In ancient times Villamagna was the name of a castle surrounded by a village 8 km north of Volterra. It was probably of Roman origin as its name clearly suggests: Villamagna in Latin means “big dwelling house” or “big farm” or “big building”.

The most ancient documented information about Villamagna go back to the 8th century and more precisely to January 780, when a merchant of Longobard origin, a certain Ratcauso, born and bred in Villamagna, donated part of his property just situated in Villamagna to the benedictin Abbey of St. Peter in Palazzuolo, nearby Monteverdi, 20 km north-west of Volterra. This famous Abbey had been founded not many years before and was consolitading thanks to the donations of many benefactors.

The Church in Villamagna, called Pieve di San Giovanni and Santa Felicita, is mentioned in some parchments dated 975 and 990 and in a charter certificate released to the canons of Volterra in 1015 by Henry II the Holy, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire and king of Germany and Italy.

In the 11th and 12th centuries Villamagna belonged to the noble Lords of Montignoso ( a fief 7 km north-east of Villamagna) and in particular to the aristocratic family of Cattani. On 1st May 1199 the nobles Cavalcanti definetely ceded the property and the civil jurisdiction on the whole territory of Villamagna to the local authorities as they wanted to put an end to the age-long conflict with Volterra. Since then Villamagna became part of the growing Republican State of Volterra with full right.

Villamagna was a fertile and a very coveted land and as such it was contended for a long time by the political factiones of Volterra fighting for the civic power, particularly during the conflicts between the Bishop and the Town Council and between Guelphs and Ghibellines (13th century).

As a border land Villamagna was also at the centre of the wars between Volterra and its powerful neighbours, in particular Pisa and Florence. One of the most notorious episodes is to be considered the invasion of the Florentine armies who plundered Villamagna in 1223 destroying houses, fields and villages in order to punish Volterra for being allied of Pisa in the war ( then lost) against Florence the previous year.

Alfanuccio di Maffeo was the first member of the Volterranean Maffei family, who had a great importance for Villamagna in the following years, to own pastures around the village in 1280.

Soon Villamagna got a military significance too. The leaders of the Republic of Volterra realized that Villamagna could become an important defensive bulwark north of the town. In 1291 the first military defensive works were built. The opportunity arose by the fear of a raid of the Pisan Army against Volterra. The Municipality built up a number of defensive works along the ridge that develops westwards from the ranges of Montignoso, centres on Villamagna and then keeps up towards the sea. It is the same ridge where the German armies put up a fierce resistance to the American Army coming from the south in summer 1944 during World War II.

In 1301 the first census of the people living in Villamagna was taken due to military reasons. As a matter of fact the local authorities wanted to draw up lists of eligible men for military service.

Villamagna was steadily the core of perpetual wars in Italy because of its attitudes and its military preparations. It was plundered several times: once at the end of 15th century when the Greek soldiers were sent by the Republic of Venice for help to Pisa in the new war against Florence. In that occasion they devasted the whole land. It was plundered again in 1527 when the well known Lansquenets appeared in Villamagna. These German infantries had been sent to Italy by Emperor Charles V of Spain to punish Pope Clemente VII of the powerful Florentine Medici Family who had tried to get out of the Spanish egemony by joining forces with the king of France. Two memorials in the Villa of San Donnino witness such a sad event.

Villamagna came up again during the last war of the free Republic of Florence against Emperor Clarles V and Pope Clemente VII allied again with Spain in 1530. Volterra, that happend to fight together with Florence, was besieged by the Spanish troops and to avoid the worst it surrendered on 24th February 1530 and signed the capitulation at Villamagna where the generals of Charles V had placed their headquarter. However Florence launched a counterattack and occupied Volterra again in April 1530 thanks to a brilliant action of the republican general Francesco Ferrucci. He then defended the town when the Spanish troops, after reorganizing and having got reinforcements, assaulted Volterra again in May 1530. The Spanish commanders Fabrizio Maramaldo and Marquis Alfonso d’Avalos Del Vasto pitched their camp in Villamagna and from there they directed the battle against general Ferrucci. However the Spanish were defeated and had to clear out the Volterranean territory in June 1530.

That war that had opposed the Republic of Florence to the alliance between Spain and the Pope was then lost by Florence and the town was definitely subdued by the Medici family whose most important member – Cosimo I – was soon given the title of grand duke of Tuscany in 1569.

