Andrea Moroni – architect

Talented designer contributed to the beauty of Padua

Padua's Basilica di Santa Giustina is one of
Andrea Moroni's best known works

Architect Andrea Moroni, who designed many stunning buildings in Padua and the Veneto region, died on 28 April 1560, 536 years ago today, in Padua.  

Moroni was the architect of some acclaimed Renaissance buildings but has tended to be overlooked by architectural historians because his career coincided with that of Andrea Palladio.

Moroni, who spent most of his working life in Padua, made a name for himself with the Benedictine Order and obtained commissions for two Benedictine churches in Padua, Santa Maria di Praglia and the more famous Santa Giustina.

His contract with Santa Giustina was renewed every ten years until his death and he settled down to live in Padua.

He was commissioned by the Venetian Government to build the Palazzo del Podestà, which is now known as Palazzo Moroni in Via VIII Febbraio, and is currently the seat of Padua city council. It is considered one of the most significant Renaissance buildings in the entire Veneto region.

Moroni was also involved in the construction of the Orto Botanico, Padua’s famous botanical gardens, where medicinal plants were grown, and he designed some of the university buildings.

The Orto Botanico, the world's first botanical
gardens, was designed by Moroni

It is known that he supervised the construction of Palazzo del Bo, the main university building in the city, but there is some controversy over who designed the palace’s beautiful internal courtyard. Famous names such as Sansovino and Palladio have been suggested, rather than Moroni, contributing to his talent tending to be overlooked over the centuries.

The Loggia of Palazzo Capitaniato and the 16th century Palazzetto are also attributed to him.

Born into a family of stonecutters, Moroni was the cousin and contemporary of Giovan Battista Moroni, the brilliant painter. They were both born in Albino, a comune to the north east of Bergamo in Lombardy. The architect has works attributed to him in Brescia, another city in Lombardy about 50 kilometres to the south east of Bergamo. He is known to have been in the city between 1527 and 1532, where he built a choir for the monastery of Santa Giulia.

He probably also designed the building in which the nuns could attend mass in the monastery of Santa Giulia and worked on the church of San Faustino before moving to live and work in Padua.

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Giuseppe Tartini – composer and violinist

Talented musician was maestro di cappella at Basilica of Sant’Antonio

Giuseppe Tartini spent much of
his career living in Padua

The Baroque violinist and composer Giuseppe Tartini, who spent most of his career living in Padua, composed more than 100 violin concertos and many beautiful sonatas, including the Trillo del Diavolo (Devil’s Trill), which he once said had been inspired by a dream.

Tartini became principal violinist and maestro di cappella at Padua’s Basilica of Sant’Antonio in 1721 and later founded a school of violin playing and composition in the city. His greatest pupil was Gaetano Pugnani who went on to teach the violinist, Giovanni Battista Viotti.

Tartini was born in Pirano, which was in the Republic of Venice, on 8 April 1692. His birthplace was in Venetian territory in the 17th century, but it is now named Piran and is part of Slovenia.

He went to Padua to study divinity and law but also took violin lessons and became an expert at fencing. Before he reached the age of 20, he had secretly married a protégée of the archbishop of Padua, but this led to him being arrested on charges of abduction, so he disguised himself as a monk and fled the city, taking refuge in a monastery in Assisi, where he continued to study the violin and played in the orchestra there.

Later, he was allowed to return to his wife by the archbishop of Padua, who had heard that Tartini’s violin playing was attracting favourable attention. The musician then spent most of his life in Padua, apart from a brief period when he was invited to Prague to play at the coronation of the Emperor and direct the city’s orchestra.

The Basilica of Sant'Antonio, where Tartini
was principal violinist and music director

Also a music theorist, Tartini formulated the principles of musical ornamentation and harmony. He wrote a treatise on music, Trattato di musica, in 1754, as well as a dissertation on the principles of music harmony, and a treatise on ornamentation in music. He also composed music for trios and quartets and a few religious works.

His violin playing was said to be remarkable because of its combination of technical and poetic qualities, and his bowing technique became a model for later violinists. His skill was widely recognised and he was invited to go on a concert tour of Italy in 1740.

