Mausoleo degli Equinozi

Extraordinarily well preserved inside, it is built in opus quadratum of travertine blocks, with a cement core of flint flakes, lime and pozzolana and probably dates back to the 2nd century BC. Cylindrical on the outside, with a masonry drum with a diameter of approximately 13.50 m, it was originally covered by a mound and accessible from a dromos. The interior consists of a square room with sides of approximately 5.30 m, covered by a barrel vault approximately 7 m high. On three sides there are rectangular niches on three sides, in which as many “wolf’s mouth” windows open.

In 1748, the architect and engraver Giovan Battista Piranesi drew and described some fragments of plaster that he saw on the walls, from which it can be assumed that the room was frescoed. The name of the tomb, to which we do not know which family it belonged, derives from the peculiarity of being astronomically oriented towards the equinox.

Through a window of the burial chamber, sunlight enters, generating a particular effect on the exact center of the floor on the day of the equinox, a moment of the year in which in ancient times rites related to the cult of the dead and the fertility of the earth were held.