Each turist coming in Rome during the weekends has in program monuments  and places that are famous around the world.

Few people know that there are amazing places near “the eternal city” where turist could enjoy a special atmosphere. One of those is Ariccia and its palace.

The ducal palace of Ariccia represents a unique example of Roman Baroque residence unaltered in its own context and original furnishing, documenting the splendour of one of the major Italian papal families: The Chigi.

The ancient castle, marked by Medieval and Renaissance traces, was enlarged in the second half of the 16^th century by the Savelli family and transformed by the Chigi family between 1664 and 1672 into a sumptuous Baroque residence by Carlo Fontana after a project of his master Giovan Lorenzo Bernini.

Agostino Chigi*, nephew of pope Alexander VII and Prince of Farnese, together with his cousin Cardinal Flavio and uncle Mario, bought the feud of Ariccia from the Savelli in 1661, because of its vicinity to Castel Gandolfo, seat of the pontifical holidays. Bernini was enlisted to complete the urban restoration of the village.

In 1665 Bernini had to temporarily leave the Roman scenario, because he was called to Paris by Louis XIV to project the façade of the Louvre. As a first project he suggested a solution identical to the Assunta complex; at his return the old artist conceived an unusual composition for the Palace in Ariccia, combining the “U” scheme of Roman Villas with a rectangular plan and corner towers, inspired by the French castles of Ile de France.

As he did for Cardinal Flavio I in the villa in Cetinale, near Siena (1672) Fontana adopted the “color dell’aria” (color of the air) for the façade: a bluegray hue, that would become very fashionable in the 1700s.

The Palace features an important collection of painting, sculptures and furnishing, mostly dated to the 17^th century.

Luchino Visconti chose the palace  to film most of his masterpiece Il Gattopardo (The Leopard; 1963), inspired by the homonymous novel by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa. Other important movies shot in the palace are l'Avaro by Tonino Cervi, Luisa Sanfelice of the Taviano brothers (2003), I Borgia  by Antonio Hernandez (2005), I Vicerè by Roberto Faenza (2006) and tv serial such as Elisa di Rivombrosa (2002) and Orgoglio (2003-2005.

Ariccia is definitely a lovely place to visit near Rome for a better understandinfg of the history of Rome  but also an amazing landscape to enjoy.

*The Chigi descend from the counts of Ardenghesca, Lord of Macereto. Since the 1200s they established themselves among the most notable lineages of Siena in commerce and finance.

Agostino Chigi “The Magnificient” (1465-1520) was an outstanding figure of the family, among the greatest patrons of the Renaissance, who commissioned the family chapel in Santa Maria del Popolo and in Santa Maria della Pace to Raphael, the famous villa later called “Farnesina to Baldassare Peruzzi and the Villa delle Volte outside Siena.

Agostino accumulated great fortunes through the monopolies of alum from Tolfa, salt and other activities. He opened banks from London to Istanbul and lent money to popes and Kings from Charles VIII to Alexander VI and Leo X.

After some absence from the political and cultural scene, the family reached new glory with the election of Cardinal Fabio Chigi to the papacy as Alexander VII (1655-1667). He surely was the pope that contributed the most to making Rome a baroque city, by commissioning important urban and architectural works to Bernini, Borromini, Pietro da Cortona.

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