The name Basilicata takes its name from the Latin Basileus, meaning land of kings. The poets however, have always called it something different - Lucania - a more musical sounding word, evoking the memory of the now vanished Lucania people, whose dialect has lived on in many Basilicatan villages.
Irrespective of whatever name this Italian province deserves, this area represents the essence of southern Italy.
In this region people from the hills bond with those from the shores of the Ionian sea and legendary Magna Graecia and Tyrrhenian coasts.
Along the Tyrrhenian seaboard nature takes in both mountain and littoral, creating an inspiration that is increasingly being visited by enthusiastic holiday makers to view a meeting in man's history between east and west and a land which embraces every Italian landscape possible.
Each town in Basilicata, hangs on to its local culture, customs and traditions tightly. Observable traditions, like the harvesting of grapes for example, can reveal an extraordinary richness in being, that can even surprise at times, the inhabitants of the area themselves who have grown up with them like they do visitors who only catch a glimpse of it.
If you let your fantasy run wild while exploring the countryside in Basilicata, it is evident upon first glance that ancient customs and myths will never die out, in this land where nature takes first priority as man’s first and foremost protector and provider.
Italy's Mezzogiorno or afternoon as it is literally translated, with it sun that creates vivid contrasts on the earth's surfaces is realized in the province of Basilicata in which the sacred mountains begin their trek towards the tip of the Italian peninsula, dominating the skyline in solemnity and grandeur.
Italy is, without question, realized to its full extent in Basilicata a land of between earth, sky, stars and trees.
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