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Art
Cities >> AREZZO
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Our travel guide to Arezzo provides information, history, itineraries and vacation rentals such as villas, hotels, country & farmhouses, apartments, bed & breakfast lodging & accommodation.
Arezzo is a luminous town on a hill which has preserved
a big part of its medieval origins and lies at the margin of
a basin, between Valdarno Superiore, Valdichiana and Casentino.
SOME HISTORY...
The Cities has Etruscan origins,
with walls from the Roman period (4th century B.C.) when Arezzo
played an important strategic and military role, and also provided
the Patrician villas with prestigious red painted vases (so
called coral vases). During the Middle Ages Arezzo was in war
with the other Tuscan Cities and managed to win the war against
Siena, only to then capitulate against Florence in the awful
battle of Campaldino (1289). Arezzo became part of the Grand
Duchy of the Medici as the rest of Tuscany. This was the beginning
of the inexorable decline which reached its top when Arezzo
was sold to Florence. |
Discovering the Cities |
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LOCAL
TRADITIONS
The most famous tradition in Arezzo is
the "Giostra del Saracino" (The Saracen Joust)
which is held every year the first Sunday in September in the
splendid Piazza Grande.
The parade and the joust celebrates the period of the Crusades
and the four "contrade" (quarters) of the Cities are
the actors: Porta Crocifera, Porta Sant'Andrea, Porta San Lorenzo
and Porta Santo Spirito. The participants of the 4 contrade
parade in medieval costume from the square outside the Duomo
to the Piazza Grande where the joust is placed. The puppet,
which represents Saracino, has to defend himself from the assaults
of the Cavalieri of the Contrade. The Saracino has a hammer
and protects himself with a shield divided in sectors which
feature different scores. The Cavaliere is supposed to hit the
part of the shield which gives the highest score and at the
same time, avoid Saracino's hammer. |
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