From the hunts to the Palio “alla tonda”.Zooarchaeology of a Feast

The horse race held in the “tufo” ring of Piazza del Campo is only the most recent form of competition through which the Contradas of Siena have challenged each other over the centuries. In fact, the Palio has taken on different forms in various phases of its centuries-old history. The first written sources concerning the Feast, dated to the 14th century, speak of pugne, a sort of brawls, periodically organised by the city government. Only from the 16th century begins the use, never abandoned, of the animals. From that moment onwards, the Palio will be represented, in different periods, by hunts, races on donkey-back or on buffalo-back (called asinate and bufalate respectively), bullfights and, finally, horse races, disputed first alla lunga, run across the whole city, then alla tonda in the Campo. In this preliminary work, through the examination of iconographic and written sources, we intend to reconstruct the different methods of exploitation of the animals adopted by the Sieneses in the Palio.