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Venice's Marriage of the Adriatic The "Marriage of the Adriatic," or more correctly "Marriage of the Sea" (Sposalizio del Mar) was a ceremony symbolizing the maritime dominion of Venice. The ceremony, established about A.D. 1000 to commemorate the Doge Orseolo II.'s conquest of Dalmatia, was originally one of supplication and placation, Ascension Day (Thursday in the sixth week following Easter Sunday) being chosen as that on which the Doge had set out on his expedition. The form it took was a solemn procession of boats, headed by the Doge's maesta nave, afterwards the Bucentaur (from 1311) out to sea by the Lido port. A prayer was offered that "for us and all who sail thereon the sea may be calm and quiet," whereupon the Doge and the others were solemnly aspersed with holy water, the rest of which was thrown into the sea while the priests chanted "Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean." To this ancient ceremony a sacramental character was given by Pope Alexander III. in 1177, in return for the services rendered by Venice in the struggle against the emperor Frederick I. The pope drew a ring from his finger and, giving it to the Doge, bade him cast such a one into the sea each year on Ascension day, and so wed the sea. Henceforth the ceremonial, instead of placatory and expiatory, became nuptial. Every year the Doge dropped a consecrated ring into the sea, and with the words Desponsamus te, mare (We wed thee, sea) declared Venice and the sea to be indissolubly one (see H. F. Brown, Venice, London, 1893, pp. 69, 110). In the Arsenal of Venice is still the vast covered shipyard which once housed the Doge's fabulous barge called Bucintoro (Bucentaur). It was normally stored above its slipway to be launched into the water, after caulking and refitting, just before civil and religious ceremonies. The most important of these was the sensa (Ascension Day), when the Doge accompanied by the signoria went aboard for this visit to San Nicolò di Lido to celebrate the traditional desponsatio (marriage) with the sea up to 1789.
The name bucintoro is derived from the Ital. buzino d'oro, "golden bark," latinized in the middle ages as bucentaurus on the analogy of a supposed Gr. Oovth'raupos, ox-centaur (from ,ous and itvravpos). This led to the explanation of the name as derived from the head of an ox having served as the galley's figurehead. This derivation is, however, fanciful; the name bucentaurus is unknown in ancient mythology, and the figurehead of the bucentaurs, of which representations have come down to us, is the lion of St Mark. The name bucentaur seems, indeed, to have been given to any great and sumptuous Venetian galley. Du Cange (Gloss., s.v. "Bucentaurus") quotes from the chronicle of the Doge Andrea Dandolo (d. 1 354): cum uno artificioso et solemni Bucentauro, super quo venit usque ad S. Clementem, quo jam pervenerat principalior et solemnior Bucentaurus cum consiliariis, &c. The etymology of Bucintoro is uncertain, as is the number of the Doge's ships that succeeded one another through the centuries. Only four are know for sure, although the ancient chronicles recount the existence of "a ducal Ship", perhaps derived from a similar Byzantine tradition preceding the historical encounter at Venice in 1177 between Emperor Frederik Barbarossa and Pope Alexander III, period to which later hagiographies attribute the first Bucentaur.
