A unique and original Italian Tower Contrada (district) Palio flag.
This Contrada Palio flag was formerly part of the collection of the M.H. de Young Museum. Founded in 1895 in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, the de Young Museum was San Francisco's first museum. It was a great success from its opening and has been an integral part of the cultural fabric of the city and a cherished destination for millions of residents and visitors to the region for over 100 years.
Michael Henry de Young ,1849 -1925, was an American journalist and businessman who owned and published the San Francisco Chronicle. He used his wealth to further his eclectic tastes and accumulated a collection of immense variety, and such diverse objects such as sculptures, paintings, flags, polished tree slabs, paintings, objet d'art, jewellery, a door reputedly from Newgate Prison, birds' eggs, handcuffs and thumbscrews, and a collection of knives and forks. As San Francisco's premier repository the de Young Museum came to house a number of flags. Little is known about the history or acquisition of this flag by de Young.
This flag was used by the Tower contrada (district) in the city of Siena. It is an original. A tower appears as a howdah on the back of the elephant in the shield. It rests on a red caparison bearing a white cross and there is a swallow-tailed flag of the same design flying from the tower. This white-cross-on-red is the symbol of the Kingdom of Savoy, whose ruling dynasty provided the kings of modern, united Italy. It appears in the Tower shield by special grant from King Umberto I, following his visit to Siena in 1887.
The background colors of the Tower flag have been in use since the 17th century - dark red, white, and medium blue. The exact design, however, was in use for only a single year. In keeping with Palio flag tradition, a new pattern is created each year for each contrada. The standard coat of arms or other symbol and traditional colors are always maintained, but imaginative geometric and heraldic patterns provide variations that are unique for the Palio of a given year. There is no symbolism associated with those variations: their purpose is simply to be visually appealing.
In modern times numerous tourist souvenirs showing the Palio flags have been produced for sale. There are also silk bandannas which are worn or waved by the partisans of one contrada or another. Books and postcards prominently feature both the banners and uniforms to recall the Renaissance pageantry on which the Palio is based.
The flag is dated to circa 1888 and is in good condition, with a minor tear on the bottom edge. It is made of silk and is hand-stitched. The flag's staff sleeve features a blue-red-white rosette at its very top; please see companion pieces ZFC0226 and ZFC0414.
ZFC Significant Flag
Item is Framed
Provenance:
• Made in Siena, Italy.
• Acquired by Michael Henry de Young.
• Conveyed to de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA.
• Sold via Butterfield & Butterfield Auctions in San Francisco, CA, to the Zaricor Flag Collection, 1997.
Sources:
History of the de Young Museum, de Young, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, 17 November 2011: http://deyoung.famsf.org/about/history-de-young-museum
THE PALIO HORSE RACE, ilpalio.org, 17 November 2011: http://www.ilpalio.org/palioenglish.htm
Contrade of Siena, Wikipedia, 17 November 2011, from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contrade_of_Siena
Palio di Siena, Wikipedia, 17 November 2011, from:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palio_di_Siena
Image Credits:
Zaricor Flag Collection
