_The Campo of Siena and the Palace of the Commune_
At the heart of Siena, where its three hills meet, is the famous Piazza
upon which so many of the stormiest scenes in the history of the city
have been enacted: the Campo, now known officially as the Piazza
Vittorio Emanuele. It is a semicircular space, the central portion paved
with brick and curiously resembling the concavity of a shell bordered by
a stone pavement, surrounded with what were once aristocratic palaces.
It is entered by narrow streets, which in stormy times could be securely
held by mere handfuls of armed men. On the southern side of the Piazza,
built as it were upon the diameter of the semicircle, rises that perfect
ideal of a republican home of the State--the superb Gothic Palazzo
Pubblico, perhaps better known as the Palazzo Comunale or the Palazzo
dei Signori. Pandolfo Petrucci conceived the idea of surrounding the
Piazza with a _porticato_, and is said to have commissioned Baldassare
Peruzzi to carry out the plan; the Balìa revived the notion at a
subsequent period in 1547, long after the fall of the Petrucci, but
nothing came of it.
In the Campo is the fountain, known as the Fonte Gaia from the
rejoicings that hailed the advent of its waters. On Whitsunday, 1343,
the water was brought into the fountain from the Fontebranda, and a
fortnight of wild festivity followed. "There was such rejoicing in
Siena, such dancing and such illumination," writes the old chronicler,
"that it would seem incredible if it were told, nor could anyone believe
it who had not seen it." Soon after the completion of the work a
beautiful marble Venus was discovered, which is said to have borne the
signature of Lysippus. The Sienese were mad with delight, and the
artists rushed to worship this divine relic of antiquity--_questa tanta
maraviglia e tanta arte_, as Ghiberti, the teller of the tale, calls
it--which was finally carried in state to the fountain and enthroned
upon it. But things went badly with the Republic; factions ran riot,
famine and pestilence ravaged the city. The Twelve who now ruled were
less liberal and more ignorant than the Nine, and at length a worthy
citizen in the Senate declared that such idolatry was forbidden by the
Christian faith; that all their misfortunes came from the presence of
this statue, which should straightway be smashed to pieces and buried in
Florentine territory. This act of vandalism appears to have been
perpetrated. At least, in the Books of the Deliberations of the
_Concistoro_ there is an entry under November 7th, 1357, to the effect
that the marble statue, at present placed upon the fountain of the
Campo, shall be taken away as soon as possible, and dealt with in
whatever way shall seem best to the _Signori Dodici_.[69] In the
following century Giacomo della Quercia was commissioned to make the
marble fountain, from which he was afterwards known as Giacomo della
Fonte; he produced a work which has been described as deservedly ranking
"among the model fountains of the world." The present fountain is only a
modern and incomplete copy, but the mutilated remains of Giacomo's work
are still to be seen in the Opera del Duomo.
Something will have been gathered from the preceding chapters of the
faction fights that have swept over the Campo and raged round the
Palace. Here, too, in one of those fevers of piety that overtook the
Sienese at intervals, vast crowds assembled to listen to the burning
words of San Bernardino. Specially famous are the discourses that he
delivered here in the August and September of 1427, immediately after he
had refused the Bishopric of Siena. He had been specially urged to come,
not only by the Commune, but by the Pope and the late Bishop, to allay
the bitterness of the rival factions within the city. "Ah, my children!"
