Castello di Panzano historical timeline

The castle predates its own record. It had certainly developed before the twelfth century and was among the possessions of the Firidolfi; the first mention of the name Panzano itself comes in the twelfth century, in the phrase plebe Sancti Leolini sitam in Panzano, and the thirteenth-century tithes also cite the church of Santa Maria standing inside the castle.

Of its own story, little survives. The record states flatly that of the historical vicissitudes of the castle not many traces have remained — which is why the building has to be read rather than looked up.

In the mid-thirteenth century it was assigned to a league. When the Florentine contado was organised into leagues, Panzano was included in the Lega della Val di Greve.

In 1260 it was sacked and lost two towers. After the battle of Montaperti the castle was plundered and had two towers destroyed by the victorious Ghibelline troops.

In 1397 it was sacked again. During the war that set Florence against the Visconti of Milan, Panzano was occupied and plundered a second time, by the troops of Alberico da Barbiano.

In 1478 it became the headquarters. In the war of the Pazzi, Sienese troops and their allies — the forces of Ferdinand I of Aragon, king of Naples — invaded the Chianti for the second time. Panzano's castle was one of the most important bulwarks in defence of the Republic of Florence, so much so that it became the seat of the Commissario della Repubblica.

After 1555, nothing. Following the fall of the Republic of Siena, Panzano was not involved in warlike events again until 1944.

The owners changed twice in the modern era. Built and always held by the Firidolfi or da Panzano, in the mid-nineteenth century the castle passed — partly by succession and partly by repurchase — from the Conti Mancini to the Buoninsegni, later Tadini Buoninsegni, to whom it belonged until the second half of the twentieth century.

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