Roughly triangular in shape, Tuscany borders the regions ofLiguria to the northwest,Emilia-Romagna to the north,Marche andUmbria to the east, andLazio to the south and southeast. Thecomune (municipality) ofBadia Tedalda, in the TuscanProvince of Arezzo, has an exclave named Ca' Raffaello within Emilia-Romagna.
Tuscany has a western coastline on theLigurian Sea and theTyrrhenian Sea, among which is theTuscan Archipelago, of which the most significant island isElba. Tuscany has an area of approximately 22,993 square kilometres (8,878 sq mi). Surrounded and crossed by major mountain chains and with few (but fertile) plains, the region has a relief dominated by hilly country used for agriculture. Hills make up nearly two-thirds (66.5%) of the region's total area, covering 15,292 square kilometres (5,904 sq mi), and mountains (of which the highest are theApennines), a further 25%, or 5,770 square kilometres (2,230 sq mi). Plains occupy 8.4% of the total area—1,930 square kilometres (750 sq mi)—mainly around the valley of theArno. Many of Tuscany's most significant cities lie on the banks of the Arno, including the capital,Florence,Empoli, andPisa. To the north of Florence lies theMugello valley, a green and fertile area surrounded by the Apennine mountains, known for its rolling hills, medieval villages, and the Mugello Circuit, one of Italy’s most famous racing tracks.
The climate is fairly mild in the coastal areas, and harsher and rainy in the interior, with considerable fluctuations in temperature between winter and summer,[11] giving the region a soil-building active freeze-thaw cycle, in part accounting for the region once having served as a key breadbasket ofancient Rome.[12]
TheEtruscans (Latin:Tusci) created the first majorcivilization in this region, large enough to establish a transport infrastructure, to implement agriculture and mining and to produce vibrant art.[17] The Etruscans lived in the area ofEtruria well into prehistory.[13] The civilization grew to fill the area between the Arno andTiber from the tenth century BCE, reaching its peak during the seventh and sixth centuries B.C., finally succumbing to theRomans by the first century BCE.[18] From the Etruscans, Tuscany took the name of Etruria, Tuscia for theRomans and subsequently Tuscania and Tuscany. While the areas of north-western Tuscany were inhabited by the ancientLigures. In northwestern Tuscany, the area between the Arno and Magra rivers was culturally aligned with the Etruscans in the early Iron Age, and came under Ligurian control in the late Iron Age.[19]
One reason for the eventual demise of this civilization was the increasing absorption by surrounding cultures, including the adoption of the Etruscan upper class by the Romans.[17][18]
Soon after absorbing Etruria (to the north, northeast, east, and a strip to the south), Rome established the cities ofLucca,Pisa,Siena, andFlorence, endowed the area with new technologies and development, and ensured peace.[17] These developments included extensions of existing roads, the introduction of aqueducts and sewers, and the construction of many buildings, both public and private. However, many of these structures have been destroyed by erosion due to weather.[17]
Pilgrims travelling along theVia Francigena betweenRome and France brought wealth and development during themedieval period.[17] The food and shelter required by these travellers fuelled the growth of communities around churches and taverns.[17] The conflict between theGuelphs and Ghibellines, factions supporting thePapacy or theHoly Roman Empire in central and northern Italy during the 12th and 13th centuries, split the Tuscan people.[17] The two factions gave rise to several powerful and richmedieval communes in Tuscany:Arezzo,Florence,Lucca,Pisa, andSiena.[17] Balance between these communes was ensured by the assets they held: Pisa, a port; Siena, banking; and Lucca, banking and silk.[20] But by the time of theRenaissance, Florence had become the cultural capital of Tuscany.[20]
One family that benefitted from Florence's growing wealth and power was the rulingMedici family. Its scionLorenzo de' Medici was one of the most famous of the Medici. The legacy of his influence is visible today in the prodigious expression of art and architecture in Florence. His famous descendantCatherine de' Medici married Prince Henry (laterKing Henry II) of France in 1533.
