Castle Castello di Montegufoni Florence Castle Castello di Montegufoni Tuscany Castle Castello di Montegufoni Montespertoli Italy

There are only few areas in the world where nature and man' s work are merged so harmoniously as in Tuscany. If this balance is unfortunately deteriorating around the big urban centres, it is unchanged in the countryside where you can still perceive the "civilized nature" as it has been handed down by medieval and Renaissance Tuscan Painters. From the castle of Montegufoni the ridge of hills seems to withdraw all-around in the blu-tinging distance increasing the sense of wideness; among the large square houses on the tops, of the typical Tuscan habitat, you can see the batlements of other castels marked by a few cypresses over-standing vast, tidy fields gently narrowing into steep, dense thickets." It is a poor, bare countryside, without ostentation of colours, scentless and with no pagan pageantry, but so intimate and familiar to suit well the sensitive and lonely mind" ad Giovanni Papini wrote Visitor of Florence admire the works of the great Renaissance artists, but here you can retrace the exciting, sentimental and moral atmosphere that brought them forth. The Castle still retains some medieval traits which are, anyway, soon and smoothly merged with the refinement and the splendour of the Renaissance. Just beyond the stately, you are struck by the primitive austery of the central courtyard. Soon afterwards in the large saloon where high wide windows let the sunshine in, in the rooms following one anather, the gently terraced gardens, you fell the impression of an austere, yet gentle and lively life.The atmosphere turns thenlighter and more precious in the eighteenth century large drawing-room. What you feel is a direct contact with conflicts of matter and mind and while you long for such a life of authentic relationship and cooperation, you become unexpectedly aware of your own individuality: almost without warning, you have stepped out of the dull everyday mass-life or the notoriety of an illusory limelight and you feel the exciting, yearning contact, the mysterious link with history.