Cape Town Image: Castel Sant’Angelo, Rome.

A Cape Town Castle Military Museum tagged image from photographer – eriktorner as published on Flickr.

Castel Sant’Angelo, Rome.
Castle Military Museum
Image by eriktorner

With its chunky round keep, this castle is an instantly recognisable landmark. Built as a mausoleum for the emperor Hadrian, it was converted into a papal fortress in the 6th century and named after an angelic vision that Pope Gregory the Great had in 590.

Nowadays, it houses the Museo Nazionale di Castel Sant’Angelo and its eclectic collection of paintings, sculpture, military memorabilia and medieval firearms.

Many of these weapons were used by soldiers fighting to protect the castle, which, thanks to a secret 13th-century passageway to the Vatican (the Passetto di Borgo ), provided sanctuary to many popes in times of danger. Most famously, Pope Clemente VI holed up here during the 1527 sack of Rome.

The castle’s upper floors are filled with lavishly decorated Renaissance interiors, including the beautifully frescoed Sala Paolina . Two storeys up, the terrace , immortalised by Puccini in his opera Tosca, offers unforgettable views over Rome.

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Wikipedia:

The Mausoleum of Hadrian, usually known as Castel Sant’Angelo (Italian pronunciation: [kaˈstɛl sanˈtandʒelo]; English: Castle of the Holy Angel), is a towering cylindrical building in Parco Adriano, Rome, Italy.

It was initially commissioned by the Roman Emperor Hadrian as a mausoleum for himself and his family. The building was later used by the popes as a fortress and castle, and is now a museum. The Castel was once the tallest building in Rome.

Hadrian’s tomb

The tomb of the Roman emperor Hadrian, also called Hadrian’s mole, was erected on the right bank of the Tiber, between 134 and 139 AD.

Originally the mausoleum was a decorated cylinder, with a garden top and golden quadriga. Hadrian’s ashes were placed here a year after his death in Baiae in 138, together with those of his wife Sabina, and his first adopted son, Lucius Aelius, who also died in 138.

Following this, the remains of succeeding emperors were also placed here, the last recorded deposition being Caracalla in 217. The urns containing these ashes were probably placed in what is now known as the Treasury room deep within the building.

Hadrian also built the Pons Aelius facing straight onto the mausoleum – it still provides a scenic approach from the center of Rome and the right bank of the Tiber, and is renowned for the Baroque additions of statues of angels holding aloft elements of the Passion of Christ. (Wikipedia)