Friday-Saturday, 14-15 november 2025, Florence

Our most recent previous visit to Florence was more than ten years ago, in late September. This time, in the off-season, it’s surprisingly crowded, but not defeatingly so.

We took a low-speed train from Lucca, and settled into our hotel, which overlooks the Piazza della Repubblica. It’s cheery

and busy, like every other public place we’ve seen so far. Our major tourist activity of the day was a walk to the church of Santa Croce, whose piazza is being turned into a Christmas fair:

Santa Croce holds many (many) sarcophagi and tombs, of which here’s a sampling. First, a close-up of Galileo

and next, Michelangelo’s tomb

and a cenotaph in honor of Dante, who was exiled from Florence to Ravenna and died there, after refusing to return to his birth city. The Florentines wanted to honor him anyway.

On our way along the Arno back to our hotel, we saw this memorial to fighters for Italian unification in 1871, in something different from the usual heroic stance.

On Saturday, our destination was the Duomo.

Its construction began in 1296, but the dome was not complete until 1436, and the neo-Gothic facade was added in the 1870s. (That seems like yesterday, and I don’t know when the whole rest of the exterior, in white, green, and red marble, was done.)

The dome is an engineering achievement, accomplished by Filippo Brunelleschi. It’s actually two domes, with the inner one supporting the outer one, and you can see some details in the Duomo Museum. But first you take the opportunity to climb the 463 steps to reach the top, on the staircase between the two domes. People with claustrophobia should think twice

but when you finally reach the top, you get the expected view across the city

including the bell tower.

In the Duomo Museum, there are many (many) artifacts from the years of construction and renovation. Here’s a wooden model made by Brunelleschi himself of the “lantern” at the very top of the dome:

You can also see reproductions of many of the many sculptures and decorations of the Duomo and the bell tower. I liked these illustrations of the inception of some professions:

. . . one for sculpture, and two for music.