San Marcello Piteglio

With abundant historical evidence from the 14th century on, San Marcello Pistoiese stands on a woods-covered hill. Other particularly interesting, nearby communities are the ancient villages of Maresca, located on the edge of the Teso State Forest, and Gavinana, home to the Francesco Ferrucci Museum and the Ecomuseum Information Point in the ancient Palazzo Achilli. Relics of Santa Celestina, patron saint of the town and the mountains, are preserved in the Romanesque parish church dedicated to St. Marcellus. Other unusual destinations near the town are the suspension bridge in Mammiano, the Astronomical Observatory of Pistoia Mountains, and Campotizzoro’s SMI Museums and Shelters, the largest air-raid bunkers in Europe. The village of Piteglio dominates the Val di Lima, where the important and ancient trans-Apennine road linking Pistoia to the Garfagnana ran. In the 11th -12th century, it was a fortified castle, an observation point under Pistoiese control. An easy distance from Piteglio are the hamlets of Macchia Antonini, Crespole, Lanciole, Calamecca and Migliorini. This small village has two churches: the Parish Church of Santissima Annunziata, or Pieve Vecchia (the Old Parish Church), which tradition says was founded by Matilde di Canossa, and the Church of Santa Maria Assunta, dating to the 13th century, which celebrated the ancient cult linked to the relic of the Nursing Madonna. Popiglio’s Parish Church of Santa Maria Assunta is one of the most important in the Pistoiese mountains as home to the Ecomuseum’s Diocesan Museum of Sacred Art. A pleasant tour starts from the parish church and leads to the single-arch medieval Castruccio bridge.