Le Muracce

The archaeological area of Le Muracce is located in the Pongelli district of Ostra Vetere, in the province of Ancona.

This site, still under excavation by the Université Clermont-Auvergne, represents an extraordinary testimony to the history of ancient Ostra.

An itinerary allows visitors to trace over two thousand years of history through an archaeological site that preserves the remains of a city founded in the second half of the 1st century BC, after the Roman conquest of the surrounding lands.

A small settlement that, like many other Roman cities in the Marche region, was colonized and taken from the Gallic Senones and the Piceni. With the Augustan age, ancient Ostra began to develop and take on a monumental appearance.

However, this phase of prosperity was followed by a slow decline caused by the Greek-Gothic wars and the arrival of the Lombards. The cities located in the valley floors, vulnerable like Ostra, were progressively abandoned by their inhabitants, who took refuge on more defensible heights, giving rise to new centers such as the current Ostra Vetere.

Access to the archaeological site, located approximately at kilometer 19 of the Statale Arceviese road in the province of Ancona, is indicated by a column drum with the inscription “qui fu Ostra Antica” (here was ancient Ostra), where an unpaved road leads towards the Misa river, providing direct access to the central area.

At first glance, there may seem to be nothing to see, but looking carefully to the left in the direction of the sea, it is possible to glimpse the rising brick walls from which the area’s name “Le Muracce” (The Crumbling Walls) derives.

A pagan temple is the most evident ruin of ancient Ostra. Only some walls remain of the “cella,” the inner part where the statuette of the venerated deity was kept, the identity of which remains uncertain. Excavations have revealed that the temple faced a Forum, a large porticoed square where the main buildings were located.

Well-preserved sections of the cardo and decumanus (the main north-south and east-west roads) are visible.

Also overlooking the Forum is the city’s Theater, and behind it, the ruins of a large thermal bath complex.