The Lion of the St. Mark
Dublin Core
Title
Description
Vittore Carpaccio (c. 1465 – c. 1520) painted The Lion of St. Mark in 1516 on commission for the Palazzo dei Camerlenghi near the Rialto district [1]. It features a large lion in its center––which represents the Republic’s patron saint St. Mark and therefore the Republic itself––holding a book inscribed with the message “Peace unto you, Mark my evangelist” [2]. Behind the beast is a detailed landscape of Venice, showing key centers of power like the Ducal Palace (home of Venice’s leader, the Doge), St. Mark’s Campanile, and the Arsenal of the city. This painting serves a two-fold purpose, which we can analyze with aid from the location at which it was originally displayed as well as the historical context.
Its first layer of meaning comes from its placement in the Palazzo dei Camerlenghi. The large building was not a personal residence but rather a set of offices used for clerical purposes. Thus, the vast size of the work gave all visitors an impression of the sheer power of the family that commissioned it––and whose coat of arms can be seen clearly below the lion’s front foot. The self-promotion of power, however, was not limited to just that of the administrative sense. It also projected the power of Venice.
To understand the true intent of Carpaccio’s piece, we have to look at the events directly preceding it. In 1509, several political and religious powers formed the League of Cambrai to counter Venice’s growing influence in the region [3]. Through a series of wars, the Republic had lost much of its territorial holdings and so desperately needed to reassert its dominance or risk collapse [4]. Thus, the Lion of St. Mark––which appears to be coming out of the sea (its traditional area of strength) and onto the land––expresses its desire to have dominion over both. It at the same time reinforces the myth of Venice: although the ships behind it flex its military might, the book’s inscription emphasizes its divine protection as the holiest city in Italy.
[1] "Carpaccio, Vittore," Benezit Dictionary of Artists, last modified October 31, 2011. https://www.oxfordartonline.com/benezit/view/10.1093/benz/9780199773787.001.0001/acref-9780199773787-e-00032555.
[2] Albert Cook, "Carpaccio's Animals," The Centennial Review 27, no. 4 (1983): 238.
[3] Edward Grasman, "A Salute to You: Expansion under the Wings of Saint Mark," Artibus Et Historiae 33, no. 66 (2012): 122.
[4] Patricia Fortini-Brown, Venetian Narrative Painting in the Age of Carpaccio (New Haven: Yale University Press), 1994, 54.
Creator
Source
Cook, Albert. "Carpaccio's Animals." The Centennial Review 27, no. 4 (1983): 224-43. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23739724.
Fortini-Brown, Patricia. Venetian Narrative Painting in the Age of Carpaccio. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994.
Grasman, Edward. "A Salute to You: Expansion under the Wings of Saint Mark." Artibus Et Historiae 33, no. 66 (2012): 121-31. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23509747.
Image Source: Artstor, accessed September 15, 2020. https://library.artstor.org/asset/ARTSTOR_103_41822000478501.