he said, "no longer follow these parties, nor these standards, for you
see to what they bring us. You have the example in the time that is
passed, how evilly things have fallen out of old for many. Ah! be at
peace in your own home." And again, in his last sermon: "There still
remain many peaces for us to make. I pray you hold me excused, and so I
believe that you accept my excuse. You must consider that I have had
many things to attend to in these sermons. Ah! for the love of God, love
one another. Alas! see you not that, if you love the destruction, one of
the other, what followeth to you therefrom? See you not that you are
ruining your very selves? Ah! put this thing right, for the love of God;
do not wait for God to lay His hands upon us with His scourge; for if
you leave it to Him to do, you will be chastised for it. Love one
another! What I have done, to make peace among you and to make you like
brothers, I have done with that zeal that I should wish my own soul to
receive. And so say I of this, as of the other things of the Commune; I
have done it all to the glory and honour of God, and for the weal and
salvation of your souls. As I have told you, I have treated you as true
children; and I tell you more, that if I could take you by the hair, I
would pacify the whole lot of you. And let no one think that I have set
myself to do anything at any person's request. I am only moved by the
bidding of God, for His honour and glory."[70]
Here is a scene of another kind, from the _Diari_ of Allegretto, under
July 1463, when the Duchess of Calabria with a train of Apulian nobles
visited Siena:
"In honour of the said Duchess, there was arranged by the Arts a most
beauteous pageant and dance at the foot of the Palace of the Signori,
and there were invited as many worthy young women and girls as Siena
had, who came right well adorned with robes and jewels, and young men to
dance. And there was made a great she-wolf, all gilded, out of which
came a morris-dance of twelve persons, right well and richly adorned,
and one dressed like a nun, and they danced to a canzone that begins:
'She won't be a nun any more.' And at the said dance a goodly collation
was provided of marchpanes and other cates in abundance, with fruit of
every kind according to the season. To the said Duchess and her nobles
it seemed a fair thing and a rich pageant, and that she-wolf pleased
them immensely, and they thought that we had lovely women."
On June 19th, 1482, when the factions that preceded the expulsion of the
Noveschi were at their height, a preacher of a very different stamp to
Bernardino appeared upon the scenes: the future opponent of Savonarola,
Fra Mariano, the favourite of the Medici. "Maestro Mariano da
Genazzano," writes Allegretto, "of the Osservanti of St Augustine,
preached at the foot of the Palace of the Signori, to the Signoria, the
Cardinal and all the People, the Signoria with the People having first
gone to the Duomo to fetch the Madonna delle Grazie with the
baldacchino. And the preacher's introit was: _Every kingdom divided
against itself shall be brought to desolation_, which he repeated three
times, each time raising his voice higher. And when the sermon was
finished, they brought back the Madonna to the Duomo with all the
People."[71]
No less characteristic of Siena than her faction fights and her
preachers of peace are the wild games that the Sienese played, the mad
races that they ran and still run round the Campo. The oldest of these
was the _Giuoco delle Pugna_--a furious game of fisticuffs which
sometimes ended seriously. In 1324, on the Sunday before the Carnival,
there was a desperate _giuoco delle pugna_ here, 600 a side, the Terzi
of San Martino and Camollia engaging the Terzo di Città. The latter was
driven off the ground. Then they set to with stones and sticks, and
presently with swords and lances and darts, "and so great grew the
uproar in the Campo that it seemed that the world was going upside down,
by reason of the vast crowd that drew together." The soldiers of the
Commune, the Captain, the Podestà, the Nine strove in vain to stop it.
Several of the soldiers were killed; armed men poured into the Campo;
the Saracini and the Scotti, whose palaces looked out upon the scene,
hurled stones from their windows, and the mob in return tried to fire
their houses. The secular authority proving helpless, at length the
Bishop with the priests and friars of all the religious orders in Siena
came into the Campo, with a processional cross in front of them, and
passed through the thick of the battle, until it slackened and the
combatants drew asunder. A peculiar variety of the _Giuoco delle Pugna_
were the _Asinate_ or donkey-fights. These were exhibited by the
_contrade_--those popular associations, for sport and other purposes,
into which Siena is still divided. Each contrada that took part came
into the Campo with its captain and ancients (allow me this Elizabethan
rendering of _alfieri_, the youths who carry the banners of the
contrade), with thirty _pugillatori_ and an ass painted in the colours
of the contrada. No arms of any sort were allowed--not even a ring on
the finger--under severe penalties, corporal and financial; but almost
any other sort of violence was permitted. The struggle was to force
these donkeys round the Campo, in spite of all the efforts of the rival
contrade, and the one that first completed two rounds was the winner. In
later years the _Asinate_ gave place to the less exciting
_Buffalate_--races with buffaloes. Last remnants of these departed
glories are races which are now run twice a year--on the festivals of
our Lady's Visitation (July 2nd) and of her Assumption (August
15th)--with mounted horses by the contrade. The race is still called the
Palio, from the rich stuff (now represented by a banner) given as prize.
