Travel Italy Exploring Florence About Eastern City Centre
Travel Italy Exploring Florence About Eastern City Centre
The 1966 flood permanently changed the character of the eastern city centre. Before the deluge it had been one of the more densely populated districts of the city, packed with tenements and small workshops. But Piazza Santa Croce , a short stroll east of Piazza della Signoria, and the streets around it lie lower than the surrounding area, and were devastated when the Arno burst its banks. Many of the residents moved out permanently in the following years. Leather shops and jewellers are still in evidence, but the souvenir stalls are now a more conspicuous presence.
The piazza has traditionally been one of the city's main arenas: the Medici used it for self-aggrandizing pageants, and under Savonarola it was the principal site for the ceremonial execution of heretics. It's still sometimes used for the Gioco di Calcio Storico , a football tournament between the city's four quartieri ; the game is held three times in St John's week (the last week of June), and is characterized by incomprehensible rules and a degree of violence from which the heavy sixteenth-century costumes offer inadequate protection.
