The Franciscan sanctuary of La Verna.
2021
The Franciscan sanctuary of La Verna (province of Arezzo) is famous for being the place where St. Francis of Assisi received the stigmata on September 16, 1224.
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2021
Lucca. The Cathedral of San Martino
The Cathedral of San Martino is the main Catholic place of worship in the city of Lucca. According to tradition, the cathedral was founded by San Frediano in the sixth century, then rebuilt by Anselmo da Baggio, bishop of the city, in 1060.
2008
Prato
Prato is an Italian town of 194,390 inhabitants, the capital of the province of the same name in Tuscany. It is the second largest city in Tuscany and the third in central Italy by number of inhabitants after Rome and Florence. Until 1992, the year of the constitution of the province of the same name, it was the most populated non-provincial town in Italy, then in the province of Florence. The Prato plain was inhabited since the Etruscan era, but the birth of the city itself dates back, generally, to the 10th century, when we have news of two contiguous but distinct inhabited centers, Borgo al Cornio and Castrum Prati, which merged during the following century. In the Prato economy, textile production has always played a leading role since the Middle Ages, as evidenced by the documents of the merchant Francesco Datini, but it is in the nineteenth century that Prato saw an impetuous industrial development, which still make it one of the most important districts at the European level. The city boasts historical and artistic attractions of great importance, with a cultural itinerary that begins with the Etruscans and then expanded in the Middle Ages and reached its peak with the Renaissance, when artists of the caliber of Donatello, Filippo Lippi and Botticelli.
2021
Vinci. Wonderful views of summer.
Vinci is an Italian town of 14 615 inhabitants in the metropolitan city of Florence, in Tuscany. It is known to have been the place of origin of Leonardo da Vinci.
2018
Fucecchio
Fucecchio (pronounced / fuˈʧekkjo /; fučékki̯o, Ficeclum in Latin) is an Italian town of 23,343 inhabitants in the metropolitan city of Florence in Tuscany, in the lower Valdarno. The Municipality is located on the right bank of the Arno river, on the border between the metropolitan city of Florence and the provinces of Pisa, Lucca and Pistoia and near the wet area of the Fucecchio Marsh. Its territory covers an area of 65 km², on average around 25 m s.l.m .; the town extends partly lying on a hill, which since ancient times has taken the name of "Poggio Salamartano", and for the most part in the flat area on its slopes. About 45 kilometers from Florence and 38 from Pisa, included in the Leather District, borders to the north with the municipalities of Chiesina Uzzanese and Ponte Buggianese, to the east with the municipalities of Larciano and Cerreto Guidi, to the south with the municipality of San Miniato and to the west with the municipalities of Santa Croce sull'Arno, Castelfranco di Sotto and Altopascio. The toponym is attested for the first time in 1027 [5] as "Ficiclo", "Ficecli" and "Ficecchio" and derives from the Latin ficetulum with the meaning of "wood of fig, place of figs ".
2021
Vinci. Church of Santa Croce
Of thirteenth-century origin, restored several times, it no longer retains the original structure. The neo-Renaissance style works carried out in the years 1925-1935 gave it its current appearance.
2021
Fucecchio. Abbey of San Salvatore
The abbey of San Salvatore is located in the upper part of Fucecchio, in the province of Florence, diocese of San Miniato.
2021
San Gimignano. The church of Sant'Agostino
2021
Pisa, the cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta
The cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta, in the center of the Piazza del Duomo, also known as Piazza dei Miracoli, is the medieval cathedral of Pisa as well as the primatial church. Masterpiece of the Romanesque, in particular of the Pisan Romanesque, it represents the tangible testimony of the prestige and wealth achieved by the maritime republic of Pisa at the moment of its apogee. It was begun in 1063 (1064 according to the Pisan calendar in force at the time) by the architect Buscheto, with the tenth part of the booty of the undertaking of Palermo in Sicily against the Muslims (1063) led by Giovanni Orlandi belonging to the Orlandi family [1] . Different stylistic elements come together: classical, Lombard-Emilian, Byzantine and in particular Islamic, proof of the international presence of Pisan merchants at that time. In that same year the reconstruction of the Basilica of San Marco in Venice was also begun, so it may well be that at the time there was a rivalry between the two maritime republics to create the most beautiful and sumptuous place of worship. The church was erected in an area outside the early medieval walls, to symbolize the power of Pisa which did not need protection. The chosen area was already used in the Lombard period as a necropolis and, already in the early 11th century, an unfinished church was erected which must have been dedicated to Santa Maria. The new large church of Buscheto, in fact, was initially called Santa Maria Maggiore until it was definitively dedicated to Santa Maria Assunta.
2008
Prato, the Cathedral
The church, with three naves, is built in white and green marble. It most likely dates back to the 6th century. It is one of the most important examples of religious architecture between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries in the region, with an elegant passage inside it between the large Romanesque-Lombard arches and the impetus of Gothic in the transept, most likely designed by the famous Giovanni Pisano , which inside will create a wooden crucifix and his last masterpiece, the Madonna della Cintola, in 1317. The relic of the sacred Cintola is kept there. The most important works are the external pulpit (built by Michelozzo and decorated by Donatello), the internal pulpit by Mino da Fiesole and Antonio Rossellino from 1472, the Madonna dell'Ulivo, the only work created together by the famous brothers Da Maiano, Giovanni, Benedetto and Giuliano. In the transept instead there are the frescoes by Filippo Lippi (in the Cappella Maggiore), one of the greatest expressions of the Italian Renaissance, the frescoes by Paolo Uccello (in the Cappella dell'Assunta), and by Agnolo Gaddi (in the Chapel of the sacred Cintola), all interior of a bronze gate made by some of the most important goldsmiths of the fifteenth century.
2023
Rocca di Montemurlo. Pieve di San Giovanni Decollato
The parish church of S. Giovanni Battista Decollato opens onto the square of the village. The parish church of Montemurlo has an ancient and controversial history, we find the first trace of it when Otto III, on the occasion of his coronation as emperor (995), descends to Italy for Rome and on his journey (998) confirms the possessions of Bishop Antonino of Pistoia among which our pieve is noted. It has a simple plan, with a single nave with presbytery and choir, modified in the second half of the last century. Originally the parish church had very small dimensions and it was only during the 16th century that we witness the first expansion works carried out by the humanist Bartolomeo Fonzio, parish priest in Montemurlo from 1494 to 1520, who had the rectory and the cloister built alongside the church, of which however, the round arches and columns with Corinthian capitals now walled up can still be traced. The parish church is 'protected' by an imposing bell tower which was originally a watchtower then transformed and refined, in the first half of the 16th century as part of the transformations carried out by the active parish priest, with the large mullioned windows that we see on each side, surmounted by brick arches. The large window is supported by octagonal columns and the shutters of the arches that conclude the tower are decorated with a notched frame that also surrounds the roof. Entering the church we cross a loggia, added during the 17th century, supported by brick columns with Ionic-inspired capitals. The interior of the church, with a goat-like roof, is enriched by four aedicule altars, one of which dates back to the 16th century, a model for the others built in the 18th century. On the altars and walls of the presbytery, valuable paintings by the painters Francesco Granacci, Giovanni Stradano, Matteo rosselli and Giacinto Fabroni.