Marco Polo - merchant and explorer

Venetian trader who described travels in China 

A 19th century portrait in mosaic of
Marco Polo at Palazzo Tursi in Genoa

The Italian explorer Marco Polo, who achieved a place in history as the first European to write in extensive detail about life in China, is thought by many historians to have died on or close to this day in 1324 in his home city of Venice.

Accounts of his final days say he had been confined to bed with an illness and that his doctor was concerned on January 8 that he was close to death. Indeed, so worried were those around his bedside that they sent for a local priest to witness his last will and testament, which Polo dictated in the presence of his wife, Donata, and their three daughters, who were appointed executors.

The supposition has been that he died on the same evening. The will document was preserved and is kept by the Biblioteca Marciana, the historic public library of Venice just across the Piazzetta San Marco from St Mark’s Basilica. It shows the date of the witnessing of Polo’s testament as January 9, although it should be noted that under Venetian law at the time, the change of date occurred at sunset rather than midnight.

Confusingly, the document recorded his death as occurring in June 1324 and the witnessing of the will on January 9, 1323. The consensus among historians, however, is that he reached his end in January, 1324.

Born in 1254 - again the specific date is unknown - Marco Polo was best known for his travels to Asia in the company of his father, Niccolò, and his uncle, Maffeo.

Having left Venice in 1271, when Marco was 16 or 17, they are said to have reached China in 1275 and remained there for 17 years. Marco wrote about the trip in a book that was originally titled Book of the Marvels of the World but is today known as The Travels of Marco Polo. It is considered a classic of travel literature.

A map showing the journeys said to have been 
made by Marco Polo on his travels to China

The book, which was written in prison after he had been captured during a war between the rival republics of Venice and Genoa upon returning to Italy, describes his experiences in China in terms of first-hand accounts. Sceptical experts have suggested some of the stories might have been appropriated from other explorers and merchants and passed off by Polo as his own. Yet although some of his descriptions of the exotic animals he ecountered seem somewhat fantastical, the accuracy of much of what he described has generally been confirmed in subsequent years.

The book, which Polo dictated to Rustichello da Pisa, a fellow prisoner of the Genoese who happened to be a writer, introduced European audiences to the mysteries of the Eastern world, including the wealth and sheer size of the Mongol Empire and China, providing descriptions of China, Persia, India, Japan and other Asian cities and countries.

Polo’s father and uncle had traded with the Middle East for many years and had become wealthy in the process. They had visited the western territories of the Mongol Empire on a previous expedition, established strong trading links and visited Shangdu, about 200 miles (320km) north of modern Beijing, where Kublai Khan, founder of the Yuan dynasty, had an opulent summer palace, and which was immortalised by the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge as Xanadu.

Their journey with Marco originally took them to Acre in present-day Israel, where - at the request of Kublai Khan - they secured some holy oil from the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. They continued to the Persian port city of Hormuz and thereafter followed overland routes that later became known as the Silk Road.

Travelling through largely rough terrain, the journey to Shangdu took the best part of three years.  Marco Polo’s long stay owed itself partly to Kublai Khan taking him into his court and sending him on various official missions.  In that capacity, he extended his travels to include what is now the city of Hangzhou and may have crossed the border into India and what is now Myanmar.

A painting of unknown origin of Marco Polo's
father and uncle presenting a gift to Kublai Khan

The Polos left China in around 1291 or 1292, given the responsibility to escort a young princess to Persia, where she was to marry the Mongol ruler. Their route from Persia took through parts of what is now Turkey, to Constantinople, and then north along the Adriatic to Venice.  They arrived home in 1295.

It was during the second of four wars between Venice and their trading rival Genoa that Marco Polo was captured.  He remained a prisoner until 1299, when a peace treaty allowed for his release.  Thereafter, he continued his life as a merchant, achieving prosperity, but rarely left Venice or its territories again until his death.

His book, known to Italians under the title Il Milione after Polo’s own nickname, introduced the West to many aspects of Chinese culture and customs and described such things as porcelain, gunpowder, paper money and eyeglasses, which were previously unknown in Europe. Contrary to some stories, his discoveries did not include pasta, which was once held widely to have been imported by Marco Polo but is thought actually to have existed in the Italy of the Etruscans in the 4th century BC. 

