Palazzo di Bonifacio VIII historical timeline

Last updated on October 9, 2026

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The palace is named after a pope who never owned it until three years into his pontificate, and who lived elsewhere in the same town. Its real history is Gregory IX's: a 13th-century papal residence grand enough that an emperor used it as evidence against its builder.

Chronology

1100s-1200s Two houses of the late 12th century stand on the site, and an early-medieval fortified line with two towers is absorbed into the main block. The units of measure used are French, which has been taken as evidence of French workmanship arriving through the Cistercians -- who were at that moment raising the abbey of Fossanova nearby.
1208 Innocent III consecrates Fossanova. The Cistercian connection supports the suggestion that the earliest structure here was his.
before 1225 Ugolino Conti builds his residence on land belonging to his father Mattia, completing it within the first quarter of the century -- a period of intense building across Anagni. The complex is substantial enough to be called maius.
1227 Ugolino is elected pope as Gregory IX. He assigns his inheritance, the palace included, to his niece Maria, daughter of his brother Adinolfo, reserving the right for himself and his household to live in it.
1230 On 1 September, after the Peace of San Germano and the lifting of the emperor's excommunication, Gregory IX and Frederick II sit down to table together here, with a splendid gathering of invited princes and notables, to mark the reconciliation.
1239 After a fresh rupture, Frederick writes to Gregory that the pope has forgotten the poverty of Peter -- and cites this Anagni residence as the proof, a sumptuous palace built for himself.
1254 Innocent IV, elected at Anagni in 1243, receives the ambassadors of the Kingdom of Sicily in palatio domini Matthiae, before the cardinals and the people. The palace has passed to Maria's son Mattia.
1283 Benedetto Caetani, the future Boniface VIII, begins with his relatives a campaign of purchases at Anagni that ends with the family owning the whole Castello quarter. Alongside it he commissions Palazzo Traietto, the Caetani Chapel on the cathedral's south front in 1292, the canons' residence and the enlargement of the bishop's palace.
1297 Adinolfo and Nicola, sons of Mattia de Papa, sell -- or are made to sell -- the palace to Pietro Caetani, the pope's nephew. Boniface has been pope for three years.
1303 On 7 September over a thousand mercenaries under Giacomo Sciarra Colonna reach Boniface VIII at Anagni, entering by gates opened by the pope's own betrayers, among them the great-nephews of Gregory IX. Sciarra demands his abdication; Boniface refuses -- "Here is the neck, here is the head; I recognise the firstborn of Satan" -- and is said to have been struck. His residence in the town is Palazzo Traietto, not this building.
1690 The palace leaves Caetani hands under the will of the Marquis Orazio, passing to the Astalli, relatives by marriage.
1764 Tiberio, the last of the Astalli, dies in debt. The Opera delle Suore Cistercensi della Carita redeems the building and annexes it to their 18th-century Mother House; rooms become granaries, a boarding school, a hostel and a family home.
1950 Giuseppe Marchetti Longhi, topographer and archaeologist, assembles a permanent exhibition on Boniface VIII and the Jubilee of 1300 -- and ties the complex, improperly, to the last Anagni pope. The name sticks to the building.
1953 The exhibition expands with archaeological finds and historical documents and is named the Museo bonifaciano e del Lazio meridionale, the first museum in Anagni open to the public.
2000s The collection becomes a distinct section inside a wider museum of the palace itself, which presents the building's architecture and its religious life, with new visitor routes through the historic complex.

Verified against Wikipedia, October 2026.

