After the battle of Montaperti, in which the Sienese defeated the Florentines, among the prisoners brought to Siena was a painter: Coppo di Marcovaldo. Tradition says he won his freedom by painting a Madonna for the Servite friars, and that panel is still here, signed and dated 1261. It is the Madonna del Bordone, and it hangs in a church standing on the hill from which the whole of Siena can be seen.
What to see
Besides Coppo's panel, the basilica keeps two Massacres of the Innocents, one by Pietro Lorenzetti and one by Matteo di Giovanni, and the Madonna del Popolo by Lippo Memmi: four centuries of Sienese painting in a single building. The interior was remade in the Renaissance, light and regular, with columns and chapels, and the brick front was left unfinished like so many others in the city.
The church belongs to the Servites, an order born in Florence and rooted in Tuscany, and stands in the Valdimontone district, one of the wards that run the Palio. The green in front is part of the neighbourhood's daily round: children play there, washing hangs in the houses around, and the two things sit together without trouble.
Visiting
The basilica is in piazza Manzoni, a quarter of an hour on foot from piazza del Campo, climbing to the south-east; free entry, closed at midday and during services. Half an hour.
Our editors' tip
Before going in, stop on the green in front of the church and look towards the centre: from there the cathedral, the Mangia tower and the roofs line up, and it is the point from which Siena has been photographed more often than from any other. Then go in and look for Coppo's Madonna: it is a picture painted by a prisoner of war to get out of prison, and it is still in the city that held him.