Matera
UNESCO World Heritage Site (The Sassi And The Park Of The Rupestrian Churches Of Matera, 1993); European Capital Of Culture 2019; Mediterranean Capital Of Culture And Dialogue 2026 · Matera, Basilicata
A town of cave dwellings cut into a limestone gorge in Basilicata, inhabited more or less continuously for some nine thousand years, which makes it one of the oldest lived-in places on earth. The two Sassi districts are stacked so tightly that one house's floor is another's roof, and until the 1950s families shared single rock-cut rooms with their animals at malaria rates that shocked the country when Carlo Levi wrote about them. A 1952 law emptied the caves, moving more than fifteen thousand people into new suburbs, and the Sassi stood abandoned for thirty years before artists and then hoteliers moved back in. UNESCO listed them in 1993, Europe made Matera a Capital of Culture in 2019, and a James Bond film opened here in 2021. The districts themselves are free public streets you can walk at any hour. What costs money are the rock churches, the cave-house museums, and since 2026 the belvedere across the ravine where the famous photograph is taken.
Piazza Vittorio Veneto, Matera, Basilicata, 75100, Italy
The Sassi are public streets, open always and free. Rock churches roughly 09:30-19:30 and San Pietro Barisano 10:00-19:00. Casa Noha closed Wednesdays, with seasonal hours from 09:15 or 10:00. The Murgia Timone belvedere runs roughly 10:00-16:30 in winter and 08:00-20:30 in summer on its own ticket. The Cripta del Peccato Originale runs fixed booked meeting times and admits no walk-ins.