HINC ENIM ORTI STIRPE ANTIQUISSIMA SUMUS“From here we spring, from a most ancient stock.” Cicero, On the Laws II, 3
For people born abroad or in another city to parents and grandparents who left Ciociaria, and who no longer have a house in the village. We help you find places, records and people.
Why here
Between the 19th and 20th centuries thousands of people left the Comino Valley and the Liri Valley. Many settled in Scotland, England and Ireland, others in the United States, Canada, France and South America. In some villages of the valley the most frequent foreign visitors are still the children and grandchildren of those emigrants.
Those who come back usually face three problems: they no longer have a house to sleep in, they don't know which office to ask, they don't know anyone. Alla Posta solves all three. The house has 11 beds for the extended family, it is in the middle of the valley, and the person who welcomes you is local.
The history of emigration from these valleys also has painful pages. On 2 July 1940 the Arandora Star, carrying Italians interned in the United Kingdom to Canada, was sunk off Ireland: 446 Italians died, including five men from Casalattico, in the Comino Valley. Many families in Glasgow, Edinburgh and London have part of their story there.
To people from Ciociaria, Cicero too was a successful emigrant: he left here for Rome, yet wrote that this remained his “real homeland”, the place of his roots and the traces of his ancestors. The history of the valley.
How it works
The research starts before you leave, so your days in the village are spent seeing things, not waiting at offices.
Names and surnames of your grandparents or great-grandparents, dates even if approximate, the village they left from, the name of the ship or the year they arrived abroad. Photos, letters or an old passport help too.
Tell us what you have. We tell you whether the village is close, which offices to contact and what to ask, and help you choose the right time of year.
Birth and marriage records are requested from the town hall's registry office; baptisms from the parish. Many 19th-century registers can be consulted online on the Antenati portal. For older periods you go to the State Archives: until 1927 these towns belonged to the province of Terra di Lavoro (Caserta). Watch out for towns created later: Posta Fibreno, for example, was a hamlet of Vicalvi until 1957, so earlier records are often in Vicalvi.
We go with you to the town hall, the parish, the cemetery and the district where your family's house stood. Often a surname mentioned in the square is enough to find a distant cousin.
Copies of the records, photos of the places, the recipes you cooked together. And a place to come back to next time.
Example: a week in June for the whole property costs €1,648 plus tourist tax. The longer you stay, the less you pay per night; for long stays or repeat visits, write to us.
There is also Italea, the Italian Foreign Ministry's programme for roots tourism, with a network of genealogists. We do not handle citizenship applications: for those you need the consulate or a professional.
We reply in English and in Italian.