Altitude: 9 m a.s.l.
Area: 54 sq km
Distance from Imperia: 42 km
Inhabitants: in 1881: 8854 - in 2017: 24178
Patron Saint Day: August 26th - San Secondo di Ventimiglia
Information: Municipality phone 0184 2801
The first evidences of human settlements in the area date back to the Paleolithic Age, splendidly documented by the findings of Balzi Rossi, among the most significant in Europe; the skeletons of the "Man of Grimaldi", of the Cro-Magnon type, are preserved among other things in the related Museum.
In historical pre-Roman times Ventimiglia was one of the major centers on the sea of the region, capital of the powerful tribe of the Ligurian Intemeli who, together with the Ingauni of Albenga and the Sabazi of Vado inhabited western Liguria; with the name of Albium Intimilium the city further developed after the Roman conquest (181 BC), occupying the entire plain at the mouth of the Roia.
The collapse of the Empire, however, opened the way to the barbarians and the too exposed settlement on the coast, devastated first by the Goths and then in 641 by the Longobards, was abandoned in favor of the safer nearby hill where the new walled and well fortified city was founded.
The center developed vigorously throughout the High Middle Ages and gave life to the dynasty of the Counts of Ventimiglia who for centuries dominated the area; the destiny of the city, which had all the potential to become a great metropolitan center, fulfilled itself between 1100 and 1477, in the very long bloody struggle that Genoa imposed on the city until it finally subjugated it, crushing forever, with the burial of the canal-port, any possibility of development.
Granted as a fief to the local Counts "allies" of Genoa, Ventimiglia would be disputed by Provence (Carlo Grimaldi annexed it in 1335, but Genoa regained it in 1357), with which hostilities finally ended with the peace of Lagopigo (1365), and then by the Savoys who occupied it devastating it in 1625 and then again in 1745; but Genoa always regained its possession thus retaining its dominion.
Visit of the town
Ventimiglia offers an extraordinary overview of the history of man with significant stages in the prehistoric age, in the Roman era and in the medieval period, and an equally interesting excursion into the world of flowers.
Arriving by car from the east, cross much of the town and stop immediately after passing the overpass on the railway line. There, on the upstream side of the road, are the ruins of the Roman amphitheater from the second century AD: the semicircular basin with an internal diameter of twenty-one meters could accommodate almost fifteen thousand people, sitting on the stone blocks alternating with a double row of bricks; still visible is the lower part of the hemicycle, in Turbia stone, and the well-preserved west gate.
On the opposite side of Via Aurelia continue the excavations which have brought to light remains ranging from the Republican Age (180 BC) to 600 AD; along the road to Camporosso, in the Colla Sgarba region, were brought to light the aqueduct and the necropolis, from which come most of the finds that you will soon see in the Museum.
Resuming the car, continue towards France and after crossing all Ventimiglia you’ll find on the left the massive bulk of Forte dell'Annunziata, seat of the Tourist Information Office and of the Civic Archaeological Museum “G. Rossi”.
In the different rooms are collected oil lamps and terracotta statuettes (from tombs) of the first and second century after Christ, with an interesting collection of glass jars. Another room houses the "lapidario" (collection of antique plaques), where are more than fifty Roman marble inscriptions, and sixteen marble busts from the early imperial age.
After the visit to the Roman world, take the car back towards France; at the first crossroads turn right, leave the car on the street and continue on foot taking the first street on the left which in less than two hundred meters takes you to the thirteenth century Porta Canarda, at that time the obligatory eastern access to the city. The gate is defended by the tower above, with a double row of slits on the outside that surmount the marble plaque carved with Saint George, placed there in 1514.
On the west side, the doorway is surmounted by two neighboring arches: the gap that separates them constitutes the machicolation through which the well-protected defenders inside the tower dropped stones and boiling oil over whoever intended to disrupt it; a second machicolation is on the inner side of the gate, to hit whoever had managed to pass.
On the keystone of the outer arch is carved, as a warning to the "Turks", a lion on a tower which holds a cross. A plaque reminds that this pavement has been stepped on by the noblest feet: from here Pope Innocent passed in 1251, and Macchiavelli and Charles V in the sixteenth century.
The inner side of the door is protected towards the sea by the low wall with slits with a beautiful view of the nearby Côte d'Azur; on the opposite side rises the ramp that leads to the high access door to the tower. The small terrace before the entrance was once covered; high above the tower access door are the stone shelves of the machicolation that defended it.
Back by car to Via Aurelia continue towards France and at the Latte junction turn right to Ponte San Luigi, thus reaching Capo Mòrtola where are located the Gardens of Villa Hanbury, which with their eighteen hectares make up the largest botanical garden of Europe.
Created in 1867 by Sir Thomas Hanbury around the seventeenth-century Villa Orengo, the park - currently run by the University of Genoa - now houses no less than five thousand different varieties of plants from all over the world.
