MONTALCINO, Diocese of. - City in the province of Siena, seat of a diocese, with territory partly in the province of Siena and partly in that of Grosseto. It borders on the dioceses of Siena, Pienza and Chiusi, Sovana and Pitigliano, and Grosseto.
It has an area of 800 sq. km., with a population of 40,000 inhabitants, of whom 39,980 are Catholics. It has 35 parishes served by 41 diocesan priests and 4 regulars, 1 male religious community and 12 female ones (Ann. Pont., 1951, p. 275).
Before Pius II established the diocese of M., its territory had from the most ancient times been divided among the dioceses of Grosseto, Chiusi and Arezzo. Nevertheless, from as early as the 11th century the pontiffs had granted to the abbots of the monastery of St. Antimo, eight kilometers from M., an almost episcopal jurisdiction over the churches of M. and its surroundings. In fact the parish church of the Most Holy Savior, later erected into a cathedral, was by Pius II ranked among those nullius dioecesis. The abbots of Abbadia St. Salvatore exercised the same jurisdiction over the towns of the Amiata.
M., together with Corsignano, his birthplace, which he rebuilt under the name of Pienza, was elevated to a diocese by Pius II with a bull of 15 February 1462, dated from the Baths of Petriolo near Siena, where the Pope was seeking relief for his failing health. The humanist Pontiff loved this hill, where in his youth he had often stayed as a guest of the Friars of St. Francis, and where he counted a few learned friends, such as Bernardo Lapini, a commentator on Petrarch. In his Commentarii he calls M. amplum et nobile oppidum. A single bishop originally governed the two dioceses of Pienza and M.; afterwards they were separated, then again united, then again, and definitively, separated in 1600.
The first bishop of the two united dioceses was Giovanni Cinughi, transferred from Chiusi; the first of the Montalcino diocese, separated in 1600, was Camillo Borghese, later archbishop of Siena. The diocese, however, thus on its own, proved rather small, and therefore in 1772 there were assigned to it by Pope Clement XIV another 14 parishes, namely those that the diocese of Grosseto had on this side of the river Ombrone. The number of parishes thus rose to 35, as it is at present.
Among the 29 bishops who have sat on the chair of M., special mention is due to Agostino Patrizi Piccolomini, Pope Pius III, who as cardinal was its apostolic administrator, Antonio Bichi, later cardinal, Fabio De Vecchi, to whom the enlargement of the episcopal palace and the country Palace of Castelnuovo dell'Abbate are owed, Giuseppe-Maria Borgognini and Bernardino Ciani, learned canonists, Giuseppe Pecci, who in 1788 established the Seminary, Paolo Bertolozzi, a man of letters and Rosminian philosopher, and Donnino Donnini, who passed to the see of Arezzo. - See plate XCI.
