The site lies in the Valle del Sacco some 65 km south of Rome, at the foot of the Monti Lepini, directly under the peak known as Monte Giuliano.

The location retains the name "Villamagna" attesting to the local memory of the imperial villa and its successive occupation as a monastery and lay community (casale), which have obscured the earlier remains.

The elaborate winery and its use described in the letters of Marcus Aurelius indicate that the villa was used to hold an important regional religious and secular festival celebrating the vintage, the vendemmia for Latium.

In letters to his tutor, Fronto, he describes two days spent there at a festival inaugurating the vintage of Latium: We set out to hunt, did great deeds; we did hear that boars had been captured but saw nothing ourselves.

[7] A series of very interesting charters and trials from the eleventh through 13th century speak to a small rural monastery with properties in the area of the original fundus, which despite its meagre size and income managed to become embroiled in regional and papal politics of the central Middle Ages, culminating in the suppression of the monastery in 1297 by Pope Boniface VIII.

The doliarium was paved with precious marble, as was the banqueting hall in front of it, where the emperor and his guests would have watched the ceremonial pressing of the grapes.

The panels included portasanta, giallo antico and porphyry marbles and had collapsed onto the pavement where imprints in the mortar allowed their reconstruction.

The only other extensively excavated building is the so-called "barracks", to the north of the complex which includes 31 small rooms with beaten earth floors.