Passion for Wine: 700 Years of History
The history of the Frescobaldi family begins around the year 1000,during the same time period as the birth of the banking industry of Medieval Florence. The Frescobaldis quickly became the absolute protagonists of political and economic life earning them the right to the title ‘treasurers to the English Crown’.
They inscribed their name in the history of Florence commissioning grand public and architectural works such as the Santa Trinità bridge on the river Arno, and the construction of the Church of Santo Spirito designed by Brunelleschi. Among the most illustrious representatives of the family, Dino Frescobaldi played an important role: poet of the dolce stil-novo, he was celebrated for having recovered and returned to his friend in exile, Dante Alighieri, the first cantos of the Divine Comedy, allowing Dante to continue his work. Gerolamo Frescobaldi, an early composer of Baroque music, is still remembered as one of its most influential representatives and created works of great notoriety.
The family’s start in wine production is documented at the beginning of the year 1300 at the historic estate of Tenuta di Castiglioni in Val di Pesa, southwest of Florence. From the beginning, the family has demanded that their wines be of quality and that they reflect the uniqueness of their terroirs, and by the beginning of the 1400s great Renaissance artists such as Donatello and Michelozzo Michelozzi had become faithful clients. A century later the Frescobaldi wines were served at the tables of the Papal Court and the English Court of Henry the Eighth.
