Adventurous travellers can make their way through the beautiful ruins of an abandoned ghost town which has a 1,300 year history.
Visit Craco on the heel of Italy today and you will find the tumbled down remains of what was clearly a glorious city.
Buildings made of brown bricks stack up the side of the hillside, creating small town squares on the roof tops and many vantage points to take in the stunning views of the countryside beyond.
In its heyday in the 12th and 13th centuries Craco was home to about 2,500 inhabitants - enough to warrant four beautiful palazzi and a university.
In later years, the Matera settlement would become a byword for strife.
During 1656, a plague struck, with hundreds dying and the number of families in the town reduced massively.
Around the turn of the 19th century Craco fell into the hands of Napoleonic forces, who were later bloodily thrown out by the Bourbon government in exile who plundered and killed many of the pro-French notables.
After several hundred years of civil strife life in the town quietened, only for Craco's population to plummet in the century when many left for North America fearing famine and ruin.
The threats of landslides, flood and an earthquake in 1980 cleared the final few remaining souls out of the town.
Today, thanks to the work of a dedicated team of conservationists, Craco's history and buildings are well preserved, and can be visited in the presence of a local guide.
Recently the town's majesty was captured by Dutch photographers Roman Robroek and Sven van der Wal, who shared drone footage on their YouTube channel ‘boyswithdrones’.
"The vantage point makes for an incredibly stunning and artful sight," Roman said.
"The town has many ties to its environment and the aesthetics of the local surroundings.
"This is what makes it beautiful. But ultimately, also what contributed to its demise!"
The Dutch videoographers are not the only ones to realise that Craco is something special.
The town has featured in dozens of films across the years, including the 2008 James Bond film Quantum of Solace which employed its buildings for a chase scene.
Mel Gibson's controversial 2004 film The Passion Of The Christ used Craco as a backdrop for the suicide of Judas.
