Music playing is ~ VIVALDI ~ The Spring

As well as the entertainment in St. Mark's Square, the Venetian Carnival is also famous for its concerts, which are held in the various churches of the city, for the theatrical performances, in the great Venetian tradition, and above all, for the magnificent festivals and balls, all taking take place in the unique setting of some of the ancient Venetian Palaces. ~ La Serenissima Repubblica ~ No one know when the Venice was first referred to as "the Most Serene Republic", but by the 14C it had become a recognized epithet. Many Italian cities had high-flown titles but this, unlike most, was exactly descriptive, for, throughout the long centuries from the fall of Roman Empire to the Napoleonic conquest of Italy, Venice alone of the cities of Italy knew internal tranquillity-serenity. No bloody revolutions; no brutal repressions; no merciless sackings by conquering armies; no jumped-up strutting dictators; no cowering people. The Venetians paid a price for serenity, but the fact that they paid that price for well over a thousand years shows they were happy to do so. The phrase "La Serenissima" could apply to the government, to the people in general, or even to the physical city. The feminine form of the word was partuculary appropriate, for Venetians saw their city as a beautiful woman. The official population of the city is around 300.000, but one of the problems facing Venice is that fewer and fewer citizens live in the historic centre. In 1950 there were nearly 185.000; today there are barely 80.000, the rest having migrated to Mestre on the mainland. Young married couples, in particular, have decided, reasonably enough, that they prefer to bring up families in comfortable modern apartments on the mainland rather than romantic but damp, dark, frequently cold apartments in the city centre. One of the results of this is that more and more rich "foreigners" from Milan and the like have set up second homes in the historic areas. Despite all this, and despite the tremendous pressure of tourism (in the hight season there is one visitor for every native inhabitant), the Venetian have, remakably, retained the Italian gift for actually liking strangers and treating them hospitably. Venice was linked to the mainland in 1845 when the Austrians built a railway on a causeway. The snarl of motorboats and the chugging of vaporetti are far more common than the song of the gondolier. That apart, the city is much as it was when Bellini or Carpaccio or Canaletto painted it centuries ago, the only major city in the world where the visitor can wander at will, unthreatened and undeafened by traffic - through frequently crushed by fellow tourists. It can be claustrophobic, and it is easy to get lost, for there is no map which details evey ~calle~. But there's no need to panic: all that is necessary is to keep on walking, and sooner or later you will come to the lagoon or the Grand Canal. It is, after all, an island, and one unique in the world. If you enjoyed visiting Venice Carnival with me, tell me your name and I'll personalize this Thank You Card for you. I only ask a link back to my site in return. Thanks! guestbook    e.mail Note: I made those pages with hard work. Every photograph was taken by me and my sister in past Venice Carnival. Photos effect have been made by me with Corel Photo Paint. Thanks to Grace from Countryside Heaven who draw all graphic for this site and gived them to me for my last birthday. Without her talent you couldn't enjoy these pages! Images, photographs and text are protected by copyright. Texts come from Venice in your pocket � Michelin et Cie.Proprietaires-Editeurs 1996 and � 2000 About.com, Inc. All rights reserved. Please don't steal!