The Grand Hotel Minerva Florence
Italy has created this virtual tour to enable
guests to view our best locations. Please note
that they will only appear on computers that have
the necessary "plugin" installed.
Piazza della Signoria has been the political
heart of the city from the Middle Ages to the
present day. It is a singular urbanistic creation
that began taking shape from 1268 onwards, when
the Guelph party gained control of the city again
and decided to raze the houses of their Ghibelline
rivals to the ground.
The first to be destroyed were the towers belonging
to the Foraboschi and the Uberti families, in
spite of the fact that the head of the family
(the famous Farinata celebrated by Dante in his
"Comedy"), had defended the city from
destruction after its army had been disastrously
defeated at the battle of Montaperti (September
4th 1260) by the Ghibelline coalition led by Siena.
In the end 36 houses were demolished which explains
the unusual "L" shape of the square
and why the buildings around it are unaligned,
all that remained after the city's enemies had
all been "wiped out" (nothing was ever
to be built on the site again).
Its gets its name of course from the most important
monument there, Palazzo della Signoria, designed
by Arnolfo di Cambio in 1298-99 (much of it already
completed by 1302, only three years later) for
the seat of the Republican government and which
was later to host the Gonfalonier of Justice and
the Priors of the Arts (it was in fact at first
called Palazzo dei Priori).
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