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The
great staircase was built to serve the nineteenth-century
addition.
Eighteen paintings, built in stucco frames, different
for subjects, ages, pictorial qualities and dimensions,
fit up the walls with a prevailing decorative function.
Along the great staircase there are also shown two
ornamental armours forged in the XIXc. as an imitation
of the sixteenth-century models.
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The great staircase.
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At
the foot of the great staircase is placed a Byzantine
stoup of the VIc.AD decorated with an ivy shoot
and covered by an inscription which says: "draw
water with joy" (Isaiah, 12, 3) "since
over the waters there is our Lord's voice"
(Psalms, 28, 2-3). The stoup comes from the S.S.
Mark and Andrew's church in Murano (Venice) together
with a similar one, now preserved in the Provincial
Museum of Torcello (Venice). Ludovico Moscardo bought
it for his own "Museum" and in May 1685,
Jean Mabillon saw it there, in Verona; he was so
impressed to illustrate it with a plate in his Iter
Italicum (Posthumous Edition, Paris 1724, I,
pp.22-24). The lid, sculptured with acanthus leaves,
is a later addition due to Moscardo.
Byzantine marble stoup
(VIc.AD).
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