The Prince of Palagonia’s grandson inherited enormous wealth and an array of titles but was snubbed and ridiculed by society for his ugliness, causing him to become a hermit within the walls of his own villa. He astonished everyone by marrying the beautiful daughter of a nobleman.

His once lonely baroque palazzo then became the center of parties and galas. But after finding that his wife was providing more than entertainment for their guests, the cuckolded husband closed the villa, shutting himself and his wife inside. It was said that he then began to go mad, hiring the most imaginative architect in Sicily, a Dominican friar named Tommasso di Napoli, to transform his residence into what became known as a Villa dei Mostri. In order to terrify his wife and ensure that she would not venture past the villa’s gates, sculptors were commissioned to surround the property with monstrous figures from mythology, dragons, serpents, and gargoyles, as well as gruesome representations of his wife’s lovers.

In his Italian Journey Goethe concludes his description the villa: “the coat-of-arms of the House of Palagonia is a satyr holding up a mirror to a woman with a horse’s head. Even after having seen the other absurdities, this seems to me the strangest of all”. 

Today the villa is partly open to the public.