Piazza Santa Trinita

This guide to Piazza Santa Trinita in Florence starts with the scar on the neck of the statue of Spring, on the bridge beside the square, and the night of August the third, nineteen forty-four, when retreating German troops mined Ponte Santa Trinita so thoroughly it took three rounds of explosives to bring it down. It follows the four marble statues of the seasons pulled broken from the Arno afterward, three restored whole while Spring's head stayed lost in the riverbed, and the reward a Florentine antique dealer named Bellini later offered for it. Behind the statue, a Roman column from the Baths of Caracalla still holds up a figure of Justice.