Sansepolcro | |
---|---|
Città di Sansepolcro | |
Coordinates: 43°34′15″N12°08′25″E / 43.57083°N 12.14028°E | |
Country | Italy |
Region | Tuscany |
Province | Arezzo (AR) |
Frazioni | Aboca, Gragnano, Gricignano, Melello, Montagna, Santa Fiora |
Government | |
• Mayor | Fabrizio Innocenti |
Area | |
• Total | 91.48 km2 (35.32 sq mi) |
Elevation | 330 m (1,080 ft) |
Population (31 December 2014) [2] | |
• Total | 16,012 |
• Density | 180/km2 (450/sq mi) |
Demonym | Biturgensi - Borghesi |
Time zone | UTC+1 (CET) |
• Summer (DST) | UTC+2 (CEST) |
Postal code | 52037 |
Dialing code | 0575 |
Patron saint | St. John the Evangelist |
Saint day | December 27 |
Website | www.comune.sansepolcro.ar.it |
Sansepolcro, formerly Borgo Santo Sepolcro, is a town and comune founded in the 11th century, located in the Italian Province of Arezzo in the eastern part of the region of Tuscany.
Situated on the upper reaches of the Tiber river, the town is the birthplace of the painters Piero della Francesca, Raffaellino del Colle (a pupil of Raphael), Matteo di Giovanni, Santi di Tito, and Angiolo Tricca. It was also the birthplace of the Italian mathematician Luca Pacioli, and of Matteo Cioni, who translated Piero della Francesca's treatise about perspective in painting (De prospectiva pingendi) into Latin.
Today, the economy of the town is based on agriculture, industrial manufacturing, food processing and pharmaceuticals. It is the home of Buitoni pasta, founded by Giulia Buitoni in 1827.
According to tradition the founding of the town came about through two 9th-century pilgrims to the Holy Land, Arcanus and Giles. They returned to the region and built a chapel dedicated to Saint Leonard, where they established a monastic way of life. The ruins of the chapel were built upon in the construction of the current Cathedral of Sansepolcro.
They had brought a stone from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem (thus, San Sepolcro) with them from that shrine. It was installed in the monastery and was the origin of its name. It became a popular pilgrimage site. The church was raised to the rank of Benedictine Abbey of Sansepolcro (the Badia). The monastery was declared an abbey nullius. [3]
The first historical mentions of Sansepolcro date to 1012, referring to the construction of the monastery, around which a commune began to develop. The settlement was declared a market town by the Emperor Conrad II, Holy Roman Emperor. [4] The abbey chose to affiliate with the monks of the Camaldolese Order, based in the area, in the following century. During the conflicts between the Guelfs and Ghibellines, the town's factions were headed by prominent local families, including the Pichi, Bercordati, Graziani and Bacci. [5]
Due to its central location on the local trade routes, in the 13th century control of the town was contested and seized by various forces of the region, passing from Uguccione della Faggiola, Lord of Pisa, to Guido Tarlati, Bishop of Arezzo, and his brother, Pier Saccone Tarlati di Pietramala, who ruled it from Città di Castello.
It last came under control of the Papal States. The local dialect derives from those of the Citta' di Castello and later of the Casentino valley. In 1367 Pope Urban V gave the town and its surrounding contrada to the Malatesta family, whose heirs ruled it until control was assumed by the Republic of Florence in the 15th century with the approval of Pope Eugene IV. It was raised to the rank of a city a century later by Pope Leo X.
During World War II, the town was saved from destruction by the efforts of Tony Clarke, a British Royal Horse Artillery officer who halted the Allied artillery attack in order to save Piero della Francesca's fresco Resurrection. [6]
The main church is the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist built in Gothic-Romanesque style in 1012–49. Other churches of note are San Francesco and San Lorenzo. The latter church has a Deposition by Rosso Fiorentino.
The English writer Aldous Huxley described the Resurrection by Piero della Francesca, which is in the Museo Civico, as "the greatest painting in the world". [7] The museum collection includes three other works by Piero della Francesca and many other treasures including paintings by Santi di Tito, Raffaellino del Colle and Luca Signorelli.
Sansepolcro is twinned with:
Arezzo is a city and comune in Italy and the capital of the province of the same name located in Tuscany. Arezzo is about 80 kilometres southeast of Florence at an elevation of 296 metres (971 ft) above sea level. As of 2022, the population was about 97,000.
Piero della Francesca was an Italian painter of the Early Renaissance. To contemporaries he was also known as a mathematician and geometer. Nowadays Piero della Francesca is chiefly appreciated for his art. His painting is characterized by its serene humanism, its use of geometric forms and perspective. His most famous work is the cycle of frescoes The History of the True Cross in the church of San Francesco in the Tuscan town of Arezzo.
