The most beautiful palaces in Venice. Palazzo Ca' Dario - the damned palace of Venice On the topic of interiors and exteriors of the palazzo

Venice is a surprisingly multifaceted city, rich in its history, which has seen its ups and downs. Among all this, there was a place for the history of the cursed Palazzo Dario. The story is so famous that the artist Claude Monet was interested in it, and venerable writers dedicated their works to it... But I have not heard the answer to this story. Maybe you know her? It’s easy to miss a lot in the information flow. In the meantime, here’s a story about what cast such a dark shadow over one of the most unusual palazzos in Venice.

Almost no building in Venice was mentioned in Donna Leon’s detective stories, including Palazzo Dario:
Brunetti stood in the same place for a minute, then went to one of the windows and lifted the curtain. The Grand Canal stretched below, the sun's reflections played on the water, reflected on the walls of Palazzo Dario located to the left; the golden tiles from which the mosaic was made on the façade of the palace caught the light emanating from the water; breaking up into many sparks, it again rushed down to the canal. Boats sailed by as time passed.
Donna Leon, "Counting in Venetian"

The little red dot on the map is Palazzo Dario:

First, some help from Wiki:

Ca" Dario or Palazzo Dario (Italian: Ca" Dario, Palazzo Dario) is a palace in Venice, in the Dorsoduro district. One side faces the Grand Canal, the other faces Barbaro Square. Opposite the palace is the marina of Santa Maria de Giglio. The palace is a magnificent example of Renaissance architecture. The mosaic facade made of colored marble attracts attention. The palace was built in 1487. Among the owners of the mansion was the French poet Henri de Regnier, who lived here at the end of the 19th century. The palace is also famous for the fact that one of the weddings of the famous film director Woody Allen took place here. The palace has a bad reputation as a cursed house. The owners of the mansion were repeatedly subjected to violence, became bankrupt or committed suicide. The last death occurred in 1993, when one of Italy's richest industrialists shot himself here after a corruption scandal broke out. In 2005, German writer Petra Reske published the best-selling book Palazzo Dario.
http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%9A%D0%B0%27_%D0%94%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%B8%D0%BE

Here are quotes from the said book by Petra Reschi (slightly abbreviated and highlighted in blue) and we will continue the story about Palazzo Dario. I will add my notes to the quotes in black.

“More precisely, they call him “Ka Dario,” said Wanda’s traveling companion. – Previously, all the palaces in Venice were called “Ca”, from casa, and only the Doge’s Palace was called a palazzo, Palazzo Ducale. But today things are looked at more broadly. You are surprised, signorina, aren't you? Yes, there is a lot that foreigners don’t know. Just imagine, one American woman recently asked me why the city is so flooded with water. I answered her: “Signora, this is how we wash the streets.”

The map shows the small Palazzo Dario in the center and other palazzos nearby:

Reschi's book details the curse of the palazzo and how it affected its inhabitants. Here are just a few brief mentions:

“I mean the curse,” he replied, somewhat annoyed that she had interrupted him. “The palazzo where your uncle lives brings bad luck.” Many Venetians say that Palazzo Dario especially does not like businessmen, but, on the contrary, saves artists. We Venetians always try to find a pattern in everything. But she's not here. Massimo Miniato, for example, was a businessman and survived in this palace. And the antiques dealer Fabio delle Fenestrelle, on the contrary, in my opinion, was more of an artist. The only pattern that I see here is that misfortune, like powdery mildew, falls on each of its inhabitants. Very few survived and left the palace themselves.

– The first tenant of Ka Dario, as far as I remember, was the American Robert Boulder. After him there was Fabio delle Fenestrelle. He ran an antique store. After him there was a hippie, Mick Swinton, he was the manager of the rock band What. Then Massimo Miniato Sassoferato, financier, as he called himself, whatever that means. And then Aldo Vergato. The richest man in Italy. You've heard about him, of course. Even Ka Dario didn't bring him happiness, that's for sure. Oh yeah, I probably forgot to mention that none of them survived in Palazzo Dario. That is, there was one who survived, but he was also unlucky. And these are only those who have lived there in the last fifty years. If you think about the fact that the palazzo is over five hundred years old, who knows what scenes were played out there that we know nothing about.

“In Ka Dario,” the gentleman answered, “they always celebrated something, at all times.” I think there is hardly another palazzo in which so much fun was had. During the times of Mick Swinton and Miniato, the parties boomed one after another. “Kilograms of cocaine. These were not holidays, these were orgies." “Bras and panties were flying out of the windows,” said taxi drivers who were forced to stand below the pier all night long.

– During Vergato’s time, Ca Dario was calm. And after his death, the house was empty for quite a long time; no one dared to buy it, although the price was quite reasonable. In my opinion, at first this American director became interested in him. He just had a burning desire, ten billion more for a Renaissance palazzo on the world famous Grand Canal - it’s just a gift. He always comes to Venice with his wife on New Year's Eve and stays at the Hotel Gritti just opposite Ca Dario. Perhaps one day at breakfast he looked at the house and calculated how many nights he would have to spend in Venice to justify those ten billion. And with prices like those at the Gritti Hotel, these nights wouldn't be that many. There, renting one suite costs a million, that is, the cost of almost ten thousand nights in Ca Dario. And if he were destined to spend them there, they would fly by in thirty years, which for a city like Venice is tantamount to the flap of a wing. However, he refused the deal. They say he learned about the curse of the palazzo.

