Places and landmarks in Florence

The square around the cathedral, Giotto’s bell tower and the octagonal Baptistery with its gilded bronze doors.

Florence’s main pedestrian street, from the cathedral to Piazza della Signoria past the guild church of Orsanmichele, named after the hosiers who once had their shops here.

The square that the city cleared from the 1880s on the site of the Roman forum, the old market and the Jewish ghetto, with its triumphal arch and old cafés.

The political heart of Florence for seven centuries, in front of Palazzo Vecchio, with a copy of Michelangelo’s David at its door.

The long, narrow courtyard between the two wings of the Uffizi, which Vasari built from 1560 as offices for the Medici government. Statues of famous Tuscans stand in its niches.

The bridge of 1345 lined with shops, where in 1593 Grand Duke Ferdinando I replaced the butchers with goldsmiths.

Florence’s river, between the stone embankments of the lungarni, crossed by the Ponte Vecchio and a string of other bridges.

Ammannati’s graceful bridge of 1569, blown up in 1944 and rebuilt in 1958 with stones fished out of the river.

Florence’s grandest shopping street, lined with fashion houses and Renaissance palaces such as Palazzo Strozzi.

The wide square in front of the Dominican church with the black-and-white marble front that Leon Battista Alberti finished.

A calm square of arcades, with Brunelleschi’s loggia of the Hospital of the Innocents, the city’s old foundling hospital, along one side.

The square in front of the Franciscan church where Michelangelo, Galileo and Machiavelli lie buried. In June it becomes the pitch for the calcio storico.

The sloping square below Palazzo Pitti, the palace the Medici moved into in the 16th century, with the Boboli Gardens behind it.

The village square of the Oltrarno, in front of Brunelleschi’s church with its plain, unfinished front, with a morning market and bars in the evening.