Rocchetta Mattei

Rocchetta Mattei
View of Rocchetta Mattei from the Limentra valley
Location within Emilia-Romagna Rocchetta Mattei (Italy)
General information
Type	Castle, residence and former electrohomeopathic treatment centre
Architectural style	Eclectic; Moorish Revival; neo-medieval; Liberty
Location	near Riola, Emilia-Romagna, Grizzana Morandi, Italy
Coordinates	44°13′25″N 11°03′36″E
Construction started	1850
Completed	main phase completed in 1875; later alterations until the early 20th century
Owner	Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio in Bologna
Design and construction
Architects	Cesare Mattei (patron and designer); Giulio Cesare Ferrari (collaborator)

Rocchetta Mattei is an eclectic 19th-century castle located near the village of Riola, Emilia-Romagna, in the municipality of Grizzana Morandi, northern Italy. Standing on a rocky spur above the Reno valley, close to the confluence of the Reno and Limentra rivers, it was begun in 1850 by Count Cesare Mattei (1809–1896) on the ruins of the medieval Rocca di Savignano, a fortress documented in a strategically important area linked to trans-Apennine routes, monastic possessions and later Bolognese territorial control.

Conceived as both a neo-medieval residence and the headquarters of Mattei's alternative medical system of electrohomeopathy, Rocchetta Mattei combines neo-medieval, Moorish revival and Liberty elements in a deliberately labyrinthine layout. Italian heritage authorities regard it as one of the most significant examples of 19th-century eclectic architecture in Italy.

Since 2005 the complex has been owned by the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio in Bologna (Fondazione Carisbo), which carried out an extensive restoration programme. It reopened to the public in 2015 as a museum and cultural venue and has become one of the most visited heritage sites in the Emilia-Romagna Apennines, with the foundation reporting more than 73,000 visitors per year.

History

Medieval Rocca di Savignano

Rocchetta Mattei was built on the rocky spur formerly occupied by the medieval Rocca di Savignano, a fortified site overlooking the confluence of the Reno and the eastern Limentra, at about 400 metres above sea level. The site lay close to the historical border between the Bolognese and Pistoiese territories, in an area of strategic importance for trans-Apennine communications between central Italy and the Po plain.

The importance of Savignano was linked not to a single fixed road, but to a wider network of bridges, routes and territorial jurisdictions. According to the historian Renzo Zagnoni, two major medieval trans-Apennine routes converged in this area. One followed the Reno and western Limentra valleys and is identified in Pistoiese sources as the strata de Sambuca, later associated with the Via Francesca della Sambuca. The other followed the eastern Limentra valley and is identified as the strata de Fonte Taonis, connected with the monastic and ridge system of Fontana Taona. In Bolognese statutes of the mid-13th century these routes corresponded broadly to the roads towards Pavana and Stagno. Savignano therefore stood near a point where roads, bridges, monastic possessions and political jurisdictions met.

Regional heritage records place Savignano within an early medieval frontier zone. The line Montovolo–Savignano–Montecavalloro formed one of the northernmost areas of Lombard expansion from the south, while a Byzantine defensive line ran on the opposite side of the Reno, linked to the defence of Bologna and Ravenna. By the 12th century the corte of Savignano, protected by a castle and associated with a mill and a bridge over the Limentra, belonged in part to the Benedictine abbey of San Salvatore della Fontana Taona, whose possessions extended from the Pistoiese mountains northwards along the Reno valley.

In 1235 Savignano is recorded as having a fortress with a tower, connected by a passageway to a walled enclosure protecting several houses. At that time the site was under the influence of the Alberti counts, who controlled a network of castles between the Limentra and the Brasimone. During the 13th century, as the abbey of Fontana Taona declined, the commune of Bologna strengthened its control over the Reno valley. In 1293 Bologna captured the castle of Savignano and destroyed it almost completely, before rebuilding walls and structures suitable for a garrison. In the following centuries the growing importance of valley-floor centres such as Vergato and Porretta made the older Apennine fortifications increasingly obsolete, and by the late 18th century the Rocca di Savignano had been reduced to a ruin.

Cesare Mattei and the origin of the castle

Count Cesare Mattei

Cesare Mattei was born in Bologna in 1809 into a wealthy bourgeois family of Ferrarese origin and moved in intellectual and political circles that included figures such as the writer Paolo Costa, the politician Marco Minghetti and the composer Gioachino Rossini. He was among the founders of the savings bank Cassa di Risparmio in Bologna in 1837. In 1847 he and his brother Giuseppe were created counts by Pope Pius IX after donating their possessions on the Magnavacca canal, near Comacchio, to the Papal States, an act regarded as strategically useful against Austrian positions in the area.

