A Slow Tour of Upper Lazio with Syusy and Patrizio (6)

We conclude this itinerary by followig Syusy to the Banditaccia Necropolis in Cerveteri, which was likely the largest and, today, the most important of the city’s necropolises.

Hundreds of circular tumuli – some with a diameter of 50 meters – spread across roughly 20 hectares, beneath which lie Etruscan tombs covering a very broad time span, from the 8th to the 2nd century BCE.

Guided by Patrizio Fileri, archaeologist of the Archaeological Park of Cerveteri and Tarquinia, Syusy visits a unique and astonishing tomb, discovered by Marchese Giampietro Campana, an antiquarian, in 1846.

It’s the Tomb of the Reliefs, a tomb decorated with bas-reliefs that archaeologists and restorers study today to understand how these exceptional decorations were made. Because we’re undoubtedly looking at one of the earliest known examples of this technique.

This journey into the city of the dead once again brings us face to face with Etruscan life – the life of this pleasure-loving people, as Syusy has described them.

Take a listen!