The golden vault
Full Byzantine mosaic around an eight-metre Christ in Judgement.
Zairon — CC BY 4.0 · Ingo Mehling — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Ingo Mehling — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Ingo Mehling — CC BY-SA 4.0
The Baptistery is the square's oldest building and the one Florentines hold holiest: a marble octagon predating the cathedral by centuries, where every child of Florence — Dante, Michelangelo, all the Medici — was baptised through the ages. For centuries the city believed it a converted Roman temple, and that proud belief shaped all Florentine architecture. The interior is a Byzantine surprise: a dome sheathed in thirteenth-century gold mosaic around an eight-metre Christ in Judgement, with hell scenes whose inventive demons Dante is said to have carried into the Divine Comedy. Its three bronze doors changed the history of art — the eastern pair being the Gates of Paradise — though what hangs today are faithful replicas, while the originals gleam in the Opera museum across the square.
Full Byzantine mosaic around an eight-metre Christ in Judgement.
The mosaic demons said to have seeded the Comedy.
The building Florence thought Roman, and built itself upon.
Piazza San Giovanni, 50122 Florence
Giotto's CampanileGiotto's Campanile is the cathedral's freestanding bell tower: some eighty-five 1 minute walk4.9
Opera del Duomo MuseumThe Opera museum is the Duomo's treasury: every masterpiece once on the cathedra1 minute walk4.5
Florence Cathedral (Duomo)Santa Maria del Fiore — the Duomo — is Florence itself: a mountain of white, gre2 minutes walk4.9
Basilica di San LorenzoSan Lorenzo is the Medici church: their parish, entrusted to Brunelleschi himsel3 minutes walk4.7
Palazzo Medici RiccardiThis is the first Medici palace — the house that invented the Florentine palazzo3 minutes walk4.6In 1401 the city held a contest for its north door; young Ghiberti beat Brunelleschi — then spent half a century making two doors, until Michelangelo said the eastern pair deserved to be Paradise's gate, and the name stuck. The loser Brunelleschi went off and built the dome — Florence won twice.
The doors are seen free from the square (as replicas) with originals in the museum — but the interior's gold has no equal anywhere in Florence: five minutes under that vault justify the ticket.
First: oldest building, quickest visit, and its gold opens the story — then cathedral, climb, and the museum last, where the originals wait.