Rocca Roveresca’s courtyard

The Rocca courtyard served the dual purpose of a barracks courtyard and a reception courtyard with an off-center well typical of the Renaissance and is functionally a connecting element between the entrance from the outside, which is accessed via the drawbridge, and between the residential and military sections.

This courtyard appears typically fifteenth-century; however, it retains clear traces of previous buildings and allows for a reading of the four main phases experienced by the fortress. In front of the main entrance we can see a wall of the tower on which we can read all the architectural events of the fortress: from the Roman base, to the continuation of the fourteenth-century Rocchetta, due to the work of Cardinal Albornoz around 1350, to the first fifteenth-century fortress, built a century later by Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta, to the signs of the Roveresque age, which consist in the cutting at the top of the keep present in the previous constructions, following new requirements due to the introduction of artillery. This part of the fortress, the result of many changes over time, clearly indicates that the area on which it stands has always been considered a strategic point of the city for the construction of a fortification that would constitute the fulcrum of defense works. The wall with arches seen on the right side of the courtyard is part of the 14th-century curtain wall, although they were strengthened when it became necessary to expand the defensive wall section to create masonry artillery movement plans, which replaced the wooden walkways. The water collection cistern, located next to the fifteenth-century well, dates back to the fourteenth century. It is circular with a slightly pine cone-shaped vertical trend. Its particularly beautiful and functional location allows us to affirm that over the centuries the current courtyard was always used as a free space, more or less large, surrounded by defensive walls. A similar thing can be said for the entrance: in all the buildings it maintained the same position, as demonstrated by the shape of the defensive walls of the previous fortresses.