[3] The city was established as Pisaurum by the Romans in 184 BC as a colony in the territory of the Picentes, the people who lived along the northeast coast during the Iron Age.

[4][better source needed] In 1737, fourteen ancient votive stones were unearthed in a local farm field, each bearing the inscription of a Roman god; these were written in a pre-Etruscan script, indicating a much earlier occupation of the area than the 184 BC Picentes colony.

The northern Picentes were invaded in the 4th century BC by the Gallic Senones, earlier by the Etruscans, and when the Romans reached the area the population was an ethnic mixture.

[citation needed] After the fall of the Western Empire, Pesaro was occupied by the Ostrogoths, and destroyed by Vitigis (539) in the course of the Gothic War.

Under the last family, who selected it as capital of their duchy, Pesaro saw its most flourishing age, with the construction of numerous public and private palaces,[5] and the erection of a new line of walls (the Mura Roveresche).

[6] On 11 September 1860 Piedmontese troops entered the city, and after the their win over the Papal States at the Battle of Castelfidardo 8 days later, Pesaro was subsequently annexed to the new Kingdom of Italy along with the entire Marche (and Umbria) regions.