Florence

by Christopher Hibbert

  In the left aisle is the entrance to Antonio Manetti's cloister, in the style of Brunelleschi. In the corner of the cloister, a staircase in a vestibule leads to Michelangelo's BIBLIOTECA LAURENZIANA.

  5. The Ospedale degli Innocenti, properly known as the Ospedale di Santa Maria degli Innocenti, overlooks the PIAZZA SANTISSIMA ANNUNZIATA. In 1294 the care of foundlings

  Courtyard of the Ospedale degli Innocenti

  was entrusted to the Silk Guild, which, in 1419, bought a piece of land from the Albizzi and commissioned Brunelleschi to build a hospital. It is believed to be the first hospital for foundlings in the world. Sometimes a baby would be brought with a note to identify it should a parent ever be in a position to recover it. The hospital always kept a meticulous record, which can still be seen. As the numbers of children increased – 1,320 in 1513 – wet-nurses were often hard to find because their remuneration was so small. In the late sixteenth century this problem was largely overcome, so it is said, when extraordinary news came from abroad: Spanish babies were being successfully fed on cow's milk.

  By 1427 the loggia, which has been described as the first truly Renaissance work, had been completed. Brunelleschi intended that the spandrels of the arcade should be left empty; but they were filled with terracotta roundels of swaddled babies by Andrea della Robbia. It seems that the delegates also tinkered with Brunelleschi's plans for the rest of the hospital, which was completed after his death.

  At the left end of the arcade behind the present grille was a wheel upon which babies could be deposited without the persons bringing them being seen. A plaque above informs the passer-by that for four centuries until 1875 the ‘Ruotadegli Innocenti' was a ‘segreto rifugio di miserie e di colpe’.

  There are two cloisters. The larger, the Chiostro degli Uomini, is decorated with the emblems of the Silk Guild, and of two hospitals which were united with the Innocenti in the course of the fifteenth century. In the north-west corner is the entrance to the church, which was remodelled in 1786. Over the door is a lunette of the Annunciation by Andrea della Robbia.

  Steps in the cloister lead to galleries containing works by Botticelli, Piero di Cosimo, Luca della Robbia, Bernardino Poccetti, Domenico Ghirlandaio and others. In the background of Ghirlandaio's Adoration of the Magi, the Massacre of the Innocents is depicted. The priest in the middle ground is probably the donor, the hospital's prior, Francesco Tesori. In the corner diagonally opposite the entrance to the church a passage leads to the Chiostro delle Donne, reserved for the female members of the staff. The hospital still functions as an orphanage.

  6. The portico of the hospital of Santa Maria Nuova is by Bernardo Buontalenti. As well as the monastery of Santa Maria degli Angeli, the much-enlarged hospital has absorbed the church of Sant'Egidio, which was completed about 1420 and consecrated by Pope Martin V. Bernardo Rossellino carved the marble tabernacle. The bronze door is a copy of one executed for the church by Ghiberti. A Madonna and Child by Andrea della Robbia is now in the office of the Presidenza. This also contains the original of Dello Delli's terracotta Coronation of the Virgin, a cast of which is on Buontalenti's portico. The hospital's numerous benefactors have included Filippino Lippi and Leonardo da Vinci. From the fifteenth to the seventeenth centuries it was admired throughout Europe; Henry VII requested a copy of its regolamento when planning the Savoy hospital in London.

  7. The main building of the Studio Fiorentino, now called the Università degli Studi, is in the south-east corner of the Piazza San Marco. After a strike at the University of Bologna, Bolognese professors were offered posts in Florence, and the university was founded in 1321. It never became as reputable a university as Bologna or Padua, and from time to time it was closed down altogether. It did, however, develop a good reputation as a centre for humanist studies in the course of the fifteenth century.

  8. The Tomb of Baldassarre Cossa, Pope John XXIII, who died in Florence in 1419 was designed by Donatello and executed by Michelozzo c. 1424–7. The bronze effigy of the Pope is attributed to Donatello.

  9. As well as the family chapel in SANTA CROCE, there is a Bardi Chapel in SANTA MARIA NOVELLA. The family took it over in 1334. It was once used by St Peter Martyr's Laudesi brotherhood, who commissioned Duccio's Rucellai Madonna, which was later moved to the CAPPELLA RUCELLAI and is now in the UFFIZI. The lunettes of the Virgin Enthroned have been attributed to Cimabue. The altarpiece is by Vasari. The Palazzo Bardi alle Grazie, No. 5 Via dei Benci, built about 1430, has been attributed to Brunelleschi.

