The next 12th March, the assessor of Tourism of the municipality of Siena, Sonia Pallai, will go to the Istituti Italiano di Cultura in Krakow for the “Notte Italiana”. There she will present the City of the Palio and the Via Francigena through videos created for EnjoySiena and the main activities and events linked to the Francigena, beginning with Santa Maria della Scala. 

“An important invite – says Pallai – in a city rich of history and many similarities with Siena. A cultural, artistic, university, touristic centre as well as a UNESCO world heritage site, like ours. The meeting of the 12th March is an opportunity to present how much we have designed and realised for the appreciation and promotion of sustainable tourism and of a clear identity of a place along the route. An area which, with its natural and cultural elements, already has unique characteristics and has always been a fundamental rest-stop of one of the most ancient routes of Europe: the Via Francigena.“

The initiative is part of a project by Betti Editrice, which, a year after the presentation of the Polish translation of “La Santa dell’Oca Vita, morte e miracoli di S. Caterina da Siena”, returns to the Polish city to narrate the area of Siena and the ancient route, which united Canterbury and Rome in the Middle Ages. 

An occasion for cultural gathering and comparison and the result of the dedication of professor Massimo Mazzini, university professor of Siena, and for many years, scientific and cultural expert of the Italian Embassy in Warsaw; as well as of doctor Ugo Rufino, director of the Istituto, who will open the evening. The Italian Ambassador of Warsaw, Alessandro de Pedys, will also be present.

The editor, Luca Betti, will offer a list of 30 titles, which through characters, landscapes, stories and internal torments will narrate the land of Tuscany: from borghi to cities, the mysteries of the present and memories of a distant past. For the meeting, there will be an opportunity to see the photographic exhibition “La Via Francigena in Toscana con gli occhi aperti“, after the recent openings in Florence in the Tuscan regional council halls. The photos offer unusual, and sometimes extreme, perspectives, which draw the gaze through the Tuscan tract of the Via Francigena, characterised by a captivating variety of landscapes and portraits of inhabitants.  

Source: press release Comune di Siena