Centro storico di Tarquinia con mura medievali e torri

Tarquinia's historic centre preserves a medieval street plan within a defensive circuit of walls and towers. Its hilltop streets bring together Romanesque churches, medieval gates and later palaces, with views across the Marta valley and surrounding countryside.

Why it matters

The medieval town grew from a nucleus on the castello spur in the sixth and seventh centuries. It was first called Corneto, became known as Corneto-Tarquinia in 1872 and took the name Tarquinia in 1922. Its defensive fabric developed over several centuries: the official history describes walls from the ninth to twelfth centuries around the Poggio and Valle quarters, followed by an extension toward the castro novo in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.

What to notice

Porta di Castello stands beside the round Torrione di Matilde di Canossa. The fortified gate, commissioned by Giovanni Vitelleschi in the 1430s, has a zigzag plan known locally as the resechata; its features include a bertesca and a machicolation. Across the centre, towers rise among the medieval streets, while the macco-stone walls, Palazzo Comunale, Palazzo Vitelleschi and the town fountains show different layers of the city's history. Barriera di San Giusto frames a view toward the coast.

Context and history

In 1080 Matilde di Canossa held a placito at Tarquinia with papal officials, according to the town's historical account. From the mid-twelfth century Corneto was a free commune, and in 1435 it became a bishopric. Under the Vitelleschi, the town was rebuilt and refortified; the gate of 1439 separated the old castello quarter from the expanding town. The defensive system's history is also recorded in a 1734 fresco of the genealogy of Corito in the town hall.