Bisaccia, the ducal castle where Irpinia looks out over Apulia

There are villages that don't shout. Bisaccia is one of them: perched on a spur at the eastern edge of Irpinia, where the province of Avellino already looks out towards the Ofanto valley and the borders of Apulia. You won't find queues, tour buses or lines at the ticket office. You'll find the wind on the plateau, a few old folk sitting in front of a stone doorway, and a silence that many will find almost disorienting.

The Ducal Castle is the heart of the town. Its origins go back to the Lombards, but it was reworked after the earthquake of 1198, in the Swabian period: the mighty keep that still dominates the settlement is attributed to Frederick II. In the 16th century, having lost its military function, it became a fortified noble residence, the home of the dukes of Bisaccia. Today the ground floor houses an archaeological museum with the grave goods from the Iron Age tombs found on the town's hill: vases, ornaments, fragments of a community that lived on these ridges almost three thousand years ago.

Beyond the castle opens the old town, made of narrow alleys, stairways, patrician palaces and carved doorways. You walk slowly, because here there is no other way. From certain viewpoints, such as the cliff by the church of Sant'Antonio, your gaze runs the length of the entire Ofanto valley, all the way to where Campania becomes Apulia.

Bisaccia is not a half-day, hit-and-run destination. It is a place to go along with: a stop at a tavern, the herbs and cheeses of the plateau, the village festivals where you end up chatting with the locals. It is inland Irpinia, the one organised tourism skips over on its way elsewhere, and which for that very reason has kept itself genuine.

Come for the castle, stay for the silence. And leave the village as you found it.

Getting there

You arrive by car from the A16 Naples-Bari motorway, exiting at Lacedonia and continuing on the provincial roads towards Bisaccia, in the high Irpinia on the border with Apulia. The nearest railway station is Calitri-Pescopagano, on the Avellino-Rocchetta Sant'Antonio line, though it is served by only a few trains. The reference airport is Naples.