The Grandma and her friends are leaving Tuscany. They have spent some unforgettable weeks visiting one of the most beautiful places of the world and they have got lots of beautiful memories of this visit.
During the flight back to Barcelona, The Grandma has decided to read about, perhaps, the most famous Tuscan family, the Medici,whoseactions changed the history of this wonderful land.
The Medici family was famous and rich people who had lots of possessions, some of them available nowadays. This is the case of their Villas that extended across Tuscany; give an idea of the great power and fortune that this family had.
The Medici villas are a series of rural building complexes in Tuscany which were owned by members of the Medici family between the 15th century and the 17th century.
The villas served several functions: they were the country palaces of the Medici, scattered over the territory that they ruled, demonstrating their power and wealth. They were also recreational resorts for the leisure and pleasure of their owners; and, more prosaically, they were the centre of agricultural activities on the surrounding estates.
In 2013, the Medici villas were added to UNESCO's World Heritage list.
The first Medici villas were the Villa del Trebbio and that at Cafaggiolo, both strong fortified houses built in the 14th century in the Mugello region, the original home of the Medici family.
In the 15th century, Cosimo de' Medici
built villas designed by Michelozzo at Careggi and Fiesole, still quite
severe buildings, but with additional recreational spaces: courtyards,
balconies, and gardens. Lorenzo de' Medici spent long periods at the Villa di Careggi.
Villa Medici, Fiesole, Tuscany
Gradually, Florence became surrounded by a collection of Medici villas, with others in more distant parts of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. By the end of the 16th century, there were at least 16 major estates, with at least another 11 of secondary interest -mainly agricultural or owned by the Medici family for a short time-, together with a constellation of farms and hunting lodges throughout Tuscany. Giusto Utens painted a series of lunettes depicting the main Medici villas in the 17th century, which are now held by the Museo di Firenze com'era.
The last Medici villas were the Villa di Montevettolini and the Villa di Artimino, bought in 1595/6 by Ferdinando I while he was expanding the Villa di Castello, Villa La Petraia and Villa dell'Ambrogiana.
The later villas are outstanding examples of Renaissance and Baroque architecture, and were often accompanied by gardens. The garden at the Villadi Castello, created for Cosimo I de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, was the first in Italy by Niccolò Tribolo, who later designed the Boboli Gardens for Cosimo's Florentine new residence, the Palazzo Pitti.
Each significant member of the Medici family owned an estate. The Duke moved from one house to house. When in residence, the villa became a microcosm of the Medici court. For hunting, he could visit the Villa del Trebbio, Villa di Cafaggiolo or Villa di Pratolino; reside at the Villa dell'Ambrogiana in the spring; and move to the Villa di Artimino, to while away the summer in its cooler elevated position.
After the death of Gian Gastone de' Medici in 1738, the Grand Duchy of Tuscany and the Medici's assets, including their villas, were acquired by Francis, Duke of Lorraine -later Holy Roman Emperor.
Today, some of the Medici villas are museums; others are occupied by institutions, and a few are owned privately, and often hired privately or used to stage public events.
In 2006, the Italian government submitted the Medici villas for designation by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. At the 37th UNESCO World Heritage Committee in 2013 at Phnom Penh, Medici Villas and Gardens in Tuscany was added to the World Heritage list.
Today, The Grandma wants to talk about Mauthausen, one of the first massive concentration camp complexes in Nazi Germany, and the last to be liberated by a squad of US Army Soldiers of the 41st Reconnaissance Squadron of the US 11th Armoured Division, 3rd US Army on a day like today in 1945.
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was a genocide during World War II in which Nazi Germany, aided by local collaborators, systematicallymurderedsome six million European Jews, around two-thirds of the Jewish population of Europe, between 1941 and 1945.
Jews were targeted for extermination as part of a larger event during the Holocaust era, in which Germany and its collaborators persecuted and murdered other groups, including Slavs (chiefly ethnic Poles, Soviet prisoners of war, and Soviet citizens), the Roma, the incurably sick, political and religious dissenters such as communists and Jehovah's Witnesses, and gay men.
Taking into account all the victims of Nazi persecution, the death toll rises to 17 million.
Nowadays, we can see astonished how the right-wing is rising unstoppably in Europe and economic, social and moral crisis seem to help in this increasing. We must learn from our recent past to not do the same mistakes.
