Montaperti and the Republic of Siena

At Montaperti in 1260 Siena and its Ghibelline allies crushed the army of Guelph Florence, a slaughter Dante recalled in the Inferno. Under the merchant government of the Nine, Siena built the Palazzo Pubblico and the Campo, and Ambrogio Lorenzetti painted his frescoes of good and bad government in its council hall. The republic fell to Florence and Spain after a siege in 1555.