A sweeping and comprehensive history of Venice--from its formation in the early Middle Ages to
the present day--that traces its evolution as a city city-state regional power and overseas
empire. No city stirs the imagination more than Venice. From the richly ornamented palaces
emerging from the waters of the Grand Canal to the dazzling sites of Piazza San Marco visitors
and residents alike sense they are entering as fourteenth-century poet Petrarch remarked
"another world." During the Middle Ages and Renaissance Venice was celebrated as a model
republic in an age of monarchs. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries it became famous
for its freewheeling lifestyle characterized by courtesans casinos and Carnival. When the
city fell on hard times following the collapse of the Republic in 1797 a darker vision of
Venice as a place of decay disease and death took hold. Today tourists from around the globe
flock to the world heritage site as rising sea levels threaten its very foundations. This
comprehensive account reveals the adaptations to its geographic setting that have been a
constant feature of living on water from Venice's origins to the present. It examines the lives
of the women and men noble and common rich and poor Christian Jew and Muslim who built
not only the city but also its vast empire that stretched from Northern Italy to the eastern
Mediterranean. It details the urban transformations that Venice underwent in response to
environmental vulnerability industrialization and mass tourism. Alongside the city's
commercial prominence has been its dramatically changing political role including its power as
a city-state regional stronghold and overseas empire as well as its impact on the
development of fascism. Throughout Dennis Romano highlights the city's cultural achievements
in architecture painting and music particularly opera. This richly illustrated volume
offers a stunning portrait of this most singular of cities.
