APSE OF S. CRISOGNO, ZARA
The sacristy, a Gothic building with two bays of cross vaults, was the ancient church of S. Barbara, in which the Zaratines swore fealty to the Hungarian crown on the arm of S. Crisogono on July 8, 1384. In 1794 a mosaic pavement was found beneath the existing pavement. Between it and the apse is a little wagon-vaulted room, perhaps the ancient sacristy.
S. Crisogono belongs to the most ancient Benedictine convent in Dalmatia. The church was originally S. Antonio Abate; but when the body of S. Crisogono was brought from Aquileia it was deposited here, and the dedication was changed. In 906 the church and monastery were recorded under the name of S. Crisogono, and as being ruined by barbarian invasion. In 986 Majo, rector of Zara and proconsul of Dalmatia, rebuilt both, and made Madius, a monk from Monte Cassino, abbot. The standard of the city then bore S. Crisogono on horseback, added to the earlier white cross on a red ground. Destroyed by the Venetians, the church was rebuilt in 1032, and in 1056 the buried relics were re-discovered. The final rebuilding was in the twelfth century, and it was consecrated on May 4, 1175, by the first archbishop, Lampridius, though additions were made at a later date. The central portion of the west front, though Romanesque in style, is nothing like as fine as the eastern apses, and may be work of the end of the fourteenth century, since a consecration is recorded in 1407, though Bianchi states that the inscription in his time gave the date 1298. It has a central door with three unmoulded orders and a sunk tympanum beneath a gable. Above this is a heavy string course from which two pilaster strips spring, a window flanked by four arches on slender coupled columns, with semicircular niches, filling the space between them; above, a space from which it is cut by a second string forms the next stage; over it is another string and two small windows beneath a gable cornice of corbelled arches, the same cornice raking over the aisles. Beasts project at the gable angles, and the summit it crowned by a finial. All the arches are round, and the little arcade has red and grey voussoirs. To the left is a large squat campanile which was built in 1546-1562, and was then higher. A fire damaged it in 1645. The north aisle wall has an arcade of twelve arches with twisted columns, and the cast end has three apses, the central one larger and with a fine open arcade beneath the cornice; above its roof in the gable is a cross which had scodelle in the arms and centre. The interior has an arcade of seven arches, arranged three, two, and two, between piers, with a flat pilaster running up to what was once the wall plate. The columns are antique, as are some of the caps. The horizontal moulding above the nave arcade is the same as that above the apse arcade, and is ornamented with beasts' heads, &c. A twelfth-century mosaic in the apse was destroyed in 1791. The pavement of the presbytery is of coloured marbles, and on the aisle wall hangs a great painted crucifix which was once in S. Domenico, and recalls the work of the early Tuscans. The church was the burial-place of many distinguished Zaratines, and the body of Elizabeth of Hungary, who was killed in the castle of Novigrad by Giovanni Palisna, prior of Vrana, in 1386, was buried here for some years. When the church was restored, nineteen historic gravestones were set in the outer wall. At the same time a relief of S. Crisogono, remains of an early ciborium or chancel, and traces of a crypt were found, also the Limoges pastoral staff now in the museum. The cloister has been pulled down, and a school erected on the site.
S. Maria is first mentioned in 906. It was given in 1066 by the Benedictine monks of S. Crisogono to nuns of their order. It is called in the deed "Ecclesiola S. Mariæ minoris ante portam Beltatam." The street opposite the lesser door led to the ancient city gate, Porta Bellata or Belluata, by which animals were brought into the city. The convent was rebuilt and enlarged by Cicca the abbess, who took the veil after the murder of her husband, and who was sister to Cresimir the younger, king of Dalmatia; and it was consecrated on October 28, 1072, by Andrea, bishop of Zara, five other bishops and four abbots being present, when Andrea and the President Drago gave the island of Selve to it. The fine tower was built in 1105 by order of Coloman, to commemorate his entry into Zara as king of Dalmatia, as an inscription states. Of this period is the chapter-house containing the tomb of Vekenega, the repudiated wife of the monarch, and daughter of Cicca, who died in IIII. A window in the north aisle of the church communicates with it, but is only opened when a nun professes, or when one dies. The nuns' choir is above the main door on the level of the side galleries, shut off by a gilded grating inscribed: "Placida abbatissa fieri fecit anno MCCCVI." Within are the stalls made or altered by Giovanni da Curzola in 1495. The façade of the church, which faces on to a small courtyard, is of the period of the Lombardi. At the side of the high-altar towards the sacristy Bishop Andrea was buried, and here are also the remains of Coloman, brought in 1117 from Zara Vecchia, where he died. Cicca died in 1096. Just within the door to the right is a Christ crowned with thorns, and the Virgin lamenting—a good picture of the school of Titian, if not by the master. There is also a SS. Peter and Paul by Palma Vecchio.
The treasury is above an altar at the end of the north aisle. The sacristan, who told us that he had filled that position for fifty years, lighted candles before opening the doors, kissed each reliquary before returning it to its place, and insisted upon the authenticity of each relic. The objects are scarcely so interesting as those at the cathedral, but include several fine fourteenth-century reliquaries as well as one or two which were made, or remade, in Renaissance times. The reliquary of S. Gregory has on the front Christ enthroned between standing figures of SS. Mark and John beneath a round-arched arcade on twisted columns. Three more saints are at the back, and at the ends are the subjects of the Annunciation and the Visitation. Upon the sloping parts of the lid are medallions of angels writing between scroll-work, and at the top is a figure of S. Gregory. It was a votive offering of Catherine, wife of Sandalius, Voivode of Bosnia, who died between 1433 and 1436. A reliquary of an unknown saint (which Bianchi speaks of as S. Zoilus) has on the front a fine equestrian figure of a knight with lance in rest, said to be S. Crisogono, between two figures of ecclesiastics (SS. Zoilus and Donato), all three in high relief. Upon the pyramidal cover are medallions of the symbols of the Evangelists in lower relief, with bands of running ornament along all the angles. At the back are figures of Christ and two saints, and at each end three saints. The reliquary of S. Quirinus, another work of much the same period, has saints under a pointed trefoiled arcade on twisted and horizontally ringed columns, with foliage in the spandrils. In the centre at the back is a figure of our Lord; on the lid are an angel, Gethsemane, S. Peter sleeping, and the winged lion, between scrolls. A panel of S. Gregory, with low mitre, and inscription in Lombardic letters, holding a dragon-headed crozier, and with his bird at the other side, has a stamped border of thirteenth-century character; and a fine relief of the Madonna and Child, with decorated nimbi upon a ground which has once been blue enamel, has a gabled top with a border of relics in roundels with jewels in the interstices. It must once have been used as a door, as the hinges, still attached to the wood, testify.
The reliquary of the clothes of Our Lord is of good early Renaissance design, but some of the figures appear to be of an earlier date. In the centre is an oblong panel with the Madonna "del Parto" in the centre, and S. John the Baptist and S. Paul in high relief. Outside, on brackets, are the Angel Gabriel and the Virgin; at the back are S. Anthony and another saint. Above is a medallion containing three relics from the manger at Bethlehem, from the house at Nazareth, and from the clothes of Our Lord, crowned by a crucifix and flanked by figures of the Virgin and S. John on brackets. On the foot are four medallions in niello amid arabesques. There are also six arm reliquaries of the usual pattern, two of which have little doors of niello, two or three heads, and an ostensory, at the top of which is a thorn from the crown of thorns.
RELIQUARY OF THE CLOTHES OF OUR LORD, S. MARIA NUOVA, ZARA