Capri

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Capri

Capri (Italian

Italian language

Italian is a Romance languages spoken by about 63 million people as a first language, primarily in Italy. In Switzerland, Italian is one of four Linguistic geography of Switzerlands....
pronunciation Cápri, usual English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that originated in Anglo-Saxon England and has lingua franca status in many parts of the world as a result of the military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence of the British Empire in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries and that of the United States from the mid 20th century onwa...
pronunciation Caprí) is an Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic , is a country located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe and on the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia....
island off the Sorrentine Peninsula

Sorrentine Peninsula

The Sorrentine Peninsula is a peninsula located in southern Italy that separates the Gulf of Naples to the north from the Gulf of Salerno to the south....
, on the south side of the Gulf of Naples

Gulf of Naples

The Gulf of Naples is located in the south western coast of Italy . It opens to the west into the Mediterranean Sea. It is bordered on the north by the cities of Naples and Pozzuoli, on the east by Mount Vesuvius, and on the south by the Sorrentine Peninsula and its main town Sorrento, Italy; the Peninsula separates it from the Gulf of Sal...
. It has been a resort since the time of the Roman Republic

Roman Republic

The Roman Republic was the phase of the Ancient Rome characterized by a republican form of government; a period which began with the overthrow of the Roman Roman Kingdom, c....
.

Features of the island are the Marina Piccola (Small Harbor), the Belvedere of Tragara, which is a high panoramic promenade lined with villas, the limestone masses called Sea Stacks that stand out of the sea (the Faraglioni), Anacapri, the Blue Grotto

Blue Grotto

The Blue Grotto is a noted sea cave on the coast of the island of Capri, Italy. Sunlight, passing through an underwater cavity and shining through the seawater, creates a blue reflection that illuminates the cavern....
(Grotta Azzurra), and the ruins of the Imperial Roman villas.

Capri is part of the region of Campania

Campania

Campania is a Regions of Italy of southern Italy in Europe. The region has a population of around 5.8 million people, making it the second-most-populous region of Italy, its total area of 13,595 km? makes it the most densely populated region in the country....
, Province of Naples

Province of Naples

The Province of Naples is a Provinces of Italy in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital city is Naples, within the province there are 92 Comuni of the Province of Naples....
.

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History

See also; History of Capri
History of Capri

Capri is situated in the Gulf of Naples, between Italian Peninsula and the islands of Procida and Ischia. Of limestone origin, its lower section is to the center, while its sides are high and encircle you for more from frightful precipices, where finds numerous coves....

Ancient and Roman times

According to the Greek geographer Strabo

Strabo

Strabo was a Ancient Greeks history, geography and philosophy....
, Capri was once part of the mainland. This has been confirmed by geological surveys and archaeological findings.

The city has been inhabited since very early times. Evidence of human settlement was discovered during the Roman era; according to Suetonius

Lives of the Twelve Caesars

De vita Caesarum commonly known as The Twelve Caesars, is a set of twelve biographies of Julius Caesar and the first 11 Roman Emperor of the Roman Empire written by Suetonius....
, when the foundations for the villa of Augustus were being excavated, giant bones and 'weapons of stone' were discovered. The emperor ordered these to be displayed in the garden of his main residence, the Sea Palace. Modern excavations have shown that human presence on the island can be dated back to the Neolithic

Neolithic

The Neolithic period was a period in the development of human technology, beginning about 9500 Before the Christian Era in the Middle East that is traditionally considered the last part of the Stone Age....
and the Bronze Age

Bronze Age

The Bronze Age is, with respect to a given prehistory, the period in that society when the most advanced metalworking included smelting copper and tin from naturally-occurring outcroppings of copper and tin ores, creating a bronze alloy by melting those metals together, and casting them into bronze artifact s....
.

