The stone materials in the historical architecture of Levanto and their durability (Liguria, Italy)

The present contribution aims to focus on the analysis of the materials that characterize the constructions realized in Levanto, a seaside village of the Eastern Ligurian coast, highlighting the close link between historic building and locally available materials. The geological characteristics of the territory have in fact influenced significantly architecture up to the beginning of the XIXth century. Indeed, the mountains bordering Levanto, are mainly constituted by serpentines and sandstones (found as pebbles along the Ghiararo torrent and in the shore line) used extensively for the construction of both load bearing and not load bearing structures. For architectural elements such as arches, jambs, columns, located at the lower floors of noble and ecclesiastical buildings, quarried serpentinite stones were adopted, later replaced by sandstone, easy workable thanks to the presence of orthogonal fracture systems that allows to obtain trusses and slabs. There are also slate, adopted for the construction of architraves and bas-reliefs, as well as tiles for coverings and oficalcite, the Rosso di Levanto, which had already been quarried by Romans and which, widely traded since the Middle Ages, can be sporadically found in walls and in some architectural elements.