Piazza di Santa Croce
Vast square that once hosted a defiant siege-time football match before an emperor's army.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to the Piazza di Santa Croce in Florence returns to February 1530, when the city, besieged by Emperor Charles V's army, staged a defiant game of calcio storico -- a brutal ancestor of soccer -- in plain sight of the enemy, with musicians on the basilica roof to make sure they heard the celebration. It traces how fifty-four of Florence's proudest nobles played it out on a sand pitch laid across this square, a tradition four neighborhoods still revive every June. Look for the two marble discs set into the paving that still mark out the old pitch.
This audio guide was created using AI.
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