Surroundings, Pisa

The village of Calci lies on the southwestern slopes of Monte Pisano in the Valgraziosa, a valley with extensive plantations of olives.

Close to Calci, 14km/9mi to the east, is the Certosa di Pisa, a Carthusian house founded in 1366. The present aspect of the extensive complex of buildings results from the remodeling in Baroque style which was carried out in the 17th and 18th century. Visitors can be shown round the monastery only on conducted tours. The main features of interest are the two cloisters (15th and 16th centuries) and the church, in pure Baroque style.

Legend has it that the Apostle Peter landed at this place, then on the coast, on his way to Rome. The church which he founded here, the Ecclesia ad Gradus (Church by the Steps), became from an early period an important staging-point for pilgrims making their way to Rome from the north. The present aisled Romanesque basilica, under which excavation has revealed remains of an earlier church, probably dates from the 11th century. The choir apse at the east end is flanked by two subsidiary apses, and there is also an apse at the west end; there is no transept. The church has frescoes of about 1300 (lower register, portraits of Popes; middle register, scenes from the life of St Peter; upper register, the heavenly Jerusalem) which are generally attributed to Deodato Orlandi.