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Sorrento Peninsula and Amalfi Coast: The Long-Term History of an Enchanting Promontory

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Landscapes and Landforms of Italy

Part of the book series: World Geomorphological Landscapes ((WGLC))

Abstract

The mountain ridge forming the Sorrento Peninsula and the Amalfi Coast is of great physical beauty and plenty of tourist attractions. Moreover, it has an interesting geomorphological history that this chapter illustrates in the form of a 7-stops visit tour. The local landscape was influenced by extensional tectonics that divided the western coastal belt of southern Italy in horsts and grabens. While creating impressive fault scarps with truncated landscapes suspended above them, tectonics promoted, among others, cutting of steep canyons and opening up of ancient karstic conduits. Around the end of Middle Pleistocene the area attained tectonic stability and the following climatic and eustatic changes are geomorphologically recorded at stream mouths and in some coastal caves.

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Correspondence to Aldo Cinque .

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Cinque, A. (2017). Sorrento Peninsula and Amalfi Coast: The Long-Term History of an Enchanting Promontory. In: Soldati, M., Marchetti, M. (eds) Landscapes and Landforms of Italy. World Geomorphological Landscapes. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-26194-2_34

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