Siena, city of wolves!

I promised like a million years ago that I would recount my trip to Siena. SO here I go.

My first views of Siena. We were all miserably tired because, as I have said before, these field trips start at the point juuuuust when night can be considered to have become day. It's that early.* It was a bit surreal getting off the bus as well, as the entire city was wreathed in fog. It was quite beautiful, actually, but strange. 

The town hall of Siena, which looked very cool and creepy in the mists. Strangely enough my phone camera captured the fogginess very well.

We went for a tour of the civic building, which was very interesting, for two reasons. 

1. Our main point of focus was the frescoed room that represented the effects of Good Government and Bad Government. Alas, no pictures were allowed, so I can't supply any photos. Sufficeth to say** that it was quite beautiful and very important in the timeline of Italian Art History, as it depicted a detailed landscape. The first of its kind!
2. Helen (my professor) brought in a colleague of hers to discuss this very mysterious fresco in the adjacent room. A horse and rider in yellow and black livery on a landscape depicting two castles. Not that stunning in itself, but for ages there has been controversy on who the guy actually is, needless to say who even painted him.

My drawing of the rider and notes on the CONTROVERSY. So this painting was thought originally to have been done by Simone Martini in 1330, of the famous general who fought for Siena, Guido Riccio. Many many many (many) elements of the painting and history contradict this, however. First off, Guido abandoned Siena for another city, one of Siena's enemies as it turned out. If this painting was of him, they would have destroyed it, blacked out his face, and thrown things at it -- this was the way of things. Secondly, the horse and rider float really weirdly out of the landscape, suggesting that they were done at different times. Thirdly, there were no representations of family coats of arms in the Palazzo until 1355. Fourthly, the heraldry on the horse's trappings and the guy's clothes were definitely added after the two of them were painted. Several parts of the wall aren't original, including those bits. FIFTHLY, they uncovered a second fresco below this one, much more skillful in execution (which suggests that Simone Martini did it instead of the first one, as the first one isn't so great) AND there is a general type guy there with a sword, whose face is surrounded by gouges in the plaster suggesting that people threw stuff at it. Perhaps this is our Guido instead. Anyway. No one knows to this day.

About two hours later, you can see the fog has definitely cleared and it is a beautiful sunny day!

Next we visited the cathedral of Siena, which really shows how Siena lost the contest of awesomeness with Florence. Not that the church isn't fantastic -- it is! But it's unfinished! They pretty much finished it, and then they saw the plans for Santa Maria del Fiore in Firenze: the most famousest of Duomos. It was a lot bigger than the Sienese cathedral. So naturally, as Siena and Florence were neck and neck in the Race to Be the Best, the Sienese tried to build their cathedral up...a lot.

The campanile (bell tower). Note the similarities to our Dear Duomo!

Aha! Now this is pretty cool -- when we stood in this square, we were inside the unfinished portion of the church. So there were arches and windows and the like that were simply enclosing an empty square. It was like being in a ruin, only it wasn't a ruin, just an unfinished.

Another example of where ceilings should be that ceilings are not.

The facade -- in my opinion they could still give Florence a run for their lira, but Siena fell behind in the contest because the plague of the mid 1300's killed off almost all of their population. There was no one left to work on the cathedral.

Inside the cathedral. Look at dem pillars. Not bad, eh?

This lovely piece of loveliness was the decoration of the mini-library inside. We had to go through it quickly, without talking, so naturally I can't remember any of the information Helen gave us about it, and I could only get 2 pictures. 

Here's a pretty picture of a book anyway!

The Sienese cathedral also had some really beautiful floors. We came to visit at one of the times during the year that they keep the floors uncovered. They periodically cover them up with cardboard so that the constant wear of feets doesn't degrade them beyond recognition. Not that we were walking on them anyway -- all the prettiness was roped off, which led me to get some really weird, distorted photos of them.***

Okay, let me explain. This will also help with the title a bit. Siena's founding legend is that Romulus, brother of Remus and founder of Rome, also had twin sons, who were also suckled by a she-wolf. Oddly enough. One of the twins, Sienus, went on to found the city of Siena. That makes sense...somehow. Anyway, this medallion depicts Siena surrounded by the representative animals of nearby Italian cities.

A sibyl! That's how you spell it, right?

Some fightin' guys. I love the way that these floors were done -- black line! I do love lines.

Good god this is turning out to be a long post, and we haven't even gotten to San Gimignano yet. So let's jump ahead to there. As some of you may recall, I visited the Manhattan of Tuscany**** when I was 16 with the PGC Italy trip. It was much the same as I remembered, which was nice. It was the same feeling I got in Lucca. We did see some very different things, though, so here they are.

The main square -- I have a distinct memory of following Blair through here.

Also, the torture museum! Blair bought a postcard from here to send to Matt! Most of my memories of this town seem to concern the sister, strangely enough.

This is just the sign for the museum we went to, but the lettering is so cool I couldn't resist.

Little sketches I did inside the museum, of Mary, piggies, and feet. The piggies were a huge mystery to me -- they appeared in many many frescoes in the civic building and I was confused...so I drew them wherever I saw them! It turns out that the little peeg belongs to St. Anthony the Abbot. He had a pet baby boar for some reason. Anyway, it was a cute lil' thing, except for when it was making an "I am an angry squeely piggie" face.

Our trip concluded with climbing the really really tall tower of the civic building. It was a bit terrifying going up, as it was...tall, but boy was that a fantastic view. Sundrenched Tuscan hills dotted with those iconic terra cotta roofs. It was pretty lovely.

And, as a treat, Helen gave us some special San Gimignano treats: pecorino cheese, wild boar sausage, and WINE. As I was one of the handy-outy helpers, I didn't get to have any cheese, but I snagged some sausage and wine for myself. Not a bad day, all told.

*Okay, I may be exaggerating. We meet at 7 am. ON A SATURDAY, THOUGH?

**I know that it's supposed to be "suffice it to say", but I have always thought that people were saying "sufficeth to say", which I like better, so I'll use it, thanks very much.

***We're supposed to pick a work of art to write a paper about at the end of the semester. I asked Helen if I could possibly write about these fantastic floors, which were done by -- let me just check my notes because I forgot -- Beccafumi. She said "Sure, only you'll have to come back to Siena to see his paintings". Of course I didn't say this aloud to her, but I definitely thought "yeah that's not happening". Not that it wouldn't be nice to visit Siena, but it would be a pain in the you-know-where to get there on my own steam. My solution? Lie and say I did see 'em!

****That's what they call it, don't blame me. San Gimignano used to be bristling with towers (there are now only 7, as they have been torn down over the years or bombed or just collapsed), as having a big tall tower was both a. a status symbol and b. a damn good idea to protect yourself and your family in the Olden Days. There used to be over 70 towers, so I guess it did kinda look like Manhattan. You know, if you squinted.

ps. Here's just a comparison photo :) Totally CREEPY in a sweet way.

2012.

2008.