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Checked against Wikipedia — It is difficult to establish with certainty the sequence of interventions that brought the palace to its present form: the researcher Rossana Ferretti holds the building entirely attributable to the will of Boniface VIII, while Giovanni Carbonara identifies fifteen different interventions, nine of them datable between the 10th-11th and the 15th century -- in the course of the first half of the 13th century the union of two dwellings of the end of the 12th century led to the creation of a Romanesque palazzetto with an adjacent tower, the structure was then modified in the Gothic taste in the second half of the century and enlarged with substructures consisting of imposing arches on very high pillars, For the scholar Teresa Rinaldi the building phases would instead be seven: between the end of the 12th century and the beginning of the next, an early-medieval fortified line with two towers was incorporated into the main body of the building, entailing the construction of a structure with transverse arches and wooden floors, and the use in it of French units of measurement led Rinaldi to hypothesise the presence of workmanship of French origin or influence, probably through the Cistercian order -- not far away, at Fossanova, Cistercian monks from beyond the Alps were working on the erection of an abbey consecrated in 1208 by Pope Innocent III, a hypothesis that could support the presumed Innocentian ownership of the first structure; to the subsequent pontificate of Gregory IX would be attributed the building of the southern wing and of the two floors over the pre-existing fortifications and the raising of the northern wing, while to the Caetani would be owed the enlargement of the eastern wing, The sources report with certainty the existence of a building dating to the beginning of the 13th century, although stratigraphic analysis of the masonry allows still older structures to be hypothesised; it was certainly the dwelling of Ugolino Conti, Pope Gregory IX, described as "maius" for the importance of the complex, its construction took in land owned by the pontiff's father Mattia and must have been completed within the first quarter of the 13th century, a period of generally intense building activity throughout Anagni, and on his election as pontiff in 1227 the pope assigned his inheritance, and therefore also the Palace, to his niece Maria, daughter of his brother Adinolfo, reserving for himself and his household the possibility of living in it, In this setting Gregory IX and the emperor Frederick II of Swabia met on the first of September 1230, following the Peace of San Germano and the pontiff's withdrawal of the excommunication hanging over the sovereign: the two "sat together at table, with a splendid gathering of princes and notables invited there", to underline the reconciliation between the two authorities; Frederick cannot have forgotten that visit, for in a letter of 1239, following a new rupture with Gregory IX, he reproached the pontiff with having forgotten the poverty of Peter, as the Anagni residence itself demonstrated, having had a sumptuous palace built for himself, After Maria's death the Palace was inherited by her son Mattia, recalled by the sources on the occasion of a new political meeting between Papacy and Empire: in 1254 Innocent IV, elected at Anagni itself in 1243, received the ambassadors of the Kingdom of Sicily in the presence of the cardinals and the people, in palatio domini Matthiae; and in 1297 the sons of Mattia de Papa, Adinolfo and Nicola, sold -- or were forced to sell -- the Palace to Pietro Caetani together with other properties, At Anagni, Benedetto -- the future Boniface VIII -- together with other relatives began from 1283 a series of purchases and sales until he owned the whole Castello quarter, to which must be added the works commissioned by Boniface VIII: the great palace today known as Palazzo Traietto, an imposing construction with a front of great arches, the Caetani Chapel added in 1292 to the southern front of the Cathedral, the residence of the canons and the enlargement of the Episcopio; the Palace, with some structural modifications, therefore falls within an urban programme aimed at creating a family stronghold, defended by the ancient wall circuit of the acropolis still visible today, on the model of the Roman noble families, and in this light it takes a prominent representative role, as the richness of its decorative apparatus also testifies, Although its name attributes ownership to Pope Boniface VIII, the Palazzo became the property of the Caetani, the pontiff's family, only in 1297, when Boniface had already been raised to the papal throne three years earlier, and the building was bought by Pietro Caetani, the pope's nephew and son of his brother Roffredo count of Caserta, within a series of acquisitions of houses and land around the Cathedral of Anagni by the powerful house, The Palazzo del Museo "Bonifacio VIII" is in reality the Palazzo of Pope Gregory IX, which from the 1950s began to house the museum dedicated to the Caetani pope; it was one of the buildings of Anagni bought by Pietro II Caetani, and Boniface VIII owned another palace in the city today known as Palazzo Traietto, while until the middle of the twentieth century this building was called the Palazzo di Gregorio IX, being the property of the other Anagni pope, Ugolino di Anagni, and afterwards of his heirs; today it forms part of the Casa Madre of the Cistercian Sisters of Charity, The palace remained Caetani property until 1690, when it passed by testamentary bequest of the marquis Orazio to the Astalli, related by marriage; in 1764 the last of the Astalli, Tiberio, died in debt and the Opera delle Suore Cistercensi della Carita then redeemed the building, annexing it to its own 18th-century Casa Madre, so that some of the rooms underwent a change of use, being turned into granaries, a boarding school, a hostel and a family home; currently the different parts of the complex house the "Suor Claudia De Angelis" nursery school, a guesthouse on the route of the Via Francigena, and the museum dedicated to the Palace with the collection of the Museo bonifaciano e del Lazio meridionale inside it, The valorisation of the complex is owed to Giuseppe Marchetti Longhi, topographer and archaeologist, who tied it improperly to the last Anagni pope: in 1950 he formed the nucleus of a permanent exhibition dedicated to Boniface VIII and the Jubilee of 1300, and the exposition, expanded from 1953 with a collection of archaeological finds and historical documents, was named "Museo bonifaciano e del Lazio meridionale", constituting the first museum in Anagni to be open to the public; from the 2000s the collection became a distinct section absorbed into the wider museum of the palace, which also valorises the architectural structure and the religious nature that has characterised the building over the centuries, inaugurating new visitor routes through the historic architectural complex (October 2026).
Checked against ArcheoAres (concessionaire, Palazzo di Bonifacio VIII, Anagni) — Boniface VIII was ready to excommunicate Philip IV but did not have time: on 7 September 1303 more than a thousand mercenaries led by Giacomo Sciarra Colonna reached him at Anagni, the enemies entering through gates already opened by the pope's betrayers, among them the great-nephews of the other Anagni pontiff Gregory IX, shouting "Long live the king of France, death to pope Boniface"; negotiations began, Sciarra demanded surrender and resignation from the papal throne, the pope refused and answered "Here is the neck, here is the head! I recognise the firstborn of Satan", and it is on this occasion that Sciarra Colonna is said to have slapped him (October 2026).

Palazzo di Bonifacio VIII historical timeline

Chronology

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