Santa Maria della Scala hospital

This hospital was one of the first in Europe. Located in the Tuscan city of Siena, it was in operation for almost 900 years, from 1090 to 1900.

It is located in front of the beautiful Cathedral of Siena and preserves remarkably intact evidence of a thousand years of history, from Etruscan and Roman times to the Middle Ages and even the Renaissance.

On the main pilgrimage route to Rome, it was built to house pilgrims traveling along the Via Francigena and to help disadvantaged and abandoned children.

It had agricultural properties called "grance" in different areas of the country. They have had in Val d'Orcia, Val d'Arbia (Grancia di Cuna), in the Masse area, in Crete and Maremma. For almost five centuries, these places were the source of livelihood of the Hospital of Santa Maria della Scala, until their alienation was ordered in the second half of the eighteenth century.

In the location of our vineyard, there is the structure of a fundamental annex of the hospital. Within these walls, pilgrims were cared for and thousands of people were cared for and cured. That is why we have decided to turn it into our wine cellar, where we care for and age our wines.

Inside the hospital, you can admire the extraordinary Pilgrimage Room, with 15th century frescoes, on which Domenico di Bartolo also worked, depicting the missions of the hospital and the daily life of the time, such as the distribution of alms or the reception and marriage of an orphan who has lived in the hospital.

Today it is no longer in operation and has been a museum since 1995. Little by little they opened it to the public and renovated the place to be able to exhibit it as a museum. It has various relics that were donated to them, including part of the girdle of the Virgin Mary and her veil, possibly to encourage the travels of pilgrims, Saints Augustine and Marcellin, and a nail from the cross of Christ. It is full of art, frescoes with Catholic scenes and altarpieces.