The Story of Siena and San Gimignano

tsteps of

Roman Church, and of the Commune and of the People of the City of Siena, and to the good and pacific state and to the increase of the Spedale of Madonna Holy Mary Virgin of Siena, which is place

work. Thus began the hospital for the sick; while a dream of a devout woman, who saw upon this spot a ladder reaching up to Heaven, and little children passing up it into the arms of the Blessed Virgin, caused a home for foundlings to be united to it. Modern writers, however, question the existence of the Beato Sorore, and assign the foundation of the Spedale to the eleventh century.[103] Be that as it may, throughout the whole course of Sienese history the Spedale has a sublime record of devotion and charity, especially in those terrible epochs-that re

student. But withal there is a certain uncouthness, at times exaggerated to the verge of grotesqueness. The painter is following the Florentine methods, but is not fully equipped with Florentine science; the nude figure which we see in the foreground of the second fresco is a striking innovation in a Sienese picture, but it will not stand the comparison-which it inevitably invites-with the naked youths in Masaccio's famous scene of St Peter baptising in the Carmine of Florence. The two frescoes on either side of the window are unimportant. Then, on the left wall, is another by Domenico di Bartolo (1443), fairly well preserved, representing the granting of privileges to the Spedale, in the person of its Rector, by Celestine III.; a magnificent young Sienese gentleman in the costume of the fifteenth century stands in the cent

Pietro has unimportant frescoes by Vecchietta, and (inclosed in a tabernacle) the "Madonna of Mercy," by Domenico di Bartolo. In the Infirmary of San Pio a "Beato Sorore" is likewise ascribed to Domenico, and in the Infirmary of San Galgano is a C

here in 1380 that Stefano Maconi heard a voice in his heart telling him that Catherine was dying, and he at once hastened to Rome to receive her last injunctions. In a little cell, adjoining the oratory, St Catherine passed long hours in prayer, and from it she assisted at the offices of the Disciplinati. Here is still shown the hard bed of stone upon which she slept, in the intervals of tending the sick at the hospital. In a room beyond, belonging to the confraternity of St Catherine, are some pictures; a Madonna and Child with Saints by Taddeo di Bartolo, and four small paintings, much restored, in the manner of Girolamo del Pacchia. One of the latter represents the members of the confraternity dressed as you may still see them at the door of St Cathe

e out anew in 1400, and the Spedale was overwhelmed with the sick and the dying, Bernardino collected a band of young men to aid t

r is in the form of a Greek cross. It was built by Girolamo di Domenico Ponsi, at the end of the fifteenth century, and its sacristy contains Madonnas

the side of the hill upon which the Duomo and Spedale stand, to th

TEB

nico first becomes fully visible-rising up grandly on the brow of the opposite hill, over the humble valley of the tanners and dyers. A shrine and a faded fresco on the left at the corner still mark the spot of her first vision. "She saw in the air, above the church of

y-may have lingered a moment by it as they followed Brennus in his march to Rome. It hardly needs the adventitious fame that has accrued to it from the supposition-stated as a fact by the earliest commentators, but at present generally rejected by scholars-that it is the Fonte Branda recorded by Dante in the thirtieth canto of the Inferno, for whose waters, even to cool the burning thirst of Hell's foulest circle, Maestro Adamo would not have given the sight of his aristocratic seducers sharing his agony. There is a curious tradition that certain

ched, that precious vessel and gift of God, blessed Catherine of Siena, who in her life did so many miracles. And many have wondered that the Commune of Siena in that place has not made some temple to the praise of God and honour of that Spouse of Christ."[107] The house had passed through many hands since the death of St Catherine (who, during the latter part of her life, lived with her mother in another house in the present Via Romana), and was then in a ruinous condition, as the document just quoted goes on to state. But in 1464 the inhabitants of the Costa Fontebranda petitioned the Signoria to buy the house, offering themselves to pay all the rest of the expenses for the building and adornment of the chapel or oratory, "the which they are disposed to do in such form and so well adorned, that it will be to the honour of God and St Catherine of Siena and of your Magnificent Signory, and the consolation of al

uasta, as well as Antonio Federighi and other masters, seems to have had a hand in it. Over the door is a relief of St Catherine with Angels-an unworthy work by Urbano da Cortona-and on the fa?ade are the four shields: the Libert

F ST CA

of Montepulciano, and when she stoops to kiss the foot of the dead virgin it moves itself to meet her lips, while "a very white manna falling like heavenly dew" descends upon her. Here the painter has combined two different legends about her visits to Montepulciano. The two girls kneeling on the left are Catherine's two nieces (Lisa's daughters) whom she placed in the convent; the young man in the foreground is a

d devout in sentiment, and the one in which the worthy dyer finds his daughter at prayer, with the mystical dove hovering over her head, is decidedly pretty. The picture over the altar, of her receiving the Stigmata, is perhaps by Girolamo di Benvenuto. The little cell beyond is the chamber which was made over to her as her own, when her father was convinced that she was following a supernatural call. Under the wooden covering of the floor is the very pavement upon which her feet trode, and, shown beneath bars and glass, is the hard pillow of brick