TheBlack Death epidemic hit Tuscany starting in 1348.[21] It eventually killed 70% of the Tuscan population.[22][23] According to Melissa Snell, "Florence lost a third of its population in the first six months of the plague, and from 45% to 75% of its population in the first year."[24] In 1630, Florence and Tuscany were once again ravaged by theplague.[25]
Tuscany, especiallyFlorence, is regarded as the birthplace of theRenaissance. Though "Tuscany" remained a linguistic, cultural, and geographic conception rather than a political reality, in the 15th century, Florence extended its dominion in Tuscany through the annexation of Arezzo in 1384, the purchase of Pisa in 1405, and the suppression of a local resistance there (1406).Livorno was bought in 1421 and became the harbour of Florence.
From the leading city of Florence, the republic was from 1434 onward dominated by the increasingly monarchicalMedici family. Initially, underCosimo,Piero the Gouty,Lorenzo andPiero the Unfortunate, the forms of the republic were retained and the Medici ruled without a title, usually without even a formal office. These rulers presided over theFlorentine Renaissance. There was a return to the republic from 1494 to 1512, when firstGirolamo Savonarola thenPiero Soderini oversaw the state. Cardinal Giovanni di Lorenzo de' Medici retook the city with Spanish forces in 1512, before going to Rome to becomePope Leo X. Florence was dominated by a series of papal proxies until 1527 when the citizens declared the republic again, only to have it taken from them again in 1530 after a siege by an Imperial and Spanish army. At this pointPope Clement VII andCharles V appointedAlessandro de' Medici as the first formal hereditary ruler.
The Sienese commune was not incorporated into Tuscany until 1555, and during the 15th century, Siena enjoyed a cultural 'Sienese Renaissance' with its own more conservative character. Lucca remained an independent republic until 1847 when it became part ofGrand Duchy of Tuscany by the will of its people.Piombino and other strategic towns constituted the tinyState of thePresidi under Spanish control.
UnderBenito Mussolini, the area came under the dominance of localFascist leaders such asDino Perrone Compagni (from Florence), andCostanzo andGaleazzo Ciano (fromLivorno). Following the fall of Mussolini and the armistice of 8 September 1943, Tuscany became part of the Nazi-controlledItalian Social Republic and was conquered almost totally by the Anglo-American forces during the summer of 1944.
Following the end of the Social Republic and the transition from the Kingdom to the modern Italian Republic, Tuscany once more flourished as a cultural centre of Italy. Since the establishment of the regional government in 1970, Tuscany has always been ruled by centre-left governments.
Tuscany has an immense cultural and artistic heritage, expressed in the region's churches, palaces, art galleries, museums, villages, and piazzas. Many of these artifacts are found in the main cities, such asFlorence andSiena, but also in smaller villages scattered around the region, such asSan Gimignano.
Tuscany has a unique artistic legacy, and Florence is one of the world's most important water-colour centres, even so that it is often nicknamed the "art palace of Italy" (the region is also believed to have the largest concentration of Renaissance art and architecture in the world).[26] Painters such asCimabue andGiotto, the fathers of Italian painting, lived in Florence and Tuscany, as well as Arnolfo andAndrea Pisano, renewers of architecture and sculpture;Brunelleschi,Donatello andMasaccio, forefathers of the Renaissance;Ghiberti and theDella Robbias,Filippo Lippi andAngelico;Botticelli,Paolo Uccello, and the universal genius ofLeonardo da Vinci andMichelangelo.[27][28]
In the medieval period and the Renaissance, four main Tuscan art schools competed against each other: theFlorentine School, theSienese School, the Pisan School, and theLucchese School.