Tartini also studied acoustics and contributed to the science with his discovery of the Tartini tone, which was a third note, heard when two notes are played steadily and with intensity.

After almost 50 years in Padua, Tartini died in the city in 1770, at the age of 77.

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Erasmo of Narni

Statue of condottiero still watches over Padua

The statue captures
Erasmo's fighting spirit

One of the most famous condottieri of the Renaissance, Erasmo da Narni, who had a distinguished career as a military leader, died on this day in 1443 in Padua. Known as Gattamelata, which meant the honey-eyed cat, Erasmo has been immortalised by Donatello’s bronze equestrian statue of him in Piazza del Santo. 

Erasmo had ruled over Padua from 1437, having risen to the rank of General Commander of the Armies of the Republic of Venice. He continued to serve the Venetians in a military capacity until being taken ill in 1440. 

Donatello’s bronze equestrian statue of Gattamelata is to the left of the Basilica di Sant’Antonio in Padua as you approach the church from the direction of Via del Santo. The statue was completed in 1453 and is believed to be the earliest Renaissance equestrian statue that still survives. It became a precedent for many later sculptures honouring military heroes. 

The soldier and his horse are both portrayed in life size by Donatello, instead of being larger than life as with previous, classical equestrian statues. Donatello had been commissioned by the family to create a monument in memory of the great Commander of the Armies of the Venetian Republic and the statue is mounted on a pedestal that resembles a sepulchre. Gattamelata appears in the style of a Roman emperor astride his horse. His head is uncovered and the expression on his face shows his wonderful fighting spirit. 

Born in Narni in Umbria, Erasmo went from a humble household into a military life, serving in turn the rulers of the Papal States, Rome, Florence, and Venice. With his friend, Brandolino Brandolini, he worked for the Assisi lord, Cecchino Broglia, and later, serving under another condottiero, Braccio da Montone, lord of Perugia, he played his part in the conquests of Todi, Terni, Narni, Rieti, and Spoleto and helped win the battle of Viterbo against Muzio Attendolo Sforza in 1419. 

Donatello's statue standing guard over the
magnificent Basilica di Sant'Antonio 

During the War of L’Aquila, Braccio’s army was defeated and the condottiero himself was killed, so Erasmo led the remaining troops into the service of Florence. Later, Pope Martin V hired Erasmo to recapture the lands he had lost in the battles against Braccio da Montone. Erasmo was also hired by the Republic of Venice to fight against Filippo Mario Visconti of Milan. 

In the conflict, he came up against another condottiero, Niccolò Piccinino, who defeated him in a battle in 1434 in which Erasmo was wounded. After defending Brescia and Verona against the Visconti army successfully, Erasmo was granted the title of General Commander of the Armies of the Republic of Venice. He was made ruler of Padua in 1437. 

The following year, the Venetians lost Legnago, Soave and Verona, which led to criticism of Erasmo, but with the help of Francesco Sforza, he was able to re-enter Verona in 1439. In 1440, while mustering a flotilla on Lake Garda, Erasmo suffered a cerebral haemorrhage. He never fully recovered from this illness and was unable to lead any further military campaigns. 

Erasmo died in 1443 and was buried in the Basilica of Sant’Antonio in Padua. Donatello’s statue of Gattamelata was later placed outside the front entrance of the church as a tribute to him. Erasmo’s daughter, Polissena Romagnola, married Tiberto Brandolini, the son of his old friend and military comrade, Brandolino, and they had two sons, Sigismondo and Leonello. Sigismondo, Erasmo’s grandson, was later considered good enough to marry into an important family in Piacenza. 

Narni, where Erasmo was born, is a hill town in the region of Umbria that is close to the exact geographical centre of Italy and there is a stone in the town marking the precise spot. Erasmo’s birthplace is in Via Gattamelata, which has since been named after him, and there is now a plaque on the outside of the house. You can reach the birthplace from Via Garibaldi, or from the end of Vicolo degli Orti.

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Why Padua University graduate Vittorino da Feltre gave free education to poor children

Vittorino da Feltre both studied
and taught at Padua University

Vittorino da Feltre, a scholar who was considered to have been the greatest humanist educator of the Renaissance, owed his success partly to the education he had received at the University of Padua.

