Florence

C

Art Galleries, Bridges, and Churches

Between the Palazzo Vecchio and the Arno stands the Palazzo degli Uffizi, built late in the 16th century to house government offices and law courts. It is famous for its art gallery, the Uffizi Gallery, one of the finest in Europe, which contains an unsurpassed collection of works by the greatest painters of Italy and a rich selection of works by Flemish and French masters. The nearby Ponte Vecchio, which is lined with goldsmiths' and jewellers' shops, was built in 1345; it is the only bridge in Florence spared during World War II and leads across the Arno to the Palazzo Pitti on the left bank. This building, begun in 1458 and subsequently much enlarged, was the residence of the grand dukes of Tuscany from 1550 to 1859. It contains another famous art collection, particularly rich in works by Andrea del Sarto, Raphael, Il Perugino, Titian, and Tintoretto. Behind the Pitti are the vast Boboli Gardens, used for outdoor concerts during the music festival held each year in May.

On the right bank of the Arno, in a kind of half-circle around the cathedral and the Palazzo Vecchio, are many famous churches and palaces. Noteworthy are the 13th-century Gothic Church of Santa Trinità, possessing a fine, luminous interior and a 16th-century Baroque façade; and Santa Maria Novella (13th-15th century), with a coloured marble façade and richly decorated cloisters, one of the most beautiful churches in the city. Eastwards are the 15th-century church and cloisters of San Lorenzo, designed by Brunelleschi. The adjoining structure is the Medici Chapel, private chapel and burial place of the famous Medici family. Above the crypt of the Medici Chapel is the New Sacristy, for which Michelangelo was both architect and sculptor; the sacristy contains the tombs of Lorenzo II de’ Medici, Duke of Urbino, with figures of Dawn and Dusk; and of Giuliano de’ Medici, Duke of Nemours, with figures of Day and Night (1520-1534).

The Palazzo Medici-Riccardi, built by Michelozzo for Cosimo de' Medici in the mid-15th century, faces San Lorenzo across a large piazza. Typical of the residences built by prominent families at that time, the ground floor is strongly fortified, with a graceful courtyard, and private apartments occupying the upper floors. It houses the Medici Museum. A few streets to the north-east is the former Dominican monastery of San Marco, also largely the work of Michelozzo. It is now a museum in which are preserved works by the two monks and painters Fra Angelico and Fra Bartolommeo, as well as the cell once occupied by the preacher and reformer Girolamo Savonarola. Nearby are the Spedale degli Innocenti (orphanage), with Brunelleschi's graceful portico decorated with ten of Andrea della Robbia's celebrated blue and white terracotta medallions; the Gallery of the Academy of Fine Arts, housing many works by Michelangelo, including his David (1501-1504); and the Archaeological Museum, with an outstanding Etruscan collection.

To the south, near the Arno, stands the handsome Franciscan church of Santa Croce, built, except for a modern façade, in the 13th and 14th centuries. This church, with an interior of classic Franciscan simplicity and which is decorated with frescoes by Giotto and other masters, is called the Pantheon of Florence because it contains the tombs of Michelangelo, Niccolò Machiavelli, Galileo, the poet and dramatist Conte Vittorio Alfieri, and Gioacchino Antonio Rossini, as well as monuments to many other famous Italians.

D

Libraries

Florence contains one of the greatest libraries in Italy, the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale. Other libraries are the Laurentian Library, containing a priceless collection of books and manuscripts assembled by Cosimo, Piero, and Lorenzo de’ Medici; the Biblioteca Marciana in the convent of San Marco; and the Moreniana, which is particularly important for local history. Thousands of documents pertaining to the history of Florence and Tuscany are preserved in the State Archives. The University of Florence, established in 1923, is the successor of an institution chartered in 1321. Florence is the seat also of a conservatory of music and of the Istituto Geografico Militare, which is world famous for fine mapmaking.

IV

History

Florence was founded under Julius Caesar as a military settlement during the 1st century bc. Under the Romans, Florence (then known as Florentia, “the flourishing town”) developed into a provincial capital and trade centre that grew during the 2nd and 3rd centuries ad. During the 5th and 6th centuries the Ostrogoths, Byzantines, and Lombards successively captured and occupied Florence, which regained its former importance only in the 11th century. By the second half of that century it was governed by a council composed of nobles and intellectuals that nominally functioned in the name of the people, thus making the city a republic.

A

Struggles and Fortunes

In the 12th century the Florentines captured the nearby town of Fiesole and began their attempt to conquer all the broad, fertile plain drained by the Arno. Internally the republic was divided by the struggle of its leading families for power, and in 1300 civil war broke out in Florence between two Guelph factions, the Neri (Blacks) and Bianchi (Whites). Dante, one of the defeated Bianchi, was exiled from the city in 1302. Despite its internal strife, the city prospered. Industry—especially woollen-cloth manufacturing—and banking, through which many Florentines later amassed great fortunes, were added to an ever-expanding commerce. In addition, the organization of merchants and artisans into powerful guilds gave the city an unexpected measure of stability. The wood guild, the richest of all, employed some 30,000 workers and owned 200 shops at the beginning of the 14th century. Merchants and bankers thus took a commanding lead in civic affairs and began to beautify the city. The republic warred repeatedly with Milan in the 14th and 15th centuries. Despite the financial collapse of the two main banking families in the mid-14th century and the outbreak of the Black Death in 1348, in which nearly half the population (45,000 people) perished, the city continued to prosper; in 1406 it finally acquired Pisa, downstream on the Arno, thus winning a long-coveted outlet to the sea.

B

Flourishing Commerce, Flowering Art

Considerable friction had developed meanwhile between the workers, who felt themselves exploited, and the wealthy classes. The conflict came to a head in 1433, when the aristocratic party exiled Cosimo de’ Medici, a wealthy merchant-banker and the leader of the popular party. Cosimo returned in 1434, exiled his opponents, and in alliance with the poorer classes effectively became the ruler of the republic, although remaining nominally a private citizen. The Medici dominated the city, except for brief periods of exile, for the next three centuries and helped finance the arts in Florence, particularly in the 15th century. Cosimo was succeeded by his son Piero and his grandson Lorenzo de’ Medici, called Lorenzo the Magnificent, a great patron of learning and the arts. Lorenzo reduced the republican government to a shadow and by an ambitious foreign policy succeeded for a time in making Florence the balance of power among Italian states. The Florentine gold coin, the florin, became the standard of trade throughout Europe, and the commerce of Florence embraced the known world. The great flowering of Renaissance art in architecture, painting, and sculpture took place within little more than the span of the 15th century.

Lorenzo’s son and successor, Piero, made humiliating concessions to Charles VIII of France, who invaded Italy in 1494; in that year the outraged populace drove Piero and his family from the city. Girolamo Savonarola, prior of the Dominican monastery of San Marco, emerged as the leading personality in Florence after Piero’s downfall. Savonarola, however, who had long inveighed against the luxury of Lorenzo’s court, came into conflict with the pope and gradually lost popular favour. In 1498 he was seized by a mob, tried, and executed. The Medici, returned to power by a Spanish army in 1512, were again exiled in 1527, and permanently restored in 1531. The title grand duke of Tuscany was bestowed on the head of the Medici family by the pope in 1569.