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Comune di
Sestino

Comunità Montana
Valtiberina Toscana

Fondazione Mediateca Regionale Toscana

Università degli studi di Urbino
"Carlo Bo"

Camera di Commercio di Arezzo

Portale italiano sul cinema documentario

LOCATION

Sestino

Sestino is a small Tuscan village in the Province of Arezzo, on the border between the Regions of Marches and Emilia Romagna, nestled on the slopes of the central Appenines.

Sestino, an ancient land historically traversed by the footsteps of various peoples who arrived either by travelling up the rivers of Foglia and Marecchia, or along pathways, at first rudimentary but later well-established, all leaving traces of their passage.

Thus tribes at the outer edge of history, Estruscans, Picenes, Umbers, Senon Gauls and then Romans forged the history of Sestino, geographic hub of the Tuscan-Umbran-Marchan Appenines, center of roadways linking the lands of the Adriatic with those of the Tiber Valley, and from there to the north and the south of Italy.
By the time the Romans reached Sestino, it was already populated by shepherds, hunters and farmers, leaving us their archeological remains in the form of arrowheads and traces of dwellings.

The Romans constructed a city of monumental proportions (1st century B.C.- 4th A.D.), a Municipium with a Forum, a Curia and Baths. The Roman history of Sestino and its illustrious characters is told in the “stone archive” which makes up the Lapidarium of the National Antiquarium. On slabs and columns of local travertine marble the feats of the Sestine families, the Volusenes and the Cesians are told. With their military prowess, these families shed luster on the town. A number of marble statues in addition represent magistrates, emperors, divinities and more. After the fall of the Western Roman Empire (476 A.D.) Sestino belonged to Exarchate of Ravenna, as witnessed by the round tower of Monteromano and the remarkable traces of the Carolingian and Lombardic periods conserved in the crypt of the Romanesque church of St. Pancrasius. After the year 1000 the territory of Sestino was successively controlled by the Church, the Della Faggiola family, the Malatestas, Frederick of Montefeltro, the Della Rovere family and, finally in 1520,  Florence, whose three-century rule brought peace and prosperity. In 1566 Cosimo I of the Medici family began construction of the fortress city on Sasso di Simone, the Città del Sole, outlying stronghold designed to defend the borders of the Grand Duchy against the expansionist ambitions of the dukes of Urbino.

Sestino offers visitors a view of traces of its thousand-year-old history, while the nature-lover can immerse himself in the silence of the uncontaminated beauty of the Appenines, following the trails of the Sasso di Simone Nature Reserve or the Ranco Spinoso Wildlife Park, discovering amazing panoramas and noteworthry geological sites.

Sasso di Simone

Sasso di Simone (Simon’s Rock) is a montain rich in history: the earliest confirmed human presence dates back to the Benedictine monks who built the St. Angelo Abbey at the beginning of the 12th century. The presence of the monks attracted a number of families who arrived and began to cultivate the land on and around the mountain.

Though the population grew to a sizable number, the plague of 1348 decimated them and even the monks were forced to abandon the site. Repopulation did not begin until halfway through the 16th century when Duke Cosimo of the Medicis, at the time reorganizing the military structure of his state, chose to build a fortress city there to defend his territory from the bordering and powerful Duchy of Montefeltro. The construction of the city, whose symbol was the Sun, began in 1566 and was finished a few years later. Its life was short, however, as it was dismantled in 1673. A stone on top of Sasso commemorates the inauguration of the fortress in the presence of Cosimo dei Medici, the local Bishop and even "twelve priests bedecked for festivities". Still today on the high plain of the mountain, traces of the fort’s urban plan can be found: the main street, once faced by buildings made of wood, the cisterns which were filled with rainwater, the outer city walls and the guard towers.