St Mark's in Venice – an Exterior Tour

Exploring the Art and Architecture Outside Basilica San Marco

Aug 23, 2009 Barbara Rogers

One of Italy's most iconic sights, St. Mark's Basilica is as rich an art gallery and museum outside as it is inside, with its five huge domes and mosaic-painted façade.

St. Mark’s exterior is pure magic by day or night. The brilliant mosaic panels above its portico catch the sun’s rays at a million different angles, bringing the figures to glittering life. When the moon is full and the high tide floods St. Mark’s Square with a layer of still water, the lighted façade reflects below in a shimmering mirror image.

Built 1063-94 as the chapel of the Doges (rulers of Venice), Basilica San Marco is Romanesque with heavy Byzantine influences that are clear from first sight. It is considered, in fact, one of the best remaining examples of the Byzantine architectural style.

St. Mark’s Façade

Supporting the lower level’s five arches are clusters of columns, decorated with mosaics underneath the arches. The one at the extreme left is the only one in the façade that is the original from the 13th century – the others have been renewed at various times (although with the same images).

Above, another set of five arches crown a portico, and in its center stand replicas of the iconic bronze horses, which were brought back as booty from Constantinople. (Look for the originals inside in the museum, and for the upper gallery leading out onto this portico.) Four more mosaic panels are above this portico, their gold tesserae catching and glimmering in the sun along with a golden Lion of St. Mark, symbol of the saint, the church and the city itself.

St Mark’s Five Domes

The church is crowned by five domes, each of which has a little onion-shaped mini dome on its top. Around the edges stand a row of open towers, each topped by a spire. These, and the capitals of the columns are embellished with stone carving; the saints and angels that top the lacy stonework between these towers were added early in the early 1400s.

After standing back for the whole effect, take a closer look at the façade to find such details as the 13th-century carvings over the central doorway that show in beautiful detail the labors of each month.

Booty from the Crusades

One of the most interesting things about St Mark’s exterior is that it has continued through the centuries to be decorated by a surprising variety of art, much of which predates the church itself by several centuries. As Venetian ships returned from the Crusades and other expeditions, they were filled with treasures, and many of the architectural bits from ancient sites and buildings found their way onto the basilica. That accounts for the somewhat strange patchwork of friezes and other carved stone panels that cover some of its walls in random arrangements.

Perhaps the greatest of these treasures is The Four Tetrarchs, a sculpture of a group of four life-sized men, stand conversing at eye-level on a corner of the building, alongside the Doge’s Palace. Carved in porphyry, the group dates from the 4th century and was created in Asia Minor. The two free-standing square pillars outside the Baptistery door (also around to the right, alongside the Doge’s Palace), are from a 6th-century church in Constantinople.

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