The Grandma and her friends are in Tuscany and they want to talk, in a special day like today, about Roberto Benigni, the great Tuscan artist well-known by his role in the film La vita è bella, a film that talks about fascism and WWII in Italy.
Roberto Remigio Benigni, born 27 October 1952, is a Tuscan actor, comedian, screenwriter and director. He co-wrote, directed and acted in the 1997 film Life is Beautiful, which won him the Academy Award for Best Actor at the 71st Oscars Ceremony.
He also portrayed Inspector Clouseau's son in Son of the Pink Panther (1993) and has collaborated with filmmaker Jim Jarmusch in three of his films: Down by Law (1986), Night on Earth (1991) and Coffee and Cigarettes (2003).
Guido Orefice (Roberto Benigni) in La Vita è Bella
Benigni was born in Manciano La Misericordia, Castiglion Fiorentino, a small, walled city in eastern Tuscany, in the province of Arezzo, between the cities of Arezzo and Cortona. The son of Isolina Papini, a fabric maker, and Luigi Benigni, a bricklayer, carpenter, and farmer.
His first experiences as a theatre actor took place in 1971, in Prato. During that autumn he moved to Rome where he took part in some experimental theatre shows, some of which he also directed. In 1975, Benigni had his first theatrical success with Cioni Mario di Gaspare fu Giulia, written by Giuseppe Bertolucci.
Benigni became famous in Italy in the 1970s for a television series called Onda Libera, on RAI2, produced by Renzo Arbore, in which he interpreted the satirical piece The L'inno del corpo sciolto, a scatological song about the joys of defecation. A great scandal for the time, the series was suspended due to censorship. His first film was 1977's Berlinguer, Ti voglio bene, also by Bertolucci.
His popularity increased with L'altra domenica (1976-1979), another TV show of Arbore's in which Benigni portrayed a lazy film critic who never watches the films he's asked to review.
In 1980 he met Cesenate actress Nicoletta Braschi, who was to become his wife and who has starred in most of the films he has directed.
In June 1983 he appeared during a public political demonstration by the Italian Communist Party, with which he was a sympathiser, and on this occasion he lifted and cradled the party's national leader Enrico Berlinguer. It was an unprecedented act, given that until that moment Italian politicians were proverbially serious and formal.
Guido Orefice (Roberto Benigni) in La Vita è Bella
Benigni was censored again in the 1980s for calling Pope John Paul II something impolite during an important live TV show Wojtylaccio, meaning Bad Wojtyla in Italian, but with a friendly meaning in Tuscan dialect.
Benigni's first film as director was Tu mi turbi in 1983.
In 1984, he played in Non ci resta che piangere with comic actor Massimo Troisi. Beginning in 1986, Benigni starred in three films by American director Jim Jarmusch.
In 1993, he starred in Son of the Pink Panther, directed by veteran Blake Edwards. Benigni played Peter Sellers' Inspector Clouseau's illegitimate son who is assigned to save the Princess of Lugash.
Benigni is perhaps best known outside Italy for his 1997 tragicomedy La vita è bella, filmed in Arezzo, also written by Cerami. The film is about an Italian Jewish man who tries to protect his son's innocence during his internment at a Nazi concentration camp, by telling him that the Holocaust is an elaborate game and he must adhere very carefully to the rules to win.
Benigni's father had spent three years in a concentration camp in Bergen-Belsen, and La vita è bellais based in part on his father's experiences. Benigni was also inspired by the story of Holocaust survivor Rubino Romeo Salmonì.
More favourable critics praised Benigni's artistic daring and skill to create a sensitive comedy involving the tragedy, a challenge that CharlieChaplinconfessed he would not have done withThe Great Dictatorhad he been aware of the horrors of theHolocaust.
'Forbidden access to Jews and dogs'
In 1998, the film was nominated for seven Academy Awards.
At the 1999 ceremony, the film was awarded the Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film, which Benigni accepted as the film's director, Best Original Dramatic Score, and Benigni received the award for Best Actor, the first for a male performer in a non-English-speaking role, and only the third overall acting Oscar for non-English-speaking roles.
Famously, giddy with delight after Life Is Beautiful was announced as the Best Foreign Language Film, Benigni climbed over and then stood on the backs of the seats in front of him and applauded the audience before proceeding to the stage.
After winning his Best Actor Oscar later in the evening, he said in his acceptance speech, This is a terrible mistake because I used up all my English! To close his speech, Benigni quoted the closing lines of Dante's Divine Comedy, referencing the love that moves the sun and all the stars.
