The castle, taking origin from the imperial city of Porto, is placed on Portuense street and, thanks to recent restorations, has a well kept structure. Around the port-establishments, founded by Claudio and restored by Traiano, rose a small village named Porto. At Costantino’s ages the port-complex got completely detached from Ostia, gaining autonomy and becoming, in 314 A.D., bishop’s seat. The Christianity achievement on the Sacred Island determined the growth of the city to its maximum splendor, so much to become as big as Ostia. In the beginning of the 6th century, the town kept most of its initial circle of walls; only after the first barbaric invasions the roman walls started to be partially substituted with bastions and other defense works that became necessary. Porto’s first occupation was in 537 by the Vitige’s hordes, and its second was Goti’s in 545. More invasions are dated back to 846 when the Saracens took possession of the mouth of the Tiber making Porto the base for their incursions in Roman countries. By the end of the 9th century the two basins of Claudio and Traiano were covered with sand and Porto stopped being populated too. Porto’s forts are first remembered in a document dated 983. In another document dated 1018 they tell about the presence of two towers, the “turrus cucuzina” and the tower “Molon”. During Pope Bonifacio the 8th’s papacy (1294-1303) the “castrum Portus cum fortilitio seu rocca Troiano” was given, as a feud, to Tancia, Annibaldo Stefaneschi’s widow. At that time Porto had lost the aspect of city to become, instead, only a place from which the artificial mouth of the Tiber could be controlled. The only efficient building in Porto, in this period, was the castle itself, where on may 1463, Enea Silvio Piccolomini was a guest. The construction was fortified also by Pope Sisto the 4th and by the cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, the future Pope Alexander the 6th. The castle was remarkably restored in 1583 thanks to Pope Gregory the 13th. In the chart of Alexandrian cadastre, the castle is called “Bishop’s residence”.

A strategically important harbor in imperial times, Ostia saw an implacable decline during the centuries, so much that in the 6th century Procopio describes it as a “city once notable and now lacking even its walls”. An attempt to save it from the deterioration it had follen into was made by Gregorio the 4th. From its refortification work, that should have let the city manage the frequent Saracen attacks, Gregoriopoli took its origin, a small town surrounded by powerful walls and protected by strong towers. A bold work that unfortunately didn’t discourage either Saracen pirates, or the pisan fleet, supporting Federico Barbarossa the 1st, who arrived in Ostia in 1167 damaging and sacking the whole territory. Strictly bound to Roma and, therefore, victim of the innumerable contrasts between Papacy and Empire, Ostia was, several times during the centuries, reinforced and refortified: in the 3rd century, former thanks to Gregory the 9th and latter after the damages made by Manfredi’s supporters who occupied it; in the 4th century, after the fire lit by the genoese, allied with Roberto D’Angio’, and after the king’s own occupation; and again in the 5th century, after the long siege of Ladislao’s troops, king of Naples. On the remains of the ancient village, instead, in the beginning of the 15th century, Pope Martin the 5th had a “turris excelsa et rotunda” built; by the end of that century, starting from this tower the fort was built, today seen as a symbol of the splendor of the renaissance. The fort was designed by Baccio Pontelli as asked by the Cardinal Estouteville; it was ended in 1487 by Giuliano Sangallo for Giuliano della Rovere’s will, future Julius the 2nd. Frescoed in a few halls by Baldassarre Peruzzi in the 6th century, it was destroyed by the Lanzichenecchis, restored by Paul the 3rd and, subsequently, bombed by the Spanish. Center of Pope’s military power, it lost its value when in 1557, after a flooding, Tiber’s bed deviated its way going away from the fort.

The tower, once quadrangular, had a raised entrance, accessible through a wood movable staircase: the entrance to the castle was possible by a wood bridge laying on the borders of the roman basins. The walling technique is typical of the 13th century, with rectangular bricks and just a little mortar. The sea small fortress scheme tended to get the donjon away from the bay, decentralizing it from the enclosure, to place it in a totally safe position: the thick walls of the tower, exposed to the sea, worked as breakwater and didn’t fear the strikes of throwing weapons. In 1268 Astura tower witnessed the famous betrayal against Corradino di Svevia, nephew of Federico the 2nd. Subsequently, under the Colonna family dominion, Astura declined as an inhabited center but kept on being important as a fortress. That’s the period (half of 15th century) when the pentagonal tower was built, totally reconstructed on the foundations of the medieval one: in the north side two walls are added to favor the installation of a wall staircase. It was also built a bricked wall with small bowed windows, running 4 meters away from the medieval border. In 1594 tower and castle became a possession of the Apostolic Chamber that made them part of a coastal defensive chain against the always more frequent Turkish invasions. That’s where the present aspect dates back: the medieval structures are thickened, the tower base is reinforced by a shoe wall, the donjon, not defensive anymore, is placed in the middle of a wide enclosure. Once closed the original north front door, an entrance was obtained along the east wall. Inside the castle, the creation of underground environments lifted the halter’s floor, while on the two parallel walls it was made a strong vault supporting the gallery. The whole old medieval core could, in case of need, be isolated.

ST. SEVERA CASTLE

Closed in its polygonal walls, the medieval village of St. Severa, with the Saracen tower and the castle, both stretched out towards the sea, developed, maybe since the 9th century, where it once rose the first Etrurian then roman village of Pyrgi. Not too far, but totally independent from the historical core, rises the present inhabited center. From Farfa Abbot to St. Paul outside the roman wall’s Benedictines, from di Vicos to Everso Count of Anguillara: before being owned by St. Spirit Hospital in the end of the 15th century, and recently owned by the St. Marinella Common, the Castrum Sanctae Severae has had a lot of famous owners. Between the 16th and the 17th century, the castle was often visited by the Popes during their trips from Rome to Civitavecchia, Popes like Lion the 10th, Paul the 3rd, Gregory the 13th, Sisto the 5th and Urban the 8th. After the maximum splendor in the 17th century, the castle meets a slow and progressive decline that’s visible during the 20th century. That’s when the restoration works become urgent. In the last years, the restoration interventions made the reopening to the public of most of the complex possible, except for the castle still being restored.

From the websites: www.manieri.it www.mondimedievali.it e www.icastelli.it