The Glassmaker's Daughter

Chapter 2

TWO

They entered through the bell tower entrance, their footfalls echoing off the marble floor to rise up into the tall, confined space of Santo Stefano’s brick campanile. Dawn’s pale light kissed the land and the toll of the bells summoning all to work reverberated in morning’s fresh air. The warmth of the late spring day had not yet crept in to muffle the mesmerizing sound.

Men of all ages, shapes, and sizes filed in; their wondrous diversity as varied as their styles. Some wore the grand fashion of the Spanish, with embroidered doublets, sword and dagger hanging from their waist. Long hair flowed past their shoulders and thin mustaches or goatees adorned their faces.

The less ostentatious wore simple linen or silk shirts and breeches, with plain but elegant waistcoats. From the chins of the older, mostly bald gentlemen hung long, dignified beards. The younger, still pretty men preferred clean faces and closely cropped caps of hair.

They converged from almost every glassworks on the island, the owners and their sons, concern and fear tempering any joy to be had in their assembly.

The sun hovered at the horizon now, its rays imprisoned by the close-set buildings, and the gloomy shadows clung to the parish church’s interior. In the muted light, the solemn procession soon filled the pew’s wooden benches. These men, the Arte dei Vetrai, represented the members of the glassworkers’ guild. This league of artigiani united in self-preservation, to provide aid for the sick and aged in their profession as well as the widows and children of their lost loved ones.

Somber whispers rumbled through the incense laden air, a remainder of dawn’s devotions. In Murano, as in other parishes of Venice, there stood as many churches as there were winding canals. The Arte had chosen Santo Stefano as their home decades ago, selected for its simple grace and its centralized location on the Rio de Vetrai, the main canal running through the glassmaking district. Legend held that it had been built by the Camaldolese hermits at the time of the millennium, restored and renovated many times since.

A gavel’s hard rap upon the podium broke the quiet discourse; Domenico Cittadini, the owner of the Leone d’Oro glassworks and steward of the Arti, called the meeting to order.

“It is with great sadness that we come here today to discuss the deaths of our colleagues Hieronimo Quirini, Norberto Clairomonti, and Fabrizio Giustinian.”

“Parodia! Terribile! Orrible!”

Outraged shouts cracked like thunder, ricocheting against stone walls, lofting to the high, vaulted ceiling, and out the windows where the women of the town stood and listened. Huddled together, their heads straining to get as close to the partially opened windows as they could.

“Silenzio!” Cittadini countered their din. Veins pulsed on his forehead, splotches of red burst upon his olive skin, dark eyes bulged under thick salt-and-pepper brows. “The Capitularis de Fiolarus is clear.”

He threw a thick wad of string-bound vellum on the floor. The men in the front pews flinched away from the loud thwack. The statutes imposed upon the glassworkers by the Venetian government were a long, imposing list.

“I am as ravaged by their demise as any of you, but our lost brethren knew what could happen when they left for France, when they allowed the foreign devils to entice them away with promises of riches and fame.”

The denunciation of the dead hung heavy in oppressive silence; almost two hundred men swallowed their distaste upon their tongues with respect for their leader. Cittadini had served but two months of his one year, elected stewardship, but he shouldered his duties with supreme dedication.

From the back of the church, wood creaked as a slight, elderly man rose, unfurling his curved and bent body as he slid a blue silk cap from his balding pate. Every head swiveled to the sound. Every ear strained to hear what Arturo Barovier, a descendant of one of the greatest glassmaking families in the history of Murano, had to say.

“For over two hundred years they have kept us prisoner and now they have killed.” His voice warbled like birdsong. “We must tolerate this no longer.”

Impassioned, angry diatribes erupted. Scarlet-faced men pointed fingers at one another, punctuating their arguments. Any semblance of order dispersed like smoke on the breeze of discontent. They did not debate the existence of the restrictive government control but whether or not it was warranted. Under the guise of protection, La Serenissima—the government of the Most Serene Republic of Venice—began its meticulous ascendancy of the glass working industry nearly four centuries ago. A fanatical Republic ruled by perversely tyrannical patriots, they deemed no action egregious did it benefit the State.

Their control spread as did the renown of Venetian glass. They spoke of fear for the growing population living in mostly wooden structures, the risk of fires posed by the glassmaking furnaces. The decree restricting all vetreria to the island of Murano came late in the thirteenth century and the virtual imprisonment of the glassmaking families began. The regime’s sophistry was an ill-fitting disguise; its true intention soon became clear.

Greed not safety motivated the regime’s concern. They meant to isolate the glassworkers, to inhibit any contact they might have with the outside world. As time passed, the pretense fell away; clear, unmistakable threats of bodily harm were made to any defecting glassworker and their families. The isolation intended—first and foremost—to protect the secret of the glass. That and nothing else, for the exquisite vetro of Venice brought the State world fame and filled the government’s coffers with overflowing fortune.

The statues of the Captularis quickly swelled to include the Mariegole, a statement of duty for all glassworkers. It told them who was allowed to work and when, when the factories could close for vacation and for how long, going so far as to dictate how many bocche a furnace must have as if the government knew better than the workers the best number of windows a crucible needed.

