SOVANA-PITIGLIANO, DIOCESE OF
In the province of Grosseto, it covers an area of 2,000 km² and has a population of 60,000, of whom 59,000 are Catholics, distributed across 51 parishes served by 69 diocesan priests and 12 religious; it has a seminary, 4 male religious communities and 17 female (*Ann. Pont.* 1953, p. 407).
The diocese of Sovana-Pitigliano, suffragan of Siena, has its minor seminary in Pitigliano; for the philosophical and theological courses it relies on the regional major seminary of S. Maria della Quercia (Viterbo). It comprises 9 municipalities, 8 of which are in the province of Grosseto: Pitigliano, Castell'Azzara, Manciano, Porto Ercole, Roccalbegna, Semproniano, Scansano; one is in the province of Siena: Piancastagnolo.
**Sovana** (hamlet of the municipality of Sorano), in the province of Grosseto, at 289 m above sea level: 729 inhabitants (census of 4 December 1951). Its original Etruscan name was *Siana*; as the Roman *Siana*, it was an important Etruscan centre in the 7th–6th centuries BC. It then experienced a period of decline, from which it recovered in the 3rd century BC when, as a municipium, it came under Roman rule. It was besieged and destroyed by the Lombards; yet the fact that it already had its own bishops in the 7th century suggests that the city rose again from its ruins. A new era of splendour followed under the Aldobrandeschi, a family almost certainly of Lombard origin, which claimed descent from King Ildeprand (736–44) and which by around 1000 already held extensive estates in the Amiana and S. Fiora regions. At the end of the 13th century it passed, through a marriage of female descent, to the Orsini, who retained possession until 1410, definitively losing it in 1431 after a brief period under Sienese rule. Returning to Siena, it subsequently came under the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, whose rulers sought to halt the decline caused especially by malaria. Sovana was called the “city of Jeremiah” precisely because of its state of abandonment and ruin, which in 1672 led to the transfer of the bishop’s residence to Pitigliano. It is interesting to note the boundaries of the dioceses in this territory, which was once part of the heterogeneous lands of the Aldobrandeschi estates, where around 1000 the bishops of Castro (later transferred to Acquapendente), Massa Marittima, Volterra, Siena, Chiusi, and the more recent dioceses of Grosseto, Montefiascone, Corneto (Tarquinia), Montalcino, Pienza and Città della Pieve exercised jurisdiction.
According to Ughelli, the first bishop of Sovana was Tadino; but others give Maurizio, who in 680 subscribed to the Sixth Ecumenical Council of Constantinople.
Sovana preserves few Etruscan remains: notable is a necropolis displaying a variety of chamber tombs. The cathedral (SS. Peter and Paul) was restored in the 11th, 12th and 14th centuries, yet retains its Romanesque structure; its façade is covered by the canons’ house. The interior, grand but austere, has three naves and preserves the tomb of St Mamilian, seventh bishop of Palermo, exiled during the Vandal invasion of Gaiseric in 445 and who died in Sovana in 460. A church dedicated to the saint once stood on the site, built over the remains of a Roman temple; only ruins remain. The patrons of Sovana are SS. Mamilian and Gregory VII (Ildebrand, son of Bonizo), born near Sovana.
**Pitigliano**, a town in the province of Grosseto, 85 km distant, at 919 m above sea level: present population 5,760, legal population 5,565 (census of 4 November 1951). It stands in a very picturesque position on the edge of cliffs. Very scant are the records of Etruscan and Roman Pitigliano, on whose ruins the present town arose. With its territory, it was spared from barbarian incursions and then belonged to the Aldobrandeschi, followed by the Orsini, who, having lost Sovana, took the title of Counts of Pitigliano. Under them Pitigliano became the most important centre and capital of the Maremma county. In the 16th century the rapid decline of this family began; after various lordships and vicissitudes, in 1604 Pitigliano passed definitively to the Grand Dukes of Tuscany. As early as the 15th century a numerous Jewish colony settled in Pitigliano, which had its own synagogue; many later moved to Florence and Livorno. In 1590 the ancient church of S. Maria was raised to the status of a collegiate church, rebuilt from its foundations by Count Niccolò III; then, in response to the appeals of Grand Duke Leopold II, Gregory XVI by a bull of 11 January 1844 declared Pitigliano a city, elevated the collegiate church to cathedral status of SS. Peter and Paul, and transferred its chapter there. The last bishop of Sovana, Barzellotti (700th in the series), was the first to bear the title Bishop of Sovana and Pitigliano.
Among the monuments of Pitigliano stands out the Palazzo Orsini, dating from the 14th century with 15th-century remodelling, damaged during the popular revolt against the Orsini in January 1561. The cathedral (now SS. Peter and Paul) has a Baroque façade, with on the left a characteristic three-tiered bell tower that diminishes in size as it rises; its interior was renovated in the 16th century.
with on the left a characteristic three-tiered bell tower that diminishes in size as it rises; its interior was renovated in the 16th century.