| 2. The Byzantine and Lombard and Period |
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 The Barbarian invasions seriously impaired the importance of
Florentia. In 405, even though gravely damaged, the city managed
to halt the hordes of Radagaisus, which were defeated by Stilicho
but later it could not avoid being involved in the disastrous
Gotho- Byzantine war. Its strategic position as bridgehead on the
Arno and strong point in the communications route between Rome
and Padania explains why the city was so keenly contested between
the Goths and the Byzantines. In 541-44 the latter erected a
secondary city wall inside the old Roman city but in 552 even
this failed to keep out the Goth, Totila. The new city walls were
built utilizing the structures of various large Roman buildings:
the Campidoglio, the reservoir for the water of the Baths, the
Theater. A pair of coupled towers, whose foundations have
recently come to light behind the remains of the side apses of Santa Reparata, terminated the
fortifications of the small "Byzantine" city wall at
the northeast corner. The wall was
trapezoidal and its modest size testifies to the decline of the
city, greatly depopulated (there may have been less than a
thousand inhabitants) and reduced to a castrum. Meanwhile, in the
early decades of the 6th century or even before, but certainly at
the time of the late Roman city, the church of Santa Reparata was
built. According to tradition, the Florentines built the church
in 405, a tribute to the victory of General Stilicho's imperial
troops over the Ostrogoths of Radagaisus. Around the end of the
6th century when the Lombards conquered northern and central
Italy, Florence also fell under their dominion. This was the
beginning of what may be considered the darkest period in the
city's history. Cut off from the major routes, the main reason
for its existence suddenly vanished. For their north-south
communications, the Lombards abandoned the central
Bologna-Pistoia-Florence route as being too exposed to the
incursions of the Byzantines who still held control of the
eastern part of Italy; and made use of a route further to the
west that crossed the Cisa pass and reached Pavia and Milan via
the Sarzana-Piacenza route.
In the Middle Ages this road, later to be known as romea or francigena, became the
main continental artery between Italy and the countries north of
the Alps. Similar reasons lie behind the Lombard choice of Lucca
as the capital of the duchy of Toscana, a city that lay along the
road they used for internal communications.
In any case, during the period of Lombard domination, especially
after Queen Theodolinda had been converted to the church of Rome,
a number of religious buildings were founded in the city. Among
the others the Baptistery of San
Giovanni (St.John the Baptist) although not of course in its
present form and size. Indeed it seems that the original
Florentine baptismal church was much smaller than the present
one: it was most likely a small octagonal temple whose
foundations are visible in the "subterraneans" of
"bel San Giovanni".
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