Palazzo Corner Contarini dei Cavalli is a palace in Venice, located in the San Marco district, overlooking the left side of the Grand Canal, between the Rio di San Luca and Palazzo Grimani on one side and Palazzo Tron and Palazzetto Tron Memmo on the other. Opposite is the Palazzo Papadopoli.
The construction of the current building presumably dates back to the
mid-fifteenth century but in 1310 the previous building was branded with
the so-called "brand of infamy", reserved for traitors to the state
because their owners took part in the failed conspiracy of Baiamonte
Tiepolo against the Republic of Venice.
Among the illustrious men
who stayed there was the leader Bartolomeo d'Alviano towards the
beginning of the sixteenth century.
The property of the building
passed through marriage to the Contarini family in 1521 and they kept it
until 1830 when it was sold to the Mocenigo family; after them it passed
successively to the Ulbrichts, the Knights and the Ravennas. Currently
the building houses some offices of the Ministry of Justice.
The building is attributable to the Venetian flamboyant Gothic style
but presents different architectural styles on the various floors as it
was subject to various renovations over the centuries. The ground floor
has seventeenth-century ashlar work with a central water door made in
the serliana style; the main floor maintains its original appearance
with a hexaphora with trefoil arches surmounted by quadrilobes and a
lateral single lancet window that recall the style of the facade of
Palazzo Ducale while the second floor, which is a nineteenth-century
elevation, develops with a trifora, of which the central one wider than
the others, and two pairs of lateral single-lancet windows with round
arches. All the openings are provided with a jutting balcony, except for
the two lateral ones of the mullioned window on the main floor.
The additional denomination "dei Cavalli" is due to the presence in the
foreground of two large shields from the 15th century which reproduce
horses.