Via dei Malcontenti (‘street of the unhappy’) leads from via delle Casine to Piazza Piave and constitutes an exception among Florentine street names, as it neither originates from resident families (like via Strozzi, via Cerretani, Piazza Peruzzi, etc.), nor from artisans or tradesmen who worked there (as via Calzaioli, via degli Speziali, etc.), but goes back to a darker chapter of the city’s history. Leaving the prisons of the Bargello in earlier days and that of the Carcere delle Stinche (then located about where the Teatro Verdi is today) in later days, prisoners condemned to be hanged were led in chains onto a cart that would carry them along via dell’Anguillara and Piazza Santa Croce to via di San Giuseppe, where they would receive the final sacrament in the Capella della Compagnia dei Neri. They then proceeded on a march through the ancient Porta della Giustizia (‘gate of justice’) and eventually reached the gallows situated outside the city walls, close to the Torre della Zecca. A faction of the Templars, the Battuti Neri-so called as they dressed in black cowls and flagellated themselves (si battevano)-that were situated in via San di Giuseppe, dedicated themselves to comforting the prisoners during their final hours. For the same reason, various tabernacles were raised along the way. Among these, at the corner of via delle Casine and via dei Malcontenti is the tabernacle Madonna with child and saints by a follower of Niccolò Gerini, (replaced by a copy after the 1966 flood). The Granducato di Toscana was the first pre-unification Italian state to abolish capital punishment in 1786.
