The area of coast around Porto Recanati has undergone lots of changes through the ages.
It is at this precise point that the Romans founded the town of Potentia in 184 BC, on the Northern bank of the Flosis river- now known as the river Potenza the mouth of which was a bit further south than it is today-The Romans founded Potentia in 184 BC, as part of the colonisation of the Adriatic coast.
During the barbaric invasions and gothic war during the first half of the VI century the people of Potentia sought refuge in the upland areas alongside the river in the area of Montarice and, what is today known as, Torretta, or fled up the valley towards the hills leaving the lowlands to become flooded and marshy.
The territory of Porto Recanati was donated to the Town Council of Recanati in 1229 by Federico II, who also gave instructions to build a port.
Porto Recanati developed around the Castello Svevo, dated from the XIII century, at around the same time as when Federico II donated the lands between the Musone and Potenza rivers. on which the ancient “ Castrum Maris” was built, to the Recanati town council.
The castle was completed during the XV century but the much sought after port remained a far off dream.
The main work of the period was the loading and unloading of the vessels that, in the absence of an actual port, were forced to dock and land at the castle, there were high fines for not doing so.

At the beginning of the XVI century the possibility of building an actual port seemed, for a short time, feasible. A venetian engineer, Giorgio Spaventa presented two projects however they were both forgotten. In 1510 Pope Giulio II della Rovere decided to make a generous contribution towards the construction of a port. The task was given to Michele di Pasquale an architect of the Repubblica Ragusea. The works were interrupted and restarted numerous times but never came to an end. Recent flooding has uncovered the dock and what were the foundations of what should have been “ Porto Giulio”.
During those same years the area underwent heavy attack from the Turkish who in 1518 managed to penetrate the fort- thanks to the betrayal of a greek who lived there- and caused terrible damage.
The community underwent important growth and development during the 18th century thanks to the land reclamation works that were carried out saving the area from floods and limiting the cases of malaria.
After the intense conflict and fighting that took place during the unification of Italy- the battle of Castelfidardo in 1860- the population of Porto Recanati continued to grow and the independent parties pushed constantly for independence from Recanati. This independence was conceded on the 15th of January 1893 in a decree signed by King Umberto I.