The death of his mother and his disillusionment with politics after 1848 led Mattei to withdraw from public life and devote himself to the study of a new therapeutic system which he called elettromiopatia or elettromeopatia. In 1850 he acquired the land on which the ruins of the Rocca di Savignano still stood and, on 5 November of that year, laid the first stone of what he affectionately called the Rocchetta (“little fortress”). According to the Archivio Museo Cesare Mattei, the choice of the Savignano site may also have been connected with Mattei's family network: his brother Giuseppe had married Carolina Brunetti, whose family owned land in the area.

Mattei personally directed the works, initially with the ambition of recreating a medieval castle. He settled permanently at Rocchetta Mattei in 1859, adopting the lifestyle of a “medieval lord” with a small court of collaborators and patients, and continued to modify and enlarge the complex throughout his life. Treccani states that the main phase of the building was completed only in 1875, while later additions and decorative changes continued under Mattei and his successors.

Use as residence and treatment centre

Rocchetta Mattei was not only Mattei's residence but also the headquarters, clinic and symbolic showcase of his system of electrohomeopathy. Here he received patients from Italy and abroad, drawn by treatments based on plant-derived remedies, medicated granules and so-called “electric fluids”.

Contemporary promotional literature and later local tradition report that members of European high society were treated or received at Rocchetta Mattei, including Ludwig of Bavaria, Alexander II of Russia, Empress Elisabeth of Austria ("Sisi") and Gioachino Rossini, alongside a wider bourgeois and aristocratic clientele. Some later sources identify the Bavarian ruler as Ludwig III of Bavaria, but institutional heritage descriptions often use only the less specific form “Ludwig of Bavaria”. The Italian heir to the throne, the Prince of Piedmont, also made an official visit in 1925.

The connection with Rossini also involved Mattei's family circle. An autograph letter written by Rossini in Paris on 15 December 1863 to Count Luigi Mattei, son of Cesare's brother Giuseppe, indicates that Luigi was following the composer's Italian property affairs while Rossini was living in France.

The demand for cures led to the construction of a number of small “climatic villas” in the surrounding estate, especially around the nearby Borgo dell’Archetta, to house patients during their stay.

Construction, collaborators and photographic documentation

During Mattei's lifetime the castle was continuously reshaped, with successive building campaigns adding towers, terraces, loggias and interiors in different styles. The architectural realisation of the Rocchetta was directed by Cesare Mattei as patron and guiding figure, but involved the collaboration of artists, craftsmen and local master builders rather than a single professional architect. Heritage catalogues and later historical accounts mention the Bolognese painter and scenographer Giulio Cesare Ferrari, together with other collaborators and local workers, as one of the figures involved in translating Mattei's ideas into drawings and built form during several construction phases.

The transformation of the Rocchetta was also recorded by 19th-century photography. The Bolognese photographer Pietro Poppi, founder of the studio Fotografia dell'Emilia, produced a series of views documenting the successive enlargements, alterations and modifications of the castle. Views of the Rocchetta appeared in Poppi's 1879 catalogue under the section "Paysages et villes"; by 1883 they formed a more substantial photographic group, and the 1888 general catalogue of the Fotografia dell'Emilia included a section specifically devoted to a third photographic campaign of Rocchetta Mattei. Individual negatives from the Poppi collection, such as the 1879–1883 view of the Loggia Carolina, also document parts of the castle that are now relevant to the restoration of the Arab-Moorish wing.

The castle photographed by Paolo Monti in 1969

Late memorial projects and the Golden Protocol

In the final months of his life Mattei was still concerned with both the completion of the Rocchetta and the documentary commemoration of his electrohomeopathic enterprise. A letter of 15 March 1896, published by Renzo Zagnoni and Alex Vannini in the local historical journal Nuèter, shows that he wished his tomb, the church and the so-called "rooms of the plebiscite" (stanze del Plebiscito) to be completed. These rooms were intended to display letters, seals, stamps and testimonials from civil and religious authorities, notable figures and sovereigns who had expressed support for or interest in electrohomeopathy. Zagnoni and Vannini interpret the project as a planned memorial, within the castle, to the written memory of Mattei's medical enterprise.

The same documents refer to a Protocollo d'oro ("Golden Protocol"), described by Mattei in a letter to Cesare Fava as a dossier intended to complete a European plebiscite in favour of electrohomeopathy and to be displayed on the walls of a "new room" (stanza Nova). Zagnoni and Vannini identify it as a precious file of documents signed by people who supported Mattei's electrohomeopathy or reported favourable results from it. They also note that, although the dossier appears to have existed, it has not been found.

