AREZZO, DIOCESE OF. – It remains today the largest diocese in Tuscany, extending over 325 sq km of territory, which includes the upper Arno valley (Casentino), the upper Valdarno as far as San Giovanni Valdarno, and the Val di Chiana. It borders the dioceses of Fiesole, Sarsina, Borgo San Sepolcro, Città di Castello, Cortona, Montepulciano, Chiusi and Pienza, Montalcino, and Siena. The diocese of Arezzo has 215,000 Catholics out of a total population of 220,000; 750 churches, 336 parishes, 355 diocesan priests, and 95 regular clergy. It is a diocese immediately subject to the Supreme Pontiff. The bishop holds the archiepiscopal insignia (pallium and double cross) by perpetual concession granted by Clement XII to Bishop Giovanni Antonio Guadagni (1724–32), later a cardinal and his nephew. The bishop also holds the title of Count of Cesa.
Arezzo is an ancient city. It was one of the most powerful Etruscan city-states, first an adversary and then a faithful ally of Rome. Due to its location on the Via Cassia between Cortona and Florence, it also became an important military station. It flourished in bronze sculpture and, above all, in a refined ceramic art whose products, known as Arezzo ware, were celebrated for their elegance and perfect decorative sense and enjoyed great diffusion. After the fall of the empire and the transient events of the 6th century, Arezzo underwent Lombard domination, then Frankish rule, became part of the March of Tuscany, and finally came under the rule of its bishop-counts (cf. G. Schwartz, *Die Besetzung der Bistümer Reichsitaliens unter den Sächsischen und Salischen Kaisern mit den Listen der Bischöfe 951–1122*, Leipzig 1913, pp. 199–203). In 1098 the commune arose, soon dominated and agitated by the struggles between the powerful Ghibelline families of the Ubertini, Guidi, and Tarlati of Pietramala, who gave the diocese three notable bishops: Guglielmino Ubertini (1248–89), under whose episcopate the Aretines defeated the Sienese at the Battle of Pieve al Toppo (1288; cf. Dante, *Inf.*, XIII, 121), but were then disastrously defeated the following year by the Florentines at the famous Battle of Campaldino, in which Dante also participated (*Purg.*, V, 92), and in which the bishop himself perished; Ildebrandino Guidi (1289–90); and Guido Tarlati (1306–27), who raised the city to its greatest splendor. Soon, however, Arezzo had to submit to Florence (1336); it attempted rebellion but without success, and from the second half of the 14th century onward it definitively entered the orbit of the powerful Florentine republic, following its political fortunes.
Christianity must have reached Arezzo at a relatively early date, given its location along one of the great consular roads; its systematic conversion, however, dates to the 4th century. The series of bishops, preserved in a 11th-century parchment (U. Pasqui, *Documenti per la storia della città di Arezzo*, IV, p. 259), begins with St Satyrus, of the first half of the 4th century. In the 14th–16th centuries, the territory of the diocese was considerably reduced to the benefit of new dioceses: Cortona under John XXII (1325), Pienza and Montalcino under Pius II (1462), Borgo San Sepolcro under Leo X (1520), and Montepulciano under Pius IV (1561). Regarding territory, a long dispute began in the early Middle Ages and lasted for centuries between Arezzo and Siena over jurisdiction over 18 pievi in the Sienese countryside (cf. E. Besta, *Il diritto romano nella contesa tra i vescovi di Siena e di Arezzo*, in *Archivio storico italiano*, 5th ser., 37 [1905], pp. 61 ff.).
NOTABLE PERSONS. – Arezzo has given birth to many illustrious persons, some of the highest order. The principal ones include: Maecenas (d. 8 BC), friend of Augustus and patron of Virgil and Horace; Fra Guittone d’Arezzo (d. 1294), poet; Margaritone (13th cent.), painter; Francesco Petrarca (d. 1374); Spinello Aretino (d. 1410), painter, the most distinguished master, along with Angelo Gaddi, of the Florentine school at the end of the 14th century; Leonardo Bruni (d. 1444), humanist, man of letters, and historian; Angelo Gambiglioni (d. 1451), jurist; Francesco Accolti (d. 1483), philosopher, jurist, poet, and musician; Andrea Contucci (d. 1529), called il Sansovino, from Monte San Savino near Arezzo, sculptor; Pietro Aretino (d. 1556), noted satirical poet; Giorgio Vasari (d. 1574), painter, architect, and writer; Andrea Cesalpino (d. 1603), philosopher, physician, and physiologist, to whom the discovery of the circulation of the blood is attributed; Alessandro del Borro (d. 1656), celebrated captain; Francesco Redi (d. 1698), physician and poet; Pietro Benvenuti (d. 1844), painter; Vittorio Fossombroni (d. 1844), mathematician, economist, and statesman; Antonio Guadagnoli (d. 1858), poet; Gianfrancesco Gamurrini (d. 1923), historian and archaeologist, to whom we owe, among other things, the discovery of the *Peregrinatio Aetheriae*; Giulio Salvadori, from Monte San Savino near Arezzo, critic and poet, d. 1928 in a reputation for holiness, and for whom the process for beatification is underway.
