The Venetians: A New History: from Marco Polo to Casanova (23 page)

Overjoyed by this diplomatic coup, the Venetians were determined to ensure that it was confirmed as soon as possible. As Caterina lived in Venice, the Signoria insisted that the union with James II should be sealed by an immediate marriage by proxy, which took place at Venice on 13 July 1468. The marriage may have been hurriedly arranged for purely political
reasons, but its celebration showed no signs of haste or lack of feeling. This was to be one of those great state occasions at which Venice so excelled. Caterina was led in procession by forty wives of the city’s noblest families from the Palazzo Corner to the nearby landing stage. Here she embarked upon the magnificent
Bucintoro
and was accompanied down the Grand Canal by a flotilla of gondolas, whilst musicians serenaded her and heralds proclaimed the passage of the doge’s barge through the centre of the city to the watching crowds along the shore. On arrival at the Molo, Caterina was escorted to the Doge’s Palace to the cheers of the onlookers (who had witnessed nothing like this: republican Venice had never before staged a coronation, by proxy or otherwise). She was led up the steps to the Great Council Chamber where, before the gathered representatives of the Republic, the actual ceremony took place. Doge Cristoforo Moro presented a gold wedding ring to the Cypriot ambassador, Philip Mistachiel, who as representative of James II slid this onto Caterina’s finger in an act of symbolic marriage.

Although Caterina was now formally married, and thus officially ‘Queen of Cyprus’, the Venetian authorities were so overwhelmed by what was taking place that they took the unprecedented step of bestowing upon her the unique honour of a purely Venetian title concocted for the occasion, that of ‘Daughter of San Marco’. (According to a contemporary anecdote this prompted the Bishop of Turin to point out that, according to the Bible, St Mark had not taken a wife and that, had he done so, fathering a daughter aged fourteen at his great age would indeed have been a miraculous feat, even if one quite worthy of a saint.)

Marriage by proxy was not uncommon at the time, especially between members of powerful families, and was in many ways analogous to an engagement – though such was its binding power that to break off such a ‘marriage’ could cause sufficient offence to provoke a declaration of war. Consequently it was not unusual that Caterina continued living in Venice for the next four years, whilst her husband remained in Cyprus.

As was the custom for a daughter of one of the most prestigious Venetian noble familes (who had already provided one doge, and would go on to provide three more), Caterina had lived a privileged and highly protected life. From birth, she would seldom have left the confines of
the Palazzo Corner, and would have been heavily chaperoned whenever she did so.

Caterinas seclusion throughout her childhood precluded the possibility of any private tutor and any real education. Thus, apart from learning the graces and manners of aristocratic family life, she would have acquired few other skills: there was no possibility of instruction in dancing, or the playing of a musical instrument, or even instruction in a language (although she may well have acquired some Greek from her mother). Despite this, according to her biographer, Leto Severis: ‘While still a child, Caterina gave signs of a dynamic character, a well-balanced mind and great intelligence.’ Although it is difficult to assess the precise meaning of such qualities, given the historical context, there can be no doubt that she did stand out as in some way exceptional – for she was only the third daughter of the family. At the age of ten she was escorted to the strictly closed convent of St Ursula, at nearby Padua on the mainland, where she was boarded with the nuns, who would have given her a rudimentary religious-based instruction. But most importantly, they would belatedly have taught her to read and write.

When Caterina Cornaro emerged at the age of fourteen for the great public procession in the
Bucintoro
down the Grand Canal for her proxy marriage at the Doge’s Palace, she would have been stepping onto the stage of a public world she could only have known about from tales and gossip – a world she had barely seen, let alone experienced in any social sense. Even her clothes would have been a novelty: at home and in the convent, like girls of all classes, she would have been plainly dressed, whereas for such a ceremony she would have been decked out in all the finery her family (and the Republic) could provide. A drawing of this event, done many years later by the artist G.L. Gatteri, who would certainly have been cognisant with the customary adornment for such an occasion, depicts the bride in a sumptuous full-length wedding dress whose resplendent train is supported by two pageboys. Although she would undoubtedly have been rehearsed for this event, all are said to have marvelled at Caterina’s poise and beauty. The Cypriot ambassador, acting as proxy for James II, wrote back to his king, ‘Her beautiful wide dark eyes shone like stars, her long blond, abundant hair seemed to be made of gold, and her handsome features and noble stature easily betrayed her noble origins’

