The religious who still live here today observe the Benedictine rule, imposed on the monks of Monte Oliveto since 1319. Bernard Tolomei in 1313, in a solitary place (exactly as it is today: in fact, the abbey is far from everything and everyone, immersed in total tranquility). We are still near Asciano: nestled in a forest is the wonderful and little-known Abbey of Monte Oliveto Maggiore, founded by St. On the summer solstice it is in the flattening of the window that the solar disk disappears, while the first star and the lights of Siena shine.” A work executed in dialogue with the landscape that welcomes it, it can be visited at all times, every day. “The shadow of this stone furniture,” says the artist, “traced its walk on the ground thanks to the appearances of the Moon and the Sun. It stands on a hill between the villages of Leonina and Mucigliani and is a stone structure that dialogues with light and the sun. It is a work of Land Art created by French sculptor Jean-Paul Philippe (Altfortville, 1944), who lives and works between Paris and Siena, and is one of the most interesting works of contemporary open-air art to be found in Tuscany. It’s a bit of a struggle to get all the way here, because it is located in the middle of the barren landscape of the Crete Senesi, a short distance from Asciano, but the view from the Site Transitoire repays the dirt road made to reach it. Then a visit to the Collegiate Church of Sant’Agata, with its beautiful altarpiece by Francesco Vanni, and to the Church of San Francesco, which contains fragments of late Gothic frescoes, is not to be missed.
Its historic center, dominated by the Mencia Tower, has an extraordinary concentration of works of art: a visit can start from the Museum of Palazzo Corboli, where there are two unique masterpieces such as the Badia a Rofeno triptych by Ambrogio Lorenzetti and the fresco by the fourteenth-century Sienese Cristoforo di Bindoccio and Meo di Pero, which features a very rare iconography, that of the Wheel of Barlaam, and where it is possible to admire works by Giovannii Pisano, Francesco di Valdambrino, Matteo di Giovanni, Giovanni di Paolo and other great artists of the Sienese school. It is one of the most characteristic villages of the Crete Senesi and still has its medieval layout.
The origins of the settlement are actually much older: already in the Bronze Age, in fact, the land on which Asciano stands was inhabited. AscianoĪccording to legend, the town of Asciano was founded by Ascanio, son of Remus and brother of Senio to whom myth attributes the founding of Siena instead. Here are the 10 stops of an itinerary among the Crete Senesi that we suggest and that you cannot miss. This is one of the most beautiful and also least known areas of Tuscany: a trip from these lands will leave anyone who makes it with the indelible memory of a land that has no equal. The landscape of the Crete Senesi is extremely varied: in fact, not infrequently we also come across large green meadows, small groves, or we come across a few villages rising on the top of a hill. It is a unique landscape in Italy: splendid views, large areas where no plants grow (a hilly area in these parts is even known as the “Accona desert,” although it is not really a desert), spectacular formations such as gullies, crags and biancane, the typical dome-shaped reliefs that appear white due to the presence of large amounts of salt on the surface. Not far from Siena, a short distance from the outskirts of the city, heading southeast, one comes across a characteristic, almost lunar landscape: these are the Crete Senesi, the vast area characterized by large areas of barren, clayey soil (hence the name), made up of “mattaione,” a clay mixed with rock salt and chalk dating back millions of years. What to see in the Crete Senesi: a 10-step itinerary of must-see villages, art and nature.
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