The church of San Domenico stands on the island of the same name, north-east of the town, and recalls the presence of the Dominican friars in Chioggia from the late thirteenth century. In 1287 it was decided to found a convent here, and by 1291 church and convent, in Romanesque style, were finished. From this island a long bridge then ran to Clodia minor, today's Sottomarina; it was destroyed in the war between Genoa and Venice and never rebuilt.
What to see
Damaged by the War of Chioggia and later by a fire in the mid-seventeenth century, the church was rebuilt to a design by the Venetian Pietro Pelle, who in the same years was also working on San Giacomo; in 1770 a decree of the Venetian Senate removed the friars, and the convent later became a military area. From the old church survives the fourteenth-century bell tower, 29 metres high, restored between 1497 and 1503 by the master builder Giorgio di Menagio, as an inscription on the south side records. The interior is 55 metres long, 25 wide and 21 high. On the inner façade are four canvases by Pietro Damini of 1619-1620, including Saint Hyacinth of Poland saving shipwrecked men; beside the high altar are a Deposition by Leandro Bassano and the Ecstasy of Saint Thomas by Domenico Tintoretto, and two altars have altarpieces by Andrea Vicentino.
The high altar, in Carrara marble, was bought in 1812 from a suppressed church in Venice, and frames the great crucifix venerated by the people of Chioggia: almost five metres high, it has the body of Christ carved from a single block of willow, and under the linen cloth laid over the wood small cords were inserted to make the veins stand out. It is a work of northern origin, datable to the mid-fourteenth century; it is known to have come from Iesi and to have been fished out of the water near the island after the ship carrying it was wrecked. Fishermen painted its image on their boats, and for the first procession, in 1814, part of the façade had to be knocked down to get it out.
Visiting
The church is on the island of San Domenico. In the chapel to the right of the entrance are some forty «tolèle», votive panels showing fishing boats in shipwreck. Opening hours should be checked on site or with the diocese.
Our editors' tip
On the north wall look for Vittore Carpaccio's Saint Paul receiving the stigmata, a canvas dated 1520.
