Paestum Excursion

Paestum Excursion

After pickup at your hotel in Palinuro, we'll head by minibus to the archaeological park of Paestum, where we'll embark on a fantastic tour of three magnificent Doric temples dedicated to the goddesses Hera and Athena.

Once we reach the archaeological site, we'll begin to explore this beautiful city of Magna Graecia, founded under the name of Poseidonia and later renamed Paistom by the Lucanians and Paestum by the Romans. After an initial general overview of the park, we'll visit the Temple of Hera I, the oldest of the three which features a peculiar enneastyle front. Did you know that its construction dates all the way back to 550 BC?

After discovering the history and characteristics of the Temple of Hera I, we'll move on to the largest temple in the park: the Temple of Neptune, also known as the Temple of Hera II. The cultural attribution of this temple is still up for debate. The most credible hypothesis sees it dedicated to the goddess Hera, Zeus or Apollo, while the attribution to Neptune seems to be the result of an error made by scholars of the 18th and 19th centuries. Next, we'll move to the Temple of Athena, the smallest of the three, characterized by the mixture of Doric and Ionic columns.

Following the visit of the archaeological area, declared a World Heritage Site in 1988, we'll head to the museum of the park, which houses an important collection of artifacts found in the areas that surround Paestum. Here, we'll be able to observe some grave goods from the Greek and Lucanian necropolis, as well as vases, weapons and frescoed tomb slabs.

We'll then move on to the highlight of the museum, the frescoes of the iconic Tomb of the Diver, a unique example of Greek painting from the classical age and Magna Graecia, interpreted as the transition from life to the realm of the dead.

After an afternoon spent discovering the historical and artistic heritage of Paestum, we will conclude the activity by taking you back to your hotel in Palinuro.