Tuscany's rolling hills are garlanded with cypress trees, lush
vines and olive groves that make way here and there for sleepy
villages and medieval hill towns. The area rests languidly in the
middle of the Italian peninsula, with parts stretching to the
coastline of the Tyrrhenian Sea. Snaking through the Tuscan
landscape from Florence to Pisa and soaking its thirsty banks is
the Arno River. Akin to the gentle flow of a river is the ebb of
life in the region. People work in the fields in much the same way
their ancestors did before them, producing some of Italy's finest
wines and olive oils. From this same landscape emerges a profusion
of art and architecture that has fashioned Italy onto the cultural
map. Tuscany was the birthplace of the Renaissance, a period of
unprecedented innovation in art, architecture and humanist
scholarship. The grandeur of the High Renaissance was enjoyed
during the Medici family's reign when they commissioned the art and
architecture that lives on within the elegant precincts of
Florence.