At Capo Mortola there is also a tower against Saracenic incursions, used as an agricultural warehouse.
From Mortola go back by car to Latte and at the junction take the road along the sea to Ponte San Ludovico; upon arriving to the clearing -formerly of the customs- park and reach the Prehistoric Museum of Balzi Rossi, which exhibits the finds found in the nearby caves that open into the rock overlooking the sea, and which constitute one of the most important prehistoric deposits in Europe; in addition to stone artefacts, are displayed three skeletons dating back some thirty thousand years, adorned with shell necklaces. The exhibited suggestive terracotta statues reproducing the Mother Goddess with showy sexual attributes are copies of the originals found here but transferred to Paris.
Resuming the car return to the east, take the detour to the left that leads to Ventimiglia Alta and park outside the walls. Enter the historical center through Porta Marina, coming out a hundred meters further, in the churchyard of the splendid cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta, the most important monument of Romanesque architecture of the whole Liguria.
The original construction, perhaps built on the ruins of a pagan temple, was erected in the Carolingian period, around 700-800 AD; the cathedral was then completely rebuilt in the 12th century in the form of a three-aisled basilica with massive pillars and tuff arches, remaining practically intact ever since, except for modest touch-ups: in the following century the truss roof was replaced by the barrel vault and the portal was added in the 12th century.
The bell tower was built in 1150 as a robust fortified tower; in the last century it was remodeled at the top. The façade is dominated by the beautiful strongly splayed portal with marble columns with a high decorated base, in whose capitals the guardian wizards keep watch, alternating on the right also with rabbits; above the portal there is a wide three-light window framed by alternating black and white bands according to the tradition of Pisa (with which Ventimiglia was always allied against Genoa), surmounted by the hanging arches in the attic.
Crude angels with raised arms are carved on the internal jambs and external corners; a rosette is carved in the middle of the left jamb. The interior has three naves, divided by massive pillars linked by round arches; immediately to the right of the entrance is walled the massive Roman plaque engraved with the inscription to the Goddess Juno Regina which supports the hypothesis of a pre-existing Roman temple.
Further on there is the seventeenth-century painting of San Secondo who asks for the protection of the Holy Family over Ventimiglia, of which a panorama of the time is depicted below. On the left wall the first large chapel, dedicated to the Assumption, has valuable carved wooden backbenches; further on, below the low arch, is the small side door and then, behind the railing, the remarkable Capitular Room with carved wooden backbenches and the great nineteenth-century marble group of the Virgin.
To the left of the high altar is the small staircase leading to the wide crypt, actually formed by the apse of the small church with a single nave originally from the eighth century; there are preserved Byzantine marble fragments, including a capital carved with two rams that are butting one another, a monolith with faces of angels and several plaques with geometric motifs. In the crypt rest the relics of San Secondo, martyr of the Tebea Legion, to whom the church was originally dedicated.
Going outside take the left going around the cathedral on its right side, on which open very small lancet windows and the side door with a stone round arch. The first apse, pierced by a beautiful single-light window with carved-capital columns, is decorated in the attic with hanging arches with corbels carved into guardian wizards alternating with ox heads.
The central apse, larger and taller, is pierced by large single-lancet windows with columns and round arches; in the attic instead of the hanging arches are the most archaic small shelves, divided by four small columns with decorated capitals resting on larger half-columns that descend to the ground. Leaning against the apse is the majestic baptistery built in the 12th century on the classic octagonal plan, surmounted by a large octagonal "lantern".
The lower part repeats in the attic the shelves decoration of the apse of the cathedral; the lantern is enriched under the shelves by hanging arches. Inside there is in the center an imposing massive stone basin for immersion baptism, dating back to late Roman times; another lustral basin preserved in a lateral niche bears the date 1100 of the construction of the complex.
In the baptistery there are fragments of sculptures from the Longobard period (700-800 AD) and a giant pulvino from 500 AD. In the sixteenth century the baptistery was divided into two floors, of which the upper one used as a chapel of the cathedral; there is preserved an anonymous seventeenth-century painting "Baptism of Jesus with Saint Clare".
Go down the external staircase next to the apse and, leaving to the right the arch with a monolith that leads into the Canoniche small square, pass the stone arch in front of you and go around the baptistery, passing next to the low part of the bell tower in squared blocks of tuff, with a high slit overlooking the street.
Go back to the cathedral churchyard, of which you can see from there the decoration with hanging arches on the external jamb of the portal; beyond the church, on the other side of the street, rises the seventeenth-century massive Monastery of the Sisters of Nostra Signora dell’Orto, which incorporates the remains of the pre-existing Ventimiglia castle.
Go along Via Garibaldi in front of the church and, past the beautiful stone portal on the right, reach a bit further on the former theater, now the seat of the Aprosiana Library, founded in 1648 by Father Angelico Aprosio, among the first public libraries in Italy; it preserves works -including manuscripts- from the sixteenth century onwards.