The Sienese School of painting flourished inSiena between the 13th and 15th centuries and for a time rivaled Florence, though it was more conservative, being inclined towards the decorative beauty and elegant grace of lateGothic art. Its most important representatives includeDuccio, whose work shows Byzantine influence; his pupilSimone Martini;Pietro andAmbrogio Lorenzetti;Domenico andTaddeo di Bartolo; andSassetta andMatteo di Giovanni. Unlike the naturalistic Florentine art, there is a mystical streak in Sienese art,[citation needed] characterized by a common focus on miraculous events, distortions of time and place, and often dreamlike coloration, with less attention to proportions. In the 16th century, the ManneristsBeccafumi andIl Sodoma worked there. While Baldassare Peruzzi was born and trained in Siena, his major works and style reflect his long career in Rome. The economic and political decline of Siena by the 16th century, and its eventual subjugation by Florence, largely checked the development of Sienese painting, although it also meant that many Sienese works in churches and public buildings were not discarded or destroyed by new paintings or rebuilding. Siena remains a remarkably well-preserved Italian late-Medieval town.
The Lucchese School, also known as the School of Lucca and as the Pisan-Lucchese School, was a school of painting and sculpture that flourished in the 11th and 12th centuries in the western and southern part of the region, with an important centre inVolterra. The art is mostly anonymous. Although not as elegant or delicate as the Florentine School, Lucchese works are remarkable for their monumentality.
Apart from Tuscan being the standard model for Italy's national language (historically preferred over other languages of the peninsula), theTuscan dialect (dialetto toscano) is spoken in Tuscany. The Italian language is actually literary Tuscan itself, specifically theFlorentine dialect, only commonly referred to as Italian for political and nationalist reasons. It became the language of culture for all the people of Italy, thanks to the prestige of the masterpieces ofDante Alighieri,Petrarch,Giovanni Boccaccio,Niccolò Machiavelli, andFrancesco Guicciardini. It would later become the official language of all theItalian states and of the Kingdom of Italy, when it was formed. Many Tuscan terms are also common in theCentral Italian dialects of Umbria and some parts ofEmilia Romagna.[29]
Tuscany has a rich ancient and modern musical tradition, and has produced numerous composers and musicians, includingGiacomo Puccini andPietro Mascagni. Florence is the main musical centre of Tuscany. The city was at the heart of much of the Western musical tradition. It was there that theFlorentine Camerata convened in the mid-16th century and experimented with setting tales ofGreek mythology to music and staging, resulting in the first operas, fostering the further development of the operatic form, and the later developments of separate "classical" forms such as thesymphony.
Several famous writers and poets are from Tuscany, most notably Florentine authorDante Alighieri. Tuscany's literary scene particularly thrived in the 13th century and the Renaissance.
In Tuscany, especially in the Middle Ages, popular love poetry existed. A school of imitators of the Sicilians was led byDante da Maiano, but its literary originality took another line – that of humorous and satirical poetry. The democratic form of government created a style of poetry that stood strongly against the medieval mystic and chivalrous style. Devout invocation of God or a lady came from thecloister and the castle; in the streets of the cities everything that had gone before was treated with ridicule or bitingsarcasm.Folgóre da San Gimignano laughs when in his sonnets he tells a party of Sienese youths the occupations of every month in the year, or when he teaches a party of Florentine lads the pleasures of every day in the week. Cenne della Chitarra laughs when he parodies Folgore's sonnets. The sonnets of Rustico di Filippo are half-fun and half-satire, as is the work ofCecco Angiolieri of Siena, the oldest humorist we[who?] know, a far-off precursor ofFrançois Rabelais andMichel de Montaigne.[citation needed]
Another type of poetry also began in Tuscany. Guittone d'Arezzo made art abandon chivalry andProvençal forms for national motives and Latin forms. He attempted political poetry, and although his work is often obscure, he prepared the way for the Bolognese school.Bologna was the city of science, and philosophical poetry appeared there.Guido Guinizelli was the poet after the new fashion of the art. In his work, the ideas ofchivalry are changed and enlarged. Only those whose heart is pure can be blessed with true love, regardless of class. He refuted the traditional credo ofcourtly love, for which love is a subtle philosophy only a few chosen knights and princesses could grasp. Love is blind to blasons but not to a good heart when it finds one: when it succeeds it is the result of the spiritual, not physical affinity between two souls. Guinizzelli's democratic view can be better understood in the light of the greater equality and freedom enjoyed by the city-states of the center-north and the rise of a middle class eager to legitimise itself in the eyes of the old nobility, still regarded with respect and admiration but dispossessed of its political power.[citation needed]
Guinizelli'sCanzoni make up the bible ofDolce Stil Novo, and one in particular, "Al cor gentil" ("To a Kind Heart") is considered[by whom?] the manifesto of the new movement which would bloom in Florence underCavalcanti, Dante and their followers. His poetry has some of the faults of the school of d'Arezzo. Nevertheless, he marks a great development in the history of Italian art, especially because of his close connection with Dante'slyric poetry.
