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Bolca, the world capital of fossils

Visiting Bolca is like jumping back into the past, the real one

Bolca, the world capital of fossils - img 1062

This village is located 803 meters above sea level, in the northeastern part of the province of Verona (Veneto – Northern Italy), at the end of the Val D’Alpone. The village is located on the south side of Mount Purga, with an extraordinary panorama of the valleys of D’Alpone and Chiampo, the Berici and Euganei hills, over much of the valley of Po, as well as the Massif Carega (North), the Grappa and Pasubio untiil the Dolomites (East).

It enjoys a mild climate, both in summer and in winter (thanks to the phenomenon of thermal inversion), particularly suitable for families, but also for sports activities. This is why the locality is chosen by various football clubs as their base for summer preparation, using the new arena in “Preari”.

Bolca, the world capital of fossils - fossile

Bolca is known worldwide for its remarkable fossils (plants and fish) of the Tertiary era (middle Eocene, about 50 000 000 years), exposed in different places on the territory, of which the most famous are the Pessàra, the Postale, the Vegroni, the monte Purga and the Spilecco.

In the last half millennium, these extraordinary specimens, unique to the variety and the state of preservation, have conquered scientists, scholars, geologists and paleontologists, but also heads of state, Popes, men of government and ambassadors, and have gone to enrich the most prestigious museums of natural sciences in Italy and around tthe World (Paris, London, Vienna, Munich, Budapest, Edinburgh, Dublin, Zurich, New York , Washington, Moscow, just to name a few) and countless private collections (among the oldest ones, those of G. Fracastoro, F. Calceolari, Pope Sixtus V, L. Hazel, S. Maffei, Gaikwad, Canossa, Séguier, etc.).

Bolca, the world capital of fossils - ceratoichthys pinnatiformis

Great scholars have examined and written the fossils of Bolca for five hundred years around these parts and still continue to do so to find answers to old and new questions about the history of the Earth and the evolution of species. For this, they continue to visit Bolca today, from all over the world.

Every year, tens of thousands of people, many from abroad, come to visit the Fossil Museum, the house-museum of the Cerato family, the caves of Postale and Pessàra; many students (about 15,0000) carry out an annual school trip on the mountains of the Val D’Alpone, which makes a surprising and fascinating journey over time.