From The Contemporary Review.
SIENA.

IT has been truly said that every square league of Italian soil deserves our attention and study, and perhaps no part of Italy is more full of rich and varied human interest than the quondam republics of Florence, Pisa, Lucca, and Siena, of the last of which I propose to write in this article.

direct from Florence, and the ancient little city is passed by. Those, however, who follow the older fashion find its interest grow upon them, as the strain and stress of the nineteenth century fades from their mind and they gradually feel more and more at home among the relics of the spirit of the Middle Ages.

In the short space at my disposal, it would be vain for me to do more than briefly glance at one or two interesting episodes in the history of this little republic, speak of some of the worthies it has produced (a few of whom, by the common consent of Christendom, have been deemed worthy on fame's eternal rollcall to be filed "), and then describe the Palio, the August festival of the city.

Etruscan vases and other remains have at various times been found in and around Siena; but nothing is known with certainty of its history, until, in the reign of Augustus, we find it spoken of as a Roman military colony. The three hills upon which it stands rise to upwards of one thousand feet above the sea-level, and the soil of which they are composed is doubtIn a famous passage Macaulay deless the product of volcanic action. Siena scribes the wide reaching effects of the has always been subject to earthquakes, ambition of Frederick the Great, and how, which, however, at the worst, never did as its bitter fruit, the natives of Corogreater injury than the shaking down of mandel engaged in internecine slaughter, a few chimneys. Formerly they recurred and Red Indians scalped one another on at intervals of forty or fifty years, but the great lakes of Canada. In like manlatterly they have been much more fre- ner, for hundreds of years, there was conquent, ten years rarely passing without stant strife among the republics of Italy, their unwelcome advent. During the and the flower of their citizens perished months of July and August of last year either on the battlefield or the scaffold, they occasioned great terror in Siena: in because of the rivalry of the great facone day no fewer than seventy shocks tions having their origin in Germany, were observed, and thousands of the in- the Guelphs and Ghibellines. Indeed, habitants camped out in the squares and gardens, lest their houses should fall upon them. Scientific men tell us that the tufa upon which the city stands being to a great extent hollowed out, there is very little danger of the earthquakes doing real injury; but to unscientific residents, the existence of this hollow space underneath makes the fate of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram seem more painfully probable than if solid earth were below. Be this as it may, in spite of the panic, no damage has actually been done; and the huge masses of the churches and palaces show no rents or cracks, save one or two that are almost as venerable as the buildings themselves.

Siena used to be a more favorite station for English residents than it now is. Before railway days, almost all visitors to Rome from the north passed a day or two in Siena; now the railway conveys them

the history of the Italian republics throughout the Middle Ages is the record of constant warfare in the interest of the one or the other party. Without, therefore, trying to realize what Siena may have been when the great Etruscan league bore sway throughout central Italy, or when, having become subject to Rome, the conquering legions tramped through its streets on their way to Gaul or Germany or Britain, let us come at once to the medieval history of the city, from which period the walls, churches, and palaces date. After the Lombard invasion of Italy, Siena was governed by a representative of the Lombard kings; but when, in 800, Charlemagne destroyed, or, more properly, absorbed into his empire the kingdom of the iron crown, Siena was declared a free city. The lordships and baronies and rich lands he divided, with no niggard hand, among his warlike

followers from beyond the Alps, and some | Still, it would be a great mistake to suppose that the patrician families of Siena are poor. On the contrary, the most distinguished of them remain possessed of great estates in the country as well as of their stately old palaces in the city. For instance, the Palazzo Tolomei was built in 1205. It is an imposing square Gothic pile of stone, dark with the grime of nearly seven centuries, during which period the family have been leading patricians in Siena, and they still continue to occupy an important position in the city. The Chigis, Piccolominis, Bandinis, and many others, retain their ancient state and greatness. The Piccolomini family gave two popes to Rome the celebrated Eneas Sylvius, who wore the tiara as Pius II., and his nephew, Pius III. To this family also belonged that Ascanius Piccolomini, archbishop of Siena, who, when the prison doors of the Inquisition were opened to Galileo, received the venerable philosopher, and made a home for him within the walls of the archiepiscopal palace. The persecuted philosopher seems to have been quite overcome with the kindness showered upon him by the archbishop, for he speaks of it in his letters as "inexplicable." To this family also belongs that Ottavio Piccolomini whose defection from Wallenstein forms the subject of Schiller's drama. His portrait may be seen at the Palazzo Pubblico on a charger at full gallop in somewhat the same truculent attitude in which Napoleon is popularly represented crossing the Alps. The Saracini family, whose massive palace is one of the principal ornaments of the Via della Città, has during its long history given one pope and many cardinals to Rome. It is, however, on the point of dying out, only one aged, childless representative remaining.

