] gave a very different character to the Square of St.
Mark; and fifteen years later, the acquisition of the body of the Saint,
and its deposition in the Ducal Chapel, perhaps not yet completed,
occasioned the investiture of that chapel with all possible splendor.
St. Theodore was deposed from his patronship, and his church destroyed,
to make room for the aggrandizement of the one attached to the Ducal
Palace, and thenceforward known as "St. Mark's." [Footnote: In the
Chronicles, "Sancti Marci Ducalis Cappella."]
SECTION V. This first church was however destroyed by fire, when the
Ducal Palace was burned in the revolt against Candiano, in 976. It was
partly rebuilt by his successor, Pietro Orseolo, on a larger scale; and
with the assistance of Byzantine architects, the fabric was carried on
under successive Doges for nearly a hundred years; the main building
being completed in 1071, but its incrustation with marble not till
considerably later. It was consecrated on the 8th of October, 1085,
[Footnote: "To God the Lord, the glorious Virgin Annunciate, and the
Protector St. Mark."--_Corner_, p. 14. It is needless to trouble the
reader with the various authorities for the above statements: I have
consulted the best.
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