In his Aeneid, Virgil

Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro was a classical Roman poet, best known for three major works?the Bucolics , the Georgics and the Aeneid?although several Appendix Vergiliana are also attributed to him....
states that the island had been populated by the Greek people of Teleboi, coming from the Ionian Islands

Ionian Islands

The Ionian Islands are a island group in Greece. They are traditionally called "Eptanisa", i.e. "the Seven Islands" , but the group includes many smaller islands as well as the seven principal ones....
. Strabo says that "in ancient times in Capri there were two towns, later reduced to one." (Geography
Geographica (Strabo)

The Geographica , or Geography, is a 17-volume encyclopedia of geographical knowledge written in Ancient Greek by Strabo, an educated citizen of the Roman empire of Greek and Georgian descent....
, 5, 4, 9, 38). Tacitus

Tacitus

Publius Cornelius Tacitus was a Roman Senate and a historian of the Roman Empire. The surviving portions of his two major works—the Annals and the Histories —examine the reigns of the Roman Emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and those that reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors....
records that there were twelve Imperial villas in Capri (or Capreae, as it was spelled in Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Military history of the Roman Empire, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe....
). Ruins of one at Tragara could still be seen in the 19th century.

Augustus's successor Tiberius

Tiberius

Tiberius Julius Caesar Augustus, born Tiberius Claudius Nero , was the second Roman Emperor, from the death of Augustus in AD 14 until his own death in 37....
built a series of villas at Capri, the most famous of which is the Villa Jovis
Villa Jovis

Villa Jovis is a Ancient Rome palace on Capri, southern Italy, built by emperor Tiberius who ruled from there between 27 and 37. It is the largest of the twelve Tiberian villas on Capri mentioned by Tacitus and the entire complex, spanning several terraces and a difference in elevation of about 40 m, covers some 7,000 m? ....
, one of the best preserved Roman villas in Italy. In 27 CE

Common Era

Common Era, abbreviated as CE, is a designation for the calendar system most commonly used in the Western world, and also internationally, for numbering the year part of the calendar date....
, Tiberius permanently moved to Capri, running the Empire

Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the Roman Republic phase of the Ancient Rome, characterised by an autocracy form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
from there until his death in 37 CE. According to Suetonius, while staying on the island, Tiberius (accompanied by his grand-nephew and heir, Caligula

Caligula

Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus , more commonly known by his nickname Caligula , was the third Roman Emperor, reigning from 16 March 37 until his assassination on 24 January 41....
) enjoyed imposing numerous cruelties and sexual perversions upon his slaves.

In 182 CE, Emperor Commodus

Commodus

Lucius Aurelius Commodus Antoninus , was a Roman Emperor who ruled from 180 to 192 . The name given here was his official name at his accession to sole rule; see 'Commodus#Changes of name' for earlier and later forms....
banished his sister Lucilla

Lucilla

Annia Aurelia Galeria Lucilla was the second daughter and third child of Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius and Roman Empress Faustina the Younger and an elder sister to future Roman Emperor Commodus....
to Capri. She was executed shortly afterwards.

Middle and Modern Ages

After the end of the Western Roman Empire, Capri returned to the status of a dominion of Naples, and suffered various attacks and ravages by pirates. In 866 Emperor Louis II

Louis II, Holy Roman Emperor

Louis II the Younger was the King of Italy from 844 and then Holy Roman Emperor from 855 until his death.He was the eldest son of the Emperor Lothair I and Ermengarde of Tours....
gave the island to Amalfi

Amalfi

Amalfi is a town and commune in the province of Salerno, in the region of Campania, Italy, on the Gulf of Salerno, southeast of Naples. It lies at the mouth of a deep ravine, at the foot of Monte Cerreto , surrounded by dramatic cliffs and coastal scenery....
. In 987 the first Caprese bishop was consecrated by Pope John XV

Pope John XV

John XV , Pope from 985 to 996, succeeding antipope Boniface VII , .John XV was the son of Leo, a Rome presbyter. At the time he mounted the papal chair Crescentius II was Patrician of Rome, significantly hampering the pope's influence, but the presence of the Empress Theophano, regent for her son, Holy Roman Emperor Otto III , in Rome from...
.

In 1496, Frederick IV of Naples

Frederick IV of Naples

Frederick IV , sometimes known as Frederick I or Federico d'Aragona, was the last List of monarchs of Naples and Sicily of the House of Trast?mara, ruling from 1496 to 1501....
established legal and administrative parity between the two settlements of Capri and Anacapri. The pirate raids reached their peak during the reign of Charles V

Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor

Charles V was ruler of the Holy Roman Empire from 1519 and, as Charles I of Spain, of the Spanish realms from 1516 until his abdication in 1556....
: the famous Turkish admirals Barbarossa Hayreddin Pasha and Turgut Reis

Turgut Reis

Turgut Reis was an Ottoman Empire admiral as well as Bey of Algiers; Beylerbey of the Mediterranean Sea; and first Bey later Pasha of Tripoli....
captured the island in 1535 and 1553 for the Ottoman Empire, respectively.

