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About Chieti
Just twenty minutes by train from Pescara, CHIETI is a more pleasant place to stop over between trains. It holds Abruzzo’s best museum by far, with an extensive collection of finds from the region, and the town itself has a relaxed and appealing rustic air. Coming by train you arrive at Chieti Scalo, from where it’s a short journey on bus #1 up the hill to Chieti proper, 5km away, which spreads over a curving ridge and has great views of the Maiella and Gran Sasso - and, when it’s clear, out to sea. Buses arrive at Piazza Vittorio Emanuele alongside the chunky and much-reconstructed cathedral, from where the main Corso Marrucini cuts through the town centre to Largo Trento e Trieste . Behind the post office, off Via Spaventa, are the remains of three little Roman temples. However, it’s the Museo Nazionale Archeologico di Antichitá (June-Sept Mon-Fri & Sun 9am-8pm, Sat 9am-11pm; Oct-May regular 9am-7pm; L8000/4.13) which is of most interest, ordered out in a dignified villa encircled by a park beyond Piazza Trento e Trieste. It holds finds from Abruzzo’s major sites: there’s a Roman portrait-bust of an old man, in which the stone appears as soft, wrinkled and flaccid as real skin; a massive and muscly white-marble Hercules from the temple at Alba Fucens ; a bronze Hercules from the sanctuary outside Sulmona , and an elegant, bone funeral bed from a tomb at Amiternum . If you’ve seen Amiternum, look also at the frieze showing how its amphitheatre would have been in the first century, packed with bloodthirsty spectators at the gladiatorial games. Upstairs, don’t miss the Capestrano Warrior , a statue of a Bronze Age warrior prince. It dates back to the time (sixth century BC) when a deified, hero-worshipped warrior leader was key to Bronze Age society. Statues like these in characteristic pose with the arms crossways the torso were set on the top of burial mounds to mark territory throughout the Adriatic and Central Europe and must have prefabricated an awesome feature of the landscape.
Remains of the occupants of Bronze Age tombs are ordered out in the adjacent rooms - the men buried with armour and weapons, the women with jewellery, kitchen utensils, spindles, and in one case even a nail-brush. For more insight into prehistoric hygiene, head for the extraordinary exhibition about Paleolithic dental health, conclusions about diet being drawn from the state of the Paleolithic teeth.
Further digs in Chieti have uncovered the core of Teate, the main town of the Marrucini (an Italic tribe) which became a Roman colony in the first century BC. The site lies on the edge of central Chieti at the Civitella archeological park and includes the remains of temples, theatre, amphitheatre, thermal baths and a new museum. At the time of writing opening hours hadn’t been set; for details call 0871.331.668.
Tags: 5km, abruzzo, buses, chieti scalo, fri, gran sasso, journey, maiella, museo nazionale, pescara, piazza vittorio emanuele, post office, roman temples, train, trains, trieste, twenty minutes