Do you live in a chaotic and stressful city? Are you tired of the endless traffic, the always crowded streets and people all around? If you dream of a much quieter reality, maybe Italy has what you need!
Civita di Bagnoregio is a very little tiny town in Viterbo’s province, in the region of Lazio.
Are you curious to know how many people live here? Currenty they are just 11!
This is the reason why Civita is sadly nicknamed “La città che muore” (The dying town).
The History of this amazing place is very old, because it was founded by Etruscan over 2500 years ago. It rises inside a suggestive valley of badlands.
During the Roman period, Civita occupied a strategic position, because it stood not far from the mouth of the Tiber, that was an important trade area.
Even during the Middle Ages Civita lived a positive season, in fact you can still admire the Middle Ages typical architecture there.
Civita rises in a territory mainly composed of clay, tuff and lava.
The site is also subject to severe erosion due to torrents, weathering and heavy deforestation. Erosion has been one of the major causes of this small town’s depopulation.
Today to access the town you must take a long bridge made of reinforced concrete and built in 1965, the bridge is about 300 meters long and you can walk only (just authorized residents can use motorcycles or cycles).
In ancient times Civita had 5 doors, but because of erosion it is now possible to enter only one: the door of Santa Maria. In the town you can only enter by buying a ticket, but it has a very small cost (only 5 € per person, less than 6 dollars).
Civita has a very suggestive and magical atmosphere: if you look at it on foggy days, it seems to watch a village perched on the clouds!
Civita Bagnoregio offers many breathtaking views of the badlands all around it.
There is no shortage of monuments and places that deserve to be visited. One of them is the church “San Donato”, with a Wooden Crucifix inside. According to a legend, during the plague of 1499 this Crucifix put an end to this epidemic, so it is still much venerated in Civita.
Near this town there is a cave called “Grotta di San Bonaventura” (Cave of Saint Bonavenuta). According to legend, Saint Francis of Assisi often came to pray in this area. One day he met a very sick child named Giovanni Fidenza, inside the cave. Saint Francis healed him and later told him “Bona Ventura” (“Good luck!”)
Once the child grew up and decided to enter the Franciscan order with the name of Bonaventura. This Franciscan friar will be destined to become a saint.
The beauty of this place is such that it has allowed Civita to become part of the most beautiful villages in Italy; each year hundreds tourist (from Italy and beyond) come here to visit this magical town.
Even the movie industry has noticed Civita, in fact more and more movies are filmed here and in 1986 the Japanese director Hayao Miyazaki was inspired by the uniqueness of this place in his famous animated film “Laputa – The castle in the sky”.
