Rocca Pia is how the castle in the centre of Tivoli (RM) with tuff rock structure and four circular towers is best known. It was built in 1461, when the wars between the Guelphs and the Ghibellinis and the Colonna and Orsini families had come to an end, by Pope Pius II (1458-1464) whose name it conserves. He entrusted the construction work to Niccolò and Varrone, pupils of Filarete (Antonio di Pietro Averlino). It is likely that the castle stands on the site of a structure dating to his predecessor Pope Callixtus III (1455-1458).
It was considered in the design for a residence for the governor Ippolito d’Este in the 1500s (the Cardinal responsible for the commission of Villa d’Este). It served as a barracks for French and Austrian soldiers in the 18th century and as a prison during the Napoleonic period. A penal structure until 1960 it was mostly abandoned and reopened to the public only in late 2018 under the management of the Municipality of Tivoli.
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