It’s easy to see how Villa Palagonia – very close to Palermo – earned its nickname: the Villa of Monsters. Studded around its Baroque garden walls, peering through lemon trees, cacti and jasmine, is a menagerie of bizarre stone sculptures. Visitors on the grand tour flock to see Villa Palagonia’s freak show: hunchbacked dwarves, multi-eyed goblins, frowning cherubs and fantastical distorted creatures – the nightmare creation of the Italian villa’s former owner, a disfigured prince who was imprisoned for insanity.
Such is the caricatures’ gruesome appearance that local women used to avoid looking at them – afraid their influence might deform their unborn children.
