# Bishop's Palace [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [ROSSELLINO, Bernardo]() - Date: 1401-1450 - Technique: Photo ## Commentary Although Sienese, Pope Pius II \(originally Enea Silvio Piccolomini\) had actually been born in a small town south of Siena called Corsignano. Beginning in 1459, he attempted to establish this town as a papal seat. In 1462 he rechristened it Pienza in honour of himself, rated it to a bishopric, and hired Bernardo Rossellino, who had previously been a capomaestro on Nicholas V's new apse and transepts for St Peter's and had worked in an elaborated classicising style in Florence, to transform its centre into a suitably coherent setting for the town's new status. Rosselino's plan was determined in part by pre-existing streets, by the medieval town hall at the site, and by the precipitous drop of the hill where Pius planned a new cathedral. To either side of the cathedral Rosselino placed the bishop's palace and Pius's own palace, forming a trapezoidal piazza. Pius's own coat-of-arms appears prominently in the gable of the cathedral, whose triple-arched façade recalls ancient Roman triumphal arches. View the <a href="\#" onClick="w=window.open \('/support/plans/r/rosselin/bernardo/pienza.html', 'newWin', 'scrollbars=yes,status=no,dependent=yes,screenX=0,screenY=0,width=400,height=600'\);w.opener=this;w.focus\(\);return false">ground plan</a> of Piazza Pio II, Pienza. ## Related artworks - [Annunciation]() - [Cathedral and Palazzo Piccolomini]() - [Cathedral and Palazzo Piccolomini]() - [Cathedral and Palazzo Piccolomini]() - [David of the Casa Martelli]() - [Exterior view]() - [Interior view]() - [Palazzo Piccolomini: Courtyard]() - [Palazzo Piccolomini Façade \(detail\)]() - [Palazzo Piccolomini: Garden]() - [Portal]() - [Tabernacle \(detail\)]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()