All his life, Boulder dreamed of living on the world famous Grand Canal in Venice. He knew that many famous singers, composers, artists, writers and poets lived in the fashionable palazzos of the world famous Grand Canal: Hemingway and Rainer Maria Rilke, Hugo von Hoffmannstel and Marcel Proust, and even the Queen Mother herself. He bought Palazzo Dario from a mysterious guy whom he had seen only twice in his life at the Florian cafe. This guy's eyes burned like coals. He offered his empty palace at a ridiculous price. Boulder, who never turned down a good deal, agreed without hesitation. Did he then assume that by concluding this deal, he thereby handed over his soul to a dark force?

People like Robert Boulder are unlikely to be sensitive to such sensations at all. And even more so, Americans, unlike Europeans, are completely insensitive to spiritualistic phenomena. If a mysterious man with sparkling eyes had told Boulder that there was a curse on Palazzo Dario that had cost the lives of all its previous owners, he would have laughed in response. Perhaps he might have been impressed by the accident that befell Mario del Monaco, the famous tenor, after he had negotiated a price with a mysterious man and signed a contract to purchase the ill-fated palace. On the way back to Treviso, the singer's elegant limousine overturned and, still recovering from his terrible injuries, he canceled the purchase of Ca Dario.

Boulder, however, took ownership of Palazzo Dario with complete confidence. Having wildly celebrated the signing of the purchase agreement at the Florian cafe, he boarded a gondola on the St. Mark's embankment. The moon, making its nightly round, entailed a trail of light along the water of the world famous Grand Canal. A trail of ghostly radiance lay like a shroud on Palazzo Dario, but Boulder did not feel that the cold fingers of the curse were already touching him.
– Stunning Venetian light! - he sighed while the gondolier paddled steadily through the black water of the world famous Grand Canal.

The boy's heart began to beat wildly because Boulder immediately invited him to lunch at Palazzo Dario.
A little later they entered the palace through the wrought iron gates. Boulder leaned his shoulder against the heavy oak door, and Girolamo found himself in a room with a cool white marble floor, bathed in the soft, warm amber light of tall candles. There were ancient musical instruments there: harps, cymbals, lyres and spinets.
– Do you study music? - Girolamo whispered.
“No,” Boulder answered and smiled with some contempt. “It was Juan who wanted to furnish the salon with musical instruments.”

He then took him around the palace and even showed him the “luxurious” bathroom, noting the delight with which Girolamo looked at the bidet made from a single piece of marble. In the salon, the boy especially liked the tiger skins with tan marks, and in the hallway he was scared to death by the small marble children's sarcophagi.
“Oh, these are just hat stands,” Boulder smiled, noticing that the boy was scared.

On the topic of interiors and exteriors of the palazzo:

Among its rivals challenging each other on the world-famous Grand Canal, Palazzo Dario looked exhausted. Yellow-gray fragility incarnate. A house of cards that only holds up because its base is wider than the upper floors. it seemed that it was enough to just touch a small piece of its marble and the entire palace would silently collapse and collapse into the world famous Grand Canal. On the base of the palace was engraved GENIO URBIS JOANNES DARIO - “Giovanni Dario to the genius of the city.” Above, three narrow windows with pointed arches, chained with triple bars, rushed upward, as if they were intended to protect the harem. The marble façade was decorated with medallions made of green granite and red porphyry - the painted, made-up face of the palace was reflected in the water.

But even this beautiful mask could not hide the conspicuous thinness, although it set off all three floors - two piano nobile, aristocratic floors, conceived for viewing, and not as housing, and a modest, restrained upper floor. The palazzo stretched coyly and swaggered in its entire appearance, but individually each floor was nothing more than an impressive salon. On the ground floor was the Mohamed Salon, named after Sultan Mohamed II, to whom the architect Giovanni Dario owed his fame and fortune.

On the second floor there was a pink salon. Next to it was a library, a luxurious bathroom, a bedroom, small guest rooms and closets with storage.

Within the walls of the palace pier it was cold, damp and dark. Generations of Venetian architecture students devoted their diploma theses to these marble arches, vaults and columns of late medieval and Renaissance piers and quays.

The marble vaults were washed away by the tides, and they were completely covered with pockmarks and chips due to endless flooding. On the pier of Sopraport, two marble figurines of boys, whose foreskin had been chewed off by water, held in their hands the turquoise and white striped coat of arms of the Dario family. Everything that was once beautiful about them crumbled and disappeared: limbs, curls, noses - now the salt was biting into their faces. One of them had such a cavity in the lower part of his face, as if he had leprosy.

Take the stairs to the second floor. The corridor was decorated with gilded plaster rosettes - examples of eerie rococo. But what can you do? For five centuries, the palazzo digested all its inhabitants, calmly and silently.

Some of them believed that they could express themselves by building a marble fountain, while others tried to embody their creative impulses by equipping the palace with a dumbwaiter to deliver food to the upper floors.