Christopher Columbus and other explorers are said to have been inspired by Marco Polo to begin their own adventures, Columbus discovering the Americas effectively by accident after setting sail across the Atlantic in the expectation of reaching the eastern coast of Asia.

Marco Polo is buried at the
church of San Lorenzo

Travel tip:

One of the wishes Marco Polo expressed on his deathbed was that he be buried in the church of San Lorenzo in the Castello sestiere of Venice, about 850m (930 yards) on foot from Piazza San Marco. The church, whick dates back to the ninth century and was rebuilt in the late 16th century, houses the relics of Saint Paul I of Constantinople as well as Marco Polo’s tomb. Castello is the largest of the six sestieri, stretching east almost from the Rialto Bridge and including the shipyards of Arsenale, once the largest naval complex in Europe, the Giardini della Biennale and the island of Sant’Elena. Unlike its neighbour, San Marco, Castello is a quiet neighbourhood, where tourists can still find deserted squares and empty green spaces.

Arched Byzantine windows thought to
have been from the Polo family home

Travel tip: 

The Polo family home in Venice, which was largely destroyed in a fire in 1598, was in the Cannaregio sestiere close to where the Teatro Malibran now stands, in Corte Seconda del Milion, one of two small square that recall Marco Polo’s nickname, Il Milione, which may have been coined as a result of his enthusiasm for the wealth he encountered at the court of Kublai Khan in China or as a result of his being from the Polo Emilioni branch of the family. The Byzantine arches visible in Corte Seconda del Milion are thought to have been part of the Polo house.  The Teatro Malibran was originally inaugurated in 1678 as the Teatro San Giovanni Grisostomo, opening with the premiere of Carlo Pallavicino's opera Vespasiano.  It was renamed Teatro Malibran in 1835 in honour of a famous soprano, Maria Malibran, who was engaged to sing Vincenzo Bellini's La sonnambula there but was so shocked as the crumbling condition of the theatre that she refused her fee, insisting it be put towards the theatre’s upkeep instead. 

Also on this day:

1878: The death of Victor Emmanuel II, first King of Italy

1878: Umberto I succeeds Victor Emanuel II

1944: The birth of architect Massimiliano Fuksas

2004: The death of political philosopher Norberto Bobbio

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Paolo Sarpi – writer and statesman

Patriotic Venetian who the Pope wanted dead

Paolo Sarpi was an outspoken critic of
the Catholic Church

Historian, scientist, writer and statesman Paolo Sarpi died on this day in 1623 in Venice.

He had survived an assassination attack 16 years before and was living in seclusion, still preparing state papers on behalf of Venice, writing, and carrying out scientific studies.

The day before his death he had dictated three replies to questions about state affairs of the Venetian Republic.

He had been born Pietro Sarpi in 1552 in Venice. His father died while he was still a child and he was educated by his uncle, who was a school teacher, and then by a monk in the Augustinian Servite order.

He entered the Servite order himself at the age of 13, assuming the name of Fra Paolo. After going into a monastery in Mantua, he was invited to be court theologian to Duke Guglielmo Gonzaga.

He then went to Milan, where he was an adviser to Charles Borromeo, the archbishop of Milan, before being transferred back to Venice to be professor of philosophy at the Servite convent.

At the age of 27, Sarpi was sent to Rome, where he interacted with three successive popes. He then returned to Venice, where he spent 17 years studying. His writings were highly critical of the Catholic Church.

Pope Paul V, who plotted to have
Sarpi killed

Sarpi was a defender of the liberties of Republican Venice and a proponent of the separation of the church and state.

After Paul V was made pope, Venice adopted measures to restrict papal prerogative, but Paul V excommunicated the Venetians. Sarpi entered the argument and set out principles, which struck radically at papal intervention in secular matters. A compromise was finally arranged between the Pope and Venice through Henry IV of France

Afterwards, however, Sarpi became the target of an assassination attempt instigated by the Pope. In 1607, an unfrocked friar assisted by two other people agreed to kill Sarpi for the sum of 8,000 crowns, but the plot was discovered and they were arrested and imprisoned after crossing into Venetian territory.

