Frascati Culture

Frascati holds together three cultures that have no particular reason to coexist, and the result is the most interesting thing about it.

The first is wine. Frascati produces the white wine that carries its name, and the cellars and the Roman weekend trade that comes for them are the town's most visible face.

The second is the villa culture of the Castelli Romani — the summer landscape of the papal court and the Roman aristocracy, which makes Frascati a historical and artistic centre rather than simply a wine village.

The third is science. The town is closely associated with it, being the location of several international scientific laboratories, which gives a comune of twenty-three thousand people a research population and an international one.

Underneath is an older identity still: this is Tusculum Novum, the new Tusculum, named for the Latin city destroyed in 1191 on the hill above, whose bishopric came down here. The 1515 statute called the inhabitants Populus antiquae civitas Tusculi — the people of the ancient city of Tusculum.

And there is an educational legacy that the town carries lightly: Europe's first free public school opened here in 1616.