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The Cyclopean Walls of Fondi: 2,500 Years of History in Blocks of Stone
The walls of Fondi are among the oldest and best-preserved in Lazio. They run for approximately 1,500 metres around the town, an almost perfect quadrilateral of 370 metres per side, and come from at least three distinct periods. The oldest sections date back to the 8th and 7th centuries BC, when the territory was inhabited by the Aurunci: enormous blocks, stacked without mortar, so massive that the ancients attributed them to the mythical Cyclopes. Fondi is in the province of Latina, an hour from Rome along the Via Appia.
Three Techniques, Three Periods
Walking around the perimeter, the phases of construction can be read like an open book. Along Via degli Osci and Via dei Latini, the original Cyclopean boulders are visible, fitted dry and laid with a battered face. On Via Marconi, five-sided polygonal blocks appear, more carefully worked and datable to before the 4th century BC, again mortar-free. The turning point comes in the 3rd century BC, with the introduction of mortar: along Viale Regina Margherita and Via Giulia Gonzaga, the walls display opus incertum and Roman reticulate work, techniques that allowed greater height to be achieved with smaller blocks.
Still visible After 2,500 Years
Today roughly 80% of the walls survive. Fires, invasions, and earthquakes have damaged them over the centuries, but the original circuit has never changed.
