Castel Gandolfo
Castel Gandolfo, near Rome and overlooking Lake Albano, possibly occupies the site of ancient Alba Longa. The Palazzo Pontificio built in 1624 by Carlo Maderno, enjoys the privilege of extraterritoriality. The clock is still split into six sections following the Italian time counting system which was in place in Italy until Napoleon imposed the move to the European system and which was reinstated in Rome after 1815.
Lake Nemi, to the south east, is the ancient Nemorensis Lacus, also called the "Mirror of Diana" Speculum Dianae, the setting of events at the start of The Golden Bough by Sir James George Frazer.
The Da Vinci Code
Dan Brown, in his bestselling novel "The Da Vinci Code", has Bishop Aringarosa jet into Rome's principal gateway, Leonardo da Vinci Airport. Aringarosa meets the Vatican delegation at the Pope's summer residence in the township of Castel Gandolfo.
The Works of Thomas Gray edited by Edmund Gosse
One drives to Castel Gandolfo, a house of the Pope's, situated on the top of one of the Collinette, that forms a brim to the basin, commonly called the Alban lake. It is seven miles round ; and directly opposite to you, on the other side, rises the Mons Albanus, much taller than the rest, along whose side are still discoverable (not to common eyes) certain little ruins of the old Alba longa. They had need be very little, as having been nothing but ruins ever since the days of Tullus Hostilius. On its top is a house of the Constable Colonna's, where stood the temple of Jupiter Latialis. At the foot of the hill Gandolfo, are the famous outlets of the lake, built with hewn stone, a mile and a half underground. Livy, you know, amply informs us of the foolish occasion of this expense, and gives me this opportunity of displaying all my erudition, that I may appear considerable in your eyes. This is the prospect from one window of the palace. From another you have the whole Campagna, the City, Antium, and the Tyrrhene sea (twelve miles distant) so distinguishable, that you may see the vessels sailing upon it. All this is charming. Mr. Walpole says, our memory sees more than our eyes in this country.
Mr. Gray to Mr. West. Rome, May, 1740.
