Description
The church of San Zaccaria, a few steps from Piazza San Marco and the Doge's Palace, is dedicated to the father of John the Baptist. It has a Renaissance façade in Istrian stone and, inside, a great many works of art, including an altarpiece by Giovanni Bellini.
It is among the oldest places of worship in Venice. The first building dates to the ninth century, built to house the relics of Saint Zechariah, given to the city by the Byzantine emperor Leo V the Armenian to strengthen friendship with Venice.
Beside the church rose a Benedictine convent, founded by the doges Agnello and Giustiniano Partecipazio. In 1105 a fire destroyed everything: it is said that more than a hundred nuns died suffocated in the crypt, which still exists under the high altar.
Work on the "new church" began on June 10, 1458. Antonio Gambello started, still in the Gothic style, and Mauro Codussi continued, who signed the great Renaissance façade. The nuns managed contracts and materials directly.
Of the old church the chapels on the right remain. Among them is that of San Tarasio, with frescoes by Andrea del Castagno, which brought Tuscan Renaissance to Venice.
On the left wall of the nave is Giovanni Bellini's San Zaccaria Altarpiece, a Sacred Conversation from 1505. The walls are covered with large seventeenth-century canvases, with stories of the monastery and the church.
In the sacristy you can see Tintoretto's Birth of Saint John the Baptist: an almost down-to-earth scene, with the women tending the child and Zechariah looking up toward a light.
Doges are buried here. The altar with the urn of the body of Saint Zechariah is the work of Alessandro Vittoria, who also made his own tomb. Also worth seeing are the carved polyptychs by Ludovico da Forlì, from the fifteenth century.
The façade shows well the change of hands on the building site: the lower part, with marble inlays and twisted columns, is still late Gothic, while the upper part, with the great arched pediment and the statue of the saint on top, marks a different rhythm.
It is among the oldest places of worship in Venice. The first building dates to the ninth century, built to house the relics of Saint Zechariah, given to the city by the Byzantine emperor Leo V the Armenian to strengthen friendship with Venice.
Beside the church rose a Benedictine convent, founded by the doges Agnello and Giustiniano Partecipazio. In 1105 a fire destroyed everything: it is said that more than a hundred nuns died suffocated in the crypt, which still exists under the high altar.
Work on the "new church" began on June 10, 1458. Antonio Gambello started, still in the Gothic style, and Mauro Codussi continued, who signed the great Renaissance façade. The nuns managed contracts and materials directly.
Of the old church the chapels on the right remain. Among them is that of San Tarasio, with frescoes by Andrea del Castagno, which brought Tuscan Renaissance to Venice.
On the left wall of the nave is Giovanni Bellini's San Zaccaria Altarpiece, a Sacred Conversation from 1505. The walls are covered with large seventeenth-century canvases, with stories of the monastery and the church.
In the sacristy you can see Tintoretto's Birth of Saint John the Baptist: an almost down-to-earth scene, with the women tending the child and Zechariah looking up toward a light.
Doges are buried here. The altar with the urn of the body of Saint Zechariah is the work of Alessandro Vittoria, who also made his own tomb. Also worth seeing are the carved polyptychs by Ludovico da Forlì, from the fifteenth century.
The façade shows well the change of hands on the building site: the lower part, with marble inlays and twisted columns, is still late Gothic, while the upper part, with the great arched pediment and the statue of the saint on top, marks a different rhythm.