Casale Marittimo

Beneath today's village lies one from almost three thousand years ago. At Casalvecchio, when Volterra was growing and sending people down the Cecina valley, there was a village of huts with, in its midst, a building for assemblies and ceremonies, a point of reference for the whole district. From the nearby necropolis come two stone statues that are among the oldest free-standing sculptures found in Italy. And a tholos tomb, discovered in 1896 at Poggiarella, was taken apart stone by stone and rebuilt in the garden of the archaeological museum of Florence, where it still stands.

The village changed its name twice in half a century: it was Casale nelle Maremme, in 1862 it became Casale di Val di Cecina, and only in 1900 did it take the present one. It cares about that: in 2021 it printed a postcard with a special postmark to celebrate 121 years of the name. It cared before, too: at the plebiscite of 1860 on annexation to the Kingdom of Sardinia, out of 320 voters a single vote was against.