Identity: a capital between two seas
Seat of the Calabria Region's Executive in the Cittadella at Germaneto (the Council sits in Reggio Calabria) and capital of a province of 80 municipalities. City of the "three Vs": Vitaliano, the patron celebrated on 16 July, the wind and the velvet of its silk tradition. Arbëreshë communities in nearby villages.
Sections: Geography · History · Population · Languages · Time zone · Public holidays
Institutions
Catanzaro is Calabria's capital under the regional statute: it hosts the Presidency and the Executive in the regional Cittadella at Germaneto, opened in the 2010s, while the Regional Council sits in Reggio Calabria (Palazzo Campanella), the result of a historic compromise between the two cities. The city also hosts the Court of Appeal, the Prefecture, the university hospital and the state offices for the region. The Province of Catanzaro has 80 municipalities, from the Ionian coast to the Sila and the Tyrrhenian at Lamezia. The Comune is not divided into municipi.
Languages
The Catanzaro dialect belongs to the central-southern Calabrian dialects, with transitional traits; in the city regional Italian is mostly spoken. A few kilometres away live Arbëreshë (Italo-Albanian) communities recognised under the law on historic minorities: Caraffa di Catanzaro, Vena di Maida, Andali, Marcedusa and the Zangarona district of Lamezia Terme.
Saint Vitalian and the three Vs
The patron is Saint Vitalian, bishop of Capua whose relics are kept in the cathedral; the feast is on 16 July, with the procession through the centre and fireworks. Catanzaro is remembered as the city of the "three Vs": Vitaliano, the wind that blows between the two seas across the isthmus, and velvet, a memory of the silk industry that made it famous from the Middle Ages to the eighteenth century. The Bisantis Bridge (1962), a reinforced-concrete arch by Riccardo Morandi, is the city's modern symbol.
Data
Sources
Updated: 2026-10-14
Updated: 2026-10-14
Updated: 2026-10-14
Reviewed: 10/22/2026 · by piero.avolio · rev. 1 · Period: → 2027-10-31
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