The correspondence with Fava also records the disorderly preservation of some of Mattei's papers shortly before his death. According to Zagnoni and Vannini, after Mario Venturoli had been excluded from the castle, the lawyer Turriccia took over the administrative direction, while Fava was entrusted with the production of the remedies and received the keys to the cabinet where instructions for their preparation and other important documents were kept. In a letter of 11 December 1895 Fava reported that, after receiving the key to the "cabinet of essences" (armadio delle essenze), he had found papers placed in disorder, including a packet addressed to Venturoli containing letters from the pope, the king and the queen, together with other documents and objects. The episode is relevant to the later history of the Rocchetta because it illustrates the fragmentary preservation of the documentary material connected with Mattei's medical and commemorative projects.

Venturoli and the 20th century

After the inheritance crisis of 1887–1888, caused by unsuccessful financial operations by Mattei's nephew Luigi, several family properties were put up for auction and even the Rocchetta was placed at risk. Cesare Mattei consequently disinherited Luigi and relied on his collaborator Mario Venturoli, whom he adopted in 1888. After Mattei's death, Rocchetta Mattei and the electrohomeopathy business passed largely to Venturoli, who took the name Mario Venturoli Mattei.

Venturoli oversaw further architectural changes, adding Liberty-style decorative schemes and interiors to parts of the castle, including the Music Room, the Hall of Peace and the final arrangement of the Hall of the Ninety. Under his direction the network of electrohomeopathic depots continued to expand internationally until the early 20th century.

The production of Mattei remedies in Bologna carried on, with ups and downs and amid controversy from the medical establishment, until the 1960s, when the laboratories finally closed in 1968.

During the Second World War the castle was occupied by German forces and suffered damage and the loss of furnishings. In the post-war period Mattei's heirs attempted to donate the property to public institutions without success. In 1959 it was purchased by entrepreneur Primo Stefanelli, who transformed it into a private tourist attraction with a hotel, restaurant and entertainment facilities. This phase, often remembered for its somewhat kitsch additions, nevertheless helped keep the site in use until financial difficulties led to its closure in 1986 and subsequent abandonment.

By the early 2000s the complex was in a serious state of decay, with structural problems and widespread deterioration of its finishes and decorative apparatus.

Acquisition and restoration by Fondazione Carisbo

The Rocchetta Mattei in 2015

In October 2005 Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio in Bologna (Fondazione Carisbo) acquired Rocchetta Mattei, classified as an architectural monument under Italian cultural heritage law, with the aim of saving it from ruin and reopening it to the public.

A major restoration campaign, lasting around seven years, involved the structural consolidation of large portions of the castle, the refurbishment of roofs and terraces, the recovery of decorative cycles and finishes and the installation of modern systems and accessibility measures. Approximately two-thirds of the complex were restored and made safely accessible.

On 9 August 2015, following an agreement between Fondazione Carisbo, the municipality of Grizzana Morandi, the Metropolitan City of Bologna and the Union of Municipalities of the Bolognese Apennines, Rocchetta Mattei reopened to the public with guided tours at weekends and on selected days. The reopening quickly turned the castle into a major cultural attraction for the area.

In 2024 a new phase of restoration was launched, focusing on the Arab-Moorish wing, considered the oldest and most authentic part of the complex, where Mattei first took up residence. The intervention, funded within the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR) in the pilot project Da Campolo l’arte fa Scola, is divided into three levels: complete restoration of the ground-floor rooms and selected first-floor spaces, including the Waiting Room, Dining Room, Ceramics Room, Kitchen, Flamingo Room, Loggia delle Uri and Heraldic Staircase; partial restoration and safety works for areas such as the Loggia Carolina, Pope's Room, Turkish Parlour, Turkish Room and Hall of Mirrors; and conservative safety works in the Count's wing, including the Count's Room, Vision Room and English Parlour. The aim is to consolidate the remaining unrestored structures and make further sections of the castle safely visitable.

Architecture

Overall character and styles

Rocchetta Mattei is a deliberately eclectic ensemble, built in stages on a rocky outcrop overlooking the Reno river. The plan is irregular and articulated on multiple levels, with a network of staircases, small courtyards, terraces and passages that create a sense of spatial labyrinth, a characteristic often noted in visitor accounts and official presentations.

Architecturally, the complex combines neo-medieval motifs (crenellated walls, cylindrical and square towers, stone stairways, coats of arms and telamons) with a rich Moorish-revival vocabulary (horseshoe and polylobed arches, domes, arabesque stuccoes, tilework inspired by the Alhambra and the Great Mosque of Córdoba) and early 20th-century Liberty interiors. Many of the “precious” elements are in fact realised with modest materials, plaster, brick, timber, canvas and papier-mâché, painted or modelled to imitate marble, carved wood or stone, in keeping with Mattei's taste for trompe-l’œil and theatrical illusion.

