Italy means something different to every tourist. Pizza, ruins, great works of art, hot beaches, handsome youths, good wine... The country is an obliging one, and few visitors leave disappointed. If you're looking for one aspect of Italy, you'll find it served on plate, even richer than you expected. And if you are open and receptive, the chances are you'll find much more than you dreamed of.

The Roman Castles are located in the Colli Albani/Alban Hills just south of Roma. The area has been a refuge for wealthy Romans since the Middle Ages. Not much has changed, as today this is where wealthy Romans come to escape the city on weekends and holidays. The area is littered with castles, villas, palazzi and refreshing easy towns to tour.

There are 13 towns in the Castelli Romani or Roman Castles (Frascati, Grottaferrata, Castel Gandolfo, Marino, Rocca di Papa, Ariccia, Nemi, Monteporizio Catone, Colonna, Albano Laziale, Genzano, Montecompatri and Rocca Priora). This is a perfect area to have a good dinner or lunch, to start or end a trip (as they are relatively close to the Champino airport).
For the Roman emperor and the wealthy cardinals in the heyday of the Renaissance, the Castelli Romani exerted a powerful lure, and they still do.

Castel Gandolfo is a town located 25 kilometres (16 mi) southeast of Rome in the Lazio region of Italy. Occupying a height on the Alban Hills overlooking Lake Albano, Castel Gandolfo and over the south side of Rome, has a population of approximately 8900 residents and is considered one of Italy's most scenic towns. The construction of Castel Gandolfo is based on the ancient and splendid Roman villa of Albanum Domitian which was the residence that the emperor Domitian built between the years 81 and 96. The town remained in oblivion until 1200 when the Genoese family of the Gandolfo built the castle on top of the hill overlooking the lake. Even when the papal footprint was engraved in the middle of the 16th century, the reconstruction of the Papal Residence was designed by Carlo Maderno for Pope Urban VIII in the 17th century, however, Pius XI later added the Papal Palace and the adjoining villa Barbarini. The small square in front of the Residence was renamed in 1870 with the name of Liberty Square during the movement for Italian unity. The Papal Palace was uninhabited from 1870 to 1929 when Mussolini, with the signature of the Lateran Treaty, recognized the Holy See as its owner.

On the opposite side of the lake (of Castel Gandolfo) on which the town overlooks, lies the territory of the ancient pre-Roman city (actually Latin) of Alba Longa from which it is possible to derive the descendants at the origins of the Roman civilization. In fact, Alba Longa was the capital of the kingdom of the Latins gave birth to Romulus and Remus, giving way to the millenary history of Rome.

History

As it is told in the Aeneid, Aeneas, son of the goddess Venus, flees from Troy, now occupied by the Achaeans, with his father Anchises and his son Ascanius; while his wife Creusa, daughter of King Priam, perishes in the fire of the city. After various wanderings in the Mediterranean, including the landing in Carthage where he is welcomed by Dido, Aeneas arrives in Lazio in the territory of Laurento. Aeneas then decided to found a new city, giving it the name of Lavinium, in honor of his second wife, Lavinia. Subsequently, the son of Aeneas, Ascanio, founded a new city named Alba Longa over which his descendants reigned for numerous generations (from the 12th to the 8th century BC), until the reign of Amulius, who had usurped the throne to his brother Numitor.

Numitor, being older than Amulius, had inherited the ancient kingdom of the Silvia dynasty. But the brother usurped the throne, even committing crimes:

Finally, he forced his brother's only daughter, Rhea Silvia, to become a vestal and therefore to take a vow of chastity, depriving her of the hope of becoming her mother. However, the god Mars fell in love with the girl and after having possessed her by force in a sacred wood, where she had gone to draw water, she made her the mother of the twins Romulus and Remus. The second of these two babies was given the same name as the Rutulus leader decapitated in his sleep by Niso during the war between the Trojans and the Italics.

The Roman cusine is both simple and fantastic delicate. Nice pastas like "spaghetti alle vongole" (small scallops), roasted baby porc, thin stone-oven baked pizzas with real mozarella and local ham, roasted lam chops, grilled swordfish, artichoke and a pletora of ancient fired vegetables, and so on and so forth Castello's cultural heritage and typical cusine, came from the local Roman one, but here is the land of wine.

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