Verrucola Castle and Borgo: Verrucola Castle and Borgo is located east of the Lunigiana (northern Tuscany) town of Fivizzano. Verrucola recently was voted Prettiest Tuscan Hilltown by Europe for Visitors readers.
How to Arrive at Verrucola Castle: Coming from the A12 Autostrada along the Mediterranean coast near La Spezia, change to the A15, direction Parma. Exit at Aulla and follow the signs to Fivizzano. Go past Fivizzano about 1km, the Borgo pictured on the upper right will be on your left.
How old is Verrucola Castle?: First mention of the castle called Verrucola Bosorum is found in 1044, when it was owned by the Bosi family, although it is built on an earlier Roman site; traces remain of Roman construction in a wall that encloses the castle. It's pretty certain that at the end of the antique period the castle controlled the road and collected tolls from travellers coming from the Cerreto pass. In the 1500s the Castle was turned into a monastery.
Who lives in Verrucola Castle today?: Pietro Cascella, a very famous sculpture who uses the local marble and travertine, lives and works in the castle today. You can see one of his works at the entrance of the Borgo of Verrucola: the Fontana della Verrucola, the Verrucola fountain, dedicated in 1984. You'll see more of his works if you visit the castle on Fridays.
Verrucola Castle: Visiting Hours: You can visit the public parts of the castle and see some of Pietro Cascella's works and models on Friday afternoons between 1 and 5pm. The tour is free. In Italy, call 0585-92466
Services in the Borgo of Verrucola: There is a small Pizzeria at the entrance to the Borgo, which serves pizza and traditional foods, including wild boar with polenta. No other stores are found in Verrucola, but you'll find everything you need in nearby Fivizzano, including a Wednesday open market.
Verrucola Attractions: Verrucola is easy to photograph. The main road past it is raised so that any picture of Verrucola seems as if the photographer climed an adjacent hill to get the perfect vantage point; just aim and shoot.
Wander the ancient road that makes a ring around the castle. It's a very evocative Borgo, all houses are all of carefully restored stone construction.
If you're near Verrucola on Fridays, take the tour and see Cascella's works. The sculptures are very interesting, using interlocking pieces of white marble like ancient constructions and featuring very human scenes. Some invoke the menhir and stelle figures of antiquity--the stelle statues of the Lunigiana (see them at the castle in Pontremoli) the Betole of Sardinia, and the standing figures of Malta.
The visit takes in the parts of the castle that were given over to the army barracks--the lower portion, now the artist's studio and storage area. The upper stories are the artist's rooms, which they won't let you see. The tour is only given in Italian, but you can see what's going on without much explanation. The rooms are beautifully constructed of local materials including light and porous tufa rock.
See our Verrucola Picture Gallery for a virtual tour of the castle and pictures of the borgo.
