CAPRI   :

Many studiouses make the name “Capri” deriving from “Kapros” (wild boar), in consideration of the greek colonization of the isle. The erudites of the XVIII centhury  thought it could rise from the phoenician word “Caprain” (“two cities”), also mentioned by Suetonius in his book “Geographia”. Today, the consolidated opinion is that its origin is thyrrenic and latin, that is from “Caprae” (“goats”). Many thyrrenic isles, in fact, have a similar denomination as Capraia, Capraria, Caprera.

• The Square

This level tract was in every time the crossing point of the ways of access wheter from high or low, and it shaped as a “rustic yard” after the year one thousand, when began to rise the first inhabited nuclei between the zones of “Li Curti” and “Longano”, where the covered accesses, leaning against the raisings of the greek walls, constituted the first defense rampants to the poor and modestes houses, together with the continuous wall that closed the space facing west between Arcucci Palace (today Cerio) and the present bell–tower almost blended with the drawbridged door. The second half of the seventeenth century marked the transformation limit of the Square that from possible market place, as every similar medieval towns, assumed the face of “religious space”, that’s when it was rebuilt the S. Stefano cathedral and it was erected the episcopal Palace (today the City Hall) that, L-shaped, has given it the present look. On the suppression of the Bishop’s house, on the demolition of the wall that was closing it, and on the arrival of the first tourists, it recovered, in the second half of the nineteenth century, its so called “profane” character with the opening  of some handicraft shops and of a bookshop. After the latest war and the following touristic “boom”, the Square became the preminent “exclusive” meeting point. The english writer Norman Douglas called it the “theatre of the world” because of the cosmopolitan crowd of tourists that stop in and throng it.

• Acquaviva 
  (street)

From the medieval door in the Square, to the main road Marina Grande. That’s the oldest way of access to the built-up area of Capri, and it’s also the first tract that the procession of the patron saint of the isle covers when every year, on his festivity on may 14^th, he’s led to the original church S. Costanzo a Marina Grande. It takes that name in consequence of a spring which flew from the live rock. Anciently it fed the tanks of a roman thermal resort, but until the Forties it was a source of water supply to the people of Capri town.

• CAMERELLE 
  (street)

From the Quisisana Hotel to via Tragara. So were called the about forty roman tanks that, following one another, served as terrace to the street which conducted to the imperial villa of Tragara, whose waters provided the villa and the port below. The classic barrel stone vaults are the principal characteristic of this building. In the middle age they were progressively opened on the frontage of the present street and were utilized as various storehouses. Today they have been turned in elegant shops.

• CERCOLA 
  (street)

From via Padre Reginaldo Giuliani to via Matermania. “Cercula” is the dialectal voice for “oak”, already present in her different species on the isle since the earliest times and that, together with the pines, form the verdant woods which mantle the hilly zones of the isle.

• CESINA 
  (locality)

“Cesine” were called the hilly extents where abounded the coppiced trees, “cedui”, that’s from “cut” (from Latin cesum=cut), from whom the localities “Cesa” and “Ceselle” in Anacapri too.

• DENTECALA 
  (street)

From via Matermania to Piazzetta delle Noci. It treads, in part, the old path conducting to Matermania and Fico creeks. It comes from the dialectal voice “Dint’e cale”=in the creeks.

• FENICIA 
  (staircase)

The only connection to Anacapri until 1876 when the first carriage road was built. Its XVIII century learned toponym ascribes its costruction to the Phoenicians. It is, instead, the greatest monument dating back to the Hellenistic age. Its Greek roots show in its highest portion where the steps are carved into the rocks like Greeks used to do in the rocky islands of the Egean sea to link their inacessible acropolis to their navy.

• FUORLOVADO
  (street)

The end of  Via Le Botteghe used to mark, during the middle age, also that of the built-up area. The toponym “Fuor-lo-vado”, which means “Out-I-go” comes from the fact that to leave the town it was neccessary to pass through the door underneath the arch which still stands where the road begins.

• LI CURTI 
  (Street)

From Via Le Botteghe it leads to Via Listrieri, in the area once called “limekiln”. The toponym has its roots in the medieval latin word “curtis” (court) and it recalls the town typical houses with curtyards and gardens.

• LISTRIERI 
  (Street)

From S.Ann Church all the way to via Longano. The toponym comes from the Indo-European root “strei”  which means narrow, thus “streieri” being a narrow passage. In fact, both via Li Curti and Parroco Canale, just as narrow as Listireie, converge in this tiny road.

• LONGANO 
  (Street)

Departing from the Piazza it leads to Sopramonte. The toponym derives from the Greek word “longones” which means “stones to build citywalls”. In fact the road stands over the edge of the first portion of the ancient Greek citywalls and it runs along it. A legend tells us that these citywalls were built around the VIII century by the Teleboi, led by their king Telone and coming from the Acarnaia region.

• LO PALAZZO 
  (Street)

From via Acquaviva to via Roma. It used to lead to the  "Casa Palaziata", a XIV century building which have been property of English Sir Nathaniel Thorold during the XVIII century. It used to be the residence to king Ferdinando the IV of Borbone when he would come to Capri during the quail hunting season.

• MARUCELLA 
  (Street)

From Via Lo Palazzo all the way to Via Fenicia. It crosses Capri’s country in the island north side. The homonymous spring water were once piped into the wide Roman reservoirs(cellae) still standing in via Cogliano. They are interconnected, thus forming a unique, huge vintage of water which doesn’t differ much from the sea. The Toponym comes from the latin word “maris-cellae”.

• MATERMANIA (Street-locality-
  Grotta)

Via Sopramonte prosecution, it leads to the homonymous cave, turned into a “ninfeo”(small temple consecrated to the nymphs)  by Tiberio and then dedicated to Cibele, Romans’ Mater Magna. Some experts asserts that the toponym comes, instead, from the word “Mitromania” thus related to Mitra’s cult performed in the same cave later on

• MULO 
  (Street)

From via Roma to Marina Piccola. Its name comes from the popularization of the dialectal word “muolo” (pier). In fact the road used to lead to the ancient Roman harbour, whose remains still stand close to the mermaid rock.

(*) Queste note sono tratte dal volume "I Nomi di Capri" di Salvatore Borà.
     Edizione "La Conchiglia" 1992.