Siena
SIENA, the Ghibelline, at one time always at war with Florence the Guelph, no longer disputes with her ancient rival the glory of being the foremost of Tuscan cities. But, though she no longer does this, pride in her Roman origin has never ceased. She still retains the S. P. Q. S. as the head-line of municipal notices; and the she-wolf and twins are to be found sculptured on many a column that adorns some of her little courtyards as well as on odd corners about her walls. Nine gates, one of which boasts a barbican, admit the stranger to her dark up-and-down-hill streets. She possesses many fine palaces. She might have possessed the grandest Gothic cathedral in all Italy had funds permitted its completion. As it is, it is one of the most remarkable and is adjoined by one of the most beautiful campanile in the country. If the visitor braves the heat of August, she can show him the very best survival of mediæval times in her celebrated Palio, or horse-race, that takes place every year in the great piazza. In her streets you will hear the purest Italian spoken. Her women, as the month of May comes round, don the most becoming of straw hats, and her people are justly famed for their courtesy. Fortunately for some of us, the tourist hurries on to Florence or Rome. But for him who loves the repose and personal charm of an old-world city, Siena will always open her arms and gather him in an embrace that will hold him for ever enchanted by the fascination of a delightful memory.
Almost in the centre of the city and occupying a space on the top of the highest hill, Siena’s cathedral is to-day a fragment only of what its builders hoped to erect. The west end of the original nave is away at the end of the piazza to the south of the present south transept. The present nave was built as one of the transepts, and when its size is realised the grand scheme that was never completed can be judged. The building was begun in 1229 and the dome over the crossing finished thirty years later. About sixty years after this the scheme to construct the huge nave was commenced. It was only owing to a terrible plague which carried off, it is said, eighty thousand people, that this was abandoned. The tracery of a very beautiful Gothic window remains at the unfinished west end, to make one marvel at the splendid proportions of the intended fabric.
The cathedral, of which a fine view is obtained from the church of S. Domenico on the opposite hill, is approached from the Piazza del Duomo by twelve marble steps. The topmost which forms the platform in front of the façade is inlaid with graffiti designs in black and other colours. Three crocketed gables crown Giovanni Pisano’s façade. Their surface is covered with modern mosaics. Under the centre gable, surrounded by a square frame of Gothic niches filled with half-length figures of saints, is an immense round window devoid of all tracery, but filled with good glass. A flat black band of marble frames the niches. Elegant turrets with crocketed pinnacles surmounted by saints are on either side of this gable. The two other gables are flanked by towers, each with a solid turret. The purest piece of architecture is the gallery which is between the centre and these two side gables. Below runs a classic frieze separating the upper from the lower part of the façade. The columns and pilasters of the three portals are of white and red marble; they are so heavily laden with elaborate sculpture of beasts, birds, and foliage that they seem to lose their raison d’être and no longer support anything. The capitals of all these are formed of elongated acanthus leaves, and might be likened to a field of waving maize. It is very interesting to note, by the classic work which Pisano introduced everywhere on the façade, how difficult it apparently was for him to get away from the tradition of his country’s classic architecture when designing a Gothic façade.
The whole front is covered with white marble statues perched on every available place. Gargoyles, like chevaux de frise, protrude from every angle and corner. On the brackets over the four main columns of the porches are two horses, a winged lion, and a lion regardant. The whole of the front lacks repose, a condition which is intensified by the black and white inlay of the flat surfaces. The centre gable overlaps the portal beneath, and the apexes of the two side gables are beyond the middle of the two side portals. This is a good arrangement, and assists the balance of the composition, which is well restrained by the deep-set gallery and dark shade of the flanking towers.
The pointed windows of the south aisle and transept are canopied. On top of each of the buttresses between them is a white marble figure. The magnificent campanile rises above the chapel close to the south door. Like the rest of the cathedral it is banded in black and white marble. The lowest of its seven courses is constructed with a solid exterior, the next is pierced by an arch, the third by two arches, and so on, increasing until at the top stage there are six arches. Four turrets with slender spires finish off the corners at the top, and a good hexagonal spire rises from the centre. The dome is supported by an open gallery. The idea of a central tower never seems to have appealed to the Italian in his Gothic work; even at Milan the spire of the cathedral can hardly be said to rise from a tower.