Da Feltre, who was originally named Vittore dei Ramboldini when he was born in Feltre in the republic of Venice in 1378, went to study and then taught at the University of Padua. He later chose to settle in Padua and he became a successful teacher, welcoming pupils into his own home and varying his fee according to the financial situation of the pupil’s family.

He himself had come from a good family that had become impoverished and his own early education had been a struggle. This contributed to making him a strong and decisive character and made him leave his home in Feltre when he was 18 to go to Padua.

He supported himself financially while studying grammar and Latin at the university under Gasparino da Barzizza, the greatest Latin scholar of the age, by teaching grammar to children.

After receiving his degree of doctor of arts in Latin composition and logic, he began the study of mathematics. By 1415, Da Feltre was teaching both grammar and mathematics in Padua. He took students to live in his house and closely supervised their activities.

He was promoted to Chair of Rhetoric in Padua in 1422 and became one of the most popular teachers at the university.

Palazzo Bo, part of the University of
Padua, where Da Feltre taught

In 1423, he was asked to become tutor to the children of the powerful Gonzaga family, who ruled over Mantua. He agreed to do this providing he could set up his own school away from the Gonzaga court and its political influence.

He also enrolled other children to be taught at the school along with the Gonzaga children, both noble and poor children, who were selected because of their ability. The poor children did not have to pay for their education and were taught on an equal footing with the children from wealthy families. He also educated girls and did not consider the female pupils to be inferior to the male pupils.

Latin and Greek language and literature were at the centre of the curriculum of the school. The children were also taught arithmetic, geometry and music and did games and physical exercise, following the Greek ideal of development of the body as well as of the mind. The school was close to a lake and surrounded by beautiful countryside, which also contributed to the wellbeing of the pupils.

Federico da Montefeltro was
among Da Feltre's pupils

Da Feltre saw education as a pathway to living a Christian life and made his pupils feel loved and cared for in terms of their health and characters. He adapted his teaching methods to their individual abilities and needs and never used corporal punishment. Among his students were Federico da Montefeltro, who became Duke of Urbino, and Gregorio Correr, who became Patriarch of Venice.

One of the first modern educators to develop during the Renaissance, da Feltre’s teaching methods were therefore innovative and many other schools in Europe were to adopt his educational model.

During his career, Da Feltre not only educated future Italian rulers and professional men but also taught Latin and Greek scholars who came to him from the east. This paved the way for the translation of the Greek manuscripts that were to inspire the Renaissance in Europe.

After Da Feltre’s death at the age of 68 in Mantua, Iacopo da San Cassiano, a humanist and mathematician who had been one of his pupils, took over the running of the school and inherited his library. Da Feltre was laid to rest in the Chiesa di Santo Spirito in Mantua. 

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Padua’s Ghetto

Fascinating area preserves Jewish heritage in the city

A narrow, cobbled street in
the Ghetto area of Padua

A small district known as the Ghetto, situated within Padua’s historic centre, still has many shops where craftsmen follow the traditional occupations of Jewish residents in the city.

Jews are recorded as living in Padua as far back as the 13th century. The city was one of the great centres of medieval Judaism, with a celebrated rabbinical academy where students from all over Europe came to study.

Students were also attracted to Padua by its very old medical school, which was the only one to accept Jews.

In 1548 the Venetian authorities decided to require all Jews to reside in an area near Piazza delle Erbe that was called the Ghetto. However, Jewish students were still allowed to graduate from Padua’s prestigious university.

From 1609 all four streets leading to the Ghetto were closed at a certain hour of the evening and guarded gates isolated the district during the night.

The Ghetto was officially abolished in 1797 after Napoleon’s proclamation of the equality of all citizens.

By the 19th century there were three synagogues in the district, reflecting the number of Jewish people then living in Padua.

Piazza delle Erbe, close to the area of Padua
where Jewish residents were required to live

The number of Jewish residents was greatly reduced in the 20th century and today there is only one synagogue still open for worship, at number 9 Via San Martino e Solferino, where the offices of the Jewish community are also located.  

This synagogue was originally built in 1548 but has been restructured several times. One of the four original gates to the Ghetto, crowned with the lion of Saint Mark, stands nearby.

Full equality for Jewish citizens was achieved in 1866 when Padua was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy.

