Where we are

Orig­i­nally an Um­brian city, it was con­quered and en­larged by the Etr­uscans , who called it Cur­tun. Cor­tona even­tu­ally be­came a Roman colony under the name Corito . Dur­ing the bar­bar­ian in­va­sions of the 553, Cor­tona was sacked and de­stroyed by the Goths. Cor­tona be­came a Ghi­bellin­ian city state in the 13th cen­tury, with its own cur­rency. From 1325 to 1409 the Ranieri-Casali fam­ily suc­cess­fully ruled the town.
After being con­quered by Ladis­laus of Naples in 1409, Cor­tona was sold to the Medici in 1411. In 1737, the se­nior branch of the Medici line went ex­tinct and Cor­tona came under the au­thor­ity of the House of Lor­raine. Fol­low­ing the Ital­ian Wars of In­de­pen­dence , Tus­cany – Cor­tona in­cluded – be­came part of the King­dom of Italy .

Arezzo lies on a hill close to the Apen­nine Tosco-Ro­mag­nolo. As its ar­chi­tec­ture proves, Arezzo boasts its an­cient ori­gin first as one of the great­est Etr­uscan towns and then a strate­gic Roman city. The upper part keeps a re­mark­able me­dieval as­pect with the Cathe­dral and the Medici Fortress. The rather Gothic Cathe­dral con­tains fine works of art among which La Mad­dalena by Piero della Francesca and the stained-glass win­dows by Guil­lame de Mar­cil­lat.
The cen­tral Pi­azza Grande shows dif­fer­ent styles of ar­chi­tec­ture. The Pi­azza Grande hosts an­nu­ally the Gios­tra del Sara­cino , a tour­na­ment held on the third Sun­day of June and the first Sun­day of Sep­tem­ber, and the An­tique Fair on the first week­end of every month. The Bacci Chapel in the Basil­ica of San Francesco host the stun­ning Re­nais­sance cycle of fres­coes of The leg­end of the True Cross by Piero della Francesca. The sin­gle-nave church of San Domenico houses the newly re­stored Cru­ci­fix by Cimabue. Many other churches and palaces prove how im­por­tant and orig­i­nal in the cen­turies Arezzo was.

Stun­ning me­dieval lit­tle town on sides of the hills be­tween the So­vara and the val­ley of the Tiber. Its name is con­nected with a fa­mous bat­tle ( the Bat­tle of Anghiari) fought in 1440 in the plain of Anghiari and painted by Leonardo in Palazzo Vec­chio in Flo­rence. Going up the hill you see the Borg, the me­dieval core sur­rounded by im­pos­ing XVI cent. Walls.
In the heart of the his­toric cen­tre stands the Palazzo Tagli­eschi, seat of the Mu­nic­i­pal Mu­seum which houses fine works of art (a poly­chrome wood Madonna by Ja­copo della Quer­cia, some Della Rob­bia ter­ra­cotte, a XVI cent. portable organ still work­ing). In spring the lanes of the vil­lage are an­i­mated by crowds of vis­i­tors com­ing to the tra­di­tional Arts and Crafts Fair.

This is the birth­place of the great Re­nais­sance sculp­tor An­drea Con­tucci called Il Sanso­vino and of Pope Julius III. The his­toric cen­tre spreads out from the Cassero, the old fortress dat­ing back to the XIV cent., and con­tin­ues along Corso San­gallo, lined by the Re­nais­sance Logge dei Mer­canti at­trib­uted to Sanso­vino, to the Palazzo di Monte, today the seat of the Coun­cil, from Palazzo Pre­to­rio with its tower, and on to the Pieve and the Church of Sant’Agostino which houses a beau­ti­ful As­sun­zione by Gior­gio Vasari.

A short dis­tance from the his­toric cen­tre is the Sanc­tu­ary of Santa Maria delle Ver­tighe which was al­ready doc­u­mented in the XI cent. A par­tic­u­lar ap­point­ment in the sum­mer is the the­atri­cal event Teatro Popo­lare Il Giogo , which is held every year in Mon­tag­nano, dur­ing July.

This is one of the most in­ter­est­ing cen­tres in Tus­cany be­cause of its orig­i­nal cas­tle on an el­lip­ti­cal plan, closed in by a wall with tow­ers. The old vil­lage cen­tre pre­sents, per­fectly con­served, the Palazzo Co­mu­nale dat­ing from the XIII cent.. In­side is a small mu­seum con­tain­ing paint­ings from the Siena and Are­tine Schools as well as valu­able pieces of gold works from the late Gothic pe­riod such as the fa­mous Tree relic of Lu­cig­nano.

Of great note are other re­li­gious build­ings and the church of San Francesco dec­o­rated with fres­coes by the Sienese painters Bar­tolo di Fredi and Tad­deo di Bar­tolo. Of great in­ter­est is the one above the first altar of the right aisle known as the Tri­onfo della Morte in which, in a very ef­fec­tive way, is rep­re­sented the pre­car­i­ous­ness of human life. The imag­i­na­tion and the in­spi­ra­tion of its char­ac­ters are shown in spring on the oc­ca­sion of the Mag­gi­o­lata Lu­cig­nanese where the sounds and colours re­live a tra­di­tion rich in his­tory and music.