  10. The Via de' Bardi runs parallel with the Arno from the south end of the PONTE VECCHIO to the Piazza dei Mozzi at the end of the PONTE ALLE GRAZIE. The CASA AMBROGI was at the eastern end. The PALAZZO CAPPONI DELLE ROVINATE at No. 36; the Palazzo Canigiani, with a courtyard ascribed to Michelozzo, at No. 30. The church of Santa Lucia dei Magnoli (Santa Lucia fra le Rovinate) at No. 24 was first built in the early eleventh century. The lunette of Santa Lucia over the entrance door is by Benedetto Buglioni, the picture of her on the first altar on the left is by Pietro Lorenzetti. Domenico Veneziano's St Lucy altarpiece, which once hung over the third altar on the right, is now in the UFFIZI. It has been replaced by a copy of Andrea del Sarto's Disputà, the original of which is in the PITTI PALACE. The Palazzi dei Mozzi beyond the church were built in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries for the Mozzi, a rich Guelph family of papal bankers who entertained Pope Gregory X here in 1273. Andrea de' Mozzi was Bishop of Florence before being moved to Padua because of the scandalous escapades which caused Dante to include him among the sodomites.

  At No. 1 Piazza dei Mosti is the Museo Bardini in the Palazzo Bardini, which was built by Stefano Bardini in 1883 to house his varied collection of paintings, sculpture, furniture, ceramics, musical instruments, swords, drums, shields, armour and numerous architectural fragents including well-heads, fountains, fireplaces, tomb effigies, and various emblems of the Parte Guelfa and the city's guilds. There are early works by the Della Robbia, frescoes by Giovanni di San Giovanni from the Palazzo dei Pucci, and a painting of St Michael by Antonio Pollaiuolo. The collection was presented to Florence by Bardini in 1923.

  Beyond the Palazzo Bardini, in Via di San Niccolò, are the fifteenth-century Palazzo Alemanni (No. 68) with copies of Giambologna demons on its façade, and the church of San Niccoló sopr'Arno, an eleventh-century foundation rebuilt in the fourteenth century, which contains, in the sacristy, a fifteenth-century fresco attributed to Baldovinetti within a pietra serena tabernacle from Michelozzo's workshop.

  11. The Piazzale Michelangelo affords a spectacular vista of Florence. It is reached by the tortuous Viale Giuseppe Poggi from the PORTA SAN NICCOLÒ. Copies ofMichelangelo's works, including his David, have been placed here. Above the Piazzale stands the church of San Salvatore al Monte, much admired by Michelangelo. When Castello Quaratesi's offer to provide funds to face SANTA CROCE was turned down, he put his money towards this new Franciscan church. A monk provided the initial design, and it was completed by Cronaca. In the second chapel on the north side is a terracotta Deposition, probably by Giovanni della Robbia. The Pietà in the chancel is attributed to Neri di Bicci.

  12. Pier Francesco Silvani rebuilt the Palazzo degli Albizzi, No. 12 BORGO DEGLI ALBIZZI, in the seventeenth century. Only a small part, on the left with the medieval tower, now remains of the fourteenth-century palace. The Albizzi owned other palaces in the street.

  13. The equestrian mural of Niccolò da Tolentino in the DUOMO is by Andrea del Castagno (1456).

  14. As well as the PALAZZO ACCIAIUOLI, there are several other palaces or parts of palaces in the Borgo Santi Apostoli and the Piazza del Limbo. The Palazzo Altoviti is on the corner of Via delle Bombarde, the early-sixteenth-century Palazzo di Oddo Altoviti by Benedetto da Rovezzano at No. 1 Piazza del Limbo. The Palazzo Rosselli del Turco, with a relief of the Madonna by Benedetto da Maiano, has a façade on to the

  View of Florence from the Piazzale Michelangelo

  Borgo Santi Apostoli by Baccio d'Agnolo. Th
e thirteenth-century Palazzo Usimbardi, or what was spared of it by the bombing in the Second World War, at No. 19, has its principal overlooking the Arno. It used to be the Grand Hotel Royal, where Charles Dickens stayed in 1845. Ruskin, Henry James, Swinburne and Longfellow also stayed here. Beyond the eastern end of the Borgo is the church of Santo Stefano al Ponte with a façade of 1233 and aninterior altered by Ferdinando Tacca in 1649. The church of SANTI APOSTOLI is in Piazza del Limbo.

