Who we are

Near the town of Cortona, "Monastero S.Silvestro" is a sprawling farmhouse with marvelous panoramic views of Cortona and the Chiana Valley and the distant mountain of Amiata. The main farmhouse has been divided into 8 apartments, each decorated in traditional Tuscan style. The property accommodates 30 divided into the eight apartments, all very spacious and very comfortable.  The property has extensive gardens and a large, well-kept swimming pool with a beach. In the garden each apt. is furnished with garden umbrella, tables and chairs and equipped with barbecue. At disposal the laundry and iron. In "Monastero S. Silvestro" there is, for group, a main hall, excellent for banquets, meetings or party, with kitchen complete with fireplace.

Monastero S.Silvestro is near Florence, Rome, Assisi, Perugia, Siena, Urbino, Lake Trasimeno, Chianti and other typical Italian towns. Many cultural activities take place in Cortona, for example the Show of National Market of Ancient Pieces of Furniture (last week of August/first week of September), the Tournament of Archidado (Juin), the National Fair of  copper (April), theatrical activities and concerts throughout the year which take place in the open-air garden in the summer months, and many more activities.

Historical Outline

On the slopes of Cortona, Monastero San Silvestro, was one of the many Benedictine monasteries built in the 13th century in the centre of Italy, which had a brief life with the arrival of the Dominican and Franciscan mendicant orders.  Due to scarce documentation, it is difficult to give in-depth information, but from the 14th century there are archival sources that allow us to reconstruct the vicissitudes of this religious building.  Documentation on the ‘Pastoral Visits’ (visits that the archbishops had to make on an annual basis to all the churches on the territory, both as a doctrinal and as an administrative control) is preserved at the Historical Diocesan Archives of Cortona.  The most ancient ‘Pastoral Visit’ dates back to 1337 wherein our Ecclesia Sancti Silvestri is found.  In fact, San Silvestro had the fortune of not being abandoned and, from a Benedictine monastery, was transformed into a parish church with an oratory, where, every year on the 31st December – feast of San Silvestro – the parish feast was celebrated.  In 1515, Cardinal Passerini (1469-1529), in order to augment the income of the Chapter in which he presided included Ecclesia Sancti Silvestri among the possessions of the Administration Chapter.  As a result, San Silvestro started its decline: deprived of its own parish (handed over to the nearby church of S. Marco in Villa) and of its community, it slowly became neglected.  On one of his last holy visits, the Bishop Monsignor Niccolò Baldacchini Laparelli declared : ‘(and) in the deed of the holy visit to the church of S. Silvestro situated in S. Marco in Villa this day 28 August of the year 1815, declared and decreed to the Most Reverend Cathedral Chapter of Cortona to immediately reinstate the Church of S. Silvestro into an antique parish and make decent and suitable for Divine  worship, (and).’
In 1830, the Chapter preferred to alienate it and it became the property of the family in which it has remained to this day, and which has been transformed into a country house.  The adaptation from that of a religious building to that of sharecropping (with a precise regulation imposed on by the Tuscan Grand Duke, already from the mid-18th century, by means of a habitat for the animals on the ground floor, civil residence on the first floor and turret for the dovecot on the roof) in the 19th century consisted of substantial internal modifications.  In 1983 the building was classified as one of the fifty Tuscan cottages worthy of mention for its architectural peculiarity (cfr. Tullio Seppilli (a cura di), Case Contadine in Valdichiana,  NGed. Firenze, 1983, pp.182-185; Amministrazione Provinciale di Arezzo, Case Coloniche della Valdichiana, Grafiche Badiali, Arezzo, 1987, p.206; Guido Biffoli, La Casa nella Campagna Toscana, Valecchi Editore, Firenze, 1989, p.218).  In 2002, Monastero San Silvestro was completely restored and renovated, leaving the traces of history intact.