Landmarks

Palazzo D’Avalos
If you were to ask any resident of Vasto what the most significant symbol of their city was, Palazzo D’Avalos would probably be their answer. If any building or place is synonymous with Vasto, it is the Palazzo D’Avalos.

The palazzo’s panoramic position overlooking the sea makes it the central and most visible landmark in Vasto’s Centro Storico. Seen from the beach below, or the coastal highway, the former home of the noble family D’Avalos, that ruled Vasto from 1440 until the late 1700s, dominates the silhouette of the old town.

This palace from the 14th century, built with the symmetry and proportions of Renaissance architecture, was a colossal structure by the standards of the time. It was not only a residence for the ruling nobility, but a symbol of their wealth and power, meant to imbue admiration and respect in their serfs, underlings, and their enemies. The walls of the southern façade still have remnants of the original decorative embellishments, windows, and masonry.

Today the town of Vasto, is a more than three hundred years removed from the harsh conditions of the feudal society that dominated rural life in Italy. Palazzo D’Avalos, once a seat of power and aristocratic opulence, is now the center of the cultural and historical life of his part of Abruzzo.

The palazzo, and its well-tended Neapolitan garden that was typical of the time, now provides a picturesque hub for the majority of cultural events in Vasto. There is a continual agenda of conferences, weddings, civic meetings, book presentations, recitals, and international engagements.

Besides being the heart of the historical center of Vasto, the palazzo is an archeological museum that highlights the town’s past as a Roman municipality and houses a collection of art and artifacts from Vasto and Abruzzo’s various historical periods.

Note: Surrounding the palazzo on two sides is a brick and stone wall that is seven hundred years old. Does anyone build with bricks now? Will these sheet metal and poured concrete buildings of the 21st century be standing seventy years from now, let alone seven hundred?

Castello Calderesco
A fortress that protected Vasto from invasion from land and sea.

The medieval walls and turrets of Castello Calderesco, from the 14th century, like the Palazzo D’Avalos are entwined with the historical identity of Vasto.

Medieval Europe was a continent of monarchs and noblemen, whose realms were divided into principalities and city states. These areas, both large and small, ruled by kings or local lords, had their own set of laws and taxes. Instead of land being divided by fixed lines, borders were often marked by natural features. Rivers, mountains, or the sea, separated territories or countries whose boundaries were a cause of continual strife, raids and plundering. For protection, towns grew up around castles that were often fortified by walls and armaments to repel invaders. The Caldora Castle was built both for protection, and as a palatial residence by the Marquis Jacobo Caldora, and then added on to by the D’Avalos dynasty, when Vasto came under their rule. 

Today, along with the castle and its turrets, and its three remaining towers, the ancient gates though the city wall, Porta Catena and Porta Nuova, remain as they were five hundred years ago.

The castle is now privately owned, and the towers are used as private residences.

Ancient Entrances to the City of Vasto

Porta Panzotto

The arch over the Porta Panzotto is an access point through the ancient wall that surrounded the old town. It is a remnant of the city's medieval defense against marauders that came from the sea, and a reminder of Vasto's past as a fortified hilltop town. 

Porta Catena

The gate at Porta Catena was another part of the defensive walls that were built to protect Vasto from bandits and pirate raids. It was one of the city's four main gates and was an entrance to the city from the east. Now Porta Catena leads onto the Loggia Amblingh with its spectacular view of the Adriatic Sea.

Porta Nuova

The arch at Porta Nuova is one of Vasto’s iconic landmarks located at the ancient city border. It originally dates to Roman times, when Vasto was known as Histonium, and later controlled access to the city through its medieval defensive wall.