The interior of the cathedral, by reason of the very decided black and white bands of marble, although mellowed with age, is not restful to the eye. The nave consists of five bays on each side. The aisles have round arches. The transepts are double and of unequal length. All the windows are pointed with the exception of the two round ones at the east and west ends. The clustered columns of the nave are of very good proportion; above them is a heavy frieze. Between the numerous consoles of this is a series of terra cotta busts of all the Popes. Executed at one time, they are, like the medallion portraits of the Pontiffs in S. Paolo fuori at Rome, not authentic likenesses. What gilding there is, is away up in the roof and on the bosses in the soffits of the arches, but it is old and not really obtrusive. The same may be said for the star-spangled blue vault. The illustration shows the cold light from the north transept window striking Niccolò Pisano’s beautiful pulpit, in contradistinction to the warm rays that penetrate this noble fabric through the clerestory windows of the nave. Arnolfo di Cambio and Niccolò’s son Giovanni had a share in the execution of this splendid work, which may be ranked next to the pulpit in the Baptistery at Pisa. The pavement of the whole cathedral is composed of graffiti in coloured marble pictures. To preserve this unique pavement the authorities have wisely covered the nave and aisles with a wooden floor; and except during the month of August and on great festivals, when this covering is taken away, the only portion in the lower part of the church exposed to view is that under the dome. This is railed off.
The six niches at the top of the clustered columns that support the cupola are filled with colossal metal figures. On bronze brackets, fixed to each pier of the choir, are thirteenth-century bronze figures of angels holding lamps. One admires the good taste that has always left these bronzes ungilded. The same praise may be accorded in the case of the grand bronze candlesticks on the high altar, and the magnificent tabernacle by Lorenzo di Pietro which rests on it. The only note which really jars is the crescent of hideous gilded cherubims that partially surround the east window. The choir stalls, which were exchanged for those in the convent of Mont’ Oliveto Maggiore, nineteen miles out of Siena, have extremely good intarsia work of architectural and “still-life” panels.
In the north aisle is the Piccolomini chapel, with a very fine Renaissance wall of carved arabesques. In niches stand statuettes, in the execution of which Michael Angelo had a hand. The celebrated Libreria Piccolomini adjoins this. Its walls are decorated with the frescoes of the life of Pius II., a scion of this noble House. In the centre of the library stands the beautiful group of the Three Graces, a Græco-Roman work which Raphael drew from and studied.
The baptistery, S. Giovanni Battista, is below the east end of the cathedral on a steep hill-side. Its exceptionally good Gothic front by Giacomo di Mino was never completed, and for this reason, as will be seen in the illustration, the roof of the cathedral has a barn-like termination at this end. The interior is a sort of transverse nave with two piers supporting a groined and vaulted roof. The frescoes of the apse, though much faded, still retain some of the rich colouring with which two Brescian painters decorated them. The font is a very beautiful example of Giacomo della Quercia’s work, and is adorned with six bronze gilt panels, one of which is by Donatello. Small figures occupy the corners, and are by the same master-craftsman.
Among the many great names on Siena’s roll of fame, the two saints Catherine and Bernardino are perhaps the best known. A little way beyond the margin of the first picture of this chapter, to the left, is the house where the former first saw light. The last of twenty-five children born to Giacomo Beninsca and his wife, her childhood was marked by an extraordinary ascetic devotion overwhelming all other feelings, so that at the age of sixteen she entered the Order of S. Dominic. The series of chapels which the Casa Beninsca is now turned into will be for some, from their sacred associations, the most interesting spots in all the city. The house has a charming loggia and cortile, but otherwise no architectural features worthy of note. On the hill above, and behind the spot from which the sketch was made, is the church of S. Domenico, in which S. Catherine worshipped; it is a huge building in the style of all Dominican churches, with a great nave, no aisles, a shallow choir and transepts. Her life was one replete with visions. In the chapel at the west end S. Catherine took the veil. Little could she have known at the time, that she was ordained some future day to be the prime factor in recalling Pope Gregory XI. from Avignon to Rome.
