Bloody Florence: The Dark History Behind the Renaissance Darling

Traveling through the Medici’s dark history breathes new life into the famous Florence sights

Behind the beautify of Florence lies a dark and fascinating history. Florence (Firenze) is the home of iconic masterpieces of the Italian Renaissance. The sophisticated wine country city is a tourist’s dream and a bucket list stop. Once upon a time, it was also a fragile republic walking a fine line between dangerous neighbors. And the famous sites of Florence carry violent marks.

Led by the powerful Medici bankers, Florence had its nose in everything. Including bloody upheavals. With famous locations and plotlines worthy of a bingeable show, this is the dark history of power, money, treachery, and violence in an evolving Florence.

The Assassination at the Duomo of Florence

1478. Florence is seething under its success. Renaissance Florence is a financial powerhouse in Italy and no family is more influential than the Medici. Lorenzo the Magnificent is a charismatic and cunning man: a politician, poet, and patron of famous artists. The people adored him and his brother Guiliano. But other wealthy and more established families despised them. Disgusted with these nouveau riche usurpers, the Pazzi family turns to deadly intentions.

Jacopo Pazzi gathered his murder conspirators, including Pope Sixtus IV and his nephew. After several postponements, they finally decided on the scene: the majestic Duomo’s Holy Mass. As the sacred host was elevated, the conspirators fell upon Guiliano, stabbing him to death. A knife grazed Lorenzo’s throat before his friend pulled him behind the heavy sacristy door. He and his surviving friends barred the doors and prayed.

The completed Duomo was fairly fresh in terms of history, just 42 years old. Now she had seen bloodshed under her miraculous dome, and at one of the holiest moments of the Mass.

When you stand today under those soaring frescos and massive columns, picture this moment. The violence shattered the sacred silence. Florence erupted in chaos and fear, the screams spreading across the street as the city’s alarm bells rang. But the worst bloodshed was yet to come.

The Pazzi Executions at Florence’s Palazzo Vecchio

1478. The Medicis had just been attacked. The congregation fled into the streets and the armed Medici friends raced to their aid. Citizens didn’t know yet who had orchestrated this attack and if they too were in danger. Jacopo Pazzi took this moment to head to the main piazza (next to the Palazzo Vecchio) and rally the people to overthrow the Medici.

Two things happened. One, papal reinforcements didn’t arrive. Two, Jacopo had wildly overestimated the Florentines’ resentment towards the Medicis. The crowd turned instead on them, and the Pazzis scattered like roaches in the light.

Gaze up today at the Palazzo Vecchio and you will see a homely fortress turned palace turned government office. It’s hard to see the dark history of Florence with the crowds of tourists here.

But look up at those second-story windows. The bodies of the first captured conspirators flew down from these into the piazza. The angry mob, standing where tourists stand now, stripped them and cut their bodies to pieces.

This is the most morbid chapter in dark history of Florence. In just a few hours, the killers of Guiliano hung from the ramparts of the Palazzo, including the Pope’s nephew. The crowd killed and mutilated an estimated 100 conspirators before the days of violence ended. Angry citizens even bit the dead bodies in rage.

Jacopo was hung, and buried by his family. But the mob wouldn’t let him rest in a cemetery and he was unearthed and reburied. Even that wasn’t enough. Children unearthed his body again, drug it through the streets to his house, and had his corpse knock to greet his family. Pazzi finally found rest in the Arno river.

Pope Sixtus VI raged. He demanded Florence to rebel against Lorenzo and, when they did not, threatened to forbid the entire city-state from holy rites. But Florence believed the pope’s role in the sacrilege. They didn’t budge.

The pope excommunicated Lorenzo and government officials of the Republic. Florentine priests defied the Holy See and carried on with masses and rites. Florence stood against the rest of the powers of Italy and Lorenzo had to find a way out. But that’s a story for another time and one that travels down to see the infamous, ruthless madman– Ferrante of Naples.

(Both section resources: book April Blood; Magnifico: The Brilliant Life and Violent Times of Lorenzo de’ Medici; Ultimate History Project)

Savonarola’s Trial by Fire in the Piazza

1498. Let’s stay in the piazza just outside the Palazzo Vecchio. Wandering this space today you will get a sense of violence just by contemplating the statues. Look down and find the circular plaque near the Palazzo’s entry. This marks the spot of the execution of the doomsday priest Savonarola. Just twenty years after bodies fell into the piazza, he had risen, and fallen, in the roller coaster Renaissance.

Lorenzo was dying when Savonarola came to Florence. But his son Piero was not the man his father was and the Medici machine behind the Republic façade was falling apart. Savonarola, preaching the end of times for man’s sins, struck a chord with the nervous city.

Sure enough, as he preached destruction, the French King Charles VIII’s army entered into today’s Italy, sacking Milan. Piero couldn’t withstand Charles and instead Savonarola negotiated the peaceful passage of the French through Florence. The Medici were out. Florence was his.

But a scared population is a fickle one. Savonarola wanted a “godly republic.” His bands of wild boys enforced the Bonfire of the Vanities. When the wealthy Florentines had to destroy their nice things, the tide secretly turned. Meanwhile, that rascal Pope Alexander, the infamous Borgia, had coaxed Charles back to France.

Now Alexander turned his sights on Savonarola, who busy preaching that Alexander was a minion of the devil. The order of Franciscan monks took up the pope’s call and challenged Savonarola’s Dominican order to a trial by ordeal. Two champions would walk through a fire in the piazza and the surviving friar was God’s favorite. A thunderstorm ruined the fun.

But the fire still came. Shortly after, Savanarola was arrested, interrogated, and tortured. He denied his visions, then denied his denials, back and forth depending on the torture. Three days after arrest he hung from the Palazzo. They burned his body so there could be no relics.

