San Pietro Martire

The Fondamenta dei Vetrai runs the length of the canal as far as Gothic church of San Pietro Martire, one of Murano’s few surviving churches—before Napoleon there were 18.

This one was built in 1348 as part of a Dominican monastery and originally dedicated to St John the Evangelist; it then burned to the ground and was rebuilt in 1511, and rededicated to St Peter Martyr, a Dominican saint from Verona who is usually portrayed walking around with an axe embedded in his tonsure.

Like many in Venice, the church was suppressed and stripped of all its treasures in 1808, although a few years later it reopened, redecorated with art from the churches of Murano that were closed, notably Santa Maria degli Angeli.