Photo: Maksimsokolov (CC BY-SA 4.0)
A self-guided audio walk through the Sassi of Matera, from the upper town down into the cave districts and back. It begins in Piazza Vittorio Veneto, above the Palombaro Lungo, the great cistern completed by 1870, and passes San Domenico of 1230 and San Giovanni Battista before descending into the Sasso Barisano to San Pietro Barisano, with its underground putridarium, and Casa Cava, a former tuff quarry that is now an auditorium. The rock churches of Madonna delle Virtù and San Nicola dei Greci lead up to the cathedral on the Civita, completed in 1270, Casa Noha, the Palazzo del Sedile and the skull-carved door of the Chiesa del Purgatorio. From the Belvedere at Piazzetta Pascoli the walk tells how the Sassi were emptied under the special law of 1952 and inscribed by UNESCO in 1993, then goes on through the Sasso Caveoso to San Pietro Caveoso, Santa Maria de Idris, Santa Lucia alle Malve, the Casa Grotta di Vico Solitario and the Convicinio di Sant'Antonio. Matera has no port: cruise passengers come by road from Bari, and the ship's own excursion is the safer choice.
19 narrations, yours to keep — no subscription, no expiry. Works offline once downloaded, and if it isn’t for you we’ll refund it.
Going somewhere with no signal? Put the guide on your home screen first, then download it from that icon while you are on wi-fi — that way you download once, and it works in airplane mode with no roaming charges. Show me the order →
Every claim in this tour traces back to a named source — excavation records, the heritage authority for the site, and the primary texts themselves. Nothing is copied from other guidebooks, and anything we can't source doesn't make the recording.
Each stop is built from OpenStreetMap · 118 features in this old town (the field-surveyed mapping database behind Apple Maps), Wikidata · 33 cross-referenced entries (peer-reviewed structured records), the heritage authority below, and the primary historical texts where they exist.
Cross-referenced against Modern excavation publications · academic peer-review.
Every sentence is checked against those sources before it is recorded. If a claim can't be traced, it doesn't make the audio.
Every tour is reviewed by a person before it goes on sale. Stop selection, the route and anything ambiguous come back to the editor for a decision, and those questions routinely send a stop back for another accuracy pass. Nothing publishes on a machine’s say-so.
Spot anything inaccurate? Email [email protected] — fixed in the next pass.
Piazza Vittorio Veneto, Palombaro Lungo, San Domenico, San Giovanni Battista, San Pietro Barisano, Casa Cava.
Madonna delle Virtù and San Nicola dei Greci, Matera Cathedral, Casa Noha, Piazza and Palazzo del Sedile, San Francesco d'Assisi, Chiesa del Purgatorio.
Palazzo Lanfranchi, Belvedere at Piazzetta Pascoli, San Pietro Caveoso, Santa Maria de Idris and San Giovanni in Monterrone, Santa Lucia alle Malve, Casa Grotta di Vico Solitario, Convicinio di Sant'Antonio.
The vast cistern under the main square, completed by 1870 by linking older caves, where residents once lowered buckets into the water.
A church partly cut into the rock, with an underground putridarium that served as Matera's only cemetery for a long period.
The cathedral on the highest ridge of the Civita, completed in 1270, with a stone Nativity that sets the birth inside a cave.
A Baroque church on the themes of death and redemption, its wooden door carved with 36 panels of skulls, mitres and crowns.
A terrace over both Sassi, where the story is told of the 1952 law that emptied the caves and the UNESCO listing of 1993.
A cave house kept as a museum, with the high family bed, the hearth and the stable where a mule lived alongside the family.
Tap "Start Walking Tour" and allow location access. The map shows all 19 narration points.
Follow the suggested route or explore freely. GPS tracks your position. Reach a site and the narration plays automatically.
Each site has its own narration. 19 narration points.
Narrations play when you reach each site. No buttons, no track numbers. Walk naturally — the stories find you.
Premium narration that sounds like a documentary. Warm and knowledgeable, not a textbook reading.
Every narration is drafted, cross-checked against primary sources, then passed through a second editorial pass that strips unsupported claims. Dates, names, and citations verified.
See all narration points on the map. Tap any point to hear it early or replay it later.
Every narrated point in Matera — the Sassi and the Civita, each with its own narration.
Spend an hour or a full day. Skip sites, revisit favourites, take breaks. The tour adapts to you.
19 narration points, including Piazza Vittorio Veneto, Palombaro Lungo, San Pietro Barisano, Matera Cathedral and Casa Noha. That is about 31 minutes of narration in all, and you walk between the stops at your own pace.
Yes. It plays in your phone’s browser as you walk: no guide, no group, no app to install and no fixed start time.
Three ways, all built in:
The map-tap option means you can stand anywhere — even at home before you travel — and play any narration. GPS just makes it hands-free while you’re actually walking the site.
No. Use the “Download for offline” button before you go, and the entire tour — audio, maps, narration text — works without any data connection. Tap-to-play and the map both work fully offline. GPS itself doesn’t need data; only the download does.
Add the icon first, then download from the icon. On iPhone a guide downloaded in Safari cannot be seen by the home screen icon, so downloading first means downloading the whole thing twice.
Putting it on your home screen — iPhone or iPad (Safari):
On Android (Chrome): tap the three-dot menu at the top right, tap Add to Home screen (some phones say Install app), then confirm. On Android either order works.
If you opened this link from inside Instagram, Facebook or Gmail, you are in that app’s built-in browser. It cannot add anything to your home screen, and a guide downloaded there is thrown away when the app closes. Open the link in Safari or Chrome first.
Two backstops. First, the map shows every site — just tap the marker for the place in front of you. Second, you can manually queue any narration even when GPS is off. The platform never assumes GPS works; it’s the convenience layer, not the gate.
The audio runs ~1–2 hours total, but you walk at your own pace. 19 narration points across the site. Most visitors take 2–4 hours; some spread it over multiple visits. Once you buy it, it’s yours — there’s no expiry and no subscription. Come back next year if you like; the link in your receipt always works.
One purchase covers one device session. Most couples share earbuds and use a single phone — the audio is paced for that. If you want everyone listening on their own device, each person needs their own purchase. We do not gate sharing aggressively; we trust visitors to do the right thing.
Full refund if you never trigger a single narration on-site. Partial refund based on how far you got. See the refund policy for specifics.