History
LaChiusa
La Chiusa dates back to the Etruscans in 1000 BC–we have several Etruscan tombs on the property. Our land was originally owned by a Roman soldier named Ansano Landucci whose family became members of the nobility in ancient Tuscany. It was passed down generation to generation in his family. Afterwards, a toll and guard complex was built to collect taxes from travelers on the ancient Montefollonico to Montepulciano road in the 800s. In the 1200s the large kitchen was used by area farm houses as a collective kitchen. In in the 1500s it was turned into an olive mill where it was enclosed by 1000s of olive trees–thus the name ” La Chiusa (the closed). It was transformed into a hotel and restaurant in the 1970s.
We make our own olive oil from our trees. We have 6 different types: Leccino, Maremmano, Oreolo, Pendolino, Correggiolo, and Frantoioe. Our trees grow and live in an extraordinary environmental panorama. Cultivated with respect for people, tradition and our territory. We produce an oil with a balanced and authentic flavor of things made with love.
Montefollonico
The village of Montefollonico is located atop a hill between the Valdichiana and the Val d’Orcia. Its foundation dates to the around the year 1000, but many artifacts have been found that attest to some kind of settlements in the area as far back as Prehistory.
The name comes from “Fullonico,” the first mountain settlement near the Conventaccio (Abbey of Cassinese monks dating to the 8th century) which, taking advantage of a nearby “trench,” engaged in follatura, working and dyeing wool. The first fortification dates to the 6th century, when the name changed from Monte a Fullonico to Montefollonico. But at the beginning of the 1200s, the fortified castle, being in a borderland, took on great strategic importance for the Republic of Siena, to whom the town remained loyal for more than a century.
Montefollonico is off the beaten track and has maintained its image as a small village that measures the seasons with the chimes coming from the bell tower. The historic defense walls, largely surviving, enclose small gems of “minor” architecture: the Church of San Leonardo is one of the most important traces of Romanesque architecture in the Sienese territory; the Church of San Bartolomeo dates to the 12th century and is perhaps the oldest in town; and Palazzo della Giustizia bears an oriole on its façade.
