Torre di Terigi

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The high tower, still intact, belonged to the Peruzzi family in the fourteenth century and, in the next century, to the Carucci.

After several changes of ownership it passed to the nuns of Santa Caterina da Siena who had a convent in Florence in Piazza San Marco who held it until the Napoleonic era. In the cartography of 1774 it is documented as torre del Molini, the name of the owners who also owned the villa di Vernalese. In the late nineteenth century it belonged to the Schneiderff.
The structure, which has a hanging cornice made of limestone with ancient decorated tiled windows above, is an example of the best preserved noble houses from the thirteenth century. A lower building rests against it, also attributable to the Middle Ages.
Inside the Torre di Terigi is a fresco, unfortunately worn by time, showing the figure of a noble character (some have recognized it as the image of St. Christopher) and a date that could be read as 1320. On the wall opposite to the fresco is a curious engraving, made at the end of the last century, which reads: “This house was inhabited by the Panichi family P. R. s. this memory was made by Panichi Angiolo/year 1881 on the October 15”. Until the end of the sixties, the complex was inhabited by two families of settlers who worked the farms Terigi I and II.
One of the functions of the tower houses of the countryside was that of ensuring a chain of communications that could even get to the city through various conveniently located towers. During the day the signals were made with flags of different colors, and at night with torches and bonfires lit on the top of the same. Findings and studies made in the area seem to indicate that Torre Terigi was at the center of a road network that connected the towns of Paterno, Terzano and Vernalese where there are interesting tower houses mostly incorporated into rural structures.

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