More than other paintings of its supposed era, the Guido Riccio fresco inspired elaborate and eloquent analysis. One can read about how the famed Simone Martini fused realism, fantasy, and pictorial imagination in a truly exceptional manner. He provided the viewer not only with the facts about a specific siege-in this, it is emphasized, the painter was especially accurate-but with the universal truths about warfare, its destruction, and its desolation. All of this, we are told, Simone presented with a refined elegance that is unique to his special sensibilities. In short, the Guido Riccio became an exquisite example of fourteenth-century taste and a testimony to Simone's genius.[1]

'The theme of knighthood, touched on in several episodes of the life of St. Martin in Assisi, occurs again in purely secular terms in the famous portrait of Guido Riccio da Fogliano frescoed on the wall opposite the Maesta in the Palazzo Pubblico in Siena. It bears the date 1328, the year in which th.is "honourable Captain of \Var" overran the fortress of Montemassi, which had become a hideout for Chibelline outlaws and which we see depicted on the left of the scene. On the right is the "bastita" or fortification built by the Sienese during the siege, along with the camp of tents interspersed with the black and white banners of Siena. Between these two constructions is the knight himself, clad in a rich panoply embroidered with the same motifs as those on the saddle-cloth of his horse. It is an image of epic solemnity that stands out against a dark blue sky (repainted, but in keeping with the original), and rises in solitary splendour above a bare landscape, which with its undulating lines echoes the sinuous curves of the horse's saddle-cloth. '[2]

Military glory juxtaposed heavenly glory, where the mounted knight is shown cloaked in his tabard, embroidered with all the insignia of the da Fogliano family, his horse liveried in the same style. The figures are outlined, avoiding contact with the surrounding landscape - the Montemassi castle to the left, the wall of the besieged hill town above and below, the Battifolle castle with its siege towers and the Sienese military camp low on the left, with tents and agricultural fields. The painting’s unusual subject, coinciding with the arrival of chronicle painting, is arranged to support contemporary political reality. This new style of painting portrayed society as worthy of artistic attention, not merely as an intermediary between the human and the divine. Simone Martini’s authorship had been taken for granted for centuries but, from the 1980s, his fresco was at the centre of an argument regarding its authenticity. Long debates between important critics such as Briganti and Zeri called the attribution of the Guidoriccio into doubt. Whatever one believes, it can be confirmed that the painting – or at least its original parts - is of the highest stylistic element and technical quality. The skills needed are clear signs of Simone Martini’s hand. Below the Guidoriccio, Simone Martini - there is another fresco with a similar theme. This was painted around twenty years earlier by an exceptional hand, showing Due personaggi e un castello – Two Characters and a Castle. The fact that the work was soon covered with a layer of plaster makes it impossible to attribute it to any particular tradition in painting. A heated debate has enveloped this fresco too. Some refer to it as the last of Duccio’s works. His work as a fresco artist was little known until recently, but is now identified in numerous examples from Siena and its surrounding. Another hypothesis, again by Zeri but in contrast to what he has said about the Guidoriccio, is that the painting is by Simone Martini. Less likely are the proposals that the work is by Ambrogio Lorenzetti or Memmo di Filippuccio. The protagonist could be the podestà or a citizen of the Republic of Siena in the act of capturing a castle. Simone Martini. The iconography once again refers to military glory and Siena’s expansionist aims. This fresco was probably painted over, as were many others showing the lands and castles conquered by Siena, to make way for the Mappamondo by Ambrogio Lorenzetti. This was an elaborate rotating disc, a large wooden wheel covered in cartapecora – parchment. Unfortunately lost three centuries ago – though a vague description exists – it contained an image of the city of Siena in its centre, surrounded by its associated lands and, in the background, all other lands known at the time. Nothing remains except the imprints of its attachment to the wall, the hole for the central pin, and of course the fact that it gave the room its name. Below the Guidoriccio, Simone Martini - in 1529, Sodoma painted two of the city’s patron saints: San Vittore and Sant’Ansano, both perfectly preserved.[1]