The Gonfaloniere was a highly prestigious communal post in medieval and Renaissance Italy, notably in Florence. There he is one of the nine citizens selected by drawing lots every two months, who form the government, the Signoria. As Gonfalone di Giustizia he was the temporary standard-bearer of the Republic of Florence and custodian of the city's banner, which was displayed from the yardarm of a portable cross. To distinguish him from his other eight colleagues, his crimson coat, lined with ermine, is further embroidered with golden stars. Each of Florence's neighborhoods, the rioni had its own priore who might be selected to serve on the council, and its own gonfaloniere di compagnia selected from the first families of each quarter. Defensive towers at San Gimignano, Tuscany, bear witness to the factional strife within communes. ... Founded 59 BC as Florentia Region Tuscany Mayor Leonardo Domenici (Democratici di Sinistra) Area  - City Proper  102 km² Population  - City (2004)  - Metropolitan  - Density (city proper) 356,000 almost 500,000 3,453/km² Time zone CET, UTC+1 Latitude Longitude 43°47 N 11°15 E www. ... The Signoria was the government of medieval and renaissance Florence. ...

Other central and northern Italian communes, from Spoleto to Piemonte, elected or appointed gonfalonieri. When Artemisia Gentileschi painted a portrait of Pietro Gentile as a gonfaloniere of Bologna in 1622, with the gonfalon in the background, the appointment was a shadow formality. [1] Judith Beheading Holofernes (1612-21) Oil on canvas 199 x 162 cm Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence Artemisia Gentileschi (July 8, 1593 - 1653) is today considered one of the most accomplished Early Baroque painters in the generation influenced by Caravaggio (the Caravaggisti). Remarkably, in an era when women painters were not...