Pizzo, also called Pizzo Calabro, is a seaport and comune in the province of Vibo Valentia (Calabria, southern Italy), situated on a steep cliff overlooking the Gulf of Santa Eufemia.
Fishing is one of the main activities, including that of tuna and coral.
As with many other places in Calabria, an origin in the ancient Magna Graecia, Pizzo has claimed to have been founded by colonists from ancient Magna Grecia, but there is no documentary or archeologic evidence for this. Pizzo history begins with the documentation of the existence of the community of Basilian monks, a fort, and a fishing village since 1300. The name Pizzo (translated into bird's beak, projecting point) fits perfectly to the tuffa promontory that juts into the sea near the mouth of the river Angitola.
For centuries, in the months of May and June, tuna was trapped in these beaches. Until the 1970s, in an area called Centofontane, was where nets were spread to corral tuna from offshore. Ruins of the activity remain. The activity is now banned. In the area Piedigrotta and Prangi there are some sea caves. The cave of the Saracen, crumbling today, supposedly was used by Saracen pirates as a repository of prey and people captured in raids.
