hill two kilometers to the southwest of Francavilla Marittima. It is an archaeological site which was inhabited since the Middle Bronze Age. In the Iron Age the hill was the site of an Oenotrian settlement. Over time the settlement was transformed into an important sanctuary, which was notable as the site of the first known ancient Greek temples on the Italian Peninsula. The Oenotrians were in ...
Founded: 9th century BCE |
Location:
Francavilla Marittima, Italy
Romito Cave
The Romito cave (Italian: Grotta del Romito) is a natural limestone cave in the Lao Valley of Pollino National Park, near the town of Papasidero. Stratigraphic record of the first excavation confirmed prolonged paleo-human occupation during the Upper Paleolithic since 17,000 years ago and the Neolithic since 6,400 years ago. A single, but exquisite piece of Upper Paleolithic parietal rock engraving was documented. Sever ...
Founded: 17000 - 6400 BCE |
Location:
Papasidero, Italy
Naniglio Roman Villa
Built in the late first century BC, the Villa of Naniglio reached its maximum splendour in the third century AD. The main attraction of the villa is a huge, well preserved water reservoir, comprised of a central nave and two lateral aisles. The Naniglio is an underground structure consisting of a central nave and two side aisles, with a ceiling made of crossed vaults supported on eight square columns arranged in two rows ...
Founded: 1st century AD |
Location:
Gioiosa Ionica, Italy
Centuripe Roman Bath
Centuripe was founded by Greeks in the 5th century BC, but the Imperial Roman age has left the most impressive monumental remains. Grandiose monumental ruins, a rich complex of sculptures, numerous inscriptions: a whole series of elements seem to mark the accomplishments of a local family that, in the 2nd century, came to express a consul, a son of one of the components of the entourage of the emperor Hadrian. A large num ...
Founded: 5th century BCE |
Location:
Centuripe, Italy