SINUESSA - THE UNDERWATER CITY

​

Sinuessa from which Mondragone originated, borders to the north with Sessa , to the east with Capua , to the south with Castelvoturno and to the west with the Tyrrhenian Sea. In ancient times, those from the Ausoni region who wanted to enter Campania coming from Minturno, on the Via Appia , met Sinuessa placed on the beach in a small plain and in an inlet of the sea. This, formerly called Sinope for the beauty of its site, was occupied in the year 415 BC by Tito Manlio Torquato who, fighting with the Samnites, took possession of it, making it a Roman city, changing its name from Sinope to Sinuessa , in honor of a pagan divinity, the Nymph Sinuessa (mother of Neptune).

We have very little news of the ancient Greek city while we have certain news of Sinuessa. The city was very large, and was located in the plain between the Massive Hills and the Tyrrhenian Sea . It had temples erected on granite columns and other precious marbles, was adorned with statues and mosaics, and was home to very famous baths where the Roman nobles went to take care of their health. The particular fertility of the soil and the proximity of the sea meant that in a short time the so-called Production Villas were built in the colony of Sinuessa , equipped with everything needed to produce specialized crops. In the 2nd century BC the houses also occupied the higher slopes of both Mount Petrino and Mount Massico (the ruins of a villa found in Colombrelli , where the Venus of Sinuessa was found, testify to this). On these mountains the cultivation of vines spread which, in a short time, provided a significant wine production, so much so that the city was renowned for the Falerno wine. Even the poet Horace celebrates it in his poems and, in Rome , there was no important banquet that was not washed down by Falerno .

This wine was so delicious that it was kept for two hundred years. The wealth of the city was not only linked to wine production but also to that of cereals, olives and cattle breeding. These products contributed to the wealth of the Sinuessani.

The city grew in a short time and became a commercial and tourist center and reached its highest splendor in the 1st century AD for the inauguration of an important road, the Domitiana, which was built in 96 AD, so much so that many politicians and influencers including Cicerone Tigellino, a cruel man and friend of the emperor Nero , had rich villas built in this area.

All this testifies to the greatness of the Ancient Sinuessa and suggests that its disappearance took place not only by the barbarians, but above all by earthquakes and tsunamis. Catastrophic upheavals across the coast have engulfed the city.