During the week leading up to our trip to Sienna, we learned
all about Sienna in Marco’s class. I
learned so much! The symbol of Sienna is the same as Rome, the she-wolf nursing
the twins (Romulus and Remus). The city
was built along Via Francigena, which is one of the original roads connecting
Rome to the rest of the Christian world including France and England. Sienna is known for its territorial issues
both inside its own walls and with Florence, whom it has never gotten along
with. The City is divided into 17
districts, or Contradas, each with its own symbol. It is very important where you are born in
Sienna as it determines which Contrada you belong to. Each Contrada contains a main road, a main
church (Contrada Oratorio), a main fountain, and a Museum which is usually
attached to the main church. The Museum
usually houses saved old costumes, banners etc. from the Palio, and whenever a
baby is born in the Contrada a flag is flown outside the museum with a blue or
pink ribbon to singify the baby’s sex.
The Palio is the world renowned horse race which occurs
twice a year on July 2nd and August 16th. In each Palio, 10 contrada compete at a time,
and the 7 extra compete in the next one, meaning that at least 3 contradas
compete bi-annually. In the main square
of Sienna, known as the Campo (which is neutral territory) dirt from Orvieto,
usually Tuffa, is laid out in the Campo in preparation for the race. 35 horses
compete in the trials and 10 are chosen.
On the day of the race, the horse is brought to the main church of the
contrada it has been assigned to and is blessed before the race. It is said that if the Horse deficates in the
church during the blessing it is considered good luck. The race itself is apparently very famous all
around the world and is in fact shown all around the world. The winner of the Palio is given a painted banner
with the Virgin Mary on it. Each year,
because there are two banners, one banner is painted by a Siennese artist and
the other by an artist from another town.
The Contrada who wins keeps this banner in their museum forever to show
how many times they have one.
With all of this history of the town I was very excited to
visit it! When we arrived we walked to
meet Marco outside of one of the churches.
We then walked through the Goose Contrada to the main museum and
church. We were given a tour of the
museum which houses their 65 banners, the most Palio wins of any Contrada.
After we finished we walked to the Campo to the tower which
is located in the tower (or fish) district.
We then took a short tour of what they consider to be “city hall”. After that we were dismissed to walk off on
our own. Amanda, Jessica, Berta and I
all went to find some lunch and we found this cute little Italian restaurant
which had really great food! Amanda and I split Pizza and Lasgna. We then walked through the city, passing
through the Elephant district, where we saw a ribbon for a baby boy born that
morning! It was very exciting.
At each of the touristy stores, they sell small versions of
each of the contrada flags. A lot of the
girls picked the giraffe and elephant flags because of the pretty colors. I opted
for a flag which represented Sienna as a whole, and which also had the She-wolf
and the twins on it.
Before the end of the day, we went to the Basilica of
Sienna. This church is beautiful! It
rivals Orvieto’s cathedral. However, in
true Italian fashion, it was never finished.
The two aps of the church were finished along with a not-so-perfect dome
(which is not prefectly round….) but the main façade was never actually
attached to the church. One of the aps
now acts as the main entrance, which I find slighty amusing.
At the end of the day when we all got back to our
apartments, Jess, Amanda, and I elected to make something useful out of our
flags. So we made capes and became superheroes.
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