Castiglione del Lago

The deeds of Ascanio, the duke that made of Castiglione del Lago a Renaissance showcase

The stories of Castiglione del Lago are melted with those of the character that has left the sign more than every other: the commander, strategist, swordsman, architect, humanist and patron duke Ascanio della Corgna. Definitions are never enough to capture such personality and appears reductive describing him only versatile. A man who really ease in the excess, in the disproportion and in all of what is immoderate, just like his ambition. Nephew of Gian Maria Ciocchi Del Monte, or, pope Giulio III, Ascanio ties his name to Castiglione in the second halves of 1500, when his uncle surrenders the whole territory to the family Della Corgna. He decides then to equip the place and to raise it to his greatness, making build the Palazzo Ducale firstly, and then furnishing it with every sort of possible wonder. First of all a cycle of frescos that celebrates his person and his deeds in the most important room: the '' Room of the Deeds of Ascanio ''. For the rest numerous other frescos, all of Renaissance taste. One room is devoted to the deeds of Hannibal. Niccolò Circignani, said the Pomarancio, was called to paint the frescos almost entirely realised together with Giannantonio Pandolfi. The Building was surrounded then by magnificent gardens that made it similar to a palace. The whole city turned itself into the sign of Ascanio, who made it beautiful, ordinate and Renaissance, like still today can be admired. Such figures are not judged equally to any deadly communes; sometimes they occur to illustrate all of their possibilities to the men. Only lukewarm personalities rarely find the necessary heat to realize the most ambitious projects. Sometimes we have the suspect that Ascanio was continually pushed over the sign to the only purpose to offer subject to the literature and the painting, to be able to admire and to enjoy the salt by his own enterprises. Because to fight otherwise?

To us remains only the opportunity to enjoy some beauties produced by the exuberance of whom has known to interpret the spirit of its time to the maximum levels delivering us the section of a Renaissance court of which is still possible to breathe its perfume and to admire its luxury. The visitor finds himself absorbed in an atmosphere of other times, in a city that every day returns again to resplending thanks to the light that receives from its lake. From Castiglione it opens a panorama that hardly can find suitable comparisons. Thanks to its position, above a high ground, it allows to embrace the lake, the hills and the whole underlying territory, giving a vision engraved in the soul and directly deposited in the drawer of the memory. If we think about the Trasimeno and its perimeter as a precious golden ring, Castiglione del Lago is certainly the most precious diamond of it, without price, but accessible to everybody.