teenth century onwards, and represent scenes from St Catherine's life, with other Saints and Beati of Siena. In contrast with those in the lower oratory, they are largely concerned with her later life and with her public actions; her saving the souls of the tortured felons; her freeing a woman from an evil spirit (by Pietro Sorri); her persuading the Roman People to submit to Pope Urban (by Alessandro Casolani); and her inducing Gregory to return to Rome. The more artistically important of the series are her mystical marriage with Christ, by Arcangiolo Salimbeni, and her canonisation by Pope Pius II. (with the Blessed Bernardo and the Blessed Nera of the Tolomei below), by Francesco Vanni. The second oratory-the Oratorio del Crocifisso-was built in the sixteenth century on the site of the garden of the family. Over the altar is the sacred Crucifix from Santa Cristina at Pisa-a painting ascribed to Giunta Pisano-praying before which, on the Fourth Sun

lli, who is said to have designed the loggia-are the rooms belonging to the "Nobile Contrada dell'Oca." In the S

at lead into the Via Benincasa are guarded by larger wooden geese of this type, set upon the walls of the houses, while at the bottom of the street, at the church, the way is closed by a temporary tabernacle and altar. From earliest morning, Mass is offered up unceasingly in the three oratories, while the figurino (the gaily decked representative of the Contrada) and the alfieri, waving their banners and preceded by a band, march through the city, to pay hono

LLA GA

. The brothers of the Company of St Catherine follow, bearing the silver bust of their patroness, with the priest of the Contrada. The end of the procession is brought up by t

opolani of the Oca celebrated the feast of their glorious patroness, there was a solemn reconciliation between them and the rival Contrada of the

alked in the cloisters where once the convent was. The soaring Campanile was raised in 1340. Though considerably altered-in the sixteenth century it was used as a fortress from which the Spanish soldiery might command the city-it is always the same building that St Catherine knew, and that is so intimately connected with the events of her life; presumably there are few buildings in Italy so quick with the livin

Quattrocento, Benedetto da Maiano. The two marble Angels, kneeling on either side of the altar, are also his. There is a fine view of the Duomo from the back of the choir. In the second chapel, to the left of the choir, is one of the loveliest and most characteristic pictures of the Sienese school-the "Santa Barbara" painted by Matteo di Giovanni in 1479. The Virgin Martyr of the Tower sits enthroned, in robes gorgeous with gold and embroidery, accompanied by St Mary Magdalene and St Catherine of the Wheels; two Angels crown her, two more make melody behind her throne. The faces of the three women-particularly the golden-haired maidens, Catherine and Barbara-are full of pensive sweetness; they have dreamed among the lilies all day and all night of love, such passionless love as that of which the Vita Nuova tells, while the faction fights have splashed Siena's streets with blood, and in her palace chambers the things have been done of which her novelists speak. And, surely, when the Angels sing to their lutes or viols, it will be no hymn, but some such amorous canzone as that with which Casella refreshed Dante's soul on the shores of Purgatory. The lunette above re

it-representing the Svenimento, St Catherine fainting into the arms of her two attendant nuns, Alessia and Francesca, overcome by the glory of the vision of her celestial Bridegroom, and St Catherine miraculously fed with the Food of Angels in the Sacred Host-are by Bazzi, and were painted in 1526. Hardly elsewhere (save, perhaps, in the St Sebastian of the Uffizi painted in the previous year) has the wayward painter of Vercelli touched such a height of inspiration; in conception and execution alike, they are among the supreme triumphs of Italian art. The fresco on the left-representing the execution of Niccolò di Toldo, St

sy of St.

om Bazzi'

rate Tommaso Nacci Caffarini, the authors of the Leggenda and the Leggenda minore respectively. Beautiful as the shrine is-and it would have been perfect in its harmony had only Bazzi completed the decorations-it is impossible at times not to feel that there is something more melodramatic in its treatment than quite accords with

proach the altar, to be fed with that Bread of the Angels, "which," says the collect for that day, "sustained even the temporal life of the blessed Virgin Catherine." The curtain is raised, and behind the gilded bars of the shrine the pale, strange face appears, its features still recognisable. The a

hands; the bull from Pope Gregory at Avignon granting her the dispensation to have Mass upon it wherever she went; and one of her fingers. The latter relic is-so

llars she knelt always, to hear Mass in the church below. Here her visions came to her, here had she those strange mystical revelations of the Divine Word. "Disposing wondrous ascensions in her heart, Catherine went up these steps, to pray in the chapel to Christ her Spouse." Thus runs the

ea di Vanni, perhaps painted in her life-time and in any case her authentic likeness, in which the mantellata is giving her hand to kiss to a kneeling follower of her own sex-in the way to which (when men were concerned) such exception was taken during her life. In the centre of the chapel a piece of the old pavement where she trode-walked with Christ, in the phrase of the legend-is religiously preserved. Elsewhere, marble tablets on the floor are marked with heart, cross or robe, and inscribed: "Christ changeth heart with Catherine"; "Catherine bestoweth her cross on Chris

ich are those set down below, as the blessed Raimondo her confessor telleth, and they are a

Dominic, and she was the first virgin w

, she had frequent ecstasies, and for the most part in these she used to lean against this pilaster, in one of which ecstasies she was zealously portrayed by a painter on the wall ou

rosary, to Jesus Christ in the shape of a poor man, who afterwards t

e of a poor man, who afterwards robed her with an i

d when straightway she fell to the ground thereat, He opened her breast and put there His own heart, saying, 'Lo, most dear daug

here alight, in honour of some saints, fell upon the veils of her head and e

o be fed with the Holy Communion; but because it was late, and the confessor knew not that she was there, she stayed there patiently; then did Jesus Christ in per

rds to her otherwise than in her own heart. Yet, who shall set limits to the potential ascents of the human spirit when held so slightly by its mortal velo, when so little encumbered or shadowed by the nube di sua mortalità as was that of Caterina Benincasa? In those mystical suprasensible regions-during that h