The origin of this event is to be found in the distant Middle Ages, about 1200, when Siena contended in Florence the supremacy of Tuscany and which, within it, was fragmented into seventeen districts, each with its own traditions and culture and managed like micro states.
The Palio was the "peaceful" occasion to show with pride the belonging to a particular district and the resentment towards others; all this mix of emotions and pride still relive today.
The Palio is the Palio. No sociological, historical, anthropological interpretation could explain it. Sublimation and damnation with the fate of each individual and in his Sienese citizenship. Raging furious senese, in any case incomparable confirmation of it.
Mario Luzi, poet, 1998
