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Kirmenjak - the stone on which Venice was built

Kirmenjak, white limestone from the quarries near village Kirmenjak in Istria (Croatia), in the past known as Pietra d Istria (Istrian stone), has been regularly used for constructing the basal zone of Venetian buildings since the 13th century. Its characteristics - extremely low water absorption and high compressive strength make it the ideal material for the lowest part of Venetian buildings - the zone between the foundation (wooden piles) and brickwork walls. In this zone, exposed to the daily high tide flooding and low tide drying, materials deteriorate very quickly, but Kirmenjak proved to be resistant and durable even in this aggressive environment. This dense micritic or pelmicritic stylolitised limestone from Upper Jurassic Tithonian age was used as an efficient damp course in the basal zone of Venetian structures, to protect building superstructures from the aggressive impact of saline water of the Lagoon. Our assumption is that the Venetian constructors made advantage of horizontal stylolite discontinuities (partially filled with clay) as the multi-layer humidity insulation, which minimised already very low water absorption. Therefore, we made a preliminary investigation on how Kirmenjak blocks were laid into the base zone of Venetian buildings, taking into account prevalent stylolite orientation.

Kirmenjak - Istrian stone; limestone; Venezia; aggressive environment; resistance; durability; damp course; stylolite discontinuities

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