Ancient Path

... trampling the superimposed footsteps of those who, that road, not for pleasure, but out of necessity, went tracing, to survive, to meet others, to know, to escape, to reach the ends of the world.

- Duccio Demetrio -

In recent years it has become "fashionable" to rediscover ancient forgotten paths, ancient communication, trade and pilgrimage routes. Over the course of history, the needs of populations change, the centers of power and worship change, the political structures and economic needs change, consequently trade and the movements of people also change, new trade routes open up and old routes gradually lose importance, sometimes become obsolete, are abandoned, forgotten.

Rediscovering and retracing these ancient routes means discovering and connecting to a territory and its characteristics, it is very different from doing a simple excursion or trekking. Spending several days in a territory, sleeping there, eating there, seeing it at various times of the day, means entering the soul of the places, because not only are they crossed at a slow pace, marked by our steps and our breathing, but you get to know the territory in a more intimate way, if we can use this term. It's similar to when you go to the same place several times, because you particularly like it, or you feel particularly good there, then something happens, a complicity, a feeling of welcome, a knowledge that goes beyond the superficial visit.

We are led to think, with all modern means, that traveling is a prerogative of us moderns, to tell the truth man has always traveled, travel is the destiny of man. Despite the limited means of travel in our past, men have always traveled, covering impressive distances, they probably traveled more than us, and their trips were much more adventurous and motivated, they did not travel for vacation or out of boredom.

In ancient Greece many people set out to discover the world, and on foot many even reached the far north of Europe, they were trips that lasted a lifetime, and often the return was not contemplated, despite the limited means and the difficulties of the language. In ancient Rome, those who could afford it would set off to reach the coast of Turkey on the Black Sea, near the present-day city of Inebolu, where there was a famous oracle, and all this journey just to have a prophecy, a premonition, a prediction about the future, which was also a clear scam.

Then think of the Renaissance painters, who had to travel from Rome or Florence to Venice to buy pigments from distant lands, to create their colors, ultramarine blue takes its name from this long journey that the pigments had to make to reach Venice. In the Middle Ages, a thinker of the caliber of Giordano Bruno left his homeland of Umbria to travel on horseback to Paris, to get a book that was in a library in that city!

Our primitive ancestors built axes and spearheads with a particular rock that was extracted in a mountainous area in the current province of Savona, artifacts built with this material have been found on Mount Lama near Bardi, but not only, also in the Veneto and in territories of Austria, so trade routes that moved stones from Liguria to the heart of Europe already existed in prehistoric times. The history of mines and mineral resources has often marked the history of man, and has been the cause of intense trade and migration.

The ancient Minoans from the Aegean island of Crete had copper mines in North America, in Michigan and in the Great Lakes area, Roman coins have been found buried in New York State, the Vikings and the Chinese in ancient times knew and traded with the Americas, artifacts with Egyptian hieroglyphics have been found in caves in the Amazon forest, think of the Grand Tour so popular in the nineteenth century.

In short, traveling around the world is certainly not a prerogative of modern times. and today we want to do it with all the comforts possible and imaginable and in complete safety, guaranteed and insured, and then we call these pre-packaged packages that are proof against the unexpected "adventures".

Today we are used to conceiving a "way", a path, as a well-defined and marked line, like a road, a railway, a well-marked path, but in ancient times it was not exactly like that. A path, an ancient way, was more realistically a wide track, it designated a territory and a direction of crossing, not so much a road or a well-defined path. So much so that often the paths and places of transit changed often in relation to the social and morphological situations of the territory, an area could be unsafe, then one went elsewhere, if a stretch of path gave way due to a landslide, then one went around the obstacle by going elsewhere, rather than repairing the damage, so the paths were variable traces, a maze of paths and variants that led in a certain direction, dotted with refreshment points, places to change horses, taverns, hostels, hospitals, and some obligatory passage points, such as bridges (where they existed), passes, customs.

Our Apennines have also witnessed the rise and fall of many ancient communication routes, they have been crossed and trampled by pilgrims, merchants, armies, invaders, kings, saints and smugglers. and many of these routes are being recovered today, for tourism purposes, to promote the territory, and for reasons of historical and cultural interest. They are interesting routes, to be studied, to be faced prepared, and to be traveled with attentive eyes and an open mind, to rediscover an authentic and ancient way of traveling and relating to the territory and its people.

In these pages I will try to illustrate and collect all the ancient routes and ancient paths, more or less rediscovered, more or less recovered, that crossed our Apennines, hoping it can be useful in some way, or at least pleasant or curious for someone. A way to tell and illustrate our beautiful mountains and its nature, and to remember a little of our roots.