Venice is a city located in northern Italy. Also, this city is Veneto’s capital. It is found across 118 small islands that are linked by bridges and separated by canals. This city is known for the beauty of its setting, and that explains why it attracts many people who would like to pay a visit to Venice. Some of the magnificent things that make Venice a beautiful city are its artwork and unique architecture. Besides, some parts of the city alongside its lagoon are recognized as World Heritage Sites. Venice is sparsely populated as compared to most cities in the world. According to a 2014 statistical analysis, 264,579 people were residents of Comune di Venezia, and among these people, 55,000 stayed in the city of Venice.
The name of Venice was derived from the Veneti people who lived in this area in the 10th century BCE (Teatini, et al. 72). Over the years, Venice has been identified with many names such as La Dominate, City of Canals, City of Water, and others like City of Masks. In the early years, for instance, in the 13th century to around the 17th century, Venice was a dominant maritime power and city of finance (Savoy 98). It was also a starting area for the Battle of Lepanto as well as a recognized center of commerce and art. Venice is considered having been one of the first international financial centers that thrived from the 9th century and became even more renowned for its commercial activities in the 14th century (Savoy 98). This stands out as the primary reason as to why Venice remained one of the wealthy cities in history.
This modern age found Venice already thriving. Besides, in the 18th century, Venice had become an elegant and apparently the most refined city in Europe considering that it had the high influence of literature, art, and architecture. Most buildings in Venice are constructed by wooden piles that are closely spaced. Regardless of the centuries of submersion, most of the piles in Venice are still intact. Venice foundations are composed of Istrian limestone that is placed on top of wooden piles (Casagrande 121). Above these footings, there are buildings of stone or bricks. This type of construction methods has been used for centuries because of its durability and the strength in construction of buildings.
Venice’s climate as recorded in the Koppen climate classification is that this city is on humid subtropics. Similarly, the city experiences hot summers and cold winters. Precipitation in this area relatively spread evenly from January to December with an average of 748 millimeters. From the 1990s, center-left parties were the governing bodies of Venice until 2010s when the politics changed, and the mayor was directly being elected (Casagrande 122). The Veneto region of Venice has always been the stronghold because it has the majorities making politicians from that area to ever win many elections at regional, national, and communal levels. Venice’s municipality is subdivided to include six administrative Boroughs. Every Borough has a Council and a President contextually elected to govern as the city Mayor. However, the Italian Constitution rules the public organization.
The economy of Venice has changed in time throughout its history. However, in the earliest years, the prosperity of Venice was on slave trade of those people captured from central Europe and shipped for sale in the Levant and North Africa. Venice had an advantage in this trade because of its location since it was above the Adriatic as well as directly over the Alps and south of Brenner Pass’s terminus. The slave trade made this city to become a middleman in this kind of deal. Today, Venice’s economy is thriving even more because it is based on shipbuilding, tourism and industrial exports alongside other services (Ferraro 57). Furthermore, lace production in Burano together with the creation of Murano glass in Murano has an enormous impact on this city’s economy.
Venice is among the world’s top tourist destinations considering that it is a celebrity in architecture and art. Grounded on a 2017 estimate, it is notable that up to 60,000 tourists visit this city every day with a rating of up to 30 million tourists annually (Ferraro 58). The transportation system in Venice varies with the area of interest. The conventional means of transport in the lagoon areas is a motorized waterbus. Also, there are buses on the road traffics on the Islands. In Venice’s mainland, the standard means of transport are transit riders, several bus routes, and commuter trains. There are also cruise ships and airports in Venice city. As for the education system, Venice is one of the major international centers that have higher education. Institutions in this city include Venice International University and the Ca’ Foscari University (Wei 470).
There are different cultures in Venice. Literature is one of the customs, and it has been among the primary sources of inspiration for poets, authors together with playwrights. Some of the most renowned writers from Venice were Marco Polo and Giacomo. People of Venice have for many years remained orthodox Roman Catholic. It is notable that this city has always had freedom of religion and it executed nobody for embracing their faith. Venice is one of the cities that produced some of the best and refined rococo architectural designs. Moreover, this city is recognized for having best ornate glass-works identified as Venetian glass. These are some of the glasses that are colorfully and skillfully made in elegant ways. Venice city has an annual festival known as the Carnival of Venice, and it is held every year. The festival goes for two weeks. Nevertheless, Venice is among the most recognized cities in the world.
