In the hamlet of Borgio, on the edge of the Piana Crixia commune, two castles stand within close sight of each other: the fragmentary ruins of a medieval fortress built by the Del Carretto family, and the shell of a nineteenth-century neo-medieval castle constructed in a romanticized interpretation of the original. The juxtaposition is odd and strangely appealing — eight hundred years of history compressed into a single view.
The Del Carretto were the dominant feudal power in this corner of Liguria through much of the medieval period, and the original castle controlled the valley route between the Ligurian coast and the Piedmontese interior. Little remains of the medieval structure beyond foundation walls and one round tower, but the setting — dense forest, terraced vineyards, and the Bormida river below — is handsome. The nineteenth-century addition was never completed and has been a ruin almost as long as the medieval one.