Whispers of Revolution in the Narrow Alleys of the Centro Storico
An important chapter of Italian history was written in the in the labyrinth of lanes and alleys that lead from the Church of Santa Maria Maggiori to the nearby Belvedere Loggia Amblingh. When I step out from my house onto the Via San Gaetanello, a narrow passage from the middle ages, and walk a few steps under the arch called Porte Panzotto, I am following the footsteps of the men who were members of the forbidden society called the Carbonari, revolutionaries whose ideas and struggle in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries led to the unification of the Italian States. Their meeting place was the vaulted cellar opposite the medieval Panzotto Arch, in the building where the Ristorante Panzotto is located.

One of the prominent leaders of the Carbonari, was the Vasto born scholar Gabriele Rosetti, who played a key role in the political movement that challenged the rule of Italy by foreigners and the noble classes.

Rosetti was sentenced to death for his outspoken criticism of the King of Naples and active support of the movement for a united Italy. He was forced into hiding, and in 1824 fled to England.

Vasto’s town square bears his name and has a statue in his  honor. The Rosetti family’s heritage left its mark on art and literature. Gabriele was a Dante scholar, and poet. His children born in England, all gifted, followed suit influencing both art and literature. Gabriele’s son Dante Gabriele Rosetti was both an acclaimed and innovative painter and poet. His daughter Christina Rosetti, was one of the nineteenth century’s most well-known English language poets. His two other children were both authors.

 Vasto’s Historical Connection to the Sea
Vasto’s long coast and beautiful beaches haven’t always been the peaceful refuge for bathers and holiday makers that they are today. If you had a time machine that took you back 3000 years to the age of Homer’s Iliad, this is what you might see: the hero Diomedes and his soldiers sailing the Bay of Vasto, looking for a place to make land, perhaps to replenish supplies and water, perhaps to plunder and pillage.

The beaches along the Gulf of Vasto have witnessed the ebb and flow of time. The Sirocco winds, that blow north from the Sahara, continually alter them. Storms and wind change the contours of their shores, pile sand into dunes and then tear them down in a continual cycle of change and renewal, much like the towns and villages along its shores that have been destroyed and rebuilt through the centuries.

Every place holds echoes of the past. If you stroll along the panoramic walk Loggia Amblingh, above the steep hillside that leads down to the beach and wander back through history in an imaginary time machine, you might see the warships of the Greek hero Diomedes sailing the bay and making landfall. A legend recorded in Homer’s epic poems “The Iliad and Odessey” says that 3000 years ago, Diomedes on one of his voyages, came and established the town that would be called Istonia.

The Adriatic Sea, its dangers, beauty and bounty, have always been inseparable from Vasto’s identity. Historically, the coastal villages of Abruzzo were isolated and cut off from the rest of Italy by the rugged Apennines that formed the ridged backbone of the Abruzzo Region. In the 1970´s a modern highway was built connecting Abruzzo to the Mediterranean provinces. Historically, because of the difficulty of crossing the high mountains, trade and travel were carried out primarily by sea, but it was also from the sea, in earlier centuries, that invading armies, pirates and marauders made their landfall. Vasto was no exception, and until the 18th century the town was plundered, destroyed, and rebuilt several times. To guard them from attacks, cities and villages were established either on high cliffs or several kilometers inland.  On the Loggia Amblingh, you can see the Porta Catena, an entrance into old Vasto through the remains of the ancient wall that protected it from attacks from the sea.

It wasn’t only the heroes from the epic the “Iliad and the Odessey” that crossed the long, sandy beaches along the Gulf of Vasto, but in the millennia that followed, there were Roman soldiers and merchants, pirates, and Turkish invaders. The tide and waves still wash up shards of brick and pottery from the Roman port of Punta Penna, reminders of a past, where merchant vessels loaded their cargos of Abruzzo oil and grain to be freighted to other parts of the Imperial Empire. The remains of Roman baths and buildings can be seen along Vasto’s archeological walk, The Via Adriatica.

Via Adriatica

The Via Adriatica, the panoramic walk with a view of the sea that stretches to the horizon, was once the political and social center of the ancient Roman municipality Histonia. The path  leads to Tthe Roman Baths, Terme Romani di Histonium. The baths that were once a meeting place for Romans citizens from all walks of lifelevels of society, and is now a well- restored archaeological site that tells a story gives a glimpse of life in ancient Vasto. It was a place where people discussed politics, met friends,friends, and conducted business., and discussed the issues of daily life.