Italian heritage catalogues and the owner foundation describe Rocchetta Mattei as one of the most interesting and emblematic examples of eclectic architecture in Italy in the second half of the 19th century and as a symbolic landmark of the Reno valley landscape. Its Moorish-revival elements also place it within a broader European taste for orientalising architecture in the 19th century. A 2025 essay in The Public Domain Review compared Rocchetta Mattei with the Castle of Sammezzano in Tuscany as two Italian examples of aristocratic Moorish-revival fantasy architecture.

Entrance, stairway and central courtyard

The visitor approach follows a steep external stairway in stone that climbs the rocky slope to a noble Moorish entrance flanked by a tower. The balcony of the tower is protected by a marble balustrade that reproduces the medieval pulpit from the abbey of Pomposa, today in the Louvre. Along the ascent stand numerous 19th-century statues, while near the portal a cement copy of the famous medieval Pisan Griffin, the largest Islamic bronze preserved in Italy, recalls the taste for archaeological quotations. The main Moorish-style door is accompanied by a large cement figure, halfway between a harpy and a gargoyle, bearing the globe on its shoulders.

Beyond the entrance an antechamber with primitive-style figures gives access through a Moorish arch supported by two neo-medieval telamons, one with a demonic face, the other human, to the large central courtyard. Here several important pieces of medieval spolia are reused: the balcony of the so-called Pope's Room is carried by two carved stone corbels with lion heads, acanthus leaves and a coat of arms from the tomb of the jurist Giovanni da Legnano (1383) by the Dalle Masegne brothers, while above the entrance to the main staircase a circular relief of the condottiero Niccolò Ludovisi, attributed to Jacopo della Quercia, has been mounted. At the centre of the courtyard stands a large fountain obtained from the baptismal font of the medieval parish church of Verzuno, a village in the surrounding area.

Principal interiors and courtyards

The standard tour, as presented by the management, follows a route through some of the most characteristic rooms currently accessible to visitors:

• Hall of the Ninety (Sala dei Novanta). Initially conceived by Mattei as a mausoleum dedicated to Queen Victoria, it was transformed into a ballroom by Mario Venturoli in the early 20th century. The décor and furnishings are in Liberty style, and a large oval stained-glass window features a portrait of Cesare Mattei with his date of birth. The name of the hall derives from the likely apocryphal story that Mattei wished to celebrate his 90th birthday here surrounded by eighty-nine other nonagenarians.
• Chapel. Accessed via a stairway from the hall, the chapel is the most iconic space of the Rocchetta. Its design combines elements inspired by the Great Mosque of Córdoba, most notably the striped intersecting arches, with features of Italian medieval church architecture such as the matroneum and the semicircular apse. The structure and decorative apparatus are executed in humble materials (gypsum, cement, brick and wood) skilfully painted and modelled to simulate marble and carved stone. The ceiling, which appears to be richly carved woodwork, is actually composed of painted canvases with applied wooden floral elements. In the lunettes are depictions of apostles painted in the early 20th century in a style imitating mosaic. From the gallery above the altar, the visitor can see Mattei's monumental tomb, a colourful glazed ceramic sarcophagus produced by the Minghetti factory in Bologna according to the count's testamentary wishes.
• Hanging garden and upper courtyards. Leaving the chapel, a short stair leads to the hanging garden (cortile pensile), offering views of the various towers of the castle, the square “Count's tower” and the circular “Vision tower”, and over the surrounding Apennine landscape. The balustrades, in cement modelled and painted to resemble intertwined branches and roots, and the faux-antique architraves reflect the taste for natural and antiquarian motifs.
• Courtyard of the Lions (Cortile dei Leoni). One of the best-known spaces, this courtyard reprises on a smaller scale the layout of the Court of the Lions in the Alhambra in Granada. A central fountain with four lions is surrounded by a portico rich in Moorish stucco decoration (originally polychrome). Above the arches a frieze of panels bears the motif of the Vision tower, used as the logo of Mattei's remedies, while an inscription in Arabic script runs along the upper part of the structure. The walls under the portico are lined with Seville tiles of high quality. Historic and heritage sources note that Mattei drew on illustrated publications such as Owen Jones's The Grammar of Ornament (1856) and on the Moorish displays at the 1851 Great Exhibition in London for many of these motifs.
• Music Room (Sala della musica). This neo-medieval hall, with twin columns bearing the Mattei coats of arms and two large ribs spanning the vault, was decorated in Liberty style under Venturoli. It reflects documented ties between the Mattei family and Rossini and today houses part of the Collezione Marino Marini, a collection of automatic and mechanical musical instruments gathered by the Romagna industrialist Marino Marini (1907–1985) and owned by Fondazione Carisbo. Since 2019 a selection of the collection has been incorporated into the public route of the Rocchetta; in 2023 the display was enlarged with additional instruments, including gramophones, an organ, a phonograph and automatic pianos.
• Hall of Peace (Sala della pace). A refined Liberty interior with silk wall coverings, a large alabaster chandelier and two small turrets with blue stained-glass windows. Inscriptions with the word pax above the architraves suggest that it was conceived by Venturoli after 1918 as an allegorical celebration of peace following the First World War. Recent restoration has focused on recreating the original wall hangings and window frames using contemporary materials.
• Hall of Oblivion (Sala dell’oblio). A smaller room overlooking the Courtyard of the Lions, with original inlaid flooring and woodwork bearing the initials of Mario Venturoli Mattei. It is traditionally identified as his private room.
• Red Room or Count's study (Sala rossa). A space whose ceiling is adorned with a striking muqarnas-like relief formed of numerous small pyramidal elements originally in papier-mâché, stained to resemble carved wood. According to tradition, the room functioned as Mattei's study and possibly bedroom. Some of the wall decorations were modified by film set designers when the castle served as a location for Marco Bellocchio's adaptation of Enrico IV in 1984.

