Castello di Formigine, Italy

Castello di Formigine

The town of Formigine where depends my little village administratively has a late medieval castle built, if I've understood it correctly, in 1201. Il Castello di Formigine was built for military use by local lords and contained among other buildings fortified walls, a clock tower, a church (S. Bartolomeo - only foundations left), a moat and a cemetary. Since 2001 they have been excavating the grounds looking for new evidence of its ancient past and restoring the castle and its fortifications, creating a museum (entry = 4 euros) that is open on weekends and in the week on request for group visits.

Entrance

They have also exhumed the graves in the cemetary, finding more than 60 corpses or more importantly, what came with them and that included clothing, jewellery and other artifacts that would contribute to the studies of the castle's past.

Within the grounds

The moat

I was walking round the centro the other day looking for a fruit grocer (found it - very expensive) and saw that the castle gates were open. Before I knew it, I found myself in its grounds. Have never seen it open before in the past 2 years, though I know that when they held concerts and displayed fireworks in the town, it's always in and/or around the castle.

From the outside

Very nicely restored. I didn't get to visit the museum or climb the fortifications and will try to do that one of these days. Just walked in the grounds and took a few pictures. It is very nice having such old buildings around. I hope that we would be capable of building something that can stand and still look so good nearly a thousand years later.