The present castle dates from the late xv century and was built by Luca Spinola who had been created Knight of the Golden Sprons by Charles VIII, king of France.

The imposing building opens onto the square of the ricetto, has preserved, among the oldest fortifications, the round tower overlooking the Piota Valley.

A huge coat of arms of the Spinola family is painted on the east wall.

In the center of the castle is carved out a characteristic 15th-century triangular courtyard with stone arches and columns and mullioned windows with two lights.

Inside, numerous lounges, halls and other rooms display on the walls a rich collection of paintings including some of artistic value (Rubens, Van Dyxk).

There are also antique period furniture and furnishings.

Remarkable gallery of coats of arms of joint families: Doria, Pallavicino, Negrone etc.he.

The castle, like many others in Oltregiogo, was also studied by Architect Andrade.

On leaving the castle and church, a descent leads into the ricetto, which stands on a sheer spur of the Piota River.

The ricetto was equipped with two entrances: one downstream and the other pertaining to the castle.

Very interesting is the typology of the buildings in the shelter, which have two overlapping rooms with an opening on the ground floor and one on the upper floor.

Of note: the chimneys of the side streets to the west and the structure of some stone portals dating from the 11th and 12th centuries.

Of the early castle, in addition to the circular keep, one of the towers of the enclosure remains, adapted as the apse of the parish church.

In the interior in the center of the apse there is a niche, protected by shatterproof glass, where the precious panel depicting the Virgin and Child by Barnabas of Modena is placed.

At the side are wooden busts of Saints John and Peter.

Above is a painting by an anonymous Genoese school depicting the Baptism of Jesus by the Baptist: it is a work dated 1608.

On either side are effigies of Augustine and Cecilia Spinola, genuflected, feudal lords of the castle.

There are also other important works:

St. Francis, the Holy Family and another Saint, separated by panels with the Spinola coat of arms, which historian Emilio Podestà attributed to Giambattista Paggi;

Canvas of Saint Charles praying and the Baptist in the chancel;

Plaque from 1612 commemorating some extensions to the church ordered by the Spinola marquises;

18th-century crucifix by Anton Maria Maragliano.

The church erected probably in the 11th century is now incorporated into the cemetery.

For a long time it was the parish church of Lerma until the early 1500s, then ceded its role to the oratory within the walled village.

The exterior facade depicts an imposing St. Christopher, protector of wayfarers and fords dated 1512.

Inside, the apse and right wall are richly frescoed, and notable similarities have been found with painters such as Galdino Da Varese.

In the apse basin is the figure of Christ Pantocrator within a mandorla, to which the symbols of the evangelists are juxtaposed.

Below, within niches separated by twisted columns the figures of Saints: Michael, Peter, John the Baptist, Lawrence, James and Benedict.

The northern part of the church is entirely occupied by a sixteen-station “Stations of the Cross” by an unknown author referred to as the “Master of the Pieve di Lerma”

On the road from Tagliolo to Lerma, before the Piota River, a road branches off to the right leading to the Shrine of Our Lady of Grace, called “Delle Rocchette”

In the building is the guesthouse that offered lodging to those who traveled along the ancient “salt road” that connected Oltregiogo with nearby Liguria.

Legend has it that the mountain in front of the shrine was the site of gold mined in the valley by slaves who found asylum here and, having converted to Christianity, erected the primitive shrine there.

The largely eroded pillars of the Stations of the Cross are still visible along the road.

The church had been, in the late 13th century, a subsidiary of the Monastery of St. Mary of Banno.

During times of pestilence and war, the shrine was a pilgrimage destination and a point of reference for the faithful who implored the Virgin Mary for graces and protection.

Ex votos are still present.

Recent history in the dark years of the last war brought to the fore a priest from Mornese Don Luigi Mazzarello, who was awarded the title “Righteous Among The Nations” and who saved several Jews, including Levi’s brother, from Nazi-Fascist barbarism in a daring way.

Fr. Luigi Mazzarello was the last chaplain of the Shrine.

On the border with Silvano D’Orba and Castelletto D’Orba are the ruins of the “Alabrola Tower.”

It was part of a defensive lookout system created against the Saracen invasion in the year 1000.

His job was to pick up signals from Mount Colma and transmit them to the Gazzolo Tower in St. Christopher’s.

Toward the end of the 17th century, the Abbey of St. Philip Neri was built at the Tower, from which the present name of the Cascina Abazia is derived.