Bufalini Castle

After the battle of Anghiari of 1440, which stopped the expansion of the Visconti di Milano towards central Italy, in the Alta Valle del Tevere the border between the Papal State and the Florentine Republic was established. The then villa of San Giustino becomes a frontier place and its medieval fortress, owned by the Ghibelline family of the Dotti di Sansepolcro, is a strategic military outpost for the defense of the territory of Città di Castello. Assaulted, burned and destroyed several times the fort between 1487 and 1492 becomes the property of Niccolò Bufalini of Città di castello, which transforms it into a large fortress. Beginning in 1534, Abbot Ventura and his brother Giulio Bufalini transformed the fortress into a fortified manor house with large loggias of late Renaissance style. In the following centuries a large "Italian" garden was created, in which there were the main varieties of fruit, citrus fruit with lemon, ragnaia, rare flowers, medicinal herbs, vegetables and a labyrinth established in 1692, still existing. Over the centuries in the halls of the Palace have alternated artists such as Nanni Hungarian, Vignola, Cristofano Gherardi, Giovanni Ventura Borghese Mattia Battini. In 1789 a violent earthquake caused the collapse of the ancient bell tower and the building's elevations (mezzanines, apartment and dovecote of the main tower, armory). In order to compensate for the enormous damage, the Marquis Filippo II obtained permission from the Pope to dispose of a large part of the collection of works of art and family furniture, thus causing the large masterpieces to be dispersed in the market. Faced with this dispersion, the Castle is one of the few historic houses that preserves a large part of the furnishings of relevance.
In July 1989 the Bufalini castle was acquired by the state property with the aim of assigning it to a museum of itself.