Grondola stands at 630 meters high, on the country road to the Brattello pass, on a spur of the mount Molinatico. The control of this place and its castle caused in the Middle Ages sour struggles that brought to following destructions and reconstructions of the fortification, today a ruin, with the rests of the tower and portions of the building curtain. The castle allowed to check at the same time the road of the Brattello and the one of the Borgallo.
Grondola was a Malaspina possession, since the times of Obizzo the Great, that helped the emperor Frederick I to cross the Appennines here, as Pontremoli deniedthe passage through the pass of Mount Bardone, supporting the Guelf part. The village must be contemporary to the castle, remembered for the first time in 1296 as part of the parish of Vignola. The Malaspinas in 1195 sold Grondola to Piacenza. In 1241, it became possession of Pontremoli and in 1245 of Parma. In 1248 Grondola was again under Pontremoli and in 1324 under Parma. The continuous changes, justified by the importance of the pass of the Brattello, finished with the ascent of the most practicable road of Mount Bardone and with the consequent loss of importance of the village.

More information:
The villages of Pontremoli