Until the first decades of the 20th century, those born in Florence had only one place to receive the first sacrament: the Baptistery of San Giovanni Battista. This makes the books extremely precious, still preserved in the archive of the Opera di S. Maria del Fiore, in which the names of all those who, starting from 1450, were baptized in the ancient octagonal church, dedicated to the patron saint : it is in fact an irreplaceable source for establishing dates of birth, names of parents and grandparents, area of ​​residence and other personal data on Florentines who lived between the Renaissance and our times.
About twenty years have passed since the Opera first published on its website a digital resource for online consultation of this extraordinary archival series. Today this tool is re-proposed in a new version, profoundly changed, thanks above all to the replacement of the images with much higher quality reproductions, which will allow for much easier reading. The resource, which has also greatly improved in terms of graphics, has also been enriched with introductory texts which will provide the user with the necessary historical-archival framework and a practical guide to online consultation.