Benigni is an improvisatory poet. Poesia estemporanea is a form of art popularly followed and practiced in Tuscany, appreciated for his explanation and recitations of Dante's Divina Commedia from memory.
During 2006 and 2007, Benigni had a lot of success touring Italy with his 90-minute one man showTuttoDante. Combining current events and memories of his past narrated with an ironic tone, Benigni then begins a journey of poetry and passion through the world of the Divina Commedia.
Roberto Benigni is also a singer-songwriter. Among his recorded performances are versions of Paolo Conte's songs.
Today, Jordi Santanyí and his friends are still in Arezzo. They want to
visit the Francesco Petrarca's house, where this genius, father of Renaissance,
was born and where the artistic and literary heritage of the PetrarchanAcademy
is kept in. Nowadays, this building is owned by the Accademia Petrarca di
Lettere Arti e Scienze di Arezzo, established in 1623. It dates back to the XVI
century and was built on top of a previous building of the XIII-XIV centuries.
The library has got about 20.000 books and incunabula, some of which
date back to the XVI, XVII, XVIII and XIX centuries. Among them there are
valuable editions of some Petrarchan works and some antique books, including
some works by F. Redi, a doctor, literary man and naturalist from Arezzo, who
lived in the XVII century (1626-1697).
All the books dating back to the XV-XVIII centuries were collected by
F.Redi himself and his successors until 1820 when they were inherited by the
Petrachan Academy.
As well as the Redi Library, the Academy owns important collections of
books including G. L. Passerini’s Dante’s Library andvaluable collection of letters, about 8000, belonging to the most well-known literary representatives of the
Italian culture of the first three decades of the XX century.
Jordi and The Grandma love Literature and visiting Petrarca's home is an
unforgettable experience for them. Jordi wants to know more things about
Petrarca's life and The Grandma is interested in the mysterious figure of Laura,
the secret love of the Tuscan writer.
Francesco Petrarca (July 20, 1304-July 18/19, 1374), commonly anglicized as Petrarch was a scholar and poet of Renaissance who was one of the earliest humanists. His rediscovery of Cicero's letters is often credited with inventing the 14th-century Renaissance.
Petrarch is often considered the founder of Humanism. In the 16th century, Pietro Bembo created the model for the modern Italian language based on Petrarch's works, as well as those of Giovanni Boccaccio, and, to a lesser extent, Dante Alighieri.
Jordi visits La Casa di Petrarca, Arezzo
Petrarch would be later endorsed as a model for Italian style by the Accademia della Crusca.
Petrarch's sonnets were admired and imitated throughout Europe during the Renaissance and became a model for lyrical poetry. He is also known for being the first to develop the concept of the Dark Ages.
Petrarch was born in the Tuscan city of Arezzo in 1304. He was the son of Ser Petracco and his wife Eletta Canigiani. His given name was Francesco Petracco. The name was Latinized to Petrarca. Petrarch's younger brother was born in Incisa in Val d'Arno in 1307. Dante was a friend of his father.
Petrarch spent his early childhood in the village of Incisa, near Florence. He spent much of his early life at Avignon and nearby Carpentras, where his family moved to follow Pope Clement V who moved there in 1309 to begin the Avignon Papacy. He studied law at the University of Montpellier (1316–20) and Bologna (1320–23) with a lifelong friend and schoolmate called Guido Sette. Because his father was in the legal profession, a notary, he insisted that Petrarch and his brother study law also.
Petrarch however, was primarily interested in writing and Latin literature and considered these seven years wasted. Additionally, he proclaimed that through legal manipulation his guardians robbed him of his small property inheritance in Florence, which only reinforced his dislike for the legal system. He protested, I couldn't face making a merchandise of my mind, as he viewed the legal system as the art of selling justice.
Petrarch was a prolific letter writer and counted Boccaccio among his notable friends to whom he wrote often. After the death of their parents, Petrarch and his brother Gherardo went back to Avignon in 1326, where he worked in numerous clerical offices. This work gave him much time to devote to his writing. With his first large-scale work, Africa, an epic in Latin about the great Roman general Scipio Africanus, Petrarch emerged as a European celebrity.
On April 8, 1341, he became the second poet laureate since antiquity and was crowned by Roman Senatori Giordano Orsini and Orso dell'Anguillara on the holy grounds of Rome's Capitol.
