BUCENTAUR (βους and κόπταρος), the state galley of the Venetian doge, which was gilded from the prow to the stern, adorned with pillars, and covered overhead with an awning of purple silk. In this galley it was the custom annually on ascension-day for the doge, accompanied by the ambassadors and senators, to sail over a portion of the Adriatic, and dropping a ring into the sea, to espouse it in the name
of the republic, using the words Desponsamus te, mare, in signum veri perpetuique domini.