But what all its residents valued as the individuality of the house - the white and golden tiled stoves of the Rococo era and the ceilings decorated with plaster rosettes, was nothing more than worthless tinsel decoration, which, however, could not spoil the true originality and individuality of the Palazzo Dario.

Of the three floors of the palazzo, Radomir occupied mainly only the third. On the second floor, that is, the first of the piano nobile, one could only live in the summer. The Sovraintendenza, the Office for the Protection of Monuments, has prohibited the heating of this salon in order to preserve the unique examples of stucco in it. Therefore, the furniture on the second floor dozed under white sheets during the winter months. Radomir opened this piano nobile only in exceptional cases, for example, when he received photographers from publishing houses producing albums of Venice, naturally, for a certain monetary compensation.

He didn’t care in which album the photographs of his palace would appear: “Life in Venice”, “Venetian Palazzos”, “Palazzo of the world famous Grand Canal” - Radomir and his Palazzo Dario should have appeared in any of them: Palazzo Dario - view from water; Palazzo Dario - view from the garden; detail of the marble fountain at the entrance; second floor fountain; luxurious third floor bathroom.

Second floor. Window glass, cast with a generous dose of lead, painted the interior a bright pink color.

The pink salon was crammed with furniture, of which until now only an Empire style couch could be used. Everything else: chairs with graceful legs, chests, cabinets, chests of drawers, magnificent inlaid tables and secretaries made of root wood - seemed to demonstrate indignation at the very idea of ​​​​using them for their intended purpose.

“You know, in a certain sense, I have a special relationship with Palazzo Dario, because thanks to me, it preserved the original furniture,” he said proudly. “Who knows what would have happened if someone else had bought it.” The best items from it would then be in Milanese salons or in America. And Venetian antiques would not tolerate this. He needs the Venetian climate. High humidity. If you put it in an American apartment, where the air conditioner works in the summer and everything dries out in the winter due to heating, it will very soon come to an end.

From the history of the owners of the palazzo:

– Palazzo Dario holds many secrets for me as an art historian. A lot of circumstances hide the truth about him. For a long time there was not a single worthy historical evidence, except for the inscription “Genio Urbis Joannes Darius” on the facade, but such a meager message did not limit human imagination, rather the opposite. And perhaps this is precisely what should be considered as the source of endless stories about the palace.

– Palazzo Dario is the only one in Venice named after its creator. The inscription on the facade is a sign of Giovanni Dario's respect for his homeland. Giovanni Dario was one of the few owners of palaces on the world famous Grand Canal who were not aristocrats. Most likely, the aristocrats of the world famous Grand Canal considered him an upstart, and all his life he fought for public recognition.

“Once I looked at the magnificent decoration of this facade, and it seemed to me that I saw in it the elegant nuances of the early Lombard style.
...a balcony with an iron balustrade, installed in the 18th century, emphasizes the splendor of the facade decoration, the same can be said about the grille for the lower windows near the water.

One of the rooms was almost entirely covered in copper. Above the windows of the second floor hall there is a Gothic amazingly inlaid cornice. Palazzo Dario, undoubtedly, became a worthy possession and home of its creator - Giovanni Dario, whose name we read on the facade.

– The Dario family belongs to the most famous and ancient in Venice. It comes from Crete. Giovanni Dario was supposedly born in 1414. By origin he was a tradesman, not a patrician, and a member of, on the one hand, the honorary, and on the other hand, the minor group of Senate secretaries. He performed various duties in the Council of Ten, led quite significant departments in the Senate and carried out various assignments...
– Many historians have appreciated the merits of Giovanni Dario. Tentori, for example, admires him, almost idolizes him, as a person with a wealth of experience and talent as a politician. Lecomte of the Faculty of History at the University of Montelier writes that Dario was already appointed ambassador of the Republic in 1450. However, this statement is not scientific; it is unproven.

...To Paolo Morosini, our honored historian from Padua, we owe the fact that it was Giovanni Dario who managed to make peace with the Sultan of Turkey, the terrible Mohamed II, conqueror of Constantinople...
– Dario was authorized in 1478 by Doge Giovanni Mocenigo with unlimited rights to decide and conclude peace with Mohamed II.
– Giovanni Dario was held in high esteem in Constantinople, as evidenced by two extremely interesting letters in which he describes the luxurious reception he received in that city...
...for establishing peace with Mohamed II, the Republic granted him possession of Noventa in Padua and, in addition, a thousand ducats from the salt magistracy as a dowry for his illegitimate daughter Marietta. And Mohamed gave him three gold-woven outfits...

...and Dario's family settled in the palace: Dario with his mistress Chiara, his daughter Marietta and his two nephews Andrea and Francesco Pantaleo.
- How? Giovanni Dario was not married?
- Apparently not. But there are no direct indications of this. Giovanni Dario was seventy-five years old when he settled in his palace, and his life was already clouded with thoughts of illness and death. Then he made a will. And in the same year, his daughter Marietta married the patrician Vincenzo Barbaro.

These Barbaros were a very influential and aristocratic family. They lived in a nearby palazzo. On May 1, 1494, at the age of eighty, Giovanni Dario died. After his death, the palace came into the possession of the Barbaro family. Until the beginning of the 19th century it remained their property. With the death of Dario, some kind of fate came upon his heirs and descendants...
– Marietta was unlucky with her husband; Vincenzo Barbaro’s temper and anger were known to everyone. Soon he was expelled from the Grand Council for ten years for insulting one lawyer.

