Venice

Early Renaissance palaces occur frequently in Venice and form a pleasing contrast with those in the Gothic style. The Palazzo Dario with its dedication, Urbis genio, and the Vendramin Calergi or Non nobis palace, whose façade is characterized by its round-headed windows of grouped twin lights between columns, are among the more important ; though beautiful specimens, such as the Palazzo Trevisan on the Rio della Paglia, and the Palazzo Corner Reali at the Fava, are to be found all over the city.

Later Renaissance.

In this period architecture in Venice lacks any peculiarly individual imprint. It is still characterized by great splendour; indeed, the library of San Marco, begun by Jacopo Sansovino in 1536, is justly considered the most sump tuous example of Renaissance architecture in the world. It is rich, ornate, yet hardly florid, distinguished by splendid effects of light and shade, obtained by a far bolder use of projections than had hitherto been found in the somewhat flat design of Venetian façades.

The old Procuratie were built by Bartolomeo Buon about the new by Scamozzi in 1580, yet it is clear that each belongs to an entirely different world of artistic ideas. The Procuratie Vecchie is perhaps the longest arcaded facade in the world and certainly shows the least amount of wall space; the whole design is simple, the moulding and ornamentation severe. The Procuratie Nuove, which after all is merely Scamozzi's continuation of San sovino's library, displays all the richness of that ornate building. It contains the museum of ancient sculpture, founded by Cardinal Domenico Grimani in 1523.

Among the churches of this period those of San Giorgio Mag giore and of the Redentore are both by Palladio. In 1631 Baldas sare Longhena began the fine church of Santa Maria della Salute. With a large and handsome dome, a secondary cupola over the altar, and a striking portal and flight of steps, it occupies one of the most conspicuous sites in Venice on the point of land that separates the mouth of the Guidecca from the Grand Canal. In plan it is an octagon with chapels projecting one on each side. The facades of San Moise and of Santa Maria del Giglio are good specimens of the baroque style.

Among the palaces of the later Renaissance the more remark able are Sansovino's Palazzo Corner della Ca' Grande, Long hena's massive and imposing Palazzo Pesaro, the Palazzo Rez zonico, from designs by Longhena with the third storey added by Massari, Sammicheli's Palazzo Corner Mocenigo at San Polo, and Massari's well-proportioned and dignified Palazzo Grassi at San Samuele, built in Modern Buildings.—In recent times the general prosperity

of the city has brought about a revival of domestic and civic architecture both in the Venetian Gothic and the Renaissance Lombardesque style.

Among the most remarkable buildings in Venice are the scuole, or gild halls, of the various confraternities. The six scuole grandi, San Teodoro, S. Maria della Carita, S. Giovanni Evangelista, San Marco, della Misericordia and San Rocco, built themselves mag nificent gild halls. The Scuola di San Marco is now a part of the town hospital, and besides its façade, it is remarkable for the handsome carved ceiling in the main hall (1463). Other beautiful ceilings are to be found in the great hall and the hall of the Albergo in the Scuola della Carita., now the Accademia containing the famous picture gallery, with a number of works returned by Austria in 1919 by Marco Cozzi of Vicenza. But the most mag nificent of these gild halls is the Scuola di San Rocco, designed by Bartolomeo Buon in 1517 and carried out by Scarpagnino and Sante Lombardo. The façade on the Campo is large and pure in conception. The great staircase and the lower and upper halls contain an unrivalled series of paintings by Tintoretto.

Campanili.

Among the more striking features of Venice we must reckon the campanili or bell-towers. (See CAMPANILE.) These were at one time more numerous, earthquakes and sub sidence of foundations have brought many of them down, the latest to fall being the great tower of San Marco itself, which col lapsed on July 14, 1902. Its reconstruction was at once under taken, and completed in 1912, together with that of Sansovino's beautiful Loggetta, on its east side. In a few other cases, for example at San Giorgio Maggiore, the fallen campanili were restored; but for the most part they were not replaced. The Venetian campanile usually stands detached from the church. It is almost invariably square. The campanile is usually a plain brick shaft with shallow pilasters running up the faces. It has small angle-windows to light the interior inclined plane or stair case, and is not broken into storeys with grouped windows as in the case of the Lombard bell-towers. Above the shaft comes the arcaded bell-chamber, frequently built of Istrian stone; and above that again the attic, either round or square or octagonal, carrying either a cone or a pyramid or a cupola. Among the exist ing campanili the oldest are San Geremia, dating from the 11th century, San Samuele from the 12th, San Barnaba and San Zac caria from the 13th.