No one who cares for Siena and the Sienese should miss any opportunity
of seeing these races as often as he can; for in no other way can he
enter into the peculiar spirit of this most picturesque of Tuscan
peoples.[72]
It is a far cry from these things to Dante, to whom we owe the story of
Provenzano Salvani's act of humility in this place. But Boccaccio has
given us a vivid picture of the poet himself at one of these typical
Sienese entertainments, which would seem to have been a tournament in
the Campo. Dante had found a little book in an apothecary's shop, "which
book was of much fame amongst men of worth, and had never yet been seen
by him. And as it befell, not having leisure to take it to some other
place, he leant with his breast against the bench that stood before the
apothecary's and set the book before him, and began most eagerly to
examine it; and although soon after, in that very district, right before
him, by occasion of some general festival of the Sienese, a great
tournament was begun and carried through by certain noble youths, and
therewith the mightiest din of them around--as in like cases is wont to
come about, with various instruments and with applauding shouts--and
although many other things took place such as might draw one to look on
them, as dances of fair ladies, and many sports of youths, yet was there
never a one that saw him stir thence, nor once raise his eyes from the
book."
The superb Palace of the Commune of Siena--built between 1288 and 1308
to house the Podestà with his _famiglia_, or household, and the members
of the Signoria--is essentially the architectural and pictorial monument
of the government of the Nine. Like several other Gothic palaces in the
city, it is partly in grey stone, partly in red brick. Needless to say,
the façade tells us a later and more comprehensive story; over every
door and window is the _balzana_, the black and white shield of the
Commune, but in the centre, between it and the lion shield of the
People, are the arms of Duke Cosimo, the sign of the death of the
Republic. Above all, rises the mystical monogram of the Divine Name,
bringing us back to Bernardino. The tall soaring tower, known as the
Torre del Mangia, was begun in 1338 and finished in 1348 or 1349; it has
recently been discovered that its architects were two brothers from
[Illustration: THE PALAZZO PUBBLICO]
Perugia, Minuccio and Francesco di Rinaldo, and that the upper part was
designed by the painter, Lippo Memmi, in 1341.[73] The Chapel at the
foot of the tower was begun in 1348, "for a certain miracle that Our
Lady the Virgin Mary did"--or at least vowed in that year, as a memorial
of deliverance from the Black Death, and built in the third quarter of
the fourteenth century. The upper part, with its beautiful frieze of
griffins, is the work of Antonio Federighi, and dates from 1460. The
statues of saints in their niches merely show to what depths Sienese
sculpture had sunk by the latter part of the fourteenth century, before
the rise of Giacomo della Quercia. The ruined and restored fresco is
Bazzi's last work in Siena. He promised in 1537 that he would have it
done by the Feast of Our Lady in August for 60 golden scudi, but went
off for a holiday to Piombino after beginning it, and did not return to
complete the work till the following year. The door behind the chapel
leads into a picturesque and deserted court, with a faded fifteenth
century fresco and a number of old armorial bearings on the walls.
The Lupa of gilded bronze on the column to the right of the Palace marks
the entrance to the apartments of the Signoria. Over the door, two very
lean wolves are adoring the crowned Lion of the People. We ascend the
steps to the first floor, into a magnificent series of rooms, glowing
with masterpieces of Sienese painting. The first room--variously called
the _Sala delle Balestre_, the _Sala del Mappamondo_, and the _Sala del
Gran Consiglio_--is now a law-court. Here at one epoch the Consiglio
della Campana, or Senate, at others the minor councils of the State met.
