we need your expertise uncle L

Tonight after dinner in the piazza Il Campo, old town Siena we stumbled out upon a procession. This procession consisted of countless priests followed by 4 priests carrying a canopy, followed by about 30 more priests. There was a man on a loud speaker changing prayers in Italian, then the crowd would sing back a response.
Fueled by liquid courage, I started asking everyone around me what this was for. The first older gentleman behind me only spoke Italian. This turned out to be ok, because drunk, I seem to believe that I too speak Italian. He told us that this was a procession to celebrate (what I thought he said) was a type of birthday or anniversary that would end at the Duomo. Realizing what was happening Sister D and I decided to jump in the procession. Next I asked a fellow in front of us what this was about. In broken English he told me that this was a celebration of the host. That even more than 200 years it was the same... that it was an anniversary of sorts for Corpus Domini. At one point as he and I struggled to exchanged words, I found I could articulate myself better in Spanish than Italian which he seemed to also speak. Very cool.


Next I asked a policeman. He said this was an annual celebration of God. (Obviously not very insiteful as I had already gathered this much.)


Finally, once inside the Duomo (large town cathedral) I was able to ask a priest and decon. The priest didnt speak English but the decon did. The two of them collaborated on how to tell us that this was a celebration of the eucharist. That even after three centuries it was as fresh as when it started.


This was all the information I was able to collect. Any ideas Uncle L on what this was we stumbled on? We had wanted to call you immediately after this happened, but it was 11:30pm and the streets were empty. We were immediately lost, and finding a phone, let alone a taxi to take us home felt impossible. We have a habit of getting lost in Siena. Assisi was a maze, and Siena is a labrynth. Instead, we decided to set out in search of a taxi.