Known for
A working cruise port on Italy's Tyrrhenian coast
Must-see landmarks
Forte Michelangelo and the Cattedrale di San Francesco d'Assisi
Getting around
Old town is walkable from the port gate; trains link the station to Roma
Free to visit
Piazza Leandra and the old quarter and the length of the Pirgo seafront
Cruise passengers reach this small Trajanic-era harbour basin on foot through the pedestrian Varco Fortezza gate, still a working base for fishing boats that sell the day's catch after they return. Archaeologists recovered a bronze arm from a colossal Neptune statue here in 1834. Forte Michelangelo stands a short walk away.
Pope Julius II commissioned this quayside fortress from the architect Bramante; it was finished in 1535 under Paul III with a tower attributed to Michelangelo. It now houses the harbourmaster's office, closed to the public, though its walls can be walked around from the path outside. The Fontana del Vanvitelli is a 7 minute walk away.
Luigi Vanvitelli carved this travertine fountain in 1743, commissioned by Pope Benedict XIV to replace an older basin on the same spot along the port's 17th-century defensive wall. Its faun's-head niche and curved staircase face the old harbour. Piazza Leandra, at the centre of the old town, is a 4 minute walk away.
At the heart of the medieval quarter, this square is named for Leandro, a sailor whose speech is said to have persuaded residents to resettle the coast after a Saracen raid in 828. Its restored fountain and the small Chiesa della Stella, a 15th-century sanctuary rebuilt after wartime bombing, face the square. The cathedral is a 3 minute walk away.
Franciscans broke ground on this church in 1610, and Pope Clement XIV had it enlarged by the architect Francesco Navone, consecrated in 1782; it became a cathedral in 1805. Allied bombing left only the facade and bell tower standing in 1943, and it reopened rebuilt in 1950. The archaeological museum is a 3 minute walk away.
Finds from the Roman port and the Taurine baths fill this museum, among them a marble Apollo tied to the Colossus of Rhodes and a Roman copy of Phidias's Athena Parthenos, both unearthed at a villa in nearby Santa Marinella. A renovation currently limits the open galleries to the top floor. Il Pirgo and the seafront are an 11 minute walk away.
The seafront promenade runs from the fortress past Piazza della Vita, a hub for markets and open-air events in summer, down to Il Pirgo, a beach pavilion first built in the 1800s and rebuilt in 1997. Its name recalls Pyrgi, the ancient Etruscan port on this stretch of coast, and its terrace looks back over the whole waterfront.
The old town's main square costs nothing to sit in beyond a coffee at one of the bars around its edge, its restored fountain and the nearby Vicolo dell'Archetto passage both free to see close up at any hour.
Free to attend, mass is held at 9:30 and 18:30 on weekdays and five times on Sundays inside the cathedral rebuilt after the 1943 bombing.
Closed to visitors inside, the fortress costs nothing to walk around on the pedestrian path that circles its walls, the same free view of the Maschio tower that greets every ship sailing into port.
The pebbles and water along this stretch of seafront are free to use any time, with a charge applying just to the sunbeds and umbrellas set out by the beach pavilion at its centre.
Free to view from the old port wall, this 1743 travertine fountain sits a few steps from the working fishing harbour, with no ticket or opening hours to plan around.
Free access through the Varco Fortezza gate leads to this Trajanic-era fishing basin, where the moored boats sell their catch straight off the deck in the afternoon.
Civitavecchia is a working port of just over 50,000 people, not a resort, and most of the millions who pass through it each year are ashore for a matter of hours rather than days. What the town offers instead is a compact old quarter squeezed between the harbour and the sea, built and rebuilt over two thousand years since Trajan laid out its original basin, and a train line that puts Rome within reach for anyone with a full day to spare. For passengers starting or ending a cruise here, the port also makes a natural first stop on a longer tour of what to see across Italy.
Trajan's engineers finished the original harbour around AD 110, and the name Centum Cellae, the hundred rooms of the emperor's villa, stuck to the town for centuries. Saracen raiders destroyed it in 828, and returning settlers renamed it Civitavecchia, the old city. Popes fortified and rebuilt the port from the 15th century on, and Allied bombing flattened most of the centre again in 1943 and 1944; the fortress, the cathedral and the squares standing today are largely post-war reconstructions of that older layout.
Everything worth walking to sits within the loop between Forte Michelangelo and the Museo Archeologico Nazionale: the Darsena Romana fishing harbour, the Vanvitelli fountain, Piazza Leandra and the cathedral. Corso Centocelle runs the length of it, connecting the railway station to the harbour with shops and cafes. Above the town, the Roman Terme Taurine baths, expanded under Hadrian, are currently closed to the public for restoration work.
Regional and Intercity trains connect Civitavecchia's station to Roma Termini, making the port a realistic base for a single day in the capital. The Colosseum and the Vatican are the two sights that dominate most itineraries, though a return journey leaves only a few hours to see either properly. The Etruscan necropolises of Tarquinia and Cerveteri, a joint UNESCO World Heritage site since 2004, lie along the coast to the north and south for travellers with more time.
The old town is flat and entirely walkable from the port's pedestrian gate, with everything on this page reachable inside an hour on foot. Cruise ships dock at one of five terminals inside the port, and berth assignments vary by ship, so the walk from any particular berth to the town gate is not the same distance twice.