The Grandma & Claire inside La Casa di Petrarca
He traveled widely in Europe,served as an ambassador, and has been called the first touristbecause he traveled just for pleasure, and the reason he climbed Mont
Ventoux. During his travels, he collected crumbling Latin manuscripts
and was a prime mover in the recovery of knowledge from writers of Rome
and Greece.
Disdaining what he believed to be the ignorance of the centuries preceding the era in which he lived, Petrarch is credited or charged with creating the concept of a historical Dark Ages.
Petrarch spent the later part of his life journeying through northern Italy as an international scholar and poet-diplomat. His career in the Church did not allow him to marry, but he is believed to have fathered two children by a woman or women unknown to posterity.
About 1368 Petrarch moved to the small town of Arquà in the Euganean Hills near Padua, where he passed his remaining years in religious contemplation. He died in his house in Arquà early on July 20, 1374 -his seventieth birthday. The house hosts now a permanent exhibition of Petrarchian works and curiosities; among others you find the famous tomb of Petrarch's beloved cat who was embalmed.
Petrarch is best known for his Italian poetry, notably the Canzoniere and the Trionfi. However, Petrarch
was an enthusiastic Latin scholar and did most of his writing in this
language. His Latin writings include scholarly works, introspective
essays, letters, and more poetry.
Among them are Secretum Meum, an intensely personal, guilt-ridden imaginary dialogue with Augustine of Hippo; De Viris Illustribus, a series of moral biographies; Rerum Memorandarum Libri, an incomplete treatise on the cardinal virtues; De Otio Religiosorum and De Vita Solitaria, which praise the contemplative life; De Remediis Utriusque Fortunae, a self-help book which remained popular for hundreds of years; Itinerarium; invectives against opponents such as doctors, scholastics, and the French; the CarmenBucolicum, a collection of 12 pastoral poems; and the unfinished epic Africa. He translated seven psalms, a collection known as the Penitential Psalms.
Joseph visits La Casa di Petrarca, Arezzo
Petrarch also published many volumes of his letters, including a few written to his long-dead friends from history such as Cicero and Virgil. Cicero, Virgil, and Seneca were his literary models.Most of his Latin writings are difficult to find today, but several of his works are available in English translations.
Petrarch collected his letters into two major sets of books called Epistolae familiares and Seniles, both of which are available in English translation. The plan for his letters was suggested to him by knowledge of Cicero's letters. These were published without names to protect the recipients, all of whom had close relationships to Petrarch.
His Letter to Posterity gives an autobiography and a synopsis of his philosophy in life. It was originally written in Latin and was completed in 1371 or 1372 -the first such autobiography in a thousand years, since Saint Augustine.
While Petrarch's poetry was set to music frequently after his death, especially by Italian madrigal composers of the Renaissance in the 16th century, only one musical setting composed during Petrarch's lifetime survives. This is Non al suo amante by Jacopo da Bologna, written around 1350.
On April 6, 1327, after Petrarch gave up his vocation as a priest, the sight of a woman called Laura in the church of Sainte-Claire d'Avignon awoke in him a lasting passion, celebrated in the Rime sparse. Later, Renaissance poets who copied Petrarch's style named this collection of 366 poems Il Canzoniere.
Laura may have been Laura de Noves, the wife of Count Hugues de Sade, an ancestor of the Marquis de Sade. There is little definite information in Petrarch's work concerning Laura, except that she is lovely to look at, fair-haired, with a modest, dignified bearing.
Laura and Petrarch had little or no personal contact. According to his Secretum, she refused him because she was already married. He channeled his feelings into love poems that were exclamatory rather than persuasive, and wrote prose that showed his contempt for men who pursue women. Upon her death in 1348, the poet found that his grief was as difficult to live with as was his former despair.
In his Letter to Posterity, Petrarch wrote: In
my younger days I struggled constantly with an overwhelming but pure
love affair -my only one, and I would have struggled with it longer had
not premature death, bitter but salutary for me, extinguished the
cooling flames. I certainly wish I could say that I have always been
entirely free from desires of the flesh, but I would be lying if I did.
Francesco & Laura
While it is possible she was an idealized or pseudonymous character -particularly since the name Laura has a linguistic connection to the poetic laurelsPetrarch coveted- Petrarch himself always denied it.