Other areas of note include a spiral stone staircase painted in two alternating colours on the shaft and the cylindrical wall, creating the illusion of two mirror-image staircases, and various corridors with finely crafted original doors and access to Mattei's small private study.

Decorative artworks and applied arts

Several of the most valuable elements of Rocchetta Mattei belong to the field of applied arts, historicist decoration, medieval and Renaissance spolia, and 19th- to early 20th-century artistic craftsmanship. In addition to its architectural quotations and theatrical use of materials, the castle preserves works and decorative objects connected with Bolognese artistic production, ceramic manufacture, Renaissance sculpture, Liberty design and the reuse of older works of art.

One of the most important sculptural elements in the central courtyard is the round limestone relief depicting the equestrian portrait of Niccolò di Ligo Ludovisi, a Bolognese condottiero of the early 15th century. The relief, placed above the entrance to the noble staircase, has been attributed to Jacopo della Quercia and is described as belonging to his late Bolognese activity. It originally came from the tomb of Niccolò and Giovanni Ludovisi in the Chiostro dei Morti of the convent of San Domenico in Bologna, and was probably acquired by Cesare Mattei in the 19th century together with other sculptural fragments from suppressed or dismantled Bolognese ecclesiastical complexes.

The same central courtyard also incorporates other medieval spolia of high artistic value. The balcony of the so-called Pope's Room is supported by two carved stone corbels with lion heads, acanthus leaves and a coat of arms from the tomb of the jurist Giovanni da Legnano, made between 1383 and 1386 by Jacobello and Pier Paolo dalle Masegne. The presence in the same courtyard of the Ludovisi tondo and the Dalle Masegne corbels has been interpreted as evidence of Mattei's 19th-century collecting of prestigious sculptural fragments from Bolognese ecclesiastical monuments.

Among the most important ceramic works is the monumental tomb of Cesare Mattei, placed in the gallery above the altar of the chapel. It was made by the Ceramiche Minghetti in the early 20th century, by the will of Mario Venturoli but according to Mattei's testamentary indications. The majolica decoration on two sides includes stars arranged according to contemporary astral hierarchies, inscriptions referring to the greatness of Creation and the universe in relation to human fragility, and symbols such as the cross, the pine cone and the poppy bulb.

Another significant work is the Camino dei Fenicotteri (“Flamingos' Fireplace”), a majolica fireplace that decorates a small room of the Rocchetta. It was produced by the Bolognese Minghetti manufactory from a detailed preparatory drawing by Giulio Casanova, now preserved in the Museo Civico d'Arte Industriale e Galleria Davia Bargellini in Bologna. The fireplace was the subject of the 2020 exhibition Il Camino dei Fenicotteri. I disegni dei Casanova dall'Æmilia Ars alla Rocchetta Mattei, curated by Paolo Cova, Mark Gregory D'Apuzzo and Ilaria Negretti, which presented it as a little-known but important example of the creative production of the Æmilia Ars society, founded in Bologna in 1898 under the influence of the Arts and Crafts movement.

The applied-arts dimension of the castle also includes the high-quality Seville tiles in the Courtyard of the Lions, the Liberty decoration of the Music Room and Hall of Peace, and the Collezione Marino Marini of automatic and mechanical musical instruments displayed in the Music Room. These elements reinforce the character of Rocchetta Mattei not only as an architectural fantasy, but also as a container of decorative arts, ceramic production, medieval and Renaissance reuse, historicist collecting and early 20th-century craftsmanship.

