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The article discusses the socioeconomic factors related to crime and punishment in Renaissance Florence in Italy. Religious superstition and fatalism were part of the standard equipment of the Florentine mind. Lack of street lighting provided an environment conducive to frequent night attacks on those brave souls who ventured from the security of their homes. The course of human life was regarded much as an experience of the inevitable. Man was born, the Florentine considered, primarily to reproduce his kind. Florence was probably more reluctant to free her slaves than some cities, but was not the last to do so. Pistoia in 1205 led the way in freeing her slaves, Bergamo followed in 1237, Vercelli, in 1243, Bologna, in 1256, and Florence--by three stages--in 1289, 1344, and 1415. Life in the market places was far from safe. Crimes against person and property kept the city magistrates constantly busy meting out justice to offenders from the Mercalo Vecchio. In addition to a social environment conducive to criminal acts in what was considered normal times, plagues and wars operated as crime-inducing agents in periods of great social disorganization. The descriptions of the social conditions in Florence during an extended period of pestilence strikingly point out the disorganized state of jurisprudence; imply that crimes against person and property were prevalent; and that crimes were committed without much fear of consequent apprehension.