Giglio Island
Born from 4.5 to 5 million years ago, Lily, has to its geographical position "strategic" the origin of his adventurous story and contention. Already inhabited since the Stone Age and later chosen by the Etruscans as a likely military outpost, the lily lived one of the moments of greatest splendor under Roman rule, the Domizi Enobardi Family, owners of the monumental patrician villa located in loc.Castellari, (visited today Only the lyre) by becoming a key node in the maritime trade between provinces, as evidenced by the numerous shipwrecks in the waters off the Island, and the references in the literature of the period (Julius Caesar's De Bello Civili I "- Pliny" Naturalis Historia " - Antonino Augusto "Itinerarium maritimum" Rutilio Namaziano). In 805 Charlemagne gave the island abbey of Tre Fontane, but after various events passed to Aldobrandeschi to Pannocchieschi, the Gaetani, the Orsini and the City of Perugia. Gigliesi waters in 1241, the fleet of Frederick II destroyed the Genoese leading prelates in Rome for the Council convened by Pope Gregory IX against the emperor himself. From 1264 the island was held by Pisani, to which we owe the layout of Giglio Castello. In later centuries, the island suffered many conquerors including the Medici of Florence from the early fifteenth century. Unfortunately at that time, the island suffered numerous raids Saracen, one of the most disastrous by the pirate Khair ad-Din Barbarossa. On November 18, 1799 marks the end of the barbarian invasions and the heroic victory of Gigliesi against the "Turks". From this moment begins a period of greater calm, promoting economic recovery and population, with the resumption of agricultural activity and the start of mining (limonite, hematite, pyrite) and openness of the granite quarries, tasks, both already in vogue in Roman times (many columns of ancient Rome, and some Italian basilicas are mostly Giglio). Following the closure of the pyrite mine in 1962, began the current reality of the Island of Giglio: the adventure "tourism."
Do not forget that the name derives from the flower or not GIGLIO domination Fiorentina, but derives from the greek word romanization of Capra or Aegilium: Island of Goats