Arab-Moorish wing and Count's apartment

The current public route does not correspond to the whole historical and architectural extent of Rocchetta Mattei. A further section of the castle, usually referred to in recent restoration documents as the Arab-Moorish wing, corresponds to the earliest and most historically authentic part of the complex, the area in which Cesare Mattei first established his residence. This portion had remained outside the main restoration campaign that led to the reopening of the castle in 2015 and became the object of a new restoration and safety programme launched in 2024 within the PNRR-funded project Da Campolo l’arte fa Scola.

The restoration project divides the unrestored rooms into three groups. A complete restoration, including structural consolidation, architectural requalification and restoration of the surviving decorative apparatus, concerns the ground-floor rooms: the Waiting Room, Dining Room, Atrium, Ceramics Room, Kitchen and Flamingo Room. On the first floor the same level of intervention concerns the Corridor, the Loggia delle Uri with its storeroom, and the Heraldic Staircase.

A second group is subject to partial restoration and architectural requalification, without full restoration of the wall decoration. This includes the Loggia Carolina, Pope's Room, Turkish Parlour, Turkish Room and Hall of Mirrors. Contemporary reports describe these rooms as part of the heart of the Arab-Moorish section of the castle, whose recovery is intended to enlarge the public route and make the Rocchetta more completely visitable. The Loggia Carolina is also documented by a late 19th-century negative from the Pietro Poppi collection, dated to 1879–1883.

The most conservative intervention concerns the rooms of the Count's wing, identified in the project as the part most directly associated with Cesare Mattei's private apartment: the Count's Room, Violet Parlour, Loggia with false razor-well, Hall of the Vision and English Parlour. The works planned for these rooms consist mainly of structural consolidation where necessary, cleaning and technical adaptation, with the aim of making them safe for future visits while preserving their surviving historic character.

Materials, illusionism and symbolism

Both heritage inventories and art-historical studies have emphasised the “theatrical” character of Rocchetta Mattei. Many elements that appear to be in precious stone or carved wood are in fact realised with inexpensive materials, canvas, gypsum, cement or papier-mâché, painted to imitate more luxurious finishes. The chapel ceiling, the stalactite-like vault of the Red Room and several beams and architraves are often cited examples.

The decorative programme also includes symbolic motifs related to Mattei's scientific and spiritual interests: astronomical references and hierarchies of stars on his tomb, Christian symbols such as the cross and the pine cone (eternity), the poppy (sleep), and, in the Vision Staircase, allegorical imagery celebrating the victory of his “new medicine” over traditional medicine, accompanied by Latin distichs composed by the abbot Giordan.

Symbolic and esoteric interpretations

Because of its labyrinthine spatial sequence, allegorical inscriptions and mixture of Christian, scientific and orientalising motifs, Rocchetta Mattei has often been interpreted in symbolic or esoteric terms. The regional heritage catalogue itself describes the visitor route as having an “initiatory” character, especially in relation to the succession of halls, towers, stairways and courtyards.

Such readings are generally presented by institutional and heritage sources as part of the building's visual and cultural reception rather than as a formally documented architectural programme. The same sources primarily frame the Rocchetta as an example of 19th-century eclectic historicism and Moorish revival, shaped by Mattei's personal self-representation, his medical activity and later interventions by Mario Venturoli Mattei.

Electrohomeopathy

Origins and theory

Electrohomeopathy (called by Mattei elettromiopatia or elettromeopatia) is a therapeutic system devised by Cesare Mattei in the mid-19th century. It combined medicated granules and liquids called “electric fluids”, obtained from medicinal plants by means of a secret process and interpreted through a doctrine of positive, negative and neutral bodily “electric” forces.

Treccani describes the system as a mixture of homeopathy, phytotherapy, alchemy and magnetism that went beyond the principles of Hahnemannian homeopathy. Mattei claimed that disease resulted from an imbalance between positive and negative electric forces within the organism and that his internal and external remedies could restore equilibrium. The remedies were categorised into different families (e.g. anti-scrofulous, anti-cancerous, anti-angioitic, febrifuge, pectoral, anti-lymphatic, vermifuge, anti-venereal) and the fluids were polarised as “red”, “blue”, “white”, “yellow” and “green” electricity.

Mattei presented electrohomeopathy as a universal, non-toxic cure for a wide range of diseases, including cancer. His claims were strongly contested by mainstream physicians, who denounced the lack of scientific basis for his theories, the secrecy of his preparations and the absence of demonstrable electricity in the products. Nonetheless, the system attracted a large following in Europe and beyond in the late 19th and early 20th centuries and was widely discussed in medical and popular literature.

