While Italy may be best known for its epochal cities, the country’s small towns and villages have long played a pivotal role in the peninsula’s millennia-spanning history. There are thousands of these places; some have even gained worldwide renown, like Portofino and Positano, once quiet fishing villages, later must-stops for celebrities and international tycoons who brought a jet-set gleam to the rocky shorelines and sirenesque seascapes.
In recent years tourist throngs have descended upon the hamlets of Cinque Terre, their numbers exploding to more than two million in prime season. But a good many villages remain unexplored, even though their unvarnished charms provide the chance to experience that authentic Italy so coveted by travelers today.
