A few days back I posted about the Florentine street, the Via delle Terme, that evokes the city’s Roman foundation.

Today I took a long walk down this street from east to west, starting at Por Santa Maria to Piazza Santa Trinita. Here are the pictures I took on this beautiful, sunny, spring day.

I started my walk on this corner and shot pictures of the fabric of the street as I walked to its western end. I photographed signs of each of the little alleys that lead off the Via delle Terme.  There is a lot of Medieval and Renaissance building on this lovely old strada.

Above is the intersection of Via delle Terme and Via Por Santa Maria, the easternmost point of the former street.

There is a street near me that evokes the Roman foundation of Florence.  Oh, to time travel back two thousand years!!

Via delle Terme.  The street of baths.  You can find the street roughly in the center of the map, running roughly east/west between the Piazza Santa Trinity and Via Por Santa Maria.

The ancient Roman baths were located in this area, receiving the waters by a sophisticated water system which began on Mount Morello. According to Wikipedia, the baths fell into disuse with the barbarian invasions.

By the late Middle Ages, wealthy Florentine families were settling in this area, building their fortified palaces with tall towers. The street was, for example, the headquarters of the famed Buondelmonti family. When Buondelmonte Buondelmonti was killed by a rival family near the Ponte Vecchio, the funeral procession wound its way over what is today the Via delle Terme.

During the 19th century, many old Florentine streets in the center were revamped.  Fortunately, the via delle Terme escaped both that tampering as well as, mercifully, any destruction as a result of World War II.

Also according to Wikipedia, the Buondelmonti palace is still in situ, as well as the nearby Tower of Buondelmonti. Wiki says the tower is located in front of the back of the Guelph palace and Canacci palace.  I have no idea about this, but will look into it soon.

Other interesting buildings on via delle Terme are the Palazzo de’ Nobili, on the corner of Via del Fiordaliso,  and the Palazzo Scali-Ricasoli and Palazzo Bartolini-Salimbeni.  The latter’s facade faces Piazza Santa Trinita. During the 19th-century, the Hotel du Nord was located within the Palazzo Bartolini-Salimbeni, and an epigraph on the south wall of the building notes that the American poet, James Russell Lowell, spent the winter of 1874 therein:

Here in the ancient Hôtel du Nord
James Russell Lowell
American poet and critic
Dante scholar
Lived during the winter of 1874
Inspired by the beauty
The city of Florence

Another epigraph appears on the facade of the Palazzo Scali-Ricasoli,  in memory of the location where Guglielmo Marconi, inventor of the wireless telegraph, worked :

Here, where the Institute was located Cavallero
He first forayed on the path of knowledge
Guglielmo Marconi
Inventor of wireless telegraphy
His teachers and fellow scientists
Place this memory
May 1903 »

This fertile area has never been the site of extensive archaeological research as, for example, the foundation of the Duomo has been. But, during the laying of foundations for new buildings, in 1926 and 1948, impressive masonry below the current street level was found.  We know that there were Roman era thermal baths along the southern wall of the city, occupying a vast space from the entrance of the Vacchereccia to a Guelph square. In looking at a plan of the Via delle Terme, we see that the souther edge is continuously broken by alleys and chiassi (Manetto Chiasso, Chiasso measures, Chiasso Cornino, Via del Fiordaliso, Vicolo delle Bombarde, Chiasso de’ Ricasoli), all of which lead to the Santi Apostoli church.

On the north edge of the Via delle Terme, we find the Via di Capaccio and the San Biagio alley.  After them, the north edge is not intersected; this is because the Roman walls of the city were originally located here, and subsequent Medieval buildings were seamlessly built along those walls.  For example, a series of houses including the Canacci, the House of the Nobels, etc., extend to the Palazzo Bartolini-Salimbeni.

Remarkably many of these houses and medieval towers still exist on the street.  Fortunately, this street and its many buildings were not destroyed by the 19th-century refiguring of the city, nor by the retreating German army in 1944 when they placed mines throughout the area.

Even the pavement of the street, according to Wikipedia, contributes to the character of the place, having been “laid ‘in bulk ‘, with short sidewalks on both sides.”

While there is no doubt that this street and its environs will provide future archaeologists with fascinating findings about Roman Florentine, for now we can just be grateful that the overall character of the street is still essentially residential. The via delle Terme, together with the parallel Borgo Santi Apostoli, are both considered to be of exceptional urban value, both historically and artistically.

For more, see:https://books.google.it/books?id=p6xJCgAAQBAJ&pg=PP90&lpg=PP90&dq=via+delle+terme+florence&source=bl&ots=DZ6uZpdxK3&sig=J-zAgkrl7aUh3KBWngAlBEWsi1g&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjXit-5gIHSAhVJbRQKHeszCMs4KBDoAQhQMAk#v=onepage&q=via%20delle%20terme%20florence&f=false

Another fun fact: Until the Merlin Law, the road was “popular” in Florence for being the home of one of the most famous brothels.