Falvaterra

The name is that of a town that no longer exists. Fabrateria nova was founded by the Romans in 125 BC on the right bank of the Liri, just below its meeting with the Sacco, right after the destruction of nearby Fregellae, and Juvenal put it into his verses as the right place for otium. When the Lombards razed it along with Aquino and Atina, the survivors climbed onto the spur of the Ausoni mountains that overlooks the valley and called the new village Falvaterra: the name is the old one, worn down.

Of the many masters who passed the castle among themselves — the de Ceccano, the bishop-count of Veroli, the Pagani, the Caetani, for four years even the Borgia — it was the Colonna who stayed, and they stayed until 1870. It was the Colonna, too, who were one of the reasons for the war of 1556 between the pope and the king of Spain: when in November of that year the Duke of Alba invaded the Papal States, the castle of Falvaterra was the only one to hold, nine days of siege, and it surrendered only after the complete rout of the papal troops. In January 1944 it was the peasants who organised, to take back the livestock seized by the Germans: the reprisal was a sweep that caught at least two hundred people and the shooting of innocents.