Beyond Venice: At the Margins of the View

Studies of the View of Venice have often focused on its depiction of the islands of Venice proper —its careful rendering of specific sites and its evocative delphinic shape. Chapter 5 concentrates instead on the work’s margins, including the mountainous border that runs across its top three sheets. This often-overlooked mainland frontier contrasts with the city: a rural and undifferentiated landscape set against a meticulously differentiated urban center. Yet Jacopo de’ Barbari’s margins testify to the ambitions and scope of the View, particularly how it addresses a German clientele. The mainland towns identified along the margins—Marghera, Mestre, Treviso, and Serravalle—describe a sequence by which German merchants and pilgrims traveled between Venice and Germany. This essay considers how the Alpine landscape between southern Germany and Venice took on its own character around 1500 and suggests a method for studying early modern cartographic margins and their geographical and rhetorical integrity.