Introduction

‘Fiorentin mangia fagioli

Lecca piatti e tova glioli.’

The Florentine who eats beans

Licks the plates and tablecloths

(Old Tuscan Saying)

Aldous Huxley called Florence a ‘third rate provincial town’ which is unfair. But certainly in spite of its wealth of art and culture the city sometimes seems designed to annoy the uninformed visitor. From six in the morning when the huge covered central market rings with the shouts of what sounds like the entire Florentine population, the noise of traffic and people fills the streets. VIVOLI, the best and most famous ice cream shop in Florence is busier at midnight than any other time. Museums are open only in the mornings, shop hours alter with a bewildering frequency and just when you think you have cracked the system, everything shuts at one o’clock for lunch. Grey steel shutters clang down abruptly to cover all the tempting displays of goodies, leaving formerly lively shopping streets bare and bleak. For four hours nothing moves except the occasional fly and in the summer heat of Florence (one of the hottest and most humid cities in Italy) even the flies can be a little sluggish.