Even though present-day hospitals all around the world are basically centers providing medical assistance and rehabilitation of the sick, the forerunners to these institutions were originally conceived in a broader sense as "places of hospitality:” hence the similarity between the two terms (both deriving from the Latin hospes, that is, guest). In Medieval Tuscany, when flocks of pilgrims used to cross the region by walking along the Via Francigena, hospitals were called spedali (ospedali in modern Italian) and served mainly as a refuge for wanderers.

Nowadays, some of these ancient buildings still exist. What is more, many of them still reveal their original function as real touchstones in the development of the era's architectural perfection: one need only think of the Spedale di Santa Maria della Scala in Siena, or else of the famous Spedale degli Innocenti in central Florence, probably the earliest example of Italian Renaissance architecture. Let's take a tour of Tuscany and go in search of the most beautiful ancient spedali!