A cluster of terrestrial islands in the town of Piglio, a group of small and medium sized parcels, each with its own personality, together they form an alternation of farming and nature.
We have vines, olive groves, officinal herbs, walnuts and a vegetable garden.
Each island of the cluster (cru or contrada) is an independent being, that merges with the surrounding environment and with the soil. Over the years each island expresses itself through shades that define its character. Together they create a mosaic that we’ve also helped build.
We make wine from four of them (San Giovanni, Cercione, Collepasso, Vignali), olive oil from five of them (Costa Ilia, Collepasso, Fontana di Grano, San Giovanni, Mignano).
In some islands like San Giovanni and Ilia the plants are very old and have achieved a complete adaptation to the environment.
The officinal herbs complete the cultivated flora, as well as fruit trees and other spontaneous plants. Around each of them there are woods, fields and meadows.
PIGLIO
Town of Piglio, in the province of Frosinone, forty kilometers south of Rome, Lazio region.
A small enclave surrounded by the mountains that lead to Abruzzo, facing the Roman countryside. First DOCG of Lazio.
Bernard of Clairvaux took his vows here (and the teachings of the Monastic tradition, including agriculture) before going to Burgundy. The Roman emperors Nerva and Trajan would pass their summers in villas, that used to be on the fields that Abbia Nòva cultivates today. The Benedictine Monastery of Saint Scholastica is our agricultural library.
For the past four hundred years one variety has prevailed over the others that have passed by here and still try to stand out in the old vineyards.
​
Cesanese d’affile is the protagonist among the vines, but we’ve committed ourselves to give voice also to other, more ancient varieties, that we deeply cherish, from Passerina to Nostrano.
METHOD
We come from humble farming families. We have a natural agricultural approach, often quite personal, in constant flux, that reflects who we are: a fusion of local traditions and of something that is deeply cultural, that we’ve built from the teachings and influences of the many natural methods that we’ve experimented through the years.
Maybe because our grand parents handed over their hoe to our right hand and a metaphorical library to the other, that we’ve used to deepen the various agricultural approaches, treasure them and fuse them with our own. That hoe represents the viticultural tradition of Piglio, that has existed for two thousand years, on volcanic soils, with an obsessive care for plants and vineyards that have always coexisted with gardens, fruit trees and animals.
Our cellar is a small country house in the mountains, on the consular Roman road that took from Lazio to Abruzzo, two rooms with amphoras, concrete, wood and demijohn glass jugs. Our only tools, coordinated only by our heads and hands.