of these became the ancestors of the nobility of Siena. The soil, then, as now, rich beyond all northern ideas, and generous of corn, wine, and oil, soon rendered wealthy its fortunate possessors, who, no longer contented with the feudal castles on their estates, began to build palaces in Siena, and built them so solidly that now, after five or six centuries, they stand firm and strong as when erected, and there seems no reason why they should not bid defiance to time and earthquakes for five centuries more. The feudal origin of these palaces, and the fact that the possessors derived their revenues from wide lordships and domains outside the city, in some degree accounts for what for a long time greatly puzzled me. As you walk through the old streets of Siena, every hundred yards, or even much more frequently, you come upon great palazzi, for the most part built of enormously solid masonry, and often of such vast size that you would think that each one could accommodate a whole regiment. How was it possible, I have often thought, for such houses to be erected and the expenses of such households to be borne in an inland city, shut out from the wealth derived from maritime trade, which made princes of the merchants of Venice, Genoa, and Pisa? True the wealth of many of these great families is a thing of the past. I recently heard of a whole patrician family living in a portion of their huge palace, all being entirely supported out of the dowry of the wife of the eldest son, who was probably the daughter of some wealthy plebeian. Yet not one of this interesting family would do a band's turn of work to save himself from starvation; they are far too sensible of what is due to themselves and to the honor of the family.*

I am assured that the families who reckon popes among their predecessors, as for instance the Piccolomini, Chigi, and Saracini, date the greater part of their wealth and greatness from that time. The popes appear, as a matter of course, to have made use of the vast revenues of the

With a city full of huge empty palaces, one would naturally suppose that strangers would be embarrassed in their choice of desirable furnished apartments. So I expected, and put what I thought a likely advertisement in a little Sienese journal, the Lupa. Not an answer, however, did I receive, and I am assured that that Sienese patrician must be poor and miserable indeed who would not rather see the palace of his ancestors crumble to ruin than resign a portion of it to the occupation of strangers. I have since secured an apartment in the palazzo of a noble family, whose history ridiculously cheap rate, but under such peculiar cir. has been bound up with that of the republic for cen- cumstances as in no way to militate against the above turies, and at what in England would be regarded as a statement.

Church to aggrandize their families. We | On August 11, 1259, the king sent a reply, are wont to attribute the political maxim, still preserved in the archives of Siena, in "To the victors the spoils," which has which he announced the despatch of an proved so great a curse to the great Trans- army sufficient to place the Ghibelline atlantic republic, to old General Andrew cause in its old position of supremacy; Jackson; but, if the above statement be but, alas! instead of the promised army, true, he took no new departure when he only one hundred German troopers arlaid down the principle, but was following rived. The mountain had brought forth a time-honored, not to say sacred, prece- a mouse, and things looked gloomy indent. An unwritten law, by which only deed for Siena. In this crisis, however, a the eldest son of each patrician housé has leading Florentine exile, Farinata degli been allowed to marry, has powerfully Uberti, whom Dante, a few years later, contributed to prevent the dispersion of was to immortalize in the pages of the their inherited wealth. "Inferno," cheered the drooping spirits From the time of Barbarossa (1152) un- of the Sienese. He said, "We have the til long after the last of the Imperial house banner of the king; this will suffice to of Suabia, the unfortunate Conradin, had make him send us as many soldiers as we perished on the scaffold at Naples (in may require, and that without asking for 1269), Siena was always intensely Ghibel- them." The city was at the time closely line and anti-papal, although its sturdy invested by the Florentines. Uberti gave independence showed itself, even when the unhappy Germans as much wine as Barbarossa was at the height of his power, and came, breathing out vengeance against the Italian free cities, determined to deprive them of their liberty. Siena alone had the courage to shut its gates in the face of the mighty conqueror and to dare him to do his worst. Frederick sent his son Henry with a large army which closely invested the city. The besieged, however, made a simultaneous sortie from the two gates, Fonte Branda and S. Marco, and, attacking the German camp at a place called the Rosaio, routed the Imperialists and put them to flight. But if Siena was Ghibelline in its politics, its great rival and sister republic, Florence, held by the Guelphs.

Under the great emperor Frederick II., the old quarrel between the Papacy and the Empire broke out with fresh fury, and involved all Italy in strife. Upon his death, Florence first, quickly followed by the whole of Tuscany, with the exception of Siena, threw off its allegiance to the Empire. The leaders of the Ghibelline party in Florence took refuge in Siena, which speedily led to hostilities between the two cities.

