ABSTRACT
Let us now leave the vacillating heights of religious architecture and turn to the depths of the ocean. During the Renaissance, trade encouraged exchanges between Pisa, Genoa, Venice and Africa. Figure 73 reproduces a thirteenth century mosaic in the Basilica San Marco in Venice; as its Latin inscription indicates, it depicts the Evangelist St. Mark aboard a boat on its way to Alexandria. It was a voyage that excited admiration because it evoked the idea of Egypt: “ad Egyptum per Alexandriam” – to Egypt via Alexandria.
