World Heritage Identification Number: 1026
World Heritage since: 2004
Category: Cultural Heritage
Transboundary Heritage: No
Endangered Heritage: No
Country: 🇮🇹 Italy
Continent: Europe
UNESCO World Region: Europe and North America
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A Cultural Landscape: The Val d'Orcia of Tuscany, Italy
The Val d'Orcia, located in the heart of Tuscany, Italy, is a testament to the harmonious blend of natural beauty, human ingenuity, and artistic inspiration that characterizes this region. Inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2004, the Val d'Orcia offers a unique insight into the evolution of Renaissance agricultural landscapes and their enduring influence on art, culture, and tourism.
More to come…UNESCO Description of the World Heritage Site
The landscape of Val d’Orcia is part of the agricultural hinterland of Siena, redrawn and developed when it was integrated in the territory of the city-state in the 14th and 15th centuries to reflect an idealized model of good governance and to create an aesthetically pleasing picture. The landscape’s distinctive aesthetics, flat chalk plains out of which rise almost conical hills with fortified settlements on top, inspired many artists. Their images have come to exemplify the beauty of well-managed Renaissance agricultural landscapes. The inscription covers: an agrarian and pastoral landscape reflecting innovative land-management systems; towns and villages; farmhouses; and the Roman Via Francigena and its associated abbeys, inns, shrines, bridges, etc.
UNESCO Justification of the World Heritage Site
Criterion (iv): The Val d’Orcia is an exceptional reflection of the way the landscape was re-written in Renaissance times to reflect the ideals of good governance and to create an aesthetically pleasing pictures.
Criterion (vi): The landscape of the Val d’Orcia was celebrated by painters from the Siennese School, which flourished during the Renaissance. Images of the Val d’Orcia, and particularly depictions of landscapes where people are depicted as living in harmony with nature, have come to be seen as icons of the Renaissance and have profoundly influenced the development of landscape thinking.
Encyclopedia Record: Val d'Orcia
The Val d'Orcia or Valdorcia is a region of Tuscany, central Italy, which extends from the hills south of Siena to Monte Amiata. Its gentle, cultivated hills are occasionally broken by gullies and by towns and villages such as Pienza, Radicofani and Montalcino. Its landscape has been depicted in works of art from Renaissance painting to modern photography.Additional Site Details
Area: 61,187.96 hectares
(vi) — Directly associated with events or living traditions
Coordinates: 43.06666667 , 11.55
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© Stefanoacetelli, CC BY-SA 3.0 Resized from original. (This derivative is under the same CC BY-SA license.)
