We leave by the door of the L. aisle, and make our way through the long Campo S. Margarita to the church of S. Pantaleone, which we visit for the sake of the fine altar-piece, a Coronation of the Virgin, by Giov. Alemano and Antonio Vivarini in the chapel L. of the choir. What art was able to accomplish four centuries later we may see by lifting our eyes to the ceiling of the church over which expatiate Fumiani’s paintings of the Martyrdom and Apotheosis of the patron-saint.
We leave the church on our left, and continue N.E. to the Campo S. Tomà. Here we shall find the old Guild Hall of the Cobblers (Scuola dei Calerghi) with a relief by Pietro Lombardo, St Mark healing the cobbler. The quaint signs of the craft over the portal and Pietro’s sculpture bear traces of the original colouring. We make our way E., passing the fourteenth-century Campanile of S. Polo, one of the finest at Venice. At the base are carved in stone two lions, one of which has a serpent coiled round its neck, the other holds a human head in its claws. They are popularly supposed to symbolise the fate that overtook Marin Faliero. We note on the L. the fine old Gothic S. portal of the church, and emerge into the broad Campo S. Polo.
From the S.E. angle of the campo a way leads along the Calle della Madonetta, and by the Calle del Perdon to the Campo S. Apollinare. On the L., just before we emerge into the campo, are an inscription and a medallion of Pope Alexander III., which mark his legendary resting-place (p. [50]). (Another tradition, however, indicates the portico of the old church of S. Salvatore in the Merceria as the spot where he lay.) S. from the campo a way leads to the S. Silvestro Pier on the Grand Canal.
SECTION XV
Giudecca—The Redentore—S. Trovaso
A STEAMER leaves the Riva degli Schiavoni every hour for the S. Croce Pier on the island of the Giudecca where stands Palladio’s masterpiece, the plague church of the Redentore de’ Cappucini. The island, formerly known as Spinalunga was assigned (giudicata) in the ninth century as a place of banishment to certain of the nobles implicated in the murder of Doge Tradenico. Hence according to some authorities its name: by others it is believed to have been the ancient Jewry.
The fine proportion and symmetry make the interior of the church even more impressive than that of S. Giorgio Maggiore. In the sacristy are three early Venetian paintings once assigned to Giov. Bellini, now generally attributed: (1) Virgin with the Sleeping Jesus attended by two Angels to Alvise Vivarini (p. [196]); (2) Virgin and Child with SS. John and Catherine and (3) Virgin and Child with SS. Mark and Francis to Bissolo. The last is by some critics attributed to Pasqualino, a feeble imitator of Giov. Bellini.
We may return by the steamer that crosses every few minutes to the fondamenta of the Zattere (rafts) so called because here the great rafts of timber from the Alps were and still are landed, and follow the rio di S. Trovaso, on which is a most picturesque squero (boat builder’s) purchased by the municipality of Venice to save it from destruction, to the church of S. Trovaso. The church contains two Tintorettos of interest. At the high altar is his Temptation of St Anthony. “A small and very carefully finished picture, marvellously temperate and quiet in treatment,” says Ruskin, who describes the painting in the Venetian Index. There is little tranquillity in the other picture, the Last Supper, in the L. transept. The whole scene is full of “bustle and tumult” and in nearly all its details the composition is coarse and irreverent. The moment chosen is when Christ has uttered the words, “One of you shall betray Me.” An overturned rush-bottom chair is in the foreground. One of the Apostles is leaning down to fill his glass from a large fiasco of wine on the floor; another is in the act of lifting the lid of a soup kettle; a cat is lapping up some of the soup. The solemn scene is degraded to the level of a vulgar beanfeast.