Pentidattilo

The "five fingers" (in Greek Pentedáktylos ) of Mount Calvario, a reddish cliff on which it rises, gives its name to Pentedattilo, one of Calabria's most scenically attractive villages. We find ourselves on the Ionian side of the province of Reggio Calabria, a strip between land and sea on the slopes of Aspromonte, called Costa dei Gelsomini, in the municipality of Melito di Porto Salvo.

Of Byzantine origin, the village flourished in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; later it became a fief of the Alberti, until 1685. On top of the village are the remains of the castle, of mediaeval origin.

In 1783, Pentedattilo was severely hit by the Southern Calabria earthquake and began its slow and inexorable depopulation. A former ghost town, the locals have recently returned to take care of it, rescuing it from abandonment and making tourism and handicrafts flourish again.