Room 11
THE BIRTH OF CASTEL SAN GIOVANNI
Castel San Giovanni, founded in 1299, gave Florence a new territorial arrangement and weakened enemy seignories. The model in this room shows its putative reconstruction at the end of the 14th century. You will notice: the subdivision into lots, the Via Maestra (today’s Via del Corso) where the main activities and shops were concentrated and from which the chiassi (side streets) branched off, the Palazzo di Arnolfo in the centre and the two adjoining squares with two churches (the parish church of San Giovanni and the church of San Lorenzo). All enclosed at the sides by the town walls, which were provided with four entrance gates to the town.
CASTEL SAN GIOVANNI AND CASTELFRANCO
In recounting the birth of Castel San Giovanni and Castelfranco, Villani explains the phase of the origins with more detail than the more laconic official documentation. He recalls that ‘the municipality and people of Florence', finding themselves ‘in a good and happy state’ despite the attempts of interference by the great families, and in order to strengthen their presence in the countryside and at the same time ‘diminish the power of the nobles and of the powerful of the countryside, especially that of the Pazzi di Val d’Arno and the Ubertini, who were Ghibelline’, ordered that ‘two large castles and lands be made in Valdarno’ In the case in point, one, Castel San Giovanni, located between Figline and Montevarchi and the other at Casauberti ‘on the opposite side of the Arno, and was called Castello Franco.’ To entice people to move there, the municipality took on the burden of enfranchising all the ‘inhabitants of the said castles were freed for ten years from all communal duties and expenses, so that many of the faithful of the Pazzi and Ubertini families, and those of Ricasoli and of the Conti and other nobles, in order be freed men, became dwellers of the said castles; on account of which these grew and multiplied in a short time, and made themselves fruitful and large lands.’
(The text is taken from the museum guide, edited by Claudia Tripodi and Valentina Zucchi, Sagep, 2024)
