Andrea Dandolo, trained in historiography and law,…

Andrea Dandolo, trained in historiography and law, had tudied at the University of Padua where he became a law professor until he was elected as doge.

He is descended from an old Venetian noble family that has played an important role in Venetian politics from the twelfth century and produced numerous admirals and several other prominent citizens, as well as four Venetian doges, of which he is the last.

Dandolo's rise to prominence in Venetian public life had been precocious.

In 1331, at the age of only twenty-five, he had been named procurator of St. Mark's Basilica.

He became doge in 1343 at the age of thirty-seven.

Dandolo is known as a benefactor of the arts.

To St Mark’s Basilica he has added the Chapel of San Isidoro, overseen changes to the Pala d'Oro and expanded and beautified the Baptistery.

Ongoing repairs on the Pala d’Oro—the high altar retable of the Basilica di San Marco in Venice—are complete by 1345.

Universally recognized as one of the most refined and accomplished works of Byzantine craftsmanship, with both front and rear sides decorated, the altarpiece consists of two parts.

The lower part, with enamels illustrating the story of Saint Mark, the doge's portrait, and the Pantocrator group, originated as an antependium commissioned by the doge Ordelafo Faliero from the court craftsmen of Constantinople in 1102.

The image of Archangel Michael and the whole upper third are supposed to have been looted by the Crusaders in Constantinople in the Fourth Crusade of 1204.

In 1343, the Doge Andrea Dandolo had ordered both parts to be joined within a single Gothic framework featuring as many as one thousand nine hundred and twenty-seven gems.

The pala (from Latin palla, "cloth") is to be covered by Paolo Veneziano's wooden altarpiece and opened to the astonished public during liturgies only.