From the ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum to city's best museums and churches, Claire Gervat selects five of the most enticing attractions in the Italia.
1. Museo Archeologico Nazionale
Delicate mosaics, frescoes from Roman villas, bronze oil lamps shaped like snails: this impressive collection of antique goodies, housed in a lofty 17th-century palazzo, is one of the world's largest and best. You'll need half a day to whizz through, despite the closure of the Egyptian section for restoration. Non-Italian speakers may find the labelling frustrating, though there are audio-guides in English.
Piazza Museo 19
00 39 081 564 9841
9am-7pm, closed Tue
2. Napoli Sotterranea and San Lorenzo Maggiore (excavations)
Hemmed in by their city walls for more than 2,000 years, the Neapolitans had no option but to build over previous structures. Catch a tantalising glimpse of these older layers on an escorted underground tour through part of a Roman theatre, and the tunnels and cisterns of the ancient city's water system, used as air-raid shelters in the last war.
Nearby, excavations under San Lorenzo Maggiore have revealed a section of the Roman covered market – once housing bakers, dyers and butchers – below the traces of a sixth-century courthouse. A small museum gives more information about the site through the centuries.
Napoli Sotterranea
Piazza San Gaetano 68
00 39 081 296 944
Tours: Mon-Fri noon, 2pm, 4pm; Sat-Sun 10am, noon, 2pm, 4pm, 6pm
€9.30
San Lorenzo Maggiore (excavations)
Via dei Tribunali 316
00 39 081 211 0860
Mon-Sat 9.30am-5.30pm, Sun 9.30am-1.30pm
€5
3. Museo di Capodimonte
By the 18th century, the art collection of Naples's Bourbon rulers and their Farnese relatives was so enormous that it took a new royal palace on a hill above the old town to house it all. These days mere mortals can pace the endless corridors, galleries and royal apartments admiring paintings and sculptures by predominantly Italian artists. It's all on such an epic scale that you'll appreciate being able to recover in the surrounding park.
Porta Piccola via Miano 2
00 39 081 749 9111
8.30am-7.30pm, closed Wed
€7.50
4. Capella Sansevero
Santa Chiara has its Majolica-tiled cloister and a Roman bath, Gesu Nuovo has its frescoes and unusual façade and the Duomo has its gilded treasures and saintly relics, but they're models of ecclesiastical restraint compared with tiny Sansevero Chapel. Originally built in 1590, its interior was remodelled in high Baroque style two centuries later: cue coloured marble, stucco and trompe l'oeil decoration, plus a multiplicity of statues of saints, cherubs and mythical creatures.
Via F de Sanctis 19
00 39 081 551 8470
Mon and Wed-Fri 10am-6pm, Sat-Sun 10am-1.30pm
€6
5. Pompeii and Herculaneum
Vesuvius's eruption in AD79 may have been disastrous for the people of Pompeii and Herculaneum, but for posterity it has been a blessing. Pompeii, smothered by volcanic ash and cinders, is a revelation: a neat grid of cart-rutted paved streets lined with two-storey houses with gardens and courtyards, and shops complete with signs and counters, not to mention public baths, theatres and an amphitheatre. Herculaneum, drowned in boiling mud, is even better preserved, though only partly excavated, with delicate frescoes and mosaics that you'd swear were newer than 2,000 years old.
If your imagination needs help reconstructing Roman times, stop off at the new multi-media museum in Ercolano, halfway between the site and the station. Along with volcanic rumblings and hissing jets of steam, there are holograms, street cries and screens showing villas and streets before and after.
Pompeii
Via Villa dei Misteri 2
00 39 081 857 5347
8.30am-7.30pm (5pm Nov-Mar); last entry 90 minutes before closing
€11
Herculaneum
Corso Resina
00 39 081 857 5347
8.30am-7.30pm (5pm Nov-Mar); last entry 90 minutes before closing
€11
Museo Archeologico Virtuale Ercolano
Via IV Novembre 44
00 39 081 1980 6511
9am-5pm except Mon
€7
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