The castle that anchors Travo on the left bank of the Trebbia: three towers, a count’s residence, a small archaeological museum, and the tower room where the writer Giana Anguissola spent her summers writing.
At a glance
The southern side of Piazza Trento in Travo is closed by a castle. Behind its square gate-tower the old village begins, guarded on one side by the river and on the other by the fortress; a second tower stands within, and a third, cylindrical one rises closer to the Trebbia. In the late eighteenth century Count Giacomo Anguissola turned part of the complex into a stately residence. Today the castle houses local associations and the Civic Archaeological Museum, and on summer nights the little square under the round tower fills with chairs for the literary evenings named after Giana Anguissola.
Key facts
- Type: medieval castle of the Anguissola counts, on the left bank of the Trebbia
- Towers: square gate-tower on Piazza Trento, an inner torrione, and a cylindrical tower near the river
- Remodelled: late 1700s, as the residence of Count Giacomo Anguissola
- Today: Civic Archaeological Museum and local associations
- Literary link: Giana Anguissola (1906–1966) summered and wrote here from 1948
- Events: the Giana Anguissola literary evenings and prize, held in the piazzetta below the tower
History
Travo grew where the Trebbia leaves its gorge, and the castle is the reason the village has its shape: houses gathered behind the fortress, the river covering one flank. The Anguissola, one of the great feudal families of the Piacenza hills, held it for centuries, and when the age of fortresses ended they did what many such families did, turning part of the walls into a residence. The conversion under Count Giacomo Anguissola in the late 1700s left the towers standing and put windows where the defences had been.
The castle’s modern life has two threads. One is archaeological: since the 1970s the local research group La Minerva has gathered the finds of the valley, and the Civic Archaeological Museum in the castle now displays the material excavated at the Neolithic village of Sant’Andrea, a short walk away. The other is literary. In 1948 the writer and journalist Giana Anguissola, born in Piacenza in 1906 and one of the most read children’s authors of her generation, began spending her summers in Travo, living and writing in the castle’s ancient tower. The village has not forgotten it: a literary prize carries her name, under the patronage of the Ministry of Culture and the Emilia-Romagna Region since 2021, and on August evenings the piazzetta under the torrione becomes an open-air reading room.
What you see
From Piazza Trento the castle reads as a wall of rough stone with a square tower at its centre; the arch beneath it is still the way into the old village. Inside, the lanes tighten between high masonry until the cylindrical torrione appears, its rubble-stone drum capped by a corbelled brick crown. When the evening lights come on for a reading, the whole surface of the tower turns to texture, every stone throwing its own small shadow over the audience below.
Practical information
- The piazzetta and the village lanes are freely accessible; the museum follows its own opening hours.
- The literary evenings are held in summer; the programme is published by the Giana Anguissola prize and the Comune di Travo.
- Allow half an hour for the castle and village, more with the museum.
Getting there
Travo lies in the Val Trebbia about twenty kilometres south-west of Piacenza, along the SS45 toward Bobbio and Genoa. The castle stands at the village centre, on Piazza Trento. GPS: 44.86026, 9.54392 — open in Google Maps.
Nearby
- Borgo di Travo — Val Trebbia — the stone village behind the castle.
- Archaeological Park, Neolithic Village of Travo — the Sant’Andrea site whose finds fill the museum.
Sources
- Turismo a Piacenza — Comune di Travo, on the castle, its towers and the museum.
- Visit Piacenza — Giana Anguissola, on the writer’s years in Travo from 1948.
- Concorso Letterario Giana Anguissola (gianaanguissolatravo.it) — the prize and the patronage of the Ministry of Culture and Emilia-Romagna Region.
- Piacenzasera — reporting on the Giana Anguissola literary evenings at Travo.
Gallery
Photographs by Roberta Valla.
Find it on the map
See this place and what’s around it →📷 Become a Cultural Heritage Online photographer
Share your photos of places: they stay published under your name as the author. The more they're seen, the more you get noticed — and soon a contest will reward the most appreciated photos.
Log in or sign up free to add a photoIs this page about you?
This page is read by travellers and heritage enthusiasts who find it on Google. Tell us how you are connected to this place and we will take it from there.