Caposele

Caposele has 3,537 inhabitants in the upper valley of the Sele, and the name says exactly where it is: caput Sylaris, the head of the river. From the limestone rock of Monte Paflagone the spring gushes out, and from here the Apulian aqueduct sets off: the water that comes out below the village goes to be drunk in Puglia. According to Paulus Orosius it was precisely ad caput Sylaris that the revolt of Spartacus was finally crushed.

The plague of 1656 was a massacre: the sources tell that of three thousand inhabitants more than two thousand five hundred died, and decades passed before the village filled up again. On the hill above the centre stands the hamlet of Materdomini, where Gerard Majella died and where the sanctuary dedicated to him is today: together with the springs, it is the reason why people come to Caposele from outside.