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Populonia

Overlooking the Gulf of Baratti, Populonia was between the 4th and 3rd centuries BC the main outlet to the sea of Etruria, whose memory survives today in the necropolises of San Cerbone, Casone, Poggio della Porcareccia and the Grotte. The typology of the tombs and their grave goods bear witness, in the first three, to a period of orientalizing and archaic colonization, with barrow tombs and a chamber tomb (7th-6th centuries BC) beside others of aedicule form (4th century), while the Grotte necropolis contains hypogeum chamber burials from Hellenistic times (4th-2nd centuries BC), The town, deserted in the Roman age, rose again in the late 14th century with the construction of the rectangular Rocca wh ich still today watches over the three roads of the castle. In its old olive mill is housed theGasparri Collection, a small private museum of the civilizations that succeeded one another up to the end of the Roman era. On leaving Populonia we return to the Via Aurelia to climb up to Campiglia Marittima, on the hills of the Val di Cornia.