His frequent use of l'aura is also remarkable: for example, the line Erano i capei d'oro a l'aura sparsi may both mean her hair was all over Laura's body, and the wind l'aura blew through her hair.
There is psychological realism in the description of Laura,although Petrarch draws heavily on conventionalised descriptions of love and lovers from troubadour songs and other literature of courtly love. Her presence causes him unspeakable joy, but his unrequited love creates unendurable desires, inner conflicts between the ardent lover and the mystic Christian, making it impossible to reconcile the two.
Petrarch's quest for love leads to hopelessness and irreconcilable anguish, as he expresses in the series of paradoxes in Rima 134 Pace non trovo, et non ò da far guerra;/e temo, et spero; et ardo, et son un ghiaccio:I find no peace, and yet I make no war:/and fear, and hope: and burn, and I am ice.
Laura is unreachable -the few physical descriptions of her are vague, almost impalpable as the love he pines for, and such is perhaps the power of his verse, which lives off the melodies it evokes against the fading, diaphanous image that is no more consistent than a ghost.
In addition, some today consider Laura to be a representation of an ideal Renaissance woman, based on her nature and definitive characteristics.
Petrarch is traditionally called the father of Humanism and considered by many to be the father of the Renaissance. In his work Secretum meum he points out that secular achievements did not necessarily preclude an authentic relationship with God.
Petrarch argued instead that God had given humans their vast intellectual and creative potential to be used to their fullest. He inspired humanist philosophy which led to the intellectual flowering of the Renaissance.
He believed in the immense moral and practical value of the study of ancient history and literature -that is, the study of human thought and action. Petrarch was a devout Catholic and did not see a conflict between realizing humanity's potential and having religious faith.
Yesterday, Claire Fontaine and her friends visited Siena one of the most beautiful cities in Tuscany which was declared by UNESCO a WorldHeritage Site. Claire loves Design and Architecture and visiting Siena is a fantastic opportunity to see amazing places from the Renaissance and breathe art around the city.
Siena, in Latin Sena Iulia, is a city in Tuscany and the capital of the province of Siena.
The historic centre of Siena has been declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site. Siena is famous for its cuisine, art, museums, medieval cityscape and the Palio, a horse race held twice a year.
Siena, like other Tuscan hill towns, was first settled in the time of the Etruscans (c. 900–400 BC) when it was inhabited by a tribe called the Saina. The Etruscans were a tribe of advanced people who changed the face of central Italy through their use of irrigation to reclaim previously unfarmable land, and their custom of building their settlements in well-defended hill forts. A Romantown called Saena Julia was founded at the site in the time of the EmperorAugustus. Some archaeologists assert that Siena was controlled for a period by a Gaulish tribe called the Senones.
According to local legend, Siena was founded by Senius and Aschius, two sons of Remus and thus nephews of Romulus, after whom Rome was named.
Joseph visits the Siena Cathedral
Supposedly after their father's murder by Romulus, they fled Rome, taking with them the statue of the she-wolf suckling the infants, Capitoline Wolf, thus appropriating that symbol for the town. Additionally they rode white and black horses, giving rise to the Balzana, or coat of arms of Siena with a white band atop a dark band.
Some claim the name Siena derives from Senius. Other etymologies derive the name from the Etruscan family name Saina, the Roman family name Saenii, or the Latin word senex (old) or its derived form seneo (to be old).
Siena did not prosper under Roman rule. It was not sited near any major roads and lacked opportunities for trade. Its insular status meant that Christianity did not penetrate until the 4th century AD, and it was not until the Lombards invaded Siena and the surrounding territory that it knew prosperity.
After the Lombard occupation, the old Roman roads of Via Aurelia and the Via Cassia passed through areas exposed to Byzantine raids, so the Lombards rerouted much of their trade between the Lombards' northern possessions and Rome along a more secure road through Siena.
Siena prospered as a trading post, and the constant streams of pilgrims passing to and from Rome provided a valuable source of income in the centuries to come.
The oldest aristocratic families in Siena date their line to the Lombards' surrender in 774 to Charlemagne. At this point, the city was inundated with a swarm of Frankish overseers who married into the existing Sienese nobility and left a legacy that can be seen in the abbeys they founded throughout Sienese territory.
Feudal power waned, however, and by the death of Countess Matilda in 1115 the border territory of the March of Tuscany which had been under the control of her family, the Canossa, broke up into several autonomous regions. This ultimately resulted in the creation of the Republic of Siena.