Immediately after there are the beautiful stone pointed arches of the fifteenth-century Municipal Loggia, protected by guardian wizards carved on the first and last corbels of the hanging arches that decorate it at the top. Today the place is occupied by shops.
After passing the beautiful stone lintel carved with Saint George killing the dragon at number 7, there is on the right the Baroque façade with a skull and crossed tibiae of the funereal Oratorio dei Neri of 1650, which preserves frescoes by the Carregas. Immediately afterwards, anticipated by a stone column with a clock, opens up the widening which has in the center a beautiful nineteenth-century fountain with a circular marble basin and a central pillar with a mask surmounted by a marble lion; on the right, as a suitable backdrop, is a fifteenth-century house with ogival arch stone portals and a beautiful three-light window with marble columns on the first floor.
Walk along the street down to the right before the square, and when you reach Piazza del Canto go to its right corner to observe the beautiful mullioned window and then, after passing the next vault, go left, passing at number 4 the window-door facing the rich Baroque aedicule of 1765; looking up to observe the roof terraces and the decorations in the attics of the eighteenth-century buildings, pass the other Baroque aedicule on the left and the window-door after number 129, thus reaching the square where the Romanesque church of San Michele stands on the right.
The building was erected before the year one Thousand as a private noble chapel by the Counts of Ventimiglia who later ceded it to the Benedictine Monks of Lerins. The strongly splayed portal is decorated with pilasters and small columns that end at the top with capitals carved with raised-arms angels identical to those of the cathedral; above the round arches that close the portal there is a mullioned window with three small columns surmounted by a small cross-shaped window between two tiny oculi; the attic is decorated with inclined hanging arches.
The interior has a single nave, with a bare stone apse and the trace of a fresco depicting Saint Sebastian on the arch to the right; at the entrance are inserted on the sides two milestones of Via Julia Augusta that have been transferred there from the surrounding countryside where they were found. The most moving and evocative part of the church is the crypt, which can be accessed through the original staircase to the right of the altar, where part of the pavement of the time remains.
The small low rectangular room is divided into three naves by columns in precious marbles from Roman buildings and monuments, which support cross vaults resting on the walls on carved stone shelves. The first column you’ll encounter is actually a milestone of Via Julia Augusta from the time of the Emperor Caracalla, with the inscription: "IMP - ANTONINVS PIVS FELIX - AVG PONI CVRAVIT DXC" which reminds the distance in miles (590) from Rome, a figure that is repeated identical on the milestone of the Augustus era placed at the entrance.
Leaving the church go down the flight of steps on the right and go around the apse in tuff blocks with a low slit, to better observe the quadrangular bell tower, with two single windows on each side of the belfry, as well in blocks of tuff, with three slits to confirm the also military use of the structure.
Back to the churchyard, cross the whole square up to the beautiful fountain under the vault with seats on the right: this is the sixteenth century Funtanin, with a semi-oval decorated stone basin and a monolith with two masks on the façade. From here on the right pass through the sixteenth century gate Porta Piemonte, the northern access to the village, with a wide view over the whole valley; at the sides continue the high sixteenth-century walls with an uninterrupted series of slits at the top and others at the bottom.
Returning to the square, go up to the right along Vico d'Appio and, keeping the right, upon reaching the widening, observe in the garden under the fig tree on the right, the continuation of the walls with loopholes, advancing along which you’ll reach Porta della Colla, of which you have in front of you the crossed arches that support the stairs and the walkways of the quadrangular defensive bastion.
Outside, you’ll face the second circle of lower walls, with loopholes, while to the left proceeds the circle of mighty inner walls that continue from the gate and then bend at right angle to the sea. You can follow them to the hanging guardhouse at the corner and see their continuation to the east, appreciating their favourable strategic position dominating a wide stretch of sea.
Going back you’ll see that to the left of the gate the walls continue to descend and embrace the historical center, forming at the corner the quadrangular 16th century bastion of defense. Returning by the same street, just before reaching the square, turn right along Vico Scorzese; past the stone tondo decorated with an Agnus at number 32, upon arriving to the widening you’ll see on the right beyond the garden an aedicule with a stone tondo carved with a Virgin and Child.
Continuing among archaic houses, when you arrive to the widening go right reaching the arch of Porta Nizza, with its sixteenth-century walls equipped with high slits; from there go back on the same street and, past the widening, walk next to the thirteenth-century church of San Francesco, of which you’ll see on the left side the side door with a stone ogival arch, and then continue until you reach the cathedral square and from there, on the right, go back to the car.
Once the visit to the city is over, go by car along Via Aurelia towards the east and, after crossing again part of the town, take on the left the State Road 20 of Colle di Tenda. The road climbs up the left bank of the Nervia stream and repeatedly intersects with the viaducts of the Ventimiglia-Cuneo railway line, taking you in ten kilometers of wild landscape to the village of Airole.