For foodies
Where to eat well in Basilicata
11 towns
Towns holding at least one place a guide put its name to. The ones several guides agree on come first.
Matera
Province: Matera · 401 m
Cave dwellings carved into limestone since the Paleolithic, called the shame of Italy in the 1950s and made European Capital of Culture in 2019.
Maratea
Province: Potenza · 300 m
Basilicata's only commune on the Tyrrhenian, thirty-two kilometers of rocky coast overlooked by a marble Christ raised inland in 1965.
Castelmezzano
Province: Potenza · 750 m
A medieval village wedged into sandstone teeth at 750 meters, linked to Pietrapertosa by a 1,452-meter zipline since 2007.
Melfi
Province: Potenza · 530 m
At 530 meters on volcanic slopes, first Norman capital of the south and seat of a landmark 1231 legal code issued from its castle.
Rotonda
Province: Potenza · 626 m
The Pollino park's Lucanian gateway: a 3,171-resident borgo at 626m on the Basilicata/Calabria border, headquarters for the Parco Nazionale del Pollino, Italy's largest national park, with the Loricato pine forests immediately above town.
Terranova di Pollino
Province: Potenza · 926 m
At 926 meters on the Lucanian side of the Pollino, the gateway into Italy's largest national park, home of the Sarmento red potato.
Acerenza
Province: Potenza · 833 m
A walled ridge town at 833 meters in the north Lucanian hills, archbishopric since 1068 under a Romanesque cathedral begun in 1080.
Irsina
Province: Matera · 548 m
A 548-meter Bradano-valley hill town, called Montepeloso until 1895, whose cathedral holds a Renaissance rarity.
Latronico
Province: Potenza · 888 m
A mountain town at 888 meters on the northern edge of the Pollino, with two prehistoric thermal springs at the Calda hamlet below.
Venosa
Province: Potenza · 415 m
Founded as Roman Venusia in 291 BC, birthplace of Horace, with an unfinished abbey built from amphitheater stones and a 1470 Aragonese castle.
Viggiano
Province: Potenza · 975 m
A 975-meter Val d'Agri ridge town, home of the Black Madonna of Lucania and the Italian folk harp, on Europe's largest onshore oil field.
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From elsewhere in Italy
Five more towns to discover
Arquà Petrarca
Province: Padova
The Euganean Hills village where Francesco Petrarca spent his last four years and died in 1374, renamed in his honor in 1868.
Samugheo
Province: Oristano
Sardinia's textile-weaving capital: a 2,757-resident Mandrolisai borgo where the MURATS regional textile museum, the Tessingiu woven-art biennale, and an active community of weavers on traditional looms keep a knot-stitch tradition alive.
Salò
Province: Brescia
On the deepest gulf of the lake, with the longest waterfront promenade and the cathedral of the Riviera di Salò.
Matelica
Province: Macerata
A Verdicchio town at 354 meters in the upper Esino valley, with a Roman marble globe in its archaeological museum.
Montecarlo
Province: Lucca
A walled hill village at 163 meters above the Lucca plain, founded by Emperor Charles IV in 1333 and named for him, surrounded by twenty wineries.