The main piazza in Arezzo is one of those great Tuscan spaces, with pedestrian lanes
leading out from it in all directions.
We'll take you on a walk along the main Corso Italia, with detours into various little side
lanes, and show many of the old buildings dating back to the Middle Ages when Arezzo
was a fortified town with a wall around it.
Among the many attractions here there is one particular focal point, which is a series
of paintings by Piero della Francesca depicting scenes of the True Cross.
The historic center between the train station and Piazza Grande is just about one square
kilometer, so it's really easy to see it on foot walking around for a day.
You'll really enjoy this main street, Corso Italia, lined with shops, and there's apartments
above, there's a few little hotels here and there, in a quiet pedestrian zone with the
few little service vehicles.
You'll notice a slight incline in the angle of the street as you enter the town, but Arezzo
is relatively flat, not one of those steep hill towns of Tuscany.
Within 10 minutes walk from the train station, you can reach the Basilica of San Francesco,
perhaps the major landmark of town, because inside is that series of fresco paintings
by Piero della Francesca, depicting Legends of the True Cross, a world famous collection
of art.
We'll take a closer look at these beautiful pieces at the end of the video.
Like in many other Tuscan towns, this broad pedestrian route is the main pathway connecting
the lower part of town to the historic one, more up towards the top of the hill.
It's a slight uphill walk, but very nice stroll with many kinds of shops, there's restaurants,
antiques and more.
This is the most popular gathering place for the locals.
You'll notice there are quite a few shutters drawn over the doors and windows.
Well, that's because I happened to arrive in the mid-afternoon, which is siesta time.
In that Italian tradition, many things shut down from 2:00 until five, and then shops
usually stay open in the evening until 8:00.
Of course, the ideal time to be walking on any main pedestrian street is during the passegiatta,
which is early evening.
That's when all the locals come out for their exercise and to see their friends.
While this is a beautiful town to visit, Arezzo is not one of the major tourist draws of Tuscany,
and therefore it's usually pretty quiet, especially because I was visiting here in the off-season
in the middle of November, when the weather was generally quite delightful.
We kind of felt like we were the only tourists in town.
Corso Italia will bring you directly into the Piazza Grande.
You see the columns on the rounded backside of the Church of Pieve di Santa Maria Assunta.
We'll see the front later.
Another important building is the courthouse Palazzo dei Tribunali.
Next to it is the Palazzo della Fraternita dei Laici.
Construction of this palace began during the Gothic period, 1375, and was finished in the
late Renaissance, resulting in a mix of architectural styles.
The secular brotherhood that built it became a wealthy and powerful city institution.
Its main room is now open to the public.
A couple of medieval palace towers, Torre Faggiolana, and Palazzo Lappoli, which is
actually three separate buildings, side by side, combined into one palace.
The public fountain dates back to the 16th century, and behind it the Loggia of Vasari,
considered to be the masterpiece of the square.
This open-air arcade of the loggia formerly sheltered many shops, but now there is a restaurant
here and open space for the public to enjoy.
Designed by Giorgio Vasari, who is a native of Arezzo.
Vasari was an architect and a painter, but he is most famous as an art historian who
wrote a biography of the main Renaissance artist called Lives of the Most Excellent
Painters, Sculptors and Architects.
Another important writer from Arezzo was the poet Plutarch.
But we can safely say that the most famous son of the town is Giorgio Vasari, and his
house is open as a museum.
After creating this loggia, he went on to Florence, where he designed the famous Uffizi,
a palace for the Medici, which has become a very famous art museum and has a similar
loggia.
This well would have been a major source of water back in the day when people did not
have running water inside their homes.
The Palazzo Cofani lower portion dates to the 14th century with large openings, and
the two upper floors were remodeled in the 15th century.
Now sporting an outdoor cafe.
Well, here in the middle of November, the piazza is very quiet, but in the summertime
there are a couple of days when it gets incredibly lively.
It's a jousting tournament, a historical reenactment that's the town's most important festivity.
Knights ride their horses and take aim with a long lance at a wooden figure.
The whole town shows up wearing historic costumes.
It happens the third Sunday in June and the first Sunday of September.
Even if you're not here on those particular days, Arezzo is always any time of the year,
a wonderful place to visit.
And you will definitely want to spend time in this piazza, which had been the center
of town from the 12th century right up to the early 20th century.
It is one of those perfect places, typical of Tuscan towns, where in the old days the
government, religion and civic functions all came together.
Exiting the piazza, we walk around the corner to have a look at the front of the church
whose backside we saw in the piazza.
