Florence exists partly thanks to a meeting held here. In 1260, after the Ghibelline victory at Montaperti, the winners gathered at Empoli and proposed to raze Florence to the ground and scatter its people across this plain: Farinata degli Uberti opposed them alone, and the city was saved — Dante gives him credit for it in the Inferno. The name, on the other hand, does not come from emporium, as was long believed: more probably from a Germanic personal name, Impo. In the Tabula Peutingeriana Empoli is marked as In Portu, a river port on the Arno where the salt road from Volterra also crossed.
Empoli gave art one of its revolutionaries: Jacopo Carucci, called Pontormo, born in the village of Pontorme in 1494 — his birthplace can be visited. And it gave music a giant: Ferruccio Busoni, born in 1866, celebrated by the study centre that bears his name. The collegiate church of Sant'Andrea, with its Romanesque front in white and green marble, is a reminder that Tuscany is at home here. For a century the town blew the verde Empoli: the glass of demijohns and bottle-green goblets, now told by the glass museum. During the German occupation the Nazis shot twenty-nine people in the square that today bears the date of that massacre. The Thursday market and the position — Florence, Pisa and the Chianti half an hour away — do the rest.
Chiesa di San Martino · Chiesa di Santa Maria · Chiesa di Santo Stefano and 2 more
Bistecca alla Fiorentina
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Next up: Saint Andrew the Apostle, patron with a collegiate church overlooking Piazza dei Leoni, Monday 30 November
Nearest airport: Firenze Peretola, 23 km away
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📅 Every year, on 30 November
Empoli celebrates Saint Andrew the Apostle on 30 November; the collegiate church dedicated to him, recorded since the 5th century, dominates Piazza Farinata degli Uberti, known to the people of Empoli as Piazza dei Leoni, and holds a 14th-century triptych by Lorenzo di Bicci.
Chiesa di San Martino The Romanesque church of Pontorme, with panels by Giovanni Toscani and a terracotta Madonna of debated attribu Chiesa di Santa Maria The Franciscan convent at the junction of the roads to Pisa and Lucca, with works by Botticini and Sogliani. Chiesa di Santo Stefano The Augustinian church of Empoli, with what remains of Masolino's frescoes and their sinopie. Collegiata di Sant'Andrea Empoli's collegiate church museum, with works by Masolino, Filippo Lippi, Lorenzo Monaco and the Rossellino. Santuario della Madonna del Pozzo Empoli's sanctuary «outside» the walls, built around a fresco that survived a fire, with portico and octagonal Straight-line distances from the town centre. Tap a point to open its page.
The closest destinations covered by our editors, with straight-line distance.
