394 cecilia cristellon and silvana seidel menchi
devotional universe, it is possible to piece together a history thanks to
onomastic and toponymic analyses, through various forms of art (both
popular art and the products of aristocratic patronage), the dedication
of churches, altars, and chapels, the cult of relics, and the denomination
of confraternities (also known as fraterne or scuole), special associations
which met under the aegis of a particular saint within a parish or dio-
cese for devotional ends, mutual assistance, and the defense of common
interests.37
Naturally, it is not possible to analyze the history of all the varied cults
of individual saints. We shall, however, mention several of them: that of
st Mark, whose translatio constituted the allegorical representation of the
political unification of the lagoon under the doges. His cult represented
the nucleus of the Venetian civic conscience, thanks to which religious
and civic values became inseparable. Patron of the city alongside Theo-
dore, Mark personified the Venetian state, which celebrated its victories
in battle to the cry of “viva san Marco.” in Renaissance political thought,
it was through the evangelist that the doge acquired his divine potestas.
indeed, the doges modeled their own relationship with st Mark on that of
the popes with st Peter. As those who guarded Peter’s relics had inherited
his authority, thus the doges did with Mark. As the cult of the apostle gave
Rome its autonomy, thus the cult of the evangelist guaranteed Venetian
independence.
The experience of the Crusades, during which the remains of many a
saint were robbed, and Byzantine influence help explain the popularity in
Venice of saints otherwise rare in the West but common in the Christian
east, such as the prophets of the old Testament. some saints owed their
prominence in the city’s devotional life to a particular event in Venice’s
history, like santa Marina, to whom was attributed the merit of the recon-
quest of Padua in 1509. san Nicola, as protector of sailors, naturally enjoyed
great esteem in the city on the lagoon: after the Virgin, he was, during the
Middle Ages, one of the most universally popular saints.38 other saints
were dear to the Church universal yet at the same time almost Venetian:
saints such as Roche who, after the successful theft of his relics in the
15th century, the city’s liberation from the plague, and the erection of a
scuola in his honor had in Venice one the principal sites of his cult. others
37 Antonio Niero, giovanni Musolino, and silvio Tramontin, Santità a Venezia (Venice,
1972).
38 edward Muir, Civic Ritual in Early Modern Venice (Princeton, N.J., 1981), pp. 78–101.