What happened on March 9 in Venice

According to the Venetian Liturgical Calendar, today is St. Frances of Rome’s Day

- March 9, 1499: the Veneto Senate selects the architect Pietro Lombardo to supervise the works on the Doge’s Palace, previously entrusted to Antonio Rizzo from Verona, who had already constructed the magnificent Scala dei Giganti and a large part of the facade on the courtyard; the total cost of the works amounted to the incredible sum of 97,000 ducats, to the point that Rizzo, charged with defrauding the treasury, had to flee: a chronicler writes: "No work was done and I discovered that he had falsified the policies for twelve thousand ducats and ran away and fled to Ròmagna, and soon after he died in Foligno; and all that is found belonging to him has been sold off».

- March 9, 1510: during the war against the League of Cambrai, the Blessed Virgin appears in Motta di Livenza to Giovanni Cigana, a 79-year-old farmer well-liked by all.

- March 9, 1705: Tommaso Temanza, architect, hydraulic engineer and art theorist, scholar of the Renaissance style and Palladio, is born in Venice, he gives impetus to the development of Venetian neoclassical architecture and is the author of 'Lives of the most famous Venetian architects and sculptors'.

Taken from 'Almanacco di Venezia -1600 anni ab Urbe còndita' by Andrea Gersich and Edoardo Rubini

Venice, 9th March 2021