The Lupa of gilded bronze on the column to the right of the Palace marks the entrance to the apartments of the Signoria. Over the door, two very lean wolves are adoring the crowned Lion of the People. We ascend the steps to the first floor, into a magnificent series of rooms, glowing with masterpieces of Sienese painting. The first room—variously called the Sala delle Balestre, the Sala del Mappamondo, and the Sala del Gran Consiglio—is now a law-court. Here at one epoch the Consiglio della Campana, or Senate, at others the minor councils of the State met. The whole wall above the place of the president of the court is occupied by a vast fresco by Simone Martini painted in 1315, “right marvellously coloured,” as Ghiberti calls it. Our Lady, enthroned as Queen of Siena, is holding up the Divine Child standing on her knees to bless the deliberations of the Council; Apostles and the Baptist hold the poles of the canopy, Virgin Martyrs and Angels stand in attendance, while two kneeling Angels offer flowers on behalf of Siena’s four sainted patrons—Ansanus, Savinus, Crescentius and Victor. All the faces have the winning sweetness and spiritual loveliness that we find throughout the works of the Sienese school. At the foot of the throne is a poetical inscription: “The angelical flowers, roses and lilies, wherewith the celestial meadow is adorned, do not delight me more than good counsels. But sometimes I see one who, to exalt himself, despises me and deceives my city; and when he speaks worse, he is more praised by each one whom these words condemn.” And along the base of the picture is their Queen’s answer to the prayers of the Saints: “My beloved ones, be assured that I will make your devout chaste prayers content, as you shall wish. But if the potent oppress the weak, harassing them with shames and harms, your prayers are not for these, nor for whoso deceives my city.”
Such being the ideal basis of Siena’s policy, we are now given a series of her victories. On the opposite wall, painted by Simone in 1328, is a mediaeval warrior, Guidoriccio, riding alone, fully armed save for the head, his baton of command in his hand, his steed gorgeously caparisoned. The face is an admirable piece of portraiture. Behind him lie the camp of the Sienese and the captured castle from which the banner of the Commune floats. On either hand are preparations for storming the town in front; but he proudly rides forward alone, to summon it to surrender. Guidoriccio dei Fogliani of Reggio was elected Captain of War in Siena for six months in 1326, and afterwards confirmed so many times in the office that he kept it for seven years. In 1328, when the power of Castruccio degli Interminelli was at its height in Tuscany, he led the Sienese against Montemassi (the town represented in the fresco), repulsed the forces sent by Castruccio to its relief and forced it to surrender. In 1329 he put down a formidable bread-riot in the Campo, and in 1331 he won a great victory over the Pisans under the walls of Massa, after which he had himself dubbed a knight on the field of battle and returned to Siena in triumph. He died in 1352, and the Commune gave him a sumptuous public funeral in San Domenico.
Two later battle-scenes are on the wall opposite the windows. First is the great victory gained by the Sienese over the Company of the Cappello in October 1363, at Torrita, in the Valdichiana. After a vain attempt to come to terms, the Sienese hired four hundred German men-at-arms, and took the field with the forces of the city and the contado under Ceccolo degli Orsini, the Captain-General of the Commune. Before marching out of Siena, the republican army was put under the protection of St Paul the Apostle—apparently because the Christian name of the then Prior of the Twelve was Paolo. Orders had been given not to risk a battle; but, as soon as they came up with the enemy, the Germans set upon them, and the Captain with the Sienese following, a complete victory was gained. On the left of the fresco St Paul, with drawn sword, is seated at the gate of Siena, surrounded by warrior Angels. We see the advancing host of the Sienese, in front of which the splendid mercenary cavalry has already burst upon the ranks of the Company and broken through them, while on the right the rout is complete. The Sienese treated their prisoners magnificently; they deprived Ceccolo of his command, for having disobeyed their orders, but knighted him and heaped honours and presents upon him. The Twelve gave a solemn banquet in the Palace to him and his officers, presented him with a palfrey covered with silk, a sword of honour, a suit of armour and a golden crown, with double pay to his troops and household. A solemn Mass was celebrated in the Duomo, with great offerings to the miraculous Madonna, and the Twelve commissioned Lippo di Vanni to paint the fresco in memory of the glorious event. The second fresco, more than a hundred years later, was painted by Giovanni di Cristofano and Francesco d’Andrea in 1480, a record of the epoch when Duke Alfonso of Calabria was virtually the arbiter of Siena’s destinies. It represents the battle of Poggio Imperiale, near Poggibonsi, in September 1479, the chief action in the war in which Duke Ercole of Ferrara held the baton of command of the Italian league that defended Florence against the allied powers of Rome and Naples, led by the Dukes of Calabria and Urbino. In the temporary absence of Ercole from the seat of war, Alfonso stormed the camp of the league. The painters have represented it as a triumph of Siena over Florence. On the left the Florentines are flying from the field, their condottiere Costanzo Sforza leading the rout, and the standard of the red lily is being lowered from every battlement and tower. Beneath the banners of the Church, Naples and Siena, the allies—led by “El Possa,” a Sienese named Domenico di Michele, who was in the service of the Duke of Calabria—are driving the defeated army before them; in the centre are Alfonso and the Duke of Urbino; reinforcements are advancing on the right, while in the background the light armed foot-soldiers are sacking the Florentine tents.