  15. Palazzo Guicciardini, No. 15 Via Guicciardini, stands on the site of an earlier family palace burned down in the Ciompi riots of 1378. Francesco Guicciardini, the statesman and historian, was born here in 1483. The Machiavelli houses on the other side of the street no longer exist. There are two other palaces of the same name in Florence: Palazzo Guicciardini, No. 14 Via Santo Spirito, and Palazzo Guicciardini, No. 7 Lungarno Guicciardini. Next door to the latter at No. 9 is Palazzo Lanfredini by Baccio d'Agnolo.

  16. San Giovannino degli Scolopi was begun in 1579 by Bartolommeo Ammannati, who designed the second chapel on the left as his burial place. His wife, the poet, Laura Battiferi, is also buried here. The altarpiece is by Alessandro Allori and Giulio and Alfonso Parigi.

  17. The Chapel of Onofrio Strozzi is the sacristry of SANTA TRINITA. The altarpiece by Gentile da Fabriano, in which are portraits of various members of the Strozzi family, has been removed to the UFFIZI; but his decoration of the chapel arch can still be seen. The altar steps are inlaid with Strozzi emblems.

  18. The church of Santa Maria dell'Impruneta is the parish church of Impruneta, south of Florence. It was consecrated in 1054. According to tradition, the site was chosen by two bullocks bearing the foundation stones. It was rebuilt in the mid fifteenth century through the generosity of its parish priest, and reconstructed after its near destruction in the Second World War. The Romanesque thirteenth-century crenellated campanile survives. Michelozzo built the two chapels on either side of the high altar. The Chapel of the Madonna, on the left, contains the Virgin's miraculous image, and on the right is the Chapel of the Cross, with a terracotta Crucifixion from the Della Robbia workshop.

  19. The Noviziata, or Novices' Chapel, in SANTA CROCE, is also known as the Medici Chapel. The glazed terracotta altarpiece is by the Della Robbia.

  20. Cafaggiolo was more like a fortress than a villa. Vasari described it as having ‘all the requisites of a distinguished country house' with a pleasant garden, groves and fountains. But its high towers and battlemented arches were surrounded by a moat crossed by a drawbridge. It was bought, together with Il Trebbio, by Prince Borghese, who had the central tower pulled down and the moat filled in. The Sacra Conversazione, which Alesso Baldovinetti painted for the chapel dedicated to SS. Cosmas and Damian is now in the UFFIZI.

  21. Belcanto, later known as the Villa Medici. The reconstruction carried out for Giovanni de' Medici was finished in 1461. Vasari describes the high cost of building foundations on a steep slope. The villa was intended to accommodate great cellars for storing produce from the estate as well as wine and oil presses. Sold by the Grand Duke Cosimo III in 1671, it was renovated in the 1770s for Robert Walpole's widow, the Countess of Orford: and in the nineteenth century was bought by the English painter and collector, William Blundell Spence, when it became known as the Villa Spence. More recently it belonged to Lady Sybil Cutting, whose daughter, Marchesa Iris Origo, was brought up there. The Marchesa bought it in 1959.

  22. From the courtyard of the Palazzo Medici (now the Palazzo Medici-Riccardi), in which Donatello's David used to stand, one staircase leads to the Medici Chapel. Benozzo Gozzoli's fresco has been cut to accommodate the staircase which was added in the seventeenth century. The iconography was doubtless chosen by the Medici because of their close association with the Compagnia dei Magi, a confraternity dedicated to the cult of the Magi. The other staircase off the courtyard leads to the MEDICI GALLERY. The Medici Museum on the ground floor, in the former private apartments, is devoted to the history of the family.

  23. Niccolò Grosso's lamps hung outside several Florentine palaces. Permission to display spiked lamps of this sort had to be obtained by special decree. Of the very few that now survive, an example can be seen in Piazza dei Davanzati as well as on the Medici Palace. The lamps Grosso made for the PALAZZO STROZZI were designed by Benedetto da Maiano. Grosso was nicknamed ‘il Caparra’ (advance payment) since he never gave credit.

  24. Constantly increased by Cosimo and his heirs, the Medici Library, the Biblioteca Laurenziana, was eventually to contain no fewer than 10,000 codices of Latin and Greek authors

  Palazzo Medici-Riccardi

  Michelangelo ‘s staircase, Biblioteca Laurenziana

  and hundreds of manuscripts from the time of Dante and Petrarch, as well as others from Florence's remote past. Cosimo kept the library first at the VILLA MEDICEA DI CAREGGI, and later at the PALAZZO MEDICI. Confiscated by the Signoria in 1494, when fines of as much as fifty florins were imposed on borrowers who did not return books immediately, it was transferred to SAN MARCO at the suggestion of Savonarola. The library was bought back in 1508 by Pope Leo X, who removed it to Rome. Returned to Florence by Clement VII it was – in 1532 – placed in the building in the cloisters of SAN LORENZO, where it remains.