Back in Cyprus, James the Bastard showed no great enthusiasm for having his bride brought home to him. Months passed, and then years, and still he despatched no bridal flotilla; meanwhile the Venetian authorities bided their time patiently. The prize was too great to lose. However, James was in fact still engaged in widespread diplomatic activity, in the hope of attracting a more powerful ally, or combination of allies, to ensure his continued rule. Envoys with inviting offers had been despatched to all available sources: these included the Emir of Karamania (which occupied the Anatolian coast north of Cyprus), and later Mehmet II when his Ottoman army had overthrown the emir. Other offers had been sent to the Mameluke Sultan of Egypt, to the Genoese and to King Ferrante I of Naples (who had replied suggesting a proxy marriage to one of his illegitimate daughters, who was nonetheless a princess of the royal house of Naples).

Venetian diplomats had soon overheard rumours of these negotiations, reports of which were duly carried back to the Council of Ten, which remained wary, but nonetheless recognised them for what they were – the frantic and feeble attempts of a weak ruler to play any potential conquerors off against each other. Eventually the Senate conveyed to James II an official letter, whose contents demonstrated just how far their diplomatic expertise had advanced since the inept blunders of its early forays into Europe just over a century previously.

The letter opened by assuring the king how pleased and honoured the Republic was to be so closely linked with his royal highness and his island kingdom. This link was made all the more precise by the fact that it had been celebrated in such a solemn marriage ceremony, in the presence of representatives of all the noble families of Venice. In consequence, the Republic regarded this as so much more than the union between a single Venetian family (be it ever so noble) and the royal house of Lusignan – it was a union that involved the entire aristocracy of Venice. Indeed, to emphasise this point Caterina herself had been elevated to the unique rank of ‘Daughter of San Marco’, thus becoming a child of the city itself.

However, the Senate wished to inform his majesty that rumours had been reaching Venice that he might be contemplating a marriage contract with some other princess. In all likelihood this was the usual sort of idle
gossip that frequently circulated amongst the courts of Italy. Yet should such a contract be signed, it would not only be taken as a gross insult to Caterina and all the noble families who had partaken in her marriage ceremony, but would also be seen as an aggressive act against the Republic itself. Such empty gossip should not be allowed to persist, and in order to preserve the honour and dignity of his majesty and his bride Caterina, as well as all others concerned, it was behoven upon the king to despatch with the utmost haste a flotilla of his ships to Venice to collect his bride and take her to her rightful home in Cyprus.

By now the people of Cyprus were becoming increasingly fearful of the political situation in the eastern Mediterranean. As well as advancing east along the southern Anatolian coastline, the Turkish army had completed the conquest of Greece by overrunning the Peloponnese, causing the indigenous Greek population of Cyprus to feel increasingly encircled by the menacing Ottoman presence. In consequence, they were keen for their foreign rulers and landlords to take action. Threatened by the withdrawal of Venetian support, James had no alternative but to send at once for his queen, and Caterina once more emerged from her family palace to be transported on the
Bucintoro
in a grand procession down the Grand Canal to the awaiting flotilla of four Venetian war galleys and three lesser galleys from the Cypriot navy. The doge conducted a formal farewell ceremony at the Molo, and contemporary sources describe the onlookers as being awed by Caterina’s appearance. During her four years of seclusion the fourteen-year-old girl had grown into a mature eighteen-year-old woman of apparently striking attractiveness. Such fulsome descriptions of her beauty have a note of sycophancy, to say nothing of the authors being carried away by the grandeur of the spectacle and the importance it held for Venice.

