THE NEW CAMPANILE OF VENICE.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 10034, 3 May 1910, Page 3

THE NEW CAMPANILE OF VENICE.

When the old Campanile of St. Mark's collap-ed on July 14th, 1902, after an existence of 1,041 years, the general feeling, at least among the people of Venice, was that tne tower must go up again.

The strength of the popular feeling was recognised and interpreted by the town council when it voted the reconstruction of tha Campanile "dove era e come era," "where it was »nd as it was"; and it is difficult not to rejoice at the triumph of "the better vulgar," and to hope that, now the tower is approaching completion, the justness of their yiew will be recognised.

THE FOUNDATIONS. When once it had been resolved to rebuild the Campanile the question of the foundations claimed the first place. The foundations, spreading far beyond the limits of the original structure and of far more massive proportions, were completed about two years ago, and the part of the Campanile above ground, the base, the shaft, the bell-chamber, the attic, and the pyramid, was at once attacked. But immediately there arose the first of those problems the solution of which has, in a measure, retarded the progress of the worn. The square brick shaft of the original Campanile rested on a base of five courses of stone, set stepwise. The wieght of the great tower—"il peso che non dorme mai"—and the gradual subsidence of the soil of Venice, a process going on at the rate of about one metre in a thousand years, had caused two-and-a-half of the five courses to disappear below the level of the present pavement. When the town council resolved tn rebuild the tower '• where it was and as it was," it did not occur to the authorities to determine whether they mean "as it was" when first erected or "as it was" when it fell; in other words, with a base of five coursed above ground or a base ot only twn-and-a-half. The works were suspended while a Commission sat on the question; but seeing that the five courses above ground were already laid, it was decided, and rightly, that they should remain; fcr if the old Campanile had sunk to the extent of two-and-a half courses in a j thousand years, the end of another thousand would find the new Campanile without any visible base at all.

The intention was to reproduce the old tower as faithfully as possible both in structure and m colour; with that object in view the bricks have been specially Rejected and laid as in the original Campanile, the modelling [ot the windows and the internal arrangement of inclined planes have been preserved. The shaft in reality is composed of an inner and outer sha't; between them mounts the inclined plane which leads to the bell-chamber. The walls of the outer shaft are 6ft thick, and the interior of the tower presents a fine piece of brick construction, almost Roman in its impressiveness. The design of the inner shaft offers the only important structural change which differentiates the new tuwer from the old; for the sake of lightness the double arch on each of the four sides has been replaced by a single span from angle to angle. The inner and outer shafts are bound together at each angle by iron rods running through the cement of which the corner* landing-places are made, while the pilasters at the angles ot the inner shaft are similarly united by iron rods running through the cement which forms the basis of the inclined plane. The whole tower is thus solidly linked together, and, should it ever fall again, it will not sit down gently, as did the old tower, causing comparativey little damage, but must inevitably fall in one block, crushing whatever it touches.

WORK AND MATERIALS. j The brick shaft was finished about four months ago, and the more difficult part of the reconstruction, the stonework of the bell-chamber, has now been reached; the arcade of four arches on each side is all but complete. The three verde-antique columns which occupied the middle places on the eastern, northeru, and western arcades in the old Campanile have been preserved, and, though slightly damaged, have been replaced; the grey granite column in the centre of the southern arcade is new. The lions' heads in the spandrils and the capitals of the columns are also new, though both have bean faithfully reproduced from surviving specimens

of their predecessors. The two figures of justice which adorned the east and the west sides of the square attic, above the bell-chamber, are intact, and will be employed when the reconstructon of the attic is reached; the lions of St. Mark, which originally occupied the centre of the north and south aides of the attic, were defaced during the French occupation of Venice, but are to be restored to the modern Campanile.

Above the attic will come the pyramid, or cusp. In the old Campanile it was built of brick round a hollow cone in the centre, the result being that at the angles there was a ponderous mass of useless brickwork. The new pyramid will ba consructed in cement, and iron, which is far lighter. The exterior will, of course, retain the copper pi a tee, as in the old Campanile, and no difference will be visible to the eye, as the rich green patina will be reproduced by time and weathering. Unlike the Campanile, the Loggetta is not being rebuilt; though shattered by the fall of the tower, its fragments were not ground to powder, and now, by a triumph of patience, labour and intelligence, the graceful building has been pieced together, and Sansovino's masterpiece will once more decrrate the basi of the Campanile. The same patient! care ha 3 been bestowed on Sansovino's terra-cotta group of the Medonna and Child with St. John, which occuped the interior of the Loggetta. The statue was reduced to a thousand fragments, but has been most successfully recompostid, with the unfortunate exception of the St, John, which is past mending. The whole work of the Campanile j will be completed well within 1911. f