The Church of Pieve di Santa Maria Assunta.
Towering above it is a massive square bell tower constructed in 1330, with so many windows
it was called the Bell Tower of a Hundred Holes.
The facade has three rows of columns and a ground level with five recessed arches, three
of them with doorways.
A view of the back of the same church on the Piazza Grande side.
The front of the church is quite original.
Three extraordinary rows of loggias with different numbers of columns, increasing towards the
top with 12 columns on the first level, 24 on the second tier, and 32 in the third.
Each column has a unique design.
Some are plain, others fluted, spiral, or teeming with patterns.
The interior has a knave and two aisles separated by richly sculptured, huge Romanesque columns
topped with Corinthian capitals, and an elevated choir at the back end, whose curved shape
we had seen earlier from the outside.
This is one of the largest and most beautiful Romanesque churches in Tuscany, first built
from the 11th century and a facade dating to 1216.
A block further on the same course here Italia is Palazzo Pretorio, with a facade covered
with coats of arms of the captains and various nobles who held the office of podesta.
The Palazzo was the seat of the People's Captain until the year 1290.
The Office of Podesta was the highest judicial and military official in the community, kind
of like a mayor and a chief justice in one.
The building later served as a prison for 500 years, from 1600 until 1926.
And now it's a library.
You'll see a few arcaded courtyards as you walk along.
We're still on Corso Italia, which is a relatively straight and long street that was quite unusual
for medieval cities, making this ideal for the occasional horse race, which did happen
on this street every year until recently.
This one street connects most of the important parts of town together within easy reach,
but now leaving it to go from Piazza Grande over to the Duomo, continuing along one of
the side lanes.
It's convenient that Arezzo's historic center is quite small, so it's only a short walk
of 300 meters from Piazza Grande to Piazza del Duomo.
Palazzo de Priori became the new seat of government in the 1300s and is still the City Hall.
The Duomo stands on the higher part of town.
Construction began in the year 1277 and went through many phases, and ended in 1511.
The facade remained unfinished and was added in the 20th century.
It's located on the site of a preexisting Christian church, and maybe of the ancient
city's Acropolis.
The Interior is spacious, with the nave and aisles divided by massive pilasters, and some
fine 14th century sculptures.
The long lines of intensely tall pillars end in an apse, with tall lancet windows filled
with brilliant stained glass.
We were lucky to visit the cathedral while the organ player was performing, sending those
deep, rich tones throughout the wonderful acoustics of this vast stone building.
The cathedral was begun during the Lordship of Bishop Guglielmo Degli Ubertini, who became
the Supreme Ruler of Arezzo.
It was somewhat unusual that the commune of Arezzo, from its earliest beginnings in the
12th century, lived under the shadow of the bishops, who exercised complete control over
the religion, the politics and the economy.
Among many important artworks is a beautiful porcelain by Andrea della Robbia.
The Cathedral stands in a location that was probably the Etruscan forum.
The walls around Arezzo were erected in 1320, but by 1384 Arezzo had to yield to the Florentines,
and the walls were reconstructed by Casimo de Medici, in the mid 16th century.
In the Middle Ages, Arezzo became a free commune and maintained itself as an independent city-state,
but after several battles Florence took control.
And that is your potted history of Arezzo, as we continue strolling along the Corso Italia.
We're getting kind of hungry now, after visiting this town for a few hours, so let's drop in
to one of the excellent restaurants.
After recharging our batteries with some outstanding Italian food we are heading to the grand finale
of the visit: Piero della Francesca.
His fresco paintings inside the Basilica of San Francesco altered the history of art forever.
Piero was one of the inventors of three-dimensional perspective, a much different style than the
earlier flat Byzantine paintings.
Piero used single point perspective, a new technique of the time, imparting great depth
to the subject.
Piero was one of the Tuscan painters who were scientific men as well as artists.
He understood something of the distribution of light, shade and depth, and was a forerunner
of Leonardo, as we see in the Annunciation.
A couple of final artistic notes: Among the treasures excavated from Arezzo are the Chimera,
which is now in the museum in Florence, and a Minerva in bronze, also in Florence, both
of them dating back to the Etruscan period.
Arezzo is located in eastern Tuscany, about 80 kilometers from Florence, close to Cortona,
just 17 minutes away by train, and Perugia, in Umbria, is 70 minutes away by a direct
train, and Siena is about a one-hour drive, or from Rome, it's a two and a half hour train
ride.
Arezzo is in the center of Italy, easy to reach and well worth visiting.
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