In the 13th century, there were several majorallegorical poems. One of these is byBrunetto Latini, who was a close friend of Dante. HisTesoretto is a short poem, in seven-syllable verses, rhyming in couplets, in which the author professes to be lost in a wilderness and to meet with a lady, who represents Nature, from whom he receives much instruction. We see here the vision, the allegory, the instruction with a moral object, three elements which we shall find again in theDivine Comedy.Francesco da Barberino, a learned lawyer who was secretary to bishops, a judge, and anotary, wrote two little allegorical poems, theDocumenti d'amore andDel reggimento e dei costumi delle donne. The poems today are generally studied not as literature, but for historical context. A fourth allegorical work was theIntelligenza, which is sometimes attributed to Compagni but is probably only a translation of French poems.[30]
In the 15th century,humanist and publisherAldus Manutius published the Tuscan poets Petrarch and Dante Alighieri (Divine Comedy), creating the model for what became a standard for modern Italian.
Wine is a famous and common produce of Tuscany. The red wineChianti is perhaps the most well-known internationally. Due to the many British tourists who come to the area where Chianti wine is produced this specific area has been nicknamed "Chiantishire".
Between 1851 and 1860, theGrand Duchy of Tuscany, an independent Italian state until 1859 when it joined theUnited Provinces of Central Italy, produced two postage stamp issues which are among the most prizedclassic stamp issues of the world, and include the most valuable Italian stamp. The Grand Duchy of Tuscany was an independent Italian state from 1569 to 1859 but was occupied by France from 1808 to 1814. The Duchy comprised most of the present area of Tuscany, and its capital was Florence. In December 1859, the Grand Duchy officially ceased to exist, being joined to the duchies ofModena andParma to form the United Provinces of Central Italy, which was annexed by theKingdom of Sardinia a few months later in March 1860. In 1862 it became part of Italy and joined the Italian postal system.
The gross domestic product (GDP) of the region was 117.5 billion euros in 2018, accounting for 6.7% of Italy's economic output. GDP per capita adjusted for purchasing power was 31,400 euros or 104% of the EU27 average in the same year. The GDP per employee was 106% of the EU average.[32]
The subsoil in Tuscany is relatively rich in mineral resources, with iron ore, copper, mercury, andlignite mines, the famoussoffioni (fumarole) atLarderello, and the vast marble mines inVersilia. Although its share is falling all the time, agriculture still contributes to the region's economy. In the region's inland areas cereals, potatoes, olives, and grapes are grown. The swamplands, which used to be marshy, now produce vegetables, rice, tobacco, beets, and sunflowers.[11]
One of the traditional foundations of the industrial sector is mining, given the abundance of underground resources. Also of note are textiles and clothing, chemicals and pharmaceuticals, steel and metalworking, glass and ceramics, and printing and publishing. Smaller areas specialising in manufacturing and craft industries are found in the hinterland: the leather and footwear area in the south-west part of the province of Florence, the hot-house plant area inPistoia, the ceramics and textile industries in thePrato area, scooters, and motorcycles inPontedera, and the processing of timber for the manufacture of wooden furniture in theCascina area. The heavy industries (mining, steel, and mechanical engineering) are concentrated along the coastal strip (Livorno andPisa areas), where there are also important chemical industries. Also of note are the marble (Carrara area) and paper industries (Lucca area).[11]
Tuscany has many small and picturesque villages; 29 of them have been selected byI Borghi più belli d'Italia (English:The most beautiful Villages of Italy),[36] a non-profit private association of small Italian towns of strong historical and artistic interest[37] that was founded on the initiative of the Tourism Council of the National Association of Italian Municipalities.[38]
The fashion and textile industry are the pillars of the Florentine economy. In the 15th century, Florentines were working with luxury textiles such as wool and silk. Today the greatest designers in Europe utilize the textile industry in Tuscany, and especially Florence. A large plant of production is happening in the town ofPrato.
