Bardi

The Bardi were a noble and banking family of Florence, whose rank was documented as early as 1164, when Emperor Frederick Barbarossa enfeoffed Count Alberto with the county of Vernio. From 1215 they took the Guelph side in faction wars, fighting at Montaperti in 1260 and at Campaldino in 1289, the latter alongside Dante.

Their power rested on the Compagnia dei Bardi, whose bills of exchange made them one of Europe's chief bankers by the 1320s. In 1338 the house was at its height, but it had lent Edward III some 900,000 gold florins for the Hundred Years' War, and his default in 1345 brought the bank down.

The family survived as merchants and patrons of the Franciscans, whose Bardi Chapel in Santa Croce was frescoed by Giotto. Contessina de' Bardi married Cosimo de' Medici around 1415; he restored the family to Florentine public life when he took power in 1434.