churches in the West were planned as “Latin” crosses, with one long arm and a shorter crossing – an arrangement that recalls the shape of Christ’s cross while providing a large space for the congregation. The “Greek” plan of the imperial churches in Constantinople was instead based on an equal-armed cross, surmounted by a dome.
Hagia Sophia has survived as a mosque, but the Apostoleion was completely destroyed in the conquest of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks in 1453.
The doge’s concept was to bring the Greek model to Venice, where a magnificent new building would be the final resting place of the Evangelist who had been the first to translate the Gospel for a broad Roman audience. This structure would not just be a church; it would also be the chapel of the duly elected doge of Venice, adjacent to his palace, with a political as well as a religious significance. And the symbol of the city would become Saint Mark’s emblem, the lion.
Mosaic detail from St. Mark’s Basilica showing the arrival of the body of Saint Mark in Venice.
Venice: 976
The default building material in Venice was wood. Besides being plentifully available from the mainland, it was also lighter than stone and therefore easier on the city’s fragile foundation. But wooden structures were vulnerable to fire, so Venetians took elaborate precautions to prevent fires and to contain them if they started.
That night in 976, though, the fire was set deliberately. An angry crowd barricaded the portals to the Doge’s Palace and began throwing torches through the windows. The object of their rage, Doge Pietro Candiano, was locked inside with his second wife, the beautiful Lombard princess Waldrada, and their infant son. A cousin of the Holy Roman Emperor Otto I, Waldrada, as a foreigner, was only the most visible locus of Venetian dissatisfaction with Pietro. He had married her for her lavish dowry and imperial connections after packing off his first wife, a native Venetian, to the convent of San Zaccaria.
Plan of St. Mark’s Basilica.
Pietro had always been something of a renegade, rebelling against his father, who had also been elected doge, and dabbling in piracy. He was charismatic and popular in certain circles, but always controversial. He had actually been exiled to Ravenna and had to be elected doge in absentia. Arriving back in Venice in great state, he made it clear he had no patience for the city’s democratic system. He attempted to reign as a monarch, but in fairly short order the Venetians had had enough. When word came that Otto I had died, leaving Pietro without his most important ally, they attacked.
The doge’s family attempted to escape through a passage connecting the palace directly to St. Mark’s Basilica. They prayed the mob would respect this holy structure that symbolized the special relationship between the doge and the Evangelist. But when they emerged from the passageway into the church, choking in the smoke, they were surrounded by heavily armed men. Pietro pleaded for mercy, but they only laughed. The baby was quickly speared with a lance. Pietro died more slowly after being stabbed many times. In the confusion, Waldrada somehow escaped and fled the city, large parts of which were engulfed in flames.88
Chronicle of John the Deacon, cited in Norwich, A History of Venice, 42.
The message was clear. While the Venetians expected multiple doges to come from a group of prominent families, each of those doges needed to be properly elected and submit himself to the established protocols of the government. The citizens were not prepared for any doge to set himself up as king, no matter how wealthy or well connected.
When the fires were finally extinguished, the Doge’s Palace had been completely destroyed. St. Mark’s was badly damaged and its most precious relic, the body of the Evangelist, was nowhere to be found.
Efforts were made to repair the church after the great fire, and as Venice enjoyed an economic boom in the eleventh century this project grew more ambitious, culminating in a full reconstruction. While the original Greek-cross plan was retained, the new church was far more vertical, with five domes rising high above the city. The thick masonry walls required to bear their weight put a strain on the wooden supports below, but the builders persevered, convinced that the foundations would hold.
Indeed, Venetians gained confidence from their continuing good fortune. In return for the Venetian navy’s support, the Byzantine emperor Alexius I Comnenus issued a decree in 1082 that Venetian merchants could travel tax-free through the empire, and that their transactions would be free of excise taxes. This “Golden Bull” was a great advantage, and it coincided with another major economic opportunity for Venice: the Crusades.
It was a nagging humiliation to Christendom that the Holy Land had remained in Muslim hands ever since the Arab conquest of Jerusalem in 638 AD. Western monarchs mounted successive military efforts to reclaim these territories ostensibly in the name of the church, but also to enrich themselves and expand their domains. The First Crusade achieved its goal by gaining control of Jerusalem in 1099, but setbacks followed. For the next two centuries, crusaders would keep launching campaigns, with diminishing success.
Most of these expeditions flowed at least in some part through Venice, where armies purchased supplies, hired expert sailors and navigators, and sometimes even ordered entire navies. Venetian merchants had to develop a whole new system of accounting, called double-entry bookkeeping, to track these complex and lucrative transactions. Venice would also play a key role in preparing for the Third Crusade, launched in 1189 in an effort to recapture Jerusalem after it fell (again) to the great sultan Saladin. And it was in Venice that Pope Alexander III reconciled with Frederick Barbarossa, the rebellious Holy Roman Emperor who went on to lead the crusade as a demonstration of his renewed piety.
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Venice: July 24, 1177
When Alexander was elected pope in 1159, his first priority was to excommunicate Frederick. The preceding pope had intended to do it but died before he could get the job done. The sentence stood for seventeen years while pontiff and emperor contended for control of Italy. The pope stubbornly maintained that he was the ultimate spiritual authority in Europe and, as such, had jurisdiction even over the emperor. Frederick, an inveterate warrior who aspired to be a new Charlemagne, supported a series of anti-popes in an effort to undermine Alexander’s position.
The result was a brutal power struggle that engulfed much of Europe in war. For a while it seemed the emperor would prevail as his armies pressed into Italy, but after a disastrous defeat at Legnano in 1176, and with an uprising against him back in Germany, Frederick agreed to accept Alexander’s terms.
Venice had managed to alienate both sides in the conflict, but Doge Sebastiano Ziani, a brilliant administrator, aimed to repair those relationships. This effort culminated in the selection of Venice as the site for the reconciliation of Alexander and Frederick. St. Mark’s Basilica was chosen as the perfect backdrop for the ceremony; although it was unfinished, the three grand portals were in place, creating a sort of triumphal arch that would frame the central figures, while the Evangelist himself would be an implied presence blessing the important event.
On a beautiful summer day at dawn, the pope arrived at the basilica and took his place on the high throne that had been constructed for him in front of the main entrance. The emperor followed. His famous red hair was going white, but he wore a brilliant cloak in his signature color, which he shed before making his final approach to the throne on his knees until, finally, he lay prostrate before Alexander, kissing his feet. The pope raised him, embraced him, and seated him on the adjoining throne.
The conflict between them had been long, bloody and personal. But in the end, the prevailing sense seems to have been relief. Later chroniclers insinuated that Alexander and Frederick had whispered insults to each other during the ritual of abasement, but contemporary records suggest this was a genuinely joyful occasion. The pontiff invoked the biblical story of the Prodigal