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Torre Ghibellina o di Sant'Agnese - Pisa in Tuscany

The massive square tower has been completely rebuilt in brickwork. The walls are pierced by a few small windows (some of them walled up), overhung by rectangular or pentagonal architraves. The building is topped by a brickwork structure rebuilt in modern times. A large part of the brickwork is covered with plaster, and numerous buildings are set against the tower. The building takes its name from the Church of Sant’Agnese, located within the city walls and suppressed in 1780. The tower was inserted in this stretch of walls only towards the end of the 13th century, when Count Federico da Montefeltro had it built with swallow-tailed Ghibelline crenellations using materials drawn from the rubble of the towers belonging to the Pisan Guelph families defeated by the Ghibelline faction after the struggle that followed the Battle of Meloria.

The tower was incorporated into the stretch of walls that bordered the area where the shipbuilding activity of the Pisan Republic was concentrated, and was immediately called “Ghibellina”. The “Tersana”, with its powerful walls and tall towers, also served as a defensive structure on the sea side. In the 15th century, during the first period of rule by the Florentines, the Ghibelline tower was completely rebuilt, as was part of the republican shipyard. The Florentines built the Cittadella Vecchia (old citadel) as distinct from the 15th-century Cittadella Nuova (new citadel, present-day Giardino Scotto). The new defensive systems included the Ghibelline Tower, the Guelph Tower and another tower-like structure named “Palazzetto di San Giorgio”, which is no longer extant. The Guelph and Ghibelline towers were then joined by a fortification wall which was later demolished by Grand Duke Cosimo I.

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