Pieve di Santa Maria

The Parish of Santa Maria a Pian di Sco' rises above the chief town and it was the point of reference of those who went to live on the hill around the year 1000. This building, with three apses and a bell tower, underwent long restoration works in the 60's.

As it has already been said, its construction certainly dates to around the 1000 and preceded the foundation of Pian di Scò. It was first cited in 1008 in an act of donation with which the Ubertini, one of the powerful feudatory seigniories in Arezzo, ceded it to the Abbey of Santa Trinità in Alpe. As far as the spiritual jurisdiction is concerned, it has been ascertained that the parish had immediately been put under the direct control of the Bishop of Fiesole.
In the years, the bulls issued by pope Pasquale II in 1103, by pope Innocenzo II in 1134 and by pope Anastasio IV in 1153, reiterated the authority of the curia of Fiesole on the Parish of Santa Maria. Between the XII and the XIII centuries, the parish of Santa Maria remarkably enlarged its jurisdiction. Numerous churches depended upon it, among them there was the Abbey of San Salvatore in Soffena. Its parishioners had to go to the Parish of Scò to baptize their children. Part of these "dependants" detached from its jurisdiction around the XV century.
The façade of the church had once become more "piatta" by the presence of an earthwork and it recovered its previous Romanesque appearance thanks to the restoration works of 1966. By visiting the inside, the experts' main reasons of interest in this architecture can be seen. In effect, a certain difference in the manufacture of the more decorated and accurate part of the parish adjacent to its façade and the presbyteral part which is less accurate and rougher can be noted.
This detail has been deceiving its observers for years because they have considered the back part of the church as the more ancient. Actually, the façade and the first part of the parish are the most ancient. In effect, differently from many other parishes that needed restorations during the centuries for the fall or damage of their façade, the Parish of Santa Maria is one of the few that went through a more serious deterioration in its back part.
During restoration works, a fresco that was irremediably compromised in its lower part was discovered at the half of the left wall. It was a "Madonna in trono con il Bambino in fasce". This work has been attributed to Paolo Schiavo, an artist born in Florence and who became famous mainly because he had worked in many churches and chapels of the Upper Valdarno.