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v G. Capone - v Taiani -
TORRE NORMANNA - SS 163 - Badia S MARIA De OLEARIA - SS 163 località
Capo D'Orso - GROTTA della PORTA - SS 163 - frazione Erchie - Cappella
di S MARIA - Chiesa della MADONNA ASSUNTA - TORRE ANGIOINA.
DIFFICULTY: MEDIUM
TIME: 4 hrs
This route is of about 10 km and so it is advisable to use a car or the
public transport system that has a bus for Salerno about every hour.
Taking the seafront to the East, we find ourselves at the locality Costa
d'Angolo, SS 163...
Passing the NORMAN
TOWER, the pretty fiord of SALICERCHIE, the ZONE OF
CANNAVERDE. Coming to a straight piece of the road, on the inside lane
there is a unmade slope yet another road to the Avvocata that allows one
to cover a good part of the road by car, and saves about an hour...
Going ahead,
passing the cemetery, amongst the cacti and tall grasses we can see an
imposing building clinging to the rocks, we have arrived at
S MARIA DE OLEARIA ABBEY
This
installation had its origin at the end of the X century and is the work
of the eremite Pietro who chose a large cave as his hermitage...
With time the
nephew of the holy man, Giovanni, still a boy, come to join him and they
lived by making baskets that they sold on the Amalfi market. The passing
of time brought other proselytes and they built first one chapel and
then another turning the place into a proper centre Marian named S Maria
"De Olearia" because of the olive groves that covered the
slopes down to the sea or maybe because there was an olive press in the
vicinity...
After the death
of Pietro, the first abbot was Tauro and in 1088 the Pope gave the
monastery to the Abbey of the SS Trinity of Cava Dè Tirreni, and it
become a bridge in the introduction of Latin into the Byzantine church
of the South. Later amplified until it assumed the actual structure of
three chapels one built on top of the other, the lowest level entirely
in the rock the oldest part created by Pietro. The walls richly frescoed
show the "MADONNA ORANTE BETWEEN SS PAOLO and GIORGIO".
A passage leads from the cells of the monks, in later centuries used as
funeral vaults: therefore the name "CATACOMBE of BADIA"...
Small steps join
the last chapel, frescoed with EPISODE FROM THE LIFE OF S NICOLA DI
BARI. Interesting to note the signatures of devout pilgrims who
through the centuries have visited the site...
We continue
forwards Salerno, a few curves and in a opening we find the ancient
"CARCARA" (a rudimental construction used to smelt the stone
from which lime was extracted) high on the rock face a small entrance to
the GROTTA della PORTA discovered in 1934 a narrow passageway
leads to three large halls where you can admire stalagmites and
stalactites in the shape of cauliflower's...
Passing CAPO
D'ORSO ROCK, a few kilometres after the bus stop we take a forked road
on the outside lane, almost rolling down the winding road we emerge in
the picturesque sea side village of ERCHIE...
A handful of
little white houses between the olive trees, their arches hidden by the
fat leaves of the fichi d'india, as if rudely awoken from a pleasant
dream, Erchie is jealous of her silence, the lapping of waves and
the song of the grasshopper, a dream that last all day...of peace and
memories...
A Greek colony of
the IV century B.C. Hercules himself gave it its name, and even if tiny
the important Benedictine Abbey of St Maria de Irchi, or de Hercule, in
the X century earned the "jus piscariae" (right to the tenth
part) on all the fishing of the area, and it dominated Cetara, Suverato,
Fonti and the hamlets in this important zone...Until 1440, when a
violent storm took parts of the beach and destroyed the Abbey. The
inevitable decline, reduced it to a fishing village, it was noted only
for "TONNARA" the important market of tuna and swordfish...
At the centre of
the village St. MARIA ASSUNTA CHURCH. Built on the ruins of the
abbey, with a splendid DOORWAY dark squares of tufo and stone, and on
the main altar a superb MADONNA WITH CHILD of the X-XI century
...
By the sea on the
eastern side the imposing TORRIONE built on a square plan with an
ample gallery, it was built by order of Carlo I D'Angiò in 1278, it is
most probably the oldest sentinel on the coast ...
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