Built in part by reusing materials taken from the nearby Bleso amphitheater, Rocca Pia was commissioned by Pope Pius II Piccolomini (1405-1464), who began work in 1461.
The site, close to the medieval urban wall, was chosen for strategic reasons, both for the military defense of the city, as an element of allocation of the papal troops, controlling all the access routes to Tivoli and the entire territory towards Rome, and to control the city and the internal contrasts between the Orsini and Colonna families.
The marble inscription above the entrance reads verses by Giovanni Antonio Campano, a humanist of the Papal Court and a great friend of the Pope:
“PLEASING TO THE GOOD, FROWNED UPON BY THE WICKED, AN ENEMY TO THE PROUD, HERE I AM, I AM HERE FOR YOU IN TIVOLI, FOR SO PIOUS DECREED.”
Giorgio Vasari, the only source, attributes the design of the Rocca to Filarete and his disciples, although the collaboration of other military architects in the circle of Pius II is likely .
The complex consists of four towers of different sizes, connected by high walls and enclosed by Guelph battlements: at various points, fire mouths open.
The entrance to the fortress on the west side was protected by a deep defensive trench and a drawbridge.
It is almost certain that the work was completed under Pope Alexander VI (1492-1503), who built the two minor towers.
Historians report that in 1539 an important event took place in Rocca Pia: Pope Paul III verbally approved the draft Rule of the Society of Jesus, proposed by St. Ignatius of Loyola.
When Cardinal Ippolito II d’Este received from Pope Julius III (1550-1553) the appointment as Governor of Tivoli, he did not hesitate to occupy the green area around the Rocca, where the Roman Amphitheater is located (then not visible as it was covered by the ground), and to fence it off, using it as a hunting reserve (the place was called the “Barchetto”); in 1621 Cardinal Alessandro d’Este built nearby the “Stallone Estense,” the stables that still exist today, where over a hundred horses were housed.
In the 19th century, the fortress, used as papal barracks and prison, underwent structural modifications that changed the architectural appearance of the inner courtyard, in which a body was added leaning against the north wall, resulting in changes to the minor towers and greatly reducing the width of the courtyard.
In the 19th century it alternated the function of papal barracks with that of a prison, capable of housing up to 100 inmates in the circular towers; this function it maintained until 1960, thus remaining in existence to the present day, bearing witness to more than 500 years of history.
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