The Marina Grande (Large Marina), which was the only seafaring village in Sorrento until the 15th century, is located on the mouth of the ravine closing on the west the old city and crossed on top by the bridge of Parsano, from where it started the Via Minerva (Athena's Road) leading to the sanctuary of Athena on the Punta Campanella. Marina Grande is separated from the centre of Sorrento by the promontory which housed the Roman villa of Agrippa Postumus, nephew of the emperor Octavian Augustus.

Even now we enter the Marina Grande (if we follow the pedestrian path) through the ancient gate, built with large blocks of limestone. For its construction typology (even if it was renovated many times) we estimate it belongs to the 3rd century before Christ. From here entered the Saracen pirates who ravaged Sorrento in 1558, because of the betrayal of a slave who, as told by the tradition, in the middle of the night secretly opened the gate, otherwise impregnable.

The Marina Grande of Sorrento has been touched only partially by the touristic development which has instead changed radically the Marina Piccola. It has better saved its peculiarity of seafaring suburb, thanks to the character of its inhabitants, who have always formed a community much united and tenaciously attached to their family values and to their working and religious traditions. Here the beach is felt and experienced as a collective space (as in the past) for the work and the free time of the whole community, as demonstrated by the presence on the sand of the fishing nets, the equipments and the beached boats.

On this beach, as a shipyard in the open air, they were built the famous "gozzi sorrentini", typical boats from this area, with a single lateen sail, long from 6 to 12 meters, manageable and reliable, practically unsinkable. The mastery of the craftsmen was so renown that those boats were adopted by fishermen and sailors from all over the gulf and from the islands, who came to Sorrento to order their boats. Heirs of this tradition are the motor boats (Gozzi) built nowadays in Sorrento and in the surroundings.  [ More...]