Description

Underground Ancona is a compelling journey back in time lived in the mysterious atmosphere of silent and dark tunnels that hide beneath the chaotic surface city. We are talking about an underground network extending for at least 3 km. Little is known about it yet.
It develops from the avenue to the port, with branches up to the Colle del Guasco.
It is difficult to assign a historical date to the work, but it is suspected that these conduits date back to a remote era.

In fact, it is known that Ancona was an important landing place in ancient times and therefore had to have sufficient water resources for the urban needs of the port.
However, the nature of the land on which the city stands would lead to excluding the hypothesis of a supply based exclusively on well water. It is not so surprising then, to discover that even today a real stream flows through the tunnels, the same one that, until recently, quenched the city's thirst. Due to a whole series of evidence, there is reason to believe that the origin of the waters circulating in the underground system is to be found on the slopes of Monte Conero. If this were the case, we could think big, i.e. imagining a system of tunnels which, to divert the water to the port, originally had to extend for around 20 kilometres.
This hypothesis is confirmed by the mysterious tunnels found on the slopes of the Conero, in the area of the so-called "Gradine".
The most logical interpretation of these enigmatic structures, whose entrances are artfully hidden in the dense vegetation of the countryside, considers these works as relics of an ancient aqueduct.
And in fact the underground spring of Santa Margherita, found in the oldest branch of the underground city, is accessed through a conduit whose typology is completely similar to that of the Conero tunnels.

According to this suggestive hypothesis, the source captured on the Conero would be the source of Capodacqua, in the municipality of Sirolo. Incidentally, the long tunnel of about 2 km starts from the same source, which is still passable and goes down to Numana.
We are still at the beginning of the research, and the underground city still presents many secrets, real enigmas that are still far from being revealed.