Already Virgil, in the X book of the Aeneid, quoted the course of this river: “Fair Astur follows in the wat’ry field,
Proud of his manag’d horse and painted shield.
Gravisca, noisome from the neighb’ring fen,
And his own Caere, sent three hundred men; With those which Minio’s fields and Pyrgi gave,
All bred in arms, unanimous, and brave.” The Mignone River has its source on the Sabatini Mountains, at Veiano, crosses the Tolfa Mountains and flows for 8 km inside the Monterano Reserve, until flowing 62 km further on, into the Tyrrhenian Sea, between Lido di Tarquinia and Civitavecchia.

The river, in particular its old wooden bridge, was the setting of many well-known films of the past, among which Ben-Hur, Romulus and Remus, Maciste in the Land of the Cyclops, Brancaleone at the Crusades, the Marquis of Grillo, The Three Faces of Fear, and 2 Rrringos in Texas. The original bridge structure has now been lost; however, in addition to being the protagonist of famous films in which it is clearly recognisable, it was intensely used as a crossing point by the locals, so much so that starting from the 90s it was replaced by a new concrete bridge. The final collapse of the pillars of the previous bridge occurred due to a flood.