To resist the victorious Guelphs, Siena had only the alliance of Pisa; and the little republic, hardly beset, sent pressing requests for succor to Manfred, son of the emperor Frederick, and king of Naples.

they could drink, and, promising them double pay, persuaded them to charge the enemy's lines. This they did, and with incredible fury. The Florentines, taken by surprise, and not knowing what might follow this whirlwind of one hundred German devils, were upon the point of raising the siege. When, however, they perceived the insignificant number of their assailants, they summoned heart of grace, slew the hundred troopers to the very last man, and capturing the royal banner subjected it to every conceivable outrage. This was exactly what the Mephistophelean Uberti desired. Enraged at the dishonor done to his standard, Manfred despatched eight hundred German knights, under his cousin Giordano Lancia di Angalono, to the help of Siena, and with the levies from Pisa the whole of the Ghibelline forces amounted to nine thousand horse and eighteen thousand five hundred foot soldiers.

To maintain this host was an enormous tax upon the city of Siena, and in order to employ the army, and if possible to induce the Florentines to give battle, the Sienese commanders laid siege to the neighboring city of Montalcino.

The Florentines were, however, not at all disposed to make easy the plans of their enemies, and obstinately remained within their walls. But the guile of

asking mercy of God. The Twenty-four Signori, who then ruled Siena, posted a watchman on the tower of the Palazzo Marescotti, now the palace of the Saracini, whence the field of battle was distinctly visible. The winding road over hill and dale would make the distance five or six miles; but, as a bird would fly, in a direct line, Monte Aperto is little more than three miles away. Thus, the watchman, a certain Cerreto Ceccolino, could distinctly perceive the movements of the contending armies. Terrible was the anxiety of the crowd of old men, women, and children at the base of the tower as they waited for the report of the combat. At length the watchman strikes his drum, and, in the breathless pause that follows, he cries with a loud voice so that all may hear: "They have reached Monte Selvoli, and are pushing up the hill to secure it, as a coign of vantage, and now the Florentines are in motion and they also are trying to gain the hill."

Uberti was more than a match for them. | orders, were assembled in the cathedral With great secrecy he despatched two monks to the leaders of the people of Florence, to represent that they were the emissaries of the most powerful citizens of Siena, who, finding the tyranny of Provenzano Salvani* and Uberti insupportable, were determined to deliver themselves from it at any cost. The messengers added that when the Florentines, under pretext of succoring Montalcino, should reach Siena, one of the gates of the city would be opened to them. Unhappily for Florence, her leaders believed the messengers and acted upon their insidious advice. The people of Florence rose in mass, and aid was demanded from the allied Guelphic cities. Bologna, Perugia, and Orvieto sent their contingents. A host of thirty-three thousand warriors gathered around the Carroccio, or sacred car of Florence. The army marched to Monte Aperto, a few miles from Siena, in the full hope and expectation that the city would soon be theirs. Towards sunset on the 3rd September (1260) the Sienese, after publicly invoking the aid of the Virgin, and dedicating their city to her, marched out to meet their enemies, and upon the following day the struggle took place. It was a hard fought and long doubtful battle, and it was by treachery that it was at length decided. Bocca degli Abati, a Ghibelline, who fought in the ranks of the Florentines, struck off, with one blow of his sword, the hand of Jacopo di Pazzi, who bore the standard of the cavalry. Fell panic seized the Florentine riders when they saw their banner fallen, and that there was treachery within their ranks, the extent of which they could not gauge. Each man spurred his horse away from the fatal field, and soon the foot-soldiers were involved in one common rout. Then began a butchery which made the Arbia stream run blood;

lo strazio e il grande scempio Che fece l'Arbia colorata in rosso. Meanwhile, in the city of Siena, the old men, women, and children, together with the bishop, priests, and monks of all

This is the Provenzano mentioned by Dante in the eleventh canto of the "Purgatorio: "

"Colui che del cammin si poco piglia
Dinanzi a me, Toscana sono tutta
Ed ora a pena in Siena sen pispiglia
Ond' era sire, quando fu distrutta
La rabbia fiorentina che superba
Fu a quel tempo sì com'ora è putta.

Again the drum sounds: "The armies are engaged; pray God for victory." Next the watchman cries, "Pray God for ours; they seem to me to be getting the worst of it." But soon the pain and suspense of the anxious crowd were relieved by the watchman crying, "Now I see that it is the enemy who fall back." And now in all the joy of victory the watchman beats a triumphant march, and informs the anxious ones below that the standards of Florence have all gone down, and that her soldiers are broken and routed, and how cruel a slaughter there is among them. Cruel slaughter, indeed! The Carroccio, or sacred car of Florence, drawn by white oxen, and with the great standard of the city displayed from its lofty flagstaffs, was taken at a place called Fonte al Pino, close to the Arbia. Among its gallant defenders was a Florentine named Tornaquinci, with his seven sons, all of whom were slain.