Among the most distinguished ecclesiastical figures are: Guido Monaco, reformer of ecclesiastical chant; Grazia Aretino (d. after 1243), archdeacon and canonist; Fra Benedetto Sinigardi (d. 1292), companion and friend of St Francis, missionary in Greece; Blessed Rainerio de Marianis, Franciscan (d. 1304), to whom Pius VII granted the office and Mass for the Franciscans; Bernardo Dovizi (q.v.) of Bibbiena, called Cardinal Bibbiena (d. 1520), great friend of Leo X and patron of Raphael; Pietro Accolti (d. 1532), cardinal and canonist; Pope Julius III (q.v.), born in Rome of a family originally from Monte San Savino near Arezzo; Blessed Paolo Burali (q.v.), bishop of Piacenza and later cardinal (d. 1570), beatified by Clement XIV in 1772; Francesco Pitigiani (d. 1616), skeptical theologian; the Servant of God Bartolomeo (q.v.) da Salutio, orator, mystic, and poet (d. 1617); St Margaret Redi (d. 1770), granddaughter of the poet Francesco Redi, canonized in 1934; Fr Giuseppe Borghi of Bibbiena (d. 1847), man of letters best known for his sacred hymns.
In the annals of the Arezzo Church, mention must also be made of the death of Blessed Gregory X (q.v.), pope, who died in Arezzo and was buried in the cathedral. In Arezzo, the election of his successor, Blessed Cencio V (q.v.), a Dominican, also took place.
Abbeys and Monasteries. - The diocese of A. has had, and still has, many religious houses and celebrated shrines. Suffice it to recall the Camaldoli (v.), cradle of the Camaldolese hermit monks, founded by St Romuald (v.) around the year 1012; the monastery and shrine of La Verna (v.), where St Francis received the stigmata (1224); MAGGIORASCATO (v.), cradle of the Olivetan Benedictine monks, Tolomei (v.) with the approval of the bishop of A., Guido Tarlati (1319), when that territory belonged to the diocese of A., later passing to the diocese of Pienza (1462); the shrine of Santa Maria del Sasso near Bibbiena (Dominican), whose church is recorded as early as 1204; the shrine of Santa Maria delle Vertighe (Franciscan), with a church rebuilt in the early 1500s. Among the abbeys and monasteries of the diocese that have now disappeared, the following may be recalled: the Aretine monastery, first called San Benedetto, then of the SS. Flora e Lucilla, founded in 770, whose buildings still exist (cloister attributed to Sangallo, refectory and church with paintings by Vasari); the Aretine monastery of Santa Maria in Gradibus, of the Camaldolese, existing before 1500; the monastery of San Gennaro at Capolona, of the Benedictines, founded in the 10th century; the monastery of San Salvatore di Selvamonda in Casentino, near the Zenna stream, founded around the year 1000, first for nuns, then for Benedictine monks: from this abbey, later passed to the Camaldolese, depended the priory known as Badia a Tega, near Ortignano in Casentino; the monastery and abbey of the Most Holy Trinity of the Alps, also called Fonte Benedetta, founded at the end of the 10th century above Faltona in Casentino; the monastery of San Fedele di Strumi, near Poppi in Casentino, founded at the end of the 10th century, later passed to the Vallombrosans, of which Callistus III, the antipope at the time of Alexander III (1159-1181), was abbot; the monastery of Santa Maria di Prataglia, today Badia Prataglia, founded by the bishop of A., Elemperto (986-1010); the monastery of San Bartolomeo di Anghiari founded by the Camaldolese in the early years of the 12th century; the monastery of Santa Maria d’Agnano in Val d’Ambra, which already existed at the end of the 12th century, first for Benedictine monks, then for Camaldolese; the monastery of San Pietro a Ruoti, or the famous Badia a Ruoti, founded around 1100, also first for Benedictines and then for Camaldolese; the monastery of San Salvatore di Berardenga, or abbey of Berardenga in Fontebuona, founded in 967; the monastery of San Quirico delle Rose, also called at Nasciano, near Il Pozzo in Val di Chiana, founded by the Camaldolese in the second half of the 12th century; the monastery of Santa Maria di Farneta in Val di Chiana, existing since the early 12th century, now in the territory of the diocese of Cortona; the monastery of Santa Maria in Rofena, in Val d’Ombrona, existing in the 12th century; the monastery of Santa Maria in Sicille near Petroio, now in the diocese of Pienza, inhabited first by Benedictines, then by Camaldolese and passed to the Olivetans in 1443.