The following month Sarpi was attacked and left for dead with 15 stiletto thrusts. His attackers were welcomed back into papal territory but the pope’s enthusiasm for them cooled after he discovered Sarpi had survived his injuries.

His would-be assassins settled in Rome and were granted a pension by the viceroy of Naples.

Plots continued to be formed against Sarpi and he occasionally occasionally spoke of taking refuge in England.

But he stayed in Venice and served the state until the end. His last words are said to have been: ‘Esto perpetua,’ or ‘May she endure forever.’

These words were later adopted as the state motto of American state of Idaho and appear on the back of the 2007 Idaho quarter.

The statue of Parlo Sarpi in Campo
Santa Fosca in Cannaregio in Venice

Travel tip:

A bronze statue of Paolo Sarpi stands on a monument to him in Campo Santa Fosca in the Cannaregio district of Venice near Strada Nova. It is close to the place where he was stabbed by the Pope’s would-be assassins.

Travel tip:

Liceo Classico Paolo Sarpi, established in 1803, is a public high school in Bergamo’s Città Alta, which is ranked highly nationally because of the teaching methods and the subjects studied. Students shared their experience in a 2012 television documentary film, Gli anni e I giorni.

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Andrea Gabrieli - composer

Father of the Venetian School

Andrea Gabrieli was the organist at the
Basilica di San Marco in Venice

The Venetian composer and organist Andrea Gabrieli, sometimes known as Andrea di Cannaregio, notable for his madrigals and large-scale choral works written for public ceremonies, died on this day in 1585.

His nephew, Giovanni Gabrieli, is more widely remembered yet Andrea, who was organist of the Basilica di San Marco – St Mark’s – for the last 19 years of his life, was a significant figure in his lifetime, the first member of the Venetian School of composers to achieve international renown. He was influential in spreading the Venetian style of music in Germany as well as in Italy.

Little is known about Andrea’s early life aside from the probability that he was born in the parish of San Geremia in Cannaregio and that he may have been a pupil of the Franco-Flemish composer Adrian Willaert, who was maestro di cappella at St Mark’s from 1527 until 1562.

In 1562 – the year of Willaert’s death – Andrea is on record as having travelled to Munich in Germany, where he met and became friends with Orlando di Lasso, who wrote secular songs in French, Italian, and German, as well as Latin.  There was evidence in the later work of Di Lasso of a Venetian influence, while Gabrieli took back to Venice numerous ideas he learned from Di Lasso.

In 1566 Gabrieli was chosen for the post of organist at St. Mark's, one of the most prestigious musical posts in northern Europe, and he retained this position for the rest of his life.

Giovanni Gabrieli published his uncle Andrea's
music after his death

The acoustics of St. Mark's helped him develop a grand ceremonial style. In part, this was because his duties at St. Mark's included composing music for ceremonial affairs.

These included the festivities accompanying the celebration of the victory over the Turks in the Battle of Lepanto in 1571 and the music for the visit to Venice by a party of princes from Japan in 1585.

He was also renowned, towards the end of his career, as a teacher. His nephew, Giovanni, was a pupil, along with the music theorist Lodovico Zacconi and the German composer Hans Leo Hassler.

Andrea Gabrieli is reckoned to have written more than 100 motets and madrigals, which are pieces written for voices rather than musical instruments, and a smaller number of orchestral or instrumental works.

The church of San Geremia sits by the junction of the
Grand Canal and the Cannaregio Canal

His music featured repetition of phrases with different combinations of voices at different pitch levels. In many ways, his music defined the Venetian style for future generation.

Little of his music was published during his own lifetime, apparently through his own reluctance, but it was preserved largely thanks to Giovanni, who recognised its importance and, after his uncle’s death at the age of about 52, of unknown causes, he took it upon himself to publish it.

Among the works Giovanni published was his Magnificat for three choirs and orchestra, almost certainly written to be performed in St. Mark’s, which is regarded as one of Andrea Gabrieli’s finest compositions.

The Ormesina Canal in the Cannaregio district

Travel tip:

The church of San Geremia, where Andrea Gabrieli probably played at some stage early in his career, is situated at the junction of the Grand Canal with the Cannaregio Canal, which is one of the main waterways of the city but which is often overlooked by tourists. The Ormesina and Sensa Canals, which run parallel with the Cannaregio Canal, are lined with good cafes and restaurants and interesting shops, but mostly they are the preserve of people living in the area.

