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Scuola degli Albanesi
The Albanian confraternity
Hard by the church of San Maurizio is the Scuola degli Albanesi, built in 1531 as the centre of Venice’s Albanian community, refugees from Ottoman imperialism who settled in this neighbourhood in the 1400s; the Lombardesque reliefs on the façade include a scene of Sultan Mehmet II studying the castle of Scutari.
The Albanians hired Carpaccio to paint a series on the Life of the Virgin, and in the 1700s, when the Albanians were too few to keep up the confraternity, it was taken over, art and all, by the bakers’ guild; two of the paintings are now in the Ca’ d’Oro and the others hidden somewhere in the back rooms of the Museo Correr.
Practical Info 
Campo San Maurizio
Vaporetto Santa Maria del Giglio
Text © Dana Facaros & Michael Pauls
Image by Dana Facaros and Michael Pauls