TORCELLO (Turricellum). – An ancient episcopal see, an island in the Municipality of Venice, 10 km to the north of the city in the lagoon, with few houses and some small palaces of architectural interest; it is inhabited by a community (about 100 people) of market gardeners, vine-growers and fishermen.
I. HISTORY
After the descent and destruction by the Lombards, the population of Roman Altino (q.v.) settled permanently at T., where the episcopal see was also transferred. Churches, monasteries and dwellings soon arose, so much so that it rivalled the abandoned city, which, on account of its walled and turreted enceinte, was at least recalled in the name of the new site: hence the name T. (Turricellum), perhaps indicating the existence of some watchtower or defensive structure, if it is not a transformation of an earlier name: Dorceum (Brunetti). It was surrounded and defended by the islands of Mazzorbo, S. Niccolò de Cavana, S. Giacomo in Palùo, ancient Burano, Murano, Costanziaca, Centranica, S. Pietro di Casa Calbo, Ammiano and others, so that the problem of the origins of Venice is closely connected with the history of T., where the first outlines of what would later become, in spirit and action, the great Marian Republic were formed.The consecration of the Basilica in 639 is attested by the inscription, which is the oldest document of the lagoon’s history of consecrations; Constantine Porphyrogenitus, in the mid-10th century, called T. “a great emporium of trade and industry.” From T. came Rusticus, one of the two navigators who, from Alexandria in Egypt, brought the body of St Mark to the Venetian lagoons in 828.
Even in the late Middle Ages, T. was in better condition than other coastal islands and settlements, so much so that in the 15th century some of their convents migrated there. T. declined as Venice absorbed its activity; but the determining cause was to be found in the gradual silting up of the lagoon and the consequent spread of malaria. The depredations of marbles and stones hastened the work of destruction, even though laws (1441) imposed penalties: “in addition to the lash, the eye of the thief was to be gouged out without remission.” The series of bishops lasted until 1792; in 1659 the episcopal see was transferred to Murano; in 1818 it was annexed to the Patriarchate of Venice.
II. ART
T. retains in its aspect as a lagoon centre some elements that make it similar to Venice: the Rio Maggiore, corresponding to the Grand Canal, other narrower canals, paved quays, campi (squares), hills, the central piazza with the cathedral church and government palaces. In 639, by order of Isaac, Exarch of Ravenna, the military commander erected the Basilica on a longitudinal plan, preceded by a portico (replaced in the 15th century by a narthex), with three naves divided by columns and a single central apse, flanked by a prothesis and diaconicon; its structure and type recall similar buildings in Ravenna, Parenzo and Grado; the baptistery in front was circular in plan with two niches on the sides (7th century: certain traces survive). In the 9th century, two small apses were opened in the flat end walls; beneath the central apse (which Bettini considers to be of the 9th century), a semi-annular crypt was created, and above it the other cathedra and the presbyterial steps were adapted with a revetment of precious marbles. Bishop Orso Orseolo (1008) remodelled the structure, raising the walls, opening windows, reusing columns whose capitals of various periods directly support the arches on high pedestals, renewing the iconostasis, the ambo (remodelled in the 11th century), and the floor with marble inlays; the arcades, which rhythmically divide the façade, raised in the 11th century, are of Ravenna-derived taste and derivation.Behind the Basilica stands the robust, square Romanesque campo (11th century). The mosaic decoration covers only certain parts of the Basilica and assumes high artistic and iconographic value: in the golden conch of the central apse dominates the solemn and hieratic Madonna (probably of the 12th century); in the lower zone of the central apse, the twelve Apostles, and above the triumphal arch, the Annunciation; in the apse of the Santissimo, Christ in Majesty with angels, and saints in the lower zone, are the work of Venetian craftsmen reflecting the taste and influence of Ravenna (11th century, at the time of the Basilica’s third reconstruction). To the same period is attributable the decoration of the vault, including four angels supporting the cippus with the Mystic Lamb: a motif conceived on a compositional scheme of Roman-Ravenna origin. On the back wall, the large 13th-century mosaic with the Last Judgement, of Byzantine tradition with infiltrations of Western elements. In its superimposed zones are depicted: the Stauroxis or Crucifixion; the Anastasis or Descent of Christ into Limbo and the Resurrection of Adam and the Patriarchs from Limbo; Christ the Judge in the glory of the celestial court, and at the centre the Deesis, i.e. Christ within the iridescent mandorla of light between the Virgin and the Baptist, supplicating for humanity; the Hetoimasia, equivalent to the divine throne prepared for the Judgement, and on the sides, scenes of the Resurrection of the flesh; the blessed and the damned, distinguished according to their different sins; in the last, lost zone, Adam, with the souls of the just, the Virgin in prayer, the good thief, the gate of Paradise guarded by a cherub, St Peter with the keys and an angel “psychopompos”; in the lunette above the main entrance of the Basilica, the Virgin appears half-length, in an attitude of prayer, begging divine mercy: “O Virgin – says the inscription – with your prayer, turn the Son of God to pity, cancel every fault.”
Among the sculptures of various periods, mention should be made of: capitals from the 6th, 7th and 11th centuries, the reconstructed episcopal cathedra (9th century), the front of an altar, now a tabernacle for holy oils (7th century), the altar with a simple mensa on small columns, restored to its original form and resting on a Roman sarcophagus (early 3rd century) containing the body of St Heliodorus, first bishop of Altino; the wells of the “occasion” and of the “wheel” (11th century); the Virgin in Majesty with Child and the Archangel Raphael, belonging to the “pala d’oro” of the Cathedral, a Venetian-Byzantine repoussé work (11th century), now in the Museum of the island of T., which also houses other relics, ceramics, fragments and works of painting and sculpture from various periods; the holy water stoup (11th century), the Virgin and Child by Pietro Lamberti (15th century); and the most excellent canvas of the Assumption by Tintoretto.
The reconstruction of the altar and the restoration of the Basilica are due to F. Forlati (1929). Together with the Basilica and the baptistery, the small church of S. Fosca (probably an initial martyrium) formed a unified complex, with a central plan with one longer arm comprising the apse and the side apses, a dome on squinches and an external portico; everything, from the plan to the balance of the members and spaces, according to Bettini, betrays that decisive and profound intervention of Byzantine taste which became (but not before the 12th century) one of the determining factors of Venetian taste, grafting itself onto the earlier, and always living, tradition of the Exarchate. – See pl. XXX.