traveldk.com

Though a neighbour, Dante didn’t live here, but the house is filled with documents recreating medieval Florence. His beloved Beatrice is buried in the tiny church across the street.

Going since at least the 1500s, and famous for its antipasto table laden with vegetables, fish and meat.

The house in which the saint was born was made a sanctuary in 1466, with a modest Baroque church containing the 12th-century Pisan Crucifixion that gave Catherine the stigmata, a brick loggia (constructed in 1533 by Baldassare Peruzzi) and a small oratory with Baroque paintings by Il Riccio, Francesco Vanni and Il Pomarancio. Follow the staircase down past Catherine’s cell to see if the Oratorio dell’Oca and its frescoes of angels are open.

Santa Verdiana is Tuscany’s loveliest and most successful Baroque church. Its interior is swathed in frescoes celebrating the odd life of Verdiana, who walled herself into a cell here for 34 years with two snakes, which God sent to test her.

The estate that invented modern Chianti Classico is back in the Ricasoli family after years under Seagram’s, and the wines have improved vastly. “Iron Baron” Bettino Ricasoli, Italy’s second prime minister, perfected the formula here.

Medieval castle turned spectacular hostelry. Though far from civilization, with a fine restaurant and pool, it feels less removed than many a rural retreat. Apartments are also available.

Around the core of a 12th-century castle, this is the Chianti’s most luxurious inn. It sports a room for wine tasting, an outdoor pool and a plethora of antiques. Corner rooms, with their lattice of ceiling beams, are best.

A fairy-tale hotel, hewn from a 13th-century castle and outbuildings immersed in the green hills of a nature reserve. Relaxation is the order of your stay, with an absence of TVs and telephones in the huge, country-styled rooms and apartments.