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The view is of the celebrated Grande Cascata di Tivoli falls, which drop 120 metres within the Parca di Villa Gregoriana near Rome. Located at the foot of an ancient acropolis, the cascata are part of a romantic-style garden featuring both natural and artificial waterfalls, gorges, cliffs, and caves surrounded by lush vegetation and Roman remains including the villa of Roman consul Manlius Vopiscus and the Temple of Vesta overlooking the ravine.
Commissioned in 1832 by Pope Gregory XVI, in order to contain the continuous floods of the Aniene river, engineers built two tunnels to alter the course of the river and created the waterfall and the park around it, reducing four waterfalls to two. After its completion and during the 19th century, the Romantic park and cascata were more popular than the nearby Villa D’Este and they became a necessary stop on the Grand Tour. However, throughout the 20th century, and after bomb damage during the last war, this treasure was largely forgotten and then abandoned. In 2002, the park was taken over by the Fondo Ambiente Italiano (FAI), an organisation similar to the National Trust. It was in such a poor state that it required a mammoth landscaping operation. FAI volunteers collected thousands of tons of rubbish, rubble and vegetation, they restored 750 old stone steps and replanted or pruned 2,300 trees. The park was reopened to the public in 2005.
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