The whole wall above the place of the president of the court is occupied
by a vast fresco by Simone Martini painted in 1315, "right marvellously
coloured," as Ghiberti calls it. Our Lady, enthroned as Queen of Siena,
is holding up the Divine Child standing on her knees to bless the
deliberations of the Council; Apostles and the Baptist hold the poles of
the canopy, Virgin Martyrs and Angels stand in attendance, while two
kneeling Angels offer flowers on behalf of Siena's four sainted
patrons--Ansanus, Savinus, Crescentius and Victor. All the faces have
the winning sweetness and spiritual loveliness that we find throughout
the works of the Sienese school. At the foot of the throne is a poetical
inscription: "The angelical flowers, roses and lilies, wherewith the
celestial meadow is adorned, do not delight me more than good counsels.
But sometimes I see one who, to exalt himself, despises me and deceives
my city; and when he speaks worse, he is more praised by each one whom
these words condemn." And along the base of the picture is their Queen's
answer to the prayers of the Saints: "My beloved ones, be assured that I
will make your devout chaste prayers content, as you shall wish. But if
the potent oppress the weak, harassing them with shames and harms, your
prayers are not for these, nor for whoso deceives my city."
Such being the ideal basis of Siena's policy, we are now given a series
of her victories. On the opposite wall, painted by Simone in 1328, is a
mediaeval warrior, Guidoriccio, riding alone, fully armed save for the
head, his baton of command in his hand, his steed gorgeously
caparisoned. The face is an admirable piece of portraiture. Behind him
lie the camp of the Sienese and the captured castle from which the
banner of the Commune floats. On either hand are preparations for
storming the town in front; but he proudly rides forward alone, to
summon it to surrender. Guidoriccio dei Fogliani of Reggio was elected
Captain of War in Siena for six months in 1326, and afterwards confirmed
so many times in the office that he kept it for seven years. In 1328,
when the power of Castruccio degli Interminelli was at its height in
Tuscany, he led the Sienese against Montemassi (the town represented in
the fresco), repulsed the forces sent by Castruccio to its relief and
forced it to surrender. In 1329 he put down a formidable bread-riot in
the Campo, and in 1331 he won a great victory over the Pisans under the
walls of Massa, after which he had himself dubbed a knight on the field
of battle and returned to Siena in triumph. He died in 1352, and the
Commune gave him a sumptuous public funeral in San Domenico.
Two later battle-scenes are on the wall opposite the windows. First is
the great victory gained by the Sienese over the Company of the Cappello
in October 1363, at Torrita, in the Valdichiana. After a vain attempt to
come to terms, the Sienese hired four hundred German men-at-arms, and
took the field with the forces of the city and the contado under Ceccolo
degli Orsini, the Captain-General of the Commune. Before marching out of
Siena, the republican army was put under the protection of St Paul the
Apostle--apparently because the Christian name of the then Prior of the
Twelve was Paolo. Orders had been given not to risk a battle; but, as
soon as they came up with the enemy, the Germans set upon them, and the
Captain with the Sienese following, a complete victory was gained. On
the left of the fresco St Paul, with drawn sword, is seated at the gate
of Siena, surrounded by warrior Angels. We see the advancing host of the
Sienese, in front of which the splendid mercenary cavalry has already
burst upon the ranks of the Company and broken through them, while on
the right the rout is complete. The Sienese treated their prisoners
magnificently; they deprived Ceccolo of his command, for having
disobeyed their orders, but knighted him and heaped honours and presents
upon him. The Twelve gave a solemn banquet in the Palace to him and his
officers, presented him with a palfrey covered with silk, a sword of
honour, a suit of armour and a golden crown, with double pay to his
troops and household. A solemn Mass was celebrated in the Duomo, with
great offerings to the miraculous Madonna, and the Twelve commissioned
Lippo di Vanni to paint the fresco in memory of the glorious event. The
second fresco, more than a hundred years later, was painted by Giovanni
di Cristofano and Francesco d'Andrea in 1480, a record of the epoch when
Duke Alfonso of Calabria was virtually the arbiter of Siena's destinies.
