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Chiesa di Santa Maria, Panzano in Chianti

Chiesa di Santa Maria, Panzano in Chianti site features

Last updated on November 3, 2026

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Chiesa di Santa Maria, Panzano in Chianti site plan

The church

Read the left flank from the old graveyard and the building explains itself. The enlargements of the turn of the century are, in the record's own words, clearly recognisable from there.

The nave grew in both directions at once. The deep restructuring between the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century created the side chapels, prolonged the central nave at the front until the new facade took in part of the bell tower, and extended it at the rear into the two semicircles there now.

That extension closed a door that no longer led anywhere. The forward prolongation shut the entrance to the old cemetery, which following the edict of Saint-Cloud — issued by Napoleon in 1802 and promulgated for the Kingdom of Italy in 1806 — had already been decommissioned.

The best room is the chapel of the Annunciation, entered from the right. It holds the Annunciation of about 1520, the Crucifix attributed to Jacopo Sansovino, an old gilded wooden ciborium in the form of a hexagonal tempietto of fine late-sixteenth-century workmanship whose painted door panels are attributed to Michele di Ridolfo del Ghirlandaio, and some old vestments embroidered in gold and silk with ancient reliquaries.

Before the Renaissance church there was a Baroque parish. From the Renaissance period Santa Maria had a single nave without an apse, about 19 metres long and 9 wide, with two great stone windows behind the high altar and the same in the facade, side altars against the flanks, and a vaulted chapel off the left side housing the octagonal pietra serena font. Numerous burials of the most notable Panzano families lay in the floor — Firidolfi, Quercetani, Petrucci, De Luigi, Baldi, Cappelletti.

And the doors are modern and deliberate. The great cypress-wood portal encloses eight bronze panels by the sculptor Umberto Bartoli (1965), with above it, on the facade, his Madonna surrounded by angels, standing out white in plaster.

Verified against Wikipedia, October 2026.

Key highlights

A Crucifix attributed to Sansovino

Carved in polychrome poplar with a loincloth of linen cloth, gessoed and painted blue with gilded decoration, attributed to Jacopo Sansovino and dated between 1510 and 1518. After the restoration of 1998 Francesca Petrucci wrote that it "revealed a harmonious Renaissance structure, heightened by the presence of the original polychromy of very fine pictorial quality".

An Annunciation a bishop saw in 1542

From the workshop of Ridolfo del Ghirlandaio, executed around 1520. It is the tabula egregie dipincta cum immagine Anunciationis B. M. recorded by Braccio Martelli, bishop of Fiesole, at his pastoral visit of 1542 — the same visit that records the Crucifix as a pulcram immaginem Cristi Crucifixi. (Visit Tuscany attributes the panel instead to Michele Ridolfo del Ghirlandaio.)

A bell tower that used to be a castle tower

The campanile is one of the perimeter towers of the ancient medieval castle, taken over probably in the fourteenth or fifteenth century — and then partly absorbed into the new facade when the nave was lengthened around 1900.

A Trecento Madonna in a Quattrocento frame

The oldest furnishing: a small fourteenth-century panel of the Madonna and Child referred to Cenni di Francesco di ser Cenni, framed in the following century by a panel with saints by Bernardo Rosselli. It now hangs in the third chapel on the left.

A font ordered by a bishop

The octagonal baptismal font in pietra serena at the entrance on the right was made around 1730 by the then prior Giuseppe Maria Mammoli, by order of the bishop of Fiesole Luigi Maria Strozzi.

A second fifteenth-century Crucifix

On the altar of the first chapel on the left, attributed to a fifteenth-century Florentine sculptor, also in poplar with a gessoed linen loincloth painted blue.

Bronze doors with the Second Vatican Council on them

Umberto Bartoli's eight panels of 1965 show the Holy Family, the Sermon on the Mount, the Four Evangelists, the ecstasy of Saint Francis and Catherine of Siena persuading the pope to return to Rome from Avignon — and alongside them the Second Vatican Council, John XXIII's visit to Regina Coeli and Paul VI's meeting with the patriarch Athenagoras.

Sources & verification Covers the sourced claims on this page.

