OLIVE OIL - NATURE’S ENERGY FLOW
IS THE FUTURE OF MANKIND.

THE PROJECT

TRAPPETO SAN FELICE is a “young” memory-enhancement project in the town of Presenzano near Venafro.
It represents a generational challenge that binds enthusiasm to the bare rock thanks to a love of what is good and beautiful and the wish to give
new life to the commitment of those who have gone before us. A rediscovery of tradition in its ceaseless flux of becoming.

PIETRAOLIVA

PIETRAOLIVA is Trappeto San Felice’s first extra virgin blend, obtained from olives growing on centuries-old trees restored to new life. Harvesting and milling are performed separately for each of the different varieties before being brought together in search of the perfect balance between flavour and aroma.  

PIETRAOLIVA takes its inspiration from the eponymous work by Joseph Beuys, representing a dynamic balance between chaos and order: oil is energy, conserved in cold forms that interact to build reality: a metaphor of life and a reflection on humanity.  

PIETRAOLIVA is a top-class extra virgin olive oil, obtained directly from the olives using only mechanical processes. The aroma has light hints of fruit, with fine and delicate tones recalling freshly mown grass, almond, and apple. On the tongue, it leaves a lively finish with notes of oregano and tomato.

The town of Presenzano

Presenzano lies in an area well known in ancient times for the production of olive oil and trappeti, imposing limestone mills used for pressing olives. The most famous quarry was in Taverna San Felice.

TRAPPETO SAN FELICE is a “young” memory-enhancement project in the town of Presenzano, near Venafro. It is an identity-building project, which projects the memory of these places into the modern world.
In Roman times Marcus Portius Cato, known as Cato the Censor, mentioned Rufri Maceria (Presenzano) with its oil mills, together with Pompeii and Nola, among the places in Campania where oil was produced by artisans. This historic reference confirms the presence and systematic exploitation of quarries, presumably for the extraction of limestone, as can be deduced from the surviving remains of the oil presses. The most important was the quarry of Taverna San Felice, still active today. The trapetum was used to crush the olives during the initial phase of oil production, separating the stone ( nucleus) and the bitter liquid ( murca) from the pulp ( sampsa: worked separately using the torcularium). This was a gentle procedure: the grinding wheels were fixed “lightly” to avoid damaging the olives and the ensuing destruction of the nucleus. Virgil mentions the trapetum in his Georgics (II: 519), where he writes: “teritur Sicyonia baca trapetis , meaning “the olives of Sicyon are crushed in presses”.

Pressing ‘Sicyon’ olives (named after the town near Corinth) was one of the activities that marked the rhythm of the seasons for Virgil’s farmer as he worked the fields. Roman Venafro, just a few kilometres from Presenzano, boasted a flourishing economy linked to olive trees and their oil, launched, according to legend, in the 4th century B.C. by Marcus Licinius, a man of Samnite origin and a citizen of Venafro (hence the botanical name of the Licinian olive).

Martial too bears witness to the fertility of the soil and the fame of Venafran oil. Most of the olive groves are located on the slopes of Monte Santa Croce, about 400 metres above sea level in Venafro’s “Parco Regionale Storico Agricolo dell’Olivo”, a protected area. The trappeti not only preserve the mark of the strong, patient, and skilful hands of men, but they have a spatial dimension more typical of religious buildings, something arcane and solemn, made up of shadows and silence. They are obscurely familiar spaces that invite us to enter and relive them: they were built by fathers thinking of the future of the generations to come.

Pietraoliva at Taste in Florence: the success story of an EVO oil produced by a young company in the Caserta area.

Its name is Pietraoliva, and it was an immediate hit at Taste in Florence. We are talking about Trappeto San Felice’s extra virgin olive oil, produced using exclusively mechanical means. They are a young and dynamic company that believe in making the most of the past, and they put their belief into practice by producing an extra virgin olive oil of the highest quality. The agricultural firm is located in San Felice, Presenzano, in the Alto Casertano area, not far from Venafro. In antiquity, this was an area famous for oil production. The trapetum was an oil mill for pressing olives and was built using limestone from its quarries. If the morning crowds are anything to go by, Trappeto’s presence at the Florence trade fair will surely bring them good results: a welcome satisfaction for young Marta, Antonio and Carmine who believed in the project from the start. Pietraoliva is Trappeto San Felice’s first blend, obtained directly from olives of centuries-old plants restored to new life and extracted solely by mechanical processes. The aroma has light hints of fruit, with fine and delicate tones recalling freshly mown grass, almond, and apple. On the tongue, it leaves a lively and spicy finish with sweet and interesting notes of oregano and tomato.

Follow us

Follow us on our social media channels, and stay in touch to keep up to date about Trappeto San Felice, our news, and our activities.

Az. Agr. Trappeto San Felice di Carmine Errico
Via Provinciale 97
81050 Presenzano (CE)
email: info@trappetosanfelice.it

Contatti

For requests and information send us a message. We will take care of answering you as soon as possible

Grazie! Il tuo messaggio è stato inviato.
Messaggio non inviato. Correggi eventuali errori e invialo nuovamente.
Back to top