Piperno (rock)

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Access stairs to the mezzanine floor of Villa Meola in Portici from Piperno

The Piperno is a volcanic natural stone ( trachyte ) that occurs in Campania in the Phlegraean Fields . It was won in the areas of the city of Quarto , Soccavo and Pianura , and Nocera Inferiore . The Piperno is a characteristic natural stone that was used in many historical buildings in Naples and Campania.

The Piperno was probably formed from the deposition of a pyroclastic cloud. This type of lithic tuff differs from the common yellow tuff of the Phlegraean Fields in that it has a special texture, which is characterized by dark lenticular areas called flames, which are embedded in a lighter gray matrix.

The Piperno rock can only be extracted by subterranean separation of the large blocks that were later worked. It is weather-resistant and for this reason it has been widely used to clad buildings in Naples . It is currently no longer extracted because the underground quarries in Pianura and Soccavo are exhausted. The Piperno Plain with the overhanging Breccia Museum can be seen well at the foot of the Camaldoli hill in the Soccavo area in Verdolino.

literature

  • Ernst Kalkowsky: About the Piperno . In: Journal of the German Geological Society . tape 30 , no. 4 , 1878, p. 663–677 ( schweizerbart.de [accessed June 4, 2019]).
  • Trachyte . In: Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon . tape 19 . Leipzig 1909, p. 653-654 ( zeno.org ).

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