Castiglioncello
is situated at the Etruscian Riviera in Italy, approximately
35 kilometers south of Pisa with its famous leaning tower.
It is a sunny place with loads of flair and an astonishing cultural and environmental
variety. The surrounding countryside is dominated by rolling hills, and the sunny
coast is gifted with sand bays as well as steep and lofty cliffs. The 16th century
tower and the beautiful botanical garden are two of this enchanting town’s impressive
features.
The town is famous for the school of the Italian Impressionists,
who started excursions from their studying refuge in Castiglioncello. Among those
were renowned artists like Fattori, Sarnesi, Abiati, and Cabianca who gained world
wide reputation for their work. The town of Castiglioncello organises a variety
of fairs, exhibitions, and conferences.
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Castiglioncello gained fame as a studying refuge for worldwide
renowned Italian impressionists, among others Fattori, Sarnesi,
Abiati, and Cabianca. The town of Castiglioncello organizes
a variety of fairs, exhibitions, and conferences, and from June
to September the place is bustling with cultural activities
and events. Concerts, theatre plays and ballet-shows entertain
varied and international audience. The area is famous for its
excellent and lively evening happenings.
The annual book presentations around the “Premio Letterario Castiglioncello”,
an important price for literature, features famous writers like Umberto Eco, Dacia
Marini, and Fruttero & Lucentini, who present their latest work.
Castiglioncello and outskirts is the place in Italy, where many
famous Italians go to celebrate their holiday by the sea. Many in Italy and worldwide
well-known actors, regisseurs and politicians like Mastroianni and former president
Spadolini favourized this particular region, because of its beauty, cultural activities
and tradition.
Castiglioncello is easy to reach. The town is situated in Italy
at the railway lines Genova - Rome, Florence - Pisa – Livorno - Grosetto. The
closest airport is Pisa ( 35 km). The town is connected to the Italian motorway
system at Rosignano (2 km). The neighboring countryside is rich with impressive
testimonies of Estruscian cultural heritage.
A small but vivid town, typical Italian and perfectly
placed for those, who want to combine an unforgettable holiday
by the sea with cultural events and visits to the most famous
cities and places in Italy. Castiglioncello is simply so much
more than an ordinary seaside resort.
Italian in Italy
CASTIGLIONCELLO
one of the most suggestive Italian tourist
places, boasts of historical traditions of ancient date, Today
it is one of the most famous places of the Tyrrhenian Sea, known
in Italy and abroad for the beauties of the landscape.
Village of poor fishermen at the extreme borders
of the Etruscan-Italian empire , follows the fate of Volterra.
Of this period, of the Etruscan power in Italy, a very refined
testimony remains in the funeral urn in alabaster, which goes
back to the second century B.C. and was found just in the necropolis
of Castiglioncello. It was for centuries a calm and isolated
place. Placed in a privileged panoramic position, distant from
the big streets of communication, it has remained unknown and
uncontaminated up to the modern epoch with its luxuriant pinewoods
and its spectacular bluffs.
The Italian Medici family made a beautiful tower built, as a
part of the system of fortification erected to protect the shore
against the frequent piratical raids in Tuscany. The Tower of
Castiglioncello was the first building built on the promontory
of Castiglioncello and had function of defense and sighting
of the raids of the Saracen pirates. It was built by order of
Cosimo I of the Medici family, in the same architectural style
of the twin tower of Calafuria, that still preserves the original
characteristics, since some battlements were added to the one
in Castiglioncello, at the summit, when the Pasquini Castle
was built in the XIX century. The soldiers barracks, once adjoining
to the tower, has now disappeared.
The tourist fortune of Castiglioncello begins
in the second half of the VIII century, when for the meekness
of the climate and the beauty of the tuscan landscape, Diego
Martelli, an art critic and patron, settled here. He invited
continuously, up to the end of the century, almost all the painters
who belonged to the group of the" Macchiaioli" and
became famous afterwards. In this way he gave origin to a famous
artistic period called "School of Castiglioncello".
Writers such as , Renato Fucini and Giovanni Marradi, the real
poet of Castiglioncello, sojourned here.
Today it is one of the most famous places of the
Tyrrhenian Sea, known in Italy and abroad for the beauties of
the landscape, for the quality and refinement of the services
that it offers and for the cultural and associative initiatives
of great value that it promotes.
The tourist hospitality of Castiglioncello includes,
hotels, private lodgings, bars and restaurants, about 20 bathing
establishments, nighttime meeting places, tennis fields, cinema,
minigolf, children's playgrounds...
Among the main cultural and sports appointments
you can find the Festival of the Dance, Music and theatre of
the studio of the West Coast, the Italian Literary Prize Castiglioncello-coast
of the Etruscans, the Tuscan Sailing Regattas, the National
Photographic Contest "City of Castiglioncello", the
fish feast of Caletta that takes place on the second Sunday
of June and it is an appointment of success that is renewed
every year with the enormous frying pan on the beach of Caletta,
that starts the tourist season.
Besides the already mentioned Medicea Tower ,
the near little church among the pine trees (church of St. Andrea)
built in 1621 and the Pasquini Castle are worth a visit. The
inside of the castle, recently restructured, is the seat of
the Pasolini Language School, numerous exhibitions and conferences,
while outside there is a theatre where concerts and shows of
different types are organized. Among the recurrent cultural
demonstrations, we must mention the theme conference regarding
the problems of children and the under age where, every year,
experts and researchers of the sector of international fame
participate.
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Italian in Italy by the sea
