Foreign affairs

摘要

Imports were once the lifeblood of Venice; even its patron saint came from abroad. In 828AD Venetian merchants stole the relics of Saint Mark from a Coptic church in Alexandria and brought them home in triumph, claiming they had rescued the saint from the infidels. The theft was symbolic as well as physical. Venice wanted to set itself up as a new Alexandria: a centre of trade and learning in the Mediterranean that could link the Christian West with the Muslim East.