Page 291 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Italy

FL ORENCE  289

VISITORS’ CHECKLIST q Museo Galileo graphic ana tomical models.
The museum has installed a
Piazza de’ Giudici 1. Map 4 D1 (6 E4).
Practical Information Tel 055 26 53 11. Open 9:30am–6pm large bronze sundial outside
Piazza di Santa Croce. Map 4 E1 daily (to 1pm Tue). Closed 1 & 6 Jan, the entrance that can be used
(6 F4). Tel 055 246 61 05. Basilica: 1 May, Easter, 24 Jun, 13 Aug, 1 Nov, to read the hour and the date.
Open 9:30am–5:30pm daily (from 8, 25 & 26 Dec. 8 &
2pm Sun). Last adm at 5pm.
Closed during Mass. 5 7 & This lively and superbly w Ponte Vecchio
(includes visit to the Museo.) ^ presented museum devotes
= Museo, Cloister & Cappella de’ Map 4 D1 (6 E4).
Pazzi: Open as above. Closed two floors to various scientific Ponte Vecchio, the oldest
themes, illustrating each with
1 Jan, Easter, 13 Jun, 4 Oct, 25 & 26
Dec. 7 & (includes visit to the countless fine displays and a surviving bridge in the city,
Basilica.) ∑ santacroceopera.it panoply of old and beautifully was built in 1345, the last in a
made scientific instruments. succession of bridges and fords
Transport It is also something of a shrine on the site that dated back to
@ C2, C3. to the Pisa-born scientist Galileo Roman times. Designed by
Galilei (1564–1642), and Giotto’s pupil Taddeo
houses the only Gaddi, it was originally
surviving the domain of
instruments he blacksmiths,
designed and butchers and
built, including tanners (who
two telescopes used the river
and the for disposing
objective lens of waste). They
from the were reviled for
telescope with their noise and
which he discovered stench and were
Jupiter’s moons. evicted in 1593 by
A number of Astrolabe, Museo Galileo Duke Ferdinando I –
rooms are devoted to replaced by jewellers
astronomical, mathematical and and goldsmiths. The elevated
navigational instruments, with Corridoio Vasariano runs along
galleries concentrating on the eastern side of the bridge,
Galileo, telescopes and optical above the shops. Giorgio Vasari
games. The museum also designed the corridor in 1565 to
houses the scientific collections allow the Medici family to move
of the two dynasties that once about their residences without
ruled Florence: the Medici and having to mix with the public.
the House of Lorraine. This was the city’s only bridge
Some of the best exhibits on to escape destruction during
display are early maps, globes World War II and visitors today
and astrolabes, antique micro- come as much to admire the
scopes, thermometers and views as to browse among the
barometers. There are also some antique shops and specialized
fine old clocks, mathematical jewellery shops. A bust of the
instruments, calculators, a horri- famous goldsmith Benvenuto
fying collection of 19th-century Cellini stands in the middle
surgical instru ments, and some of the bridge.

. Cappella Bardi Frescoes
Giotto frescoed the Bardi
and Peruzzi chapels to the
right of the high altar between
1315 and 1330. This touching
scene from the left-hand
wall of the chapel shows
The Death of St Francis (1317). Ponte Vecchio viewed from the Ponte Santa Trinità

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