WHAZHOT · MADE IN FLO' · ONLY IN FLO' · DISCOUNT COUPONS
sections
Booking
.
culture
.
The medieval doormat
[Tashiya Gunesekera]
When asked to find antique shoescrapers, I wondered if I was being sent on a wild goose chase. Nonetheless, I dutifully wandered over to the Le Cure area and, lo and behold, there they were. Even more surprising was instead of finding one or two, I came across quite a few. In fact, walking from Via Caracciolo towards Via Salvini, I counted six antique shoe-scrapers on the left side of the street and three on the right. These antiques have stood the test of time and are interesting microcosms of Florentine history. The reasoning behind these shoescrapers is simultaneously practical & simple. Though a few can be found downtown, which only now do I find myself noticing, these items were mostly found outside the medieval Florentine walls. Here, the sandy roads would become muddy paths with the arrival of the rainy season. Therefore, the Florentines would use these items, just outside their front doors, to scrape the mud off their shoes before entering their homes. But as with most things Italian, these practical items grew more asthetic as time passed. They started out as simple mental bars jutting out of the wall, then evolved into more complex works of art depicting dragon heads, flowers and other intricate emblems. A shoe-scraper will not tell us anything about Cosimo de’ Medici, but it could tell us about the Signore and Signora who used to live at what is now Via della Palancola, 15. Today, these shoe-scrapers are not used for their primary purpose; even though they remain in their original locations, their function has changed. I was amused to see bicycles chained to these antiques and sometimes just the bicycle chains on their own. Shoe-scrapers are still serving an useful albeit different purpose. Nowadays, they provide an interesting, historical anecdote of Florence that depicts how much of the medieval ancient city still surrounds us today. MORE