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Town: MARINO
Ancestors of the Colonna Family was the Gens Iulia, and this justifies their
possession of territories in the Rome's southern area.
The family wished to create this park to celebrate the sacral
atmosphere of this place. There were two inspiring reasons to
create the Parco Colonna once named “Barco”, an
Italian word meaning hunters' paradise, one linked to
the sacral atmosphere an the other linked to the idea of the
renaissance garden with enclosure walls and with animals to
shoot. Thanks to the renaissance conception it was possible
to maintain this wood unmodified; it consists of several kinds
of trees with caduceus broadleaves.
The Colli Albani and the whole volcano's area was characterized
by thick woods with several kinds of trees, an example of which
is Parco Colonna, who survived to the undiscriminating introduction
of chestnuts during the 17th century. Parco Colonna belongs
to a Natural Reserve within the Parco Regionale dei Castelli
Romani, covering an area of 25 hectares.
Area's Natural Characteristics
Among the architectonic ruins within the park, there are huge
exemplars of white hornbeams having exceptional sizes. One these
hornbeam trees can be considered a sort of “patriarch”:
it reaches an height of 30 metres and it has more than 1-metre-long
diameter, perhaps one of the hugest hornbeams in Italy. Very
beautiful are also the maples, the greatest of which reaches
an height of 20 metres. Undergrowth consists of the Coronilla
emerus and the spindle trees, whose fruits' shape reminds
that of the priest's cap “nicchio” with three
tips, and in Italian it is calleed vulgarly “berretto
del prete”, meanining priest's cap. There is also
the Job's tears, a plant protected by the Law L.R. of
the 19 September 1974, no.61, whose seeds, were used for rosary
strings. There is also the Cistus rooted over peperino stones,
whose leaves are similar to those of the sage. As it is a public
garden the only animals that can be seen and heard are the birds;
they are very numerous: during summer there is the Jynks Torquilla,
an unusual woodpecker which climbs along trunks and does not
excavate nesting cavities. It seems a passerine but when it
finds in danger moves the head and the neck “snaking”
and therefore in Italian it is called vulgarly “torcicollo”
a word that means: wryneck.
Among the woodpecker's kinds there is the red dendrocupus
major, drilling the wood and eating pine seed, it succeed in
fixing pine cones on trunks so that it can eat pine seeds more
easily. There is also a kind of woodpecker, a small passerine,
moving upside-down along the trunks. Where undergrowth is thicker
there is the leaf warbler, a small bird eating insects, which
can be recognized for its chirp, that sounds like a ciff-ciaff,
ciff-ciaff.
Place
The Parco Colonna finds near the stadium in via Ferentum.
Roads and Public Transports
By car: From Rome cross the S.S. 7 Via Appia (slip-road
23 of G.R.A.), cross the via dei laghi (S.S. 217) towards Marino.
After the Ferentano woods, there is a crossroads at the km 6,500
of via dei laghi, where you have to turn to the left, and after
400 metres near the Gregorian Bridge there is Parco Colonna.
You can park in Largo Negroni, at a distance of 100 metres from
the entrance.
By train: There is a train starting each hour from Rome.
It will take you 30 minutes to reach Marino. For information
on train timetable call the phone number 848888088 or visit
the web page www.fs-on-line.it.
The railway station is at a distance of 1,5 kilometers from
the entrance to the wood.
By Bus: Rome-Marino-via dei laghi (Cotral bus service
phone number 800431784, phone number 067222153) from the underground
station ‘Anagnina' of the Linea A. It will take
you about 30 minutes to reach the bus stop “Stadium”.
Topic
Botany, fauna
Visits
The wood is always open. For information phone to the Associazione
Pro-Loco di Marino, Via Palazzo Colonna, 7, phone number O69385555.
Tourist signs
absent.
Further Information
Web sites: www.parks.it/parco.castelli.romani/index.html,
www.xiTownstamontana.lazio.it, : www.castellionline.com, www.hurricane.it/castelliromani.
Books: Bassani P., Cantiani G.P., 1997. L’ambiente
naturale del Vulcano Laziale. Ed. XI Townstà Montana
del Lazio “Castelli Romani e Prenestini”, Rocca
Priora (RM); Bassani P., Lotti L., 1992. Alberi e arbusti
del Parco Regionale dei Castelli Romani. Casa editrice del
Parco dei Castelli Romani, Rocca di Papa (RM); AA.VV., 1996.
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