It represents the battle of Poggio Imperiale, near Poggibonsi, in
September 1479, the chief action in the war in which Duke Ercole of
Ferrara held the baton of command of the Italian league that defended
Florence against the allied powers of Rome and Naples, led by the Dukes
of Calabria and Urbino. In the temporary absence of Ercole from the seat
of war, Alfonso stormed the camp of the league. The painters have
represented it as a triumph of Siena over Florence. On the left the
Florentines are flying from the field, their condottiere Costanzo Sforza
leading the rout, and the standard of the red lily is being lowered from
every battlement and tower. Beneath the banners of the Church, Naples
and Siena, the allies--led by "El Possa," a Sienese named Domenico di
Michele, who was in the service of the Duke of Calabria--are driving the
defeated army before them; in the centre are Alfonso and the Duke of
Urbino; reinforcements are advancing on the right, while in the
background the light armed foot-soldiers are sacking the Florentine
tents.
On the wall under the portrait of Guidoriccio is the famous old picture
of the Madonna from San Domenico, by Guido da Siena. The date upon the
picture appears originally to have been 1281. The frescoes on either
side--St Ansanus baptising the Sienese and St Victor protecting the
shield of Liberty--are by Bazzi, painted in 1529. The blessed Bernardo
Tolomei, founder of Monte Oliveto, is also Bazzi's, painted in 1534.
These three figures--with their lovely attendant _putti_--are among the
finest of his works. Between the next two arches are San Bernardino by
Sano di Pietro and St Catherine by Vecchietta. The last of the series,
B. Ambrogio Sansedoni, is more modern.
Out of this hall we pass into the _Sala della Pace_, originally called
the _Sala dei Nove_, where the Nine met during that most glorious epoch
in Sienese history when they held sway. In 1337 they appointed Ambrogio
Lorenzetti to decorate their meeting-place with allegorical frescoes. We
see the master's signature, _Ambrosius Laurentii de Senis_, under the
great fresco--the first of the series--on the wall opposite the window.
Here on our left is Justice, enthroned as Queen, inspired from above by
the crowned genius of Celestial Wisdom. Over her head is the text from
the _Wisdom of Solomon_, which Dante's spirits of righteous rulers
formed in that sixth sphere of Paradise that is swayed by the celestial
Dominations: "Love righteousness, ye that be judges of the earth." On
her right and left respectively, the Angel of Distributive Justice
crowns one and beheads another, the Angel of Commutative Justice gives
weapons to one and money to another. At her feet sits Concord, a
beautiful woman upon whose brow rests the pentecostal tongue of fire;
she holds two cords that proceed from the scales of Justice, uniting the
twenty-four citizens who pass in procession to the feet of the Commune
of Siena. This is represented by a majestic old man, richly clothed in
robes that show the black and white of the republican shield, royally
crowned. The mystical cord of union is attached to his sceptre, and in
his other hand he holds an image of the Blessed Virgin, whom the
Sienese had chosen for their Sovereign Lady. He sits above the Wolf and
the Twins. Faith, Hope and Charity hover above his head; Prudence and
Fortitude, Magnanimity and Temperance are his assessors. Beyond them, on
the right of the throne, reclines golden-haired Peace, in her clinging
white robe; and on the left, Legal Justice sits, with a crown and a
severed head on her lap. Around are steel-clad warriors, horse and
foot--the armed forces of the Republic--while to the gate of the city
men come offering "censi, tributi e signorie di terre," as one of the
verses of the inscription, which is probably Ambrogio's own, puts it;
prisoners are led in in fetters, and others are rigorously kept
excluded--for the mediaeval mind can hardly conceive of good government
without _fuorusciti_.
On the right wall are shown the effects of good government, the rule of
Justice. "Turn your eyes to gaze upon her who is figured here--O ye that
rule!--and who is crowned for her excellence"; so runs the inscription.
"Behold what great good things come from her, and how sweet and restful
is the life of the city where that virtue is preserved that gloweth back
more than any other." Within the city are dancing and feasting; the
shops are full and trade flourishes; cavalcades of dames and cavaliers
pass through the streets. Beyond the walls unarmed trains pass out to
the chase; the fields are cultivated, the peasants fearlessly bringing
their produce into the city. In the distance is the sea--for the
righteous republic will have commerce and become a maritime power--and a
harbour said to represent Talamone. Over all hovers Security, a winged
woman with a little gallows and a scroll: "Without fear may every one
travel freely and each man work and sow, whilst the Commune will
maintain this Lady in signory, for she has taken all power from the
wicked."
