According to the most recent studies, the church and the hospital of Santa Maria ad Valetudinarium would have very long-standing roots.
Although somebody thinks that both the hospital and the church were already present in the castle of Badia since the XI century, the first evidences that certify their existence are related to the period straddling 1012 and 1036, when the abbot of San Salvatore was Winizzo, one of the most remarkable personalities in the history of the abbey. At the time, Santa Maria acted as chapel. It completed,
in effect, a wider hospital complex, devoted to the care and the reception of pilgrims, monks and ills. For this purpose, extremely important during the Medieval Age, different explanations have been put forward. On of these theories concerns the Templar origins of the built, because of its structure, as would confirm some effigies present on the most ancient stones of the façade. At the end of the xv century, the Cistercian order stopped to take care about the hospital and the church that fell into ruin. The intervention of Pope Pio II saved it when, in 1462 he came to spend the summer at the Abbey. He ordered the reconstruction of the church, that was rebuilt ab imis, with volcanic rock and in Romanesque style, prevalent during the period of the Renaissance, as we can see from the arc, the rose window and the portal. In the second half of the XVIII century, the hospital was definitely abandoned, and the abandon of the hospital was followed by that of the church, so that at the end of the same century the church was already converted in house and transferred to the council by the family Romani. The last recollection of the functionality of the chapel dates back 1715. From the records of the church Santa Croce (preserved in the diocesan administration of Chiusi) we know that just in Santa Maria on March, 12th 1715 was celebrated the marriage between Mambrini Angelo and Pizzetti Giuseppa. Nowadays Santa Maria is deconsecrated and thanks to careful works of restoration it became a holiday home, rediscovering its tradition of millennial hospitality.
