Arco dei Gavi
Última actualización el 9 de noviembre de 2026El Arco dei Gavi se alza junto a Castelvecchio en Verona, y dos cosas suyas son insólitas.
Primero, es un monumento privado. Los arcos romanos solían ser imperiales; este lo levantó en el siglo I d. C. la gens Gavia, una familia veronesa acaudalada, para sí misma.
Segundo, está firmado. El arquitecto, un liberto llamado Lucio Vitruvio Cerdón, grabó en él su nombre: algo que muy pocos edificios romanos llevan en ningún sitio.
Y lo que está en pie tampoco está donde estaba. Las tropas napoleónicas lo derribaron en 1805; las piedras se guardaron, y en 1932 se volvió a montar aquí.
El reto para quien visita
The arch is not where the Romans put it. It was demolished in 1805 and rebuilt on a nearby site in 1932, so anyone who needs a monument in its original position should know that before walking over. It also stands beside a busy road rather than in a protected setting, and without knowing to look for the architect's signature and the cart ruts in the paving there is not much here to hold a visitor for more than ten minutes.
Consejos y estrategia de visita
Cuándo ir
Late afternoon gives the best light on the arch and on Castelvecchio behind it.
Any season -- it stands in the open with nothing to close.
Early morning is quietest; Corso Cavour is a busy road and the arch sits beside it.
Evenings when it is lit, on the walk between the centre and Castelvecchio bridge.
Cómo aprovecharlo al máximo
Find the architect's signature cut into the stone. Lucius Vitruvius Cerdo, a freedman, put his own name on this arch as its architect, which almost never happens in Roman architecture and is the single most interesting thing about the monument.
Look down afterwards for the cart ruts worn into the paving. Without those two things this is a handsome arch beside a busy road and nothing more. Take it together with Castelvecchio in a single stop rather than making a trip of it — the two stand next to each other and ten minutes is enough.
Cuánto cuesta
Nothing, and you can walk right round it. The arch stands free on open ground beside Castelvecchio, with no enclosure of any kind — which in Verona is rare enough to be worth the sentence.
So the two things that make it unusual are both free to examine: that it is a private monument rather than an imperial one, and that its architect signed it. Lucius Vitruvius Cerdo's name is cut into the stone and reads from the ground.
Verificado en Comune di Verona, noviembre de 2026.
Cómo llegar y entrar
El arco es gratuito y siempre accesible, al aire libre junto a Castelvecchio en el corso Cavour. Nada que reservar ni que pagar.
Está a diez minutos a pie al oeste de la piazza delle Erbe, inmediatamente al lado de Castelvecchio y su puente, así que los dos van juntos de forma natural.
Calcula diez minutos. Busca la firma y las roderas del pavimento: sin ellas es un arco hermoso y poco más.
El lugar está a nivel y es plenamente accesible.
Combinado con Porta Borsari y Porta Leoni, compone un paseo romano por el centro que no cuesta nada y lleva alrededor de una hora.
Accesibilidad del lugar
A free-standing Roman arch beside Castelvecchio, with nothing to enter and nothing to climb. It is free and open at any hour, and — unusually for Verona — it can be walked round completely.*
The architect’s signature, which is the rarest thing about it, is cut into the stone and readable from the ground without height or a ticket.
The ground is level, which for a Roman monument in this city is worth saying. disMappa, the Verona association that maps the city for wheelchair users, described the piazzetta beside Castelvecchio as comfortably flat after the arch’s restoration — but that was in 2013, and it recorded the surface as compacted earth at the time, so the paving may well have changed since. No current access statement is published for the site by anyone.
Lo señalado con * es nuestra propia lectura del lugar, no una afirmación del gestor. Se lo hemos preguntado, y su respuesta sustituirá a la nuestra.
Datos rápidos
- Tipo: Monumento
- Reserva: No hace falta — entradas en taquilla
- Visita típica: Unos 10 minutos
- Construido: 1st century AD; demolished 1805, reassembled 1932
- Construido para: the Gavia family
- Diseñado por: Lucius Vitruvius Cerdo
- Estilo arquitectónico: Romano
- A Roman building that names its architect: L. Vitruvius Cerdo, a freedman, signed the arch as its designer -- almost unheard of in Roman architecture, where buildings are credited to their patrons.
- Pulled down, kept, put back: Napoleonic troops demolished it in 1805, but the blocks were numbered and stored; it was reassembled beside Castelvecchio in 1932, near its original site rather than on it.
- Patrimonio de la Humanidad de la UNESCO: Sí
Visita responsable
El arco se alza junto a una vía con tráfico. Cuidado al cruzar, y no invadas la calzada al fotografiarlo.
No te subas al arco ni al pavimento romano expuesto. Las roderas son lo más frágil que hay aquí y lo más fácil de seguir desgastando.
No toques las inscripciones, tampoco la firma: las letras grabadas son exactamente lo que las manos erosionan primero.
Visitar Castelvecchio al lado apoya al museo que conserva buena parte del material romano y medieval de Verona, incluida la estatua original de Cangrande.