On the opposite wall is Evil Government, the fruits of Injustice.
Tyranny, a hideous horned monster, with dagger and poisoned cup, sits
enthroned above a goat. Avarice, Pride and Vainglory float over him.
Foul and horrible shapes sit round him as ministers: Cruelty (torturing
a child), Treason and Fraud, Fury, Division and War. At his feet lies
Justice--dishevelled, overthrown, bound. Murder and outrage wanton
within and without the walls; the smiling fields are devastated, while
at the gate of the ruined, bloodstained city hovers the dark and ragged
demon of Fear, with a scroll: "Through selfish ambition in this city has
Justice been subjected to Tyranny; wherefore by this way no one passes
without dread of death: for without and within the gates they
plunder."[74]
Beyond the _Sala delle Balestre_ is the Chapel of the Palace. The
antechapel, the walls and the roof of the chapel itself are covered with
frescoes by Taddeo di Bartolo--frescoes that are the first great Sienese
achievement in painting in the Quattrocento--executed between 1406 and
1414. On the walls and arches of the antechapel are Roman heroes and
philosophers of antiquity; Apollo and Minerva, Jupiter and Mars; a view
of the Eternal City; and, over the door that leads into the room
adjoining the consistory, a gigantic St Christopher. The Sienese claim,
not without reason, that Perugino himself imitated these frescoes nearly
a hundred years later, in the Sala del Cambio at Perugia. In the chapel
are saints and Angels and the four closing scenes of the Madonna's life;
her farewell to the Apostles, her death, her being carried upon the
bier, and lastly her Assumption--the Divine Son sweeping down with
Cherubim and Seraphim to draw His Mother from the grave. Among all the
Italian pictures of the Assumption, Taddeo's still can hold its own for
its vividness and originality. For the rest, the whole chapel is a
perfect gem of the arts and crafts of the early Quattrocento. The holy
water stoop is by Giovanni di Turino, the iron railing by Giacomo di
Giovanni; the beautiful stalls of the choir, carved and inlaid with
illustrations to the Nicene Creed, were executed by Domenico di Niccolò,
afterwards called Domenico del Coro, between 1415 and 1428, and may
possibly have been designed by Taddeo di Bartolo. Under the Nativity, on
the little wooden door between the chapel and the _Sala di Balìa_ is the
Wheel of Fortune, on which man is seen transformed to ass as he rises,
recovering human shape as he falls. To a later period belong only the
organ with Siena's wolf, which is a work of the early Cinquecento, and
the altarpiece. The latter, by Bazzi and one of his later works, was
originally in the Duomo; it represents the Madonna and Child with St
Joseph and St Calixtus, with a beautiful landscape background in which
the ruins of ancient Rome are seen. "This work," says Vasari, "is
likewise held to be very beautiful, inasmuch as one sees that Sodoma in
colouring it used much more diligence than he was wont to do in his
things."
We pass next into a small passage or anteroom, out of which the _Sala di
Concistoro_ opens on the left, the _Sala di Balìa_ on the right. In the
former, in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the Signoria met, the
nominal governors of the State; in the latter, the Collegio di Balìa,
the select committee that in reality held the Republic in its hands.
There are bits of old fresco in this waiting room--Madonnas and Saints,
a kneeling magistrate watched over by his celestial patron--and several
panels of the Quattrocento; especially a Madonna and Child with four
Angels in an old frame, dated 1484, by Matteo di Giovanni, and San
Bernardino preaching in the Campo and liberating a possessed woman after
his death, ascribed by Mr Berenson to Vecchietta.
