It is a small castle with villa and farm that belonged to the Carthusian monks of Calci in the 18th century.
The place name Alica is said to derive from the cultivation of wheat, spelt and spelt from the hill opposite Villa Saletta down to the Roglio, a tributary of the Era.
The hamlet is first mentioned in a document from 980 and refers to a cession of land by the bishop of Lucca to the people of the ancient parish of San Genesio (now destroyed) near San Miniato.
Alica became a castle in the Longobard era in an anti-Byzantine key. The castle then changed hands several times, from the Pisan Gambacorti to the Florentine Riccardi, becoming first a convent with guards, then a manor house and finally a castle-residence. Curiously, the majority of its inhabitants sided with the Grand Dukes of Tuscany and against Italian unification. Today the hamlet shows a castle-like structure with the mighty elements of the basement where the farm villa stands.
The ancient church dedicated to San Jacopo is said to have been located in a different position than the present church of Santa Maria Assunta, under which the remains of hundreds of dead were found, on which several theories arose, including the most credited one that they were the dead buried around the church because there was no cemetery.
A number of loop trails lead from Alica to other hamlets in the Palaia area.