The first famous visitor to the island was the French antiques dealer Jean Jacques Bouchard in the 17th century, who may be considered Capri's first tourist

Tourism

Tourism is travel for recreational or leisure purposes. The World Tourism Organization defines tourists as people who "travel to and stay in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes not related to the exercise of an activity remunerated from...
. His diary, found in 1850, is an important information source about Capri.

Recent history

In January 1806, French troops occupied the island. The British ousted the French troops that May; Capri was turned into a powerful naval base (a "Second Gibraltar

Gibraltar

Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located near the southernmost tip of the Iberian Peninsula overlooking the Strait of Gibraltar. The territory shares a border with Spain to the north....
"), but the building program caused heavy damage to the archaeological sites. Joachim Murat

Joachim Murat

Joachim-Napol?on Murat , Prince Murat, Grand Duke of Berg and Duchy of Cleves, Marshal of France, was King of the Two Sicilies from 1808 to 1815....
reconquered Capri in 1808, and the French remained there until the end of the Napoleonic era (1815), when Capri was returned to the Bourbon ruling house of Naples.

In the latter half of the 19th century, Capri became a popular resort for European artists, writers and other celebrities. John Singer Sargent

John Singer Sargent

John Singer Sargent was the most successful portrait painter of his era. During his career, he created roughly 900 oil paintings and more than 2,000 watercolors, as well as countless sketches and charcoal drawings....
and Frank Hyde

Frank Hyde

Frank Hyde Order of the British Empire was an Australian rugby league player, coach and radio caller.During his playing career, Hyde represented the Newtown Jets, the Balmain Tigers, the North Sydney Bears and, at the state level, New South Wales Rugby League....
are among the prominent artists who stayed on the island around the late 1870s. Sargent is best known for his series of portraits featuring the beautiful local model, Rosina Ferrara

Rosina Ferrara

Rosina Ferrara was an Italian girl from the island of Capri, who became the favorite muse of American expatriate artist John Singer Sargent....
.

Also in the 19th century, the natural scientist Ignazio Cerio

Ignazio Cerio

Ignazio Cerio was an influential but eccentric physician and amateur philosopher on the island of Capri, in Italy. His father, imprisoned for his liberal beliefs, had spent his time in jail devising chemical concoctions and mechanical constructions that would never be made; Ignazio continued the family traditions of both liberalism and idios...
catalogued the flora

Flora

In botany, flora has two meanings. The first meaning, flora of an area or of time period, refers to all plant life occurring in an area or time period, especially the naturally occurring or indigenous plant life....
and fauna

Fauna

File:Fauna.pngFauna is all of the animal life of any particular region or time. The corresponding term for plants is flora.Zoology and paleontology use fauna to refer to a typical collection of animals found in a specific time or place, e.g....
of the island. This work was continued by his son, the author and engineer Edwin Cerio

Edwin Cerio

Norman Douglas

George Norman Douglas was a British writer, now best known for his 1917 novel South Wind ....
, Friedrich Alfred Krupp

Friedrich Alfred Krupp

Friedrich Alfred Krupp was a Germany steel manufacturer of the company Krupp....
, Jacques d'Adelswärd-Fersen, Christian Wilhelm Allers

Christian Wilhelm Allers

Christian Wilhelm Allers was a Germany Painting and printmaker....
, Emil von Behring, Curzio Malaparte

Curzio Malaparte

Curzio Malaparte , born Kurt Erich Suckert, was an Italy journalist, dramatist, short-story writer, novelist and diplomat. His chosen surname, which he used since 1925, means "he of the bad place" and is a pun on the word "Bonaparte"....
, Axel Munthe

Axel Munthe

Axel Martin Fredrik Munthe was a Sweden physician and psychiatrist, best known as the author of The Story of San Michele , an autobiographical account of his work and life....
, and Maxim Gorky

Maxim Gorky

Aleksey Maksimovich Peshkov , better known as Maxim Gorky , was a Russian/Soviet Union author, a founder of the socialist realism literary method and a political activist....
are all reported to have owned a villa there, or to have stayed there for more than three months. Swedish Queen Victoria

Victoria of Baden

Princess Viktoria of Baden , later Queen Victoria of Sweden, was a member of the Z?hringen, who became the Queen Consort of Gustaf V of Sweden....
often stayed there. Rose O'Neill

