San Piero Scheraggio

The church of San Pier Scheraggio was the second largest in Dante’s Florence after Santa Reparata. The photo above shows three of San Pier Scheraggio’s six Romanesque columns forming a straight line that runs perpendicular to the Uffizi’s loggia, along Via della Ninna. That’s all that remains in open view. You have to go inside the Uffizi to see what’s on the other side of this wall: the rest of the nave.

Although the church was officially consecrated in 1068, it had already been here for quite some time, alongside adjacent properties and a cemetery. Its earliest mention in documents comes from 1066 where it’s called the church of Santus Petrus Scheradius. The epithet added to St. Peter’s name probably came from the word they used to refer to a drainage channel that passed through here on the way to the Arno: something like the church of St. Peter of the Ditch.

The church, whose historical outlines are traced on the map above in red, survives only in part. In 1546, Cosimo I de’ Medici ordered that all structures between it and the river be torn down in preparation for the great Uffizi palace. Three years later, he eliminated the church as well. The northern third of it was demolished and paved over as Via della Ninna. The rest was incorporated into the new civic showplace.

However, we can get an idea about what it once looked like from a small area to the right in the well-known painting of the execution of Savonarola and his followers (below) that has been widely attributed to Francesco Rosselli (1445 - ca. 1513). What you’re looking for is the tiny church half-hidden behind the Loggia dei Lanzi (ca. 1376-1382) and just to the right of Palazzo Vecchio.

A single central door opens in the unadorned façade beneath a round window. The nineteenth-century artist, Fabio Borbottoni, imagined it from a vantage point inside the loggia (below).

 

The orange lines in the photo above give you a general idea of where the church used to be. The little plaque (below) on one side of the Uffizi’s large pilaster and the small sign on the other are easily overlooked. The far one has its own English translation, but this one reads: “Remnants and evidence of the church of San Piero Scheraggio, which gave its name to one of the six neighborhoods of the city. Within its walls, Dante’s voice rang out during assemblies of the Popolo.”

The ancient church is significant to us not only for its importance in Florentine history, but also because its central location in the city made it a convenient space for regular meetings of the Council of the Podestà and the Councils of the Captain of the People. Dante spoke here on December 14, 1295 as a member of the Consiglio delle Capitudini (the Captain of the People’s inner council, which had 36 members, six selected from each of the sestieri), and it’s a good bet that he spoke on other occasions as well. 

They say that there were once frescoes by Giotto inside, but nothing of its interior remains except one thing: precisely the pulpit from which speakers, like Dante and Boccaccio, addressed their public (below). It was inherited in disrepair by the church of San Leonardo in Arcetri where it was restored in 1782. If you want to see it in person, it’s not far from the center, but it’s a walk straight up-hill. And, if you don’t call ahead, it’s likely they won’t let you in.