The former Ghetto has kept much of its original appearance, with the tall narrow houses in Via Arco evoking how the Ghetto must have looked in the past.

The Jewish Heritage Museum at  26 Via delle Piazze, just off Piazza delle Erbe, has precious objects on display that were taken from the two former synagogues no longer in existence, some of them dating back to the 15th century.

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Church of the Eremitani frescoes

The day a major work of art was ruined by bombs

Mantegna's Stories of St James
was one of the works destroyed 

Padua was badly bombed by the Allies on this day in 1944 and the Church of the Eremitani was directly hit, causing devastating damage to the 15th century frescoes painted by Andrea Mantegna in one of the side chapels.

It was one of the worst losses suffered by Italy’s cultural heritage during World War II as Mantegna’s frescoes were considered a major work of art.

Mantegna, who was born in Isola di Cartura near Vicenza in 1431, was commissioned to paint a cycle of frescoes in the Ovetari Chapel, one of the side chapels, depicting scenes from the lives of Saint James and Saint Christopher. The commission marked the beginning of his artistic career when he started work at the age of 17 in 1448. He was in his mid 20s by the time he had finished the cycle in 1457.

Tragically, the German invading army had established their headquarters in Padua next to the Church of the Eremitani, which was why the chapel and the wonderful frescoes were so badly damaged.

They were reduced to more than 88,000 separate pieces and were found mixed in with plaster and bricks on the ground.

A detailed photographic survey of the work had been made previously and it was therefore possible later to reconstruct the artist’s work and recompose part of the cycle depicting the Martyrdom of Saint James. Other frescoes by Mantegna had been removed before the war to protect them from damp and they have also now been reinstated.

In other chapels, 14th century frescoes by Guarentio and Giusto de’ Menabuoi miraculously survived.

The Church of the Eremitani found itself
next door to a German army headquarters

La Chiesa degli Eremitani, or The Church of the Hermits, is a former Augustinian Gothic-style church close to the Cappella Scrovegni in Piazza Eremitani in the centre of Padua.

The church was built for Augustinian friars between 1260 and 1276 and dedicated to the Saints Philip and James.

The friars remained in the church and adjoining monastery until 1806 when Padua was under Napoleonic rule and the order was suppressed. The church was reopened for services in 1808 and became a parish church in 1817.

The church has a single nave with plain walls decorated with ochre and red bricks and has a vaulted wooden ceiling. It houses the ornate tombs of two lords of Padua, Jacopo II da Carrara and Ubertino da Carrara, designed by Andriolo de Santi.

The 15th century side portal is also known as the Door of the Months because of the four panels by the sculptor Nicolo Baroncelli depicting allegories of the months.

The Musei Civici agli Eremitani (Civic Museum) of Padua is now housed in the former Augustinian monastery to the left of the church.

(Picture credit: Church of the Eremitani by Didier Descouens via Wikimedia Commons)

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Visit Este

The small town that inspired the poet Shelley

The historic town of Este in the province of Padua, with its varied and interesting architecture, is an excellent choice for a day trip from Padua as it takes under an hour by train and about 40 minutes by car.

You can walk into the centre of the town from the station in a few minutes, arriving in Piazza Maggiore, Este’s main square, in time for a drink before lunch.

The remains of the castle surrounded by gardens

Este is a wonderful example of ‘small town Italy’, with reasonably priced restaurants and bars, and plenty of things to see. It is unspoilt and relaxing to be there as it doesn’t get overcrowded with tourists.

To understand its 3000 year history, during which it has been ruled by Romans, Barbarians, important families during the medieval period, the Venetians, the French and the Austrians, you could not do much better than visit Este’s highly regarded Museo Nazionale Atestino. Right in the centre of the town, the museum is housed in Palazzo Mocenigo, a 16th century palace that incorporates part of the walls of the castle into its façade. There are said to be 65,000 items of historical significance in the museum’s collection.

Este’s castle was built in the 11th century by the Este family, who eventually moved on to Ferrara, where they built another, perhaps more famous, castle.

Este’s original castle was destroyed in the 14th century and then rebuilt by Ubertino da Carrara, Lord of Padova. He used it as a defensive outpost against the ruling families of Verona and Milan.