S. Bernardino was the son of the Governor of Massa Maritima, a Sienese town not far from the coast opposite the Isle of Elba. He joined the preaching Order of S. Francis at the age of twenty-two, and was one of those who always drew immense crowds to listen to his eloquent words. When in Florence he made a bonfire of evil books and vanities, thus forestalling one of Savonarola’s great revolutionary acts. So great was his influence considered to be that, while in Perugia, the great bell was always tolled during his occupation of the pulpit. Care of the poor was one of his chief aims, and he established the “Monte di Pietà,” for lending money on small pledges, to save those in want from the heavy hand of the usurer.
Of all the palaces in Siena that which stands on the south side of the Campo, the Palazzo Pubblico, is the most famous. Nearly every one who reads these lines must be familiar, through photographs or otherwise, with the magnificent campanile “del Mangia”—a title that originated with a figure, nicknamed the “Glutton,” that at one time struck the hours on its bells. The illustration gives a view of the tower seen through the Arco di S. Guiseppe. It is three hundred and thirty-four feet high, and is built of brick with a machicolated stone cap and bell-turret above. At its base stands the Cappella della Piazza, a very beautiful open loggia, built to commemorate the city’s deliverance from the great plague that was instrumental in causing the proposed enlargement of the cathedral to be given up. The Palazzo itself consists of a huge central square block with Sienese battlements—square with hatched mouldings. A couple of turrets rise in three storeys above the two side wings of the block. The lowest storey of the building is of stone, the others of that delightful red brick which charms the painter’s eye, and is peculiar to Siena. All the windows of the palace are pointed, with a flat containing-member outside the three lights of each. Two good courtyards give entrance by stairways to the upper floors of the building, which is now used for judicial business. Almost opposite, across the Campo, is the Palazzo del Governo, formerly the palace of the great Piccolomini family. It contains the treasures of Siena, the state archives; and in front of it stands the Font Gaia.
In the Via del Capitano, leading into the Piazza del Duomo, is the Palazzo Squarcialupi. This thirteenth-century building was, in the old days, the official residence of the Judges of Appeal and the Captains of War. The Loggia dei Mercanti was built in the fifteenth century for the use of the City Fathers who assembled here in their business capacity of merchants to judge trade disputes. So widespread was the fame of this impartial tribunal that foreigners often brought their differences before it for adjustment. The palace is now known as the Casino dei Nobili. Many fine residences line the tortuous and shady thoroughfares, and others form parts of the different squares. Most of them have iron rings and brackets let into their walls similar to many of the Florentine palaces and those already mentioned in the chapter on Bologna.
It is not, however, so much in the individual buildings that the charm of Siena lies, nor in the long line of painters whose works are on the walls of the Spedale in the Piazza del Duomo, in the Accademia delle Belle Arti, and elsewhere. Rather is it in the personal and intimate note of the beautiful old city taken as a whole. For even the sojourn of a single week will captivate and make one feel as if he belonged to Siena, and Siena to him. It may be that the wheeled traffic, which can follow but two or three distinct lines through her streets, shuts off in silence large areas of the city, and that the visitor is left more to himself and his reveries than is the case in most Italian towns. Whatever it be, it is difficult to define, but the more one knows Siena the more whole-heartedly does one give oneself up to her charm.
Is there anything quite the same, quite so peaceful, and yet so full of history’s wars, as the view from the pleasant gardens of La Lizza? Pass on to the walls of the Fortessa at the end of “the Lists,” or old tilting-ground, and what a beautiful landscape unfolds itself! Undulating ground, covered with vines and orchards, carries us into a middle distance of cypress and pine-clad hills. These stretch away into an opalescent haze, out of which to the north and east rise the peaks of far-distant mountains. To the west but one great mass soars above the sea of golden mist—Mte. Amiata, always different yet always the same. A solitary mountain, once seen ever remembered; a mountain one can love. What a land of sunshine and pastoral beauty it is! Always at its best in springtime before the summer’s sun has laid its grip on the red earth and scorched it sere, and when the showers of April freshen and draw from the warm soil that scent of Mother Earth, which nothing man has ever made can equal and which no money can buy.