Why go
Pinturicchio's scenes turn Enea Silvio Piccolomini's journey to the papacy into a richly coloured narrative. The books below them show another kind of painstaking image-making. Together they offer a compact contrast between public biography and the intimate detail of manuscript illumination within the cathedral.
The full story
Cardinal Francesco Todeschini Piccolomini commissioned the library in 1492 to hold the books and manuscripts of his uncle, Enea Silvio Piccolomini, who became Pope Pius II. Pinturicchio and his assistants painted a cycle around the room in the early sixteenth century. The scenes follow Pius from diplomatic and ecclesiastical roles to the papacy; Latin captions identify the episodes. One image places a meeting at Siena's Porta Camollia, linking the larger biography to the city outside the cathedral. The painted ceiling has mythological subjects, so the room is more than a row of historical portraits. Below the wall paintings, illuminated choir books invite a different scale of looking: their pages reward attention to colour and fine detail. A Roman copy of the Three Graces stands in the centre, adding a classical figure group to this Renaissance setting.