The _Sala di Concistoro_, with a marble doorway ascribed to Giacomo
della Quercia, has a ceiling covered with frescoes by Domenico
Beccafumi, painted between 1529 and 1535--precisely at the time when his
rival, Bazzi, was working on his saints in the other hall. They
represent scenes from Roman and Greek history, with allegorical figures
of Concord and Justice, and are extravagantly praised by Vasari, who
declares that the Justice in particular is painted "so powerfully that
it is a marvel." The foreshortening, the effects of light and shade are
certainly exceedingly clever; but it is a little too much to say, as
Lanzi does, that "Beccafumi should be called the Correggio of lower
Italy."
The pictorial decorations of the _Sala di Balìa_ were commissioned by
the Signoria in 1407, and begun in the following year. The Virtues on
the ceiling are by Martino di Bartolommeo Sensi, a Sienese painter who
belonged to the order of the Riformatori and whose chief works are in
the neighbourhood of Pisa. The scenes on the walls are by Spinello
Aretino, the Aretine who ranks as the last of the Giotteschi and who was
then nearly eighty years old, and his son Parri. They represent the life
of the great Sienese Pope, Alexander III., but are not arranged in
chronological order and the subjects are frequently doubtful. Among them
we may notice the Pope giving a blessed sword to the Doge of Venice,
Sebastiano Ziani, on the wall opposite the first window; on the entrance
wall, the capture of an Italian town by the imperialists and the naval
victory of the Venetians on Ascension Day, 1176, in which the Caesar's
son Otto was taken prisoner. The latter scene is a splendid rendering of
mediaeval naval warfare--note especially, on the right, the episode of
the capture of the prince and the frenzied efforts of the imperialists
to rescue him. The second fresco on the arch probably represents the
recognition of the Pope, when disguised as a monk at Venice, by a French
pilgrim. On the wall opposite the second window is the building of
Alessandria with its elevation into a Bishopric, and, apparently, the
humiliation of the Emperor Barbarossa. There is a curious representation
of the burning of a heretic on the arch. Opposite the entrance is the
presentation of the captured prince to the Pope, and the latter's
triumphal procession with the Emperor and the Doge leading his horse.
Beyond is the _Sala Monumentale_, painted in honour of Vittorio Emanuele
II. by modern Sienese artists with certain great scenes in the story of
the unification of Italy--the armistice after Novara, the battles of San
Martino and Palestro, the meeting of Vittorio Emanuele and Garibaldi,
the Roman Plebiscite and the funeral of the King. With the impartiality
that, in some respects, is characteristic of modern Italy, Alexander
III. is represented in one of the medallions among the precursors of the
political regeneration of his country.
In this _Sala di Balìa_--then called the Sala del Papa--there was a
notable tragedy enacted in 1455, in the very year that the "Magistracy
of the Fifteen of the Balìa" was first instituted--originally of fifteen
citizens to superintend the prosecution of the war against Piccinino.
The commander of the Sienese forces, Count Giberto da Correggio, was in
secret treaty with the enemy, sent him supplies while Siena starved, and
attempted to occupy Grosseto on his own account. The government was
warned by the officers of the Duke of Milan that their general was going
to betray them, but the Balìa had already ample proofs in its hands; not
daring to arrest him in the midst of his troops, they waited their time.
"What human cunning could devise no means to do," writes Malavolti,
somewhat sanctimoniously, "was easily ordained by the Divine Justice,
that seldom suffers such enormous crimes to remain unpunished." They
heard that, on September 6th, the Count would come to the city, to
demand payment of a large sum of money which he claimed from the
government. The morning that he was expected, the Fifteen met, reviewed
the evidence against him, and decided upon their measures. The Count
confidently entered the city with thirty horsemen, rode to the Palazzo
de' Marescotti (the present Palazzo Saracini), where he had apartments,
and demanded an audience of the Balìa. In the evening four nobles of the
city, with a number of citizens and the trumpeters of the Signoria, came
to bring him in state to the Palace for the audience that he had
demanded. The Count and his chancellor went up into the chapel, while
the doors of the Palace were closed and his other attendants detained in
the Sala delle Balestre. When all was ready, the Count was called before
the Fifteen in the Sala di Balìa--the Priors being meanwhile assembled
in the Sala di Concistoro. Perhaps he passed through that little door
upon which even then was the design of Fortune's wheel. With all marks
of honour and respect, he was invited to seat himself with the Fifteen,
by the side of the Prior of the Balìa, and questioned about what had
gone on in the field. He answered insolently and proudly--upon which he
was accused to his face of treason, and the intercepted letters shown
him that he had interchanged with Piccinino. He sprang to his feet:
"What! do you imagine that I am a prisoner in your hands?" "Quite
otherwise," answered Lodovico Petroni, one of the Fifteen, seizing hold
of his cloak. At the signal armed men rushed in--they had been lying in
wait in the room beyond--and stabbed him to death. The still quivering
body was dragged to the window and hurled out on to the pavement below.