Siena is one of Italy’ s most beau­ti­ful cities, sit­u­ated in the cen­tre of Tus­cany be­tween the Chi­anti area and the Maremma, rich in his­tory, art and pop­u­lar tra­di­tions, it is the city of the Palio. Siena still pre­serves in­tact its me­dieval as­pect: it is built on three hills; full of steep, wind­ing al­ley-ways, en­closed within the cir­cle of its mas­sive walls (some seven kilo­me­tres in lenght) which seem to safe­guard its cul­ture and the trea­sures of its art and his­tory. Of Etr­uscan ori­gin, it was a Roman colony; its im­por­tance grew in the Mid­dle Ages, first as the seat of Lon­go­b­ard, and then of Counts under the Car­olin­gian dom­i­na­tion.

After a long pe­riod of Epis­co­pal dom­i­na­tion the town reached a peak of power after be­com­ing a mu­nic­i­pal­ity, un­der­tak­ing a pol­icy of ex­pan­sion to­wards the bor­der­ing ter­ri­to­ries. Con­fronta­tion with Flo­rence was in­evitable and the strug­gle lasted, with var­i­ous vi­cis­si­tudes, until when after a long siege, Siena was con­quered by the Flo­ren­tines, los­ing its au­ton­omy and be­com­ing part of the Duchy, shar­ing its for­tunes until uni­fi­ca­tion with Italy.

Pe­ru­gia, the great “Guelf strong-hold” rises up in the re­gion’s heart, with its 5 stor­i­cal quar­ters closed-in by its Etr­uscan town walls. These enor­mous bas­tions formed by cy­clopic square masses, were con­structed 22 cen­turies ago and are still vis­i­ble for long stretches. When the city of Rome was lit­tle more that an en­camp­ment of huts, one could al­ready enter the etr­uscan Pe­ru­gia using one of 7 por­tals, among which one was par­tic­u­larly mighty, the Porta Pul­chra or of Au­gus­tus, dat­ing back to Etr­uscan times.

As­sisi, for the wealth of its mon­u­ments, can be con­sid­ered one of the richer artis­tic Ital­ian des­ti­na­tion. The his­tor­i­cal vi­cis­si­tudes that the city has known have left most pre­cious tes­ti­monies: in the shape of Churches, Palaces and Cas­tles. In the main pub­lic square of the city it is found, per­fectly pre­served, a Roman Tem­ple ( Tem­pio di Min­erva), but, def­i­nitely, the jewel of the city, ful­crum of the world-wide re­li­gios­ity, is the Basil­ica of Saint Fran­cisco.

Chi­anti is a his­toric-ge­o­graph­i­cal re­gion, sym­bol of the cul­ture of Tus­can farm work­ers, who un­der­stand the hills that rise be­tween the moun­tains of Chi­anti in the west and the river Arno. Om­brone and Arbia are to the east; and so the ter­ri­tory that em­braces the south­ern part of the province of Flo­rence and the north­ern part of that of Siena. Hilly areas with a rocky ter­rain of which it seems mirac­u­lous that a thin fer­tile strata may be so lux­u­ri­ant, with woods, vines, olives and veg­eta­bles. A ge­o­graphic re­gion that has a his­tory be­cause of the con­flict be­tween Siena and Arezzo and be­tween Flo­rence and Siena, land of saints and fight­ers, of great artists, of farm work­ers and lords, land of hills, of knolls, with farms and vil­las, cas­tles and parish churches, abbeys and cropped tow­ers, stone ham­lets and aus­tere palaces, a land that has, for about five cen­turies, given life to a wine of which is the most fa­mous of Italy.

Pienza is a small jewel of the Re­nais­sance in the heart of Tus­cany in the province of Siena, it owes its name and its rep­u­ta­tion to Enea Sil­vio Pic­colo­mini be­come fa­mous as Pio the II. Known in the high Mid­dle Ages with the name of Corsig­nano it was a Siena-strong­hold. All its beau­ti­ful ar­chi­tec­ture was com­mit­ted just from Pope Pio II be­tween 1459 and 1462 to one of the most fa­mous ar­chi­tect: Bernardo Rossellino, he trans­formed the vil­lage of Corsig­nano in one splen­did Re­nais­sance small town, an ex­cep­tional ex­am­ple of ar­chi­tec­ture and urban plan­ning of the fif­teenth cen­tury.

Na­tive land of the Brunello that has been de­fined one of the best and more fa­mous Ital­ian wine, Mon­tal­cino from the high of its 567 me­ters, dom­i­nates all the sur­round­ing coun­try­side. Just out­side the city, near Castel­n­uovo dell’Abate , you find the Ro­manesque abbey of Sant’ An­timo. This in­ti­mate and im­pres­sive tem­ple was founded by Carlo Magno in 781 and it pre­serves an al­most en­chanted at­mos­phere.