  25. The Badia Fiesolana was Fiesole's cathedral until 1028. Reconstruction and enlargement began in 1467. The façade of the earlier Tuscan Romanesque church, reminiscent of SAN MINIATO and the BAPTISTERY, was preserved, enclosed by the later enlargement. The monastery itself now houses the European University Institute, a postgraduate college founded by the EC.

  26. The Orsanmichele statues are, from left to right:

  Via dei Calzaiuoli

  (1) St John the Baptist by Lorenzo Ghiberti for the Calimala (importers of cloth) – removed for restoration in 1993.

  (2) Doubting Thomas by Verrocchio for the Tribunale di Mercanzia (the niche was originally made for the Parte Guelfa by Donatello and Michelozzo) – newly restored and on exhibition in the Palazzo Vecchio in 1993. The glazed terracotta emblem of the Mercanzia above is by Luca della Robbia. Donatello's St Louis of Toulouse, originally made for this niche, is now in the museum of SANTA CROCE.

  (3) St Luke by Giambologna for the Arte dei Giudici e Notai (magistrates) (an earlier statue by Niccolò di Piero Lamberti which stood here is now in the BARGELLO).

  Via Orsanmichele

  (1) St Peter attributed to Bernardo Ciuffagni for the Beccai (butchers) – removed for restoration in 1993.

  (2) St Philip by Nanni di Banco for the Conciapelli (tanners) removed for restoration in 1993.

  (3) The Quattro Coronati (the four Christian sculptors who were killed for refusing to make a heathen statue of the Emperor Diocletian) by Nanni di Banco for the Maestri di Pietra e Legname (workers in stone and wood). The relief illustrating the work of the guild is also by Nanni di Banco. The terracotta emblem above is by Luca della Robbia.

  (4) Copies of St George and the relief of St George and the Dragon by Donatello for the Armauoli (armourers). The originals are in the BARGELLO.

  Via dell'Arte della Lana

  (1) St Matthew by Lorenzo Ghiberti for the Cambio (bankers).

  (2) St Stephen by Ghiberti for the Lanaiuoli (wool merchants).

  (3) St Eligius by Nanni di Banco for the Maniscalchi (smiths and farriers) – removed for restoration in 1992.

  Via Lamberti

  (1) St Mark by Donatello for the Linaiuoli e Riggatieri (linen drapers and used-clothes dealers).

  (2) St James the Great attributed to Niccolò di Piero Lamberti for the Pellicciai (furriers) – removed for restoration in 1993.

  (3) Madonna della Rosa variously attributed to Giovanni Tedesco, Niccolò di Piero Lamberti and Simone Ferrucci for the Medici e Speziali. The Madonna Enthroned above is by Luca della Robbia.

  (4) St John the Evangelist by Baccio da Mondelupo for the Setaiuoli e Orafi (silk weavers and goldsmiths). The terracotta above is by Andrea della Robbia.

  CHAPTER 8 (pages 92–6)
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  1. The Villa Medicea di Careggi was purchased in 1417 by Giovanni di Bicci de' Medici. Michelozzo enlarged it for Cosimo, and Giuliano da Sangallo added the loggias on the south side for Lorenzo il Magnifico. It was looted and damaged by fire after the flight from Florence of Lorenzo's son Piero.Verrocchio's David, his terracotta Resurrection (both now at the BARGELLO) and his fountain of a little boy holding a spouting fish (now at the PALAZZO DELLA SIGNORIA) were all commissioned by the Medici for this villa. Restored by the Grand Duke Cosimo I, it subsequently fell into disrepair and was sold by the Medici's successors to Count Vincenzo Orsi. It is now used as offices for the hospital here.

  2. Donatello's bronze pulpits in SAN LORENZO were his last works. They were finished by his pupils Bartolommeo Bellano and Bertoldo di Giovanni, and were placed on columns in the seventeenth century.

  3. Donatello's David (c. 1430) is now in the BARGELLO. On its confiscation by the Grand Council after the expulsion of Piero de' Medici in 1494 orders were given for it to be erected on a column in the courtyard of the PALAZZO DELLA SIGNORIA.