Villa Gregoriana - renamed by the FAI after the restoration of the Villa Gregoriana Park - is a natural area of great historical and landscape value located in Tivoli, a few steps from Rome, in the steep valley between the right bank of the Aniene and the ancient Roman acropolis. The site is known above all for hosting the Great Waterfall, and can be considered a very particular example of a romantic garden, for its conformation and for its correspondence with the taste for the aesthetics of the sublime, so dear to romantics. A destination for travelers, poets, artists, kings and emperors over the centuries, but reduced to a state of decay and abandonment at the end of the twentieth century, Parco Villa Gregoriana was reopened to the public in 2005 thanks to the FAI after an impressive landscape restoration work
Parco Villa Gregoriana History
Just over half an hour from Rome, in Tivoli, Parco Villa Gregoriana contains a huge heritage that exemplifies the aesthetics of the sublime so dear to romantic culture. Nature, history, archeology and artifice come together here in such a seductive way as to become an obligatory destination on the Grand Tour in the 19th century and the main subject of the pictorial representations of Tivoli.
In 1832 Pope Gregory XVI promoted a grandiose work of hydraulic engineering to contain the continuous flooding of the Aniene, channeling its waters into a double tunnel dug in Mount Catillo and then artificially swelling them, thus giving life to the 120 meters jump of the new Great Waterfall. second in Italy after the Marmore. Having completed the work, the Pope created the park that bears his name and which for over a century was the destination of artists, writers and men of culture who told the world about its beauty.
After the Second World War, the site became property of the State Property which in 2002, in a state of total abandonment and very serious hydrogeological instability, gave it in concession to the FAI, thanks to whose commitment it returned to its ancient splendor. In 2005 it was finally reopened to the public who today can once again walk the ancient paths freed from brambles, smell essences previously suffocated by decades of neglect and abandonment, enjoy with all senses the seventy-four tree species present and discover interesting finds from different genres and eras. , immersed in the most luxuriant nature. Among these, the remains of the Villa of the Roman consul Manlio Vopisco, a sumptuous residence also celebrated by Stazio, and, on the acropolis, the Roman temples including the highly celebrated one of Vesta.
Among picturesque views that take your breath away and natural caves that whisper legends, walking in the thick wood of Parco Villa Gregoriana means discovering the romantic encounter between the majesty of the landscape and the tranquility of the paths that cross it