Campania is a Region of Southern Italy, bordering on Lazio to the north-west, Molise to the north, Puglia to the north-east, Basilicata to the east, and the Tyrrhenian Sea to the west. The region covers 13,595 km² and has a population of 5.7 million. The name derives from Latin, as it was called by Romans Campania felix ("fortunate countryside"), a name that is shared by the French province of Champagne. Campania was part of Magna Graecia, the Greek colonies of southern Italy; the first Greek colony was founded at Cumae, north of present day Naples, in the 8th century BC. Etruscans and Samnites gave way to the expanding Roman Republic. The regional capital is Naples (Napoli). Tourist attractions include the Sibyl's cave at Cumae, the Greek temples at Paestum, the Roman ruins at Pompeii and Herculaneum, the volcanoes of Vesuvius, Campi Flegrei and Ischia, the Amalfi Coast (Costiera Amalfitana) from Sorrento to Salerno and the island of Capri.
Naples (Napoli in italian, from Greek Νέα Πόλις - Néa Pólis - meaning "New City") is the largest city in southern Italy and capital of Campania Region. The city has a population of about 1 million, and together with its suburbs, the urban area has 4.4 million inhabitants. It is located just halfway between the Vesuvius volcano and a separate volcanic area, the Campi Flegrei.
***Vesuvius is famous for the catastrophic eruption in 79 A.D. that buried the towns of Herculaneum and Pompeii. Vesuvius has a long history. The oldest dated rock from the volcano is about 300,000 years old. It was collected from a well drilled near the volcano and was probably part of the Somma volcano. After Somma collapsed about 17,000 years ago, Vesuvius began to form. The 79 A.D. eruption of Vesuvius was the first volcanic eruption ever to be described in detail. From 18 miles (30 km) west of the volcano, Pliny the Younger, witnessed the eruption and later recorded his observations in two letters. He described the earthquakes before the eruption, the eruption column, air fall, the effects of the eruption on people, pyroclastic flows, and even tsunami. Volcanologists now use the term "plinian" to refer to sustained explosive eruptions which generate high-altitude eruption columns and blanket large areas with ash. It is estimated that at times during the eruption the column of ash was 20 miles (32 km) tall. About 1 cubic mile (4 cubic kilometers) of ash was erupted in about 19 hours It is rich in historical, artistic and cultural traditions and gastronomy. Neapolitan is a colourful, rich italian dialect- known in Naples as Napulitano. The city is served by Naples International Airport Capodichino. Sorrento is a small city in Campania, Italy, with some 16,500 inhabitants. The town can be reached easily from Naples and Pompeii, as it lies at the south-eastern end of the CircumVesuviana rail line. The town overlooks the bay of Naples; it is the key place of the Sorrentine Peninsula, and many viewpoints in the city allow sight of Naples itself and Vesuvius. The "Amalfi drive" (connecting Sorrento and Amalfi) is the narrow road that threads around the high cliffs above the Mediterranean. Ferry boats and hydrofoils provide services to Naples, Amalfi, Positano, Capri and Ischia. Sorrento's sea cliffs are impressive and its luxury hotels, particularly the Excelsior Vittoria, have attracted famous personalities including Enrico Caruso and Luciano Pavarotti. Sorrento is famous for the production of Limoncello, an alcoholic aperitif made from lemon rinds, alcohol, water and sugar. Other agricultural production include agrumes, vine, nuts and olive trees. Wood craftsmanship is also developed. On the morning of August 24, A.D. 79, a great noise was heard in the area around Vesuvius. A mushroom shaped cloud of gas and volcanic rock rose high in the air, darkening the sky. A shower of burning cinders and rock fragments covered Pompei. It lasted until the next day, caving in roofs and claiming its first victims. The Pompeians tried to take shelter in the houses or hoped to escape by walking on top of the layers of pumice stones constantly being formed, which by this point were more than 2 meters deep. But at dawn on August 25, a violent explosion of toxic gases and burning cinders devastated the city.
Other attractions : Cumae was the first Greek colony on the mainland of Italy (Magna Graecia), there having been earlier starts on the islands of Ischia and Sicily by colonists from the Euboean cities of Chalcis (Χαλκίς) and possibly Eretria (Ερέτρια) or Cuma (Kύμη).
Cumae is perhaps most famous as the seat of the Cumaean Sibyl. Her sanctuary is now open to the public. The colony was also the entry point onto the Italian peninsula for the Cumean alphabet, a variant of which was adapted by the Romans. In Roman mythology, there is an entrance to the underworld located at Avernus, a crater near Cumae, and was the route Aeneas used to descend to the Underworld.
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Naples itself is less visited than some of the surrounding attractions. There are, however, many attractions within the city. La Villa Comunale (formerly a royal park) has been refurbished and stretches along the seafront in the smarter western end of the city. It contains an aquarium which is possibly Europe's oldest and is favoured by the locals for family walks on Sunday mornings. The Museo Archeologico Nazionale Napoli contains a large collection of Roman artifacts from Pompeii and Herculaneum as well as the Farnese Marbles, some of the greatest surviving Roman statues, an amazing numismatical collection; The Museo Nazionale di Capodimonte contains art collections including works by Michelangelo, Raphael, Botticelli and Caravaggio. Naples is the home of the Teatro di San Carlo, the oldest active opera house in Europe, which opened its doors on November 4, 1737.
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It infiltrated everything, taking those who were trying to flee by surprise and making every form of defense vain. A shower of very fine ash was deposited everywhere to a depth of more than six meters, enveloping everything and adhering to the forms of the bodies and even the folds of their clothes. When, two days later, the fury of the elements abated, the entire area had a different aspect: a white blanket covered everything; the Sarno river was trying to find its course again after having been filled with volcanic rubble; and the coast, submerged by the material spewed forth by Vesuvius, had encroached on the sea! The whole city was declared off limits, to protect the property of the survivors, but clandestine diggers tried to plunder it anyway. For a long time the human presence was rare and marginal, and only under the emperor Hadrian, around 120 A.D., was at least the road system in the area reopened to traffic.