Consternation now fell upon the army of Florence. Many threw down their arms and cried, "We surrender; "" but the chronicler adds grimly, "They were not understood." A few of the bravest from Florence, from Lucca, and from Orvieto flung themselves into the castle of Monte Aperto, and there held out until the leaders of the army of Siena, sated with slaughter, admitted them to quarter.*

January 10, 1883.-Yesterday I had the advantage of driving, with a friend, over the battle-field for a second time. We called at the modern villa of Monte Aperto, where resides Signor Canale, who most cour

The chroniclers estimate that ten thou- | white and spotless, some of the most persand of the Guelphic host fell on this fect exemplars of sainthood into which fatal field, and that almost all the remain- humanity has ever flowered. The repubder were made prisoners. The misery lic of Siena made amends for the turbucaused in Florence by the battle is inde- lence and violence and bitter party spirit scribable, and in a very few years a like it had shown throughout its history by the misery was to fall upon Siena. Monte united and gallant resistance it offered to Aperto was the last decisive victory Cosimo dei Medici, when he determined gained by the Ghibelline cause. Nine to add the lordship of Siena to that of years afterwards, in 1269, the Sienese Florence in the middle of the sixteenth army was routed at Colle, and exactly century. Florence was in 1530 besieged twenty years after that at Campaldino.* and conquered by the combined arms of Nothing can be more melancholy than the the emperor Charles V. and Pope Clemstory of the internecine fratricidal strug- ent VII. Siena, yielding to the tradigles between the cities of Italy, with their tional hatred of many centuries, sent some constant episodes of treachery and cold- pieces of artillery into the Imperial camp, blooded cruelty. and rejoiced greatly at the downfall of her ancient foe. That joy did not last long. Hardly was Florence his, when Charles determined to become possessed of Siena, and this, by fraud.and force, he succeeded in a few years in accomplishing.

The history of the republic of Siena during the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries is a long tale of anarchy and revolution, and of incessant struggles between the different parties in the State. In 1277 a law excluded from the supreme magistracy not only the patricians but the people, and decreed that for the future the government should rest alone in the hands of good "merchants loyally affected to the Guelph cause." This government by the middle classes was called the "Administration of the Nine," and lasted for no less than seventy years. Though hated alike by the aristocracy and the people, this régime proved advantageous to the State. Under it the Palazzo Pubblico was built and the graceful Mangia Tower rose, while the cathedral was enlarged and beautified and the city grew wealthy with trade. When the "Nine" fell before a combined assault of the aristocracy and the people, the republic seemed to be given over to anarchy: (In four months and a half there were no less than five revolutions.) Yet, strange to say, it was at this very time that architecture and sculpture and painting advanced with wondrous strides. The great Florentine poet told of his awful visions in the exquisitely beautiful language then spoken in northern Italy, and crystallized into literary form the lovely Tuscan tongue; and against the black background of remorseless feuds, treacherous intrigues, and cruel wars, there stand out,

teously pointed out to us the site of the ancient castle of the same name, and showed us exactly where the Florentine host camped on the night before the battle, and where the Carroccio was taken at Fonte al Pino, around which stone pines still raise their lordly heads.

Dante himself fought at this battle, and in the fifth
canto of the "Purgatorio" he addresses Buonconte di
Montefeltro, mortally wounded on that field:
"Qual forza o qual ventura

Ti traviò si fuor di Campaldino
Che non si seppe mai tua sepoltura?"

The better to dominate the unruly city, the Spaniards built a powerful fortress. Proud of their long self-government and jealous of their independence, the Sienese felt this to be intolerable. They sent ambassadors to the emperor to implore him not to affix upon their free city this badge of servitude. The Imperial reply was: "Sic volo, sic jubeo." They sent to Pope Julius III.; they had hope in him, for was not his mother, Christofana Saracini, a daughter of Siena? But Julius cared more for the shameful pleasures to which he was addicted than for the liberty of the country of his forefathers, and replied, "If one castle does not suffice his Imperial Majesty to keep within bounds these hare-brained Sienese, why, let him build two." Rejected on all hands, the Sienese took courage from despair. They secretly conspired, determined to dare everything, and on July 27, 1552, they rose in insurrection against their Spanish masters. For three days a fierce struggle raged throughout the city: every street, every square, every palace, almost every house, was a battle-field. The struggle ended in the triumph of the citizens; the Spaniards were beaten, and the flag of the republic again waved from the Palazzo Pubblico.

The Spaniards, who had retired to the newly erected fortress, saw themselves compelled to capitulate, and no sooner did the citizens become possessed of it than they proceeded to raze it to the ground. Where this ill-omened castle stood, there is now the garden of the Lizza, a charming little public park, which commands very extensive views of the