About 3 km north of Metaponto, on the road towards Bernalda, an unsigned turning leads to one of the most striking Greek monuments in Italy. The Tavole Palatine are the surviving columns of a hexastyle peripteral temple of Hera, built around 530 BC and standing on the same spot ever since.
The site is open, fenceless, and free. Get out of the car, walk through a couple of trees, and you're under the columns. Combine it with the museum and the main archaeological park in town for the full picture.
A story
When the Normans arrived in the 11th century they assumed the lonely columns must have been a meeting place of the paladins of Charlemagne — and the misleading nickname 'Palatine Tables' stuck. The temple is in fact 6th-century BC Greek, dedicated to Hera, and stood at the northern edge of the Metapontine countryside as a sanctuary for travellers entering Greek territory. Fifteen of its original 32 fluted columns still stand, in a clearing under umbrella pines, with no fence and no ticket and almost nobody else there.