Vezio Castle

Vezio Castle, between a thousand years of history and a raid that shook the community

Vezio Castle, which according to several sources has watched over Varenna for more than a thousand years and reportedly dates back at least to the year 1100 AD, is now in the spotlight for two very different reasons: on one hand, its historical and touristic value; on the other, an act of violence against animals involving its falconry activities.

A medieval stronghold, between legend and history

As reported by leccotourism.it and varennaturismo.com, the castle began life as an ancient military outpost of late medieval origin, built to defend and control the lake and surrounding villages thanks to its strategic position. Popular tradition attributes its construction to the Lombard queen Theodolinda, who, according to legend, later moved to Perledo to spend the final years of her life there. On this legendary thread, the sources diverge on one detail: leccotourism.it claims that Theodolinda also had the oratory of Sant'Anna built alongside the castle, while varennaturismo.com does not mention this element, instead attributing to the queen — according to a single source — the church of San Martino with its tower-bell.

There is a further discrepancy between sources regarding the castle's location: lecconotizie.com and ilgiorno.it place it in the municipality of Perledo, on Lake Como, while varennaturismo.com does not confirm this geographical attribution.

Private property, open to the public

According to varennaturismo.com and ilgiorno.it, Vezio Castle is privately owned but remains open to visitors, with management entrusted to the Vezio Castle Tourist Association, which oversees its upkeep and promotes art exhibitions and events. The same sources note that an overall restoration project is under way, partly completed and partly to be finished in the coming years. On opening hours, however, the sources do not agree: varennaturismo.com indicates the castle is open for most of the year, generally from March to early November, while castellodivezio.it provides a more detailed schedule, with hours varying by month and winter weekend openings in good weather — information found only in this single source.

The night of the raid and the release of the birds of prey

The most significant recent event, however, occurred, according to ilgiorno.it and leccotoday.it, on the night between October 7 and 8, 2022 (lecconotizie.com more generally refers to the night between Friday and Saturday). Unknown individuals broke into the castle by scaling the perimeter walls and opened the aviaries, freeing the birds of prey — a detail confirmed by three independent sources, which also agree on the number of aviaries forced open and the number of animals released: five in both cases.

The castle's falconry activities are run by falconer Nicola Castellano, who lives there together with his birds of prey, as reported by lecconotizie.com and ilgiorno.it. According to these two sources, corroborated also by leccotoday.it regarding the immediate aftermath of the raid, one of the freed birds was found dead, killed and eaten by another bird of prey; leccotoday.it specifies — in information not found elsewhere — that this was the harris hawk Tristan, recovered a few hours after the incident. The other four animals were initially unaccounted for, and the three sources agree that the two smallest — the barn owl Semola and the kestrel Merlino — were presumed dead, while faint hopes remained for the recovery of the two larger birds of prey.

An update provided solely by leccotoday.it recounts that the harris hawk Linda returned to the castle on a Saturday, nearly a month after being freed, in conditions described by the castle's staff as weak and hungry but essentially healthy; sightings reported by locals were said to have been key to her recovery. According to this same source, of the five birds released, two were ultimately found alive — both harris hawks, Parsifal and Linda — while the intruders' act reportedly caused the death of three animals.

The falconer's outburst

Lecconotizie.com and ilgiorno.it extensively report the statements of Nicola Castellano, who has cared for the castle's birds of prey for 16 years and voiced his anger, according to lecconotizie.com, in a post on the castle's Facebook page. The falconer stressed that the animals, born and raised in captivity, were incapable of surviving in the wild: "I hope that whoever did this can read this message, and understand that with their act they did not free animals capable of surviving in nature but condemned them to die horribly — of hunger and hardship in the best case, or torn apart by each other or more likely by some wild animal." Castellano also recalled his bond with the animals, explaining that if they had wanted to escape they could have done so at any time during shows, rather than always returning to him, and he pointed to sixteen years of daily dedication, "in summer and winter, in 40-degree heat and in the snow, at Christmas as at mid-August, with a fever and even during lockdowns."

Both sources agree that the falconry shows drew school groups and numerous visitors, and that for the falconer the emotional damage outweighs the financial loss. A complaint has been filed and the castle's security camera footage has been handed over to the authorities, while falconry demonstrations have been suspended until further notice.

A broader historical heritage

Beyond the recent events, several pieces of single-source information — all traceable to varennaturismo.com — reconstruct a history of the site reaching back to remote eras, with an original settlement possibly of Ligurian-Celtic or Etruscan origin, the subjugation of the Alpine peoples by Octavian in 27 BC, and a series of warring episodes that are said to have repeatedly led to the fortification's destruction and rebuilding — including the episode of 1244, when the population of Varenna, after being destroyed by the people of Como, reportedly took refuge in the castle, considered impregnable. As this information comes from a single source, these historical details should be treated with the caution warranted by any account that has not been further verified.