THE TREASURY OF SAN MARCO, VENICE

Essay by Frances Leonard

The Treasury of St. Mark’s Basilica in Venice holds an intense, almost disturbing fascination for visitors. Modern tourists, especially Americans from a Protestant background, tend to view the Treasury as a crowded collection of elaborate and costly containers for the physical remains of saints—an arm here, a finger there—more curious and distressing than inspirational. We forget that to medieval people, these relics were great treasures indeed, to be preserved in gold and precious stones for the benefit of the faithful. These are the symbols of a faith that was expressed through elaborate ritual and ceremony.

But the Treasury holds much more than these reliquaries. In its narrow vaulted halls are the fragile, precious symbols of empires that have vanished, treasures brought to the Republic of Venice when it dominated much of Europe and the countries around the Mediterranean Sea. There are carved stone and glass vessels from the latter days of the Roman Empire, silver-gilt and gold enameled icons from the glorious days of the Byzantine Empire, and articles of Islamic origin.

The collection of treasures, however, is fundamentally religious in character. Ancient stone vessels were decorated with gold and enamels and converted into chalices; alabaster was carved into translucent plates to hold communion wafers. Byzantine and Venetian artists seem to have taken a special pleasure in combining the works of different ages into a single liturgical vessel or devotional article. The “Grotto of the Virgin,” for instance, combines late antique crystal, a Byzantine crown, and a silver Virgin of Venetian manufacture, while the reliquary of the arm of St. George is a Byzantine vessel overlaid with Gothic tracery surmounted by a Renaissance figure of the saint.

Impressive as the contents of the Treasury are, they are only a fraction of what it once contained. In 1231, a terrible fire destroyed much of the booty brought back from Constantinople. Then in 1797, when Venice fell to the armies of Napoleon, countless objects were melted down to obtain 537 kilograms of gold and silver to pay the war debt imposed upon the Republic. Precious gems were removed from icons and liturgical vessels, and the celebrated horses of San Marco were taken to Paris as the spoils of war. The horses were returned to Venice in 1815, but the melted articles could never be restored.

Catastrophes notwithstanding, the Treasury of San Marco holds a collection of rare—and, in some cases, unique—examples of late classical, Byzantine, Islamic, and European art. Those items featured in the international exhibition and in this photographic version are precious not only for their material composition and their religious intent but also for their role as witnesses to the turbulent history of western civilization.

Venice and San Marco

Founded in the age of legends, the Republic of Venice drew its identity from a legend with Apostolic authority. While sailing to preach the gospel in Aquileia, St. Mark was driven ashore on a deserted island. An angel appeared in his sleep, telling him that one day he would find his final resting place and great veneration on that very island. In 828 A.D., when Venice secured the saint’s relics from Alexandria, the citizens felt that their stature in the world had been divinely confirmed. They set the winged lion of St. Mark high on a pillar, facing the Adriatic Sea to signify the city’s power and sense of independence.

The Venetians were undeniably self-sufficient, for when they moved into the lagoon to escape invading barbarians in 568 A.D., they carried with them the very pilings on which their settlement would be built. Because they never had to recognize the authority of the Huns or Lombards, the Venetians considered themselves direct and unblemished descendants of the Roman Empire. Beginning as suppliers of salt to mainland settlements, they developed into a community of merchants unsurpassed in their skills for recognizing value and controlling trade. Fond of adventure and fascinated with discovery and learning, Venetian merchants became the connecting link between East and West in the Middle Ages. It is no wonder that the most famous Venetian of the era was a traveler and a merchant, Marco Polo.

Beginning in the ninth century, the Venetians erected three basilicas in honor of their patron saint, each grander than its predecessor to reflect the increasing wealth and power of the Republic. Construction on the present basilica, the third, began shortly after 1000 A.D. and continued through the century. Patterned after one of the loveliest churches in Constantinople, Holy Apostles, the basilica was given a cruciform shape and crowned with five domes. Artists were brought from Constantinople and other centers of the Byzantine Empire to create the brilliant mosaics that cover the interior. The basilica was consecrated in 1094, and the relics of St. Mark were transported with great ceremony to their last resting place.

In addition to honoring the relics of St. Mark, the basilica functioned as the private chapel of the Doge; thus, it was both the spiritual and political center of the Republic. Riches from all the known world were brought to the basilica and placed in its Treasury: diplomatic gifts, liturgical donations from other churches, and bequests made to the basilica by wealthy merchants. But the greatest source of treasures was the capital of the Byzantine Empire, Constantinople, which the Venetians sacked in 1204.

Byzantium and the Unholy Crusade

Like Venice, the city of Constantinople was founded on a site recommended by divine or supernatural wisdom. In 658 B.C. the Oracle at Delphi instructed Byzas, leader of a group of Greek colonists, to build his settlement on the European shore of the strait of Bosphorus. Here, his people would thrive. Byzantium, as it first was called, did prosper as a center of trade, but it did not ascend to the glory for which it is remembered until after 324 A.D., when the Roman Emperor, Constantine the Great, selected the city as his capital and renamed it Constantinople.

