One fine sunny day at Piazza Del Campo, Siena

In Italy, almost every city has public space, as termed as “square” in English in the city center. It is famously called “Piazza “ in Italy. This sounds similar to the famous Italian Food, Pizza. Pizzas are like mo:mo’s in Nepal (one of the favourites of every Nepalese). See, I got distracted by Pizza and started speaking about Pizza. This can be a good topic for our next blog. For now, we will explore Piazza del Campo.

Piazza del Campo is the main piazza located at the historic center of Siena, considered as one of Europe’s greatest medieval squares. The Tower is called Torre Del Mangia and the hall beside is called Palazzo Pubblico. This is the place where the very famous Palio di Siena is held twice a year. Unfortunately because of covid,  it has not been organized for the past two years. Let’s hope we can see some horses in Piazza del Campo this summer. I remember in the year 2020 during the first wave of COVID,  for the first time in my life I saw some herbs and shrubs growing in the Piazza as it was unpopulated for a long time.  Those were such strange times.  Otherwise, this piazza is always happy and filled with people around there taking warm sunshine in the beautiful spring, childrens playing around and especially university students making gatherings. Thanks to the COVID vaccines and government regulations, the cases are decreasing and we can see people cheerful, smiling, and enjoying themselves around the Piazza.

For the people living in Siena, Piazza del Campo is like a second home. When they leave their home, almost every person is messaging on whatsapp to meet their friends at “il Campo” (short name). Sometimes I imagine how many graduation champagnes had been opened at this place. The happiest moment of any student is the graduation day which is celebrated at this place. Unfortunately I couldn’t open my champagne during my graduation since I graduated online because of the COVID. For every reason, Piazza del Campo remains important not only from the architectural beauty but also from the human emotions and connected life, I think it will be one of the beautiful memories of all the international students who come to Siena to study. There is a superstitious belief that if a student goes to the top of the tower before he graduates, he will never graduate. I remember one of my Italian friends, Gabriele telling me, “This is superstition and I don’t believe in it. BUT I don’t climb the top before I graduate for security”. This was good humor. 

Siena is not only famous for Piazza del Campo, the worlds possibly first and the oldest  bank Monte Dei Paschi di Siena was founded in 1472. Siena has other beautiful historical and architectural beauty like Duomo di Siena. The history and culture of Siena is so huge, diverse and large that an entire book is not enough to explain in detail and hence preservation of its unique, coherent inheritance of medieval architecture is one of the main reasons to visit such a magnificent city, which has for a long time been all too aware that it lives in a fragile equilibrium.

Thanks to the spring, we can see this beautiful Piazza smiling and enjoying ourselves.

Happy Easter Holidays.

Enjoy your time.

See you next time