The story of this place
From AD 27 until his death in 37, the emperor Tiberius withdrew entirely to Capri, ruling the Roman world by messenger from Villa Jovis, the largest of his twelve villas on the island. Perched 334 metres above the sea on the island's north-east cliff, the palace sprawled across terraces with cisterns, baths, and imperial quarters commanding a 360-degree view. The gossipy historians Suetonius and Tacitus filled his retreat with lurid tales of cruelty and debauchery—including the 'Salto di Tiberio,' a precipice from which victims were supposedly hurled into the sea. How much was true remains unknown, but the ruins still evoke the paranoid isolation of Rome's second emperor.