Florence- Day 2Jul 5, 2012
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| Ciao from Florence once more! Today we had a very busy day walking the streets of Florence to see all there is to see in the city. Our first stop on the walk was the Accademia Museum to see the famous sculpture, the David, by Michelangelo. This seventeen-foot-tall statue shows the hero of the biblical story, 'David and Goliath'. The story tells that a young boy by the name of David killed the horrible beast Goliath with only his slingshot, when the most powerful army in the land couldn't defeat it. The sculpture is breath-takingly amazing and almost perfect. It was on of the greatest works of art of its time. Next on our walk, we headed to the Medici Chapel to see the tombs of the Medici family. The Medicis were known throughout Italy because they were one of the families that began the banking system. The family quickly became one of the wealthiest families of their time due to the success of the banking system. They commissioned Michelangelo to create and sculpt many of his works, including the ones that surround their tombs. The first room we entered was called the crypt. This is where the lesser Medicis are buried. Next, we walked to the Chapel of Princes, an octagonal mausoleum that holds the tombs of six Medici Grand Dukes. Their statues and crowns lie above their marble sarcophagi. Lastly, we walked down a short corridor to Michelangelo's New Sacristy. Here, in sculpted marble tombs made my Michelangelo himself, lie four of the Medici's most important members: the Duke of Urbino (grandson of Lorenzo the Magnificent), the Duke of Nemours (Lorenzo's third son), and lastly, Lorenzo the Magnificent and his murdered brother Giuliano. After the tombs, we headed back to the Duomo (as I mentioned yesterday) to check out the interior of it and the Baptistry. The inside of both were very impressive and quite beautiful, especially the domes of both (I like to call it the Duomo duom. Haha... get it?), but I thought they were not nearly as impressive as what we saw next. Our last stop on our walk was the Santa Croce church. Here, the final resting place of Galileo, Michelangelo, Machiavelli, and Dante are located. Each tomb is beautifully decorated with statues depicting the life of each man. All over the floor of the church are graves of others. Some are complicatedly decorated with a marble carving of the person in the grave, others are simply a marble slab with the person's name and date of death. Overall, Santa Croce is a very peaceful church |
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