The days without water

For days the centre of Florence had no drinking water, no electricity, no gas and no telephone. The city was cut off from the outside world at the very moment it most needed to be seen.

This square sits higher than the streets around it, which is why the first relief posts went up here. Soldiers handed out bread and water, people scooped mud out of their shops with buckets, and anyone with a working tap let the whole street come and use it. Bakers couldn't bake for days because their ovens were full of water.

The news spread slowly, since the lines were down and the scale of it only reached Rome after a few days. Once the images finally travelled around the world, help arrived from all over Europe and beyond: money, pumps, drying equipment, restorers and thousands of volunteers who made the trip at their own expense.

We walk past the Uffizi towards the river, to the little square beside the museum with the astronomical instruments.