A perfect ring of walls and towers that Dante put in the Inferno
Built by Siena in the early thirteenth century as a frontier fortress against Florence, Monteriggioni sits on a small hill along the Via Francigena, enclosed by a circle of walls about 570 metres long with fourteen square towers. Dante saw them from afar and compared them to the giants standing around the pit of Hell.
Inside the walls the village is tiny: a main square with the Romanesque church of Santa Maria Assunta, a few houses, gardens and shops. You can walk along two stretches of the walkway on the walls, with views over the Chianti and the Montagnola Senese. In July a medieval festival brings the fortress back to life.
Tip: pilgrims on the Via Francigena often stop here; the walk to the abbey of Abbadia a Isola, about 4 km away, follows the pilgrim route through the fields.
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