Grosseto, the provincial capital of the Maremma, began to develop around 935, after Roselle, an ancient city that was first
Etruscan and then Roman, was devastated by the Saracens. For a long time the Maremma was one of the poorest parts of Italy. It was covered by unhealthy swamps where malaria and cholera were endemic.
Finally, the Agency for the Maremma was created in 1951, an important event that had a tremendous impact on a large part of the area. Houses and roads were built and the Agency for the Maremma expropriated, subdivided and reclaimed the entire area, assigning plots of land to a peasant class that had never owned anything.
