Church Floor Artifact

This article contains information on a typical Church Floor Artifact. For a list of Churches, see Churches. For a more information on the artifacts, see Church Floor Artifacts.

Church Floor Artifact

Total Number of Artifacts	2221

Classification

There are two types of artifacts found in the Churches of Venice: tombs,and plaques. Most artifacts have inscriptions, honoring the deceased's life or marking a significant event in the church's history.

Tombs

A tomb, or tomba, is the most common form of floor artifact and mark the location of a burial. Due to health concerns of and flooding, the body may have been moved and may no longer be in the Church. A tomb marker is either a large rectangle or small square, depending on the type of burial and the wealth of the family. All tombs contain some amount of inscription, but the amount of information included ranges from a full obituary to simply DOM, which stands for, "Deo, Optimo, Maximo (to God, the Best, the Greatest)" or "Domino, Optimo, Maximo (the Lord, the Best, the Greatest)." These are the mottos of the Bendictine order. Both types of tombs are shown below.

• 
  Example of a rectangular tomb
• 
  Example of a small tomb

Plaques

A plaque, or placca, is the second type of artifact. A plaque has an inscription, but is not a tomb. They often represent years of construction/restoration or prominent contributors. More importantly, they do not mark the final resting place of someone. Plaques are less common than tombs and are often smaller. An example can be seen below.

• 
  Example of a plaque

Condition Evaluation

There are 5 types of damage that were evaluated by teams from Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI). The damage is rated on a 0-4 scale unless otherwise noted. On this scale 0 is Minimal or no damage, 1 is low damage, 2 is Intermediate, 3 is High or significant and 4 is Severe damage. The 5 types of damage are:

• Fading and Wear: The 0-4 scale is used here based on wear and tear or pitting. These are general damage to the artifact that can be caused by many factors such as foot traffic or furnature placement.
• Text readability: The readibility of the text on an artifact was based upon the condition of each letter. Letter were judged to be in perfect condition, damaged but readiable or completely unreadable on a 1 - 3 scale where 1 is perfect.
• Cracks: Cracks were judged as problematic or small. Higher scores would be awarded for a few problem cracks or many small cracks.
• Holes: Holes are considered places in the artifact that are missing that are 1.5 cm deep. The 0 - 4 scale is used based on fequency.
• Joint gaps: Joint gaps are points where the artifact itself seperates from the floor. These gaps can allow the artifact to shift in the floor, potentially causing additional damage.

• 
  Fading and Wear
• 
  Readability
• 
  Crack
• 
  Holes
• 
  Joint Gap

Condition Ranking

In order to create a ranked list of artifact damage, an equation that takes into account the five different types of damage assessed was developed by a team or researches from WPI. The equation was developed through experimentation with different weights in the equation so that could be seen visually (such as surface damage and text wear) could be expressed numerically. This equation and condition evaluation was developed for this website and is not recognized by other outside organizations. After using the following equation to standardize the rankings assigned to each artifact, the conditions were divided into five categories of damage.

distribution of damage

(.25)(Fading and Wear) + (.25)(Readability) + (.20)(Cracks) + (.05)(Holes) + (.20)(Joint Gaps)

The five categories of damage are as follows. Image from each damage type can be seen below:

• Excessive Damage: The artifact is too far degraded that no more information would be saved if the artifact were to undergo restoration.

• High Damage: The artifact is in need of preservation in order to maintain the image or text visible on the artifact. The text is still readable, but is in danger of being worn away to an extent that would lose all information on it.

• Intermediate Damage: The artifact has sustained some damage in any of the mentioned types of damage, but is still mostly readable. Preservation could occur, but the artifact is not yet in critical condition.

• Low Damage: The artifact has very little damage on its surface. The text is nearly flawless and only minimal efforts would need to be made in order to maintain the artifact.

• Minimal Damage: The artifact has hardly any damage, all the text and artwork is readable. At this time, there is no need for preservation.

• 
  An artifact in the excessive damage catagory
• 
  An artifact in the high damage catagory
• 
  An artifact in the intermediate damage catagory
• 
  An artifact in the low damage catagory
• 
  An artifact in the minimal damage catagory

See Also

• Churches
• Church Floor Artifacts

Bibliography

S. Hoey, M. Kahan, P Marchetti, K Mazza. Convents, Palaces and Churches: Transformation of Historic Buildings and the Impact on Venice’s Neighborhoods. An Interactive Qualifying Project for Worcester Polytechnic Institute. 2003.

Santos,Luiz G., Petrowski,Craig Peter, Kristant,Elaine Hazel, Delaive,Amanda Leigh. The Church Floors in Venice, Italy -- an Archeological Study and Analysis. An Interactive Qualifying Project for Worcester Polytechnic Institute. 2002.

External Links

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