How Tarquinia was built and evolved over time

Tarquinia was built three times, in three places, and the separation is the key to understanding the site.

The Etruscan city stood on the plateau of the Civita, north-east of the modern town. From the end of the tenth century BC it grew into one of the largest proto-urban centres in Etruria, with a main settlement there and a satellite village on the Monterozzi.

That satellite village was then buried by the dead. The Monterozzi plateau became the necropolis, and over six thousand tombs of every period have been catalogued on it, about four hundred of them painted hypogea cut into the rock and reached by stepped shafts.

In the fourth century BC, during the revival associated with the Spurinna family, the city ringed itself with powerful walls built of macco blocks and running about eight kilometres — colossal walls raised in response to threats from the Celts and from Rome.

On the coast, the emporium of Gravisca was built as the city's trading port, with a sanctuary that served Greek merchants from the east.

The modern town is the third site: a medieval hill town at 133 metres above the Marta, which carried the name Corneto until 1872 and sits apart from both the ancient city and its cemetery.