This was the first season of excavations on the site of the abbey of San Galgano. Two excavation areas were opened, situated in the eastern part of the present ticket office of the monumental complex (ex scriptorium) and inside the great church, in correspondence with the south chapel of the southern arm of the transept. The east wing of the monastic complex, shown in paintings/drawings and maps between the 17th and 18th century, was identified in the external part of the excavation. The building was paved with vertically-placed tiles forming a geometric pattern of rhombuses and triangles. On the outside of the building, the tiles were laid on a regular east-west alignment. Following the structure’s collapse, the area was partially re-occupied by storerooms/animal stalls built by several settlers who had occupied the complex.

Inside the church, the excavation concentrated on the area of the chapel of the Sienese merchant Andrea di Giacomo. In 1274, he left a sum of money in his will for the acquisition of two farms that became part of the abbey’s land holdings. This event was documented in an inscription placed in the chapel and that was still there in 1742. Therefore, the chapel must already have been standing at the time of Andrea di Giacomo’s bequest. Although the document at our disposition does not mention the construction of an altar or the dedication of a chapel, there is indirect evidence in this sense: in 1287 and in 1295 two bequests are mentioned that are linked to the construction of the same number of altars. One of the main questions associated with the Abbey of San Galgano involves the presence or lack of a paving. In actual fact, we know that in 1576 Monsignor Castelli, Bishop of Rimini visited the abbey and in describing the state of the church stated that the plaster had fallen away in many parts, the altars were without furnishings and that much of the paving needed to be repaired. Later information also details the deterioration of the plaster, floors, vaults, bell-tower and roof. When in 1920 the Superintendency for Monuments in Siena created a project for the consolidation of San Galgano, it was reported that the only visible traces of the original paving were a few ‘mezzane’ tiles at the bases of the pillars.

The excavation identified a paving of tiles and part of the chapel characterised by an opus signinum floor. Towards the window, there was the base for a small altar and two holes, which perhaps housed two small columns to support the sacred furnishings (candelabra?, cross?).
Following its abandonment, the church became a shelter for animals; several postholes in the opus signinum floor and the tile paving could form the outline of an enclosure. The written sources mention this circumstance when, in 1667, the doors of the great church were so badly decayed that animals probably entered the structure. This information was provided by canon Alessandro Bava, vicar general of the Bishop of Volterra.