Palazzo dei Dieci Savi Site Features

Thirty-seven arches

The portico along the Ruga degli Orefici runs to 37 arches, with the 37 mullioned windows above repeating the count on each upper floor. The building's whole effect is arithmetic rather than ornament -- a government office expressing itself through repetition.

The frescoed vaults

The cross-vaults inside the portico still carry their frescoes in largely good condition. They are directly overhead on a public walkway that thousands of people pass under daily without looking up.

The 1848 lion

A bas-relief Lion of St Mark was cut into the facade during the Republic of San Marco, Daniele Manin's revolutionary government, which lasted seventeen months before the Austrians retook the city. It is a piece of an uprising left on a tax office.

Justice on the corner

A 16th-century statue of Justice stands at a second-floor corner -- the appropriate figure for a building put up to house the magistrates who assessed and collected the Republic's taxes.