took the precaution of putting a large iron fence round their fountain, but their cathedral suffered. They were zealous during the time of their prosperity to have a large and splendid church, but they never found time to finish or adorn it. They left the brickwork naked, hoping for some chance fight to furnish them with marbles for it, and in 1385 they were able to secure those which had been prepared for the cathedral of Arezzo. But they did not keep them. Pellini gives a weird account of the bringing of these marbles. “These things being accomplished,” he says, referring to a very inhuman siege and conquest over the unfortunate Arezzo, “some outward sign of the acknowledged victory was necessary; so many marble stones were brought back to Perugia with some paintings upon them which had been formerly in the cathedral of the city; and the oxen and carts which brought them hither, with all the men who worked to bring them, were dressed out by our city with red cloth; but of those said stones, although they were certainly put up outside the walls of our cathedral, no sign at all remains.” A little later Pellini explains their loss, for the people of Arezzo got back their marbles. “They started on their journey back to Arezzo,” says the faithful historian, who will acknowledge no possible conquest of his own city, “and were put up on a part of their church where they may now be seen, white and red in colour, and very lovely to behold.”
Throughout the history of Perugia, in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, we hear of fights and skirmishes in the square, but it was always the cathedral and not the palace which was turned into a fortress. In 1489 one of the endless fights between the Baglioni and the Oddi occurred, and the cathedral became a castle. Guido Baglioni arrived in hot haste from Spello, and proceeded to turn the Oddi out of Perugia. “Girolamo della Penna,” says Villani, “deserted his brother Agamemnon and joined the Signori Baglioni, taking with him Silvio del Abate and others, and, together with the Baglioni, they took possession of S. Lorenzo, placed artillery there, and fortified the church, its loggia, and its roof in every way they knew of.” The Duomo, on this occasion, proved such an excellent stronghold, that the Oddi outside were entirely discomfited, and had to abandon the siege and retire once more to the country. Another remarkable instance of fighting between the two pugnacious families is given by Fabretti, which illustrates, moreover, the slight power possessed by the Pope at that period. “At the end of October 1488 there was a great fight in the Piazza degli Aratri, and then the Baglioni collected in the piazza, and an ever-increasing throng of supporters assembled round them. And on that same day the brother of the Pope (Innocent VIII.) arrived, and as he passed by the piazza the people called out, ‘Chiesa, chiesa.’ He was accompanied to the steps of the Palazzo Pubblico by Guido and Grifonetto Baglioni, who hoped that he might manage to arrange matters. But the Priori looked out of the windows above them, and seeing the Baglioni in the street below, they began to throw down large and heavy stones in the hopes of wounding Guido Baglioni. The hubbub continued with renewed force, and only at dusk did stillness fall upon the city.”
Palazzo Pubblico.
Having glanced thus rapidly over the general historical interest of the piazza, it may be well to describe the buildings separately, taking the Palazzo Pubblico first. Anyone who comes to Perugia, even for a single afternoon, will naturally hurry to this point and spend an hour or two in the Cambio and Pinacoteca; but if a little time remains he should wander further through its public corridors and halls and archives, its council chambers, library, and prisons. All these are gathered together with a certain indifference to the first lines of architecture in the shell of the massive old buildings, and by penetrating these mysterious regions one seems better able to understand the spirit of historical Perugia. The iron force of the