Now, in these infant days of the seventeenth century, the State’s malicious control had surpassed all acts that had come before; their hand of power had turned into a fist, one ready to pummel anyone who publicly defied them.

Sophia inched closer to the brick-trimmed opening as she could, straining on the tips of her toes as she nodded her head in silent, fervent agreement with Signore Barovier’s sentiments. As a woman, she could only make the glass—indulge her one true passion—in secret, another of the Serenissima’s dictates. She cared nothing for their dictates, held the politicians themselves in no esteem.

“Shh,” she hissed at the murmuring women around her, a pointed finger tapping against her pursed lips. She surprised everyone—herself included—with her boldness, too desperate to hear to remain hidden in her usual timidity.

Inside, Vincenzo Bonetti stood up, long face and nose bowed, one of the youngest men there but still the padrone of the Pigna glassworks. “I would like to hear what Signore Fiolario has to say.”

Wood groaned, fabric rustled; all eyes looked to Zeno, quiet, so far, amidst the boiling discussion.

The men often looked to Zeno for his counsel. Though he had not been the steward of the Arti for almost ten years, many considered him the best there had ever been; many still sought his wisdom like the child seeks approval from the parent. Like the others before him, Zeno stood, twisting his thin body to face the assemblage.

The morning sun’s first rays found the stained glass of the long, arched altar window. A burst of colorful streaks illuminated Zeno’s angular features with hues of shimmering moss and indigo. He appeared like a colorful specter, prismatic yet surreal.

“We are like precious works of art, cloistered in locked museums, trotted out for show when visiting royalty appears but kept behind bars otherwise.”

“Sì, sì,” incensed, agreeing cries rang out. Heads waggled in agreement, hands flew up in the air as if to beseech God to hear their entreaties.

Time after time, the Serenissima flaunted the talent and wealth of Venice in the faces of sojourning royalty, using the artisans of Murano for audacious displays. Not so long ago King Henry III of France had been the most exalted guest of the Republic. Many prestigious members of the Arte had been ceremonial attendants, including a younger Zeno just achieving the apex of his artistry, participating in exhibitions for the delight of the visiting monarch.

At the sound of her father’s voice, Sophia strained her toes, her neck, to see in the high windows. She waited now in rapt attention for Zeno’s next wise dictum.

Her father stared at the expectant faces all around him. His lips floundered, but no words formed. His head tilted to the side and his gaze grew vacant. He looked down at the space on the pew beneath him and, without another word, sat down.

Sophia released her straining toes and leaned back against the warm brick of the church. Her face scrunched; she didn’t understand why her father did not say more. He looked as if he would, but the words had been lost on the journey from brain to lips.

Inside the church, the same confusion cloaked the congregation; men shared their bewilderment in silent glances, faces changing in the shifting shadows as the rising sun found the windows and streamed in.

Cittadini took advantage of the lull. Stepping out from the podium, he crossed the altar and stood in line with the first of the many rows of blond oak pews, at the intersection of the forward and sideward paths.

“Tell me, de Varisco,” the steward addressed a middle-aged man sitting close to the front, Manfredo de Varisco, owner of the San Giancinto glassworks. “You are not a nobleman, yet you live in a virtual palazzo. You own your gondola, sì?”

De Variso nodded his head, dirty blond curls bouncing, with an almost shameful shrug.

“And you, Brunuro, you are always wearing your bejeweled sword and dagger.” Cittadini strode down the aisle, approaching a handsome man, black-haired and ruddy, sitting a third of the way down. Baldessera Brunuro, with his brother Zuan, ran both the Tre Corone and the Due Serafini.

“Would you enjoy such privileges, such luxuries, if you were not glassworkers?”

No one spoke, though many shook their heads. The answer was most surely no; other Venetian members of the industrial class did not—could not—relish such refinements as did the glassmakers.

Jerking to his right, the robust and round Cittadini raised an accusing finger, pointing to another middle-aged man, one with finely sculpted features, the owner of Tre Croci d’Oro. “You, above all, Signore Serena, your daughter is to marry a noble. Your grandchildren will be nobles. For the love of God, your male heirs may sit on the Grand Council, may one day become Doge, Il Serenissima, the ruler of all Venice!”

Cittadini punctuated his impassioned plea, throwing his hands up and wide with dramatic finality.

Serena’s brown eyes held Cittadini’s, beacons shining from out of puffy, wrinkle-rimmed sockets. He struggled to stand, long white beard quivering from his chin onto his chest. For a few ticks of time, he held the steward’s attention in a unnatural quiet. The women outside captives, their noses pressed to the sills, all fussing and fluttering ceased once and for all.

“None of us wants to give up these things, these glories that make our lives so rich, so abundant,” Serena spoke of splendors yet with a brow furrowed, a frown upon thin lips. “But at what price? It is naught more than extortion. We should be—we must be—able to live as we please, go where we please. We have earned the right.”

Cittadini didn’t answer. He studied the face of a man he called friend. He turned, impotent, to the righteous faces all around, curling broad shoulders up to his ears. “Then…what are we to do?”

Within a house of God, amidst the aura of His benevolence, not a one of them had an answer.