378 VENETIAN INDEX

armed, with one of the Ghisi family in prayer, must be very fine.¹ Otherwise the church is of no importance.

FERRO, PALAZZO,² on the Grand Canal. Fifteenth century Gothic, very hard and bad.

FLANGINI, PALAZZO, on the Grand Canal. Of no importance.

FONDACO DE’ TEDESCHI. A huge and ugly building near the Rialto, rendered, however, peculiarly interesting by remnants of the frescoes by Giorgione with which it was once covered. See Vol. X. 98, and XI. 29.³

FONDACO DE’ TURCHI, IX. 384, X. 144-148, 277 [and frontispiece]. The opposite Plate, representing three of its capitals, has been several times referred to [pp. 271, 276].

FORMOSA, CHURCH OF SANTA MARIA, XI. 136, 146. [Square of, X. 166, 309.]

[FORNO SANTA MARINA, CORTE DEL, X. 303.]

FOSCA, CHURCH OF ST. Notable for its exceedingly picturesque campanile, of late Gothic, but uninjured by restorations, and peculiarly Venetian in being crowned by the cupola instead of the pyramid, which would have been employed at the same period in any other Italian city.

[FOSCA, CHURCH OF ST., at Torcello, IX. 41, 148 (and Fig. 28), 336; X. 20.]

[FOSCARI, PALAZZO, on the Grand Canal.⁴ The noblest example in Venice of the fifteenth century Gothic, founded on the Ducal Palace, but lately restored and spoiled, all but the stonework of the main windows. The restoration was necessary, however: for, when I was in Venice in 1845, this palace was a foul ruin; its great hall a mass of mud, used as the back receptacle of a stonemason’s yard; and its rooms whitewashed, and scribbled over with indecent caricatures. It has since been partially strengthened and put in order; but as the Venetian municipality have now given it to the Austrians to be used as barracks, it will probably soon be reduced to its former condition. The lower palaces at the side of this building are said by some to have belonged to the younger Foscari. See “GIUSTINIANI.”

FRANCESCO DELLA VIGNA, CHURCH OF ST. Base Renaissance, but must be

¹ [A large picture, about 6 ft. x 2½ ft.]

² [Part of the Grand Hotel.]

³ [On a sheet of the MS. there is a fuller description:-

“When we have passed under the Rialto, ascending the Grand Canal, the first building on the right is that called the Fondaco de’ Tedeschi. A huge, blank, five-storied pile, on whose walls the first glance detects nothing but the signs of poverty and ruin. They have been covered with stucco which for the most part is now peeled away from the brick beneath, and stains of rusty red, and sickly grey and black, hang down in dark streams from the cornices, or spread in mossy patches hither and thither between its casements. Among this grisly painting where the stucco is still left, the eye may here and there discern other lines,-faint shades of that noble grey which nothing can give but the pencil of a great colourist, and subdued fragments of purple and scarlet, dying into rusty wash from the iron bolts that holds the walls together. This is all that is left of the work of Titian and Giorgione.”

For other references to these remains of fresco, see Modern Painters, vol. i. (Vol. III. p. 212 and n.). The one figure that still remains may be seen high up between two of the top-floor windows. The building is now the General Post Office.]

⁴ [The palace is now the School of Commerce. For another reference to it, see Vol. VIII. 131 n. and Plate 8.]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]