VIII. THE DUCAL PALACE 341

for the requirement of the new chamber; but the Sivos Chronicle is a little more distinct in expression. “In 1301, it was determined to build a great saloon for the assembling of the Great Council, and the room was built which is now called the Sala del Scrutinio.”* Now, that is to say, at the time when the Sivos Chronicle was written: the room has long ago been destroyed, and its name given to another chamber on the opposite side of the palace: but I wish the reader to remember the date 1301, as marking the commencement of a great architectural epoch, in which took place the first appliance of the energy of the aristocratic power, and of the Gothic style, to the works of the Ducal Palace. The operations then begun were continued, with hardly an interruption, during the whole period of the prosperity of Venice. We shall see the new buildings consume, and take the place of, the Ziani Palace, piece by piece: and when the Ziani Palace was destroyed, they fed upon themselves; being continued round the square, until, in the sixteenth century, they reached the point where they had been begun in the fourteenth, and pursued the track they had then followed some distance beyond the junction; destroying or hiding their own commencement, as the serpent, which is the type of eternity, conceals its tail in its jaws.

§ 14. We cannot, therefore, see the extremity, wherein lay the sting and force of the whole creature,-the chamber, namely, built by the Doge Gradenigo; but the reader must keep that commencement and the date of it carefully in his mind. The body of the Palace Serpent will soon become visible to us.

* “1301 fu presa parte di fare una sala grande per la riduzione del gran consiglio, e fu fatta quella che ora si chiama dello Scrutinio.”-Cronaca Sivos, quoted by Cadorin [p. 182]. There is another most interesting entry in the Chronicle of Magno, relating to this event; but the passage is so ill written, that I am not sure if I have deciphered it correctly:-“Del 1301 fu preso de fabrichar la sala fo ruina e fu fata (fatta) quella se adoperava a far el pregadi e fu adopera per far el Gran Consegio fin 1423, che fu anni 122.” This last sentence, which is of great importance, is luckily unmistakable:-“The room was used for the meetings of the Great Council until 1423, that is to say, for 122 years.”-Cod. Ven., tom. i. p. 126. The Chronicle extends from 1253 to 1454.

[Version 0.04: March 2008]