Santa Croce Square

Piazza Santa Croce took shape in the late thirteenth century, when the Franciscan Basilica of Santa Croce was rebuilt from scratch in 1295 to Arnolfo di Cambio’s design and enclosed within his final circuit of city walls. The church’s imposing size reflected the growing power of the Friars Minor, and the square was enlarged accordingly. It served for preaching and, from the fifteenth century, for jousts and festivities. The palaces around it acquired their appearance between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In 1863 the church’s Neo-Gothic façade gave the square the timeless quality admired by Metaphysical painters. Enrico Pazzi’s nineteenth-century monument to Dante Alighieri, now by the church, originally stood at the square’s centre. In June the square changes completely, becoming a sand-covered playing field surrounded by stands for Calcio Storico Fiorentino, one of Florence’s principal popular traditions. Two semi-finals lead to the eagerly awaited final on 24 June, the feast of the city’s patron, St John the Baptist. On the right when facing the church, Palazzo Antellesi stands out for its unusual frescoed façade, bearing an old marker for the field’s halfway line. Nearby are Casa Buonarroti, with interesting early works by Michelangelo; Piazza Cavalleggeri, dominated by the National Library; and, in Via de’ Benci, the Horne Museum, with the rich collection of art historian Robert Percy Horne.