February 15, 2004

From water-laden streets to romantic gondolas, Venice is nothing but simply Venice

VENICE is sinking! Though this is an age-old cliche, the truth of the matter is that it might just be getting true. However, efforts of professionals and experts may already have borne fruit to the contrary, and made sure that Venice will never sink.

Venetian history dates back numerous millennia. It started to develop as a maritime centre in the 6th century. However, recent discoveries have led to the proof that it actually existed from prehistoric times. It started as a cluster of small islands, with marshy pockets all around them. With the passage of time, these marshes were reclaimed to create build-able land thus gradually growing into a full fledged city.

Venice being an amalgamation of small islands, with a dense network of canals as its main circulation, has always been threatened by the adverse effects of the sea and the salty water. Specially during the winter season when the water level inside the lagoon of Venice rises and the entire city sinks more than a meter below water level. The phenomenon is known as Aqua Alta, or high waters, when streets of Venice are inundated with water. People wade through knee deep water to reach their destinations, and ground level of most buildings get submerged in water.

The worst Aqua Alta occurred on November 4, 1966, when the water level alarmingly rose to more than six feet above the mean sea level. And this is what finally triggered off an international rescue operation in order to save Venice.

The Italian government and Unesco stepped in. The UN body appealed to its constituent members, getting an overwhelming response from the international community, who in collaboration with the Italian government and professionals have been working on this challenging task since 1969. Since then, efforts ranging from building conservation to restoration of paintings, mosaics and sculpture, and much more, have been undertaken. An important project related to the control of sea-water level is also under way. An agreement with the Italian government has been signed for the construction of flood control gates enabling the maintainence of sea-water at a certain level.

Venice never fails to mesmerize a visitor. No matter if it’s a short stopover for a day or two or a long extended one for months or years, the city never stops to fascinate. The more you get to know it, the more it enchants you with its charisma and beauty. Venice is famed for its incredibly unique circulation network of canals, devoid of any vehicular roads within the city. The streets of Venice are a secondary network designed only forpedestrian traffic, mostly tourists. But there is so much more that one could associate Venice with. The leaning bell towers, the tolling church bells, the splashing sounds of boats and gondolas, numerous pleasant experiences of getting lost in its narrow winding streets, innumerable number of bridges to cross, and of course the Piazza San Marco the pride of all Venetians labelled by Napoleon as “the most elegant drawing room in Europe”.

Piazza San Marco is a must to visit even if a person happens to be in Venice just for a few hours. The setting of buildings and the open space is impressive, infested with an overwhelming number of pigeons and tourists throughout the year, especially at weekends. The approach of the Piazza from the sea was the original access to the city. That changed in 1846 when the railway bridge connecting Venice to the mainland (Mestre) was constructed. Traditionally Venice was a city to be visited and seen only by boats. Even today the sea approach is marked by two free standing granite columns surmounted by sculpture depicting the two symbols of Venice; the lion of St Mark on one and the sculpture of St Theodore, the first patron saint of Venice, on the other.

The Piazza San Marco is an L-shaped open space that started to be developed with the construction of the Basilica and the Dogge’s Duccale Palace. It is flanked by buildings representing centuries of the Venetian Republic’s history, spanning from 9th century, when the Basilica and the Campanile were begun, to the 19th century when Napoleon tore down a church at the far end of the Piazza to make room for a ballroom. Today the buildings flanking the main Piazza hold exhibits of Correr Museums, the Archaeology Museum and the Library.

The most dominating feature of the Piazza is the 100 meter (325ft) high tower (Campanile San Marco), constructed with brick. This 9th century bell-tower evolved to its present form by 1514. The present structure is a reconstruction of the original, which had collapsed on the morning of 14 July 1902. However, that same evening it was decided that the Campanile would be rebuilt “as it was, where it was” and the replica true to its original was inaugurated in 1912. Although the climb up (presently by a fast lift) the tower is not the same experience as it might have been in earlier days when people were taken up the ramp on horseback, but it is still worth treating oneself with, because it gives a breathtaking view of entire Venice, with its dense fabric of red sloping roofs.