To the medieval visitor, Constantinople was the “city of the world’s desire,” filled with splendors that could not be imagined. The citizens enjoyed a life of luxury and sophistication that made feudal life in Western Europe seem poverty-stricken and barbaric. A profusion of silks and spices, jewels, alabaster and porphyry greeted visitors to the bazaars along the wide, colonnaded streets. The Constantinopolitans ate with forks, a utensil unknown as yet in Europe. Chief among the city’s hundreds of lavishly ornamented churches and chapels was Hagia Sophia (Holy Wisdom), with its great dome and one thousand lamps that transformed it nightly into a glowing beacon for travelers.

Greek in their language, heritage, and culture, Roman in their laws and political structure, and Christian in their religious faith, the people of Constantinople were unlike anyone the Europeans had ever known. All aspects of their life were deeply permeated by Christianity, but theologians and scholars could quote from Plato and Aristotle, Sophocles and Homer as readily as from the Scripture to support and amplify their theology. They knew the classics of their heritage and kept them alive; had it not been for Byzantium, the great works of Greek philosophy, science, and literature almost certainly would have been lost to the modern world.

The Greek Christians refused, however, to accept the Roman Bishop’s claim to be the supreme authority in the Christian Church, arguing that all bishops were meant to be equal. Thus, there was theological friction between Constantinople and the West. When the Frankish knights of Western Europe came through Constantinople on their way to Jerusalem in the First Crusade, friction between the two cultures was intensified. The Westerners considered the Greeks “soft, effeminate, treacherous”—as one visitor wrote, “Trust not the Greeks; they live but to betray.” The Greeks, for their part, found the Westerners “savage, fickle, dangerous”—in short, barbarians.

Although Venice had developed as a vassal of the Byzantine Empire, long before the time of the Crusades she had become very much an equal, accorded special trading privileges in exchange for naval and military support to rid the seas of pirates. Byzantine resentment of the Italian colonies in their midst had culminated in a savage massacre of the Latin residents in 1182 A.D. Thus, in 1204, the Doge of Venice, Enrico Dandolo, diverted the Fourth Crusade from its original purpose into an attack upon Constantinople. After three days of ghastly pillage and bloodshed, the Venetians laid claim to one-quarter of all the treasures taken from churches, palaces, and private homes and sent them back to the Treasury of San Marco. The Byzantine art works featured in this exhibition are in large part the trophies of that “unholy crusade.”

The Treasury of San Marcos portrays some of the greatest surviving medieval relics, icons, and liturgical objects from the Basilica of San Marco. They symbolize the wealth and influence of Venice during the centuries when it was one of the most powerful states of Europe and the Mediterranean East.

Suggested Readings

The Alexiad of Anna Comnena. Trans. E.R.A. Sewter. Harmondsworth, Eng.: Penguin Books, 1969.
(A Byzantine princess describes the coming of the First Crusaders.)

Beckwith, John. The Art of Constantinople: An Introduction to Byzantine Art, 330-1453. Greenwich, CT: New York Graphic Society, 1961.

Demus, Otto. The Mosaics of San Marco in Venice. 2 parts, 4 vols. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press and Dumbarton Oaks, 1984.
(A monumental survey of the entire church, with two volumes devoted to plates.)

Geanakoplos, D.J. Byzantine East & Latin West: Two Worlds of Christendom. 1966; rpt. Hamden, CT: Shoe String Press, 1976.

Geoffrey De Villehardouin and Jean De Joinville. Chronicles of the Crusades. Trans. Margaret R. Shaw. Harmondsworth, Eng.: Penguin Books, 1963.
(A very readable primary source of information about attitudes and events.)

Godfrey, John. 1204: The Unholy Crusade. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1980.
(A good survey, with concise chapters on conflicts between East and West.)

Hagia Sophia. Lord Kinross and the Editors of the Newsweek Book Division. New York: Newsweek, 1972.
(Beautiful illustrations and well-chosen quotations from primary sources.)

The Horses of San Marco, Venice (Exhibition Catalogue). Trans. John and Valerie Wilton-Ely. Milan: Procuratoria di S. Marco and Olivetti, 1979.

Mango, Cyril. The Art of the Byzantine Empire. Medieval Academy Reprints for Teaching, 16. Toronto: Univ. of Toronto Press, 1986.

McNeill, William. Venice, the Hinge of Europe, 1081-1797. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1974.

Muraro, Michelangelo, and André Grabar. Treasures of Venice. Trans. James Emmons. Geneva: Skira, 1963; Cleveland: The World Publishing Co., 1963.
(A survey of Venetian art from the days of antiquity forward, with lavish illustrations.)

Queller, Donald E., ed. The Latin Conquest of Constantinople. New York: John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1971.
(Selected readings from primary sources.)
The Treasury of San Marco (Exhibition Catalogue). Milan: Procuratoria di San Marco and Olivetti, 1984.

Weitzmann, Kurt. The Icon: Holy Images, 6th to 14th Century. New York: George Braziller, 1978.

A humanities exhibition from Texas Humanities Resource Center
Sponsored by Olivetti, USA
With matching support from Texas Council for the Humanities