Grotta dell'Arsenale

      Situated between Marina Piccola and Punta Tragara, Grotta dell’Arsenale opens onto the sea and can be accessed via a water level slipway. Inside, several naturally formed rooms - whose grid and lattice decoration and cocciopesto floor are still partially visible - are organized around the wide central cavity. On the left hand wall of the main room there are six niches while of the six niches of the opposite wall only three plus a fourth in a poor state of conservation remain. Originally considered to have been used for as a workshop for repairing ships (arsenale) belonging to the Roman fleet, the remains of the marble flooring and the coloured tiles - ruined during ancient excavations - seem to indicated that Grotta dell’Arsenale was more probably used as a nymphaeum. The grotto was successively used as a burial area as indicated by the finding of a marble sarcophagus and as an arsenal in the Medieval times.