The family Menichelli

-PARADISO TROVATO-

THE RISE, THE FALL AND THE RESURRECTION OF

PALAZZO MENICHELLI

Once Upon A Time, around the middle of the 19th century, a courageous young Italian man and his wife, of the type we’d perhaps refer to back in Australia as battlers, packed up all of their most precious belongings and headed for the far away land of Argentina, determined to somehow find success and eventually make their fortune.

Over the years that followed they had five children, and for many a year they scrimped and saved, before finally achieving their goal and returning triumphantly to their home province of Sabina, in the central Italian region of Lazio, where they set about finding the perfect location in which to build the palazzo of their dreams. 

Upon finding the perfect site, atop a large 800 year old pair of grottas that overlooked the great river Tiber and the valley of the same name, and the long dormant volcano of Monte Soratte, and channeled its way deep into the mountainside beneath the small medieval town of Stimigliano, they set about the task of making their hard fought for dream become a reality. And so it was that, some years later, in the latter half of the 19th century, Palazzo Alberto Menichelli was born.

During their many years abroad, Alberto Menichelli and his wife Terzina had put their hard earned money to good use, accumulating a vast collection of precious antique furniture and objects d’arte. So, upon completion of Palazzo Menichelli, they commissioned their son Corrado, by now a talented and acclaimed professional artist, to cover the walls of their precious palazzo with a series of fresco seccos and trompe l’oeils to complement their artworks and antiques. And this Corrado did, paying particular tribute to the town and valley in which the palazzo sat in a series of frescoes that covered the walls and ceiling of the building’s main entrance.

The ceilings and walls of other areas of the palazzo became an ode to the Sabina’s rich ancient Roman history, with finely painted faux panelled ceilings and walls in rich earthy reds, greens and golds adorning the dining room and master bedroom in a style reminiscent of that of the nearby 14th century Orsini palace. A pair of murals depicting the family’s beloved hunting dogs took pride of place upon the second and third storey stairwell landings.

The final work on the family’s palazzo was not completed until the year 1901, when the last of the building’s exterior walls were stuccoed, and a marble plaque, commemorating the efforts of Alberto Menichelli, was mounted on Palazzo Menichelli’s rear exterior wall, just a little above the tall medieval central window of the original cellar, directly below the staircase.

The years that followed were not always kind to the Menichelli family; one son, Carlo, was killed in the First World War, while Corrado Menichelli, who had so eloquently graced the palazzo’s walls and ceilings with his beautiful frescoes, died at the age of just 24. The pain of loss was too great for some, and still more lives came to be lost prematurely in the years that followed.

After Palazzo Menichelli eventually found its way into the hands of another of Alberto’s sons, Riccardo, under the care of whom the building was used as a safe passage for locals entering and leaving the town during the Second World War and its underground grottas served as a hideout for those on the run from the Nazis, it was finally passed first to Riccardo’s daughter, and then to his grandson, Pierluigi. 

And then, one heavenly sunshiny day, in the August of 2020, after the wondrous but at times ill fated palazzo had spent a great many years with it’s beautiful frescoes hidden behind layers of paint while serving as the local school, and decades more abandoned and untouched, an average Aussie girl who’d not long sold her average Aussie house, a girl of the type we’d perhaps refer to back in Australia as a battler, completed her fourteen day quarantine in Rome, hired a rental car, took a quick drive along the Rome Florence autostrada, and made her way to a little medieval hilltop town by the name of Stimigliano.

And, once there, she walked the cobblestoned streets of the Centro Storico, and the arch covered yellow walkway of a secret entrance, until she found herself sitting in the most impossibly lovely frescoed travertine, terracotta and wrought iron stairwell of a long forgotten but strangely magical and utterly endearing palazzo, with the most unimaginably breathtaking views of the great river Tiber and the valley of the same name, of the long dormant volcano of Monte Soratte, and of a hillside awash with olive groves and vineyards.

She sat there in that lovely stairwell, her hands shaking and tears streaming down her face, wondering where in the palazzo she might put each of the precious antique furniture pieces and objects d’arte she’d accumulated during her many years back home in the far away land of Australia, as the final price was negotiated and an agreement finally reached over the phone with Pierluigi, grandson of Alberto and Terzina Menichelli, for her to buy the precious palazzo of her dreams.

Palazzo Menichelli, il palazzo dei miei sogni...

-THE FAMILE MENICHELLI-

FROM A 14TH CENTURY KNIGHT TO ONE OF ITALY'S

LONGEST SERVING MAYORS

The origin of the Menichelli name lays right here in the provinces of Lazio, where the earliest recorded references to the name date back to at least the 14th century. However, today there are more than six hundred and forty Menichelli family branches spread throughout Italy, the majority of which are to be found in the regions of Lazio, Le Marche and Umbria. The family was granted its first knighthood in the middle of the 14th century, after the crusader Alessandro Menichelli, fighting under the flag of the Spanish Cardinal Egidio Albornoz, was one of an army that conquered the provinces of Lazio and  Spoleto, and those of the Montefeltro of Urbino, the Malatesta of Rimini and the Ordelaffi of Forlì.

In the centuries that have passed since, a great many illustrious men and women have borne the Menichelli name, including His Eminence Edoardo Menichelli, Cardinal and Archbishop of Emeritus Ancona-Osimo in Le Marche; acclaimed actresses Dora Menichelli; renowned scientist Marco Menichelli; internationally acclaimed cardiac surgeon Professor Maurizio Menichelli; several times Italian, European and World Champion soccer player Giampolo Menichelli; Olympic, World and European Championship gold, silver and bronze medal winning gymnast Franco Menichelli; and 1970-2004 Mayor of Stimigliano Costante Menichelli, who holds the significant honour of being one of the longest-serving town mayors in Italian history.