World Europe Italy Tuscany Panzano in Chianti Attractions Pieve di San Leolino, Panzano in Chianti Site Features

Pieve di San Leolino, Panzano in Chianti

Pieve di San Leolino, Panzano in Chianti site features

Last updated on November 3, 2026

7 /10

Overall rating

Rate

Pieve di San Leolino, Panzano in Chianti site plan

The church

The plan is a basilica, which is what a pieve needed to be. Three naves marked off by quadrangular piers in blocks of alberese, closed by a scarsella, and covered by wooden trusses — room for the population of a whole piviere, built plainly.

The front is sixteenth-century and the church behind it is not. In the sixteenth century the portico was built across the facade, with columns in sandstone and a doorway in pietra serena. In the same century the semicircular apse was demolished and replaced by the quadrangular scarsella; the two minor apses are more recent still, and the record calls them frankly frutto di invenzione — invented.

Inside, at the first bay on the right, stands the font. A monolithic baptismal font of very simple form.

The oldest object in the building is holding up the altar. A slab of sandstone, perhaps a pluteo, is used as the support of the altar table; it carries a decoration in depressed relief of a cross with interlaced grooved ribbons and whorls, datable between the eighth and the ninth century.

A door in the right wall leads to a small cloister. Its portico has a wooden roof carried on brick columns, and the rooms of the canonica open off its sides — their doorways and windows putting them in the Cinquecento. The farm buildings belong to the complex too, and on the left of the facade stands the oratory of the Compagnia del Santissimo Sacramento, a small church with a plain and dignified eighteenth-century front whose broken-pedimented doorway, window, angles and eaves are all framed in pietra serena.

Verified against Wikipedia, October 2026.

Key highlights

The Maestro di Panzano

The reason the village is in art-historical bibliographies. A Madonna and Child with Saints Catherine, Peter and Paul, a triptych attributed by Bernard Berenson to a painter close to Barna da Siena and Bartolo di Fredi, datable to the end of the fourteenth century. The hand was never identified, so it took the village's name.

A dossale by Meliore di Jacopo

Madonna enthroned between Saints Peter and Paul and stories of their lives, of the thirteenth century — the earliest painting here, and a type (the painted altar frontal) that very few parish churches still keep.

Mariotto di Nardo at the high altar

Madonna enthroned with the Child and two angels, flanked by lateral compartments showing Saint Francis, St John the Baptist, Sant'Eufrosino and Saint Lawrence. Sant'Eufrosino appears because he is Panzano's own saint.

An altar table on a Carolingian-era slab

The pluteo beneath the altar, carved in depressed relief with a cross of interlaced ribbons and whorls, is dated between the eighth and ninth century — three hundred years older than the church standing over it.

Two Della Robbia tabernacles, and who paid for them

Both in glazed terracotta, ascribable to the workshop of Giovanni della Robbia and placed by the altar. They were commissioned by Leonardo Buonafede.

A reliquary bust that walked here

Sant'Eufròsino, a plaster reliquary bust of the eighteenth century, once belonging to the oratory of Sant'Eufrosino a kilometre away, now kept in the pieve.

Fourteen churches answered to this one

The piviere of San Leolino included the church inside the castle of Panzano, San Piero in Pesa, San Giorgio a Grignano, San Lorenzo a Grignano di sopra, Sant'Andrea a Grignanello, San Clemente a Grignano, Santa Maria in Petriolo, San Martino alle Stinche, San Niccolò a Montagliari, San Jacopo a Pietrafitta and Santa Lucia a Monteripaldi — with Santa Lucia a Favale, San Michele di Montanino and Santo Stefano di Brustino now destroyed.

Sources & verification Covers the sourced claims on this page.

