Fiesole in Tuscany

The town of Fiesole is at 300 m asl and it has medium dimensions. It has a population of 15000 inhabitants and it is near Florence. It is between two hills and it is rich in historical, artistic, archaeological and natural wonders.

The presence of man dates to the far 2000 B.C. at least, in the time called Bronze Age, on the hills of San Francesco and of Sant' Apollinare, that is the Fiesole's hills. It was quite natural, therefore, that an Etruscan settlement developed near the Fiesole's hills in the following centuries.
The city and its walls more than 2000 metres long were raised around the IV-III centuries B.C. as a communication crossroads between the centre-south and the northern Etruria. Its importance as a defensive bastion against the incursions of the Gauls and of other populations coming from the north of Italy was remarkable, as well.
There is little information about this town in the Roman period. In 217 B.C., it flanked the Romans in their war against the Carthaginian leader Hannibal and it is also known that this town was destroyed by Porcius Cato in 90 B.C. He wanted to punish it because of its hostile attitude towards the capital during the Social War. Some years later, Fiesole sided Catiline in his war against the Roman Republic and it was defeated again. In spite of its friction with the capital, Fiesole started to assume the typical appearance of a Roman city in this period. A 3000- seats theatre, a temple that substituted the previous Etruscan one and a spa were built, as evidenced by important archaeological sites.
After the fall of Roman Empire, the importance of Fiesole as a strategic and military stronghold decayed with the progressive rise of Florence. The Lombards occupied this town between the VI and the VII centuries and it was later transformed in a very powerful Christian diocese extending its influence into the Chianti and the Casentino areas. The Fiesole's bishops also exercised the civil and the administrative power. The construction of the cathedral dates to this period, around the IX century.
The power of Fiesole's bishopric decayed in the XII century, when the free city-state of Florence attacked and conquered the city, devastating it and using it for its caves. Yet, since the Renaissance, Fiesole started to be renowned as a holiday place for aristocratic and wealthy families. At that time, illustrious Florentine personalities such as Lorenzo the Magnificent, Pico della Mirandola, Giovanni Boccaccio and Poliziano attended this place. The serena stone caves became the economic pivot of this town.
In the XIX century, Fiesole lived a period of intense town planning renovation with the construction of new popular houses and mansions and by recovering the previous architectural patrimony. Nevertheless, in 1910, Fiesole lost part of its territory because of Florence's programme of enlargement, as it had established when it was the capital of Italy (from 1865 to 1870).