140 THE STONES OF VENICE

been, the circumstances of the rite were otherwise very simple. Each maiden brought her dowry with her in a small “cassetta,” or chest; they went first to the cathedral, and waited for the youths, who having come, they heard mass together, and the bishop preached to them and blessed them; and so each bridegroom took his bride and her dowry, and bore her home.

§ 9. It seems that the alarm given by the attack of the pirates put an end to the custom of fixing one day for all marriages: but the main objects of the institution were still attained by the perfect publicity given to the marriages of all the noble families; the bridegroom standing in the court of the Ducal Palace to receive congratulations on his betrothal, and the whole body of the nobility attending the nuptials, and rejoicing, “as at some personal good fortune; since, by the constitution of the state, they are for ever incorporated together, as if of one and the same family.”* But the festival of the 2nd of February, after the year 943, seems to have been observed only in memory of the deliverance of the brides, and no longer set apart for public nuptials.

§ 10. There is much difficulty in reconciling the various accounts, or distinguishing the inaccurate ones, of the manner of keeping this memorable¹ festival. I shall first give Sansovino’s, which is the popular one, and then note the points of importance in the counter statements. Sansovino says that the success of the pursuit of the pirates was owing to the ready help and hard fighting of the men of the district of Sta. Maria Formosa, for the most part trunkmakers; and that they, having been presented after the victory to the Doge and the Senate, were told to ask some favour for their reward. “The good men then said that they desired the Prince, with his wife and the Signory, to visit every year the church of their district, on the day of its

* Sansovino.

¹ [The MS. reads “memorial.”]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]