Checked against Wikipedia — The church of Santa Maria is a place of worship at Panzano in Chianti, a frazione of Greve in Chianti in the province of Florence, diocese of Fiesole, built between 1890 and 1903. It derived from the enlargement of a primitive Romanesque building recorded in the lists of the Rationes Decimarum per la Tuscia of 1274-75, itself probably enlarged in the fourteenth or fifteenth century with the use as a bell tower of one of the perimeter towers of the ancient medieval castle. At the end of the 1800s the church was contained between the two present great arches, without side chapels, and the bell tower remained detached from the church; between the two structures was the entrance to the cemetery, from which one reached the chapel of the Compagnia della Santissima Annunziata, believed to be the same seen today except for a direct access from the church, closed in the last restoration of the 1960s. The present aspect is due to the deep restructuring between the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century, with the creation of the side chapels and the prolongation of the central nave at the front, taking in with the new facade part of the bell tower and so closing the entrance to the old cemetery which, following the edict of Saint-Cloud issued by Napoleon in 1802 and promulgated for the Kingdom of Italy in 1806, had been decommissioned; the prolongation also affected the rear, creating the two present semicircles. These enlargements are clearly recognisable observing the left flank of the church from the old graveyard., From the Renaissance period the church of Santa Maria at Panzano had a single nave without an apse and measured about 19 metres long by 9 wide; in the rear wall behind the high altar opened two great stone windows with grilles and glazing, and the same in the facade; the side altars were set against the flanks, and from the left flank one reached a vaulted chapel housing the baptismal font, octagonal and in pietra serena, made around the year 1730 and in all probability the present one. In the floor were numerous burials of the most notable Panzano families of the time: Firidolfi, Quercetani, Petrucci, De Luigi, Baldi, Cappelletti., The oldest furnishing of the parish church of Santa Maria Assunta at Panzano is a small fourteenth-century panel of the Madonna and Child referred to Cenni di Francesco di ser Cenni, framed in the following century by a panel with saints executed by Bernardo Rosselli, now in the third chapel on the left. In the chapel of the Annunciation, entered from the right side of the church, are an Annunciation from the workshop of Ridolfo del Ghirlandaio executed around 1520 -- the tabula egregie dipincta cum immagine Anunciationis B. M. recalled by the bishop of Fiesole Braccio Martelli (1501-1560) in the pastoral visit of 1542 -- and a wooden Crucifix attributed to Jacopo Sansovino and dated between 1510 and 1518, also recalled by bishop Martelli as a pulcram immaginem Cristi Crucifixi, carved in polychrome poplar with a loincloth of linen cloth gessoed and painted blue with gilded decoration, of which Francesca Petrucci wrote after the restoration of 1998 that it had revealed a harmonious Renaissance structure heightened by the presence of the original polychromy of very fine pictorial quality. The same chapel holds an old gilded wooden ciborium in the form of a hexagonal tempietto of the late sixteenth century, the painted decorations of whose door panels are attributed to Michele di Ridolfo del Ghirlandaio, together with old vestments embroidered in gold and silk and ancient reliquaries. Another important Crucifix attributed to a fifteenth-century Florentine sculptor stands on the altar of the first chapel on the left, also in poplar with a gessoed linen loincloth painted blue; the octagonal pietra serena font at the entrance on the right was made around 1730 by the then prior Giuseppe Maria Mammoli by order of the bishop of Fiesole Luigi Maria Strozzi; and in the first chapel on the right is a canvas of Santa Maria Maddalena de' Pazzi and Sant'Antonio di Padova painted by Pier Dandini in the mid-seventeenth century., The great cypress-wood portal of the church of Santa Maria at Panzano encloses eight bronze panels by the sculptor Umberto Bartoli (1965) depicting the Holy Family, the Sermon on the Mount, the Four Evangelists, the ecstasy of Saint Francis and Saint Catherine of Siena persuading the pope to return to Rome from Avignon, together with the most salient events of the Church of those years -- the Second Vatican Council, the visit of Saint John XXIII to Regina Coeli and the meeting of the blessed Paul VI with the patriarch Athenagoras. By the same sculptor is the Madonna surrounded by angels standing out in white plaster on the facade above the portal., The oldest furnishing of the parish church of Santa Maria Assunta at Panzano is a small fourteenth-century