Much more than a military or commercial route, the nine hundred kilometer road between Rome and Brindisi was above all a cultural crossroads for the Roman world
The Via Appia has officially begun its journey to become a heritage recognized by Unesco. With the complete name of Via Appia – Regina Viarum, the nine hundred kilometer consular road that connects Rome to Brindisi has been nominated to enter the List of
Unesco World Heritage – of which it would become, in the event, the 59th Italian site – with a project promoted by the Ministry of Culture with the involvement of four regions (Lazio, Campania, Basilicata and Puglia), 12 between provinces and metropolitan cities, 73 municipalities, the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology, 15 parks and 25 Italian and foreign universities.
BRIEF HISTORY OF THE APPIAN WAY
The Via Appia, built between the end of the 4th century B.C. and the 3rd century BC. on the input of the influential censor Appio Claudio Caecus, it connected the capital of the Roman Empire to the port of Brundisium, one of the most important in ancient Italy, from which the commercial routes to Magna Graecia, Greece and the East branched off. Considered one of the greatest civil engineering works of the ancient world due to its enormous economic, military and cultural impact, the “queen of roads” – large sections of which are still preserved and passable today – led to a great opening of Roman society towards the Greek culture, promoting the diffusion of Greek theatre, art and literature in the empire, as well as new philosophical doctrines. Also appreciated and used in the centuries to come, the Via Appia was restored and enlarged by Augustus, Vespasian, Trajan (who made the homonymous branch in Puglia) and Hadrian, and, despite neglect, in the Middle Ages it became one of the routes used by crusaders to the Holy Land. In the mid-twentieth century, the Via became the object of a strong building abuse, which led in 1988 to the establishment of the Appia Antica Regional Park, which from Porta San Sebastiano to the slopes of the Colli Albani protects and promotes the historical-archaeological heritage and landscaped.
THE CANDIDATE OF THE APPIAN WAY FOR THE GOOD OF UNESCO
An excellent prototype of the Roman road system, the Via Appia was therefore much more than a military or commercial road, but above all it was a cultural crossroads. “It is precisely in this cultural aspect that we believe there is that element that the Unesco candidacies require”, declared the Undersecretary for Culture Giancarlo Mazzi at the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding for the candidacy of the site, last 10 January. The Ministry of Culture has invested 19 million euros in the restoration and conservation of the Via and in the preparation of the dossier, Mazzi specified, both in the conviction of the social and cultural importance of the project and because “as previous experiences have taught us, these paths lead also a strong economic impact on the territory. I am convinced that we can do it, because when the Italians play together, no result is impossible.” The next stage now falls on January 20, when the Governing Council of the Italian Unesco National Commission will evaluate the scientific dossier, which will then go to Paris together with the site management plan. (di Gulia Giaume – Artribune)