“Marietta suffered because of her husband’s shameful position. And after the death of her father, she also died soon. Young and unhappy. She was not even twenty. In the prime of youth! In the bedroom of the Palazzo Dario from a heart attack. And a few years after her death, Dario’s nephews were brutally and mysteriously killed by robbers. Neither he nor his daughter found peace even after death. The church of Santa Maria delle Grazia, where they were buried, was blown up in 1849. The fact is that since 1810 it housed a gunpowder warehouse, which was blown up when the Austrians entered here.

– We are grateful for these numerous valuable references and facts to the work of Raudon Labocca Brown, author of the famous study of the life of Maria Sanuto. Raudon Brown was the owner of the Dario Palace from 1838 to 1842. He bought it for four hundred and eighty pounds sterling from the Marquis of Ebdoll, an Armenian diamond merchant who represented Saxony in Venice until he unexpectedly went bankrupt.

...in the last years of the last century, a boarding house was located in the palazzo. The central chapter of his story. At that time it belonged to the Countess de la Baume Plouvignelle. She was friends with many thinkers, the French poet Henri de Regnier was her frequent guest in the early years of the 20th century, the inscription on the garden wall still reminds of him...

“It was Countess de la Baume Pluvignel who initiated the decisive restoration work, when, for example, the fountain on the third floor was rebuilt.

She, however, went a little overboard with the decorations, in a word, she overloaded the palace. By her order, large mirrors were hung, they still hang today, and majolica stoves were installed. As D'Annunzio rightly noted then, Palazzo Dario turned into “a decrepit courtesan, bent under the weight of her jewelry.” The poet lived at that time opposite, in the casetta rossa (pink house).

They tried to make a connection between the ebb and flow of the tides - as one of the mysteries of the palazzo:

– What does the curse of Palazzo Dario have to do with the flood? – Wanda did not let up. - All of Venice suffers from him.
- But not during low tide?! Palazzo Dario is the only palace in which the water remains standing even during low tide in the world famous Grand Canal. And it started almost immediately after our arrival: water suddenly rose through the sewer hole - black, smelly, and flooded the entire first floor. We thought it was a real flood and didn't understand why the siren didn't sound. And then we looked out of the window and it turned out that the water in the world famous Grand Canal had gone out with the tide. It had gone so far that even the boat would not have approached the pier.

– Maybe there’s something wrong with the drain? This happens often,” said Wanda.
Mikel even raised his voice.
– Yes, we had the head of the city hall’s department for floods, magistratto delle acque. And I couldn’t say anything! - he shouted.

The bells on the Campanile struck midnight and the moon bathed the city in silver light. Anya took a deep breath. The first line of vaporetto went towards the imposing church of Santa Maria della Salute. As they approached Palazzo Dario, soft light fell on its pale Istrian marble, illuminating it in a festive way.

Wanda's tension eased a little. She began to get her bearings again as they sailed through the Rio San Maurizio towards the world famous Grand Canal. So Primo really was taking her to Palazzo Dario. Palazzo Morosini dai Leoni, where the Guggenheim Museum was located, lay like an unfinished cake on the embankment. Near Rio de le Toresele between Palazzo Dario and the American Consulate. Primo brought the gondola to the portico of Palazzo Dario.
...And Palazzo Dario with its porta nera (black gate)!

Reska's book tells with great humor how various magic charlatans were invited to the palazzo to cleanse it of the curse. And here quite a cool theory of the origin of the curse due to the poor location of the palazzo:

– Basically everything is clear. So to speak, mathematically,” Wanda said. “Of course, neither you nor your predecessors even bothered to look at the map of the city and how Palazzo Dario is located. But once you take a look, everything will become clear to anyone who has even the slightest bit of imagination.
She went to the library and, taking out a map of Venice, laid it out on the table in front of Radomir.
“I’ll show you what the magician Alexander explained to me.” Do you see that the world famous Grand Canal is shaped like a snake or even a dragon? It divides the city into two parts. Here, above, at Margera's, is the head of a dragon. – Wanda pointed her index finger along the world famous Grand Canal. – Here, below, we find ourselves in an area that brings misfortune, because this is the tail of the dragon, the most unlucky place, although contradictory at the same time.
– Why contradictory? – asked Radomir.
“Have patience,” said Wanda, “just listen for once.” The place where Ka Dario stands is very negative. On the one hand, the palace is located on the left bank...
...And left means negative,” Radomir finished for her.

- ABOUT! Bravo! – Wanda responded. – Look, we are making progress in the world of the unknown! On the other hand, at the end of the world famous Grand Canal is the island of San Giorgio, named after St. George, who defeated the dragon. It neutralizes negative energy.
“Sounds logical,” Radomir agreed.
“Across from us is the symbol of Venice – St. Mark’s Cathedral,” Wanda continued confidently. – And both saints, St. Mark and St. George, must drive out evil spirits and destroy the dark power of the dragon.
“But if you look closely at the palazzo, its asymmetry becomes clearly visible. Besides, there are seventeen windows in the palace, which is very bad. And the inscription: “Genio Urbis Joannes Darius.” Dedication to the city. Like a dedication to the dragon, Alexander said. The same. He also tried to find out what the twenty-three letter anagram meant. It means: Sub ruina insidosa genero (under the rubble, treason is born). This means that everyone who moves into this palace will be destroyed,” Wanda finished.