The Basilica of San Marco itself may be termed as a collection of antique stones from all over Asia Minor and the Mediterranean, even as far as Egypt. Since Venice has no stone quarries of its own, or even near it, the Venetians used to bring marbles from ancient Roman and Byzantine sites. It is said that there are more than eighty different varieties of stones used in the construction of the Basilica of San Marco. Most of the decorative architectural features including column capitals, and the four bronze horses that were brought from Constantinople. The Palace and the Basilica were embellished with booty from the various Crusades, especially from Constantinople. Although a lot of it was taken away by Napoleon and others, still museums are rich with exemplary antique treasures.

All buildings in Venice have two main entrances; one approached from the water and the other from the pedestrian street. There are private boats as well, a substitute of cars for Venice’s rich, parked on the water side entrance of houses. In fact everything operates through boats, from goods delivery to ambulances, police, garbage collection, public transport of water busses, etc. Although the functional means of transportation are the modern motorized boats, but this in no way has reduced the importance and charm of the traditional gondolas.

Gondolas are a luxury that only a few can afford while touring in Venice, but if one has the money for it then the experience is worth each penny spent. Venice is a city designed to be seen from the water and most of its impressive facades face the canals. Only a gondola ride gives an opportunity to enjoy and cherish these masterpieces of art and architecture, because it moves so gently and slowly along the canals without the disturbing noise of the motor. The incredulous prices of gondola rides can individually be afforded only by the very rich, but an affordable possibility is to make up a group of six (that’s the maximum number of people one gondola can take) and split up the amount.

For an average visitor the experience of a gondola is made possible by the Traghetto Cross over of the grand canal; a service that takes passengers from one bank to the opposite bank of the Grand Canal for an equivalent of only 40 cents. Thus one could boast of being on the gondola no matter if it was only for two or three minutes.

Being a maritime centre, the city is symbolically married to the sea. A ceremony performed by the Dogge of Venice every year ensures that this marriage is meant to last forever. From the year 1000 till the fall of the Republic, the Dogge used to row out to Lido (the narrow strip of island that cuts off the lagoon of Venice from the sea) in his ceremonial barge and cast a ring into the Adriatic Sea symbolizing the marriage of Venice with the sea.

A paler version of this ceremony is still performed on the morning of Vogalonga (an event started in 1975 and takes place on the first Sunday after Ascension Day, in which hundreds of row-boats participate in a 32km long marathon regatta) by the Mayor and Patriarch. The impressive ceremonial royal barge (Bucintoro) of the Dogge is today displayed at the Naval Museum.

Its been long since Venice ceased to be a maritime centre. The resident population of the city has reduced from 250,000 in the time when Venice was at its peak, to only 75,000; less than three quarter of what it used to be. Today the economy of the city is mainly based upon tourism and every day thousands of tourists enter the city. On one hand Venice gains a lot from its touristic fame, but on the other it also pays a heavy price in terms of pressures and harms of tourism.

The numerous hotels and restaurants catering to a tremendous number of tourists every day, generate waste that the traditional system of discharging into the canals without treating, can no longer sustain. Venice may not be sinking anymore, but it certainly has started stinking, specially during the summers. Thus there seems to be an urgent need for drawing attention towards the fact that the water disposal should be treated before being let out into the canals. Otherwise the romantic canals will definitely head towards becoming just stinking sewers very soon.

For most of the people who visit Venice, it is just a very attractive and prime tourist destination. But the fact of the matter is that Venice is much, much more. It is a living centre where artistic expressions in numerous forms have been nurtured for centuries. It is a place haunted by the mystique of centuries old legends and myths, it is an experience of the finest and the most cultured traditions, and more recently it has become an open air laboratory of stone conservation studies.

With the coming of spring the whole city enlivens with performances by musicians and artists. The streets and piazzas bustle with life, and this festive aura gains momentum through the summer months and lasts till the coming of winter. There are no bounds to what Venice offers its visitors. No matter how short or long the visit, one always departs with a feeling that there was so much more that remained un-experienced, and with a desire to return for more.

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