Siena - part 1

On Friday, September 26 Sarah and I joined another Syracuse University - Florence school trip. It was actually for the Masterpieces and Black Death undergraduate classes but we tagged along, as did Kellin, Stephanie, Clark, Tom, and Anne. Sean and Luke were also there since they are the TA's for these classes. Professor Hatfield was leading the way. This time we were going to Siena, one of the five communes that vied for power in Tuscany before Florence took control leading up to the Renaissance. Once again, our bus left the Piazza Savonarola at 7:30am. We arrived in Siena around 9:00.


Immediately off the bus our first view was of the impressive defenses that surround the city.


Our group marched into the city center and headed straight to the Piazza del Campo.


The piazza is the site of the world famous palio. The palio is a horse race that is held twice a year. In the races, 10 riders represent their ward of the city (of which there are 17) by wearing their historic colors and symbols. The seven that did not take part in the last race are automatically included along with three neighborhoods that are chosen at random. The loser is the rider that comes in second, not last. Thousands of specatators come from around the world to see the palio. It's really quick. They only race around the piazza three times. It looks really dangerous because the specatators crowd around right along the track.


This is the Palazzo Pubblico, Siena's town hall. It was begun in 1297. The tower, called the Torre del Mangia, was built between 1325 and 1348. We didn't get a chance to go to the top of the tower but we got some great views above the city from atop the Cathedral. I'll talk about our visit inside the palazzo in a later posting.


The group gathers to plan our assault on the city. We broke up into groups and headed to different stations.


Save the clock tower!


I really liked the city of Assisi. Siena reminded me of Assisi, except it was quite a bit bigger. The picture above and the following two are to show you some of the hilly similarities the two hill-top towns have. There are a lot of areas similar to the one above where an alley between buildings is nothing but a large set of stairs.


From the city center down the hill to the city walls.


I love shots like these. It's almost identical to the one I took in Assisi. Left goes up, right goes down, and there's a shop in the middle.


Finally, here is the Basilica of San Domenico. It was built in the mid-12th century. It was not on our list of things to do but some of us found time after lunch to stop in before we re-boarded our bus. We were not aloud to take pictures inside and, for once, I obeyed. The Chapel of St. Catherine is inside. This is the resting place of the head of St. Catherine of Siena. The rest of her body is buried at the Basilica of Santa Maria sopra Minerva in Rome (I have a picture of the tomb from our trp to Rome). The legend goes that the people of Siena wanted to bury her in her in their city, but the Romans wanted to keep her. So they took her head (which is obviously less conspicuous than an entire body) and put it in a bag to try to sneak past the guards. The story I saw did not mention the task of cutting her head off, but I assume this was necessary. When the guards looked in the bag the people prayed to St. Catherine for help and the guards only saw roses in the bag. When they got back to Siena the bag held only her head again. I think St. Catherine is now the patron saint of sneaking dismembered body parts past guards.