How does someone become the face of a town? The question has been on my mind since I stayed in Ponte d’Arbia and saw a promotional brochure for Buonconvento. I imagine it’s difficult for a place like Buonconvento to differentiate itself from scores of other pretty, compact, Italian towns. So you’ve got a charming historic center, old town walls, delicious restaurants, and local craft shops? Congrats, you’re every Italian town.
Everyone needs a differentiating factor, I suppose. It’s like kids applying to college today. A solid GPA, a couple dedicated extracurriculars, and a good essay isn’t going to cut it. What’s the wow factor? What’s the narrative hook?
For Buonconvento, I learned, the town decided to throw in its lot with what must have been an unsavory group in its day. As the brochure explained, Buonconvento “commemorates the ancient local family that produced the renowned heretics Lelio Socini and his grandson Fausto, who challenged the doctrines of the Church of Rome. It was in this precise location that Socinianism, the theological-moral doctrine developed and systematized in the 16th century, was born.”
Come to Buonconvento–the town of heretics you’ve never heard of! That’s not getting you into Harvard, I’m afraid.
Still, I was curious, so I dove into Socinianism, which became a rationalist spin on Unitarianism, denying the Trinity, the godliness of Jesus (who they viewed as an exceptional human being, given divine authority, but not divinity itself), the concept of original sin (instead, they argued, human are born morally neutral and make choices for good or ill), God’s omniscience (if God knew every possibility, it would render free will obsolete), and the infallibility of scripture. Where Fausto Sozzini’s uncle, Lelio Sozzini, emphasized the anti-Trinitarian component, Fausto took aim at Christian doctrine that he viewed as irrational or unbiblical. The problem lay less with scripture, in his view, and more with the faulty human interpretations of it. A rational mind could better tap into the intended meaning.
While Socinianism thus has its roots in Siena–it should be noted, neither Fausto nor Lelio actually lived in Buonconvento, though their ancestors did–it never flowered in the region. For that, Fausto needed to move away, finding richer soil in Poland. Ultimately, though, the Polish government turned on the Socinians, expelling them from the country. Many ended up in England and the Netherlands, where they, in time, influenced the growing Unitarian and Enlightenment movements.
Of course, Buonconvento was yesterday. Still I had heresy on my mind as I set forth from Gallina in the dark. It remains fascinating that the actions and beliefs that could mark one as the greatest threat to Christianity at many points over the years were those perpetrated by fellow Christians, who differed on matters of dogma. The word “heretic” immediately conjures up all kinds of negative sentiments, and yet, from the outside looking in, there’s nothing troublesome about Socinian views. Indeed, I could find myself nodding along at times as I read through their positions.
The biggest ascent of the Via Francigena since the Apennines kicked in after I wound through the hills and crossed the Via Cassia. The castle town of Radicofani has dominated the horizon for the past day. Even this morning, it still seems discouragingly far away. And yet, once the uphill begins, it speeds past with relative ease. After all those steps on the Ligurian coast, this can’t touch me!
And in Radicofani, the next dubious face of a town awaits. Because that fortress isn’t associated with a knight in shining armor, or an illustrious lord. Rather, it was the home of a 13th and 14th-century brigand–Ghino di Tacco.
Of course, as you might expect, Ghino was no ordinary villain. He was of noble blood, born into the Cacciaconti Monacheschi Pecorai family, one of Siena’s most important lineages. Likely due to onerous taxation, though, his father, the Ghibelline Count Tacco di Ugolino, went bad, and Ghino embraced the new family business. The Sienese government couldn’t truck such behavior, though, and before long the whole gang was captured. The adults, including Ghino’s father and uncle, were executed.
This hardly redirected Ghino to the straight and narrow. On the contrary, he dialed up the aggression. Banished from the Siena Republic, he fled to Radicofani. Before his arrival, the region was considered impenetrable, almost uninhabitable, and the location was tricky, sitting right on the line between Siena and the Papal States. That suited Ghino just fine, though, and he established his lair on this mountaintop. He targeted travelers on the Via Francigena.
