History
Documents from 12th century name Rocca di Papa as Castrum Rocce de Papa ("Rock Castle of the Pope"), because Pope Eugene III lived there.
In 1541 Pier Luigi Farnese, with French troops, destroyed the castle.
In 1855 the people proclaimed the "Rocca di Papa Republic" against prince Colonna and the Papal States government.
In 1889 the "Royal Geodynamic Observatory" was built on the top of Rocca di Papa, near the little Church of the Crucified. Between 1922 and 1935 the scientist Guglielmo Marconi carried out several experiments from this building in radio-transmission, wireless transmission and broadcasting.
In 1944, during World War II, Rocca di Papa was bombed. The Centre of the city was destroyed. Thirty four people died in that air strike and 35 died in a second air strike on May 25. The city was liberated from the Nazi German occupation on June 4, 1944 by the 85th Infantry Division.
Read more about this topic: Rocca Di Papa
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“The history of any nation follows an undulatory course. In the trough of the wave we find more or less complete anarchy; but the crest is not more or less complete Utopia, but only, at best, a tolerably humane, partially free and fairly just society that invariably carries within itself the seeds of its own decadence.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)
“In front of these sinister facts, the first lesson of history is the good of evil. Good is a good doctor, but Bad is sometimes a better.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“There is nothing truer than myth: history, in its attempt to “realize” myth, distorts it, stops halfway; when history claims to have “succeeded” this is nothing but humbug and mystification. Everything we dream is “realizable.” Reality does not have to be: it is simply what it is.”
—Eugène Ionesco (b. 1912)