Castelvecchio San Gimignano

Castelvecchio was a small inhabited center located between San Gimignano and Volterra. The area on which the village stood was already inhabited in the Etruscan era; in Roman times the area was, however, uninhabited. The area was populated again between the end of the sixth century and the beginning of the seventh.

The area, in the Lombard period had a notable economic development linked to its crossing by an important communication route that from the south of Tuscany reached Piedmont and Lombardy, through the Cisa pass, thus avoiding the territories in the hands of the Byzantines. On this pecorso the one of the Francigena later developed.

Despite being located very close to San Gimignano, Castelvecchio was subjected to the authority of the bishop of Volterra, to help with the continuous attempts of conquest by San Gimignano. Volterra, which had hegemonic aims over the area, was well prepared to help such a strategic castle militarily and economically, to oppose the emerging power of San Gimignano. This state of affairs lasted until 1227.

Actually being the tip of the balance between Volterra and San Gimignano, in 1208, led the community to equip itself with a new keep and a new, more robust walls. After these works, Castelvecchio became a real fortified citadel with a vaguely elliptical wall with a perimeter of about 600 meters.

In 1250, taking advantage of a dispute over territorial borders, San Gimignano, failing to conquer the village militarily, managed to take it by deception, putting it on fire and sword. A second attempt at conquest, Castelvecchio suffered in 1308. In that year a new violent conflict broke out between San Gimignano and Volterra and the Volterra people tried to recapture the castle. The siege of the village failed and the Sangimignanesi troops coming out into the open field, defeated the enemies.

In subsequent peace treaties, the border between the two contenders stood three kilometers west of Castelvecchio, officially sanctioning its passage to the Sangimignanesi.

For Castelvecchio it was the beginning of the end: between 1310 and 1320 the new fortress of Castel San Gimignano was built which became the new reason for the clash between the two contenders, leaving Castelvecchio devoid of strategic interest. Fatal was the plague of 1348 which decimated the population, so much so that in 1353, only a few dozen woodcutters and shepherds lived in the village.

In 1452 the area, devastated by an earthquake that caused a lot of damage, led to the abandonment of the place by almost all the inhabitants, so much so that at the beginning of the seventeenth century, Castelvecchio was totally abandoned.