The baths, aqueducts  and heating system are very well preserved and reflect the genius of the construction and architectural skills of the ancient Romans. The intricate marble mosaics on the floors are a tribute to the work of the artists and craftsmen that laid them two thousand years ago.have outlived them by 2000 years.

Trabocci
A trabocco is a utilitarian construction that turned farmers and land-dwellers into fisherman.

A striking sight on Vasto’s long stretch of coast are the historic trabocci, ancient fishing platforms built on stilts and extending out into the sea. These rickety fishing piers resemble modernistic driftwood sculptures, with long wooden arms reaching out into the deep, fish-rich pools of the coastal waters. The arms were used to lower and raise large nets by an intricate system of pulleys and ropes and have withstood the pounding of the Adriatic’s waves for hundreds of years.

The trabocci enabled people from the villages and farms along the coast to supplement their diets and incomes by fishing, without having to own a boat or expose themselves to the unpredictability of the weather and dangers of the open sea. When you pass a trabocco, it’s easy to let your imagination take you back to a time before there were fish farms and the indiscriminate plundering of the world’s oceans by factory boats.

Many of the trabocci have been restored and repurposed into upscale restaurants that serve delicacies from the bounty of the Adriatic, and wine from nearby vineyards, accompanied by swooping gulls and the swell of the sea.

Chiesa San Michele Arcangelo
Veneration of St. Michael the Archangel, Patron Saint and Protector of Vasto is tightly interwoven with the town’s history and cultural identity.

In the years of 1817 to1818 a cholera epidemic ravaged Europe and the coastal cities. It is believed, that thanks to the miraculous intercession of the Arch Angel Michael, Vasto was spared the widespread death caused by the plague.

In 1827, the town’s residents, grateful for the Saint’s help, built the church of Saint Michael the Arch Angel, “Chiesa San Michele Arcangelo,” in his honor.

The Chiesa San Michele, overlooking the Gulf of Vasto, stands unique in the ecclesiastical world, housing not only the statue of the archangels Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, but the other lesser-known archangels in the Catholic tradition, Uriel, Raguel, Serachiel and Remiel.

Every year, at the end of September Vasto celebrates the feast of Saint Michael with three days of masses, processions, and cultural events.

During the celebration, the statue of the Arch Angel is carried by the clergy, and church officials, followed by hundreds of townspeople, from Chiesa San Michele to the Cathedral of San Giuseppe on Piazza Pudente. After the days of masses and ceremonies, there is another procession when it is returned to its pedestal in the church that is dedicated to him.

 Amphora: A Link to Ancient Vasto
The passing of the centuries have seen empires crumble, but not the cylindrical clay urns called amphora, that played an essential role in the transport of grains, olive oil, and wine throughout the countries that were under Roman rule. Transport of these goods was important for the military dominance and economic stability that sustained the sprawling Roman Empire.

Olive oil was a vital commodity in the Roman Empire that stretched from North Africa, the Mediterranean provinces, and even across the North Sea to England, and was used not only for cooking, but for lamps and medicines.

Oil and wine were transported from the Roman port in Vasto throughout the Empire in two handled clay vessels called amphora, sturdy terracotta urns that were antiquity's packaging. Their egg-shaped form gave them strength and was the ideal shape for transport in the holds of ships. The handles on the sides facilitated lifting. Their conical construction not only made the clay vessels more durable, it also allowed the sediment in wine and oil to settle and be confined to their tapered bottom.

To prevent the oil and wine from being tainted and souring, an amphora could be used only once. When it had served its purpose, it was discarded, sometimes by being thrown overboard. Through the centuries cargo ships ran aground or sank, depositing thousands of them on the sea floor. Two thousand years later, some of these amphorae would end up as an additional catch in the nets of the trawlers that fished in the waters around Vasto.

