Castelfranco di S. | Galleno, Orentano and Villa Campanile

Orentano is the second largest center in the municipality of Castelfranco di Sotto by population. With the black plague of 1348, Orentano, together with the towns of Staffoli and Galleno, became depopulated and the expanse of the Cerbaie hills became an object of dispute between the Municipalities until the Florentine domination. The territory was repopulated only at the beginning of the sixteenth century thanks to the emigration of farmers from Valdarno. The division of its territory remained unchanged until the beginning of the twentieth century when the inhabitants decided to reunite under Castelfranco di Sotto. Orentano hosts a permanent archaeological exhibition which, through models and educational panels, shows how people lived in the Bientina Marshes area since prehistoric times, then from the Etruscans and Romans up to the Middle Ages (see the canoe about four meters long). Orentano is also famous for the tradition of its pastry chefs. Every year in August the cream puff festival takes place in the town which culminates with the Dolcione Parade, an enormous handmade dessert that represents a monument, a character or an international icon.

Another hamlet is Galleno, the town paradoxically divided in two by a road: a sidewalk in the province of Pisa (Santa Croce sull’Arno) and a sidewalk in the province of Florence (Fucecchio). Galleno has been a rest stop along the Via Francigena since the early Middle Ages, remembered by documents and travellers’ chronicles before the year 1000. Former possession of the Cadolingi Counts of Fucecchio, upon the extinction of this feudal family it passed to the Bishop of Lucca. Also left deserted by the plague of 1348, the remains of the village were granted by the Municipality of Fucecchio to the Orlandini family who took care of that stretch of Via Francigena and reactivated the hostel and mills. From that time the family, still present in Fucecchio, took the name of Galleni.