The Basilica di San Marco

Travel tip:

The original church on the site of the Basilica di San Marco may have been built in the ninth century, although the earliest recorded mention was dated 1084. It has been rebuilt several times, the present neoclassical church dating from a rebuilding of 1795-1806, for patrician Pietro Zaguri, by Giannantonio Selva. 

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Francesco Guardi - painter

Artist evoked image of republic’s final years

A portrait of Guardi by his
contemporary, Pietro Longhi

One of the last great artists of the Venetian school, Francesco Lazzaro Guardi, was born on this day in 1712 in Venice.

Guardi’s wonderful scenes of crowds, festivals, regattas and concerts in Venice have kept the heyday of the republic alive for future generations to enjoy in art galleries all over the world.

The artist was born into a family of nobility from Trentino, who lived in a house in the Cannaregio district of Venice.

Guardi’s father and brothers were also painters and his sister, Maria Cecilia, married the great Venetian artist, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo.

Guardi’s first known works were painted in the 1730s in Vigo Anuania in Trentino, where he was working alongside his older brother, Gian Antonio.

Guardi's painting of the Doge's state barge, the Bucintoro, near
 the Riva di Sant'Elena, which is housed at the Louvre in Paris

The first work to be signed by Guardi is the picture Saint Adoring the Eucharist, which was painted in about 1739.

Guardi seemed equally comfortable painting landscapes or figures, but his early views of Venice show the influence of Canaletto on his style.

In 1757 Guardi married Maria Mattea Pagani, the daughter of another painter, Matteo Pagani.

One of his most important works was The Doge’s Feasts, a series of 12 canvases commissioned to celebrate the ceremonies held in 1763 for the election of Doge Alvise IV Mocenigo.

Guardi was also commissioned by the Venetian authorities to paint six canvases to celebrate the visit of Russian Archdukes to the city, of which only two remain.

This view of St Mark's Square is among the Guardi works
that can be seen at Accademia Carrara in Bergamo

The Academia Carrara in Bergamo has some fine examples of Guardi’s paintings in its collection, such as the Friars’ Cloister, the  Façade of Palace with Staircase and some wonderful views of Venice.

As Guardi grew older his style became noticeably different from that of Canaletto, who focused on the glamour of Venice, often showing it in bright sunshine.

Guardi often painted cloudy skies above the city at dusk, accurately conveying the mood and atmosphere of each scene. Some of his paintings evoke the onset of the decline of Venice’s empire, such as his landscape, Fire in the Oil Depot in San Marcuola, which was painted in 1789.

Guardi died in Cannaregio in 1793 at the age of 80, four years before the end of the Republic of Venice.

The house in Campiello della Madonna, a small square in
Cannaregio, where Guardi lived for much of his life

Travel tip:

Cannaregio, where Guardi was born and died, is a peaceful quarter of Venice, with crumbling, shuttered houses and little shops and bars that are still patronised by Venetians. Among the architectural masterpieces of the area are the Gothic church of Madonna dell’Orto and the early Renaissance church of Santa Maria dei Miracoli.

Travel tip:

Bergamo’s Accademia Carrara has a fine collection of paintings by Guardi including views of L’Isola di San Giorgio, Il Rio dei Mendicanti, Il Ponte di Rialto and Piazza San Marco. The Accademia Carrara is housed in a magnificent palace just outside Bergamo’s Città Alta, built in the 18th century to house one of the richest private collections in Italy. It is the only Italian museum to be entirely stocked with donations and bequests from private collectors. Visitors can view works by the masters of the Venetian, Lombard and Tuscan Renaissances as well as the great artists who came later, such as Guardi, Lotto, Titian, Moroni, Rubens, Tiepolo and Canaletto. For more details visit www.lacarrara.it.

(Photo of Guardi's house by Didier Descouens CC BY-SA 4.0)

More reading:

Tiepolo: 'greatest decorative artist of 18th century Europe'

Titian - giant of Renaissance art

How Pietro Longhi captured everyday life in 18th century Venice

Tintoretto - the dyer's son whose work still adorns Venice


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