Portici. The town and its architectures

On the south-east side of the coast of the Gulf of Naples lies Portici, a city of medieval origins. In the 13th century, under the Swabian rule, the presence of control towers on the coast and a long period of inactivity of the Vesuvius, encouraged the development of new settlements in the Vesuvian area. In the 13th century, Torre Octava (today, Torre del Greco) grew around the 8th tower and welcomed the rural population that has abandoned the area of the Vesuvius after its eruption in 1306. Torre del Greco had a great territorial expansion: it reached Somma, Ottaviano, Scafati and included small rural areas like Resina, Portici and Cremano. The history of the Vesuvian area has always been influenced by the dark shadow of the Vesuvius, which has always determined either the development or the crisis of its settlements; the fortune of one and the decline of the other. Although the Vesuvius has often brought destruction and death, its slopes have been periodically repopulated and the new cultivations that kept flourishing on the deserts of lava, have always outlined very fascinating views: green and coloured fields beam on the greyness of the lava and the emerald green sea, that laps against the Vesuvius, dazzles the dark shades of its mountains. In the second half of the 18th century, the archaeological interests of Queen Mary Amelia of Saxony, wife of Charles of Bourbon, encouraged the resumption of archaeological excavations in the Greek-roman towns of Ercolano and Pompei, destroyed by the eruption of the Vesuvius in 79 A.D.