Parco di Villa Gregoriana
Parco di Villa Gregoriana occupies a historic nature park in Tivoli, Italy, beside the city’s ancient acropolis. The Aniene River cuts through its wooded ravines. Pope Gregory XVI commissioned the park in 1835 to restore the riverbed after a devastating flood. Its design keeps water at the centre. Winding paths cross dense woodland and lead towards the Great Waterfall, the Temple of Vesta, and ancient caves. The caves bear the names Neptune and the Sirens. Roman hydraulic structures show how engineers managed water around this strategic site in antiquity. The site later became part of the Via Valeria.
Ruins also include the villa of Roman consul Manlio Vopisco, adding domestic history to the ravine. The park expresses the Romantic idea of the sublime. Its scenery attracted artists and writers during the nineteenth-century Grand Tour, when ancient ruins framed dramatic woodland. The dense trees soften the surviving stone remains. Restoration returned the park to public use in 2005 after a period of neglect. Its paths still connect history, water, and woodland.
- City
- Tivoli
- Content updated
Image: LalupaPublic domain 
Image: LalupaPublic domain
Take this page with you
The myTuur app is free, and once you are standing at a spot its story starts by itself.
Spots like this one are the stops myTuur strings into tours through Tivoli. In the app, each story begins where you stand: walk up to a spot and it starts, read it on screen or listen as you go, then follow the route to the next one.
What is myTuur?
myTuur is a free city-guide app. Its tours are built from spots, and each spot carries a story that starts when you get there, to read or to listen to as you like.