Santi Apostoli

One of Florence’s oldest churches, the 11th century SS. Apostoli is in the sunken Piazzetta del Limbo, once the cemetery of unbaptized babies. An inscription on the façade attributes the foundation to Charlemagne and his paladin Roland, in the year 800, but what stands today is from the 11th century.

The simple façade, in Romanesque style, has a portal by Benedetto da Rovezzano and a small bell tower added by Baccio d'Agnolo in the 16th century. There was talk soon after of raising the square and rebuilding the church, but Michelangelo intervened and urged its preservation. Note the plaque on the adjacent house, marking the extraordinary high water mark of the 1966 flood.

Interior

SS. Apostoli is one of the few Florentine churches to preserve its medieval original interior, especially evocative and numinous on a winter's evening: ancient green marble columns and capitals cannibalized from Roman baths in Prato line the name with a stone Romanesque apse at the head; above, richly decorated wooden beams from the 14th century, below, a restored mosaic floor.