Castel Sant'Angelo full tour. No crowds. 4K Rome top attraction, must see. History Narration & Subs

Detailed tour inside the Castle. Amazing history, lots of tunnels, great views.
I visited the castle back in 2017, having read Dan Brown's novel Angels and Demons, and subsequently watched the Ron Howard movie version.
The castle serves as a critical location in the plot, where it is depicted as the hiding place for the Illuminati and the site of the dramatic climax of the story.
In 2017 there were no queues anywhere like you see today.
I remember walking up to the gate with nobody in front of me.
Back then, closing time must have been 9pm, as I was one of a handful of visitors, and took dozens of photos of the sunset.
On this occasion I arrived at 8am, I joined the line of about 20 people at eight twenty. By 9am. Opening time, there must have been a hundred people waiting.
No more than 200 are allowed in at once, so early arrival can save a lot of time.
The same rule applies everywhere, as returning in 2018, I recall walking straight into the Pantheon. That would be impossible now.
You were also allowed to walk around St Peter's Square, with those visiting the Vatican lined up around the edge, but today you need a ticket.
The castle offers unparalleled views across the city of Rome, and its terrace is a popular spot for visitors to take in the scenery and reflect on the centuries of history that have unfolded within and around this iconic structure.
Castel Sant’Angelo, also known as the Mausoleum of Hadrian, is a fortress rich in history and architectural complexity, standing on the banks of the Tiber River in Rome, Italy.
It was originally commissioned by the Roman Emperor Hadrian as a mausoleum for himself and his family, with construction beginning around A.D.one hundred and thirty four, and completed in 1391.
The structure was initially a decorated cylinder with a garden top and a golden quadriga, a four-horse chariot, symbolizing the emperor’s journey to the heavens. Hadrian’s ashes were placed there a year after his death, along with those of his wife Sabina and his first adopted son, Lucius Aelius.1 Over time, it became the burial place for other emperors of the Antonine dynasty until Caracalla's assassination in 217AD.
As Rome faced invasions and internal strife, the mausoleum was repurposed as a military fortress in 401AD and incorporated into the Aurelian Walls by Flavius Honorius Augustus. The urns and ashes within were scattered by Visigoth looters during Alaric’s sacking of Rome in 410, and the original decorative bronze and stone statuary were used as projectiles against besieging Goths in 537.
Throughout the Middle Ages, the structure underwent significant transformations.
In the 14th century, it served as a papal residence, with a fortified corridor, the Passetto di Borgo, connecting it to the Vatican.
This passageway allowed popes to flee in times of danger, most notably Pope Clement the seventh during the sack of Rome in 1527.
A dreadful plague spread across the Mediterranean Europe during the mid sixth century, taking hundreds of thousands of lives, before reaching Rome and devastating the city in the year 590.
The name ‘Castel Sant’Angelo’ originates from a legend in which Pope Gregory the Great had a vision of the Archangel Michael, atop of what was then Hadrian's Mausoleum, raising his sword and then sheathing it as a sign of the end of the plague.
A statue of Saint Michael now adorns the top of the castle, commemorating this miraculous event.
During the Renaissance, the castle was further modified to serve as a papal fortress.
Pope Alexander the sixth, among others, commissioned the construction of new apartments and the decoration of existing ones.
The castle’s military role continued to evolve, and it was used as a prison, with its cells holding various historical figures over the centuries.
In 1901, Castel Sant’Angelo was decommissioned as a military installation and opened to the public as a museum. The Museo Nazionale di Castel Sant’Angelo now tells the story of its history, from the Roman remains of Hadrian’s Mausoleum to remnants of the fortified castle, the original prison cells, and the papal apartments.
Visitors can explore an excellent collection of paintings, sculptures, and firearms, as well as military curios and memorabilia.
Over the centuries, the structure was fortified and expanded, with the addition of towers, bastions, and intricate frescoes in rooms such as the Sala Paolina.

[@EveKrit-Anderson-ev3rf]

Thank you so much for posting this. The Castle has never been open to the public when I was in Rome but every time I passed I wondered about the inside. If I actually had a bucket list this would be near the top. Now that I may never get back my wondering is appeased. Thank you again. Very grateful. Also a marvelous narration. Mile grazi.

[@kaloarepo288]

Final act of the opera "Tosca" by Puccini takes place here where the condemned revolutionary Cavaradossi sings his impassioned aria "The stars were brightly shining" the night before his execution. His lover Tosca leaps to her death into the Tiber when the "fake" execution she thinks she has arranged turns out to be real. Actually it would be impossible to leap into the Tiber as it is too far away but this is fiction and not fact.