The story of Monteriggioni

Dante Alighieri knew these towers. In his Divine Comedy he compared the giants ringing the abyss of Hell to the turrets that crown the walls of Monteriggioni. The Sienese built this walled town on a natural hillock in 1214–19 as a front-line fortification in their wars against Florence, commanding the Via Cassia.

The roughly circular walls, about 570 metres long, follow the natural contours of the hill and carry 14 towers on square bases. There are two gates: Porta Fiorentina faces Florence to the north, and Porta Romana faces Rome to the south. The town withstood many attacks from the Florentines and from the forces of the Bishop of Volterra.

But in 1554 its commander, Giovannino Zeti, an exile from Florence, simply handed the keys over to the forces of the Medici, an act the townspeople considered a great betrayal. Inside, the main street links the two gates, and the gardens behind the houses once provided vital food during sieges.