Global diffusion and decline

According to the Archivio Museo Cesare Mattei, by 1881 there were 26 officially recognised depots for Mattei remedies in addition to the central depot in Bologna, located not only in major Italian cities but also in Paris, Nice, Regensburg, Geneva, London, Warsaw, Kraków, Moscow, Odessa, several Spanish towns, Delft, Mangalore in India, Yokohama, Buenos Aires and other locations. By 1884 the number of depots had grown to 107, and by 1914, under Venturoli, to 266 worldwide, despite opposition from allopathic medicine and the proliferation of counterfeit products.

The production of the “original” Mattei remedies in Bologna continued, under various heirs, until 1968, when the laboratories closed. Today, preparations marketed as electrohomeopathic remedies are produced in several countries (notably India, Pakistan and Germany), but they do not use Mattei's original secret formulas.

The castle as headquarters, patient accommodation and archives

Rocchetta Mattei functioned as the symbolic and practical centre of Cesare Mattei's electrohomeopathic enterprise: a place of residence, reception and medical consultation, within a wider estate developed to host patients and visitors. A provincial cultural guide notes that, as the number of patients increased, accommodation was soon expanded beyond the castle through a series of “villini climatici” (small health-climate villas) in the nearby Borgo dell’Archetta, also known simply as Archetta, on the road to La Scola. The regional heritage catalogue (PatER) likewise connects the Borgo dell’Archetta to Mattei's patient hospitality and describes it as part of the estate linked to the castle, making Archetta one of the small settlements historically associated with the Mattei complex; it also records that Mattei's adopted son and successor, Mario Venturoli Mattei, later reinterpreted parts of the complex in a Liberty style and intervened on houses and villas of the estate as well.

The preservation and musealisation of Mattei's activity is today distributed across several local initiatives and should not be confused with the ownership or management of the castle itself. A volunteer association operating under the name Archivio Museo Cesare Mattei A.P.S. states on its own website that it is a historical–cultural committee founded in 1997 and that it curates documents and objects related to Mattei and electrohomeopathy; after earlier arrangements in the area, it indicates its premises in the Riola area (Via Ponte 14/A).

In addition, the Gruppo Studi Cesare Mattei reports that it manages Palazzo Comelli (Camugnano) and hosts there a “Museo Cesare Mattei” section dedicated to Mattei's life and the Rocchetta; a regional cultural news item also describes the enhancement project for Palazzo Comelli promoted by the association.

Restoration, management and tourism

Management and visiting conditions

Since the reopening in 2015 Rocchetta Mattei has been owned by Fondazione Carisbo and managed by the municipality of Grizzana Morandi, in agreement with the Metropolitan City of Bologna and the Union of Municipalities of the Bolognese Apennines. Visits are possible only by advance booking and exclusively by guided tour, mainly at weekends and on public holidays, with additional openings in periods of high demand.

The official website emphasises the need for guided visits because of the complex, labyrinthine circulation of the castle and the fragility of many architectural and decorative elements.

Visitor numbers and local impact

Fondazione Carisbo reports that Rocchetta Mattei now receives more than 73,000 visitors per year and describes it as an internationally relevant tourist destination. Regional planning documents and heritage catalogues describe the castle as one of the key cultural attractors of the central Apennines around Bologna.

The castle is often promoted together with other nearby sites, such as the Casa Museo Giorgio Morandi at Grizzana, the parish church of Santa Maria Assunta at Riola (designed by Alvar Aalto), the historic village of La Scola and the sanctuary of Montovolo, forming a broader “cultural landscape” of the Reno valley.

Recognition and cultural network

Rocchetta Mattei is included in the Emilia-Romagna regional network of Case e studi delle persone illustri, a programme devoted to houses, studios and museums associated with notable figures who lived or worked in the region. Within this framework, Cesare Mattei is listed among scientists and inventors, and the Rocchetta is recognised alongside other Bolognese Apennine sites connected with prominent cultural figures, including Palazzo Comelli and the Casa Museo Giorgio Morandi.

Media and cultural references

Rocchetta Mattei has appeared in literature, cinema, television and music videos because of its eclectic architecture and atmospheric interiors. Mattei's remedies, rather than the castle itself, are mentioned in Fyodor Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, in the chapter “The Devil. Ivan's Nightmare”.

The Italian novelist Loriano Macchiavelli used the castle as a central setting in his 2009 crime novel Delitti di gente qualunque.

