Located on the highest part of the Sant’Angelo hill, the Castle is the symbolic and historical fulcrum of the town of Itri (LT). It was built in 882, probably commissioned by Duke Docibile I of Gaeta who ordered a pentagonal tower encircled by walls, and later modified by his grandson Marino I who raised the structure and gave it a square layout. The cylindrical tower known as the Crocodile Tower, because of the legend about a large reptile who dined on those condemned to death, was a mid 13th century addition.
The castle is also famous for the presence of Giulia Gonzaga, Countess of Fondi, who gathered a court of artists and intellectuals that included Vittoria Colonna, Sebastiano del Piombo (who painted her), Pietro Carnesecchi and Juan de Valdés, a significant figure in the Reformation debate in the years that preceded the Council of Trento. Her close friend, Cardinal Ippolito de’ Medici, actually died at Itri in 1535.
Bombed during WWII, the castle became property of the municipality of Latina in 1979 and was reopened to the public in 2003.
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