The book is an interesting read, but - Petra Reski did not give her version of the origin of the curse and left the ending open - it can be interpreted in different ways. For those who like to read books with humor, but without a logical ending, this is suitable.

I will add just a few interesting facts to the history of Palazzo Dario.

They wanted to rebuild the palazzo. On the left is a drawing of the existing facade, on the right is a drawing of the proposed reconstruction, which never took place:

The famous French impressionist artist Claude Monet and his wife visited Venice:

The history of Palazzo Dario interested Claude Monet and views of the building were immortalized in the artist’s paintings:

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And we saw this palazzo when we went straight from St. Mark’s Square in this direction.

Ca' Dario, also known as Palazzo Dario, is one of the palaces of Venice, standing on the banks of the Grand Canal in the Dorsoduro quarter at the mouth of the Rio delle Torreselle. One of its facades faces the canal, and the other faces Campiello Barbaro Square. Opposite is the Santa Maria de Giglio marina.

Ca' Dario was built in 1487 in the then popular Venetian Gothic style, and since then its mosaic façade, made of colored marble, has invariably attracted the attention of passers-by. The house itself is an excellent example of Renaissance architecture. It received its name from Giovanni Dario, secretary of the Senate of Venice, diplomat and merchant. After Dario's death, the palace became the property of his daughter Marietta, who married Vincenzo Barbaro, the son of the owner of the nearby Palazzo Barbaro. Subsequently, the Venetian Senate occasionally rented the Palazzo to house Turkish diplomats.

As mentioned above, one of the facades of Ca' Dario faces the small square of Campiello Barbaro, named after the aristocratic Barbaro family. This façade is notable for its Gothic arches. At the end of the 19th century, when the Palazzo belonged to the French aristocrat and writer Countess de la Baume-Pluvinel, it underwent a large-scale restoration. The Countess herself surrounded herself with French and Venetian writers, one of whom, Henri de Regnier, is immortalized in an inscription on the wall in the garden: “In this ancient house, in 1899-1901, the French poet Henri de Regnier lived and wrote.” It was on the initiative of the Countess that a staircase was built in Ca’ Dario, external chimneys and stoves lined with majolica were made. And in the dining room on the second floor, facing the garden, elegant carved decorations appeared.

In 1908, the great Claude Monet depicted Palazzo Dario on his canvas - today this painting is kept in the Art Institute of Chicago. And at the end of the 20th century, the wedding of the famous Hollywood director Woody Allen took place here. The building itself is now privately owned and is usually closed to the public. However, under an agreement between the owner of the Palazzo and the Venetian art museum "The Peggy Guggenheim Collection", it occasionally hosts special cultural events.

It must be said that Ka' Dario has the reputation of a cursed house. Its owners repeatedly committed suicide, went bankrupt, or became victims of accidents. For example, Marietta, the daughter of Giovanni Dario, committed suicide after her husband Vincenzo Barbaro went bankrupt and he himself was stabbed to death. Their son died tragically in Crete. At the beginning of the 19th century, the Palazzo was bought by the Armenian merchant Arbit Abdoll, who went bankrupt shortly after the acquisition. The next owner of the building, Englishman Radon Brown, also committed suicide. Another owner of the Palazzo, American Charles Briggs, was forced to flee Venice to Mexico due to accusations of homosexuality, and there his lover shot himself. In 1970, the Turin Count Filippo Giordano delle Lanze was killed in Vdorets, and a couple of years later, the next owner of Ca’ Dario, Keith Lambert, tragically died (fell down the stairs). The last tragedy took place in 1993 - then one of the richest industrialists in Italy, who was involved in a corruption scandal, shot himself.

Other people's stories ran after her like stray dogs. Wanda Viarelli has been on the road for ages. The train journey from Naples to Venice usually lasted nine hours, if the trip went well - without strikes or suicides on the rails.

Opposite sat an elderly gentleman with sunken cheeks. He talked and talked as if he had been waiting for this moment for a long time. Only occasionally falling silent, he himself was probably surprised that he trusted this red-haired woman, but after a second he began to speak again.

For Wanda, this was a familiar, familiar and annoying situation. She encouraged everyone to talk. Since childhood, she has been a collector of human confessions, revelations, anecdotes and secrets. “You must learn to listen!” - her mother inspired her, who, however, did not suspect on what fertile ground her advice would fall. Usually, it was enough for Wanda to sit opposite a person, slightly bowing her head, and look at him friendly, so that he would immediately feel trust in her. As a child, Wanda calmly accepted this ability, as, in fact, other capabilities of her body, for example, the ability to move her little toe so that the other fingers remained at rest, or curl her tongue in her mouth. It was. All her life. Even on the train on the Circumvesuviana line between Naples and Pompeii, Wanda managed to collect a bunch of confessions, despite the fact that such a trip lasted no more than half an hour.