Film and television

The castle has been used several times as a film location. The Cineturismo database of the Cineteca di Bologna records Rocchetta Mattei among the locations of Balsamus, l’uomo di Satana (1968), directed by Pupi Avati, Tutti defunti... tranne i morti (1977), also directed by Avati, and Enrico IV (1984), directed by Marco Bellocchio and based on the play by Luigi Pirandello. The location is also listed by Italy for Movies and by regional tourism sources among cinematic sites in the Bologna area.

In 2019 the castle and the life of Cesare Mattei were the subject of Il conte magico, a documentary film directed by Marco Melluso and Diego Schiavo and produced by Genoma Films. The regional film catalogue describes the work as a “docummedia” devoted to Mattei and to his Rocchetta at Grizzana Morandi.

The Rocchetta has also been the subject or setting of television productions. In 2018 Sky Arte broadcast Il sogno del Conte Mattei, a special episode of the programme Muse Inquietanti, produced by Ruvido Produzioni and narrated by Carlo Lucarelli, devoted to the history of the castle and of Cesare Mattei. In 2021 the castle was specially fitted out as the setting of the Rai 2 reality-talent programme Voglio essere un mago!, presented in Rai press material as taking place in the Rocchetta Mattei castle in the Bolognese Apennines.

In July 2024 scenes for The Dreamlands, a fantasy film directed by the German filmmaker Huân Vu and inspired by the Dream Cycle of H. P. Lovecraft, were filmed inside and outside the castle, including areas such as the chapel and the Courtyard of the Lions.

Music videos and short films

Rocchetta Mattei has also been used for musical and short audiovisual productions. In 2016 Fabrizio Pizzulo directed Canto Fonès, a four-minute film in which the singer Cristina Zavalloni performs verses by Constantine P. Cavafy in the recently restored spaces of the castle. The official video for Strade, by Roby Facchinetti and Riccardo Fogli, was filmed at Rocchetta Mattei and directed by Gaetano Morbioli.

In 2021 the British art magazine Apollo described Rocchetta Mattei as “Italy's Hearst Castle”, highlighting its mixture of medieval and Moorish elements and its long, idiosyncratic building history.

Gallery

• 
  The entrance
• 
  The main courtyard
• 
  The Courtyard of the Lions
• 
  The chapel
• 
  The Room of the Ninety

Further reading

• Stagni, Giovanni; Zanarini, Gabriele; Bottacchiari, Gilda; Parlatore, Maricetta; Roversi Monaco, Camilla; Zagnoni, Renzo (2017). Rocchetta Mattei: un cantiere con l'anima. Porretta Terme: Gruppo di Studi Alta Valle del Reno. ISBN 9788894224665.
• Homes, Bill (2011). La Rocchetta Mattei di Riola: guida alla architettura e alla decorazione. Porretta Terme: Gruppo di Studi Alta Valle del Reno.
• Bartolomei, Cristiana; Gardini, Matilde; Morganti, Caterina (2024). "A Bird's Eye View of a Handcrafted Jewel in Architecture. The Rocchetta Mattei in Italy". In REHABEND 2024: Construction Pathology, Rehabilitation Technology and Heritage Management. Cantabria: REHABEND Congress, University of Cantabria. pp. 2430–2439.
• Cova, Paolo; Gregory D'Apuzzo, Mark; Negretti, Ilaria, eds. (2020). Il Camino dei Fenicotteri. I disegni dei Casanova dall'Æmilia Ars alla Rocchetta Mattei. Porretta Terme: Nuèter. ISBN 9791280073006.
• Falqui, Laura (2018). Il mago dell'Appennino: la leggenda del conte Mattei e della sua Rocchetta. Imola: La Mandragora.
• Facci, Mario (2002). Il conte Cesare Mattei: vita e opere di un singolare guaritore dell'Ottocento, inventore dell'elettromeopatia, costruttore della Rocchetta di Riola. Porretta Terme: Gruppo di Studi Alta Valle del Reno-Nueter; Gruppo di Studi Savena Setta Sambro.
• Guidanti, Andrea; Zagnoni, Renzo (1997). Il signore della Rocchetta: il conte Cesare Mattei nel centenario della morte (1809–1896). Porretta Terme; Riola: Nuèter; Pro Loco.

External links

• Rocchetta Mattei
• Archivio Museo Cesare Mattei
• Rocchetta Mattei in the PatER – Cultural Heritage Catalogue of Emilia-Romagna
• Rocchetta Mattei già Rocca di Savignano in the PatER – Cultural Heritage Catalogue of Emilia-Romagna
• Castello Rocchetta Mattei on the website of the Italian Ministry of Culture
• Rocchetta Mattei on the Fondazione Carisbo website
• Cinematic spots in the Bologna area on Emilia Romagna Turismo
• Rocchetta Mattei on Italy for Movies