Lazio · Roma
Bracciano
The Lazio lake town with the eighth-largest lake in Italy below it and one of the best-preserved Renaissance castles in the country above it.
Known for
CASTELLO ORSINI-ODESCALCHI
1470-1485 Renaissance fortress by Francesco di Giorgio Martini, one of the best-preserved military castles in Italy.
LAKE SABATINO
Volcanic crater lake at 164 meters, eighth largest in Italy and the source of part of Rome's aqueduct supply.
TOM CRUISE WEDDING
Married Katie Holmes in the castle on 18 November 2006; the international event that put Bracciano on world tabloid maps.
When to visit
Best · Apr–Oct
- J
- F
- M
- A
- M
- J
- J
- A
- S
- O
- N
- D
- Best
- Hot or crowded
- Quiet
- Mostly closed
The festa: San Sebastiano, first Sunday of May
Why come
Bracciano stands above the southern shore of Lago di Bracciano, the volcanic crater lake known historically as Sabatino, the eighth largest in Italy. The Castello Orsini-Odescalchi was begun by Napoleone Orsini in 1470 and completed by his son Virginio Gentile in 1485; the architect was Francesco di Giorgio Martini. It is one of the better-preserved examples of Renaissance military architecture in Italy, a five-towered pentagon on a polygonal base, with frescoes by Antoniazzo Romano and the Zuccari brothers.
The Orsini lost it through debt in 1696 to Livio Odescalchi, nephew of Pope Innocent XI; the Odescalchi still own it. Bracciano supplies a significant part of Rome's drinking water through the aqueduct that begins in the lake. The town is also a hazelnut commune, member of the Città della Nocciola network. Tom Cruise married Katie Holmes in the castle in November 2006, which is how most people outside Italy heard of the place.
The Sunday letter
We haven’t written Bracciano’s letter yet.
One town every Sunday, with the photo, the food, the festa. Be there when this one comes up. Free, by Peter & Sophia from Pietrasanta.
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What to see
Castello Orsini-Odescalchi
1470-1485 Renaissance castle, five round towers on a pentagonal plan, frescoes by Antoniazzo Romano and the Zuccari brothers.
Lago di Bracciano
Volcanic crater lake, eighth largest in Italy at 57 square kilometers, source of part of Rome's drinking water.
Centro storico
Medieval town below the castle walls, organized in concentric rings around the rocca, with two surviving medieval gates.
Collegiata di Santo Stefano
16th-century parish church with works by the Zuccari school and a relief by Giulio Mazzoni.
Parco Regionale di Bracciano-Martignano
Regional park covering the two volcanic crater lakes and their wooded shorelines, established in 1999.
The slow-trip planner
Building a trip? Find where Bracciano fits in a slow Italy circuit.
Answer five questions. We will shape a geographically coherent slow trip from the 1,000 Italian towns most travelers skip. Yours to save and share.
We recommend
Where to eat and stay
Not our picks, but places the guides put their name to — a Michelin star, a Gambero Rosso fork, a Slow Food snail, a Michelin Key for the hotels. Worth a table, a counter, or a night when you pass through.
Cucina ai MontiRistorante
Cucina ai Monti holds one Gambero Rosso fork (78/100).
ErbacceLabTrattoria
ErbacceLab has two Gambero Rosso prawns to its name.
Percørsi al Vecchio PonteRistorante
Percørsi al Vecchio Ponte has one Gambero Rosso fork (79/100) to its name.
Living here
- Population 18,380
- Off the beaten pathi
- Pharmacy in town
- High school within a 30-minute drive
- Train station in the comune
- Nearest airport Rome, 1 h 8 min drive
- Regional capital Roma, 58 min drive
Tags & datadesignations · numbers · sources
Recognised as
The numbers
- Elevation: 280 m
- Population: 18,380
- Surface area: 143.06 km²
These figures were compiled from public directories — ISTAT, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata — and from the official listings of the guides named on this page. Town details change; verify with official sources before you travel.
Close by
More towns near Bracciano
Canale Monterano
Province: Roma
A hilltop village next to the burned ghost town of Monterano, where Bernini's San Bonaventura and the Baroque fountain stand roofless.
Anguillara Sabazia
Province: Roma
A medieval cape town jutting into Lake Bracciano, twenty-five kilometers from Rome, built above a 5700 BC Neolithic lakeshore village.
Trevignano Romano
Province: Roma
A volcanic-crater lake town on the northern shore of Bracciano, thirty-five kilometers from Rome, with a medieval rocca above the water.
Oriolo Romano
Province: Viterbo
A planned sixteenth-century village in the Sabatini hills, founded in 1560 by a Santacroce nobleman next to the UNESCO beech forest of Monte Raschio.
Cerveteri
Province: Roma
An Etruscan capital seven kilometers inland from the Tyrrhenian coast, with the Banditaccia necropolis holding 1,000 tombs in the largest ancient cemetery in the Mediterranean.
🌳 Parco Regionale
More Parco Regionale towns in Lazio
Ariccia
Province: Roma
The Castelli Romani town where you go for porchetta — a Bernini-designed Baroque ensemble (palazzo + Santa Maria dell'Assunzione + Piazza di Corte) on a volcanic crater rim 25 km south of Rome, with the most concentrated cluster of fraschette porchetta restaurants in Italy and Lago di Albano below.
Calcata
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A tufa-cliff village forty kilometers north of Rome, condemned and abandoned in the 1930s, then occupied by artists and never left.
Castel Gandolfo
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A papal town on the rim of Lake Albano's volcanic crater, summer residence of the popes since 1626 in the Castelli Romani.
Castelnuovo di Porto
Province: Roma
A tufa-ridge borgo twenty-five kilometers north of Rome inside the Parco di Veio, dominated by the Rocca Colonna above the Tiber valley.
Castro dei Volsci
Province: Frosinone
A Ciociaria hilltop borgo at 385 meters in the Sacco valley, named for the pre-Roman Volsci and birthplace of actor Nino Manfredi.