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Updated: May 15, 2025
For the festival of S. Felice in Piazza that is, the representation of the Annunciation of the Madonna, of which there has been an account in another place which was held by the Company of the Orciuolo in the year 1525, Jacone made among the outer decorations, according to the custom of those times, a most beautiful triumphal arch standing by itself, large, double, and very high, with eight columns, pilasters, and pediments; all of which he caused to be carried to completion by Piero da Sesto, a well-practised master in woodwork.
Down at the Abbey this night. It would be absolute folly to note down what I saw or thought of this most remarkable monastic structure. Every album possesses it, in all the beauty of its fairy architecture; its tabernacles, its niches and canopies, and statues, pinnacles, pediments, spires, and the tracery of its vaultings. The decorated work is most exquisitely executed.
Similarly to this the façade, loaded with balustrades, and round and angular pediments, and statues roosting on its stones, is a "hôtel-de-ville" frontage.
It would have been even more satisfactory had the central part been a little narrower, and had there been something to mark the barrel vault within; the omission too of the lower order, which is so much taller than the upper, would have been an improvement, but even with these defects the design is most stately, and refreshingly free of all the fussy over-elaboration and the fantastic piling up of pediments which soon became too common.
Even the exterior of the temples glowed with the richest harmony of colors, and was decorated with the purest gold: an atmosphere peculiarly favorable to the display and the preservation of art, permitted to external pediments and friezes all the minuteness of ornament the brilliancy of colors, such as in the interior of Italian churches may yet be seen vitiated, in the last, by a gaudy and barbarous taste.
Indeed, when we consider the immense number of figures employed, it becomes evident that not even all the sculptures of the pediments can have been executed entirely by Pheidias, who was already probably well advanced in life when he began the Parthenon decorations; yet all the sculptures were the work of Pheidias or of pupils working under him, and although traces may be found of the influence of other artists, of Myron, for example, in the freedom and naturalness of the action in the figures of the frieze, yet all the decorations of the Parthenon may fairly be said to belong to the Pheidian school of sculpture.
In the central part three plain arches open on to the porch, with a pedimented niche above each. In the tower the niches are placed lower with oblong openings above and below. Above the entablature of the lower order there are three windows in the middle flanked by Ionic pilasters and surmounted by pediments, while in the tower are large round-headed niches with pediments.
Payne's judgment and records show it was accepted on September 9, 1768, as agreeably built according to plan, with the exception of the brick pediments over the door which were to be corrected by Mr. Payne. The church was used for services until the time of the Revolution after which it was used only occasionally.
The only mosaic on the façade of S. Mark's which still remains is that in the arch over the left door; and that also is the only arch which has been left concave. The three flagstaffs are there, but they have wooden pediments and no lions on the top, as now. The Merceria clock tower is not yet, and the south arcade comes flush with the campanile's north wall; but I doubt if that was so.
But there is enough of the great shrine standing in the midst of the ruins to inspire one with an idea of its greatness; and, in the museum above, the heroic figures from its two pediments have been restored and set up in such wise as to reproduce the external adornment of the temple with remarkable success.
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