After Este and Padua were taken over by the Venetians, the castle was partially demolished and a wall and towers are all that remain today of the 14th century structure. Inside the walls, there is a beautiful garden, which is open to the public and is a lovely place to sit and rest, particularly when the rose garden is in full bloom.

Piazza Maggiore is in the centre of town

Este’s most important church, the Duomo of Santa Tecla, was erected in the 17th century on the site of an earlier church. It is well worth a visit, if only to see the large painting by Giambattista Tiepolo depicting Santa Tecla praying for the deliverance of Este from the plague.

While in Este you can also see the Villa Kunkler, which was rented by the English poet, Lord Byron, in the early years of the nineteenth century. He allowed his fellow poet and friend, Percy Shelley, to live there with his family between 1817 and 1818. Shelley was so inspired by the natural beauty of his surroundings he wrote some of his best poetry there, including Lines Written Among the Euganean Hills. Inspired by Este he wrote:

‘Of old forests echoing round

And the light and smell divine

Of all flowers that breathe and shine:

We may live so happy there,

That the Spirits of the Air

Envying us, may even entice

To our healing paradise

The polluting multitude:

But their rage would be subdu’d

By that clime divine and calm,

And the winds whose wings rain balm

On the uplifted soul, and leaves

Under which the bright sea heaves;’

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Orto Botanico in Padua

Botanical Garden inspired the German writer Goethe
 

The world’s first botanical garden created for educational purposes was opened in Padua in 1545.

Orto Botanico, which has now been listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, was devoted to the growth of medicinal plants that could provide natural remedies for treating illnesses.

Orto Botanico in Padua was designed
 in accordance with Renaiisance ideals

The garden was designed for Padua University by Bergamo architect Andrea Moroni, who based it on a detailed architectonic plan in accordance with Renaissance ideals. It is laid out in the form of a circle enclosing a square, which was divided into four quadrants, in which the plants were grown.

The oldest and most important plants were grown in the hub of the garden, known as the hortus spahaericus.

These include a palm (Chamaerops humilis) planted in 1585, which became known as Goethe’s palm, because the German writer made a careful study of it in 1786 and drew from it his intuitions about evolution. He later published his ideas in an essay about the metamorphosis of plants.

The garden also has greenhouses, which were added at the beginning of the 19th century, and a library, where old scientific documents are preserved.

Padua’s Orto Botanico is still used for research into rare plants and threatened species, with a view to reintroducing them to their natural environment.

The garden is in Via Orto Botanico close to Prato della Valle, one of the city’s main squares, where there is a tram stop. It is open to the public every day, but has closed temporarily due to the Covid 19 pandemic.

 

 

Ippolito Nievo - writer and patriot from Padua

Risorgimento novel now seen as an overlooked classic

The writer Ippolito Nievo, a passionate supporter of the move to unify Italy in the 19th century, was born on this day in 1831 in Padua.

Nievo, whose posthumously published Confessions of an Italian is now considered the most important novel about the Risorgimento in Italian literature, drew inspiration from his participation in Giuseppe Garibaldi’s Spedizione dei Mille - the Expedition of the Thousand.

Ippolito Nievo fought for a united Italy

Nievo was born into comfortable circumstances.  His father was a prominent lawyer and magistrate in Padua and his mother the daughter of a Friulian countess.  Their home in Padua was the Palazzo Mocenigo Querini, a 16th century house overlooking Via Sant’Eufemia, close to the city centre.

They also had use of his mother’s ancestral home, a castle in Colloredo di Montalbano, a hamlet just outside the city of Udine in Friuli-Venezia Giulia, and of the Palazzo Nievo in Mantua.

From 1832 to 1837, when Nievo was a small child, they lived in a house adjoining the Palazzo della Giustizia in Soave, about 60km (37 miles) from Padua, where his father was posted as a judge. 

By the late 1840s, Nievo was becoming increasingly fascinated by the writings of Carlo Cattaneo and Giuseppe Mazzini, two of the central philosophical drivers of the Risorgimento.

He is thought to have taken part in a failed uprising in Mantua in 1848, a year marked by a series of insurrections inspired by Italian nationalists seeking to overthrow the Austian grip on the north of the country. 

