Campo Santa Fosca Historical Timeline

Origins

A church dedicated to Santa Fosca has stood on this site since at least the 10th century, making it one of the older religious foundations in Cannaregio. Its Gothic campanile, rebuilt in the second half of the 15th century, is the oldest structure still visible today -- an earlier bell tower had collapsed during a violent storm in 1410, causing some 60,000 ducats of damage across the city.

Turning points

On the evening of October 5, 1607, the theologian and Servite friar Paolo Sarpi was crossing the bridge beside this square when a group of hired assassins attacked him with stiletto knives, stabbing him three times and leaving him for dead. Sarpi survived. When his doctor asked who he thought was responsible, he reportedly answered, in Latin, "Agnosco stylum Romanae Curiae" -- "I recognize the style of the Roman Curia," a pun on stylum and stiletto pointed squarely at the Vatican.

Influential people

Sarpi had made himself a target through his role as Venice's chief theological and legal advisor during the Interdict of 1606-1607, a bitter standoff between the Republic and Pope Paul V. According to later accounts, the assassination attempt was arranged at the instigation of the Pope and his nephew, Cardinal Scipione Borghese, and carried out by a hired brigand named Rotilio Orlandini for a fee of 8,000 crowns. A statue of Sarpi now stands in the square, close to the site of the attack.

Cultural evolution

The church itself was substantially rebuilt starting in the early 18th century, re-consecrated in 1733, with a new facade designed by the architect Domenico Rossi completed by 1741. Of the medieval church, only the campanile and the building's general footprint survive; almost everything else visible today dates from this 18th-century campaign.

Present-day significance

Campo Santa Fosca remains a genuine neighborhood square in Cannaregio, away from the densest tourist routes, where the church and the Sarpi monument sit side by side as reminders of two very different chapters of Venetian history -- one religious, one political.