Santa Maria della Salute Site Features

The sacristy

The most significant paintings are not in the main church but in the sacristy, which carries a separate small admission. Titian's early ceiling panels of Cain and Abel, The Sacrifice of Isaac, and David and Goliath are here, along with his St Mark Enthroned with Saints, painted as a plague votive after an earlier epidemic. Tintoretto's Marriage at Cana hangs on the end wall.

The floor

The centre of the nave carries an inscription reading unde origo inde salus -- "from the origin comes salvation" -- laid into a pattern of concentric circles beneath the dome, marking the point the November procession converges on.

The votive festival

The Festa della Madonna della Salute on 21 November is a genuine civic occasion rather than a staged one. Venetians cross the pontoon bridge to light a candle, and stalls outside sell castradina, a mutton dish eaten in the city essentially only on this day.