But on the way to Venice, she tried to hide behind the pages of a book, because her patience was not unlimited. She was reading Intimate Histories of the Venetian Republic. This collection was given to her before her departure by Mirat, an employee from the “New Time” department. It was an antique edition from 1893. Handing her the book, Mirate smacked his lips with relish. And at that moment, when the train passed Caserta, that is, a few pages from the beginning of the book, Wanda was just reading about how the Venetian Antonio Filacanevo, who lived on Cale dei Fuseri near San Luca, was sentenced in 1440 to six months in prison and how he was driven with a whip from San Marco Square to the Rialto Bridge for giving his eight-year-old daughter to be molested by a certain Fiore di Bologna - an elderly gentleman with sunken cheeks entered the compartment. Gray hair clung to his skull, his eyes peered out of his pasty face like raisins from a puff pastry, and his entire complexion was concentrated on his eggplant-like nose. He sat down on the sofa opposite Wanda, pulled up his trouser legs at the knees and carefully placed his feet parallel to one another. Wanda smiled welcomingly, and he immediately cleared his throat:

– Also to Venice?

“I am a Venetian,” said his counterpart. He said it as if it was his own merit. “You must be planning to spend your vacation in Venice?” Excuse my curiosity, signorina.

He spoke with a French "r", as befits the refined inhabitants of northern Italy, who do not roll out their "r" in the Mediterranean way, but almost silently crush it in the larynx, like a grape.

- No, not on vacation. “I’m moving to Venice,” Wanda answered politely.

- How interesting! In this case, you will bestow your beauty on our small city.

Wanda nodded with easy politeness, thanking her for the compliment, and continued reading. She did this with such a look and feeling, as if she wanted to absorb even the printing ink from every line. She noisily flipped through the pages, smoothing them out, her index finger following each letter. In vain.

– Have you already found an apartment for yourself? – her neighbor asked, not letting the conversation dry up. – Rent prices now are simply astronomical.

- I'm going to see my uncle. He lives in Palazzo Dario.

And then the gentleman with the sunken cheeks changed his complexion, and his nose regained its normal shade. He took a deep breath and there was no stopping him.

“Venice, signorina, is very talkative, here everyone tells something, everyone says something to someone.” The waves whisper, the walls whisper. Everyone knows everyone. This is ineradicable, we are powerless here. But I am convinced that there is something in what people tell each other. Almost always. At least, often. At least in the story of Ka Dario. Although, I must admit, I didn’t really believe this story at first. To be honest, I'm not superstitious. But after the incident with Fabio, I told myself: you never know for sure.

- What do you have in mind? – Wanda asked.

“I mean the curse,” he replied, somewhat annoyed that she had interrupted him. “The palazzo where your uncle lives brings bad luck.” Many Venetians say that Palazzo Dario especially does not like businessmen, but, on the contrary, saves artists. We Venetians always try to find a pattern in everything. But she's not here. Massimo Miniato, for example, was a businessman and survived in this palace. And the antiques dealer Fabio delle Fenestrelle, on the contrary, in my opinion, was more of an artist. The only pattern that I see here is that misfortune, like powdery mildew, falls on each of its inhabitants. Very few survived and left the palace themselves.

“In almost every village there is a house on which there is a curse,” Wanda objected and bent over her book.

She read that courtesans in 15th-century Venice lived so prosperously that, with their numerous servants, they inhabited most of the palaces on the world-famous Grand Canal, about which a special law was issued in the Republic. However, they were allowed to live only in those houses whose rent did not exceed one hundred ducats per year. And those of them who paid more than forty ducats for renting houses were subject to an additional tax. Disgusting Venetian double morality!

“More precisely, they call him “Ka Dario,” said Wanda’s traveling companion. – Previously, all the palaces in Venice were called “Ca”, from casa, and only the Doge’s Palace was called a palazzo, Palazzo Ducale. But today things are looked at more broadly. You are surprised, signorina, aren't you? Yes, there is a lot that foreigners don’t know. Just imagine, one American woman recently asked me why the city is so flooded with water. I answered her: “Signora, this is how we wash the streets.” These Americans! Now, however, not as many of them come as before, because of dollars, of course. Now we have Japanese, they don’t ask anything and smile.

His eloquence did not dry out.

Wanda read that courtesans were forbidden to decorate the walls with wallpaper, carpets or damask. They were only allowed fabrics from Brescia or Bergamo. Another decree forbade them from cutting their hair short above the forehead, tying it in knots on their heads, and also wearing clothes in men’s style...

Because it looked too sensual, Wanda thought.

– The first tenant of Ka Dario, as far as I remember, was the American Robert Boulder. After him there was Fabio delle Fenestrelle. He ran an antique store. After him there was a hippie, Mick Swinton, he was the manager of the rock band What. Then Massimo Miniato Sassoferato, financier, as he called himself, whatever that means. And then Aldo Vergato. The richest man in Italy. You've heard about him, of course. Even Ka Dario didn't bring him happiness, that's for sure. Oh yeah, I probably forgot to mention that none of them survived in Palazzo Dario. That is, there was one who survived, but he was also unlucky. And these are only those who have lived there in the last fifty years. If you think about the fact that the palazzo is over five hundred years old, who knows what scenes were played out there that we know nothing about.