Later on, it was carried to the Duomo and buried
[Illustration: The Market Place]
near the Campanile, without any honour or name to mark the spot. That
same night the Balìa notified to the Pope and their other allies what
had been done. To his Holiness they declared that "this astute seminator
of evil, this your insidious foe, this traitor to our Republic" had been
done to death by the people in a tumult; to the Duke of Milan they sent
a piece of his cloak, drenched in blood; to Venice and to Florence they
told the truth, pleading the sacred duty of saving the State, citing as
precedents the deaths of Carmagnola and Baldaccio d'Anghiari. Pope
Calixtus insisted that they should justify themselves by publishing the
evidence, and when this was done, on September 18th, he absolved the
Fifteen, each severally by name. But to the appeal of the Sienese envoys
for a general absolution for all the people of the city, he replied that
he could not grant it, "because you Sienese would be too strong in
Paradise."[75]
Two antique coffers in this room--one of them with the Lupa carved by
Antonio Barili--are also worthy of notice. In the Loggia on the second
floor of the Palace is a frescoed Madonna and Child by Ambrogio
Lorenzetti.
The second door to the left of the wolf in the Piazza leads, through a
picturesque little court covered with old frescoes, to a series of rooms
on the ground floor, at present used by the municipality. In the _Sala
dei Signori di Biccherna_, the room in which the Camarlingo and Quattro
Provveditori met, is the Coronation of the Blessed Virgin, a fresco
painted in 1445 by Sano di Pietro. Two of the Angels are holding a
scroll with a poem, thus blending painting and poetry together in the
characteristic early Sienese way: "This blessed glorious Virgin pure,
Daughter of her Son and Spouse and Mother--because the Eternal Father
found her more humble than any other person, He giveth her here the
crown of the Universe. Virgin Mother of the Eternal God, by whose holy
hands thou art crowned, to thee be recommended the devout and faithful
city of Siena, as it hopeth in thee; hail, full of grace." The San
Bernardino on the right is also by Sano. In the same room there is a
small fresco by Bazzi--the Madonna and Child with the little St John, St
Michael Archangel and St Galganus. Like all his work in the Palace it is
late, about 1537, but, unlike the rest, it is badly drawn and carelessly
executed.
In the _Stanza del Sindaco_ there is a much finer fresco of
Bazzi's--the Resurrection of Christ, with the three Maries approaching
through the early spring landscape. It was originally painted, probably
in 1535, in the place where the salt was sold, and was sawn out in the
last century. Vasari specially praises the beauty of the Angels' heads.
In another room is a frescoed Madonna by Vecchietta. On the ground floor
is also the entrance to what during the fifteenth century was the Sala
del Gran Consiglio, but which in the latter part of the sixteenth
century, after the final fall of the Republic, was converted into a
theatre.
At the back of the Palace is the picturesque market-place, the _Piazza
del Mercato_. Out of the market, the Via de' Malcontenti and the Via di
Porta Giustizia still indicate the ways by which condemned prisoners
were conveyed in carts to the place of execution beyond the walls. We
know that the feet of St Catherine frequently trode this mediaeval _via
crucis_; but it is questionable whether the execution of Niccolò di
Toldo took place in the ordinary spot, as there is frequent record of
political prisoners being done to death in front of the Palace and
elsewhere. In his fresco in San Domenico, Bazzi seems to identify the
place with the little valley before us, between the hills of Montone and
Santa Agata, crowned by the churches of the Servites and Augustinians.