Good bones.

Monday was my first day teaching at Scuola Lorenzo Dé Medici. It was good to have something to do besides indulge my every whim (that can be tedious after a spell). I’ll have more about Lorenzo Dé Medici in a later post.

Yesterday (Tues), was a visit to the Church of Santa Croche, about a mile walk through downtown Florence. Not referring to my compass often enough, I took a longer route, but I’m never disappointed to wander more than I plan.

I passed several 13th c. buildings (from before the time of the Plague!). They continue to be part of the fabric of downtown, but now, through arches under which knights on horseback may have passed some 800 years ago, there are upscale dress shops and car garages.



The Church of Santa Croche dates from 1294, (it’s pretty marble facade was added in the 1800s). After paying the visitor fee of €5, I entered an age of great gothic arches, marble crypts, and deeply spiritual art (there are sections set aside for private worship). This is time travel at its least expensive with no upscale dress shop to disrupt the wonder.





One wall has a series of elaborately carved marble tombs with the remains of many famous Florentines including Michelangelo, Galileo, and Machiavelli. The floor is festooned with marble crypts of lesser notables.



But it is the Bardi Chapel that is breathtaking, filled with some of Giotto’s most important fresco paintings. Giotto triggered the change from the archaic flat caricature of earlier medieval painting to the weight and mass of the idealized human form that would become the hallmark of the Renaissance. It is fitting that Giotto’s frescoes are on one end of Santa Croche, and Michelangelo, who represents both the highest achievement and the close of the Renaissance, is entombed at the other.



Later in the day, I came across a street festival celebrating the last day of Carnevale, a final party before Ash Wednesday. Here is a group of percussionists and costumed “dancers.” Click play button to play the video.



When I reached home, I found the lock for the outside door gone. Perhaps in the spirit of Carnevale? It would be a joke, indeed, should the lock be replaced and I’m left to roam the streets of Florence all night. No such luck, and the landlord brought a shiny key for the newly replaced lock this morning.