Travel time:
21-min drive | 3 hours walk

Our rating: To visit

The Park of Monsters, also called Sacro Bosco or Villa delle Meraviglie di Bomarzo, in the province of Viterbo, is an Italian monumental complex. It is a natural park there about 3 hectares adorned with numerous basalt sculptures dating back to the sixteenth century and depicting mythological animals, gods and monsters. The architect and antiquarian Pirro Ligorio commissioned by Prince Pier Francesco Orsini (known as Vicino Orsini) designed and supervised the realization, in 1547, of the park, elevating the genre of grotesque to a system, in the mythological figures represented there. Some scholars, erroneously, traced the “direction” to Michelangelo Buonarroti (E. Guidoni), while others, in particular for the Temple cited the name of Jacopo Barozzi da Vignola. The realization of the sculptural works was probably entrusted to Simone Moschino.