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| Matera outside of Sassi district |
Matera is a town in the extreme south of Italy that is
largely a city of rock and caves. There
is evidence that suggests this place, located in the province of Basilicato,
was originally settled 250,000 years ago and has been occupied with various
groups and cultures ever since. What
drew me to stay in Matera was how ingenious and unusual this city was with
houses and churches, schools and even hotels carved out of and into the soft
limestone rock that is the dominate feature of the place. But also I was traveling with friends whose
eyes would glaze over when I began discussing art of the Italian Renaissance or
Baroque church architecture, but would light up when we began discussing the
truly authentic Mediterranean cuisine that forms the diet of southern
Italians. Put another way, my traveling
companions wanted me to calm down a bit on my obsession to visit all the
magnificent houses of worship that cover all of Italy and what better way to
fight this temptation than to go to a place that was virtually unknown to
people like Michelangelo and Bernini?
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| The Terme at Locanda di San Martino |
I will say that I did a whole lot less sight-seeing on this
trip and much more relaxing. It didn’t
hurt that our hotel, The Locanda di San
Martino, a monastery carved out of rock in its previous life, had an
underground Terme or mineral springs
swimming pool (yes, carved into the rock too) that drew you in for hours
because of the water’s restorative effect on your skin and body. But, that said, I spent part of every- day
visiting the rupestrian (carved-rock) churches, or their fine art galleries
(also carved into the rock). There are
literally chapels and churches everywhere many of which are no longer in use
but are of historic interest revealing the architectural styles and religious
sensibilities of the many groups of people who came to settle there. There are too many of these places to list in
a single article, but the city of Matera does provide materials for a
self-guided tour at each of them.
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| This rock has 3 churches carved into it |
So what’s with the rocks and why are they so cool? People build their cities with what is
plentiful around them. This region is
dry, hot, and has few trees, but has plenty of soft limestone. The early and later settlers found natural
caves but also quickly discovered with simple tools they could create almost
anything they wanted by carving out of the rock what one would normally have to
build. The other part of the equation is
living in caves is really cool as in lower in temperature. The heat in the south of Italy can be easily
overcome by living in the cool of the rocks.
Additionally, this is a dryer region of Italy and the rocks allow for
channels and cisterns to be cut in them to collect all the precious water that
comes in the form of rain.
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| Crypt of Original Sin |
The best of the best of these “rock churches” is just
outside of Matera (you need to arrange for a tour and driver) in a place called
the Cripta della Peccatore Originale or the Crypt of Original Sin. This is not the location where Adam and Eve
had their monumental slip up with God, but is so-named because one of the
beautiful frescoes that survived depicts that epic moment in Biblical history. This cave church was part of a monastery that
was built by Christian monks migrating from southern Asia Minor (modern day
Turkey) due to political and religious pressures placed on them by the Muslims
who were conquering their lands. These
were Greek Catholics and their Byzantine sensibilities are seen in the art that
adorns their caves. If you could go back
in time, all of the cave churches were highly decorated with these kinds of
paintings, but most of them are lost simply because they were nearly impossible
to preserve in the micro-climate of a cave.
In the mid-1960s these caves were discovered and the frescoes, which
were in great condition (and possibly 1000 years old) were quickly and
carefully preserved. What stands out
about the Crypt is that it was not a creation of poverty or necessity. The paint colors reveal that this group of
monks had great resources and the ability to travel and purchase what they
wanted to make their chapel a beautiful place.
They probably could have built their monastery on a hill like so many
others were in their homeland. But they
too saw the climate they were in and the wisdom of retreating to the coolness
of a cave. One can only imagine the
haunting beauty of this church lighted entirely by candles and accompanied with
the music of Greek antiphonal chant.
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| Byzantine style fresco of Adam and Eve in Temptation |
I hope if you have found this article because you are
already planning a trip to Matera, this will excite your appetite even more to
explore this very unusual place in Italy.
If you have never been and are looking for something beyond the usual
trifecta of Rome, Florence, and Venice, I would commend this small city for at
least a few days of your trip. We stayed
there 10 days and saw everything and more but justice to Matera can be done
with a stay of 3-4 days. You will want
to research transport there and hotels and I might add there is a direct
correlation between price and comfort that is not always the case in other
locales. But if you do go, definitely
put the Crypt of Original Sin on your itinerary.
A couple of websites to get your research started:
