LOGGIA. — An open gallery on the upper floors of buildings, almost always with arches, rarely with an architrave. In church architecture it appears as a development of the pre-Romanesque motif of the series of niches or of the hanging arches, owing to the structural necessity of lightening the masonry, and at the same time to the aesthetic aim of giving movement to the surfaces.
The first examples are found in the 11th century, in the tiburium of the chapel of S. Aquilino near S. Lorenzo in Milan and in the apse of S. Sofia in Padua, where arches on piers are used; then, lightened by the use of small columns, it is very frequent in the Lombard architecture of the 12th century, in the apses (S. Giacomo and S. Fedele in Como; S. Maria Maggiore in Bergamo) and in the facades, where it follows the slopes of the roof (S. Michele in Ciel d'oro in Pavia) or marks a horizontal break (cathedral of Cremona). The Lombard master builders spread its use in northern Italy (apse of the cathedral of Murano) and central Italy, where in the cathedrals of Modena, Piacenza and Ferrara the loggias are a dominant motif that encircles the whole building; they become typical of Pisan architecture, which frequently uses them in several orders on the facades (cathedral and S. Paolo a Ripa d'Arno in Pisa; S. Michele in Foro in Lucca; S. Paolo in Pistoia, etc.). They are also adopted beyond the Alps, particularly in the Rhineland (S. Castor in Koblenz; cathedrals of Speyer, Mainz and Bonn). In the course of the 13th century they are also used on bell towers, for the crowning alone (cathedral of Cremona), or in several orders (tower of Pisa; cathedral of Pistoia); but their use becomes increasingly rare with the affirmation of Gothic forms, and few examples can be cited in facades (Santo in Padua), in apses (cathedral of Trent), in tiburia (abbey of Chiaravalle); for tiburia, however, they come back into wide use in the late 15th century in Lombardy (Certosa of Pavia; cathedral of Bergamo; S. Maria delle Grazie in Cremona) even by Bramante himself (S. Maria delle Grazie in Milan).
Not motivated by ornamental or structural reasons, but due to religious necessities, are the loggias of the blessing that surmount the entrance of the principal Roman basilicas, and are spacious enough to receive the Pontiff with his retinue. To the memory of the first jubilee is linked the loggia that was near the basilica of S. Giovanni in Laterano, commissioned on that occasion by Boniface VIII; this one, and the one that probably already existed in S. Pietro, were rebuilt with the reconstruction of the two basilicas. The solemn architectural motif was repeated also in churches annexed to the major cardinalitial palaces, not only in the Renaissance (SS. Apostoli, S. Marco), but even into the 17th century (S. Maria in Via Lata). A grandiose 18th-century example is that of S. Maria Maggiore (1748), in which the airiness of the loggia is accentuated by the heavy masses of the flanking palaces; very recent is that of S. Maria degli Angeli in Assisi.
The loggias of the cloisters (v.) respond to practical needs of circulation between the rooms, similarly to those used in civil architecture for courtyards, of which it is superfluous to cite the innumerable examples from every period. On the facades of palaces loggias appear already in the 13th century, as in Rome in the ancient senatorial palace and especially in Venice, where they become a dominant motif: typical expressions are the Doge's Palace, the Libreria by Sansovino and the loggia of the Baroque Palazzo Rezzonico. Both in courtyards and on facades the loggias were enriched with pictorial decoration, already in use in the 15th century (Palazzo dei Cavalieri di Rodi in Rome), and which has its most famous example in Raphael's loggias. In the late 16th century and more in the following centuries the external loggia of palaces often serves the purpose of a belvedere (Palazzi Farnese, Borghese, Falconieri, etc.).
The name loggia is also given to certain buildings open with arcades on the ground floor, almost always intended for public use or for representation (Loggia dei Lanzi in Florence; degli Osii in Milan; of the Palazzo del Comune in Brescia; of the Capitano in Vicenza), or, exceptionally, for charitable purposes (Loggia del Bigallo in Florence, where abandoned children were taken in), or, much more often, for commercial exchange (Loggia dei Mercanti in Siena, in Ancona, in Bologna), or for market (Loggia del Porcellino in Florence). - See pl. C.
Bibliography
Mario Zocca