Siena - part 5

Our buses then went a little over ten miles northwest to the small town of San Gimignano. It is another walled hilltop town that was first built by the Etruscans. The city has managed to preserve 14 medieval towers of varying sizes. Due to the route we took into town, I didn't have a good view to take a good picture. So I got the image below from the Internet.


They kind of look like skyscrapers from the middle ages. A lot of towns had similar towers, but for whatever reason they didn't survive. Florence had them. Rich families built them as status symbols as well as for defence. Some cities tore them down because of what they represented and sometimes they just didn't last.


I took a lot of pictures that I really don't have much to say about. Here is our approach to the city walls.


I just love the medieval feel to so many of these cities.


This is the main piazza in town. There is a well in the middle that would have been so important for a defensive hilltown. Now people just throw coins into it and take pictures in front of it. Like me. Except for the coin throwing. I don't go in for such tomfoolery.




This was their version of Florence's Palazzo Vecchio, I think. It is called the Communal Palace. Now it is an art gallery.


Professor Hatfield teaches the class about medieval Italy and the towers on the steps in front of a church called the Collegiata.


More cool medieval looking buildings.


We didn't get to stay too long before it was time to head back out to the buses.


Sarah and Kellin pass through the old walls.


Being in both Siena and San Gimignano made me feel like I was back in the Middle Ages. You get a little bit of that feeling in Florence and even Rome, but not nearly as much as in these cities. All the tourists and the shops geared toward them help to snap you back to reality.