Everything about Tuscany totally explained
Tuscany is one of the twenty
regions of Italy. It has an area of 22,990 km² and a population of about 3.6 million inhabitants. The regional capital is
Florence.
Tuscany is known for its landscapes and its artistic legacy. Six Tuscan localities have been made
UNESCO protected sites: the historical center of
Florence (1982), the historical center of
Siena (1995), the square of the
Cathedral of Pisa (1987), the historical center of
San Gimignano (1990), the historical center of
Pienza (1996) and the
Val d'Orcia (2004).
Geography
Tuscany is a region of Central
Italy, bordering
Emilia-Romagna to the north,
Liguria to the north-west,
Tyrrhenian Sea to the west,
Umbria and
Marche to the east,
Lazio to the south-east. The territory is two thirds hilly and one fourth mountainous. The remainder is constituted of the plains that form the valley of the
Arno River.
Tuscany is divided into ten provinces:
History
Apennine and Villanovan cultures.
The pre-Etruscan history of the area in the late
Bronze and
Iron ages parallels that of the early
Greeks. The Tuscan area was inhabited by peoples of the so-called
Apennine culture in the late
second millennium BC (roughly 1350–1150 BC) who had trading relationships with the
Minoan and
Mycenaean civilisations in the
Aegean Sea. The people who formed the civilization lived in the area (called
Etruria) well into prehistory. Throughout their existence, they lost territory to the surrounding civilisations of
Magna Graecia,
Carthage and
Gaul. the cultures of
Greece, and later Rome, influenced the civilisation to a great extent. One of the reasons for its eventual demise By the
renaissance, however, Florence succeeded in becoming the cultural capital of Tuscany and ensured a bright, and peaceful, future for the region.
The Renaissance
Tuscany is considered the birthplace of the Renaissance movement, and its artistic heritage includes
architecture,
painting and
sculpture, collected in dozens of
museums in towns and cities across the region. Perhaps the best-known are the
Uffizi, the
Accademia and the
Bargello in
Florence. Tuscany was the birthplace of
Dante Alighieri ("the father of the
Italian language"),
Leonardo da Vinci,
Michelangelo and
Botticelli. The Renaissance was a cultural movement than spanned roughly the 14th through the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the the late Middle Ages and spreading through the rest of Europe. The Middle Ages are commonly marked by the fall of the Roman Empire and rise of Renaissance. Between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, there's a real gap of culture, where things are very, very different from the Classical period. One of the things that was lost is literature in modern languages. All the literature produced during this era is in Latin. With the onset of the Renaissance, that all changes, we get the creating of literature all through Europe in the languages people speak. The Renaissance was then
about going back and reclaiming all that was lost during the Classical era. With very little to go on, amazingly, the three Italian Renaissance, Dante Alighieri, Giovanni Boccaccio, and Frencesco Patrarch accomplished this. Dante's forte was epic poetry
Dante Alighieri, Petrarc's, lyric poetry
Petrarch, Boccaccio's, the fictional narrative
Giovanni Boccaccio
Modern Era
In the 1400s, the rulers of Florence, the Medicis, annexed surrounding lands to create modern-day Tuscany. The
War of Polish Succession in the 1730s, however, ended in the transfer of Tuscany from the Medicis to Francis, the
Hapsburg Duke of Lorraine, who would become
Holy Roman Emperor. With the dissolution of the
Holy Roman Empire by Napoleon, Tuscany was inherited by the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, namely, the Austrian Empire. With the Italian Wars of Independence in the 1850s, Tuscany was transferred from Austria to the newly unified nation of Italy.
Economy
Tuscany is known for its
wines (most famous of which are
Chianti,
Brunello di Montalcino, and
Vino Nobile di Montepulciano), and has 120 protected
nature reserves. Other agricultural products include
Chianina cattle (origin of the famous "Fiorentina" steak) and the production of olive oil, principally in
Lucca and the surrounding hills. The industry comprises factories producing
Piaggio cars, motorcycles, scooters and aeroplanes, the texile industrial district of Prato, the petrochemical plants of
Leghorn and the steel factories of Piombino.
Tourism is the economic backbone of the so-called "Cities of Art" (
Florence,
Lucca,
Pisa,
Siena,
San Gimignano), as well as on the coast and in the isles (
Elba).
Marble is quarried in the
Alpi Apuane (
Carrara,
Versilia and
Massa), in
Garfagnana and in
Lunigiana.
Politics
Tuscany is a stronghold of the center-left coalition
The Union, forming with
Emilia-Romagna,
Umbria and
Marche the famous Italian political "Red Quadrilateral". At the
April 2006 elections, Tuscany gave more than 61% of its votes to
Romano Prodi.
Tuscany also has a student representative institution, the
Tuscany students parliament.
Demographics
In the '80s and '90s the region attracted an intense influx of immigrants, in particular from
China and Northern Africa. There is also a significant community of British and Americans. As of 2006, the Italian national institute of statistics ISTAT estimated that 215,490 foreign-born immigrants live in Tuscany, equal to 5.9% of the total regional population.
Towns of Tuscany with a population of 50,000 or more:
| Comune |
Population (2006 est.) |
| Florence |
366,901 |
| Prato |
183,823 |
| Livorno |
160,534 |
| Arezzo |
95,229 |
| Pisa |
87,737 |
| Pistoia |
85,947 |
| Lucca |
84,422 |
| Grosseto |
76,330 |
| Massa |
69,399 |
| Carrara |
65,125 |
| Viareggio |
63,389 |
| Siena |
54,147 |
| Scandicci |
50,003 |
Further Information
Get more info on 'Tuscany'.
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