Rose O'Neill

Rose Cecil O'Neill was an illustrator who created a popular period comic called Kewpie....
, the American illustrator and creator of the Kewpie, owned the Villa Narcissus, formerly owned by the famous Beaux Art painter Charles Caryl Coleman. Gracie Fields

Gracie Fields

Dame Gracie Fields, Order of the British Empire , born Grace Stansfield, was an England/Italy singer and comedienne who became one of the greatest stars of both film and music hall....
also had a villa on the island, though her 1934 song "The Isle of Capri" was written by two Englishmen. Mariah Carey

Mariah Carey

Mariah Carey is an United States singer-songwriter, record producer and actress. She made her recording debut in 1990 under the guidance of Columbia Records executive Tommy Mottola, and became the first recording artist to have her first five singles top the U.S....
owns a villa on the island.

The book that spawned the 19th century fascination with Capri in France, Germany, and England was Entdeckung der Blauen Grotte auf der Insel Capri, 'Discovery of the Blue Grotto on the Isle of Capri', by the German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
painter and writer August Kopisch, in which he describes his 1826 stay on Capri and his (re)discovery of the Blue Grotto. Capri is also the setting for "The Lotus Eater", a short-story by Somerset Maugham. In the story, the protagonist from Boston comes to Capri on a holiday and is so enchanted by the place he gives up his job and decides to spend the rest of his life in leisure at Capri. Claude Debussy

Claude Debussy

Achille-Claude Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he is considered one of the most prominent figures working within the field of Impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions....
refers to the island's hills in the title of his impressionistic prélude

Preludes (Debussy)

Claude Debussy's Pr?ludes are two sets of pieces for solo piano. They are divided into two separate livres, or books, of twelve prelude each....
Les collines d'Anacapri (1910).

As well as being a haven for writers and artists, Capri served as a relatively safe place for foreign gay men and lesbians to lead a more open life, and a small nucleus of them were attracted to live there, overlapping to some extent with the creative types mentioned above. The 19th century poet August von Platen-Hallermünde was one of the first. Jacques d'Adelswärd-Fersen wrote the roman à clef
Roman à clef

A roman ? clef or roman ? cl? is a novel describing real life, behind a fa?ade of fiction. The 'key' is usually a famous figure or, in some cases, the author....
Et le feu s’èteignit sur le mer (1910) about Capri and its residents in the early 20th century, causing a minor scandal. Fersen's life on Capri became the subject of Roger Peyrefitte

Roger Peyrefitte

Roger Peyrefitte was a French diplomat, writer of bestseller novels and gossipy non-fiction, and a defender of gay rights....
's fictionalised biography, L'Exile de Capri. One of the island's most famous foreign inhabitants was Norman Douglas

Norman Douglas

George Norman Douglas was a British writer, now best known for his 1917 novel South Wind ....
; his novel South Wind
South Wind (novel)

South Wind is a 1917 novel by British author Norman Douglas. It is Douglas' most famous book. It is set on an imaginary island called Nepenthe, located off the coast of Italy in the Tyrrhenian Sea, a thinly fictionalized description of Capri's residents and visitors....
is a thinly fictionalised description of Capri's residents and visitors, and a number of his other works, both books and pamphlets, deal with the island, including Capri (1930) and his last work, A Footnote on Capri (1952). A satirical presentation of the island's lesbian colony in the 1920s is made in Compton Mackenzie

Compton Mackenzie

Sir Edward Montague Compton Mackenzie was an English-born Scottish novelist and Scottish nationalism....
's novel Extraordinary Women (1928).

Memoirs set on Capri include Edwin Cerio

Edwin Cerio

Edwin Cerio was a prominent Italian writer, engineer, architect, historian, and botanist. He was born on the island of Capri to an English artist mother and a well-known local physician, Ignazio Cerio....
's Aria di Capri (1928) (translated as That Capri Air), which contains a number of historical and biographical essays on the island, including a tribute to Norman Douglas; The Story of San Michele
The Story of San Michele

The Story of San Michele is a book of memoirs by Sweden physician Axel Munthe first published in 1929 by British publisher John Murray . Written in English, it was a best-seller in numerous languages and has been republished constantly in the over seven decades since its original release....
(1929) by the Swedish royal physician Axel Munthe