Italy has one of the strongest textile industries in Europe, accounting for approximately one-quarter of European production. Its turnover is over 25 billion euros. It is the third largest supplier of clothing after China and Japan. The Italian fashion industry generates 60% of its turnover abroad.[39]
Florence Airport is the second-busiest airport. It served 3.5 million passengers in 2024.
Marina di Campo Airport is a small airport serving the island ofElba. The airport provides direct routes to the Italian mainland which are operated bySilver Air.[41]
The population density of Tuscany, with 159 inhabitants per square kilometre (410/sq mi) in 2025, is below the national average (195/km2 or 510/sq mi). This is due to the low population density of the provinces of Arezzo, Siena, and especially Grosseto (50/km2 or 130/sq mi). The highest density is found in the province of Prato (675/km2 or 1,750/sq mi), followed by the provinces of Pistoia, Livorno, Florence and Lucca, peaking in the cities of Florence (more than 3,500/km2 or 9,100/sq mi), Livorno, Prato, Viareggio, Forte dei Marmi and Montecatini Terme (all with a population density of more than 1,000/km2 or 2,600/sq mi). The territorial distribution of the population is closely linked to the socio-cultural and, more recently, economic and industrial development of Tuscany.[11]
Accordingly, the least densely populated areas are those where the main activity is agriculture, unlike the others where, despite the presence of several large industrial complexes, the main activities are connected with tourism and associated services, alongside many small firms in the leather, glass, paper and clothing sectors.[11]
Italians make up 93% of the total population. Starting from the 1980s, the region has attracted a large flux of immigrants, particularly from China, Romania, Albania and Morocco. There is also a significant community of British and American residents. As of 2008[update], the Italian national institute of statistics ISTAT estimated that 275,149 foreign-born immigrants live in Tuscany, equal to 7% of the total regional population.
Tuscany is a stronghold of the centre-leftDemocratic Party (PD), forming withEmilia-Romagna,Umbria andMarche the so-called Italian political "Red Quadrilateral". Since 1970, Tuscany has been continuously governed by left-wing governments.
^Military Channel (Discovery Network) documentary seriesRome: Power and Glory, episode "The Grasp of an Empire", copyright unknown, rebroadcast 11–12:00 hrs EDST, 29 June 2009.
^Neri, Diana (2012).Gli etruschi tra VIII e VII secolo a.C. nel territorio di Castelfranco Emilia (MO) (in Italian). All'Insegna del Giglio.ISBN9788878145337.Il termine "Villanoviano" è entrato nella letteratura archeologica quando, a metà dell '800, il conte Gozzadini mise in luce le prime tombe ad incinerazione nella sua proprietà di Villanova di Castenaso, in località Caselle (BO). La cultura villanoviana coincide con il periodo più antico della civiltà etrusca, in particolare durante i secoli IX e VIII a.C. e i termini di Villanoviano I, II e III, utilizzati dagli archeologi per scandire le fasi evolutive, costituiscono partizioni convenzionali della prima età del Ferro.
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