Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Description of a View of the City of Damascus, and the Surrounding Country: Now Exhibiting at the Panorama, Leicester Square
There is no building in Western Christendom now existing of which the interior conveys an impression at all similar to that produced by St. Mark's. As soon as you cross the threshold, you feel admitted into the Byzantine empire. From the resplendent cupolas and apsides above, to the rich and variegated pavement below, the whole is pervaded by the same character of mystic solemnity; dark and shadowy, but not gloomy, and full of complexity without confusion. The gold-grounded mosaics, spread over roof and wall, give to the building the appearance of being lined with precious metal.
At a time when continental Italy was in so distracted and deplorable a condition as scarcely to have the spirit or the power to undertake any work of magnitude, Venice, apart from the scene of strife, and already enriched by commercial enterprise, began a second Cathedral in honour of St. Mark. The body of the Apostle had been brought to Venice, from Alexandria, in 831, and a Church had been built immediately afterwards for its reception. This Church was burnt in a popular tumult in 976. No sooner had this disaster occurred, than the Venetians decided to erect a new Cathedral, which should not be surpassed in splendour by any then existing. For this purpose, regarding St. Sophia, at Constantinople, as the most splendid Church in the world, they resolved to raise St. Mark's from its ashes, and to take that Church for their model.
The plan of St. Mark's, like that of St. Sophia, is a Greek cross, with the addition of spacious porticos. The centre of the building is covered with a dome, and over each of the arms of the cross rises a smaller cupola. The remaining parts of the building are covered with vaults, in constructing which the Greeks had become expert, and which are much to be preferred to the wooden roofs of the old Basilicas.
Colonnades and round arches separate the nave from the aisles m each of the four compartments, and support galleries above. The capitals of the pillars imitate the Corinthian, and are free from the imagery which at that time abounded in other Churches of Italy. It is computed that, in the decoration of the building, without and within, above five hundred pillars are employed. The pillars are all Of marble, and were chie?y brought from Greece, and other parts of the Levant.
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