Vicopisano and its monuments

Vicopisano is a small medieval Tuscan village that tells its exciting thousand-year history every day.

Situated between Pisa, Lucca and Florence, at the center of the ancient trade route, it was the passageway for people and pilgrims (including the Via Francigena). With the Arno river at its feet, Vicopisano has been the protagonist of sieges and battles between these cities, in a perennial struggle for dominance over the territory.

Time has not erased the eventful past, so the village still retains visible signs of these events in its monuments, in particular in the Torre del Mastio, better known as the Rocca del Brunelleschi . Fortified by the famous Florentine architect Filippo Brunelleschi, the fortress emerges imposingly among the red roofs of the houses and it can be visited for most part of the year. If you observe, you can see a red flag with a cross symbolizing the Maritime Republic of Pisa waving proudly on top of it, even from afar.

Walking through the village, its narrow streets, the walkways along the walls, the palaces and towers, is an experience that will take you back to the Middle Ages and their atmosphere, because it was during this period that Vicopisano reached its peak as a town and as military citadel.

Most of the town's cultural assets are gathered in its historic center, the extraordinary examples of medieval civil and military constructions, but also coming from the period of the Florentine domination: in addition to Brunelleschi's fortress we must mention Palazzo Pretorio's complex and its prisons, the Camminamento del Soccorso, the city walls and the cylindrical towers, the Twin Towers, the Torre delle Quattro Porte, the Malanima Tower, the Torre del Soccorso, the old Post Office, Via Lante with its tower houses and the Clock Tower.

What shocks the most is the extraordinary unity of the urban pattern, where the monuments - individually worthy of attention - are harmoniously inserted within the streets, gardens and buildings that contribute with equal strength to connote the village and to make it authentic and pleasant to visit and to live in.