The Sassi of Matera
A city carved into the rock and inhabited for over ten thousand years, where every stone tells a story. Welcome to one of the most extraordinary urban landscapes in the world.
One of the oldest cities in the world
Matera has been continuously inhabited since the Palaeolithic: the natural caves of the Gravina were the first homes of humankind here. Over the centuries those hollows were dug out, enlarged and turned into dwellings, churches, cisterns and workshops, giving rise to the two districts we now call Sasso Barisano and Sasso Caveoso. To walk here is to cross ten thousand years in a few hundred metres.
A UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1993
In 1993 the Sassi and the Park of the Rupestrian Churches were declared a World Heritage Site, the first in southern Italy to receive the honour. In 2019 Matera was European Capital of Culture: a city once branded a 'national disgrace' and now a symbol of rebirth.
The rupestrian churches
The Matera area holds around 150 rupestrian churches, carved into the rock between the Early Middle Ages and the Renaissance and often decorated with frescoes of rare beauty. Many can be visited during the Sassi and Murgia tours: spaces of stone where the light enters on tiptoe and the silence becomes a prayer.
Peasant civilisation
Until the 1950s a large farming community lived in the Sassi, in cave houses shared with their animals. Visiting a cave house furnished as it once was — the raised bed, the manger, the tools hanging on the walls — is one of the most intense experiences of the tour.
Matera and the cinema
For its timeless landscapes Matera has won over directors from all over the world: from the Murgia belvedere you'll recognise the backdrops of famous films, where the city lent its ancient stone to Jerusalem and to faraway worlds. We'll tell you the stories of the set along the way.
In Matera stone is not merely matter: it is memory, shelter and story. Here people learned to inhabit the rock without ever waging war on it.
Experience the Sassi with a guide
The best way to understand Matera is to lose yourself in its alleys in good company. Choose the tour that's right for you.
Sassi of Matera Tour
The best-loved tour: from the old town to the Barisano and Caveoso districts, on to the Civita and a cave house where time seems to have stopped.
Murgia Park Tour
A hike in the Murgia Park among rupestrian churches, trails scented with thyme, the belvedere over the Gravina and famous film locations.
Evening Tour of the Sassi
Matera at sunset and after dark: the illuminated Sassi districts, the belvederes and the most intimate, silent moods of the city.