The Tabernacles of the noble Florentine palaces wine

Wandering through the narrow streets of the historic center of Florence will be easy to see on the old palaces, of buchette, small openings in the facades, almost at eye level.

These buchette, equipped with door and top with bow, often decorated with a cornice with a drop toe, style or smooth ashlar stone, height of about 40 cm, were also called, wrong, tabernacles of wine, where the rich landowners of the time, Florentine merchants and bankers, sold directly to the Florentines the nectar of the gods, or the wine produced in their properties, forerunners of direct sales, still very much in vogue nowadays for all those products that you look for authenticity.

The little holes were placed on the ground floor of the building, at the winery internal, and their dispensing and sale was well regulated by law: "Cells in the Vinattieri had to pour the wine to customers in jars or containers of controlled and they were not allowed to sell certain types of salty bread that stimulate thirst; the sound of the bells of the evening (the third) exercises and the cells were suspended trade ".

Here are some buildings where you can find those little holes: palace said Strozzino, in Piazza degli Strozzi 1, in via Dante, the Badia Fiorentina, in Borgo Pinti 27, Palazzo Viviani in via delle Belle Donne 2.

Frank Mariani

By the number 14 – The Year of 16/04/2014