Inaugurated in the National Archaeological Museum of Taranto - MArTA the exhibition "Athenaion: Tarentini, Messapi and others in the Sanctuary of Athena in Castro", curated by Francesco D'Andria - Academician of high schools, professor emeritus of the University of Salento and Director of excavations and of the Archaeological Museum of Castro and Eva Degl'Innocenti – Director of the National Archaeological Museum of Taranto.

The exhibition is an unpublished story of the city of Taranto because from a scientific point of view it opens a new context for reading the history and its territory. The archaeological investigations conducted in Castro (LE), in the Salento area of Lecce, starting from the year 2000, in collaboration between the Municipality of Castro, the University of Salento and the Superintendencies of the Ministry of Culture, currently including the Superintendency of Archaeology, Belle arts and landscape for the provinces of Brindisi and Lecce have made it possible to identify the Sanctuary of Athena (Athenaion) mentioned by numerous literary sources, in particular by Virgil who, in book III of the Aeneid, describes the first landing in Italy of the fleeing Trojans from Troy, led by Aeneas. The studies carried out have focused attention on the role played by the sacred place as a meeting place for different peoples, Greeks, Messapians, peoples of the opposite Balkan shore, in a strategic point of ancient navigation, at the entrance to the Adriatic Sea.