But again, Ghino was no ordinary brigand. He had a Robin Hood quality, never bothering the poor, and always leaving his wealthy targets with enough money leftover to survive.
Over the years that followed, he only grew in fame, as is reflected in the prominent sources that share his adventures. For example, Dante, in The Divine Comedy, relates that Ghino traveled to Rome with his 400 men in order to find the judge that ordered his father’s execution–and proceeded to decapitate the man! Later on, as described in Boccaccio’s Decameron, Ghino encountered the Abbot of Cluny on his return trip home from the Vatican. The abbot had made the fateful mistake of stopping to bathe in the nearby thermal waters, which left him vulnerable to Ghino’s brigands. Ghino had the abbot imprisoned in the fortress at Radicofani, feeding him only bread and dried beans–which, I should acknowledge, is pretty close to my dinner on some days. As it happens, though, this diet cured the abbot of the ills he had hoped to recuperate from in the spa. In gratitude, we’re told, the abbot persuaded the pope to pardon Ghino.
This is, admittedly, an easier narrative to sell to tourists than one involving failed heretics. Congrats, Radicofani! You’re getting into New York University.
One might expect the walk from Radicofani to be a relentless descent, but it has some surprising ascents mixed in, rolling gradually back towards the valley. Finally, at the bottom, the route intersects the Via Cassia in the village of Ponte a Rigo. Once, there was a much-valued bar located here. Now, there’s nothing beyond a small pilgrim rest area (fortunately including a fountain). Another change from the past is that the official Via Francigena today proceeds onward along the Via Cassia, on a footpath that runs parallel to the highway. By contrast, the old way backtracks briefly on the Cassia and then swings wide, eventually leading to the small fortified town of Proceno. I gladly opted for the latter. It’s a luxury of being able to tackle extra kilometers, as the farm country this longer approach winds through is quite lush, even in September, and Proceno itself is a charming spot. As my host, Claudio, led me to the pilgrim hostel in the converted palace that now houses the town government, he explained that Proceno mostly gets bike pilgrims these days, and only 300 pilgrims total overnight in the town. I had the hostel to myself.
And who does Proceno get to claim? Its lesser standing is reflected, perhaps, in that figure being Saint Agnes of Montepulciano, as opposed to Agnes of Proceno. Nonetheless, Proceno gets partial credit.
Agnes was born in Gracciano to a noble Tuscan family around 1268. From an early age, she declared to her parents that she wished to give her life to God. She visited various convents with her mother, and at one point they were passing a brothel when a flock of crows suddenly descended on Agnes, pecking and scratching her. Her mother took this as a sign–demonic forces lashing out against her daughter’s purity. Undeterred, Agnes soon after joined the monastery of the “sorelle del sacco” in Montepulciano.
By the age of 14, Agnes had already established her reputation as a holy figure, and was sent to a new convent in Proceno, where she soon after was elevated to abbess–before she was even 15. She won over the townspeople, becoming known far and wide for her virtue. Agnes met this success with elevated humility and maximum sacrifices. She ate only bread and water; she slept on the hard ground, with a stone for a pillow. Among the many miracles she performed around Proceno, the most significant might involve her intervention in support of a man in a neighboring city, who it turns out was possessed by a demon. The moment she entered the town to visit him in his home, the crazed demon caused the man’s body to roll violently from side to side. As the story goes, as she approached the house, “she heard the cowardly and despondent whimpering of the devil: ‘I am not able to stand, because the virgin Agnes has entered!’”
While she eventually moved back to Montepulciano, founding a convent on the spot of that crow attack from her childhood, and performing a host of additional miracles, she made a lasting impression on Proceno that endures to this day. Proceno gets the Claremont school of its choice.
So there you go. A heretic, a brigand, and a saint walk into a bar. Whose story do you want to hear first?