Cultural Institutes, Libraries, Archives. - Passing over the general study dealt with elsewhere, among the cultural institutes now existing should be mentioned the Accademia Petrarca of letters, arts and sciences, founded in 1810, with a semi-annual publication of Atti e Memorie. The Aretine libraries and archives are: the library of the Fraternità dei Laici with 79,000 volumes, 160 incunabula and 534 manuscripts; the library of the Accademia Petrarca, with 11,000 volumes and 6 incunabula; the Biblioteca Vasariana with the attached Vasari archive; the library of the episcopal seminary and of the Collegio Piano, with 16,000 volumes, 50 incunabula and 800 manuscripts; and with the attached archive of the Fraternità dei Chierici di Murello. Of great importance is the episcopal archive, to which is joined that of the cathedral chapter of the Duomo, one of the earliest ecclesiastical archives in Italy, both for its antiquity and the richness of its documents.
A. also possesses a museum founded in 1822, with good Etruscan material and many matrices and fragments of Aretine vases; and a municipal picture gallery, arising from the suppression of religious corporations in 1810, with many paintings from suppressed monasteries and especially rich in works by Aretine painters.
Monuments. - The principal monuments of A. consist of its churches, among which we recall: the grand cathedral, in Romanesque-Gothic style, with three naves, containing many fine works of art, erected on the highest point of the city in the 13th-14th centuries, in place of the old cathedral of the 11th century, which stood outside the walls; to it is joined the grand chapel of the Madonna del Conforto, a most venerated shrine; Santa Maria della Pieve, with artistic portals, a celebrated crypt and characteristic bell tower, the most conspicuous Romanesque monument of the city (13th century); the church of San Francesco (14th century), with the famous frescoes by Piero della Francesca; the church of San Domenico (13th century), designed by Niccolò Pisano, according to Vasari; the church of the Santissima Annunziata begun by Bartolomeo della Gatta (1491) and completed by Antonio da Sangallo; the church of the Badia, touched up by Vasari in the mid-16th century, with an attached 15th-century cloister by Giuliano da Maiano; the church of Santa Maria in Gradi, begun in 1592 by Bartolomeo Ammanati; the church of Santa Maria delle Grazie, on the outskirts of the city, begun in 1449 by Domenico di Giovanni called il Fattore, and to which was added, towards the end of the same century, an airy Renaissance-style portico, remarkable for its lightness and grace, attributed to Benedetto da Maiano.
THE UNIVERSITY. — In A. a law school flourished from the early 13th century, the exact origin of which is unknown. It seems to have been due to an emigration of masters and students from Bologna in 1215, as may be inferred from a passage by Roffredo of Benevento, who states that he passed from Bologna to Arezzo and there held a law school (*Proem. in Quaest. Sabbat.*). Denifle demonstrates that Roffredo remained in A. for three years.
The Studium at once acquired renown, and to the teaching of law it added that of
Arezzo, as is evident from the statutes, drawn up in 1255 by the college of professors under the direction of Martino da Fano. These statutes are very brief, among the oldest known: they are of great importance, among other things, for the mention they make of the “repetitors” (a figure placed between the professors and the students), who seem to have been an institution characteristic of the Studium of Arezzo. Published by Lorenzo Guazzesi (*Opere*, II), they were reproduced by Savigny in his *Storia del Diritto Romano* (III, Turin 1857, pp. 263-64). In 1338, following the interdict of Benedict XII against Bologna, other Bolognese professors of canon and civil law moved to Arezzo, where they received a salary of 200 gold florins (cf. *Annali di A.*, in Muratori, *Rerum ital. scriptores*, XXIV, Milan 1738, p. 878).
Having declined due to civil wars, the schools of Arezzo were renewed by Emperor Charles IV, who, by a diploma of 5 May 1355, raised them to the dignity of a *Studium Generale*, «i uxta imperialia privilegia, quae propter civilium guerrarum discrimina dicuntur deperdita». This Studium was later confirmed by the Pope, though unfortunately the text of the bull has been lost. The existence of this bull, however, is attested by a diploma of 1373 from which it appears that the chancellor of the university was the bishop, who based his right on papal documents: «auctoritate apostolica concessa Ecclesiae et Episcopo Aretino».
Later, the Studium again fell into decline, but in 1456 Frederick III revived it, confirming its ancient privileges and granting new ones, such as the power to confer academic degrees, no longer through the bishop but through the gonfaloniere of the city. This, however, did not succeed in reviving the languishing university. When Arezzo passed into Florentine hands, the Florentines, solicitous of the glories of the University of Pisa, which they had renewed, no longer took any interest in the Arezzo Studium, which therefore became extinct in 1470. — See Pl. CXXXIII.
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