At the end of the sickle-shaped port of Messina, there is Forte San Salvatore. In this place, thanks to its strategic importance, have always been military constructions to defend the city. At first the Normans in 1081 built a defensive tower (S. Anna tower), and next to it a Basilian monastery called San Salvatore, seat of the Archimandrite. In ancient times, there probably was also a votive column there dedicated to Neptune. 

During the rule of Charles V, the fortress was restructured by the military architect Ferramolino to reinforce the defense of Messina. In the meantime, the monastery was moved to the city centre and the religious building was incorporated into the fortress and still admirable. 

The fortress is perfectly integrated in the morphological structure of the territory. It has a polygonal plan with a semicylindrical bastion on the top called Forte Campana. Entering through an ashlar portal, you can reach a room covered by a barrel vault, and, at the end of this room, there are some rests of the ancient Norman tower. From here, two opposite ramps lead to a terrace where there are some casemates with large openings for guns.    

The ashlar portal of the entrance is stately and imposing. It has the Hapsburg coat of arms and an inscription that testifies the end of the construction in 1614. 

The fortress has always been an impregnable bulwark in defense of the city. Neither Angevins during the Sicilian Vespers nor Turkish or Saracens have ever conquered it. During the Sicilian revolution of 1848, the fortress, together with the near Real Cittadella, were used by the Bourbon army to bomb the city in order to repress the riot. 

In 1934 pope Pius XI directly from Rome illuminated the votive stele of the Virgin, which was put on the top of Forte Campana, using a contraption made by Guglielmo Marconi. The stele is 197 feet high, and it was commissioned by the archbishop Angelo Paino. At the base, on the external wall of the fortress, there is the inscription that the Virgin wrote in a letter of benediction that gave to the inhabitants of Messina who went to Nazareth in 42 A. D.: VOS ET IPSAM CIVITATEM BENEDICIMUS (I bless you and your city). In everlasting thanksgiving, the citizens nominated the Virgin the patron of the Messina.