“The earth is full of rumors,” muttered Wanda.

".. . Also, for the convenience of clients, courtesans were allowed to settle in the center, she read. “To attract visitors, they leaned on the windowsill and showed off their bare breasts. This is where the name Ponte delle tette – Bridge of Breasts – comes from.”

Along the Grand Canal, you can’t help but pay attention to the wonderful facades of Venetian palaces! Your gaze will fall on beautiful buildings that conceal the secrets and mysteries of the city, as well as reminders of its former greatness. We have selected the five most beautiful, in our opinion, palaces of the beautiful city on the water.

This marvelous Gothic-style building was built right next to the waters in 1437-1452 and belonged to the Venetian Doge Francesco Foscari, a nobleman who tried to flaunt his wealth and influence. By the way, the palace was amazingly beautiful. Even the most sophisticated critics could not find any flaws in it, calling it the most successful example of Gothic in Venice.

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Francesco also believed that he was building a true family residence, which would be occupied by his heirs and their descendants for many centuries to come. However, his dream was not destined to come true: in the 19th century, the palace served as a barracks for soldiers, whose proximity had an extremely negative impact on the building. And after a long and painstaking restoration, which was completed in 2005, the Foscari Palace turned into the residence of a higher educational institution.

Palazzo Labia

Some time ago, namely in the 18th century, this stunning palace was considered the family home of the richest Labia family in the city, who invited the most talented architects of the city on the water, Alessandro Treminiona and Andrea Cominelli, to create a building project. However, soon the wealthy family, who thoroughly enjoyed social life and increased attention from the public, went bankrupt and lost the palazzo, which passed into the possession of Prince Lobkovich. But a representative of the nobility quickly sold the palace to the Israeli Koenigsber Foundation. After this, the palace was used for various purposes: it was a sawmill, a textile factory, and a clothes dryer. In the 1960s, it was acquired by the Italian television and radio company RAI, which made its office in the palace.

Palazzo Dario

Selecting the most interesting and beautiful ones from the numerous palaces of Venice is a very difficult task. However, it is simply impossible not to mention Palazzo Dario. Its facade, like many other palaces, faces the Grand Canal, showing off its unusually bright marble color to everyone.

It was built in 1487 in classical style by order of Giovanni Dario, a member of the Venetian nobility who served as Secretary of Venice. By the way, city residents call this building the “cursed palace”, due to the numerous failures and tragedies that befell the Dario family, as well as other owners and guests of the palace. The Venetians find it difficult to even count the number of inhabitants who died here due to the absurd death of the inhabitants, diligently avoiding this place.

Palazzo Dandolo

Palazzo Dandolo is widely known outside the magnificent water city, which it has graced since the 1400s. This beautiful building once belonged to the Dandolo family, hence its name. But very soon, family members decided to sell the palace to another eminent family - Gritti, thereby starting a long history of sales and purchases of this place from one hand to another. It seemed that the rich and nobles who purchased the palazzo were simply not ready to pay for its maintenance, and therefore sold it to their friends and acquaintances.

Palazzo Ducale (Doge's Palace, Palazzo Ducale)

Palazzo Ducale, also known as, is perhaps one of the “calling cards” of Venice. The permanent residence of the Doges was built back in 1424 according to the design of Filippo Calendario in the style of exquisite Italian Gothic. For many centuries, the Doge's Palace was the very heart and symbol of political life.

However, when it fell in 1797, the purpose of this magnificent building also changed. From that moment on, it served different purposes and was home to different administrative divisions. By the end of the 19th century, the palace gradually began to decline, and the city administration allocated an impressive amount of funds for its restoration and restoration.

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On the Grand Canal in Venice, near the pompous Santa Maria della Salute, there is a beautiful Renaissance palace made of white Istrian marble. The rounded arches and colorful patterns of the Renaissance are reflected in the waters of the city's most famous artery, and nothing seems to disturb the architectural harmony and serenity of the Serenissima. However, this palazzo has a bad reputation and with enviable persistence harasses its owners, leading to ruin and death. Fatality and doom, unfortunate deaths and incredible coincidences made this place one of the most sinister and mysterious. Palazzo Dario and its curse have long become one - another Venetian legend.

This is roughly how all the stories about Palazzo Dario begin - the palazzo that kills. I doubted that all their owners were like this. Maybe this is a peculiar move, because mysticism attracts people like a magnet. And even though the place will be covered with terrible events and legends, there will be no fewer people who want to look at it. However, even a quick glance at his real history suggests that something is wrong. It’s impossible for all of its owners to be so unlucky at the same time, and the bad luck began immediately after the purchase of the beautiful mansion. Not many died, but those who survived can hardly be called lucky: ruin, collapse, death of loved ones, and sometimes madness overtook them quickly. What is it that the palace doesn’t like so much? Why does he wipe out rich, successful and wealthy people who are flattered by his beauty? No one can confidently answer this question.
The mystery of Palazzo Dario has been interesting to me for a long time, and I decided to start my research with Petra Reska’s book, for a greater immersion in the atmosphere. However, this work should not be taken at face value, although many events are not far from the truth. Firstly, the names have been changed, and secondly, the chronology does not correspond to reality. I suspect that the author did this on purpose in order to present everything in the most favorable light, and the events were perceived more clearly. However, the stories of the unfortunate owners themselves are embellished in places and overgrown with literary devices and new facts to make readers more interested. This is a work of fiction, decently modified, but still based on the realities of life. I found real analogues for almost all of Reska’s characters, only the last owner of the palazzo, Radomir Radziwill, somehow doesn’t fit in anywhere, and one real owner is not mentioned in any way in the book, but there are also those whose names have survived without distortion. For those who are curious, throughout my story I will tell you who is who in the work and in life.

