The Fortress

Address and contacts

Via Emilia ovest - 42048 Rubiera
+39 0522 622211 - Municipality of Rubiera

Opening times

The fortress is not visitable inside but it houses a restaurant and other businnesses.

Fees

N.d.

How to get there

The fortress is in the town centre. See the indication to reach Rubiera and the map above.

Historical notes

The fortress presented a formidable fortified layout comprising a compact quadrangular structure with central courtyard, articulated in four imposing scarp wall bastions.

The fortress was surrounded by deep moats whose water was conveyed from the Tresinaro River by means of a canal called Cerca. Inside, there were the service areas, garrison lodging, and the gaols. The origin of this complex could more properly be traced to the works of fortification carried out after the definitive passage of the town under Este dominion in 1421, even though in 1200 the Commune of Reggio Emilia built the castle in Rubiera to defend the Via Emilia and the crossing of the Secchia River. Leonello d’Este ordered the start of construction of high walls which were then completed by Duke Borso in the period between 1441 and 1471. Other important works were carried out in 1491 with the participation of the architect Biagio Rossetti, who designed the Ferrarese “Herculean addition.”

No traces remain of the XV-century walls. According to the military practice of the time, the walls had to be surrounded by a deep moat, with tall rectilinear curtain walls interspersed with round or quadrangular towers, in a not particularly complex geometric layout, as can be seen in the plan of the fortifications of Rubiera designed in the XVII century. Restructuring works were carried out by Duke Alfonso II after the mid-XVI century for a more functional adaptation to the use of the artillery of the time, reinforcing the walls, building bulwarks, widening the moats, and creating a barricade zone free of buildings and trees around the residential quarter. The only intervention to redefine the design of the fortifications can perhaps be seen in the broad pentagonal bulwark erected to protect the fortress towards the west, the memory of which remains today in the triangular shaped area subdivided into two sectors of the Via Emilia in the access to the town centre.

The stronghold was visited by royals and princes including Francis I, King of France, and Lorenzo de' Medici. It not only garnered the admiration of heads of state and military men but was also the object of praise and study on the part of architects and builders. Unfortunately, it was also a place of suffering, as the Este family used it as a state prison for crimes of high treason. The cells were cold, dark, and unhealthy. Formed in the rock, they dripped with moisture during every season of the year. Here, Don Giuseppe Andreoli, the first hero of the Italian Risorgimento, was detained and then decapitated on 17th October 1822. In 1867, the fortress was closed to this function and left in a complete state of abandon, increasing its ruin. Almost all the bricks were removed, baring the powerful stone wall so that the people call it “Il Sasso” (the Stone). In 1873, the State placed it on auction and from that year the tower began its transformation and demolition. In subsequent years, the urban development which began with the creation of the railway line led to the sale of the area in front of the fort, with the moats filled in. In 1922 the central part of the fortress was demolished.