medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
Thanks, Jim. What I had said way back when (13. February 2005), though,
using "Venice" to signify the diocese not the city, was that Sta Maria
Assunta was "Venice's cathedral church from the central Middle Ages to
1807". That was a slip (I had mentally substituted the ex-cathedral I
had been talking about for the one that was superseded by San Marco as
the cathedral of the diocese that now included Torcello) and Marjorie
was quite right to point out that San Marco's predecessor as cathedral
of the diocese of Venice was really S. Pietro in Castello.
Though the diocese of Torcello is certainly older than the diocese of
Venice (commonly held, as you note, to have begun ca. 775), its part of
the lagoon had seriously declined in importance well before the
ecclesiastical realignment of 1806/07 (see esp. Elisabeth Crouzet-Pavan,
_ La mort lente de Torcello: histoire d'une cité disparue_ [Paris:
Fayard, 1995]). Whatever the actual course of early events, this
diocese did consider itself a continuation of that of Altino. It is for
that reason that remains said to be those of St. Heliodorus were
preserved beneath Sta Maria Assunta's main altar and that Heliodorus was
represented there in the mosaic detail to which I linked yesterday.
Best again,
John Dillon
On Sunday, July 3, 2005, at 6:44 am, Jim Bugslag wrote:
> > I recall an exchange we had a while back in which you referred to
> Sta Maria
> > Assunta as Venice's first cathedral and I remarked that I had
> just been to
> > Venice and San Pietro di Castello makes that claim. You agreed.
> However, SMA
> > is apparently cathedral of some diocese
>
> A brief perusal of John Julius Norwich's A History of Venice
> appears to establish a
> precendence for S. Maria Assunta, also known as Torcello Cathedral,
> although he
> does not appear to treat the episcopal structure of the region very
> systematically.
> The early history, in any case, is a bit messy, with, as John
> Dillon said, populations
> fleeing the Lombards abandoning their settlements on the mainland
> and settling on
> islands in the lagoon. According to the Altino Chronicle, the site
> for S. Maria
> Assunta was established when Bishop Paul (which he rather
> annoyingly describes
> as "of that city" without specifying what city it was -- possibly
> Altino, which John
> mentioned) heard a voice from heaven commanding him to climb to the
> top of a
> nearby tower and look at the stars, which would show him the island
> to which he
> must lead his flock. The cathedral of S. Maria Assunta was
> subsequently erected
> on the celestially chosen island of Torcello in 639, and the
> document recording its
> foundation apparently still exists (although Norwich does not give
> a proper reference
> to it). As for S. Pietro di Castello, this was founded as a new
> bishopric by Doge
> Maurizio in c. 775 at the east end of the little island of Olivolo,
> on which the Trojans,
> fleeing westwards after the destruction of their city, were reputed
> to have built a
> fortress which gave the name "Castello" to the site. Since Olivolo
> is one of the
> cluster of islands known as Rialto -- i.e. downtown Venice -- while
> Torcello is sort of
> off to one side, it probably depends on just how one defines Venice
> -- as a city or as
> a state -- as to which church might be considered the oldest
> cathedral of Venice.
> And of course leaving aside all of the various post-medieval
> changes of status of
> the churches involved.
> Cheers,
> Jim Bugslag
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