Savonarola was a controversial figure, loved and hated in turn. Some celebrated his death. Others mourned. If you’re in Florence, check out that plaque. It often has flowers.

(Resources: Laphams’s Quarterly; Death in Florence: The Medici, Savonarola, and the Battle for the Soul of a Renaissance City)

Catherine Medici, the Siege, and David’s Broken Arm

1527. The Medici were out. And then back. And then out again. Machiavelli followed these events as a government worker, eventually writing his classic take on “the ends justify the means.” Florence was yet again under siege by a foreign power. This time the unlikely future Queen of France was a tween prisoner in a convent. And a new mob called to have her hanged from the walls or given to the ravenous, retreating invaders.

Catherine de’ Medici was born to Lorenzo the Magnificent’s grandson and a mid-level French countess. Her great-uncle was Pope. A promising beginning soon marred when, at three weeks, both of her parents died from the plague.

Her aunt raised her in a tumultuous era. After her great-uncle the Pope died, her uncle tried to fill the Holy See. He failed, but the man who won died quickly (poisoning, the crowds said.) Her uncle finally became pope just in time for the sacking of Rome by the Holy Roman Emperor’s mutinous soldiers. Disgusted with the invasion and her uncle’s part in it, Medici rivals seized Catherine. She went from being “the little duchess” to a convent prisoner.

The city rioted, this time against the Medici. Michelangelo’s masterpiece David had been haughtily leaning in front of the Palazzo Vecchio for 23 years (near Savonarola’s plaque). But the crowd got him. A stone hit his left arm. It fell to the ground, shattering into three pieces. Legend has it that a group of boys dashed in the crowd and snagged the famous arm, returning it later.

After making peace with the invaders, Pope Clement marched 30,000 men back to Florence to show them who was in charge. During the soldiers’ siege the crowds vented at the walls of the Benedictine convent Santissima Annuziata delle Murate, near the San Marco piazza. They wanted vengeance on the 14-year-old Catherine. It was a terrifying moment and left a mark of fear and relentless survival on the future ruler.

The siege broke and she was saved by her uncle and taken to Rome. Within six weeks she shipped off for marriage to the second son of the King of France (who owed the Pope a favor.) But when the eldest prince died the French were shocked that this “dirty Italian” refugee would someday be Queen.

Catherine de’ Medici did indeed become the queen consort of France. She went on to become powerful and (by some) detested. Her dark history moved from Florence to France. She outlived her faithless husband and all her reckless sons. She incited a religious massacre that changed the face of Europe. And she oversaw the rule of three of her boys before she died in old age.

As for David, he still haughtily handsome with a reattached arm. For his safety, he eventually moved inside the Accademia in 1873, just a few blocks from where Catherine’s convent stood. A replica stands in his old spot, gazing out across the crowds.

(Resources: Catherine de Medici; Rival Queens; The “Infertility” of Catherine de Medici; Mental Floss: Michelangelo’s David;

The Mysterious Death of Florence’s Medici ‘Princess’

1576. Catherine de’ Medici still has 13 years left to live. But the popular, and otherwise quite healthy, Isabella de’ Medici is dead in the bathroom of a family estate. She’s only 34. Her envious brother, Francisco the Grand Duke of Tuscany, said she simply dropped dead, but no one believed this. The rumor was that her violent husband strangled her. And maybe even on her brother’s orders.

The 16th century saw a rise in formidable and independent female rulers. (Role call please: Isabella and then Juana of Castile, Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Catherine Medici, Mary Queen of Scots, and ultimately the Tudor sisters Mary and the indomitable Elizabeth.) But it was still a dangerous world dictated by husbands, fathers, and brothers. And without the protection of her father, everyone knew Isabella’s husband and brother would no longer let her shine.

Isabella was the favorite child of Cosimo I, the man who restored Medici power to Florence and Tuscany. Well-educated and charming, she dominated the Florentine social scene. Isabella proudly succeeded in all areas of managing the family business. She also succeeded in drawing the lifelong envy of her brother the heir.

Because of her wealth and her father’s devotion, she had more freedom than most women in her day. She grew up in the palaces of Florence: the Medici palace, the Palazzo Vecchio, and the new Palazzo Pitti. She didn’t want to marry the sketchy Paolo of the powerful Orsini family of Rome. In this one thing, she did not get her way.

She had no desire to join her gambling and whoring husband in Rome. Her father didn’t make her, allowing for her excuses as long as grandchildren came. Like her ancestors before her, she cultivated the artists and poets of her time and hosted the best parties. She also was probably having a torrid affair with her husband’s cousin. These things never go well.

Maybe she dropped dead “to her knees while washing her hair” as her brother claimed. BUt her father had just died and her lover, accused of murder, fled to France. She was vulnerable to her enemies. After her death, her brother tried to quickly wipe out her popularity.

He wasn’t successful. People still say her ghost wanders the villa Cerreto Guidi, just outside of Florence. But if you want to see her life’s influence on Florence rather than her death’s, tour around Palazzo Medici, Villa Baroncelli, and the beautiful Palazzo Pitti and Boboli Gardens. Here her influence and commissions live on.

(Resources: Isabella de’ Medici: The Glorious Life and Tragic End of a Renaissance Princess; A Modern Reveal: Isabella de’ Medici Orsini)

May the road rise to meet you, travelers, and may you be as resilient as Florence.

(So, you’re ready to travel deeper and have the dark history of Florence come alive, but not sure how to afford it. Europe has a price tag but never fear! Need some help getting a good deal on airfare, earning and using points, finding upgrades, finding the right hotel or scoring good hotel deals in expensive places/events? Stick with us. We got this.)