The Fossa della Garofala is an historical garden which represents a still visible strip of the landscape of the Conca d'Oro, the large plain on which the city of Palermo and its surroundings extend. Its history provides traces of the many uses that have followed one another over the centuries and that have determined its current conformation. Even today, many artefacts are preserved, enough to testify to a real “water system” of Arab origin. It is a place characterised by scents, colours, monumental tree specimens and large expanses of citrus groves.

The name derives from Onofrio Garofalo, who was its owner at the end of the 15th century. Later, it became the property of Louis Philippe D'Orléans, King of France (from 1830 to 1848), who came to Palermo in 1809 to marry the daughter of Ferdinand III of Bourbon, starting the creation of an elegant garden, described in the second half of the 19th century as one of the most beautiful in Italy and even in Europe. The peculiar geological conformation of the site determined its use as an open-air quarry for the extraction of building materials from the Punic and Roman periods until the 17th century. The presence of hypogea with tunnels, of uncertain age, also fuels the hypothesis of a sepulchral use. Of particular interest were the findings of fossil remains of elephants, now preserved at the Geological Museum “G. G. Gemmellaro” in Palermo.