Calabria is the least known region of Italy. It lacks the great medieval or Renaissance monuments of the Center and the North but it is genuine. It has magnificent beaches, picturesque towns and interesting monuments from Norman and from the times of Emperor Frederick II.
Inevitably our thoughts go where they shouldn’t, when we visit that rugged, mountainous, mysterious land that seems inaccessible, where the State was replaced to a certain extent by those who, if they were capable of enforcing “the law”.
The toe of the Italian boot, between the Ionian and the Tyrrhenian, extends about two hundred and fifty kilometers from north to south and only reaches a maximum width of one hundred and ten kilometers. Its area is double that of the Community of Madrid for two million inhabitants. It is an arid and rainy area, except on the coast, with some beaches visited by national tourists and ignored by foreigners.
From Spain there are no direct connections. You arrive from Naples or Rome or better still from Catania where there are flights in summer, to cross the Strait of Messina, stopping in the city of the same name if only to visit a couple of museums, La Pinacoteca Cívica with two beautiful tables from the always perfect Antonello of Messina and the Regional Museum of Art with a couple of majestic, and not only because of their size, Caravaggio’s panels “The Adoration of the Shepherds” and The “Resurrection of Lazarus”.
Already on the ferry, during the short crossing we will remember Ulysses who had to choose between Scylla and Charybdis, the guardians of the strait he wanted to cross.
Scylla with the torso of a woman and the tail of a fish from which aggressive dogs emerged that attacked the adventurers’ ships, on the Calabrian side, and Charybdis, who formed whirlpools three times a day on the Sicilian side to catch the ships that passed by. their side to return them shattered.
Odysseus passed by the side of Scylla, he lost six sailors but he continued on his way alive.
You disembark in Reggio Calabria, whose coast was defined by D’Annuncio as “the most beautiful kilometer in Italy”. The city has an Aragonese castle and three thousand years of history. From Homer we jump to the National Museum of Magna Grecia to delight ourselves with two of the most wonderful statues of Greek art. “The Riace Bronzes”, two of the few remaining examples of ancient art. They were discovered in 1972 by some fishermen near the coast. His imposing height of a couple of meters and the perfection of the work are overwhelming. They are two warriors, in a martial position, who have lost the shield that they should carry on their left arm and the weapon on their right.
After so much beauty, one can now explore the unknown region beyond the coast. Citrus and vineyards are grown on the slopes. Higher up olive and chestnut trees grow and near the summits there are pine trees, beech trees and fir trees. It looks like the quintessential Mediterranean landscape.
Let us remember that Regio and other neighboring cities were important centers of Magna Graecia. The Brucio settled in the area, which was the dominant tribe whom the Romans considered ignorant and described as “bruttus” and from the 9th century BC, the Italians who gave that region of southern Calabria the name of Italy, which then it would spread to the entire peninsula. Then the Romans, the Byzantines, the Normans, the Aragonese, the Angevins, the Bourbons, and so on until unification.
When the Turks conquered the Peloponnese in the 16th century, Greeks and Albanians took refuge in Calabria maintaining their languages, which are still spoken today in small redoubts. A good part of the Greeks were “maniotas”, coming from the Mani peninsula, famous for their “vendettas”, a custom they maintained.
History lovers will visit Aspromonte, the mountain range near Regio where one of the decisive battles of unification took place in which the troops of Victor Manuel II captured Garibaldi after wounding him in the foot. It would be decisive, but more than a battle it was a skirmish with no more than fifteen dead.
On both coasts there are beautiful villages that sleep in winter and come back to life in summer. In the Tirreno Tropea stands out for its spectacular beach. In the north is Scalea, birthplace of the famous admiral Roger de Lauria – sorry, he wasn’t Catalan.
The local cuisine is based on products preserved in different ways: in oil such as aubergines or dried such as tomatoes, cod and cured meats, sausages and “sopressata”.
Special mention deserves the bergamot, whose fruit is not eaten but the essence obtained from the bark is used to make liqueurs and perfumes. It even has a dedicated museum.
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