The Toledo chronicle. [volume] (Toledo, Tama County, Iowa) 1873-1924, 1877-12-06
The Famous Horses Of Venice.

But one of the most wonderful things
about Venice is that, with the excep-
ton of those / intend to tell you about,
there are no horses there. How
charming it must be, you think, when
you want to visit a friend, to run down
the marble steps of some old palace,
step into gondola, and glide swiftly
and noiselessly away, instead of jolting
and rumbling along over the cobble-
stones! And then to come back by
moonlight, and hear the low plash Of
the oar in the water, and the distant
voices of the boatmen singing some
love-sick song-oh, It's as good as a
play! M 80
Of course there are no carts in Ven.
ice; and the fish-mah, the vegetables
man, the butcher, the baker and the
candlestick maker, all glide softly up
in their boats to the kitchen door
with their vendibles, and chatter and
haggle with the cook for half an hotir,
after the manner of market-men the
world over.
So YOU see the little b1ack-eyed We
netian boys and girls gaze on the bra
zen horses in st. Marks Square with
as much wonder and curiosity as 0iifs
when we look upon griffin or Uni
corn.
These horses-there are four of them
have quite history of their own.
They once formed part of q group made
by a celebrated sculptor OF antiquity,
named Lysippus. He was of such &C.
knowledgad merit that he was one of
the three included in the famous edict
of Alexander, which gave to Apelles
the sole right Of painting his portrait,
to Lysippns that Of sculpturing bis form
in any style, and to Pyrgoteles that Of
engraving it upon precious stones.
Lysippus executed group of twenty
five Equestrian statues Of the Made
DOMAIN horses that fell at the passage
of the Granicus, and of this group the
horses now at Venice formed part.
They were cafried from Alsxandrie To
Rome by Augustus, who placed them
on his tridmphal arch. Afterward
Nero, Domitian and Trajan successive
ly transferred them to arches of their
own. 49, gE5.s ~ skfzSs So
When Constantine removed the cap
.ital of the Roman Empire to the an
cient Byzantium, he sought to beautify
it by all means in his power, and for
this purpose he removed a great num-
ber of works of art from Rome to Con-
stantinople, and among them these
bronze horses Of Lysippus. !. q il
In the early part Of the thirteenth
century the fobles of France and Ger
many, who were going on the fourth
crusade, arrived at Venice, and stipu=:
lated with the Venetians for means OF
transport to the Holy Land. But, in
stead Of proceeding to Jerusalem, they
were diverted from their original inten-
ton, and, under the leadership of the
blind old Doge, Dandolo, they captured
the City of Constantinople. The fall
of the city was followed by an almost
total destruction of the works of art by
which it had been adorned; for the Lat
ins disgraced themselves by more
ruthless vandalism than that of the
Vandals themselves.
But out of the wreck the four bronze
horses were saved and carried in
triumph to Venice, where they were
placed over the central porch of St.
Marks Cathedral. There they stood
until Napoleon Bonapafte, in 1897, re-
moved them, with other trophies, to
Paris; but after his downfall they were
restored, and, as Byron says in "Childe
Harold'':
before st. Mark, still glow his steeds of brass
Their Rilded collars giittering in thesun. "a
Mary Lloyd, in st. Nicholas for Decena'
Der.