Città di Castello ; "Castle Town") is a city and comune in the province of Perugia, in the northern part of Umbria. It is situated on a slope of the Apennines, on the flood plain along the upper part of the river Tiber. The city is 56 km (35 mi) north of Perugia and 104 km (65 mi) south of Cesena on the motorway SS 3 bis. It is connected by the SS 73 with Arezzo and the A1 highway, situated 38 km (23 mi) west. The comune of Città di Castello has an exclave named Monte Ruperto within Marche.
Cospaia is an Italian hamlet (frazione) of the comune of San Giustino in the Province of Perugia, Umbria.
Raffaellino del Colle (1490–1566) was an Italian Mannerist painter active mostly in Umbria. He was born in the frazione of Colle in Borgo Sansepolcro, province of Arezzo, Tuscany, Italy.
Monterchi is a Comune (Municipality) in the Province of Arezzo in the Italian region of Tuscany, located about 80 kilometres (50 mi) southeast of Florence and about 20 kilometres (12 mi) east of Arezzo. It sits in the northern part of Valtiberina, the valley where the Tiber river runs going from Emilia-Romagna towards Rome. The valley runs through Romagna, Tuscany and Umbria, parallel to the Casentino Valley.
Summer's Lease is a novel by Sir John Mortimer, author of the Rumpole novels, which is set predominantly in Italy. It was first published in 1988 and made into a British television mini-series, first shown in 1989. The title "Summer's Lease" is a play on a line from William Shakespeare's Sonnet 18: And summer's lease hath all too short a date. The novel involves the leasing of a Tuscan villa for the summer holidays. It is divided into six parts: "Preparations", "Arrival", "First Week", "Second Week", "Third Week", and "The Return".
The Roman Catholic diocese of Sansepolcro was a Latin rite see in Tuscany, central Italy. It was erected in 1515, as the Diocese of (Borgo) Sansepolcro (Italian), though difficulties prevented the appointment of a bishop until 1520. On 30 September 1986, the diocese was suppressed and united with the Diocese of Arezzo and the Diocese of Cortona to form the Diocese of Arezzo-Cortona-Sansepolcro.
Cristofano or Cristoforo Gherardi, also known as il Doceno, was an Italian painter of the late-Renaissance or Mannerist period, active mainly in Florence and Tuscany.
The image of La Madonna del Parto is a religious depiction of the Blessed Virgin Mary as pregnant which was popularised in Tuscany, Italy during the 14th—century.
The Resurrection is a fresco painting by the Italian Renaissance master Piero della Francesca, painted in the 1460s in the Palazzo della Residenza in the town of Sansepolcro, Tuscany, Italy.
The diocese of Cortona was a Roman Catholic ecclesiastical territory in central Italy, which existed from 1325 to 1986. It was immediately subject to the Holy See.
The Diocese of Arezzo-Cortona-Sansepolcro is a Latin diocese of the Catholic Church. It has existed since 1986. In that year the historic diocese of Arezzo was combined with the diocese of Cortona and the diocese of Sansepolcro, the enlarged diocese being suffragan of the archdiocese of Florence.
Pier Saccone Tarlati di Pietramala (1261–1356) was an Italian condottiero from Pietramala d'Arezzo in the Val d'Arno, a rocca that controlled the mule track between his native town of Arezzo and Anghiari. Pietramala was the seat of the powerful family of the Tarlati, who came to prominence in the strife following Arezzo's decisive defeat at Campaldino (1289) as heads of the Ghibelline "Secchi" faction of Arezzo. Pier Saccone's brother was Guido Tarlati, bishop and signore of Arezzo.
Arezzo Cathedral is a Roman Catholic cathedral in the city of Arezzo in Tuscany, Italy. It is located on the site of a pre-existing Palaeo-Christian church and, perhaps, of the ancient city's acropolis.
The Cathedral of Sansepolcro is a Catholic church in Sansepolcro, Tuscany, central Italy.
The Museo Civico di Sansepolcro or Museo Comunale is the town or comune art gallery. It is housed in a series of linked palaces, including the medieval former Palazzo della Residenza, the Palazzo dei Conservatori del Popolo and the Palazzo del Capitano o Pretorio, located on Via Niccolò Aggiunti #65, near the center of Sansepolcro, formerly Borgo Santo Sepolcro, in the Province of Arezzo, region of Tuscany, Italy. The museum was founded in 1975.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Arezzo in the Tuscany region of Italy.
Giovanni di Piamonte was a 15th-century Italian painter. The date and place of his birth are not known, but his name indicates that he was born in Piamonte near the present-day town of Pontassieve in Tuscany. He trained in the circle of Piero della Francesca and was one of his assistants.
Saint Julian the Hospitaller is a fresco fragment of 1454–1458 by Piero della Francesca, originally in the former church of Sant'Agostino in Sansepolcro, Tuscany, and now in that city's Museo Civico alongside other works by the artist such as the Resurrection and Saint Louis of Toulouse.