The Giardino (garden), a public park on the Aventine created in 1932, provides the public with a belvedere, a panoramic view of the City, similar to other such sites in the City: the Janiculum and Pincian Hills and Monte Mario. This magnificent garden, named after the orange trees growing abundantly there, sits over the area of the Medieval family fortresses built here in the 9th century (Crescentii family) and in the 13th (Savelli family). It abuts the adjacent Clivo di Rocca Savella, a long, sloping walkway from the Tiber River to the top of the Aventine.
Part of the wall of the medieval Savelli castle remains at the far end of the hill. For many years the Dominicans of Santa Sabina utilized the open space around it as their vegetable garden.
At the entrance of the park in Piazza Pietro D’Illiria, rests a fountain composed of two separate pieces: a Roman sarcophagus and a monumental marble mask originally set on a 16th century fountain in the center of the City.
The spectacular, panoramic view from the platform at far edge of the park provides a breathtaking vista of the City below.
