Venice Monuments

St. Mark's Square is really the heart of Venice, mostly because of its location on the banks of the grand canal, and because of the great number of beautiful, historical monuments located there. Politically and culturally, St. Mark's Square has always been a very important and strategical area in Venice. On the bank of the grand canal, first you will come upon the "molo",the pier for the great number of gondolas and vaporetti which stop at the square. As you keep walking you'll come onto the piazzetta, the square where you will find the two columns where the two symbols of Venice: St Mark's Lion and the statue of St Theodore, the patron saint of Venice, keep watch over the city. In the past, this square was used for public executions. The piazza St. Marco, is the only square that is called a Piazza, the others are simply called "campo". It's much more than a simple city square, it's a symbol. The square is now "covered" with tourists and its famous pigeons which are a very integral part of the site. The square is lined with the buildings called the Procuratia, which housed the offices and apartments of high placed officials in the Venetian government. The "procuratie vecchie" date back to the 9th century, and were rebuilt in the 16th century. The Campanile is a 314 ft. tower. You can climb to the top and look out over the city and the lagoon from its panoramic balcony for 10,000 lira. Built in the 9th century, the Campanile was used as a watch tower. Galileo also used the tower for his work. After the tower collapsed, it was rebuilt in 1902. You reach the Campanile by crossing the loggeta which was built in the 16th century.

St. Mark's Basilica majestically symbolizes the lagoon and enshrines the city's history. Possession of the saint's relics enabled the Republic to establish its authority, from 828 onward, over Grado and Aquileia. In 1063, under Doge Domenico Contarini, it was decided to rebuild the church on the same Greek cross plan as the previous one. In 1096 it was finished, but the decorative work continued until the beginning of the 19th century. The model had been furnished by the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople (536-46); five domes covering the crossing and each of the arms, supported by large piers linked by arches. The light was thus directed towards the centre of the basilica, leaving the side aisles in comparative shadow.
The first patron saint of Venice was St.Teodoro. In 828 St.Mark the Evangelist substituted him when two merchants smuggled his mortal remains back from Alessandria (Egypt). St.Mark's remains were initially buried in a chapel in the Doge's Palace but later a church was built that was to be his perpetual resting place. The church later suffered damage from fire and was modified many times to adapt to Venice's evolution of power and wealth. This simple church evolved into St.Mark's Basilica. The modifications to the Basilica continued on through an entire century, therefore the results of the construction exhibit a mixture of different styles.
In order to justify the theft of St.Mark's body, legend states that when the Evangelist went to the lagoon, an angel came and said: "Pax tibi Marce, Evangelista meus" (Translation from Latin : peace to you, Mark my Evangelist), showing in this way that God had determined Venice as the final resting place of the Saint. The Venetians acted to fulfill the divine profecy.
St.Mark's Basilica is also well known for the Pala d'Oro, one of the richest and most precious altar screens in the world. It is covered with more than 3000 precious stones and enamel ikons inlaid in gold.

The Doge's Palace, Venice, has façades which date from 1309-1424, designed by Giovanni and Bartolomeo Buon. The palace, started in the ninth century, several times rebuilt, and completed in the Renaissance period, forms part of that great scheme of town-planning which was carried out through successive centuries. The façades, with a total length of nearly 152 m (500 ft), have open arcades in the two lower storeys, and the third storey was rebuilt after a fire in the sixteenth century, so as to extend over the arcades. This upper storey is faced with white and rose-coloured marble, resembling ornate windows and finished with a lace-like parapet of oriental cresting.

The arcade columns, which originally stood on a stylobate of three steps, now rise from the ground without bases, and the sturdy continuous tracery of the second tier of arcades lends an appearance of strength to the open arches. The capitals of the columns, particularly the angle capital which was eulogised by Ruskin in The Stones of Venice, are celebrated for the delicate carving in low-grained marble.

The whole scheme of columned and pointed arcades, with its combination of carved capitals and long horizontal lines of open tracery, is of that unique design which can only be termed Venetian Gothic

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