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The locality of Santa Cecilia is located along the valley of the Fosso Castello, which separates the territory of Bomarzo from that of Chia (Frazione di Soriano).
Info: Soriano Terzo Millennio Onlus Association
Tel / Fax 0761.75.95.38 3486576158 Paolo archeologia@sorianoterzomillennio.org
ProLoco of Soriano nel Cimino, Piazza Umberto I, tel./fax 0761746001
01038 – Soriano nel Cimino (VT) Tel / Fax 0761.746001 – info@prolocosoriano.it
ARCHAEOLOGICAL AREA OF SANTA CECILIA
HISTORY AND DESCRIPTION
Santa Cecilia is located along the Fosso Castello valley, which separates the territory of Bomarzo from that of Chia. The area preserves artifacts of an ancient settlement, most likely dating back to the early Middle Ages. The wooded area, in a few thousand square meters, contains remains of different types, which suggest that the site was inhabited from prehistoric times to the Christian era. The most significant ruins belong to an ancient rock village, which is accessed via a road carved into the rock. There are rocky walls and numerous volcanic boulders flattened and used to obtain caves, niches, support bases and side walls of huts, pillars, pestarole, drainage channels, various artifacts.
On a large boulder emerge the remains of a medieval church, in Romanesque style, probably dedicated to Santa Cecilia (from which the name of the place derives): interesting to admire: parts of the apse into which the religious building of rectangular shape, walls and decorative elements such as the pillar used for the altar table, capitals, toothed round arches and carved fragments. Near the building, among the ruins of the church itself, you can also see various monolithic anthropomorphic pit sarcophagi and parts of them, which in the past belonged to the ancient cemetery.
ESSENTIAL BIBLIOGRAPHY
D’ARCANGELI V., Soriano nel Cimino nella storia e nell’arte, Viterbo 1981.
EGIDI A., I resti di un antico villaggio cristiano presso Bomarzo, in “Viterbium”, anno I, Viterbo ottobre 1959.
GOLETTI A., SERRONE G., S. Giovenale e il Castello di Chia, Città del Vaticano 1996.
MENICHINO G., Escursionismo d’autore nella Terra degli Etruschi, vol. III, Viaggio nella Tuscia, Pitigliano (Gr) 2008.
SANNA M., PROIETTI L., Presenze archeologiche lungo la ” Via Publica Ferentiensis ” e le sue diramazioni. Indagine conoscitiva di un territorio, Viterbo 2007.
Soriano nel Cimino, a cura di Carivit S.p.a., autori D’ARCANGELI V., SANTOCCHI A., Viterbo 1993.
Tuscia nascosta. Guida ai luoghi antichi nella campagna viterbese, a cura di Società Archeologica Viterbese “Pro Ferento”, Viterbo 2006.
