Acquaro

The village is known for the healthfulness of the waters that flow there abundantly, recalled by both the place name of the main town and that of the hamlet Limpidi. The village is of ancient origins related to the affairs of the nearby Arena, of which Acquaro was a hamlet. Here too, as is easy to imagine, the 1783 earthquake struck with great fury, razing to the ground the old village of whose original appearance only faint traces remain. The Mother Church, whose foundation dates back to the 14th century, is decorated with 19th-century stucco and houses some valuable wooden statues. We first point out the Our Lady of the Assumption placed in the niche of the high altar, the work of Giuseppe De Lorenzo, son of the better-known sculptor Domenico; a beautiful St. Anthony of Padua, the work of the famous Friar Diego da Careri; and a St. Francis of Paola, an 18th-century work attributed by Gianfrancesco Solferino to the sculptor Giovanni Antonio Colicci, who was originally from Rome but worked mainly in Naples and the rest of southern Italy. Also of great interest is an imposing crucifix from a local workshop, which according to the aforementioned art historian Gianfrancesco Solferino can be dated to the first half of the 16th century. The small church of St. Joseph is worth a stop, where another work by Calabrian sculptor friar Diego da Careri depicting St. Francis of Assisi can be seen. Wandering around the built-up area, it is still possible to find ruins of sacred buildings and dwellings. Acquaro also boasts a lush green equipped area in the Speranza locality.