ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the remarkable and pervasive significance of the Palio within Sienese life constitutes a striking example of a modern civil religion - but one that also has roots in the medieval period, and in the civil religion of medieval and renaissance Siena. It includes a compelling range of rituals, rites, ceremonies and beliefs which collectively sustain a distinctive Sienese identity, and a corresponding set of values amounting to a specific and definable Sienese world-view. The chapter examines the overtly religious associations and aspects of the Palio, and further features of this phenomenon which point to its function as a civil religion. It suggests an additional - but certainly not an exclusive or exhaustive - interpretation of the function and meaning of the Palio within Sienese life. The chapter summarizes the ways in which the Palio and its traditions conform to the key elements in the definition of a civil religion.
