Mulazzo is a comune in the province of Massa-Carrara, Tuscany region of Italy, about 93 kilometers from Parma.

Tuscany · Massa-Carrara

Mulazzo

A Malaspina fief in the Lunigiana hills where Dante stayed in 1306, with a frazione of booksellers who walked their wares across Italy.

93 km / 58 mi

Nearest hub (Parma)

2,284

Population

Apr–Oct

Best time to visit

Recognised as

Why come

Mulazzo sitsin the Lunigiana, the corner of Toscana that bends north toward Liguria and Emilia. The town was an imperial fief of the Malaspina family from 1164, the seat of the marquisate that descended from Moroello Malaspina, and the place where Dante Alighieri is believed to have stayed in 1306 during his exile from Firenze. The Torre di Dante, the medieval tower at the head of the borgo, was once thirty meters high and six stories tall; most of it was demolished around 1750, and what remains is a sixth of the original mass. The Alessandro Malaspina study centre, inside the tower, holds materials on the eighteenth-century navigator from the same family who mapped the Pacific coast of the Americas for the Spanish crown. Three kilometers up the ridge, the frazione of Montereggio is the only Italian member of the International Organisation of Book Towns, in honor of the booksellers who left the village in the nineteenth century with panniers of books on their backs to sell across central and northern Italy.

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Gallery

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Known for

Torre di Dante
Tenth-century Malaspina tower at the head of the borgo, once six stories and thirty meters, now reduced to a sixth of its original height.
Montereggio
Frazione three kilometers up the ridge, the only Italian member of the International Organisation of Book Towns, in honor of the village's bookselling diaspora.
Centro Studi Alessandro Malaspina
Inside the Torre di Dante, holds documents on the eighteenth-century Pacific navigator Alessandro Malaspina, born in the family that ruled the borgo.
Castello Malaspina di Castevoli
Ruined Malaspina castle in the frazione of Castevoli, ten kilometers from the centro, a separate branch of the Lunigiana fiefdom.
Centro storico
Stone medieval village on a Lunigiana ridge, with narrow stepped streets converging on the Malaspina tower and the parish church.

When to visit

Best months · Apr–Oct

Best
Hot or crowded
Quiet
Mostly closed

April through June and September into October are the months when the Lunigiana ridge is at its best, with green hills, low cloud, and the chestnut and oak forests turning. July and August stay cooler than the coast thirty kilometers south, but the centro empties around midday. The Montereggio book festival, in late August, is when the bookselling frazione fills again for a weekend with publishers and readers. November through March is wet and quiet; the Apennine storms push through the Lunigiana valleys and the borgo closes most of its trattorie. The local honey, recognized by the Città del Miele network, is harvested in summer and sold through the colder months from family producers in the comune.