Apparently, this territory was not inhabited until about the year 1000. During the 11th century, a Benedictine monastery-or perhaps it would be better to say a hospitale run by the monks arose here? – aimed at being a resting place for pilgrims who intended to arrive in Genoa to embark for Rome or the Holy Land.

The Del Bosco marquises, who had long held some fiefs a little further north, also stretched their hands over these places during the 12th century, where a kind of post station, or perhaps a small fortification, arose, housing some of the marquises’ armies, who were entrusted with the task of guarding the stretch of road and collecting the toll.

Meanwhile, the abundance of water and timber had begun to make Masone the site of steel and non-steel production.

At the end of the thirteenth century, the army of the Republic of Genoa took the small fief, and the nobles of the Superb began to take an interest in this place precisely because of its “industrial” potential.

As early as the late Middle Ages, in fact, Masone became an important production center where raw materials arrived from elsewhere, and from where iron, silk and paper departed. Masone was a fief of many noble Genoese families. Recall Angelo Lomellino who, around the middle of the 14th century, had two ironworks built and encouraged the movement of skilled Lombardian ironworkers.

The former Benedictine monastery also underwent several changes, especially during the 15th century, when it also became a Cistercian monastery for women, only to be abandoned at the end of the century.

By the 1620s, Masone was in the hands of the Spinola family. Marquis Antonio had another castle built, so as to guard the new road that allowed the crossing of the Apennines.

Instead, it was a Grimaldi, in the second half of the same century, who encouraged the construction of a village around the castle, where those who came to Masone to work in the production of iron and charcoal could take up residence. The same nobleman financed the construction of a new church with an adjoining convent intended for Augustinian friars, who would take care of souls in place of the secular clergy.

In the second half of the seventeenth century, however, the local ironworks went into crisis as they could not keep up with evolving technology. Consequently, the number of Masone residents devoted to agriculture increased, so many farmsteads sprang up.

In 1747, Masone Castle, because of its connection with Genoa, which was involved in the War of Austrian Succession, was besieged and, after surrender, blown up.

In 1790, Gian Carlo Pallavicini, the new owner of the fief, had the ruins of the castle leveled to turn the site into a large square.

Around the middle of the nineteenth century, Savoy policies on imports favored the arrival of English iron in the Kingdom, thus dealing the death blow to Masone’s steel production. The only forges that survived, and indeed flourished, during that era were those that produced nails, which, absurdly, were being decimated elsewhere.

The Modern Age saw a proliferation of fortifications around the Superba. This also involved the territory of Masone with the building of Fort Geremia, completed in 1890. Two phenomena affected Masone in the 20th century: the vacationing of the Genoese bourgeoisie and World War II.

The former led to the construction of numerous villas, most notably Villa Bagnara, designed by Gino Coppedè (Florence, 1866-Rome, 1927).

The second brought occupation and Nazi-Fascist reprisals. Moreover, the woods around Masone, like so many others in Oltregiogo, gave shelter to numerous partisans, many of whom lost their lives in the Benedicta and Turchino Pass roundups.

At the end of the war, Carlo Pastorino, mayor of Masone, took care to give proper burial to the boys who had ended up in mass graves and wanted to rebuild the old Cistercian church so that it would be the shrine of the remains of many partisans.