Although a bit off the beaten path, this Synagogue is in walking distance from the main attractions of Florence Italy and is well worth the effort. It was built between 1874 and 1882 and its exterior and stunning interior reflect the Sephardic style of Moorish Spain. It survived the German attempt to destroy it during World War II.
When Michelangelo's Moses gets to feeling a bit stiff (which happens quite frequently) he strolls around the corner to his own little bar and grill to loosen up a bit. You can catch him singing along with the karaoke machine on the second Tuesday of each week.
Seen at San Pietro in Vincoli (St. Peter in Chains).
Per Wikipedia: Also known as the Basilica Eudoxiana, it was first rebuilt on older foundations[1] in 432-440 to house the relic of the chains that bound Saint Peter when he was imprisoned in Jerusalem, the episode called the Liberation of Saint Peter. The Empress Eudoxia (wife of Emperor Valentinian III), who received them as a gift from her mother, Aelia Eudocia, consort of Valentinian II, presented the chains to Pope Leo I. Aelia Eudocia had received these chains as a gift from Iuvenalis, bishop of Jerusalem.
According to legend, when Leo compared them to the chains of St. Peter's final imprisonment in the Mamertine Prison in Rome, the two chains miraculously fused together. The chains are kept in a reliquary under the main altar in the basilica.
Seen at San Pietro in Vincoli (St. Peter in Chains). If you (as I did) are wondering about the "horns", here is the explanation from Wikipedia:
The marble sculpture depicts Moses with horns on his head. This was the normal medieval Western depiction of Moses, based on the description of Moses' face as "cornuta" ("horned") in the Latin Vulgate translation of Exodus. The Douay-Rheims Bible translates the Vulgate as, "And when Moses came down from the mount Sinai, he held the two tables of the testimony, and he knew not that his face was horned from the conversation of the Lord." This was, however, a mistranslation of the original Greek text, which reads in the Septuagint: "Moses knew not that the appearance of the skin of his face was glorified." The Hebrew Masoretic text also uses words equivalent to "radiant", suggesting an effect like a halo. The church historian Diarmaid MacCulloch comments about this: "Jerome, [the translator of the Old Testament into Latin], mistaking particles of Hebrew, had turned this into a description of Moses wearing a pair of horns - and so the Lawgiver is frequently depicted in the art of the Western Church, even after humanists had gleefully removed the horns from the text of Exodus."
According to Giorgio Vasari in his Life of Michelangelo, the Jews of Rome came like "flocks of starlings" to admire the statue every Shabat.
