Page:A history of architecture on the comparative method for the student, craftsman, and amateur.djvu/469

 ITALIAN GOTHIC. 4II Venice is remarkable for the civic and domestic architecture of this period, and it must be remembered that the Venetian state occupied a prominent position as a great trading centre in the Middle Ages, her power and richness being due to the supremacy of her navy. " Where Venice sate in state, throned on her liundred isles." S. Giovanni e Paolo (1260-1400), a Dominican church, and S. Maria Gloriosa dei Frari (i 250-1 280), a Franciscan church, are magnificent examples, showing the influence of the Monastic orders. The latter by Niccolo Pisano, is of the Basilican type, with six eastern chapels, and has a fine campanile adjoining the church [cf. Siena, No. 182). S. Anastasia, Verona (1261), and S. Andrea, Vercelli (i2ig), are notable examples, the latter being peculiar in having two western towers, and an English type of plan. The Dog^es' Palace, Venice (Nos. 178 and 179 b) (facade A.D. 1424-1442, by G. and B. Buon) is the grandest effort in civic architecture of the period. Each fa(ade consisted of an open arcade of two stories, one originally advanced in front and surrounding the main building. The latter was partly destroyed by fire in the sixteenth century, but w^as rebuilt and extended over the double arcade in the Venetian style, with rose-colored and white marble, in imitation of bricks, arranged in patterns, the otherwise blank walls being broken by a few large and richly ornamented windows. The lower columns seem to rise out of the ground, having no bases, and the solid and connected character of the tracery gives some stability to the design, so heavily loaded above. The delicate and light carving in low relief which occurs in the capitals of the arcades is justly celebrated, the excellence of marble as a material for carving being largely responsible for the refinement of execution in this example. The Ca d' Oro Palace, Venice (Nos. 179 a and 180), also by the Brothers Buon, is another fine specimen of the domestic work with which Venice abounds. The tracery especially is Venetian in character, as is also the grouping of the windows towards the centre of the facade, the extremities of the design being left comparatively solid, thus producing the effect of a central feature inclosed by wings. The Ponte alle Grazie (1237) and the Ponte Vecchio (1362), both at Florence; the Bridge over the Adda at Trezzo, constructed in the fourteenth century and afterwards destroyed ; and the Bridge over the Ticino, Pavia, are other examples of the secular architecture of the period. The Palazzi Foscari, Contarini-Fasan, Pisani (No. 179 c), and Cavalli are other well-known examples. A general idea of