Usually, when the nets were hauled on board and the catch released, the urns would follow, crashing on the deck and breaking. However, the amphora in the photo was removed from the net before it was emptied and remained intact. When the trawler docked, it was purchased from the boat’s captain by a passerby, Remo Salvatorelli, that recognized it as an important link in the ancient chain of Vasto’s history and donated it to Vasto’s Musei Civica’s archeological exhibits.

Note: There is a man-made hill in Rome, Monte Testaccio, now an archeological site, containing approximately 25 million discarded amphorae. The hill is 35 meters high and has a circumference of 1500 m.

The Burden of Preserving Landmarks for Future Generations
Think of a Ferrari parked in a medieval village, or an office building in chrome and glass alongside a Roman wall from the first century. The Italian culture manages to preserve its past without shuttering itself from the present.

Among Italy’s gifts to the world are its architecturally unique buildings, Renaissance art, Roman mosaics, sculptures and frescoes. However, their beauty and invaluable historical worth, is also a burden for local, regional and federal governments. Preserving this wealth of cultural treasure presents them with some of their greatest financial challenges.

When we reflect on Italy’s abundance of ancient art and architecture, we think of Pompei and Venice, the cities of Florence, Rome, Naples and Bologna, the picturesque towns on the Amalfi coast, and the works of the masters Michael Angelo, DaVinci and Caravaggio. But the overwhelmingly amount of Italy’s cultural inheritance is not only housed in its world-famous museums and magnificent cities, but found in its hundred thousand churches, and its exquisite fountains and sculptures on the piazzas and in the parks of cities both large and small. Wherever you might look in unexpected places, you can find the forgotten art and embellishments that are hidden in narrow alleys and the nooks of ancient walls.

Italians have a sophisticated relationship and pride in their country’s archeological sites and the vast artistic accomplishments that are inseparable from the nation’s self-image and soul. The magnitude and quality of Italy’s art is unique in the world, and a short walk in the historical center of any village or town, reveals treasures, that in any other country or place, would be worth a special visit. Italy has more UNESCO Heritage sites than any country in the world, and with them, comes a heavy financial burden. Along with these extensive, and priceless works of art, historical buildings and towns, follows a responsibility to maintain and conserve them for future generations of Italians, and the peoples of the world.

These treasures, the scale of which are enormous, require vast sums of money for their upkeep. The dilemma of the Italian government is finding a way to prioritize them, when the pressing needs of a modern society and repairing an aging infrastructure, outweigh the financial benefits that tourism brings to the country.

A Window to the Past

The marble portal standing alone on the Via Adriatica offers a striking frame to the sweeping views of the sea, the Tremiti Islands, and the distant coast of Puglia. This solitary structure is all that remains of the ancient Church of San Pietro.

In 1956,  a significant part of the historic centre of Vasto was lost to a devastating landslide. Of the once magnificent Church of Saint Peter, only the archway that marked its entrance now serves as a poignant reminder of its former splendour.

The remaining portal and entrance provide a glimpse into the elaborate embellishments that once adorned the entire church before its destruction. The bell now suspended beside the portal hints at the impressive scale of the steeple that originally housed it.

The Church of San Pietro was originally constructed in the 10th century atop a temple dedicated to Ceres, the Roman goddess of agriculture, grain crops, and fertility. This place was once a site of celebration and sacrifice, before the Catholic church was built. The remnants of the temple's foundation, including parts of its walls and sides, date back to the first century A.D. The English word "cereal" derives directly from the name of the goddess Ceres.

Strolling towards the archaeological remains of the Roman baths along the Via Adriatica, is a journey not only through the recent history of Vasto's historical centre, but also back to the era when this site served as the Forum—the heart of Roman authority in the area.

Running adjacent to Via Adriatica is the archaeological walk where there are the remains of the temple’s masonry and columns, further testimony to the site’s layered and enduring history.