Lipari Castle, six thousand years of islands in six pavilions.

Lipari Castle is the high rock that separates the town's two harbours, Marina Corta and Marina Lunga, surrounded by walls. It has been inhabited since the Neolithic, and inside there are churches, open-air excavations and the Museo Archeologico Regionale Eoliano Luigi Bernabò Brea, named after the archaeologist who excavated the islands from the 1950s.

What is in the museum

The museum occupies several restored buildings in the precinct, some used as places of confinement under Fascism. You go round it in six pavilions, in chronological order:

• Prehistory, with finds from Lipari and the smaller islands, such as Filicudi and Panarea. The Aeolians were settled because of obsidian, the black volcanic glass used to make blades.
• Ancient history of Lipari and the founding of the Greek city.
• Epigraphy, with funerary inscriptions.
• Greek and Roman periods, with urban and religious life.
• Volcanology, on how the islands were formed.
• Underwater archaeology, with reconstructions of the cargoes of sunken ships, full of amphorae.

There is also a room devoted to theatre masks and red-figure vases linked to the cult of Dionysus. In the old prison, since 2014, there has been the contemporary art exhibition Mare Motus. Everything on display comes from excavations on the islands and is presented in its context: huts, houses, tombs, sanctuaries or shipwrecks.

Hours and admission

According to the Parco Archeologico delle Isole Eolie, the museum is open every day from 9:00 to 19:30, and on public holidays from 9:00 to 13:30. The castle precinct, with the churches and the excavations, is open from May to October from 9:00 to 19:00 and from November to April from 9:00 to 16:00; on public holidays, from 9:00 to 13:00.

The price does not appear on the Parco's opening-times page and the sources that give it do not agree: between €7 and €10 for a full-price ticket. Ask at the ticket office or write to the Parco's information office (telephone +39 090 988 0174).

Getting there

From Marina Corta you walk up a flight of steps to the precinct; from the hydrofoil harbour it is about ten minutes on foot. The climb is short but steep.

When to go

It is the plan for a windy day, when the boats do not sail, or for the hottest hours. Allow two or three hours to see it at leisure. When you come out, go down to Marina Corta or stay in Piazza Mazzini, at the foot of the castle, where Filippino is.