If you are embarking on a grand tour of the South of Italy, a stay in Naples is essential.  All too often, visitors head directly from Rome to the Amalfi Coast, completely bypassing Naples.  Some of this is just due to bad press coverage.  Everyone has something to say about Naples.  That it’s dirty (a lot of big cities are).  That it’s full of pick pockets (the author of this article has been pick pocketed exactly once in Italy and that was in Florence).  That it’s crazy.  It is, but in a good way. Whatever your views, Naples is one of a kind. And in ways that other more touristy Italian cities are unable, Bella Napoli offers an authentic portrait of Italy’s past, present and future. 

Naples is the geographic link between the glories of ancient Greece and the rise of imperial Rome.  Greek settlers arrived here in roughly 700 BC before later heading further North.  They brought religion, culture and WINE! With a historic center that has been continuously inhabited since before Christ, Naples is the Gateway to Italy’s South. Below you will find our top ten reasons to spend a night or two in Naples- before heading further South to your next destination!

1) The Underground 

There is a vast interconnected world underneath the above ground city of Naples.  Today you can visit an ancient Greek necropolis underneath the Rione Sanità neighborhood, an underground aqueduct in the historic center as well as a former Greco Roman theater and paleo-Christian catacombs.  All lurk several meters below street level and span several centuries of Neapolitan civilization.  Check out our founder Kristin Melia’s Guide to Naples Underground here.

2) The Street Art 

Facades of decadent buildings are like canvases for local artists in Naples.  Perhaps the most famous street artist in Naples is Jorit, who paints the faces of iconic Neapolitans on public buildings.  His rather sexy, hyper-realistic rendering of Naples’ Patron Saint Gennaro towers over the entrance to the Forcella neighborhood.  Banksy has also left his mark on the historic center of Naples with his haunting mural, Madonna with Pistol, a testament to the city’s conflicting ties to the Church and organized crime. There is also Blu, a polemic street artist who painted a truly horrifying portrait of a tortured monster on the façade of a former mental hospital in the Salvator Rossa neighborhood.  

3) Caravaggio 

Three of Caravaggio’s finest works live permanently in Naples.  Born Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio in Milano, the artist spent extensive time in Naples, where he would eventually flee after violently murdering a man in Rome. Caravaggio was a known bad boy and Naples proved the ideal place for him to escape and paint from time to time. (You can read about his time in Naples in Peter Robb’s fascinating book, Street Fight in Naples).  Caravaggio’s last known work, the Martyrdom of Saint Ursula is on display at Galleria di Palazzo Zevallos Stigliano on Via Toledo in Naples. His Seven Works of Mercy is on display at Pio Monte della Misericordia Church and his The Flagellation of Christ, commissioned by the Neapolitan de Franchis family is on view at Capodimonte Museum.  

4) The Food (And not just pizza!) 

While old school, humble trattorias are disappearing in overwhelmingly touristy parts of Italy, rest assured that Naples is home to an abundance of authentic and cheap trattorias.  All feature what we call cucina povera or ‘poor food’.  Pizza is perhaps the most famous poor food to originate in Naples.  But we have so much more to offer than pizza in Naples! Here you can find an array of humble local dishes from slow braised Neapolitan meat ragù to pasta and beans and friarielli (broccoli rabe).  Cucina povera is always seasonal and local. To experience the gastronomic essence of Naples, head to a crowded trattoria with communal tables and draft wine like Trattoria Mangia & Bevi.  For a list of our favorite trattorias in Naples, click here. 

5) The Superstitions

Naples is a land of superstitions.  We interpret dreams with a book called the smorfia which associates common objects with numbers.  Many use the book to gamble and improve their odds in the national lottery. Countless people swear they know someone who has won millions this way.  You can even go online, describe your dream and the local lottery will tell you what numbers to play that day. We also celebrate an impressive array of saint days here- the most important of which is Saint Gennaro day on September 19th, a local public holiday.  On this day, a priest dramatically waves a vial of Saint Gennaro’s blood in front of a congregation of thousands of devoted locals.  It is said that if the blood liquifies, Saint Gennaro is happy with the city of Naples.  When the blood occasionally fails to liquefy, bad things like earthquakes, volcanic explosions and cholera outbreaks occur.  You can read more about Saint Gennaro here.

