The religious centre of Florence is linked to its civic centre by the via dei Calzaiuoli, marked, at the corner, by the little and largely ignored, Loggia del Bigallo, home to the city's smallest museum.

"Orsanmichele is the most Florentine monument in Florence. The Palazzo Vecchio is a public building, as they have in every other city. Santa Maria del Fiore is a cathedral, as they have in every other city. But Orsanmichele is only to be found in Florence. Only Florence could have given birth to such a monument, a building that is half church and half granary, which served both religious and civic bodies, which exalted both faith and labour".....Pietro Bargellini, 1954

Orsanmichele: (10-17. Closed Mon. Free. The Museum is only open on Mondays from 10-17. Free).

The church of Orsanmichele takes its unusual name from the chapel of San Michele in Orto or St Michael in the Garden, which used to stand on this site. The present building does not look much like a church and that is because it started life as a grain market, the second one to be built on this site. The first had been built in 1290 and two years later an image of the Madonna, which had been painted onto one of its pillars, began to work miracles. This quickly transformed the market into a place of pilgrimage as well as commerce. In 1304, the loggia was destroyed by fire and replaced by the present building. 

Orsanmichele ended its life as a grain market in the 1360s when the open arches of the loggia were blocked in and the interior transformed into a church. At the same time two more floors were added for the storage of grain.

The exterior is adorned with fourteen niches and it was the duty of the city guilds (whose church it had become) to fill them with sculptures of their patron saints. The richer guilds were expected to commission their sculptures in bronze, a much more expensive medium than marble. The Bankers' Guild spent 945 florins on Ghiberti's bronze statue of 'St Matthew'. A marble statue would have cost between 100 and 150 florins.

It would take two full centuries before all of the niches were filled. Orsanmichele became a showcase for the biggest names in sculpture. Ghiberti, Donatello and Verrocchio, all three were commissioned to produce work. Today, all of the niches are filled with copies. Thirteen of the fourteen originals are housed in the splendid museum, which can be found on the first floor. My particular favourite is Verrochio's, 'The Doubting of St Thomas', which originally occupied the prime position in the centre of the east side of the building facing the via del Calzaiuoli. 

Donatello's original marble sculpture of St George is the only statue not to find a place in the church's museum. It, and the niche in which it originally sat, are now on display in the Bargello, in a room devoted predominantly to the works of Donatello. The statue was first replaced by a copy in bronze, which, in turn, has been removed and replaced by a copy in stone!

The interior of the church is dominated by a huge tabernacle, which was executed by Andrea Orcagna between 1355 and 1359. The tabernacle, which occupies the whole of one of the six bays of the church, is a magnificent example of Gothic art. Richly decorated with lapis lazuli, gold and stained glass, it cost the princely sum of 86,000 florins. (This was at a time when it was possible to rent a house in the centre of the city for not more than 50 florins a year). The money was only a fraction of the vast sum of 345,000 florins, which had been left to the church by victims and survivors of the Black Death, which had devastated the city in 1348. It has been estimated that the population of Florence fell from 100,000 to less than 50,000. Its population would not reach the six figure mark again until the 19th century!

The Palazzo Vecchio

The via del Calzaiuoli ends in the grand, if austere square, known as the Piazza della Signoria. This was the centre of political power in medieval Florence and home to the formidable fortress, the Palazzo Signoria, seat of the Florentine Republic in the 14th century. The Palace was designed by Arnolfo di Cambio and built between 1298 and 1310. Its tower, rising to a height of 310 feet (94m.), is the largest in the city.

It was originally called the Palazzo dei Priori, but since then its name has changed several times to reflect the shifting patterns in Florentine politics. It still functions today as the centre of political power in Florence.

The palace is also home to a wonderful museum, comprising amongst other things, the magnificent Salone dei Cinquencento, the Hall of the Five Hundred.

Standing guard at the entrance to the palace are two monumental statues: a copy of Michelangelo's world famous statue of 'David' (1501-4) and Baccio Bandinelli's much less well-known statue of 'Hercules and Cacus' (1533-4). The original statue of 'David' was placed here in 1504 and remained in position until the end of the 19th century when it was removed to the Accademia and replaced by the copy we see here today.

Loggia dei Lanzi

Set at a right angle to the palace, stands the Loggia dei Lanzi, which was built at the end of the 14th century to provide a sheltered space for the great and good to watch the many assemblies and ceremonies, which were held in the square. For the last four hundred years the loggia has acted as an open air sculpture gallery and houses two of the greatest statues of the 16th century, namely Cellini's 'Perseus and Medusa' (1545-54) in bronze and Giambologna's 'The Rape of the Sabine Woman' (1581-83) in marble.

The pedestal, on which Cellini's statue sits, is a copy. The original base can be found in the nearby Bargello Museum.

The ‘Rape of the Sabine Woman’ is an extremely interesting piece of sculpture, for it originated as a technical challenge that Giambologna set himself.  The sculptor wanted to carve three figures out of a single block of marble and integrate the figures into an action group. The present title was only suggested after the work had been completed.

The sculpture was also conceived without a preferred viewing position. Prior to this sculptures had been expressly designed to be seen from a particular angle. Giambologna challenged this premise by locking the three figures together in a spiral movement that draws our eyes upwards and around as we follow the twisting and turning shapes of the naked bodies. The result is a technical tour de force worthy of his revered hero.

The Uffizi

To the rear of the Loggia dei Lanzi stands the Uffizi, home to the world's greatest collection of Renaissance art.

The Uffizi started life not as a gallery but as a large suite of offices (which is all that the name means in Italian). It was built by Giorgio Vasari between 1560 and 1580 to bring together under one roof various government offices, which were spread across the city. The Uffizi was not built from scratch, but incorporated a variety of existing buildings into its fabric, cleverly concealed behind Vasari''s imposing and unifying facade.

The statues of famous Florentines, which occupy the niches on three sides of the piazza, were added in the 19th century.

You will see that the Uffizi is actually attached to the Palazzo Vecchio. This is the start of a corridor, almost a kilometre in length, which links the Palazzo Vecchio to the Palazzo Pitti (which lies on the other side of the river). It was built by Vasari in 1565 to honour the occasion of the marriage of the Grand Duke's son, Francesco I, to Joanna of Austria. The corridor crosses the river atop the Ponte Vecchio, one of the few remaining bridges in the world still to have shops attached. 

Today, all of the shops are devoted to the selling and or making of gold jewellery, but this was not always the case. Prior to the arrival of the goldsmiths, at the end of the 16th century, the shops were mostly occupied by members of an entirely different trade, namely, butchers, who found the close proximity of lots of flowing water conducive to the plying of their trade.

Ponte Vecchio

The Ponte Vecchio (the old bridge) was built in 1345 to replace the one which had been washed away in the great flood of 1333. The bridge, which was the first since antiquity to link the two banks of the Arno, only became known by its present name when a second bridge was built. For centuries it has been known as the Ponte alla Carraia, but originally it was known simply as the Ponte Nuova (or new bridge)!