The Villa Mansi has a long history which is linked to Girolamo Parenzi who lived in Amsterdam in the 12th century.
There he married Anna Maria Van Diemen (1675), daughter of the Governor of the East Indies Company in Batavia who sent Abel Tasman off to explore the coastline of Australia. Thus, in 1642, the famous navigator discovered a large island which he called Van Diemen's Land (now called Tasmania) and soon after reached the northern point of New Zealand which he named Cape A. Maria Van Diemen.
At the end of the 17th century, Girolamo Parenzi and his wife came to Lucca where they bought Villas and palazzos and the estate at Monsagrati. His sons added farmworkers' houses, olive mills, a large farmhouse and a Villa of simple, linear design, a classic example of a country house owned by an aristocratic Lucchese.

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