metropolitan city of Reggio Calabria

Historical Outline

One of the most ancient cities in Europe, the Calcidian colony Rhegion has been create in the VIII century BC, close to the place where it used to be located a settlement dated back to the III millennium. Reggio was one out of the most relevant town of the Magna Grecia, reaching during the V century B.C. a well renowned political and economic relevance under Anassila’s era. The polis has then developed great artistic and cultural value thanks to its Pitagora’s philosophical School and its sculpture and lyrics Schools, where important artists like Pitagora from Reggio and Ibico attended.

During Bizantinian Age, Reggio assumed the rank of Metropolis of South Italy Territories of Bisanzio, home of the Duke of Calabria and main place for the Greek Rite in Italy. Its growning moved even further up to the VIII century A.D. when it became Pope’s Reppresentative Site.

During the XVI century, barbarians incursions, epidemics maladies and the heavy fiscal drag by the Spain took Reggio to an age of decadence which has its worst moment with the 1783 earthquake which largely destroyed  the South of Calabria

On August, 21st 1860, with the famous “Battaglia di Piazza Duomo” (the battle of cathedral square), Giuseppe Garibaldi conquered the Regno delle due sicilie (Kingdom of the two siciliy), which he handled to King Vittorio Emanuele II. Reggio then acquired once again its link with the word Italia, name which, following Aristoteles mind,  was created right on its shore after the name of the mythical Enotria’s King Italòs.

Literates' view of Reggio.

With the mind to the latinist from Reggio, Diego Vitrioli, Giovanni Pascoli - in his "Un poeta di lingua morta" (A dead language poet) in the lyrics collection "Pensieri e discorsi" (1914), write about the Reggio’s  sea as following:
“This sea is full of voices and this sky is full of visions. Still the Nereids, forgotten in this sea, howl and still dead cities fly hanging in this sky. This is a sacred place, where Greek waves go after the Latin waves; and here they rest, in the nighttime mist, granting the watcher with blinking purple for each sea shell flavor. This is a sacred place. Between Scylla and Messina, down in the sea depths, under a crystal blue sky, under lighting steels from the dawn, under firing purple from the sunset. In this place, it’s told, Death stands still. And it’s not the Death stealing out of the humans plants now the flower, then the fruit in order to leave them ready to blossom once again but it’s the Death drying the plants; not clipping, but eradicating them; not the Death leaving tears behind, but the Death followed by the oblivion. Here such strength, hidden where ruins beam out, annihilated so much history, so much beauty, so much magnificence. Yet, it’s still here, as a print in the sky, as an echo in the sea. It’s here, where history is almost gone, poetry stands still forever.”

 

Reggio and Archeology

The National Museum of the Magna Grecia

This museum is one out of the most important museums of the Magna Grecia. The building, by the Italian architect and urban theorist Marcello Piacentini, is full of archeological collections with a multitude of remains coming from several City-State in Calabria, Basilicata and Sicily. Together with the Bronze of Riace (which Unesco is about to include in the World Heritage Sites list), the Museum gives place  the Philosopher’s Head, the Kuros, Apollo’s Head, the Castor and Pollux group, the bronze table from the Zeus Temple archive in Locri Epizefiri, pinakes collections and jewels and coins from an amazing spread of historical eras

Reggio between Mountains and Sea

Reggio is located at the end of the Italian “boot”, down the Aspromente’s feet, in the centre of Mediterranean Sea (where experts said Ulysses met the  Omero’smythological monsters Scilla and Carybdis) and take advantage of an amazing landscape including Sicily, the Etna volcano and the Aeolian Islands. Like in many of the Mare Nostrum cities, in the Reggio’s tradition, it is considered the centre of the Mediterranean Sea, which many and ancient populations always have a deep impact and made rich its really ancient history, culture and mindset. The jurisdiction of the city is part of the “Bacino di Reggio Calabria”, rift valley made by two faults between Campo Piale (south) and Aspromonte (East). The city spreads above an alluvial plain made by rivers’ flooding. The hills are build mainly by sand with a weak slope up to the Aspromonte dated back to Paleozoic era, while the coastal line goes back and forth into the sea where the rivers get to the water.

In Calabria, Reggio is the first city by history, extension and number of citizen. It is awarded by the rank of Metropolitan City and lead a territory which counts more then 260,000 people.


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