A Town of Towers and Palaces

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7847, 8 July 1911, Page 11

A Town of Towers and Palaces

O AN GEMIGNANO, near Siena, Italy, E 5 is a place of towers and palace-fronts; there is litfcio of interest indoors for tho antiquarian save the frescoes of Sant' Agostino, and Memmi's masterpiece in the council hall. The common houses have been so little altered from their first palatial state that, they are almost as interesting as tho great palaces themselves,, which are generally smaller than ’one anticipates, and the vigilant visitor often comes across exquisite terra-cotta mouldings above the'most humble windows —bands of repeated lions in relief, or conventional • leafage. Knock a. few bricked-up window clear in the mind.and supply a heavy door here and there, and you have San Gemignano practically as it appeared to Dante-when he came as envoy from Florence. In the Via' San' Matteo there is a splendidly preserved' twelfth century facade of the kind that is none too often seen; it belongs to the church of the Knights Templars. The place is rich in facades of this period, for there are two others to be noted, one in the main street and andcaer, San Giacomo, that is a little reminiscent of SS. Giovanni and Paolo at Rome. It has th© same bright green earthen bowls set concave into the brown brickwork giving the effect of huge emeralds at a distance. The towers which give the town its unique appearance are of.no particular interest architecturally, being rather bald in their uncompromising squareness

THE FONT!. Above may be seen a twelfth century facade at San Gimignano, Italy,

By Maxwell Arm field, in the-Boston ‘'Monitor"

and total lack , of. charming decorative features, but seen en masse they have a certain strange piquancy of effect that is at any rate uncommon.

The public wash-house of the town serves. at once to'' remind us of past splendors and to prick the conscience of some of us who come from very much larger towns devoid of such a necessary convenience. It is built at the foot of a rocky slope where wild figs spring out -from the crannies and the grass is bright with flowers, purple and red. We follow a steep path that winds down the hillside, and under an old gateway embellished with a weather-worn statue in the golden stone of the country. The Font! lie-just beyond. : They are built against the cliff side, of gray lichened brick, and resemble a huge loggia with groined roof. The archways are magnificently solid looking, and several of the great capitals are beautifully carved. Between two of the great stone tanks is a lion, battered and broken somewhat by centuries of washerwomen. From the roof and every odd corner hung festoons of maidenhair fern, intensely green in the dim light, end the clear dark water murmurs of coolness to the whispering poplars across the way. This sound, however, is quite inaudible as a rule, for the Gemiguaneso seem to wash perpetually and, like most Italians, they seem to find their work aided by a somewhat dramatic form of conversation, 1