Church of Madonna dell'Orto

Church in Venice

Chiesa Della Madonna Dell Orto, Venice (Italy) — CC BY-SA 4.0 / Clara Polo Sabat

The Madonna dell’Orto is a church in Venice, Italy, in the sestiere of Cannaregio. The church was erected by the now-defunct religious order the “Humiliati” in the mid-14th century, under the direction of Tiberio da Parma, who is buried in the interior. It was initially dedicated to St. Christopher, patron saint of travellers, but its popular name suggesting consecration to Holy Virgin comes from the following century, when an allegedly miraculous statue of the Madonna, commissioned for the Church of S. Maria Formosa but rejected, was brought to the Church from the nearby orchard (orto in Italian) where it had languished.

The church lay on weak foundations and in 1399 a restoration project was financed by the city’s Maggior Consiglio. The Humiliati, due to their “depraved customs”, were ousted in 1462 and the Madonna dell’Orto was assigned to the congregation of Canons Regular of San Giorgio in Alga. The latter order was suppressed in 1668, and the following year the Church and convent annexed were handed over to Cistercians of Lombardy. In 1787 the church came under public administration. Restoration was begun under Austrian rule in the 1840s and finished in 1869, by which time Venice had become part of the unified Kingdom of Italy.

The façade, built in 1460–1464, has sloping sides and is in brickwork, divided in three parts by two pilasters strips. The two side sections have quadruple mullioned windows, while the central has a large rose window. The portal is surmounted by a pointed arch with white stone decorations portraying, on the summit, St. Christopher, the Madonna and the Archangel Gabriel by Nicolò di Giovanni Fiorentino and Antonio Rizzo. Under is a tympanum, in porphyry, supported by circular pilaster strips. The whole is included into a porch with Corinthian columns.

The upper central section is decorated by small arches and bas-reliefs with geometrical motifs. The upper sides have instead twelve niches each, containing statues of the Apostles. Five other Gothic niches are in the central section, with 18th-century statues representing Prudence, Charity, Faith, Hope and Temperance, taken from the demolished church of Santo Stefano.

The Church of Madonna dell'Orto appears in our Complete Guide to Visiting Venice!

This website uses affiliate links which may earn a commission at no additional cost to you!