Harry Chittenden

On the night of 3 August 1944, retreating German soldiers blew up every bridge in Florence except one. It had been standing since 1345... The bridge is called the Ponte Vecchio, the Old Bridge. It is the oldest surviving crossing of the Arno River, on a site that has carried bridges since Roman times. The Romans built the first. The medieval Florentines rebuilt it twice, after floods in 1117 and 1333 swept the previous versions away. The third attempt — the one still standing today — was completed in 1345. It was one of the first segmental arch bridges ever built in the West. Three low, wide arches replaced the heavy semicircular spans of Roman engineering. The new design needed fewer piers in the river, offered less resistance to floodwater, and allowed boats to pass underneath. Six hundred and eighty years later, the engineering still holds. Shops have lined the bridge since the 13th century. The first tenants were butchers, fishmongers, and tanners, who used the river below as an open drain. In 1565, Cosimo I de' Medici commissioned Giorgio Vasari to build a covered passageway above the shops, connecting his official residence at Palazzo Vecchio to his private home at Palazzo Pitti, so that he and his family could move through the city in private, away from the public eye. The passage is called the Vasari Corridor, and it still runs above the bridge today. In the late 16th century, the smell of the butchers' waste reached the corridor windows. By decree, every butcher was expelled from the bridge and replaced with goldsmiths and jewellers. The rule has never been repealed. To this day, the shops on the Ponte Vecchio are required, by law, to sell only gold, silver, and jewels. The same shopfronts that hung over the Arno four hundred years ago are still selling the same trade. Then came the war... By August 1944, the Allies were closing in on Florence. The retreating German forces, under orders from Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, prepared to destroy every bridge over the Arno to slow the advance. On the night of 3 August, the operation was carried out. The Ponte alle Grazie, the Ponte alla Carraia, the Ponte Santa Trinita, the Ponte San Niccolò — all were detonated. The Ponte Santa Trinita, considered one of the most beautiful bridges in the world, had to be blown up three times before it finally collapsed. Only Ponte Vecchio was spared. The reason is still debated. Some credit Hitler, who had visited Florence in 1938 and reportedly admired the city. Some credit Gerhard Wolf, the German consul to Florence, who is honored by a plaque on the bridge for his role in saving it. Some credit a Florentine shop assistant who is said to have disabled the mines placed beneath the arches. I have walked across it more times than I can count. And every time, I find myself thinking that the people who built this could not have known we would still be crossing it. As John Ruskin wrote in The Seven Lamps of Architecture: "When we build, let us think that we build forever. Let it not be for present delight, nor for present use alone; let it be such work as our descendants will thank us for; and let us think, as we lay stone on stone, that a time is to come when those stones will be held sacred because our hands have touched them, and that men will say, as they look upon the labour and wrought substance of them: ‘See! This our fathers did for us.’" -- -- -- If you enjoyed this, I write a weekly newsletter read by over 50,000 people who love rediscovering the beauty of the past. You can join us here: James-lucas.com/welcome If you'd like to support my work, a paid subscription is what makes it possible.