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Le Convertite
Santa Maria Maddalena Il Redentore San Gerardo Sagredo San Giorgio Maggiore Sant’Eufemia Santa Croce Santi Cosma e Damiano Le Zittele Santa Maria della Presentazione |
History A convent founded in houses between 1530 and 1534, not until 1542-48 did the Augustinian sisters move to purpose-built premises, part of a complex including a convent and a hospice for reformed prostitutes and other sexually 'tainted' women. There was enlargement and rebuilding work on the oratory later in the same century was paid for by the merchant Bartolomeo Bontempelli, with reconsecration in 1579. Originally named for Mary Magdalene it became known as Le Convertite to reflect its role in converting 'fallen' women. The institution soon became notorious, however, due to its rector Fra Giovanni Pietro Leon using the 400 nuns as his personal harem. He would 'test' the women when they came to confess by fondling them during confession - if they resisted he would congratulate them on their resisting temptation. And then imprison and punish them until they gave in. He was denounced to the Council of Ten in 1561 and beheaded in Piazza San Marco. It took 13 attempts with the axe, evidently, before his head was removed with a knife. This was seen as evidence that beheading was deemed by God as too light a punishment for a man so wicked. and his remains were burned. Suppressed by the French in 1806, the complex became a hospital before the Austrians made it into a jail in 1857. It is still a women's prison, the entrance is under the flag to the right of the façade in the photo. On Thursday mornings organic fruit and vegetables grown by the inmates in the prison gardens are sold from a stall in front of the church. ![]() Lost art Palma Giovane painted The Apotheosis of St Mary Magdalen for the ceiling of the church here, with chiaroscuri of The Evangelists and Old Testament Scenes. All are now lost. Campanile Visible on the Merian map (see right). The church on TV In an episode of a 2010 Jamie Oliver cookery series Jamie does Venice he visits the prison, to pick vegetables from the gardens and cook minestrone soup for some suitably surly inmates. Vaporetto Sant’Eufemia |
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The facade
Art highlights
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Photo by Ryan Kasler |
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San Giorgio Maggiore |
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Interior
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Interior photo above by David Orme
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History ![]() The church and convent were founded in the 13th century, it is said, with the first documented mention in 1322. Eufamia Giustiniani entered this convent in 1425 at the age of seventeen and was the abbess here from 1440 to 1487. She was also the niece of Lorenzo Giustiniani, the bishop of San Pietro di Castello and later the first patriarch of Venice. The Giustiniani were one the of the four great patrician families in Venice, and claimed to be able to trace their ancestry back to the emperor Justinian. While she was abbess only four nuns died in the plague of 1446 and a knight who turned up at the door and asked for water was later identified as having been Saint Sebastian himself, so the well here was renamed after him and the waters were said to have miraculous powers. Prosperity and growth lead to the the church being rebuilt 1508-11, with a façade in the Tuscan style by an architect going by the name of Maestro Pellegrini. This is the church we see today. The church and convent were suppressed in 1806 with the nuns moving to San Zaccaria and the complex becoming a prison. I have also read that it was later used by an old people's home. Quite recently restored, it is currently being used for storage by the Venetian public records office. Upon suppression the relics of the blessed Eufemia were moved to the private chapel of the Giustiniani family on the Zattere. There they remained here until December 14, 1915, when the patriarch Pietro La Fontaine had them transferred to San Pietro di Castello, where they remain. Campanile Visible on the Merian map of 1635 (see below). ![]() Lost art A Virgin and Child by Lazzaro Bastiani from c.1465, from this convent, now in the Accademia. S. Antonio da Padova, S. Eliodoro and S. Filippo Neri by Antonio Zanchi now in San Pietro Martire on Murano, supposedly. Vaporetto Redentore map |
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History A convent was established here in 1481 by a Benedictine nun called Marina Celsi, who had been abbess at San Matteo on Murano and of Sant'Eufamia on Mazzorbo. The first stone was laid in 1491, with work completed in 1498. Consecrated in 1583, it is said that Mauro Codussi may have had a hand in the design of the church, he having been working at the time on San Michele in Isola and San Zaccaria, also for Benedictines. Upon suppression by Napoleon in 1806 the nuns moved to San Zaccaria. The church was stripped and became a warehouse, a barracks, and in 1887 a hospice for cholera victims. Sold in 1897 to the Herion Brothers who converted it into a textile factory (see interior photo right with the upper part of the chancel and two side chapels in the background) which it remained until the 1970s. The church was restored quite recently for use as office space for small businesses, the convent buildings having been long since converted to housing. A late 17th-century fresco in the dome of the chancel of The Virgin with Female Saints by Girolamo Pellegrini is said to be still in situ. Suitably the saints are all female, including Agnes, Lucy, Mary Magdalene, Giustina, Margaret and Agatha.
Lost art
Cloisters
Vaporetto Sant’Eufemia
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A photo from the late 19th-century showing
the original |
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![]() ![]() History The church of Santa Maria della Presentazione is better known as Le Zitelle, or 'The Spinsters', since here was a hospice for 'beautiful girls' from poor families whose beauty was thought to put them in danger of falling into prostitution. A prevention regime, than, as opposed to the nearby Convertite's concentration on helping already-fallen women. Poor young virgins were taken in, some as young as 12, and trained in lace and music making. They were kept protected until they were 18, when they could choose between marriage or the nunnery. If they chose marriage a husband was found and a dowry was provided. The hospice was founded by the Jesuit Benedetto Palmio in 1558, with the first forty arriving in 1561, and was patronised by Venetian noblewomen. Following expansion of the accommodation in the mid-1560s the church, arguably based on designs by Palladio of around 1576 for a different church, was built by Jacopo Bozzetto from 1581 to 1585. The church The Palladian façade is flanked by the wings of the hospice. The buildings extend around the back with a cloister behind the church. The complex is now a luxury hotel. ![]() Interior A small barrel-vaulted vestibule leads to a square nave. The girls' choir galleries were reached from the flanking buildings. Art highlights There are works here by Palma Giovane, Antonio Vassilacchi (a Greek painter and pupil of Paolo Veronese, also known as L'Aliense) and Francesco Bassano, one of the four sons of the better known Jacopo. The church in art The Giudecca with the Zitelle by Franceso Guardi, in the National Gallery in London. Another version (see above right) is to be found in the Kunsthaus Zurich. Opening times The church seems to have been acquired for visits by the company that runs the Scala Contarini del Bovolo, but you have to book in advance.
Vaporetto Zitelle |
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