The Studium became an imperial university in 1364, but was moved to Pisa in 1473 when Lorenzo the Magnificent gained control of Florence.

The modern university dates from 1859, when a group of disparate higher-studies institutions grouped together in the Istituto di Studi Pratici e di Perfezionamento, which a year later was recognized as a full-fledged university by the government of newly unified Italy.

The Faculty of Architecture is in the center of the city, as the Accademia di Belle Arti, home of Michelangelo's David.

[3] Alumni and faculty members of the University of Florence School of Law have held leading positions in government.

They include Presidents of the Italian Constitutional Court Silvana Sciarra, Paolo Grossi, Ugo de Siervo,[4] and Enzo Cheli,[5] President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Jugoslavia and Special Tribunal for Lebanon Antonio Cassese, Judge of the International Court of Justice Giorgio Gaja, Judge of the Court of Justice of the European Union Roberto Mastroianni,[6] former Prime Ministers of the Italian Republic Matteo Renzi and Giuseppe Conte, and members of the Constituent Assembly Piero Calamandrei and Giorgio La Pira.