Emilia Romagna Castles

Il Cardello is the home where the writer Faedo Alfredo Oriani spent most of his life and wrote all his works. The building most likely dates back to the eleventh century and was a guesthouse for the Benedictine Abbey of Valsenio, which has been documented since 1126. Alfredo’s father bought the property in 1855 and settled there in 1866. Alfredo Oriani (1852- 1909), with his many talents as essayist, novelist, historian, playwright, journalist, was an acute observer of Italian society and today is considered one of the most representative figures of his time. His account of the political and cultural crisis experienced by our country between the end nineteenth and early twentieth century have been very influential. The current structure of il Cardello is the result of a profound restructuring and is not totally in line with the original designs from 1926. With its interweaving of authentic Romanesque and fake antique, il Cardello is undoubtedly a monument of interest, whose austere impression is accentuated by the beautiful frame of the park. The interior of the house is a rare example of a noble home in Romagna of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The rooms, like the study and bedroom of Alfredo Oriani, left as they were give an intact representation of tastes of the time and an old era. The complex is now owned by the Fondazione Casa di Oriani, thanks to the donation made by Alfredo Oriani’s daughter-in-law, Luisa Pifferi, who lived here until her death in 1979. Stroll through the rooms among ancient furniture (some dating back to when Il Cardello belonged to the Abbey) and curious and original furnishings, discover old tools for cooking, working the land, producing wine. And be sure to stop and admire the bicycle with which the writer, considered as ‘the father of “cycling”, in 1897 in solitary made the journey of almost 1000 km between Romagna and Tuscany, which inspired him one of his most beloved works: “La Bicicletta.”