Among the tall modern buildings of Piazza dei Consoli, on the left side coming from "Monte del Grano", is the ancient architectural complex of Quadraro, consisting of a massive quadrangular tower with Ghibelline battlements incorporated into the buildings of a historic farmhouse, dating from between the 17th and 19th centuries. Its name originates from G. G. Guadralis, emphyteuta (a person to whom an owner ceded his land in exchange for an annual fee in money or cultivated products), in the mid-12th century, of the land on which the farmhouse was later established. The tower, made of tufa blocks, marble fragments and brick parts, was built in the 14th century, probably to replace a previous structure and in any case on top of an older building, as attested by the presence of walls in "opus incerta", dating back to the Roman Republican age. The antiquity of the site is also testified by several important discoveries made since 1776, of funerary inscriptions and sculptural material, which led to the hypothesis of the presence of a residential villa in the area of the complex. In the 12th and 13th centuries, the Casale Quatralis, then Quadrarium and finally - from the 14th century - Quadraro, belonged to the Monastery of St. Alexis; in the 13th and 14th centuries, it passed into the hands of the Arcioni and Astalli families, and then, in the following century, ended up among the possessions of the powerful Colonna family; in more recent times, the Quadraro complex was included in the latifundium of Roma Vecchia, owned by Torlonia.
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