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VELIA ARCHAEOLOGICAL PARK

Piazzale Amedeo Mauiri, 84046 Ascea SA

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Reach places

TRANSPORTS

  • CAR

    Take the A3 motorway to the Battipaglia exit, proceed along the SS18 Tirrena Inferiore to the Museum

  • BUS

    Take the RIAG line buses to and from Ascea. At the stop continue on foot for 30 minutes

  • TRAIN

    Take a regional train in the direction of Ascea and get off at the Ascea stop. Reach the destination by bus or on foot for 30 minutes

The Velia archeological area

Velia is famous for being the home of the school of philosophy of Parmenides and Zeno. Besides the Eleatic school, the archaeological site of Velia still tells the story of a great city of Magna Graecia with its citizens, its daily life, its public and private spaces.

It was founded around 540 B.C. by the inhabitants of Phocaea, a city in present-day Turkey, who left their homeland because they were besieged by the Persians. After a long voyage on board very fast ships, the exiles arrived in the Mediterranean Sea and settled in the bay south of the Gulf of Poseidonia, on the Cilento coast. The city is called Hyele, after the name of a spring, and then Elea and Velia in Roman times.

The city occupies a high part, the acropolis, and the hillsides behind it and is surrounded by a wide circuit of walls that follows the natural contours of the land. Within it, the urban space is divided into three distinct quarters, still visible today, linked by valleys, one of which was monumentalised by the construction of the extraordinary 'Porta Rosa', the oldest example of a round arch in Italy.

A community of Basilian monks built the small chapel dedicated to St. Quirinus during the 8th century A.C., while an earlier church dedicated to St. Mary Odegitria, by Greek monks, is recorded in 950. Both buildings are located within what was to become the Norman citadel, of which the tower is a magniloquent testimony, and which is still today the symbol and memory of a millenary history.

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  • Although the sources say that the city resisted the Lucanians and never lost its 'Greek identity' there was, however, a progressive insertion of Italic people affecting the social fabric and economy of the city. This can be seen in the material culture and, above all, in the epigraphic sources that record the presence of names of non-Greek origin.
  • The treaty between Rome and Elea dates back to the beginning of the 3rd century B.C., by virtue of which the Phocean city guaranteed the Urbe supplies of ships, ships that Rome used in the Punic wars. In 88 B.C. Velia became a municipium while retaining a strong autonomy. It can coin money and continue to use the Greek language. Also in the 1st century B.C., it hosted Brutus and Octavian. These are all testimonies that highlight an alliance with Rome from which Velia derived economic and social benefits.
  • In 562, it became a bishopric. The tradition of the discovery of the remains of St. Matthew and their translation to Salerno dates back to the 5th century A.C. Subsequent alluvial phenomena slowly changed the natural conformation of the coastal plain and Velia saw a slow shift of the residential area to the acropolis.
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Glimpses and perspectives

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