The portraits painted of Caterina at this time have been lost. However, the finest portrait we have of the young Caterina was painted some thirty years after her death by Titian, who almost certainly drew on at least one contemporary portrait and possibly some lost drawings made from life. The image he conveys of her is striking indeed, a portrayal of character worthy of his imaginative genius. What we see is the portrait of a young, powerfully built woman, her robust proportions cunningly softened by her
sidelong stance. She is dressed in a ruby-red velveteen gown, worn beneath a sumptuously embroidered over-garment whose long, open front collar consists of two twin lines of pearls on gold. On her head she wears a golden coronet studded with jewels and tipped with pearls, her hair modestly drawn back under a diaphanous veil, apart from the formal ringlets of red hair that hang over her forehead from beneath her coronet. Yet none of this magnificence is allowed to distract from the exceptional clarity of her features and overall expression. Caterina was not beautiful; her features appear unblemished, yet distinctly plain. But it is her sideways glance, gazing directly out of the picture, that is most revealing. Her expression is wary, uncertain almost, yet somehow manages to convey an inner strength that sits well with her powerful build. Mutely she is expressing the apprehensive feelings that must have been experienced by so many brides of the time, and of years to come. She is at once demure and determined. Here is a brave young woman of sufficient character not to be cowed by the absolutely unknown future that awaits her. And what a future this would prove to be.

On 10 November 1472, under the command of the Venetian captain General Pietro Mocenigo, Caterina’s combined flotilla sailed for Cyprus, arriving at Famagusta some weeks later. Owing to its strategic position on the main trade routes still operating between Europe and the Levant, Famagusta was on its way to becoming the wealthiest city in the entire eastern Mediterranean (a fact that would prompt Shakespeare to make it the setting for
Othello
), In December a truly royal marriage ceremony was held at the Cathedral of St Nicholas in Famagusta. Surprisingly, James II and Caterina seem to have taken to each other at first sight and it was soon obvious to all that theirs was a love-match. Queen Caterina was welcomed by the Venetian gentry, and her Greek ancestry ensured that she was also popular with the indigenous population. However, despite the royal palace being home to the new lovers, not all was sweetness and light there, for it was also home to three of James’s illegitimate children, Eugene, John and Carla, as well as his mother Marietta of Patras, who had been his father’s mistress. All of these incumbents resented Caterina, regarding her as a foreign intruder. Marietta refused to be replaced as ruler of the royal household and presented
a fearsome figure: the previous king’s wife had bitten off her nose in a fit of jealousy prompted by the affair that had produced James the Bastard, causing her to be nicknamed Marietta
comomutena
(crop-nosed).

As a major landowner, Caterina’s uncle Andrea Cornaro had long been a leading counsellor and close friend of James II – indeed, to such an extent that the young king’s extravagant behaviour had left him deeply in debt to Cornaro, who had been instrumental in arranging the king’s marriage to his niece. Despite this, Cornaro’s advice had proved of little effect during the four long years after the proxy wedding in Venice, for James had also listened to counsellors representing Neapolitan, papal, Genoese and other interests, all of whom had encouraged him to send emissaries far and wide in the search for powerful protective allies. But now that Caterina had arrived and been crowned as queen, Andrea Cornaro’s influence took on a more significant aspect. It was he who persuaded James to allow Captain-General Mocenigo to conduct his fleet on an extended tour of the island’s coastline, repairing its defences and building up the castles that guarded its main harbours.

This task also had a hidden pretext, for news soon spread over the Mediterranean that no less than the Captain-General of Venice had a fleet patrolling the coast of Cyprus, causing all rivals to be apprehensive about attempting any surprise invasion with the intention of taking over the island during this period of uncertainty. On the other hand, the local Venetian landowners also became apprehensive concerning the presence of Mocenigo’s fleet. They had long wished for an independent Cyprus, loosely allied to Venice, which would guarantee their protection in time of need. It now became clear to them that Venice had no such loose alliance in mind; it wished to impose its own direct rule upon the island – a move that would have deprived the local Venetian gentry of their considerable autonomy. At the same time, despite the reassurances of his counsellor, Andrea Cornaro, James II also became aware of what was happening. Taking matters into his own hands, in April 1473 he impetuously ordered all Venetian galleys to disembark from the port of Famagusta within two hours or they would be destroyed by the cannon lining the ramparts of the harbour fortress. From now on Venetian warships would only be permitted to put in at the minor port of Paphos, some seventy miles away
at the western end of the island. For the time being, it appeared that the covert Venetian strategy had been thwarted.