CORTONA | Local History

The typical pottery from Cortona

In Cortona there is an ancient pottery tradition, that is carried on also nowadays by some craftsmen of Cortona. If you are walking down the traditional alleys of Cortona, you could see the local pottery shops, that sell you the typical Cortona pottery. The traditional “cocci” (the dialect word that means pottery) were used as simple and everyday objects, like plates, glasses, vases and jars. During the ancient times, the Cortona potteries were produced, cooked and sold in a specific part of the city: the area called “I Cocciai”, that is a little neighbourhood just outside the city wall. You could also see nowadays this zone, which corresponds to Via del Duomo Vecchio (because originally the cathedral of Cortona was located in this place) and Borgo San Vincenzo. The original decoration was the mottled one, and it is characterized by yellow background with green spots. If you visit the ceramic’s shops in town, you could find this design on the pottery. Once the colours were made from natural ingredients that were all available in the countryside. This type of decoration reminds the shades of Valdichiana hills, full of sunflowers and wheat fields. The flower on the decoration is a daisy or a sunflower, and it is green and brown on a yellow background. The story of Cortona ceramics does not concern only the popular flower, but it reveals an important tradition coming from centuries ago. In the early nineteenth century Cortona had its own production of fine ceramics. The pottery from that period was produced in an important factory called Catrosse. The name “Catrosse” was the name of the villa where the Venuti brothers, a noble family of Cortona, lived, and here they founded the furnaced and produced the pottery in 1796. In town there are two craft shops that sells the typical pottery from Cortona. They still nowadays produce all the ceramics manually: one is “L’Antico Cocciaio”, located in Via Benedetti 24, the other is “Terrabruga”, located in Via Nazionale 54. When you come to Cortona do not miss to visit the two shops, because you will be struck by the beauty of this pottery.