PIAZZA SAN MARCO

Description

Essentials about Piazza San Marco in brief

Piazza San Marco (St. Mark’s Square) is certainly one of those places in the world that every traveler should have seen once in his life. With St. Mark’s Basilica, St. Mark’s Campanile and the Doge’s Palace, three of Venice’s main sights are located on Piazza San Marco. The 175-meter-long and 82-meter-wide square is of such incredible beauty that even Napoleon called it the “most beautiful ballroom in Europe.” No wonder Piazza San Marco is overrun every day by crowds of tourists from all over the world, who share the square with thousands and thousands of pigeons and dozens of musicians and artists. If you want to watch this daily hustle and bustle “in peace”, you should sit down in one of the luxurious cafes or restaurants in the square.

The location and architecture of Piazza San Marco

Piazza San Marco is the only square in Venice that bears the name “piazza”, as it used to be the only paved square in the city. All other squares in Venice are called “campi” (“fields”) because they were not originally paved. The part somewhat set off from the rest of the square, between the Doge’s Palace, the Biblioteca Marciana and the lagoon, is called Piazzetta San Marco. The Piazzetta is dominated by the two columns dedicated to Venice’s city saints, St. Mark and St. Theodore. on the columns, therefore, are the Lion of St. Mark and the statue of St. Todaro (posing with Todaro on a crocodile), respectively.

Piazza San Marco is one of the lowest places in Venice. Thus, the square is often flooded during high tide. Usually it is only a few centimeters. In extreme floods, footbridges are placed in Piazza San Marco so that Venetians and tourists can still move around reasonably dry-footed.

The history of Piazza San Marco

After a fire in 976, which destroyed the castle, St. Mark’s Church and about 300 houses, the then Doge Pietro I. Oresolo used the resulting open space to reorganize the area. Piazza San Marco acquired its current size after 1156 by filling in the course of the Rio Batario to the west and a landing stage for ships, which was located between the square and the Doge’s Palace. Between 1172 and 1178, under the Doge Sebastiano Ziani, it was extended to the west and already in 1177, when the Emperor Frederick I visited the city, it showed itself as a representative center of the city republic. From 1267 the square was paved. In 1340 it was decided to build the Doge’s Palace, which was rebuilt in its old form after the devastating fire of 1577. The current outline of the Piazza and Piazzetta was only finally defined by the buildings of the 16th century.

Since 1722 the square has been covered by a pavement of trachyte designed by Andrea Tirali, with a lighter geometric pattern added to the darker background, making the square appear longer. Before that, similar to Piazza del Campo in Siena, it was covered with a brick pavement laid in a herringbone pattern, which can still be seen in the paintings of Canaletto and Bellini.

The buildings at Piazza San Marco

Starting from the Grand Canal, the following buildings are located in the square (counterclockwise): the Doge’s Palace, the Porta della Carta, St. Mark’s Basilica, the Clock Tower, the Procuratie Vecchie, the Napoleonic Wing of the Procuraties, the Procuratie Nove, the St. Mark’s Campanile with the Loggetta and the Biblioteca Marciana.

Doge’s Palace

For more information about the Doge’s Palace, see the following website.

Porta della Carta

The gatehouse to the Doge’s Palace, the Porta della Carta, also called porta aurea because of its once lavish gilding, was built between 1438 and 1442 under the direction of Giovanni and Bartolomeo Buon. It opens the entrance to the Scala dei Giganti, where the magnificent spectacle of the Doge’s coronation was staged. The sculpture of the patron Francesco Foscari is above the portal. The Doge kneels before Venice, represented by the winged lion of St. Mark.

St Mark’s Basilica

For more information about St. Mark’s Basilica, see the following website.

Clock Tower

The Clock Tower (Torre dell’Orologio) was built between 1496 and 1499 by Mauro Codussi, the adjacent wing buildings (1502-1506) were built by Pietro Lombardo and in 1755 the architect Giorgio Massari added a third floor. The astronomical clock with its lapis lazuli dial shows the phases of the moon and sun and the signs of the zodiac. Two huge bronze figures strike the hours on a bronze bell. From an urbanistic point of view, the tower emphasizes the confluence with the Merceria; on the other hand, it is the end point of a visual axis led from the lake side of the square, which visually connects the Piazza and the Piazzetta.

Procuraties

The north, south and west sides of Piazza San Marco are bordered by the Procuraties, former administrative buildings of the Republic of Venice. The Old Procuraties (Procuratie Vecchie) in the north were built after the fire of a previous building, starting in 1514, under the direction of Bartolomeo Buon. The New Procuraties (Procuratie Nove) were built from 1583 under the direction of Vincenzo Scamozzi and from 1616 to 1640 under Baldassare Longhena. The square, which used to be rectangular, then acquired its trapezoidal shape. The connecting bar on the west side – the Napoleonic Wing – is a 19th century construction. At the behest of the French occupation forces, the Church of San Geminiano, which had previously closed the square, was demolished to make room for a new building adapted to the architecture of the Procuraties.

On the first floor of the buildings there are small stores and cafés, including the three most famous cafés in Venice, the Gran Caffè Quadri, Caffè Lavena and the Caffè Florian. The latter was opened in 1683, making it the oldest café in Europe. In addition, the Procuraties house the Museo Correr and the Archaeological Museum of Venice.

St Mark’s Campanile

For more information about the St. Mark’s Campanile see the following website.

Loggetta

The Loggetta at the foot of St. Mark’s Campanile was built between 1537 and 1540 by Sansovino. It served as a meeting place for the patricians of the city. In the reliefs and the sculptures, the Republic of Venice is glorified with all its virtues – skill in war and trade, political concord, eloquence of its protagonists – and its love of peace and the special protection of St. Mark the Evangelist are depicted. During the collapse of the Campanile in 1902, parts of her figural decoration were destroyed.