So, it all started in the glorious 15th century with Giovanni Dario. He was not a patrician, and his family also cannot be called very noble, but thanks to his one merit, Giovanni confidently entered the circle of people who were very important for Venice. He managed to make peace with Sultan Mohamed II, for which Serenissima generously rewarded her subject. Of course, like any decent person, Dario had his own palace on the Grand Canal, which began to bear his name. And on the facade there is still the inscription “VRBIS GENIO IOANNES DARIVS” - “Giovanni Dario - the genius of the city.” Maybe, by the way, that’s why the palace is harassing everyone? It is dedicated to Venice and there simply cannot be another owner? But let's go back to the fifteenth century. Giovanni had a daughter, Marietta, who married a guy from a neighboring palazzo, Vincenzo Barbaro, and things started to happen... Well, for starters, Giovanni himself died. Vincenzo, being a patrician and a member of the Council of Ten, was soon expelled from there for his unrestrained behavior, which immediately cast a shadow over the entire family. Poor Marietta could not stand it and committed suicide; soon the knife pierced Vincenzo, and their son died in Crete. These three deaths started people talking about the curse and evil fate of the beautiful palazzo on the Grand Canal, supposedly built on the site of an ancient cemetery. The Barbaro family took possession of the hot spot, and only at the beginning of the 19th century the clan decided to say goodbye to it. Either the palace liked Barbaro, or they carefully hid it, but the curse did not bring them much harm. But something forced Alessandro Barbaro to sell the building to an Armenian gem dealer named Arbit Abdoll, who went bankrupt as soon as he became the official owner of the unfortunate mansion. In 1838, the palace went to the Englishman Radon Brown, who, however, four years later again put the palazzo up for auction due to the impossibility of maintaining and repairing it. He, one might say, is the only lucky one - Radon died of old age in 1883 in Venice, but in the book there is a character with a name very consonant with him - Robert Boulder. This is a representative of a gay person who has caused a lot of noise, but his story has nothing to do with Brown; however, there will also be one of the real owners of Palazzo Dario, from whom Robert is based.

Further, the palace comes into the possession of the Countess de la Baume-Plouvignelle, who was visited by the French poet Henri de Regnier. Here, too, everyone seemed to be alive and well, only our poet fell seriously ill and his stay in the city on the water had to be interrupted. After the war, the prototype of Robert Boulder appears - the American Charles Briggs, who was forced to leave the Serenissima due to scandalous rumors about his homosexuality. He found refuge in Mexico, where another suicide soon occurred. Palazzo Dario spread his wings and began his activities, trapping new victims. However, the people were in no hurry, everyone wanted to live and for some time the palace was empty. In 1964, among the potential buyers was tenor Mario del Monaco, who, on his way to negotiate the details of the contract, gets into a terrible accident and, after a long period of rehabilitation, breaks the deal out of harm's way. A few years later, the palace was bought by the Count of Turin, Filippo Giordano (in the book by Fabio delle Fenestrelle), but he did not remain in the respectable status of owner of luxury real estate for long. In 1970, the aristocrat was killed right in the palace by a Croatian sailor named Raul Blasich, with whom the count had more than just friendship. Dario was the de facto advocate for healthy relationships, and his few nontraditional owners had to pay a steep price for being different. By the way, Raoul fled to London after the crime, where...? That's right, he was killed. People from show business also managed within the walls of the damned palazzo. Keith Lambert (Mick Swinton in the book), manager of The Who, also did not live a long life. He soon died in London after falling down the stairs.

In the eighties, the palazzo also gave rise to tragedy after tragedy. Businessman Fabrizio Ferrari (at Reschi Massimo Miniato Sassoferato) moved to the Grand Canal with his sister Nicoletta. Having become the full owner of the palace, he loses all his savings and assets, his sister dies in a mysterious accident, and Fabrizio himself, although he remains alive, acquires a serious nervous disorder. Now one of the richest men in Italy comes onto the scene - Raoul Gardini (Aldo Vergato), who bought Dario for his daughter. As if by order, he is overwhelmed by a series of economic problems, then the serious corruption scandal of Tangentopoli and voila - in 1993 he is shot dead under circumstances that are not fully clarified. After these horrific deaths, no one doubts the curse, and Palazzo Dario remains in splendid isolation. In the late 90s, Woody Allen looked at it, but, apparently, having carefully weighed everything, he decided to live longer :) But the palace managed to leave its mark in our century: in 2002, bassist John Entwistle, after a week's stay in the house on the Grand Canal, died from heart attack. No scientific explanations for all these events have been found. And what do you think? Is the Palazzo for sale again? No matter how it is! Everything is much more interesting - it is being restored. New owner?! To be continued???
Source of information and photos - wikipedia.it