Šibenik Cathedral

Cathedral in Croatia

The Cathedral of St. James in Šibenik, Croatia, is a triple nave Catholic basilica with three apses and a dome (32 m high inside). It is the episcopal seat of the Šibenik diocese. It is also the most important architectural monument of the Renaissance in the entire country. Since 2000, the cathedral has been on the UNESCO World Heritage List. It is often known as "St. Jacob's", because Croatian, like many other languages, uses the same name for both "James" and "Jacob". It is dedicated to Saint James the Great.

The building of the church was initiated in 1402, though plans on its construction had already begun in 1298, when Šibenik became a municipality. The actual work to transform the older Romanesque cathedral began in 1431. Built entirely of stone (limestone from a nearby stone quarry and marble from the island of Brač), it was completed in three phases, from 1433 to 1441, when the Grand City Council entrusted the work to local and Italian masters Francesco di Giacomo, Lorenzo Pincino, Pier Paolo Bussato, Bonino da Milano, and Giorgio da Sebenico (Juraj Dalmatinac) and to Croatian ones Andrija Budčić and Grubiš Šlafčić.

Initially, it was conceived as a simple church. In the period between 1441 and 1473 the construction was directed by Giorgio, who was invited to come from Venice as the investors were not satisfied with the beginning of the work. His first contract in 1441 was concluded for a period of 6 years to build just a simple church, but another contract of 10 years followed the first one in 1446. The investors considered that too little for the money spent, so Giorgio altered the plan: he enlarged the cathedral with a side nave and apses, so that the ground plan of the cathedral was in the shape of a cross, and prepared it for the dome, built the presbytery, sanctuary and his masterpiece, the baptistery. With tremendous skill, Giorgio da Sebenico combined architectural and decorative elements to create a unified entity. Giorgio combined several artistic elements in the ground plan: the Lion Gate was inspired by the abbey of San Leonardo di Siponto, the central nave by Trogir cathedral, an eagle over the main entrance as the John the Evangelist's symbol, the San Marco cathedral in Venice as one side nave and the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople as the other side nave. He constructed the western main portal, the northern portal (The Lion Gate) and the first chapel. The western main portal was decorated by Bonino da Milano, first master mason, with statues of Christ and the twelve apostles. The current bronze door was created in 1967 by the Šibenik sculptor Grga Antunac. The motif of the northern portal, called the Lion Gate, are Adam and Eve standing on two lions, which is also seen at the Trogir Cathedral, but here Adam and Eve are on columns over the lions. These statues, together with St. Jacob and St. Peter, are the work of Juraj Dalmatinac, as he is called in Croatia. The statue of Eve draws the attention of onlookers as she has a belly button, while, according to the Bible, she was conceived from a rib of Adam. The bronze doors were made in 1967 by the Šibenik sculptor Grga Antunac. The coats of arms of two bishops and of the procurator of then church of St. Saviour in Šibenik were placed over the Lion Gate. The two Renaissance putti at the northern end of the cathedral bear an inscription of the consecration in 1443 of the cathedral. Under their feet is his only remaining signature: "Hoc opus cuvarum fecit magister Georgius Matthei Dalmaticus". He also designed the baptistery in the 1440s. He built it next to the southern apse in the form of a quatrefoil. The upper part is covered with lacelike sculptures, the first Renaissance sculptural work in Croatia. The flat niches are vaulted with corrugated seashells of St. James. On the baldachins between them hold two statues: King David and the prophet Simon. The vault ribs end in the keystone representing the Father God, surrounded by angels and the dove (symbol of the Holy Ghost). The baptismal font, made from reddish breccias, is supported by three angels. The apses are decorated on the outside with various sculptural decorations, including 74 small Renaissance portraits immortalising important contemporaries and figures who had for some reason particularly impressed the architect or that he deemed to tight to help foot the bill for the cathedral's construction. Some of these heads on the facade have a damaged nose, probably due to vandalism. Indeed, until Justinian II this was the expression to discredit the reputation of someone, and so it was necessary that this individual remained anonymous. Giorgio worked probably on the cathedral up to his death in 1475 and certainly until 1473.

Between 1475 and 1505 the work was overseen by Tuscan master Niccolò di Giovanni Fiorentino (Nicola Firentinac), from the Donatello school of sculpture who developed as a sculptor and builder in Dalmatia. He continued the building in the Tuscan Renaissance style, completing the extensive galleries, building the vault in the central nave, the outer sculptures of St. Michael, St. James and St. Mark. The barrel roof is made from a line of enormous stone slabs and considered a marvel of construction at the time, and the upper façade. He also built the triforias (parallel galleries) and worked on the presbytery and sanctuary. Although the dome of Šibenik Cathedral was built after the dome in Florence, Niccolò di Giovanni Fiorentino used an octagonal drum in its construction, before Bramante and Michelangelo, in its original function as the transition from the square base to the circular dome. The cathedral served as a backdrop for the Iron Bank in the ninth episode of the fifth season of Game of Thrones. Šibenik portrayed Braavos, the city where the Iron Bank is located.