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It
is located in lake Bolsena, in the municipal district of
Capodimonte; over the centuries it had been the residence
of many pontiffs, from Pope Urbano IV in 1261 to Pope
Benedetto IV in 1758. There isn't any person that visited
the isle and wasn't struck by the beauty and spirituality
of the place. The fauna of the island varies incredibly.
It includes: wild hares, pheasants, wild swans and
cormorants as well as herons, gallinules, ducks and rovins.
As far as the vegetation is concerned, it varies and
includes centuries-old pines, lebanon cedars, oaks,
prickly pears, paulownia, centuries-old pagoda trees,
horse chestnuts, magnolias, holm oaks and lime trees as
well as a woderful hydrangeas avenue, designed by Giovanni
Fieschi Ravaschieri del Drago. Visitors may admire the
natural beauty of its extensive evergreen oak forests, its
gardens, and the attractive sinuous lines of its contours,
but there is more to it than that. Its attractions also
include the church designed by Vignola with the elegant
lead-covered dome, the octagonal shrine created by
Sangallo on the tuff peak of the "Rocchina", the
chapel of Jesus the Crucified adorned with frescoes dating
back to the 1400s, the Etruscan-Roman vault lined with
burial niches under the Rocca, the beautiful marble
sepulchre of Ranuccio Farnese III and the Malta of Popes.
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