II 
SIENESE VILLAS 
I N the order of age, the first country-seat near Siena 
which claims attention is the fortress-villa of Bel- 
caro. 
Frequent mention is made of the castle of Belcaro in 
early chronicles and documents, and it seems to have 
been a place of some importance as far back as the 
eleventh century. It stands on a hilltop clothed with 
oak and ilex in the beautiful wooded country to the 
west of Siena, and from its ancient walls one looks forth 
over the plain to the hill-set city and its distant circle of 
mountains. It was perhaps for the sake of this enchant- 
ing prospect that Baldassare Peruzzi, to whom the trans- 
formation of Belcaro is ascribed, left these crenellated 
walls untouched, and contented himself with adorning 
the inner court of the castle with a delicate mask of 
Renaissance architecture. A large bare villa of no 
architectural pretensions was added to the mediaeval 
buildings, and Peruzzi worked within the enclosed quad- 
rangle thus formed. 
A handsome architectural screen of brick and marble 
with a central gateway leads from a stone-paved court 
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