He had been inspired by conversations with his maternal grandfather, Carlo Marin, who had been a prominent official of the Venetian Republic when it fell to the Austrians in 1797.

Nievo refused to follow his father into the law as he felt it would imply submission to the Austrian government and instead pursued a career in journalism.

In the 1850s he retreated to Colloredo di Montalbano, where he wrote a number of novels set in the Friulian countryside, as well as volumes of short stories and poetry.

Most important novel
about the Risorgimento

He began writing his major work, Confessions of an Italian, at some point in the mid-1850s. The central character is an 83-year-old man, Carlo Altoviti - thought to be based at least loosely on Carlo Marin - who has decided to write down the history of his long life, from an unhappy childhood to romantic entanglements during the siege of Genoa, and fighting in the cause of revolution in Naples.

Carlo’s twin passions are the dream of a unified, free Italy and his undying love for Pisana, the woman with whom he is obsessed. With characters ranging from drunken smugglers to saintly nuns and scheming priests, as well as real figures such as Napoleon and Lord Byron, it is an epic novel that tells the remarkable and inseparable stories of one man's life and the history of Italy's unification.

Nievo’s political activity intensified in the late 1850s, when he joined Garibaldi’s Cacciatori delle Alpi, a brigade of volunteers fighting to liberate Lombardy, and then participated in the Expedition of the Thousand, given the number 690 in the list of 1,000 patriots.

Nievo embarked from Genoa on 5 May, 1860 setting sail for Sicily. After distinguishing himself in the battle of Calatafimi and in Palermo, he was promoted to colonel and took on administrative assignments, at the same time keeping diaries that served as a chronicle of events.

It was in this role that he was tasked with bringing back from Sicily all the administrative documents and receipts from the expedition’s expenses. He boarded the steamship Ercole along with other members of the military administration to travel from Palermo to Naples, but during the night between March 4 and 5, 1861, the steamship ran into difficulties off the coast of Sorrento, almost within view of the Bay of Naples, and sank.  There were no survivors.

Nievo’s life is commemorated in a number of locations, including Colloredo di Montalbano and Fossalta di Portogruaro, in the Veneto, where the Castello di Fratta, the scene of Carlo Altoviti’s unhappy childhood, was thought to be located.

Colloredo di Monte Albano - known locally as Colloredo di Montalbano - is a small village in Friuli-Venezia Giulia situated about 14km (9 miles) northwest of Udine.  In the 11th century, it was a fief of the Viscounts of Mels, who had received it from the Counts of Tyrol. In 1420, together with all of Friuli, the hamlet was acquired by the Republic of Venice.  The hamlet was severely damaged by the Friuli earthquake in 1976, yet the family castle remains intact.

Nievo’s legacy is preserved in his novel, in which the central character and narrator shares Nievo’s passions. Nievo completed the work in 1858 but it was not until 1867, six years after his death, that it was published.

When Nievo’s supporters first found a publisher the book was titled Confessioni di un ottuagenario (Confessions of an octogenarian), because Nievo’s intended title was still deemed politically sensitive. It was changed later to reflect the author’s wishes.

Nievo died for the cause he believed in passionately, at the age of just 29.

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Andrea Palladio

The most admired architect of all time was born in Padua

Palladio became one of the most
influential architects in history

The world’s most famous and influential architect, Andrea Palladio, was baptised on 30 November in 1508 at the Oratorio di San Michele in Padua.

It is not known whether he was born on the 30th, or on the previous day.

Palladio’s style was to become so popular that architects all over the world designed villas and public buildings copying his interpretation of classical Roman architecture.

For example, the White House in Washington, the home of the President of the United States, built between 1792 and 1800, has many echoes of Palladian style.

Palladio was born Andrea di Pietro della Gondola, either just before, or on the day, of his baptism. He was the son of a miller in Padua.

He found work as a stone cutter in the workshop of a sculptor initially. but moved to Vicenza when he was 16, where he joined a guild of stonemasons and bricklayers. 

It was while working as a stonemason for the poet and scholar Gian Giorgio Trissino that his career began to gather pace. Trissino not only gave him the name Palladio, after the Greek goddess of wisdom, Pallas Athene, but encouraged and helped him to study classical architecture in Rome.

