The medieval village of Collalto was witness to the birth and history of one of the most powerful families of the Treviso region. The Collalto trace their origin to the Longobards and it was here that Count Rambaldo Vll established his domain at the beginning of the 14th century.
Looking now at the ruins and the walls of the castle you can only guess its old splendor and let the imagination fly, letting yourself being immersed into the legend of the place. Like so many other old Italian villages, Collalto has its ghost still hovering among the ruins, and this sad history goes back to the times of the Crusades, when Count Tolberto lived in the castle together with his wife Chiara da Camino. The latter took advantage of her husband’s call to arms to carry out her revenge against Bianca, the handmaid to whom Tolberto had shown particular interest. She had the young woman walled up alive inside a castle tower – probably her room, the one that still stands on the hill – and according to tradition, her ghost remained in this world to appear to the descendants of the Collalto and announce impending joys or catastrophes.
This story was not made public until 1925, when Countess Maria di Collalto gave an interview to an Austrian newspaper where she also spoke of the mysterious appearances: her grandfather had seen Bianca in the Pirnitz Castle, in the Czech Republic, when he asked for his wife’s hand. She was dressed in white, of course, because that’s how she appears as bearer of good news.
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