ST. MARK'S, Cathedral - Horses

What's more, besides the Treasury, St. Mark's has even more in store for you: another room where you can admire other works of art including furniture, tapestries, priestly vestments, Persian rugs, etc., all coming from the cathedral. 

Go to the right of the entrance and walk along the terrace floor, passing through a series of rooms, sometimes of unpredictable magnitude, that have been created from the upper part of the church. Among other things, this is when you can personally verify that this huge building all covered in marble and mosaics is actually made of bricks, just simple bricks. You can also see some fragments of mosaics that have been replaced during restorations, which help you understand how mosaics are made through the placement of colored or glazed tiles according to a preliminary design Among the paintings, I suggest looking at the large panel that Paolo Veneziano, a master Venetian painter of the 1300s, painted to protect the Pala d'Oro altar.

But now, I know, you're growing impatient to get to the piece de resistance: the four gilded bronze horses that were once exposed on the cathedral's balcony. After a lengthy restoration, the originals were transferred here in the 80s, while a copy now sits on the balcony at the mercy of the weather, the pigeons, and air pollution.

The splendid quartet of horses is the highlight of the spoils of artwork collected by the Venetians during the looting of the Fourth Crusade, which I discussed in a previous file. Originally, the four horses decorated the Hippodrome of Constantinople. It is thought that they are from late imperial Roman times, but some scholars consider them to instead be of Greek origin from the third century BC. However, you will agree with me in regarding them as absolute masterpieces of naturalness and elegance. Besides, they have played a key role as models for monumental Renaissance sculptures, including right here in Venice with the equestrian statue of Bartolomeo Colleoni.

FUN FACT: fascinated by the beauty of the four horses, Napoleon took them down from the terrace of St. Mark's and had them brought to Paris. After the defeat of Waterloo, however, many of the works of art plundered by the emperor were returned to their respective owners. And so, thanks to the direct involvement of the great sculptor Antonio Canova, the horses were able to triumphantly return to Venice.