The palace follows the curve of via di Città, and so you never see the whole of it at once: you have to walk along it while the front opens a piece at a time. The oldest core is of the twelfth century and belonged to a Ghibelline family; between the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries the council that governed the Sienese republic also met here.
What to see
Inside are a private art collection, with Sienese and Tuscan paintings gathered by the owners over centuries, and the concert hall of the music foundation. In the outer loggia survive the Raphaelesque decorations wanted by the Piccolomini, who bought the building in the sixteenth century; the row of three-light windows along the front was added later, imitating the original gothic.
In 1932 count Guido Chigi Saracini founded here the music academy that bears his name, and since then the palace has been a school of advanced training: every summer students come from all over the world for the courses and the concerts. The family went on living here until 1965, so for thirty years the playing went on in somebody's home.
Visiting
The palace is in via di Città, two minutes from the Campo; the art collection and the rooms are visited by appointment and at limited hours, while in summer people mostly come in for the academy's concerts. An hour.
Our editors' tip
Look at the tower above the palace: Sienese tradition tells that from up there a trumpeter announced to the city the victory of Montaperti. It is a legend, but it explains why this building, in a street where the palaces look alike, is the one the Sienese point out first.