Inside the Siena Cathedral, Tuscany
The Republic existed for over four hundred years, from the 12th century until the year 1555. During the golden age of Siena before the Black Death in 1348, the city was home to 50,000 people.
In the Italian War of 1551–59, the republic was defeated by the rival Duchy of Florence in alliance with the Spanish crown. After 18 months of resistance, Siena surrendered to Spain on 17 April 1555, marking the end of the republic.
The new Spanish King Felipe II, owing huge sums to the Medici, ceded it, apart from a series of coastal fortress annexed to the State of Presidi, to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, to which it belonged until the unification of Italy in the 19th century.
A Republican government of 700 Sienese families in Montalcino resisted until 1559.
Siena is located in the central part of Tuscany, in the middle of a vast hilly landscape between the Arbia river valley (south), the Merse valley (south-west), the Elsa valley (north), the Chianti hills (north-east), the Montagnola Senese (west) and the Crete Senesi (south-east). The city lies at 322 m above sea level.
The Siena Cathedral (Duomo), begun in the 12th century, is a masterpiece of Italian Romanesque-Gothic architecture. Its main façade was completed in 1380. The original plan called for an ambitiously massive basilica, the largest then in the world, with, as was customary, an east-west nave. However, the scarcity of funds, in part due to war and plague, truncated the project, and the Sienese created a subdued version from the original plan's north-south transept. The east wall of the abandoned original folly of a nave still stands; through an internal staircase, visitors can climb for a grand view of the city.
The Siena Cathedral Pulpit is an octagonal 13th-century masterpiece sculpted by Nicola Pisano
with lion pedestals and biblical bas-relief panels. The inlaid marble
mosaic floor of the cathedral, designed and labored on by many artists,
is among the most elaborate in Italy. The Sacristy and Piccolomini library have well preserved Renaissance frescos by Ghirlandaio and Pinturicchio respectively. Other sculptors active in the church and in the subterranean baptistry are Donatello, Lorenzo Ghiberti, Jacopo della Quercia and others.
Tina Picotes visits Siena at night
The Museo dell'Opera del Duomo contains Duccio's famous Maestà (1308–11) and various other works by Sienese masters. More Sienese paintings are to be found in the Pinacoteca.
The Piazza del Campo, the shell-shaped town square, unfurls before the Palazzo Pubblico with its tall Torre del Mangia. This is part of the site for the Palio horse race.
The Palazzo Pubblico, itself a great work of architecture, houses yet another important art museum. Included within the museum is Ambrogio Lorenzetti's frescoes depicting the Allegory and Effects of Good and Bad Government and also some of the finest frescoes of Simone Martini and Pietro Lorenzetti.
The Palazzo Salimbeni, located in a piazza of the same name, was the original headquarters and remains in possession of the Monte dei Paschi di Siena, one of the oldest banks in continuous existence in Europe.
Housed in the notable Gothic Palazzo Chigi-Saracini on Via di Città is the Accademia Musicale Chigiana, Siena's conservatory of music.
Siena retains a ward-centric culture from medieval times. Each ward (contrada) is represented by an animal or mascot, and has its own boundary and distinct identity. Ward rivalries are most rampant during the annual horse race (Palio) in the Piazza del Campo. There are 17 wards (contrada): Aquila, Bruco, Chiocciola, Civetta, Drago, Giraffa, Istrice, Leocorno, Lupa, Nicchio, Oca, Onda, Pantera, Selva, Tartuca, Torre, Valdimontone.
Over the centuries, Siena has had a rich tradition of arts and artists. The list of artists from the Sienese School include Duccio and his student SimoneMartini, Pietro Lorenzetti and Martino di Bartolomeo. A number of well-known works of Renaissance and High Renaissance art still remain in galleries or churches in Siena.
The Church of San Domenico contains art by Guido da Siena, dating to the mid-13th century. Duccio's Maestà, which was commissioned by the City of Siena in 1308, was instrumental in leading Italian painting away from the hieratic representations of Byzantine art and directing it towards more direct presentations of reality. And his Madonna and Child with Saints polyptych, painted between 1311 and 1318, remains at the city's Pinacoteca Nazionale.
The Pinacoteca also includes several works by Domenico Beccafumi, as well as art by Lorenzo Lotto, Domenico di Bartolo and Fra Bartolomeo.
