9/19 - and we're walking...

we're walking...having no real plan in mind, but a map in hand, we end up in front of the Church of San Marco...

...a church I wish we could have spent a lot of time in...it's the home of some great art by Fra Angelico and has a well-known museum as well...but as we were looking in, the church was closing...so I just barely had time to light candles for my parents and for my friend Tom...

I have posed the question to Dave as to who might have owned this house which is on the side of the square next to San Marco...

The roundel on the left...

is similar to a printer's mark used during the 15th century, but it's an exact match to the back of early Roman coins...the roundel on the right is crossed cornacopias with a caduceaus in the middle - again an exact match to early Roman coins...maybe it was the treasury house for the church and convent??  No mention of it in the guide books...

...and another question:  why do so many buildings in Florence still have torch holders?

9/19 - it's a long day....

I know you think we saw a lot on this day and you are very correct.  I haven't even gotten you to the afternoon yet!....

I did notice that this was mostly the way I saw Dave during the entire trip:

I'm not kidding when I say it took forever to go one block...

after leaving the Medici's Palace, the next block had a lot of little things to amuse me while I waited for Himself...

 

 

 

I can hardly wait to look at the next batch of pictures to see what else I was looking at while Dave was taking heraldic shots!

9/19 Palazzo Medici Riccardi

After leaving the market, we passed this church...we didn't stop in as mass was being conducted...it was Sunday, after all...

Just a short stroll later, we came upon the Palazzo Medici Riccardi - their little 15th century place housing one of the best-known frescoes of all time which features, oh yeah...the Medicis in all their glory - created by Benozzo Gozzoli - under the narrative of "Procession of the Magi" in the Chapel of the Palazzo with family members, along with their allies, associates, and illustrious guests, portraying various subjects in the frescoes - I've put a picture from Allhistory's webpage of the most famous of the frescoes at the end of my pictures because photographs were not allowed in the chapel...everywhere else pictures were fine and there was a LOT to see!

More information on the frescoes and the personages therein can be found at http://all-history.org/253.html as well as at

 http://www.palazzo-medici.it/mediateca/en/Scheda_Il_Viaggio_dei_Magi

Here is the picture of the main wall:

9/19 Flower Market

One of the side streets from the Duomo piazza contained a flower market, and since the rain had ceased and the temperature was awesome*, we strolled down that way; stopping for refreshment and then continuing on...

* bear in mind that at home on this same date, temperatures were still in the mid90s, so 78 sort of rocked!

Sunday 9/19 - Duomo

After breakfast, even though it was a rainy day, we headed for the Piazza del Duomo (you can see the church behind us in our photo on the left -we are up on the Piazza dl Michaelangelo)...

 The Duomo is at the very end of the street...

Briefly passing by the Church of St. Maria Maggiore (more later...)

The street opens up into the Plaza...
a brief note re the Duomo (from Wikipedia)...
The Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore is the cathedral church (Duomo) of Florence, Italy, begun in 1296 in the Gothic style to the design of Arnolfo di Cambio and completed structurally in 1436 with the dome engineered by Filippo Brunelleschi. The exterior of the basilica is faced with polychrome marble panels in various shades of green and pink bordered by white and has an elaborate 19th century Gothic Revival facade by Emilio De Fabris.  The cathedral complex, located in Piazza del Duomo, includes the Baptistery and Giotto's Campanile. The three buildings are part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site covering the historic centre of Florence and are a major attraction to tourists visiting the region of Tuscany. The basilica is one of Italy's largest churches, and until the modern era, the dome was the largest in the world. It remains the largest brick dome ever constructed.

 

 

We chose not to go into the Basilica (I know, I know...full of famous art blah blah) - but entering every church or museum in the city is not enjoyable unless you can give each one it's own special day, so we were very selective on what we saw...and we have guidebooks galore that we bought everywhere so we can read more about what we did see...these surroundings kept us entertained for well over an hour just wandering around the buildings (and did I mention that the Basilica is covered in heraldry?) and we did, indeed, circumnavigate every building there as far as physically possible! 

While Dave was making sure he got several shots of every coat of arms, I studied the artwork and the patterns...can you see why a quilter like myself might just really enjoy the Duomo?  I found the juxtaposition of so many patterns together to be very inspiring.