Sull’ingresso a Siena di Carlo V (1536) e altre questioni

The history of parties and theatrical performances in the modern era is never the result of simple and linear analysis, but the union of multiple levels of information that bring together the places, people, interrelations between the classes, but also the technologies, to the point that the performance historian is necessarily a historian of urban cultures. With this in mind the analysis of an exceptional event is proposed, such as the arrival in Siena of Emperor Charles V. The celebrations orchestrated by the Accademia degli Intronati used the forms of the ancient celebration, following a path that, in the succession of days, moves from the Great Hall of the city Council to the Piazza di Campo, where an equestrian monument (ephemeral, papier-mache) of the emperor is placed. The guest, according to the program of events, discovers the city in successive stages. In a different political climate, a few years later, the entry into the city of Cosimo de Medici, the new lord of the city conquered by Florence, takes place directly in the Piazza di Campo: a different approach to the city accompanies the different political perspectives.