On the wall under the portrait of Guidoriccio is the famous old picture of the Madonna from San Domenico, by Guido da Siena. The date upon the picture appears originally to have been 1281. The frescoes on either side—St Ansanus baptising the Sienese and St Victor protecting the shield of Liberty—are by Bazzi, painted in 1529. The blessed Bernardo Tolomei, founder of Monte Oliveto, is also Bazzi’s, painted in 1534. These three figures—with their lovely attendant putti—are among the finest of his works. Between the next two arches are San Bernardino by Sano di Pietro and St Catherine by Vecchietta. The last of the series, B. Ambrogio Sansedoni, is more modern.
Out of this hall we pass into the Sala della Pace, originally called the Sala dei Nove, where the Nine met during that most glorious epoch in Sienese history when they held sway. In 1337 they appointed Ambrogio Lorenzetti to decorate their meeting-place with allegorical frescoes. We see the master’s signature, Ambrosius Laurentii de Senis, under the great fresco—the first of the series—on the wall opposite the window. Here on our left is Justice, enthroned as Queen, inspired from above by the crowned genius of Celestial Wisdom. Over her head is the text from the Wisdom of Solomon, which Dante’s spirits of righteous rulers formed in that sixth sphere of Paradise that is swayed by the celestial Dominations: “Love righteousness, ye that be judges of the earth.” On her right and left respectively, the Angel of Distributive Justice crowns one and beheads another, the Angel of Commutative Justice gives weapons to one and money to another. At her feet sits Concord, a beautiful woman upon whose brow rests the pentecostal tongue of fire; she holds two cords that proceed from the scales of Justice, uniting the twenty-four citizens who pass in procession to the feet of the Commune of Siena. This is represented by a majestic old man, richly clothed in robes that show the black and white of the republican shield, royally crowned. The mystical cord of union is attached to his sceptre, and in his other hand he holds an image of the Blessed Virgin, whom the Sienese had chosen for their Sovereign Lady. He sits above the Wolf and the Twins. Faith, Hope and Charity hover above his head; Prudence and Fortitude, Magnanimity and Temperance are his assessors. Beyond them, on the right of the throne, reclines golden-haired Peace, in her clinging white robe; and on the left, Legal Justice sits, with a crown and a severed head on her lap. Around are steel-clad warriors, horse and foot—the armed forces of the Republic—while to the gate of the city men come offering “censi, tributi e signorie di terre,” as one of the verses of the inscription, which is probably Ambrogio’s own, puts it; prisoners are led in in fetters, and others are rigorously kept excluded—for the mediaeval mind can hardly conceive of good government without fuorusciti.
On the right wall are shown the effects of good government, the rule of Justice. “Turn your eyes to gaze upon her who is figured here—O ye that rule!—and who is crowned for her excellence”; so runs the inscription. “Behold what great good things come from her, and how sweet and restful is the life of the city where that virtue is preserved that gloweth back more than any other.” Within the city are dancing and feasting; the shops are full and trade flourishes; cavalcades of dames and cavaliers pass through the streets. Beyond the walls unarmed trains pass out to the chase; the fields are cultivated, the peasants fearlessly bringing their produce into the city. In the distance is the sea—for the righteous republic will have commerce and become a maritime power—and a harbour said to represent Talamone. Over all hovers Security, a winged woman with a little gallows and a scroll: “Without fear may every one travel freely and each man work and sow, whilst the Commune will maintain this Lady in signory, for she has taken all power from the wicked.”