panel of the Madonna and Child referred to Cenni di Francesco di ser Cenni, framed in the following century by a panel with saints executed by Bernardo Rosselli, now in the third chapel on the left. In the chapel of the Annunciation, entered from the right side of the church, are an Annunciation from the workshop of Ridolfo del Ghirlandaio executed around 1520 -- the tabula egregie dipincta cum immagine Anunciationis B. M. recalled by the bishop of Fiesole Braccio Martelli (1501-1560) in the pastoral visit of 1542 -- and a wooden Crucifix attributed to Jacopo Sansovino and dated between 1510 and 1518, also recalled by bishop Martelli as a pulcram immaginem Cristi Crucifixi, carved in polychrome poplar with a loincloth of linen cloth gessoed and painted blue with gilded decoration, of which Francesca Petrucci wrote after the restoration of 1998 that it had revealed a harmonious Renaissance structure heightened by the presence of the original polychromy of very fine pictorial quality. The same chapel holds an old gilded wooden ciborium in the form of a hexagonal tempietto of the late sixteenth century, the painted decorations of whose door panels are attributed to Michele di Ridolfo del Ghirlandaio, together with old vestments embroidered in gold and silk and ancient reliquaries. Another important Crucifix attributed to a fifteenth-century Florentine sculptor stands on the altar of the first chapel on the left, also in poplar with a gessoed linen loincloth painted blue; the octagonal pietra serena font at the entrance on the right was made around 1730 by the then prior Giuseppe Maria Mammoli by order of the bishop of Fiesole Luigi Maria Strozzi; and in the first chapel on the right is a canvas of Santa Maria Maddalena de' Pazzi and Sant'Antonio di Padova painted by Pier Dandini in the mid-seventeenth century., The church of Santa Maria is a place of worship at Panzano in Chianti, a frazione of Greve in Chianti in the province of Florence, diocese of Fiesole, built between 1890 and 1903. It derived from the enlargement of a primitive Romanesque building recorded in the lists of the Rationes Decimarum per la Tuscia of 1274-75, itself probably enlarged in the fourteenth or fifteenth century with the use as a bell tower of one of the perimeter towers of the ancient medieval castle. At the end of the 1800s the church was contained between the two present great arches, without side chapels, and the bell tower remained detached from the church; between the two structures was the entrance to the cemetery, from which one reached the chapel of the Compagnia della Santissima Annunziata, believed to be the same seen today except for a direct access from the church, closed in the last restoration of the 1960s. The present aspect is due to the deep restructuring between the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century, with the creation of the side chapels and the prolongation of the central nave at the front, taking in with the new facade part of the bell tower and so closing the entrance to the old cemetery which, following the edict of Saint-Cloud issued by Napoleon in 1802 and promulgated for the Kingdom of Italy in 1806, had been decommissioned; the prolongation also affected the rear, creating the two present semicircles. These enlargements are clearly recognisable observing the left flank of the church from the old graveyard., The castle is the highest and oldest part of Panzano; a good part of the walls that girded the hill is still conserved, though on two sides they have been reduced in height while on the south-east side they are missing altogether. Corner towers also survive, one of which has been reused as the bell tower of the church of Santa Maria while another still keeps its apparato a sporgere. The internal structure is simple: from the single access gate, which may originally have had an antiporta, a single street leads to a small piazzetta onto which the cassero faces, the cassero being a tall tower rising higher than all the other buildings; beside the access gate is a building of obviously medieval character. For the accuracy of the wall facing and the form of the archivolts, all the buildings of the castle date its structures to the twelfth century., The great cypress-wood portal of the church of Santa Maria at Panzano encloses eight bronze panels by the sculptor Umberto Bartoli (1965) depicting the Holy Family, the Sermon on the Mount, the Four Evangelists, the ecstasy of Saint Francis and Saint Catherine of Siena persuading the pope to return to Rome from Avignon, together with the most salient events of the Church of those years -- the Second Vatican Council, the visit of Saint John XXIII to Regina Coeli and the meeting of the blessed Paul VI with the patriarch Athenagoras. By the same sculptor is the Madonna surrounded by angels standing out in white plaster on the facade above the portal. (October 2026).