Anghiari is the perfect location for those interested in the past. There is endless history related to the area. Anghiari in particular, was mentioned for the first time in a document dated 1048. This document is preserved in archives at Citta di Castello. Anghiari appears typically medieval and is perched up on the hillside overlooking the Tiber and Sovara valleys.
Anghiari probably takes its name from ancient castle or ‘castrum angulare’ or from gravel or 'ghiaia' piled for centuries by the Tiber river and on top of which Anghiari would have been built. Anghiari is internationally famous for the battle of Anghiari; in 1440 on the plain below Anghiari walls Florentine and papal army troops defeated the Milanese army of Filippo Maria Visconti, who was attempting to expand his territory beyond the Arno. The Battle of Anghiari is the event at the heart of the legend surrounding Leonardo da Vinci’s celebrated lost fresco painted in the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence. This masterpiece would later be “reconstructed” and reinterpreted by a number of great artists, including Rubens.
Amongst others the area boasts the oldest surviving church in Tuscany.
In Anghiari the maze of narrow roads, often actual stairs, lead into the heart of the settlement rich of craftsmanship shops (restoration and antiques).
Each small square or lane surprises, as the Romanesque church with an octagonal plant at Badia and the medieval church of St Agostino, or Palazzo Taglieschi. The Palace is now a Museum gathering wonderful artistic treasures, such as the wooden Madonna by Jacopo della Quercia or a Nativity in polychrome earthenware by Andrea della Robbia.
From Anghiari an amazing long (7 km!!) straight road (almost intact after five centuries) leads to Sansepolcro. The scenery from the top of this road in Anghiari is breathtaking!!
Many monuments and churches are in elegant Sansepolcro: for example, the Cathedral blends Romanesque and Gothic styles. Sansepolcro is also the famous hometown of Piero della Francesca (1412-1492), one of the most important Renaissance artists. He mastered perspective and he knew by intuition the secrets of space and light translating them into his paintings. The Museo Civico (town museum) houses his artistic production with a rich and homogenous gathering. Some masterpieces by Piero are on exhibition close to the works by Signorelli, Santi di Tito, Bassano, Matteo di Giovanni, Rosso Fiorentino, Raffaellino del Colle, Della Robbia. Piero’s works are: the fresco called "Resurrezione", the polyptich entitled "Misericordia" and fragments of a fresco representing "S. Giuliano" and "S. Lodovico da Tolosa".
For more information please visit the Anghiari website here.
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