Palladio became fascinated with the work of Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, architect and engineer of the 1st century BC. It was while in Rome that he came across the Pantheon, with its huge hemispheric dome inspired by Vitruvius, which was to influence many of his designs.

The Villa Cornaro in Piombino Dese 

Trissino also introduced Palladio to a number of wealthy and influential families, including the Barbaro brothers, through whom he ultimately became chief architect of the Republic of Venice, having already occupied the equivalent position in Vicenza.

Palladio received his first commissions in the 1530s and thereafter was in constant demand, his style inspiring other architects outside Italy, at first in Europe and later around the world.  One factor in the spread of his fame was his publication in 1570 of his treatise, I Quattro Libri dell'Archittetura (The Four Books of Architecture), which set out rules others could follow.

Examples of Palladio's work can be found all over the region where he lived and in Venice, where he was commissioned to build, among other architectural masterpieces, the Church of San Giorgio Maggiore, the focal point of the view across the lagoon from St Mark's Square through the Piazzetta.

He built a substantial number of villas for wealthy clients across the Veneto region, some of them lining the Brenta Canal that links the lagoon of Venice with Padua. Others such as the Villa Capra, otherwise known as La Rotonda, famous for its symmetrically square design with four six-columned porticoes, can be found in open countryside near Vicenza.

La Rotonda, near Vicenza, is one of 
Palladio's most famous buildings

Vicenza itself features many of Palladio's designs, including the fabulous Teatro Olimpico, in which perspective was used to create the optical illusion of city streets receding from the stage.  He was working on the theatre at the time of his death, after which the project was finished by his son, Silla, one of his five children, and Palladio's assistant, Vincenzo Scamozzi.

Palladio designed two beautiful villas in the province of Padua, Villa Cornaro in Piombino Dese and Villa Pisani in Montagnana.

One of his finest works is considered to be Villa Foscari, otherwise known as La Malcontenta, located next to the Brenta canal at Mira, which is between Padua and Venice.

Palladio died in 1580, aged 71. The cause of his death is not clear but some accounts say he collapsed while inspecting the construction of the Tempietto Barbaro, a church in Maser, near Treviso.

He was initially buried in a family vault in the church of Santa Corona in Vicenza, the city in which he spent most of his life, but was later re-interred at the civic cemetery, where a chapel was built in his honour.

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Chiesa di San Nicolò

Romanesque church still has many original features

One of the oldest churches in Padua, the pretty Chiesa di San Nicolò, is tucked away in a square at the end of Via San Nicolò, a turning off Via Dante Alighieri.

An outstanding example of Romanesque architecture, Chiesa di San Nicolò was first mentioned in a document in 1088 when Bishop Milone donated it to the Convent of Saint Peter for the use of the monks.

Chiesa di San Nicolò is about 1000 years old

The church was dedicated to Saint Nicolas of Myra and later acquired some of the saint’s relics.

By the 12th century, San Nicolò was a parish church attended by many of the noble families in the city.

In the 14th century, the church was extended to the side to add the chapel of the aristocratic Forzate family. By 1546 Chiesa di San Nicolò  had 11 altars, many owned by the powerful families who worshipped there, and between 1660 and 1680 some baroque features were added.

The bell tower was rebuilt in the 19th century in Gothic style, but restoration work carried out in the 20th century meticulously preserved many of the church’s original features.

Among the art treasures inside Chiesa di San Nicolò  is an altarpiece by Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo depicting the Sacred Family with Saints Francesca Romana and Eurosia. There are still traces of 14th and 15th century frescoes and there is a 15th century depiction of San Liberale by Jacopo da Montagnana, also known as Jacopo Parisato, an artist from Montagnana who was active in Padua during the 15th century.

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Francesco Zabarella

Cardinal from Padua helped end the western schism

Cardinal Francesco Zabarella, an expert on canon law whose writings on the subject were to remain the standard authority for centuries, was born on this day in 1360 in Padua.

Zabarella studied jurisprudence in Bologna and in Florence, graduating in 1385. He taught canon law in Florence until 1390 and in Padua until 1410. He took minor orders and in 1398 was made an archipriest of the Cathedral of Padua.