The horrible war and the hardships which the population had been subjected to caused a terrible bubbonic plague epidemic that drastically reduced even the number of the people of Villamagna. After having hardly overcome the infection ( the village became then the seat of a hospital and a lazaret to admit and to isolate the plague contagious patients), Villamagna entered a very long period of peace which lasted for many centuries till World War II. In July 1944 the village became again the centre of a battle between German and American armies which lasted several days and caused many losses of human lives both in the armies and the civil population.

Noteworthy in Villamagna is the already mentioned very old Parish Church of San Giovanni and Santa Felicita, built in the late 9th century. It is a Romanic aisleless church built on a pre-existent little shrine whose traces can be seen in a crypt under the high altar. Up to the first half of the 20th century the Parish Church contained an important painting of the great artist Rosso Fiorentino (1521) showing the Virgin Mary sitting. Today this work is to be found in the diocesan holy works museum in Volterra.

Not very far from the Parish Church, in the nearby area of Villamagna churchyard, there is the little church of “Madonna delle Nevi” (17th century). It is much loved by the local citizens because Virgin Mary, whose portrait goes back to the 14th century and is here exposed, is considered the providential rescuer of Villamagna from a serious typhus epidemic in the first half of the 19th century.

We know that Villamagna had 314 inhabitants in 1551, increased to 840 in 1876. Today there are about 700 people living in the Villamagna area.

The most characteristic element of Villamagna and the very true centre of the village is the Villa San Donnino.

It is an imposing 16th century building planned by the great architect Baldassarre Peruzzi (1481-1536) who was born in Volterra and lived in Siena and Rome and is still considered one of the greatest Renaissance talents.

The building was commissioned by the aristocratic Volterranean Mario Maffei (1459-1537), a well-known humanist bishop appointed cardinal by Pope Leone X (1513) and one of the most important members of the family of earls Maffei who had vast properties in the town and in the whole land of Volterra for many centuries.

The Villa was certainly finished in 1527 as the already mentioned memorials over the northern portal and on a building side remind the sorrow of Mario Maffei for the destruction caused by the Lansquenets invasion: the memorials in fact report that the palace was “amicis hospitium, pauperibus refugium” during the plunder of 1527.

Inside the Villa there is a work of the famous painter and literary man Salvator Rosa who lived in the 17th century and was great friend of the Maffei family. It is a big cross painted partly on the vault and partly on the walls of a large hall. Many rooms are decorated by the painter Lodovico Gamberucci (first half of the 19th century).

Part of the Villa is called “King Apartment” because Vittorio Emanuele II of Savoy, first king of Italy, stayed here. Till the first half of the 20th century this apartment kept the look and the furnishing of the period of the King’s permanence.

Joined to the Villa San Donnino there is an aristocratic chapel whose origin goes back to the 15th century even if it is already mentioned in the 8th century by the name of Church of San Donnino. Nearby there is a building surmounted by a tower which was the lodge for the Villa San Donnino. This building is named “The Clock” and it was already registered in the general land office of Leopoldo II grand duke of Tuscany in the early 19th century.

Many centuries ago the Villa San Donnino gave name to the great farm owned by the earls Maffei. The farm had an extension of 2000 hectares and dozen of holdings ranged in a rural landscape mainly cultivated with olive trees, vines and sown ground. Some farmhouses date back to the 18th century when a deep process of modernization and of new country building took place thanks to the agricultural reforms of Pietro Leopoldo of Lorena, grand duke of Tuscany (who then became emperor of Austria with the name of Leopoldo II Augsburg).

The fortune of the Maffei family went lost in the second half of the 19th century. The last member of the stock was earl Niccolò Maffei, a politician of democratic part who was town mayor of Volterra several times and deputy of the Italian Parliament. In the ownership of the Villa San Donnino and the farm he was followed at first by the marquis Nerli and then by Luti family. At the end of the 19th century, the whole property was bought by a wool manufacturer from Prato, Cesare di Odoardo Vannucchi, whose descendants, first Manlio and then Vanna Vannucchi, are still the owners of the central core of the property.

Today the estate is reduced compared to the period of earls Maffei because in the first half of the 20th century it has been divided for heritage reasons. It has come into force also the agricultural reform disposed by the Italian Government that has expropriated many lands in the Volterranean area giving them to the tenant farmers.

Around 1960 the Villa San Donnino was sold to some private citizens who divided it in some apartments. On the contrary the Farm, now called San Giovanni, of about 230 hectares has been modernized.

On the boundary of the Villa and on the 18th century building, originally given over to offices and to staff housings and now residence of the owners of the Farm San Giovanni, there are two memorials commemorating the peasants killed in World War I and the already mentioned battle of Villamagna in July 1944.

The business centre of the farm is surrounded by a secular park and by long cypress alleys.