6) The Music 

Because of Naple’s densely crowded urban center, the boundaries of public and private life here are occasionally blurred.  This makes the piazzas and alleys of Naples places of great vivacity and theater.  Local music fill public places with frenzied, impassioned beats.  In the evenings, particularly in the Piazza San Domenico Maggiore area, you may find street musicians playing a tammurriata,or ‘dance of the drum’.  Dancers enter a trance-like state as they wiggle, kick and sway their arms in pairs or solo.  There is a reason this dance was once called the ‘tarentalla’ or tarantula—the dancers look like hoping spiders.  Feel free to join in with the spontaneous tammurriata dances that occur across Naples’ piazzas.  That is part of the fun.  

7) The Water 

We mean water on two counts- the water that surrounds the Bay of Naples and the drinking water of Naples.  As a city on the water, Naples boasts a panoramic pedestrian seafront from which you can view the island of Capri and towering Vesuvius. Naples is very much a city of the water and the fish based cuisine of the Posillipo and Santa Lucia neighborhoods are proof of this.  Here you can enjoy Santa Lucia style tomato braised octopus, spaghetti and clams and peppered mussels.  The drinking water of Naples is also famous.  According lore, regional volcanic waters that were rich in minerals, traveled through the ancient Serino aqueduct to local pizzerias.  This special water contributed to the pliant dough of margherita pizzas, giving their crusty that characteristic puff.  Today, Neapolitans swear that to make a proper coffee (whether in a moka pot or an espresso machine) you need Neapolitan tap water.  Some Neapolitans even travel with bottles of local tap water to ensure they can enjoy a proper coffee when overseas.  Whether taking a dip in the Bay of Naples, enjoying a Margherita pizza or sipping a local espresso- make a point to enjoy the mythical waters of Napoli. 

8) The Open Markets

Open-air produce and flea markets service the people of Naples daily.  The Pignasecca market on the fringes of the historic center is the oldest in Naples.  Here you can buy local seasonal produce at bargain rates and visit the best fish monger in town, Pescheria Azurra.  In the hilltop neighborhood of Vomero, you will find the lovely Antignano market where vendors sell everything from seasonal produce, cured meats, olives, cheeses, salted cod and kitchen wares.  It is a lively place to enjoy a morning stroll.  For shoes of every sort, head to Poggioreale Market, behind the central train station.  Open Friday-Monday from 8AM-noon, this market features rows and rows of shoes of every type and price.  Every neighborhood in Naples has its own open air market.  To interact with locals and experience the cadence of regional dialect, head to a market, order an espresso and walk!

9) The Stairs 

Naples is a vertical town and each neighborhood has its own character depending on its altitude.  The hilltop neighborhood of Vomero, formerly a rural backwater, has been a middle class refugee from the din of lower Napoli since the post-war era. Whereas the more raucous zones are clustered in and around the historic center of lower Naples.  To properly understand Naples, one must explore both lower and upper Naples.  There are funiculars that connect them, but we suggest taking the stairs to get a real taste of how Naples’ geography has influenced the culture of each neighborhood.  Take the Petraio stairs to experience the Spanish quarters in lower Naples and arrive in the center of Vomero. Alternately, you may enjoy the scenic Pedementina stairs which connect the Pignasecca market neighborhood to the San Martino cloisters in upper Vomero.  The stairs of Naples are a unique feature of this vertical town and after burning off the calories required to scale them, you deserve a hearty meal in a humble trattoria.  For a list of suggested stair walks, visit our guide here.

 10) The Historic Center

The Centro Storico of Naples is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  It is also one of the longest continuously inhabited historic centers in the world. The Roman Forum, while providing a glimpse into old Roman life, is not and has not been inhabited for centuries. The historic center of Naples is unique because modern daily life coexists with archeological ruins, underground catacombs, rites and rituals from millennia past.  There are few places in the world like this left.  When the Greeks first arrived in Naples, legend has it that they arrived in the island of Megaride, just beyond the current seafront of Naples. After centuries of fighting with native Oscan and Samnite tribes, these Greeks reconstituted their city further inland in what is today considered the historic center of Naples.  When the Greeks moved their new settlement here in approximately 400 BC, they called it ‘Neapolis,’ meaning new city.  People have been living in this new old city ever since.