Paestum
Paestum has Greek Temples as old as the Parthenon in Athens. The city was established here by the Greeks in the 7th century B.C. because of the access to the sea for trade and the wide fertile plain on which it rests. The remains of the city that surround the temples began as a Greek colony named Poseidonia, after the greek god Poseidon . It was conquered by the Lucanians and finally by the Romans who re-named it Paestum. The city was abandoned when the port silted up, and the swampy ground became a breeding ground for swarms of insects the made the area uninhabitable. There is a small but interesting museum about the history of Paestum, from the Greeks to the Romans. Easy to reach by train in about an hour from Salerno. City link below.
The temples and city
Museum
The museum contains artifacts from the original Greek settlement through the Roman time.
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