The Rough Guide to Venice and the Veneto

central castello
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Campo Santi Giovanni e Paolo
that they were usually built on the edges of city centres. In Venice the various
mendicant orders are scattered outside the San Marco sestiere: the Dominicans
here, the Franciscans at the Frari and San Francesco della Vigna, the Carmelites
at the Carmini and the Servites at Santa Maria dei Servi. (The dedicatees
of the church, by the way, are not the apostles John and Paul, but instead a pair
of probably fictional saints whose story seems to be derived from that of saints
Juventinus and Maximinius, who were martyred during the reign of Julian the
Apostate, in the fourth century.)
The first church built on this site was begun in 1246 after Doge Giacomo
Tiepolo was inspired by a dream to donate the land to the Dominicans – he
dreamed that a flock of white doves, each marked on its forehead with the sign
of the Cross, had flown over the swampland where the church now stands, as
a celestial voice intoned “I have chosen this place for my ministry” (the scene
is depicted in the sacristy). That initial version was soon demolished to make
way for this larger building, begun in 1333, though not consecrated until
1430. Tiepolo’s simple sarcophagus is outside, on the left of the door, next
to that of his son Doge Lorenzo Tiepolo (d.1275); both tombs were altered
after the Bajamonte Tiepolo revolt of 1310 (see p.391), when the family was
no longer allowed to display its old crest and had to devise a replacement.
The doorway, flanked by Byzantine reliefs, is thought to be by Bartolomeo
Bon, and is one of the major transitional Gothic-Renaissance works in the
city; apart from that, the most arresting architectural feature of the exterior
is the complex brickwork of the apse. The Cappella di Sant’Orsola (closed),
between the door to the right transept and the apse, is where the two Bellini
brothers are buried; it used to house the Scuola di Sant’Orsola, the confraternity
which commissioned from Carpaccio the St Ursula cycle now installed in
the Accademia.
The simplicity of the cavernous interior – approximately 90m long, 38m
wide at the transepts, 33m high in the centre – is offset by Zanipolo’s profusion
of tombs and monuments, including those of some 25 doges.
The Mocenigo tombs and south aisle
The only part of the entrance wall that isn’t given over to the glorification
of the Mocenigo family is the monument to the poet Bartolomeo Bragadin,
which happened to be there first. It’s now engulfed by the monument to
Doge Alvise Mocenigo and his wife (1577) which wraps itself round the
doorway; on the right is Tullio Lombardo’s monument to Doge Giovanni
Mocenigo (d.1485); and on the left is the superb monument to Doge Pietro
Mocenigo (d.1476), by Pietro Lombardo, with assistance from Tullio and
Antonio. Pietro Mocenigo’s sarcophagus, supported by warriors representing
the three Ages of Man, is embellished with a Latin inscription (Ex Hostium
Manibus – “From the hands of the enemy”) pointing out that the spoils of war
paid for his tomb, and a couple of reliefs showing his valorous deeds, including
the handing of the keys of Famagusta to the doomed Caterina Cornaro
(see p.372).
To the left of the first altar of the right aisle is the monument to Marcantonio
Bragadin, the central figure in one of the grisliest episodes in Venice’s
history. The commander of the Venetian garrison at Famagusta during the
Turkish siege of 1571, Bragadin marshalled a resistance which lasted eleven
months until, with his force reduced from 7000 men to 700, he was obliged
to sue for peace. Given guarantees of safety, the Venetian officers entered the
enemy camp, whereupon most were dragged away and cut to pieces, whilst