With the passing of the centuries, and the Serenissima's increasing power, it was logical, for reasons of national prestige, that they should wish to give greater magnificence to the chief of State by reserving a special ship for him, as is reported in the Promissioni (sacramental formulas spoken by the Doge when he was sworn in) of Doge Rainiero Zeno of 1252 and subsequently in those of Lorenzo Tiepolo (1268) and Giovanni Soranzo (1312), which make repeated mention of the construction of a Bucentaurum in the Arsenal. It was not until the printers of Nuremburg spread through Europe the grand axonometric view of Venice engraved on wood in 1500 by Jacopo de' Barbari that for the first time the form of a Bucintoro appears, floating in the Arsenal in the waters of the old tidal dock. Still without its oars and decoration, except for the large wooden statue placed up on the fore quarter-deck, representing Venice in the form of Justice. From that point onward, the Bucentaur was no longer just a name recurrent in the archives of the Ducal Chancery but here took on its own form and substance within a systematic chronology. It is likely, however that that same ship, in the period in which De' Barbari portrayed it, had already reached a ripe old age, if annalist Marin Sanudo could write that on 10 May 1526 "Ascension Day the serenissimo (Doge) went in the new Bucintoro to wed the sea" and adds further on that "it was a beautiful work, larger and wider than the other one" Ser Cristoforo da Canal, courageous man of the sea and attentive student of the humanistic sciences, also says that "our new Bucintoro is a marvelous work, full of majesty".. signoriaa for his Venetian visit. Centaurus, of which the figure of a centaur may be supposed to have adorned the prow. But in 1205, when the newly elected Doge was to be fetched from his official post at a distance, a feeling of the propriety of some special mark of respect showed itself in the embellishment of the sides of the galley despatched to the Serenissimo with silk taffeta hangings. John Evelyn visited the Arsenal in 1646, and saw the Bucintoro, of which he speaks as having an ample deck so contrived that the galley slaves are not visible, and on the poop a throne for the Doge, when he went to espouse the Adriatic. The shape of this ship, more than in the paintings of Andrea Vicentino and Palma the Younger, which show it only the distance or in perspective, is most visible in an etching by Franco which shows it while on 4 may 1497 it was bearing the newly-elected Dogaressa Morosini Grimani to the Ducal Palace. On the whole it seems to repeat the scheme of the previous one, built on two decks, with 42 oars and bedecked with the traditional towering polychromatic figure of justice in the bow.. At the beginning of the new century the Venetian Senate, despite the economic and maritime decline, already painfully felt at the rialto market decided to confront the expense necessary to build a new bucentaur: the old one was still in service but was considered "overaged" by the experts. The name of the designer remains unknow, but we know that in general he was chosen from the circle of the most qualified Marangoni (carpenters) in the Arsenal. Despite the high cost of 70,000 ducats, the new vessel was approved and praised by all when it made its first "Outing" to the Lido with Doge Leonardo Donà. It look place on Ascension Day, 10 May 1606. The third barge of the ducal series was also modelled along the lines of the others, and as such represented on the whole the shape of a gallery, or better a galleas, weighed down with magnificent decorations that still felt the influence of late-Renaissance forms. They were maneristic motifs, to be sure, but nonetheless they expressed the skill of the Venetian craftsmen called upon indifferently to decorate organ lofts, vestry choirs or church altars but also, when necessary, the sides of war galleys. Who were the artists of these carvings? It was once believed that most of the wooden sculptures of the 17th-century Bucintoro were the work of Alessandro Vittorio, but recent researches in the archives have revealed the names of the brothers Agostino and Marcantonio Vanini of Bassano, artists almost unknown until now, though a contemporary affirmed that they were "authors of carvings of marvelous beauty". After more than a century of life the 17th-century Bucintoro also reached the end of its days when in 1719 "Their Excellencies the Superintendents and patrons of the Arsenal " decided to demolish it. A part of the ornaments and sculptures from the aged ship under demolition, including a large statue of Mars and the two lions of St. Mark positioned on either side of the stern, were utilized in the body of the new construction, which began taking shape on a covered slip in the Arsenal from 1722, on the design of Stefano Conti Protomagistro dei Marangoni (head master of the ships carpenters). The other wooden work was assigned to sculptor Antonio Corradini, who had already made a good reputation being called to work in Austria, Saxony and Bohemia, so the phrase Antonii Coradini sculptoris Inventum was inscribed near the bow palmette. The gold work, which had to cover the entire topside and also the inside of the tiemoo, all to be done in pure gold leaf, was entrusted to a certain Zuanne D'Adamo, whose conscientious and costly work did not fail to receive the kind recognition of the magistrature responsible for the Arsenal's affairs. |