Axel Munthe

Axel Martin Fredrik Munthe was a Sweden physician and psychiatrist, best known as the author of The Story of San Michele , an autobiographical account of his work and life....
(1857–1949), who built a villa of that name

Villa San Michele

The Villa San Michele was built around the turn of the 20th century, by the Sweden physician, Axel Munthe, on the ruins of the Roman Emperor, Tiberius' villa, on the Capri, Italy....
; An Impossible Woman: The Memoirs of Dottoressa Moor (1975) by Elisabeth Moor, who worked there as a doctor from 1926 until the 1970s; and Shirley Hazzard

Shirley Hazzard

Shirley Hazzard is an author of fiction and non-fiction. She was born in Australia, but holds citizenship in Great Britain and in the United States....
's Graham on Capri: A Memoir (2000), about her reminiscences of Graham Greene

Graham Greene

Henry Graham Greene Order of Merit, Order of the Companions of Honour was an English writer best known as a novelist, but who also produced short stories, plays, screenplays, travel writing and criticism....
.

Novels set on Capri include the eponymous Kapri (1939), by the Latvian novelist Janis Jaunsudrabinš, who represents the island as a sort of prison for Europeans who have run away from their normal lives and responsibilities, and I Love Capri by Belinda Jones.

Main sights

Villa San Michele
Villa San Michele

The Villa San Michele was built around the turn of the 20th century, by the Sweden physician, Axel Munthe, on the ruins of the Roman Emperor, Tiberius' villa, on the Capri, Italy....
Grotta Azzurra, the Blue Grotto
Villa Lysis
Villa Jovis
Villa Jovis

Villa Jovis is a Ancient Rome palace on Capri, southern Italy, built by emperor Tiberius who ruled from there between 27 and 37. It is the largest of the twelve Tiberian villas on Capri mentioned by Tacitus and the entire complex, spanning several terraces and a difference in elevation of about 40 m, covers some 7,000 m? ....
La Piazzetta
Via Krupp
Arco Naturale
Villa Malaparte
Torre Materita
Certosa di San Giacomo
Faraglioni
Faraglioni

Faraglioni is the collective name for three stack located off the island of Capri in the Bay of Naples. The stacks have been given their own names: Stella , Mezzo , and Scopolo ....
Monte Solaro
Punta Carena
Marina Grande

Tourism

Capri is a tourist destination for both Italians and foreigners. In the 1950s, Capri became a popular destination for the international jet set

Jet set

"Jet set" is a journalistic term that was used to describe an international social group of wealthy people, organizing and participating in social activities all around the world that are unreachable to ordinary people....
. The central piazzetta of Capri, though preserving its modest village architecture, is lined with luxury boutiques and expensive restaurants.

During summers, the island is heavily touristed, often by day trippers from Naples and Sorrento.

Transportation

Capri is served by frequent ferry

Ferry

A ferry is a form of transport, usually a boat or ship, used to carry passengers and their vehicles across a body of water. Ferries are also used to transport freight and even railroad cars....
and hydrofoil

Hydrofoil

A hydrofoil is a boat with wing-like airfoils mounted on struts below the hull . As the craft increases its speed the hydrofoils develop enough lift for the boat to become foilborne - i.e....
service to Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in southern Italy, the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples. The city is known for its rich history, art, culture and gastronomy, playing an important role throughout much of its existence; it is over 2,800 years old....
and Sorrento

Sorrento, Italy

Sorrento is a small city in Campania, southern Italy, with some 16,500 inhabitants. It is a popular tourist destination. The town can be reached easily from Naples and Pompeii, as it lies at the south-eastern end of the Circumvesuviana rail line....
, as well as many other boat services to the ports of the Gulf of Naples and the Sorrentine Peninsula. Boats call at Marina Grande, from where you can take the funicular

Funicular

A funicular, also known as a funicular railway, incline, inclined railway, inclined plane, or cliff railway, is a type of self-contained cable railway in which a wire rope attached to a pair of tram-like vehicles on Rail tracks#Railway rail moves them up and down a very steep slope, the ascending and descending v...
up to the village of Capri. A chair lift takes passengers to the top of the island.

Gallery

External links

on Wikitravel
Wikitravel

Wikitravel is a World Wide Web-based project "to create a free content, complete, up-to-date, and reliable worldwide guide book." Launched in July 2003 by Evan Prodromou and Michele Ann Jenkins, the Web site is based upon the wiki model, using the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike license....