Saturday, September 27, 2014

Mom's 1953 Europe Road Trip: Florence

From Mom's Europe trip diary, in the "PLACES VISITED" section: 
September 27, Sunday – Florence, Italy
Attended Mass at Cathedral, a church with a very beautiful façade.  Saw Giotto's Belfry [Campanile] and the East Door on the Baptistery in Square [Piazza del Duomo].  After breakfast we walked to Uffizi Gallery, Signoria Palace [Palazzo Vecchio] and went through them.  Also saw Loggia dei Lanzi - and statues of the Rape of the Sabine and Cellini's Perseus.  From the square we walked across the Vecchio Bridge to the Boboli Gardens where we saw Neptune's fish-pond [Fountain of Neptune].  Came back to Cathedral and looked around some more.

I could fill multiple blog posts with photos of the things my mother saw in Florence!  This post just has two photographs by my mother, and one taken by my husband.
Il Duomo di Firenze / Mark Gresham / CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
The Cathedral (pictured at left) is the Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore ("Basilica of Saint Mary of the Flower"), usually called Il Duomo di Firenze.  It was begun in 1296 but not finished until 1436 with Brunelleschi's famous dome. The exterior is covered with polychrome marble panels in various shades of green and pink bordered by white.

The Ponte Vecchio ("Old Bridge," pictured below) spans the narrowest part of the Arno River in the city.  This version of the bridge dates back to the 14th century.  It is notable for the shops built right on the bridge.  The view below is from the west, probably from the temporary "Bailey bridge" constructed by Allied troops on the surviving piers of the Ponte Santa Trinita (Holy Trinity Bridge) after its destruction by Nazi troops in their August 1944 retreat.  The bridge was rebuilt in 1958.


Ponte Vecchio in Florence, Italy, 27 September 1953 / Geraldine Guokas Pape / CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

The Boboli Gardens, pictured below, are behind the Palazzo Pitti, the palace of the Medici family who ruled Florence during much of the Renaissance.  The statue in the upper center in the photograph below is the Fountain of the Oceans, sculpted by Giambologna.
Boboli Gardens at Pitti Palace in Florence, Italy, 27 September 1953 / Geraldine Guokas Pape /  CC BY-NC-ND 4.0




This is the 51st in a series of posts transcribing entries in my mother's 1953 Europe Trip journal.

© Amanda Pape - 2014 - click here to e-mail me.

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