Parrana S. Martino is a small hamlet of the municipality of Collesalvetti (province of Livorno, Tuscany) located along the eastern slopes of the Livorno Mountains, about 200 meters above sea level, where the wood gives way to large cultivated valleys.
It can be reached either from the north, coming from Livorno along the S.P.4, or from the east, coming from Pisa or Rome along the S.R206 (Emilia).
In both cases, you need to have well-trained legs, because there are some short but challenging uphill stretches.
The name is most likely a predial toponym (the suffix -anus or -ana indicates the possession of an estate by a landowner) and here, probably, refers to the Latin surname Parra (English: hoopoe, or owl); therefore Parrana would indicate a place characterized by this type of birds. The second part of the name, San Martino, refers, instead, to the local parish and serves to distinguish this locality from other homonymous ones.
Among the notable things of this area we can mention a necropolis and a section of the Leopoldine aqueduct.
The archaeological site (discovered only 10 years ago) includes about 150 burials and is dated between the end of the Bronze Age and the beginning of the Iron Age (late 2nd - early 1st millennium BC).
The Leopoldine aqueduct was built by the Grand Duke Leopoldo of Lorraine in order to bring drinking water from the source of Colognole to the city of Livorno. It was inaugurated in 1852 and worked until the last years of the nineteenth century.
Its high and well preserved arches can be easily seen from the road coming from Livorno, before reaching the hamlet.