Zabarella also carried out diplomatic missions on behalf of Padua. In 1404 he was one of two ambassadors sent to visit King Charles VI of France to ask for his assistance against Venice, which was preparing to annex Padua. But when Padua became part of the Venetian Republic in 1406, Zabarella became a loyal supporter of Venice. In 1409 he took part in the Council of Pisa as councillor of the Venetian legate.

The antipope John XXIII appointed him Bishop of Florence and cardinal deacon of Santi Cosma and Damiano in Rome in 1411. There were two antipopes at the time as a result of the western schism, which had begun in 1378 when the French cardinals, claiming that the election of Pope Urban VI was invalid, had elected antipope Clement VII as a rival to the Roman pope. This had eventually led to two competing lines of antipopes, the Avignon line and the Pisan line, which had elected antipope Alexander V, John XXIII’s predecessor.

Although Zabarella never received major orders he was an active promoter of ecclesiastical reform. When the Council of Rome failed to end the schism, Zabarella was sent as one of John XXIII’s legates to Emperor Sigismund at Como to reach an understanding over the time and place for holding a new council.

Cardinal Zabarella's tomb in the Duomo

He helped to bring about the opening of the Council of Constance in 1414 in Germany.

In the interest of church unity he persuaded John XXIII to resign in 1415 but also opposed the Avignon antipope, Benedict XIII.

Eventually the Roman pope, Gregory XII, resigned and the Council of Constance formally deposed the Avignon line and the Pisan line.

Suffering poor health, Zabarella went to take the waters at a spa near Constance to try to recover. His last days were spent in pressing for the Council of Constance to elect a new pope as soon as possible. He died in Constance in September 1417 and was later buried in Padua Cathedral. 

By November, Pope Martin V, who had been born in the papal states near Rome, had been elected by the Council of Constance, effectively ending the western schism.

Zabarella’s most important works were: De schismate sui temporis, which dealt with ways and means of ending the schism, written between 1403 and 1408; Lectura super Clementinis, written in 1402; Commentaria in quinque libros Decretalium, written between 1396 and 1404.

Padua's Duomo and Battistero

Francesco Zabarella was laid to rest in the Basilica Cattedrale di Santa Maria Assunta, referred to in Padua as the Duomo. The present Duomo is the third structure to have been built on the site. The first was erected in 313 and destroyed by an earthquake in the 12th century. The church was then rebuilt in Romanesque style and visitors to the Baptistery next door can see how the Duomo would have looked in the 14th century, Zabarella’s era, as it appears in the frescoes executed at that time by Giusto dè Menaboui.

The present building dates back to the 16th century and was finally consecrated in 1754, with its façade left unfinished.

Teatro Verdi Padua

Famous singers have graced stage of elegant theatre 

Padua has a beautiful 18th century theatre named after the composer Giuseppe Verdi, which is in Piazza Terrani off Corso Milano in the centre of the city, close to Piazza dei Signori.

Teatro Verdi presents operas, musicals, plays, ballets and concerts organised by the Teatro Stabile del Veneto.

Teatro Verdi is in Corso Milano in the centre of Padua

The theatre was originally named Teatro Nuovo after it was built in 1751. The architect, Giovanni Gloria, had been commissioned to design the theatre by a group of important citizens of Padua, who wanted something similar to the Teatro degli Obizzi, which had been built in the city in 1652 and was used to put on operas during the first half of the 18th century.

Among the celebrated singers who appeared at Teatro Nuovo were castrati singers Gaetano Guadagni and Gaspare Pacchierotti, soprano Giuditta Pasta and contralto Giuseppina Grassini

In 1846 the theatre was restored inside by Giuseppe Japelli and in 1884, when the theatre was dedicated to Giuseppe Verdi, the interior was changed again by architect Achille Sfondrini with Giacomo Casa decorating the ceiling.

During World War I the ceiling was badly damaged by bombing and had to be redone by Giuliano Tommasi.

In 1920, when Teatro Verdi was able to reopen, the King of Italy, Vittorio Emanuele III, attended the opening ceremony.

During World War II the number of productions had to be limited and after the war the theatre became the property of the local authority.

For more information about future productions, visit www.teatrostabileveneto.it/the-teatro-verdi/

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