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EspañolChiesa di Santa Caterina
The church of Santa Caterina preserves the history of Chioggia's Cistercian convent and its later Canossian community. Founded in the early fifteenth century, it combines Venetian-school paintings and marble altars with a bell tower designed by Baldassarre Longhena.
Why it matters
For four and a half centuries Santa Caterina was the church of a Cistercian community of nuns. Canossian sisters succeeded them in the nineteenth century and continued the site's educational and charitable work until 2006. The upper choir and other features preserve the history of the enclosed religious community. The Diocese of Chioggia presents the church as part of its cultural heritage network.
What to notice
The bell tower, completed in 1661 to a design by Baldassarre Longhena, is crowned by an onion dome. Inside, early seventeenth-century alterations gave the church its present balance. The marble altars date mainly from the first half of the eighteenth century; the altar of the Madonna della Salute is particularly rich in marble and carving. Paintings by Andrea Vicentino, Alvise Benfatti and Antonio Zonelli hang among the altars. The sacristy has walnut panelling dating to 1753, and the monastic choir behind the main altar dates to 1729. A copy of the late-fourteenth-century abbess's crozier is displayed as a record of the authority these women held.
Context and history
The church and monastery grew together from the early fifteenth century. The bell tower preceded the church's consecration in 1662, when the interior still had wooden altars; these were replaced by marble altars over subsequent decades. The present set was completed in the first half of the eighteenth century. A Bazzani organ built in 1864 remains in the church. After the Cistercian community ended, the Canossian sisters continued their educational and charitable work until 2006. The building later entered the Diocese of Chioggia's cultural circuit, with displays documenting the nuns' promotion of women's literacy and their role in the city.