SAN GIMIGNANO

Return to Piazza Sant'Agostino.

Piazza del Duomo, is the heart of San Gimignano and its monumental center, is sure one of the more beautiful small squares of Italy. Here face many interesting palaces (palazzo del Podestà, palazzo del Popolo, the Cathedral, the Loggia) and various medieval towers (Rognosa tower, Chigi tower, Grossa tower, the two Salvucci towers) that gives to the city the aspect of a medieval New York.

On the western side, the square is dominated from the Romanesque, 12th century, facade of the Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta, situated to the end of a beautiful staircase. The inside of the church is with three aisles with a vaulted roof, the walls and the vaults are all frescoed from wonderful frescoes executed between the others by Benozzo Gozzoli, Jacopo della Quercia, Lippo Memmi, Taddeo di Bartolo, Barna da Siena and Bartolo di Fredi. In the inner facade is a fresco that represents the martyrdom of Saint Sebastian by Benozzo Gozzoli. Deserve particular attention the frescoes of Barna da Siena that are on the lateral wall of the left aisle and that illustrates the New Testament. At the end of the right aisle is the wonderful Chapel of Santa Fina (1468), masterpiece of the Renaissance work of Benedict and Giuliano da Maiano, remarkable, on the sidewalls of the Chapel, are two frescoes (1475) of Domenico Ghirlandaio. On the left aisle it's another cycle of frescoes of 14th century executed from Bartolo di Fredi and that represent Old Testament.

In the same square, from the opposite side of the Cathedral, it's the Palazzo del Podestà built in 1249 and enlarged in 1337, with a great facade in stone and local brickwork, the palace is dominated from the tower of the Rognosa, 51 meters high, that until the 14th century, it was used like prison. The entrance to the palace is through an enormous vault, call the Loggia, where is a wide entrance-hall, with seats in stone, in bottom to which it's a fresco of the Sodoma (1513), that it represents the Madonna with the Child and the saints Geminiano and Nicholas, there also a main gate that gives access the small Theatre of the Leggieri. Sideways to the Palazzo del Podestà it's the Chigi tower built in 1280. The two twin towers of the Salvucci complete the vision of this part of the square.

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Family managed accommodation CASA LANDI (Castellina in Chianti): Rooms and Apartments (Double Rooms with shared kitchen use and Apartments with private kitchen use). Distances from Casa Landi: Siena 19 Km, San Gimignano 32 Km, Florence 39 Km, Arezzo 69 Km.