The Open-Air Archaeological Museum is named after Alberto Manzi, a teacher, pedagogue and writer, author of various works including “Orzowei”, mayor of Pitigliano from 1995 to 1997. Located outside the town, about two kilometres from the village, it was born with a strong educational value and from the desire to counter the process of deterioration of the environmental heritage and the looting of funerary monuments of the Etruscan age by clandestine excavations, through the valorisation of the natural and historical heritage.
The archaeological area allows the visitor to fully immerse themselves in the history of the places. Walking in the “city of the living” you can reconstruct the various phases of the urban layout: from the complex protohistoric village of the final Bronze Age, represented by an educational model of a circular hut-type dwelling made in almost real size, to the Etruscan city with the three-room house with a portico that allows, with virtual glimpses, to observe its interior.
Walking along the winding and suggestive Via Cava del Gradone, which is an integral part of this museum area, you arrive at the underlying “city of the dead” where you can visit the Etruscan necropolis of Gradone with tombs with one, two and three chambers, in use from the second half of the 7th century until almost the end of the 6th century BC. Here there is a “demonstrative” tomb, inside which the burial of Velthur and Larthia has been set up to relive the sacredness and emotions typical of an Etruscan funeral ceremony.
A further descent leads to the necropolis of San Giovanni with tombs from the 6th to the 4th-early 3rd century BC. Inside the monumental tomb with a pair of pillars, some panels depicting the theatrical animations in costume that were held during the summer season are displayed. An example of the pottery found is exhibited in the Civic Archaeological Museum of Etruscan Civilization “Enrico Pellegrini”.
