Nobiltà e pietrificazione della ricchezza fra città e campagna (Italia, 1000-1280)

According to Brunetto Latini's Trésor (ca. 1265), in Italy the buildings of the nobility were characterised by the presence of war, which in the cities led to an architecture of defence and attack very different from that of the French and European nobility. What is there of any truth in this observation by one of the greatest intellectuals of Florence? What distinguished the regions of central and northern Italy, familiar to Brunetto, from those in the south? Why, for the countryside, does the Trésor speak of buildings with less use of masonry? In Italy, was petrification primarily an urban phenomenon? And what explanations can we give for the Italian peculiarities?