I. Classical archaeology
Thanks to excavations and occasional chance finds, archaeologists have been able to follow the tracks and interpret the signs of a settlement pattern which, though not dense, is nonetheless complex and multifaceted. Among these vestiges are a landing place in today's Fuenti and a thermal baths complex brought back to light from under an eighteenth-century pottery in today's Vietri, where historians locate Marcina, the Etruscan city mentioned by Strabo. From the Gallo Lungo islet to Positano, from Amalfi to the magnificent seaside villa of Minori, the coast preserves the memory of the opulence of the idle days and leisure time of ancient ages, the charm of the dreamlike villas that look out onto and are immersed in the fantastic views that the places offers. The working population lived elsewhere, among the hills of the agricultural hinterland that mountain passes link to the Nuceria Alfaterna countryside. Today these spots represent an extraordinary repository of vestiges of the past, and in particular of moveable ones. They tell a story that perhaps is not quite as splendid but is likewise spellbinding, a story that the remains of the rural villa found at Tramonti and the precious but neglected Hellenistic, Roman, Medieval vestiges can only whisper.

II. Medieval archaeology
Houses and churches, architectural details and decorative particulars, a myriad of small, almost indiscernible signs that unobtrusively escort the passerby strolling along the roads of Pontone: this is what is left of the Middle Ages on the Amalfi Coast. Middle Ages made of multicoloured marquetry and arched inner courtyards, ominous towers that have been turned into homes, ingenious Arab baths with terracotta piping and countless churches, amongst which stand out the romantic ruins of the church of St. Eustachio that still towers over the crag with its apses and its decorated façade.

III. Military archaeology
The remains of the mighty defensive system of the dukedom of Amalfi still bespeak a glorious past suspended between history and legend, telling the tale of the alternating fortunes of sieges withstood and attacks fended off. From Vietri to Positano a succession of towers stand guard over the sinuous coast-line. These towers date back to the Angevin and Aragonese period or to that of the Spanish Viceroyalty and have very particular structures, modeled according to the morphology of the site where they were built. Like watchmen, they look out at sea ready to descry, warn, signal, and report events using a complex but precise code made of smoke, fire and the blast of explosives. This awesome defensive system is completed by "castra" nested in the more strategic spots along the hills at Tramonti, Maiori, Ravello and right up to Scala: castles which were erected in defence of sea and land but are now almost in ruins. Unknown to almost all and not at all exploited, as they could be, for tourist purposes, they help reconstruct the history of a territory delimited by walls and studded with towers, permeated by presences and imbued with legends that climax in the tragic love story of Joan, duchess of Aragon.

IV. Industrial archaeology
The sites of early industrial activities that flourised in this area can still be located in the fabric of towns and retell the story of centuries-old manufacturing traditions and renowned productions. Near Amalfi numerous paper-mills are still to be found along the banks of the Chiarito river, in the luxuriant greenery of the enchanting Ferriere Valley. Multistorey buildings, locks and canals, basins and airing terraces, vaults in different styles according to the historical period to which they belong bear testimony to an ancestral wisdom: the art and practice of water power. And at Vietri the ancient potteries indicate the birth-place of the vases and ceramic tiles that add colour to the domes and floors, aedicules and decorated panels of the Amalfi Coast. Vietri ceramic recaps the sense of an amalgamation and a specific cultural hybrid, an art which bears witness to the skill with which sensitive local maestros used spring water and the fire of kilns to mould their raw material - clay - merging local traditions with inspirations mediated from foreign artists.

V. Rupestrian settlements
Oriental monasticism reached the Amalfi Coast as early as the 8th century when monks and hermits fleeing from iconoclastic persecutions settled in Maiori, Tramonti, Minori, Atrani, Pontone, Ravello, Tovere, Furore: the numerous, countless natural caves where the early hermits dwelled testify to the Amalfi Coast's past as an ideal location of mystical ascesis and pensive silence, of heart-rending prayer and longed-for solitude. Grottoes were turned into chapels and chapels grew into churches where ascetics gathered together in lauras and eventually in coenobies: during the transition from Oriental Basilian religiosity to Latin Benedictine rule these places of worship changed form and characteristics but preserved the intimate, constant imprint of a faith that was simple, essential, absolute. The places where saints and hermits dwelt still reveal a lifestyle that was pure, different, far removed from the influences that elsewhere ended up changing the original Byzantine religiosity: they are small churches, chapels, simple grottoes that timidly suggest a glimmer of rare medieval frescoes. All these vestiges have in common the misfortune of being in a state of serious neglect and deplorable dereliction that dooms them to a fate of utter degradation which in some cases makes them already totally inaccessible.