Checked against Wikipedia — The pieve di San Leolino is a basilica of three naves marked off by quadrangular piers in blocks of alberese, concluded with a scarsella and covered by wooden trusses; in the sixteenth century the portico on the facade was built with sandstone columns and the doorway in pietra serena, the semicircular apse was demolished and replaced with a quadrangular scarsella -- the two minor apses being of more recent date and the fruit of invention -- and a monolithic baptismal font of very simple form was placed at the first bay on the right. In the eighteenth century the church underwent an internal transformation in Baroque style, with the walls plastered and side altars built, all of which was removed in the restorations of 1942 that returned the church to its primitive Romanesque aspect, and the internal floor was redone in a restoration of the early 1980s. A doorway in the right wall gives onto a small cloister whose portico has a wooden roof carried on brick columns, with the rooms of the canonica opening off its sides, their portals and windows placing them in the Cinquecento; the farm buildings belong to the complex, and on the left of the facade is the oratory of the Compagnia del Santissimo Sacramento, a small church with a simple and dignified eighteenth-century facade whose broken-pedimented portal, window, angles and roof slopes are all framed in pietra serena., The pieve di San Leolino conserves numerous works of art. The oldest is a slab of sandstone, perhaps a pluteo, used as the support of the altar table, decorated in depressed relief with a cross of grooved interlaced ribbons and whorls and datable between the eighth and the ninth century. Among the paintings are a Madonna enthroned between Saints Peter and Paul with stories of their lives, a thirteenth-century dossale attributed to Meliore di Jacopo; a Madonna enthroned with the Child and two angels, a triptych attributed to Mariotto di Nardo at the high altar and flanked by lateral compartments showing Saint Francis, Saint John the Baptist, Sant'Eufrosino and Saint Lawrence; a Madonna and Child with Saints Catherine, Peter and Paul, another triptych attributed by Bernard Berenson to the Maestro di Panzano, a painter close to Barna da Siena and Bartolo di Fredi and datable to the end of the fourteenth century; a Baptism of Christ, a fresco referred to Raffaellino del Garbo in the baptismal chapel, much repainted in the nineteenth century; and a small cusped fifteenth-century panel of the Madonna, the Child and two angels, of the Florentine school. Among the sculptural works are two glazed terracotta tabernacles ascribable to the workshop of Giovanni della Robbia and placed by the altar, commissioned by Leonardo Buonafede, and an eighteenth-century plaster reliquary bust of Sant'Eufròsino once belonging to the oratory of that saint., The pieve di San Leolino conserves numerous works of art. The oldest is a slab of sandstone, perhaps a pluteo, used as the support of the altar table, decorated in depressed relief with a cross of grooved interlaced ribbons and whorls and datable between the eighth and the ninth century. Among the paintings are a Madonna enthroned between Saints Peter and Paul with stories of their lives, a thirteenth-century dossale attributed to Meliore di Jacopo; a Madonna enthroned with the Child and two angels, a triptych attributed to Mariotto di Nardo at the high altar and flanked by lateral compartments showing Saint Francis, Saint John the Baptist, Sant'Eufrosino and Saint Lawrence; a Madonna and Child with Saints Catherine, Peter and Paul, another triptych attributed by Bernard Berenson to the Maestro di Panzano, a painter close to Barna da Siena and Bartolo di Fredi and datable to the end of the fourteenth century; a Baptism of Christ, a fresco referred to Raffaellino del Garbo in the baptismal chapel, much repainted in the nineteenth century; and a small cusped fifteenth-century panel of the Madonna, the Child and two angels, of the Florentine school. Among the sculptural works are two glazed terracotta tabernacles ascribable to the workshop of Giovanni della Robbia and placed by the altar, commissioned by Leonardo Buonafede, and an eighteenth-century plaster reliquary bust of Sant'Eufròsino once belonging to the oratory of that saint., The ancient piviere of San Leolino comprised the church of San Piero in Pesa, the church of Santa Maria in the castle of Panzano, San Giorgio a Grignano, Santa Lucia a Favale (destroyed), San Lorenzo a Grignano di sopra, Santa Lucia a Monteripaldi, Sant'Andrea a Grignanello, San Clemente a Grignano, San Michele di Montanino (destroyed), Santa Maria in Petriolo, San Martino alle Stinche, Santo Stefano di Brustino (destroyed), San Niccolò a Montagliari and San Jacopo a Pietrafitta., Sant'Eufrosino, originally from Cappadocia, was one of the evangelisers of the Chianti, so much so that two places of worship dedicated to him were built in the Chianti territory: the oratory at Panzano and the Commenda di Sant'Eufrosino at Volpaia in the comune of Radda in Chianti. Tradition holds that he met his death near Panzano and that an oratory was built on the place of his burial, a goal of pilgrimages tied to the cult of a spring endowed with thaumaturgic powers, the Fontino di Sant'Eufrosino, consisting of two masonry columns supporting a sandstone architrave, inside which was the spring with the bust of the saint above it, the whole covered by a cusp with a pinnacle. The first notice of the oratory comes in a bull of 11 March 1102 from Paschal II to Giovanni, bishop of Fiesole. In 1852 an association was born whose purpose was the diffusion of the cult of Sant'Eufrosino with printed images of the saint accompanied by prayers of intercession., The pieve di San Leolino is a Catholic place of worship at Panzano in Chianti, a frazione of Greve in Chianti in the province of Florence, diocese of Fiesole; it is recorded from 982 under the name of San Leolino a Flacciano in a parchment of the abbey of Passignano, though two sculptural fragments conserved inside suggest the church has an origin older still. The present building goes back to the twelfth century, as can be deduced from its structural and stylistic characteristics. In the medieval period the church had great importance and fourteen suffragan churches depended on it, among them the one inside the castle of Panzano. In 1508 the patronage of the church passed to the Florentine hospital of Santa Maria Nuova, and from the sixteenth century began the works of restoration and transformation that gave the church the external appearance still visible. (October 2026).