What is Cetona known for?

Marchese Chiappino Vitelli bought the town from Cosimo I in 1556 and reshaped it around the Renaissance Piazza Garibaldi at the foot of the medieval grid. 1,148-meter ridge above the borgo, dividing the Val d'Orcia from the Val di Chiana, with Paleolithic caves on the southwestern flank. Cave complex on Monte Cetona with Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Age occupation, and a hermitage with Cola Petruccioli frescoes nearby.

When is the best time to visit Cetona?

Apr–Oct. April through June and September into October are the months Cetona keeps its calmest pace, the wooded slopes of Monte Cetona green or rust depending on the half. July and August are hot in the centro storico but the mountain trails above 800 meters stay cool. The Mostra del Tartufo, dedicated to the local white truffles, runs the second weekend of November in Piazza Garibaldi. November through March is quiet, most trattorie open only on weekends, and the Eremo di Belverde in winter mist, half-hidden under the travertine cliff, is the photograph the borgo's photographers most keep coming back for.

Cetona is a comune in the province of Siena, Tuscany region of Italy, about 62 kilometers from Perugia.

How do I get to Cetona?

From Perugia, Cetona is roughly 62 km by road.

Tuscany · Siena

Cetona

A medieval borgo, sold by Cosimo I to the Vitelli in 1556 and the centro storico still shaped by their fortress reconstruction.

Known for

VITELLI
Marchese Chiappino Vitelli bought the town from Cosimo I in 1556 and reshaped it around the Renaissance Piazza Garibaldi at the foot of the medieval grid.
MONTE CETONA
1,148-meter ridge above the borgo, dividing the Val d'Orcia from the Val di Chiana, with Paleolithic caves on the southwestern flank.
BELVERDE
Cave complex on Monte Cetona with Mesolithic, Neolithic and Bronze Age occupation, and a hermitage with Cola Petruccioli frescoes nearby.

When to visit

Best · Apr–Oct

Best
Hot or crowded
Quiet
Mostly closed

The festa: Stefano, 26 December

Why come

The town sits on the western flank of a ridge at the meeting point of Toscana, Umbria and Lazio, where the mountain divides the Val d'Orcia from the Val di Chiana. The medieval comune passed between Siena, Orvieto and Perugia before falling to Siena in the late fourteenth century, and it was Cosimo I who later sold it whole to a marchese. The fortress at the top of the grid and the square laid out below it are two halves of the same Renaissance move: a private residence replacing a garrison at the summit, a flat civic stage opened up at the base.

Above the town, in the woods, the hermitage and the caves belong to a much older layer, human use of the mountain reaching back to the Mesolithic, long before any comune or marchese laid claim to it. What the town adds up to is a settlement built in tiers: a prehistoric mountain, a contested medieval center, and a Renaissance overlay that reorganized the base of the hill without touching what stood above it.

The Sunday letter

We haven’t written Cetona’s letter yet.

One town every Sunday, with the photo, the food, the festa. Be there when this one comes up. Free, by Peter & Sophia from Pietrasanta.

What to see

Piazza Garibaldi
Elliptical square at the foot of the medieval grid, flat and open where the streets above it climb steeply. The civic stage of the borgo, still the first thing that orients a visitor.
Rocca di Cetona
Fortress at the top of the centro storico, its walls and keep still standing though the interior became a private residence rather than a garrison.
Convento di San Francesco
Franciscan convent below the borgo, founded in 1212, with a single-nave church and a small cloister still in religious use.
Eremo di Santa Maria a Belverde
Hermitage in the woods on Monte Cetona, reached by a marked path, holding frescoes by Cola Petruccioli of Orvieto inside a fourteenth-century structure.
Grotte di Belverde
Cave complex documented since the Mesolithic, with Paleolithic and Bronze Age layers, open seasonally with guided tours.

The slow-trip planner

Building a trip? Find where Cetona fits in a slow Italy circuit.

Answer five questions. We will shape a geographically coherent slow trip from the 1,000 Italian towns most travelers skip. Yours to save and share.

Plan your trip

Through the year

What happens here

Feasts and festivals that come back year after year. We give the month rather than the date, because the date moves and the month rarely does. Check with the source before you plan a journey around one.

Sagra del Bico di Cetonafood festival
usually held across June and July. Borghi Toscana - Eventi
Corsa delle brocche a Cetonahistorical re-enactment
usually held in July. Borghi Toscana - Eventi

Living here

Population 2,488
Off the beaten pathi
Pharmacy in town
Nearest high school over ~30 minutes away
Nearest airport Bologna, 2 h 47 min drive
Regional capital Firenze, 1 h 47 min drive

Tags & datadesignations · numbers · sources

Recognised as

The numbers

Elevation: 384 m
Population: 2,488
Surface area: 53.57 km²

On the map

Google Maps Apple Maps Directions from Perugia

These figures were compiled from public directories — ISTAT, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata — and from the official listings of the guides named on this page. Town details change; verify with official sources before you travel.

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