Tuscania is east of Capalbio on the road to Viterbo and one of the oldest towns in the Maremma, with ancient Neolithic roots and a legend that attributes its founding to Tusco, son of Hercules. It was a proud and important Etruscan city, founded in the 7th century BC, and an important maritime trading center after the Greeks took the coastal cities in the 4th century BC.

After the fall of the eastern Roman Empire in the 5th century, Tuscania was fought over by the Lombards, the Papal States, the French, the marquises of Tuscany, and various noble Italian families. It even, for a time during the 11th and 12 centuries, became a famous free commune, and it was the ruling Campanari family who spearheaded the exploration of Etruscan tombs and civilization in the 19th century, and who organized the first international exhibition of Etruscan art in London.