Campo dei Mori
| Venice and its lagoon | |
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UNESCO world heritage 
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| Campo dei Mori, statue of a person in oriental clothing |
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| National territory: |
 Italy
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| Type: | Culture |
| Criteria : | i, ii, iii, iv, v, vi |
| Reference No .: | 394 |
| UNESCO region : | Europe and North America |
| History of enrollment | |
| Enrollment: | 1987 (session 11) |
The Campo dei Mori is a place in the district of Cannaregio in Venice . It is named after three marble statues, a fourth is located next door at the Fondamenta dei Mori, which depict Orientals with (subsequently added) turbans. They are dated to the 13th / 14th centuries.
It is often believed that the three statues on Campo represent three Greek brothers named Rioba, Sandi and Alfani, members of the Mastelli family who moved to Venice as merchants in the 12th century. They were called "Mori" because they came from the Morea . “The Mastelli family immigrated to Venice from Morea in 1112. ... The people for many centuries forgot this memory of Morea all the less when the three immigrant brothers ... had three large statues, clumsy figures in Greek costumes, set up at the corners of their houses. ... The Mastelli were very wealthy in Morea and, on their flight across the sea, brought with them significant riches, which are also symbolically indicated in the statues, which carry the whole house, as each of the three men has one on their shoulder Art wears a Felleisen , whose precious content can of course only be guessed. "
This is just as difficult to prove historically as the alternative interpretation that there was a trading post of Arabs (Moors) at this place.
Together with a relief on the facade of Palazzo Mastelli at the Fondamenta Gaspari Contarini, which depicts a traveler with a camel, these statues are documents of the Venetian cultural contact with the Middle East.
literature
- Institute du Monde Arabe, Metropolitan Museum of Art (Ed.): Venice and the Islamic World, 828–1797 . Yale University Press, 2007.