Built in the 11th Century to replace an earlier church, this basilica’s distinctly Eastern-style architecture underlines Venice’s connection to Byzantium (which protected it from the ambitions of Charlemagne and his Holy Roman Empire). It’s decorated with booty from returning sea captains – a kind of architectural Venetian trophy chest.
The interior glows mysteriously with gold mosaics and colored marble. Since about A.D. 830, the saint’s bones have been housed on this site. The San Marco Museum holds the original bronze horses (copies of these overlook the square), and a balcony offering a remarkable view over St. Mark’s Square.
In a city packed with architectural wonders, nothing beats Basilica di San Marco for sheer spectacle and bombastic exuberance. IN AD 828, wily Venetian merchants allegedly smuggled St. Mark’s corpse out of Egypt in a barrel of pork fat to avoid inspection by Muslim authorities.
Venice built a basilica around its stolen saint in keeping with the city’s own sense of supreme self-importance.
Church authorities in Rome took a dim view of Venice’s tendency to glorify itself and God in the same breath, but the city defiantly created a private chapel for their doge that outshone Venice’s official cathedral (the Basilica di San Pietro in Castello) in every conceivable way. After the original St. Mark’s was burned down during an uprising, Venice rebuilt the basilica twice (mislaying and rediscovering the saint’s body along the way).
The current incarnation was completed in 1094, reflecting the city’s cosmopolitan image, with Byzantine domes, a Greek cross layout and walls clad in marbles looted from Syria , Egypt and Palestine. Unbelievably, Basilica di San Marco only replaced San Pietro as Venice’s cathedral in 1807, after the fall of the Republic.
The front of the basilica ripples and crests like a wave, its five niched portals capped with shimmering mosaics and frothy stonework arches. It’s especially resplendent just before sunset, when the sun’s dying rays set the golden mosaics ablaze. Wish we could have seen it that way – below is as close as we got.
Grand entrances are made through the central portal, under an ornate triple arch featuring Egyptian purple porphyry columns and intricate 13th-to- 14th century stone reliefs. The oldest mosaic on the façade, dating from 1270, is in the lunette above the far-left portal, depicting St. Mark’s stolen body arriving at the basilica.
The theme is echoed in three of the other lunettes, including the 1660 mosaics above the second portal form the right, showing turbaned officials recoiling from the hamper of pork fat containing the sainted corpse.
Blinking is natural upon your first glimpse of the basilica’s glittering mosaics, many made with 24-carat gold leaf fused onto the back of the glass. Just inside the narthex (vestibule) glitter the basilica’s oldest mosaics, Apostles with the Madonna, standing sentry by the main door for more than 950 years.
The atrium’s medieval Dome of Genesis depicts the separation of sky and water with surprisingly abstract motifs.
Inside the church proper, three golden domes vie for our attention. The images are intended to be read from the altar end to the entry, so the Cupola of the Prophets shimmers above the main altar, which the Last Judgement is depicted in the vault above the entrance (and best seen from the museum). The dome nearest the doom is the Pentecost Cupola, showing the Holy Spirit represented by a dove shooting tongues of flame onto the heads of the surrounding saints. In the central 13th-century Ascension Cupola, angels swirl around the central figure of Christ hovering among the stars. Scenes from St. Mark’s life unfold around the main altar, which houses the saint’s simple stone sarcophagus.
