In September 1123 a member of the pope's household named Crescenzio, probably charged with collecting the tribute of the local lords, was murdered and robbed in the territory of Maenza. Callixtus the Second held the lord of the place responsible, sent the papal troops, had the village occupied and, after a summary trial, had him beheaded in the castle square. The same logic returns in 1300, when Boniface the Eighth, backed by the Orsini, confiscated the fief from the counts of Ceccano because they sided with the Colonna: it came back to them in 1304, but only after a formal act of submission.
Berardo of Ceccano chose Maenza as his usual residence and had the Palazzo Baronale built there, where Thomas Aquinas stayed and where, according to the records of the canonisation proceedings, he worked his first miracle. In 1390 Raimondello de Cabanni renewed the castle and had cut over the entrance portal an inscription in Latin hexameters which dates the year by the turning of the sun and ends in praise of the place: the hills give oil, the valleys give grain and wine. In 1928 Maenza lost its status as a municipality and was attached to Priverno; it recovered it in 1947.
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📅 Every year, on 29 May, with the novena from 20 May
Maenza venerates Saint Eleutherius, celebrated on 29 May. The feast begins with a novena on 20 May, and on 28 May a procession is held from the town into the countryside.
Straight-line distances from the town centre. Tap a point to open its page.
The closest destinations covered by our editors, with straight-line distance.
Outside Maenza, but an easy day trip away.