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The 1729 Ascension Day was officially recorded with the issue of an osellaa and accompanied by sonnets and pubblications that praised its splendour, such as that by Antonio Maria Luchini entitled: la nuova regina sull'acque. We can imagine the Bucentaur by observing the paintings of Guardi, Canaletto, and the other veduta painters, when under the rhythmic rowing of its 42 oars, with its sculptures gleaming in gold, majestically advancing along the Riva degli schiavoni, to the flapping of its large silk banner in the wind and the thundering artillery of its escort ships: then we can understand and justify the pride and enthusiasm of its contemporaries. Level with the fort of Sant'Andrea the Bucintoro halted while the Doge, through a panel in the back of his throne, threw a gold ring into the water, uttering the centuries-old ritual phrase: In signum veri perpetique Dominii. The lady who published the account of the religious and other festivals of the Republic, Giustina Renier Michiel, scion of two noble and ancient houses, beheld the last Bucintoro before it was brutally destroyed in 1797, for the sake of its golden decorations, by Napoleon's French troops in conjunction with some Venetian adventurers. Some of its remains of which are preserved at Venice in the Museo Civico Correr and in the Arsenal, and in the latter there is also a fine model of it. |
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Guistina Renier Michiel writes:
The yearly marriage of the Adriatic was more immediately and palpably a pageant and a symbol; but it has been rendered apparent that the ceremony involved and denoted a political principle, on which the Republic was prepared, nearly down to the last, to insist at all hazards against all corners. Germany, France, Spain, England, were in turn reminded of the claim, which the unique wedding imported, in language which could not be misunderstood. |
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The Paintings Francesco Guardi (1712-1793) and Giovanni Antonio Canal / Canaletto ( ) before him depicted this splendid ceremony with the Doge's galley hung with flying red cloths and covered with gilded statues. Smaller boats, also gilded, and black gondolas provide escort. Guardi was inspired by 1776 engravings of drawings on this same subject by Canaletto, whose drier and more static style indicates a concern for topographical accuracy. Guardi freely interpreted these scenes with a sparkling touch and calculated atmospheric effects. The scene provided an opportunity to create an atypical description of Venice and its monuments in a silvery, diaphanous luminosity. Guardi painted a series of twelve pictures representing the 'Solenità dogali' - ten of which are now in the Louvre - in which the artist has faithfully copied the scenes drawn by Canaletto and engraved by Giambattista Brustolon to commemorate the festivities at the coronation of the Doge Alviso IV Mocenigo, in 1763. This has led to some confusion, and the canvases were formerly attributed to Canaletto, though their style was quite unmistakably that of Guardi. One of the pictures, bears the arms of Alviso IV Mocenigo. Two pictures in the series represent the Feast of the Bucentaur, the most sumptuous of all the Venetian festivals. It took place each year on Ascension Day, |
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The top picture above shows the Bucentaur leaving Venice, the bottom represents the Doge going to hear Mass at San Niccolò del Lido. In the latter, the painter illustrates the moment where the Doge makes ready to board the Bucentaur after having passed under a canopy raised between the church and the landing for the occasion. It is a crowded scene: gondolas of all sorts converge on the lagoon, forming patches of color that stand out against the tender green of the sea; masked figures bustle with excitement, evoking the carnival celebrations. The expansive sky of the upper portion, bathed in silver light, is contrasted with the lower half, which swarms with forms and multicolored details. The touches of lighter color impart a special animation to the scene. The mobile play of light, as whimsical as it is fleeting.. The work could not have been painted before 1775, as the panaches worn by the female figures in the boats didn't emerge as a Parisian fashion until that date. The paintings created by Guardi during the preceding decade are more topographical and their somber hues more contrasting. The evolution of Guardi's pictorial language, energetic and sketchy, is striking. A mellow light rhythmically divides the spaces and diffuses the colors in a varied play of chiaroscuro and a lively touch. In the hands of Guardi, the "vedute," or views, topographical depictions of urban landscape, take on a brilliant and whimsical allure. Sources:
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This page compliments of Marisa Ciceran Created: Friday,
July 06, 2007; Last updated:
Wednesday, September 03, 2008 |
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It
is probable, however, that in remote times for ceremonies in the lagoons the
Venetian Doge was assigned simply a small gallery chosen from those comprising
the naval fleet of the stato da mar. 
