Museo Civico

Museo Civico Review

The impressive civic museum occupies what was the "new" Palazzo del Popolo; the Torre Grossa is adjacent. Dante visited San Gimignano for only one day as a Guelph ambassador from Florence to ask the locals to join the Florentines in supporting the pope—just long enough to get the main council chamber, which now holds a 14th-century Maestà by Lippo Memmi, named after him. Off the stairway is a small room containing the racy frescoes by Memmo di Filippuccio (active 1288-1324), depicting the courtship, shared bath, and wedding of a young, androgynous-looking couple. That the space could have been a private room for the commune's chief magistrate may have something to do with the work's highly charged eroticism.

Upstairs, paintings by famous Renaissance artists Pinturicchio (Madonna Enthroned), and Benozzo Gozzoli (Madonna and Child), and two large tondi (circular paintings) by Filippino Lippi (circa 1457-1504) attest to the importance and wealth of San Gimignano. Also worth seeing are Taddeo di Bartolo's Life of San Gimignano, with the saint holding a model of the town as it once appeared; Lorenzo di Niccolò's gruesome martyrdom scene in the Life of St. Bartholomew (1401); and scenes from the Life of St. Fina on a tabernacle that was designed to hold her head. Admission includes the steep climb to the top of the Torre Grossa, which on a clear day has spectacular views.