Paliano (a town of approximately 8,000 inhabitants in the Ernici foothills, Frosinone province. 55km southeast of Rome on Via Casilina between Anagni and Fiuggi) has the most specific dual identity of any Lazio hill town: the site of one of the primary Colonna family castles (the Castello Colonna, the medieval fortification that the most powerful baronial family of medieval Rome built as the anchor of their Ciociaria territorial control) which since 1935 has housed one of Italy's most secure prisons (the Istituto a Custodia Attenuata di Paliano, a specialized detention facility for former members of organized crime, political prisoners, and high-profile convicts who cooperate with the justice system). The castle-prison is visible from Via Casilina approach road as a massive fortified structure on the hill above the town. The operational prison within it makes access to the historic castle interior impossible for normal visitors, leaving the exterior and the town below as the accessible elements.
The Paliano historic center (the medieval borgo (historic village) on the hill around the castle base, with the specific Colonna architectural program, the church of Sant'Andrea with its Colonna family coats of arms, the baronial palace façades, the 15th-century town planning that reflects the Colonna family's ambition to make Paliano a proper urban center) is the accessible historical complement to the inaccessible castle. The Colonna family (the ancient Roman baronial dynasty that produced the pope Martin V, the pope who ended the Great Western Schism in 1417 at the Council of Constance, and whose feud with the Orsini family defined Lazio politics for three centuries) made Paliano their primary Ciociaria property precisely because its position controlled both Via Casilina and the Ernici mountain access routes.
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Paliano: Town and History
The Colonna Family Heritage
The Colonna family history at Paliano: the castle was a Colonna possession from the 13th century, the scene of the specific 1556 episode in which Pope Paul IV (the Carafa pope who had a particular vendetta against the Colonna for their alliance with the Habsburgs) confiscated the castle and the Paliano dukedom from the family, before it was restored by Paul IV's successor. The "Caso Paliano" (the 16th-century legal and political dispute over the Paliano property) is a specific episode in the history of the relationship between the papacy and the Roman baronial families that modern scholars study as a defining moment in the subordination of the Roman aristocracy to papal authority. The castle exterior (visible from the town approach road and from the piazza below, the corner towers, the medieval walls, the early modern bastions added to resist artillery) is the physical documentation of four centuries of Colonna power.
Paliano Wine and the Ernici Foothills
The Paliano area (the Ernici foothills east of Via Casilina) is in the Cesanese del Piglio DOCG zone, the Cesanese indigenous red grape territory that produces the most interesting Lazio red wine. The Paliano producers (several small wineries in the Paliano municipal territory) participate in the DOCG system. The Cesanese del Piglio DOCG wine from the Paliano slope has the specific character of the calcareous-volcanic soil of this transition zone between the Ernici limestone and the Alban volcanic complex.
Q&A: Paliano
Can I visit the Colonna castle in Paliano?
No, the castle interior is the operational prison facility and isn't accessible to visitors. The castle exterior (visible from the town approach road and from Piazza Matteotti below the castle walls) is freely observable. The Museo Civico di Paliano (in the town center, with the Colonna family documents and the local history collections) provides the historical context for the castle that the exterior alone can't convey. The best Paliano visit strategy: the museum (1 hour), the historic center walk (45 minutes), and the castle exterior view before continuing to Anagni (15km north, the "city of popes" with the finest Romanesque cathedral in Lazio) or to Fiuggi (15km northeast, the thermal spa).
Internal Links
- Fiuggi: La Spa 15km da Paliano
- Colonna e Lepini: Le Famiglie Baronal del Lazio
- Cesanese del Piglio DOCG: Il Vino di Paliano
- Ernici: I Borghi della Famiglia Colonna
- Ciociaria in Primavera: Paliano e l'Ernico
- Colonna vs Orsini: La Faida Medievale del Lazio
- Fotografare il Castello di Paliano dall'Esterno