On the opposite wall is Evil Government, the fruits of Injustice. Tyranny, a hideous horned monster, with dagger and poisoned cup, sits enthroned above a goat. Avarice, Pride and Vainglory float over him. Foul and horrible shapes sit round him as ministers: Cruelty (torturing a child), Treason and Fraud, Fury, Division and War. At his feet lies Justice—dishevelled, overthrown, bound. Murder and outrage wanton within and without the walls; the smiling fields are devastated, while at the gate of the ruined, bloodstained city hovers the dark and ragged demon of Fear, with a scroll: “Through selfish ambition in this city has Justice been subjected to Tyranny; wherefore by this way no one passes without dread of death: for without and within the gates they plunder.”[74]
Beyond the Sala delle Balestre is the Chapel of the Palace. The antechapel, the walls and the roof of the chapel itself are covered with frescoes by Taddeo di Bartolo—frescoes that are the first great Sienese achievement in painting in the Quattrocento—executed between 1406 and 1414. On the walls and arches of the antechapel are Roman heroes and philosophers of antiquity; Apollo and Minerva, Jupiter and Mars; a view of the Eternal City; and, over the door that leads into the room adjoining the consistory, a gigantic St Christopher. The Sienese claim, not without reason, that Perugino himself imitated these frescoes nearly a hundred years later, in the Sala del Cambio at Perugia. In the chapel are saints and Angels and the four closing scenes of the Madonna’s life; her farewell to the Apostles, her death, her being carried upon the bier, and lastly her Assumption—the Divine Son sweeping down with Cherubim and Seraphim to draw His Mother from the grave. Among all the Italian pictures of the Assumption, Taddeo’s still can hold its own for its vividness and originality. For the rest, the whole chapel is a perfect gem of the arts and crafts of the early Quattrocento. The holy water stoop is by Giovanni di Turino, the iron railing by Giacomo di Giovanni; the beautiful stalls of the choir, carved and inlaid with illustrations to the Nicene Creed, were executed by Domenico di Niccolò, afterwards called Domenico del Coro, between 1415 and 1428, and may possibly have been designed by Taddeo di Bartolo. Under the Nativity, on the little wooden door between the chapel and the Sala di Balìa is the Wheel of Fortune, on which man is seen transformed to ass as he rises, recovering human shape as he falls. To a later period belong only the organ with Siena’s wolf, which is a work of the early Cinquecento, and the altarpiece. The latter, by Bazzi and one of his later works, was originally in the Duomo; it represents the Madonna and Child with St Joseph and St Calixtus, with a beautiful landscape background in which the ruins of ancient Rome are seen. “This work,” says Vasari, “is likewise held to be very beautiful, inasmuch as one sees that Sodoma in colouring it used much more diligence than he was wont to do in his things.”
We pass next into a small passage or anteroom, out of which the Sala di Concistoro opens on the left, the Sala di Balìa on the right. In the former, in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the Signoria met, the nominal governors of the State; in the latter, the Collegio di Balìa, the select committee that in reality held the Republic in its hands. There are bits of old fresco in this waiting room—Madonnas and Saints, a kneeling magistrate watched over by his celestial patron—and several panels of the Quattrocento; especially a Madonna and Child with four Angels in an old frame, dated 1484, by Matteo di Giovanni, and San Bernardino preaching in the Campo and liberating a possessed woman after his death, ascribed by Mr Berenson to Vecchietta.
The Sala di Concistoro, with a marble doorway ascribed to Giacomo della Quercia, has a ceiling covered with frescoes by Domenico Beccafumi, painted between 1529 and 1535—precisely at the time when his rival, Bazzi, was working on his saints in the other hall. They represent scenes from Roman and Greek history, with allegorical figures of Concord and Justice, and are extravagantly praised by Vasari, who declares that the Justice in particular is painted “so powerfully that it is a marvel.” The foreshortening, the effects of light and shade are certainly exceedingly clever; but it is a little too much to say, as Lanzi does, that “Beccafumi should be called the Correggio of lower Italy.”