The municipality of San Miniato rises on a hill at the left of the Arno river. It has a population of about 26000 inhabitants and it is famous for the white truffle, which abounds in the territory. Moreover, it is also renowned for the numerous monuments that can be admired in visiting it.

Among the architectural works of great value in San Miniato there is without doubt the Cathedral of St. Maria Assunta. It was built in the XII century on the foundations of a XVIII-century church.
Today, the cathedral also houses a Museum of Sacred Art and includes the Matilde's Tower, a testimony of the military architecture that this city was rich in when it was under the aegis of the German monarchy.
The imperial relics of San Miniato are also reflected in the Tower of Frederick II, raised in the XIII century, which overlooked the imposing stronghold at that time.
The origins of the town date to the Etruscan-Roman period and they can be traced inside the necropolis of Fontevivo and by the finds discovered in Montecalenne and Montappio.
At the time of the Roman emperor Augustus, San Miniato was an important military garrison called Quarto. It started to be fortified when the first Lombard incursions occurred. Once the Lombards conquered the "castrum", they raised a church dedicated to the martyr San Miniato in 783, from which the city took its name.
In 962, the Teutonic emperor Otto I ordered the construction of the castle, which had to house the imperial vicar who controlled the administration of the Tuscan lands.
Therefore, several emperors and important political personalities and clergymen, such as Frederick Barbarossa, Henry IV and the Pope Gregory V, visited the town. San Miniato, which had traditionally been Ghibelline, obtained numerous privileges and the German rulers invested huge sums of money in fortifications.
San Miniato' s authonomy was jeopardized with the progressive decadence of Pisa, its ally, and of the Ghibellines. It passed under Carlo d'Angiņ's rule, but, later, its inhabitants rebelled against his authority by siding with the Guelf League in 1291 and soon they went under the Florentine Republic's control. In the XIV century, the inhabitants of San Miniato tried to rise up against the new ruler twice but with no success.
When the Spanish arrived in 1530, San Miniato, which was occupied by the Iberian troops, joined Florence chasing the enemies away from the city.
Once San Miniato definitively entered the Grand Duchy, it became one of the most lively and important centres in Tuscany, also thanks to the Grifoni, a powerful family, to whom the duke Alessandro de' Medici granted the administration of the town.
In 1620, the town recovered its communal status and it even became an Episcopal see after the intercession of Maria Maddalena d' Austria, Cosimo II's wife.
In 1860, San Miniato was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy and Pisa integrated it in its province in 1925. This town was at the centre of one of the most sanguinary episodes of the civil war, since the Nazis and the Fascists, on one side, and the Allies on the other fought here.
In the morning of the 22 July 1944, before withdrawal, the Germans killed 50 defenceless citizens, who had taken refuge inside the town's dome, with a grenade.