t lies
between the Canale delle Beccherie,[1] in the Rialto, and the Rio del
Fondaco delle Farine,[2] taking as much ground between one canal and the
other as would make a perfect square--that is, the length of the sides
of this fabric was to be as great as the space which one covers at the
present day in walking from the debouchure of one of those canals into
the Grand Canal to that of the other. He intended, also, that the same
two canals should debouch on the other side into a common canal, which
was to run from the one to the other, so that the fabric might be left
entirely surrounded by water, having the Grand Canal on one side, the
two smaller canals on two other sides, and on the last the new canal
that was to be made. Then he desired that between the water and the
buildings, right round the square, there should be made, or rather
should be left, a beach or quay of some breadth, which might serve as a
piazza for the selling in duly appointed places of the vegetables,
fruits, fish, and other things, that come from many parts to the city.
It was also his opinion that right round the outer side of the buildings
there should be erected shops looking out upon those same quays, and
that these shops should serve only for the sale of eatables of every
kind. And in these four sides the design of Fra Giocondo had four
principal gates--namely, one to each side, placed in the centre, one
directly opposite to another. But before going into the central piazza,
by whichever side one entered, one would have found both on the right
hand and on the left a street which ran round the block of buildings
and had shops on either side, with handsome workshops above them and
magazines for the use of those shops, which were all to be devoted to
the sale of woven fabrics--that is, fine woollen cloth and silk, which
are the two chief products of that city. This street, in short, was to
contain all the shops that are called the Tuscan's and the
silk-merchant's.

From this double range of shops there was to be access by way of the
four gates into the centre of the whole block--that is to say, into a
vast piazza surrounded on every side by spacious and beautiful loggie
for the accommodation of the merchants and for the use of the great
number of people who flock together for the purposes of their trade and
commerce to that city, which is the custom-house of all Italy, or rather
of Europe. Under those loggie, on every side, were to be the shops