Horses of Saint Mark

The horses were placed on the facade, on the loggia above the porch, of St Mark's Basilica in Venice, northern Italy, after the sack and looting of Constantinople in 1204.

[2] In light of their short backs and long legs, it has been argued that they were originally situated above the eye line,[3] probably created to top a triumphal arch or some other grand building.

[7] Shortly after the Fourth Crusade, Doge Enrico Dandolo sent the horses to Venice, where they were installed on the terrace of the façade of St Mark's Basilica in 1254.

He had fought at the Battle of Waterloo and was with the Coalition forces in Paris where he was selected, by the Emperor of Austria, to take the horses down from the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel and return them to St Mark's in Venice.

[9] The horses remained in place over St Mark's until the early 1980s, when damage from air pollution led them to be removed and put on display inside the basilica.