Things to See in Terni | 2 Monuments & Landmarks

All the monuments in Terni

The landmarks and masterpieces worth planning a day around.

The Marmore Falls plunging in three tiers through the Nera woods

Cascata delle MarmoreMarmore Falls271 BC Roman origin, 165-meter triple drop, scheduled water releases, Byron's verses, six hiking trailsRoman engineer Manius Curius Dentatus ordered the Velino river diverted over this cliff in 271 BC, cutting a channel to drain the malarial Rieti plain into the Nera below; the result is still billed as Europe's tallest human-made waterfall, a 165-meter triple drop. Because the same water also feeds a hydroelectric plant, the cascade runs only at scheduled hours, several release windows a day depending on the season, so its full roar (and the rainbow that forms in the spray on sunny afternoons) is a timed event rather than a constant. Lord Byron gave it several stanzas in Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, calling it a "matchless cataract." Six marked trails wind through the park; the short Sentiero 1, the Antico Passaggio, crosses just behind the water at the lower belvedere, about as close a soaking as most visitors get.Plan the visit

Archaeological siteHidden GemCarsulaeTwin forum temples, Via Flaminia paving, Arco di San Damiano, mysteriously abandoned Roman townRome founded Carsulae around 220 BC along the Via Flaminia, and Augustus later gave it the temples, forum and baths of a proper municipium, yet by the sixth century the town had emptied out, abandoned for reasons historians still argue over rather than destroyed by war or disaster. What remains is unusually intact: twin temples face the forum, a theater and amphitheater sit close enough to have shared audiences, and the Arco di San Damiano still marks where the Via Flaminia entered town, its paving grooved by cart wheels. A small medieval church, built from salvaged Roman stone, stands incongruously among the ruins. Systematic excavation began in 1951 and resumed in 2006, focused now on the baths and forum, and a visitor center with accessible paths and a café sits at the entrance.

The Terni guide

More within reach

Monuments a day trip away, elsewhere in Umbria.