Arezzo, an underrated Tuscan town
- Mike
- 2 days ago
- 6 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
Not only is Arezzo destined to languish permanently in Florence's shadow but its location in the eastern extremity of Tuscany close to the 'autostrada del sole' means that everyone rushes past Arezzo on their way south to Rome, Abruzzo and beyond. Even those people exploring this part of Tuscany will be seduced more by famous places like Cortona or Montepulciano and many won't give Arezzo a second thought.
Having lived in Italy for over a decade I have less excuse than most people for not visiting Arezzo before, especially as I've been to every interesting small town around it like Anghiari, Sansepolcro, Montone, Castiglion Fiorentino, Lucignano and Monte San Savino and have a mother-in-law from the southern Casentino who would almost consider herself to be an Aretina. In my defense however, Arezzo has never come up in conversation with my Italian friends as a 'must-see' place so my expectations before our visit were neutral at best.
A glorious Sunday in late April may be the perfect time to walk around the old part of Arezzo with just enough people to give some life and atmosphere to the Piazza Grande but no crowds and plenty of outside tables available so we could drink or eat wherever we wanted. The locals were out and about enjoying their town and relaxing in warm spring weather with not a tour bus in sight.
It's always worthwhile to make the extra effort to see Italy in the company of Italians rather than when swamped by tourists; that often means traveling out of high season or going to less obvious places and imparting that knowledge has always been the goal of our website.
Petrarch's house
Arezzo is more than anything else the city of Giorgio Vasari, a versatile genius of the late Renaissance who was a painter, architect and art historian, whose Loggia graces Piazza Grande and this central square alone is worth the trip to Arezzo. Mentioning Vasari first is not meant to diminish Arezzo's other famous son, Francesco Petrarca, and last year in fact they shared significant anniversaries, being exactly 450 years since the death of Vasari and 650 years since Petrarch died.
But before we get to either Piazza Grande or Petrarch's house I'll describe the stroll we took and the things to see on the way to the beating heart of the city.
Frescoes by Spinello Aretino (left) and Cimabue's crucifix (right)
Parcheggio Pietri on the northern side of Arezzo is an ideal place to park your car because it's right beside the old city walls and you can walk straight into the centro storico. The Gothic Basilica of San Domenico is the first place of interest when arriving from this direction with its 14th and 15th century frescoes still showing well-preserved color though missing some details in places.
Also in this church is Cimabue's crucifix from around 1270 which was stylistically a significant departure from how Christ on the cross had previously been represented throughout history.
Nearby, as you walk up the to the highest part of town, is the Arezzo Cathedral (above) that dates back to the late 13th century though various modifications were made over the next 650 years. The project only got started because of a large bequest made by Pope Gregory X. It was the city's good fortune that the Pope died here in January 1276 on a break in his journey back to Rome and construction was quickly started by Arezzo's Bishop, only to be halted when the Bishop himself died at the Battle of Campaldino 13 years later.
Work restarted after several decades but there was another delay of almost a century after Florence assumed control of Arezzo and in fact the building was not completely finished until 1914.
Opposite the Cathedral is the Palazzo dei Priori (above) in Piazza della Libertà that has a similar drawn out history of construction and embellishments. Built in 1333 to house the city magistrates, the tower was added a few years later but the building underwent a sort of neo-medievalization in the early 1930s when an external loggia was built and the classic Ghibelline battlements with their v-shaped notches were inserted at the top of the façade. A little fake perhaps but at least the design is authentic.
In a small street off to the side of the Cathedral is Petrarch's house or rather several rooms in the base of a 16th century building that date back to the 12th century. Petrarch was born in Arezzo in 1304 because his father was exiled from Florence at the same time as Dante Alighieri and sought refuge in Arezzo. Petrarch subsequently lived for a period in France and traveled widely in Europe before spending his final four years in the small Veneto town of Arquà , now known as Arquà Petrarca.
Adjacent to both the Cathedral and Petrarch's house is Parco Il Prato, an area used extensively by the Romans and then fortified in turn by the Lombards and the Bishops of Arezzo prior to the Medici domination for more than a century. What remains today is the 16th century Medici fortress, disfigured somewhat by Napoleon's troops, with a large park in front of it that was created during the course of the 18th century as an open space for use by the citizens of Arezzo.
Taking pride of place in the park is a gaudy fascist era monument to Petrarch (above photo) that consumed 240 tons of white Carrara marble and is best described as overwrought and a little kitsch, though hardly cheap in 1930s currency. Inaugurated in 1928 in the presence of the ultimately disgraced Italian monarch, Vittorio Emanuele III, perhaps the perception of the statue will improve in a few hundred years but it will never look classy.
There's nothing fake or gaudy however about Piazza Grande (above) and Vasari's Loggia. The square was an important hub of Arezzo life as far back as Etruscan and Roman times and took on its present shape in the later medieval period of the 14th century, but it's look today owes more to the Medici rule during which Vasari was commissioned in 1573 to create a new urban layout.
With its irregular shape and sloping pavement in red brick interrupted by lines of white limestone, the Piazza Grande in Arezzo certainly has a different look to other central squares in Italy. The famous Giostra del Saracino is held in this square twice a year with the 4 rioni of Arezzo competing against each other.
Vasari died shortly after designing the Loggia so he didn't live to see his completed work; part of the genius of his design is the scale and height of the porticoes which lend a grandeur to the piazza that is often missing in other porticoes in major Italian cities where their low ceilings seem dark and cramped by comparison.
The Loggia in Arezzo is as impressive as its counterpart in Piazza Maggiore in Bologna, a city famous for its many miles of porticoes.
Almost as impressive is another Vasari Loggia (above) just down the road from Arezzo in Castiglion Fiorentino. It's on a different scale because the setting is much smaller but it has the compensating attraction of the arches acting as windows onto the gorgeous Tuscan countryside spreading east towards the mountains.
Some of the Piero della Francesca frescoes in the Basilica di San Francesco
Another giant of the Renaissance period closely associated with Arezzo, though born a few miles away in Sansepolcro, is the painter Piero della Francesca. His sequence of frescoes called the History of the True Cross in the Basilica di San Francesco in Arezzo are considered to be amongst his finest work, as well as his largest, and took more than a decade in the 1450s to complete.
The reason they look so good today is that a comprehensive restoration program was carried out over a nine year period in the 1990s.
And if you are a true fan of Piero della Francesco's work, as Elena is, a few miles east of Arezzo on the border with Umbria there is a medieval fortified hill town called Monterchi where the artist painted a fresco called Madonna del Parto to honor his mother who was born in the town. The fresco had to be moved once because of an earthquake but it has remained in this small village and serves as its only cultural attraction.
Arezzo has also played an important role in two very successful films of the late 1990s. The Basilica di San Francesco was the setting for the memorable church scenes in The English Patient where the actress Juliette Binoche was hoisted up by rope to admire the History of the True Cross frescoes.
The second film, Life is Beautiful (La Vita è Bella), shows much more of Arezzo itself, including the famous family bicycle ride through Piazza Grande. Written and directed by and also starring Roberto Benigni, who is from this area, the movie broke all sorts of taboos and garnered widespread praise and awards. There is a poster in a corner of Piazza Grande that tells you exactly where the various Arezzo scenes were shot.
