The 18 Years Florence Lived Without the Medici and the 3 Years It Fought to Stay Free

Florence is famous for the Medici. But twice, its own people kicked them out. They built a republic. They fought foreign armies. They even commissioned Michelangelo’s David as a symbol of freedom. This isn’t the story you learned in school.

Let me tell you about Florence’s forgotten fight for liberty.

The Italian Peninsula 1499.

When people think of Renaissance Florence, they think Medici. The grand patrons of art, politics, and power. But there’s a chapter that history often skips, the years when Florence kicked them out and stood on its own.

Not once. But twice.

In 1494, Florence erupted. The Medici, once untouchable, were driven out by their own citizens. As Piero de’ Medici fled, crowds filled the streets chanting “Popolo e libertà!” — People and Liberty.

Lorenzo de Medici by Peter Paul Reubens

This wasn’t just anger at a family. It was a rebellion against decades of oligarchic control.

Florence declared itself a Republic. Power shifted towards broader participation. For the first time in decades, the city tried to live up to its republican ideals.

The new Republic faced enemies on every side. Foreign invasions. Pro-Medici conspiracies. Inside the city, chaos brewed as Fra Girolamo Savonarola, a radical Dominican preacher, seized influence.

Savonarola’s sermons condemned luxury, corruption, even the Pope. His followers lit the Bonfire of the Vanities, burning art, books, and finery in the name of moral purity.

But in 1498, Florence turned on him. Savonarola was executed. The Republic survived.

Through all this, Florence endured.