Florence belongs to that small group of cities whose history may be told too amply in a few lines or too sketchily in many volumes. A true history of Florence, a history concerned with the heart of the story - like the true history of Rome or Athens or Jerusalem - is in the end the history of our entire civilisation; the writer who looks into it deeply enough finds it so rich that even the fullest, most analytical account of it could not do it justice. But for this very reason, perhaps, a "short history" may be useful to many readers, from the student to the more focused type of tourist to the Florentine who would feel discouraged faced with a full treatment of the subject but who does not want to give up the search for a vademecum, which will help him draw from his experience, his memories, his sensations, and his feelings too, an all-inclusive image of a remarkable - a unique - city.