B. Islands and Building Patterns

Venice, like any town, was not all settled at once. Development began in a small number of key areas and gradually spread under several constraints. The earliest settlement was in the Rialto district, on the western side of the modern Rialto bridge. From there, settlement crossed the Grand Canal to the San Giovanni Crisostomo area. Development of the city in the tenth century then proceeded along canals perpendicular to the Rialto: SS. Apostoli, toward the direction of Murano and Torcello, and the rii Palazzo, Guerra, Fava, and Fondaco dei Tedeschi, all heading toward the general direction of the Lido and Malamocco. [1] From these locales, settlement spread up and down the Grand Canal on both sides, and gradually outwards to west and east, generally running contiguously with what had been previously settled. The last area of the city to be settled was that portion of the Cannaregio that was not close either to the Grand Canal or to the Cannaregio canal; much of that is infill. [2] Settlement tended to be on the firmer islands, with a spread to less firm areas later. The Rialto district, as the largest island; the San Giovanni Crisostomo area, as the densest collection of islands with the narrowest canals; and the ducal settlement at San Marco, with a firm island and the Bacino adjacent, were all natural areas for early consolidation. [3]

Settlement on any given island followed a fairly standard pattern. The first houses would be built next to the water, so that the island would be surrounded by dwellings. Building and infill would proceed so that there would be one or more open areas in the middle of the island, for animal grazing and gardens. Building in the center of the island would be around one or more main streets, frequently running the length of the island, so that there were houses on either side. Such development would proceed inward from the edges of the island. [4] As the building proceeded, the web of waterways was joined by a network of streets, and in some cases by a competing network of courtyards. [5]

In the older areas, such as the Rialto and San Giacomo districts, the infill process eventually reached a saturation point. In order to acquire more land area, bits and pieces were added to the edges of islands, with the installation of pilings, so that fondamente had the same footing as buildings. Some of these land areas also received buildings; others, particularly on canal edges, became sidewalks and new streets. The entire process, albeit quite late in the cycle, is shown in the history of the Campo Due Pozzi, in the eastern part of the Castello sestiere. [6] The maps show relatively sparse development during the fifteenth century. In the sixteenth century, there was a great deal of building infill; there was also a pattern of infill of the land itself, taking over from the rio. By the seventeenth century, the rio became a canal, thoroughly channeled and all of one width, the narrowest possible--the land had expanded to the limits of its possible area. Occasionally, the infill process would be so all-consuming that other developments would be affected. In the areas of S. Sofia and S. Caterina, bridges actually disappeared between the Gothic period and modern times; in both cases, the former pedestrian spaces were covered over by new house development. [7]

There was a certain historical descriptiveness apparent in the naming conventions. A street that had originally been solid land and intended as a major thoroughfare and shopping precinct, paved with stone from the beginning, is still known as a salizzada, [8] such as the Salizzada San Lio, while a street created on the edge on a canal by building out from the houses already present is called a fondamenta, as in the Fondamenta San Barnaba. Other conventions included the use of "calle," from the Latin "path" or "track" for streets, and "ramo," from the Latin for "branch," to indicate a minor calle. [9] Ultimately the demand for land surface became so pressing that many canals, already subject to straightening and regularizing, were threatened with complete removal. Frequently, established institutions such as a church or convent wished to expand or to add a new building, as in the case of the convent attached to the Frari, where the friars wished to fill up the canal so that they could add on to their existing buildings. [10] This phenomenon of the filled-in canal, known as a rio terra or "land canal," is a fascinating sidelight on the development of the city.

Not all filled-up canals are necessarily commemorated with the rio terra prefix, but there are a sufficient number to give us a clear idea as to how the city's islands were originally distributed, and to where the water actually went. For example, in the Cannaregio area, at what is now the rio terra S. Lunardo, the calle running perpendicular to Campo S. Lunardo, the rio terra's continuation northwards, and the calli going south toward and east/west across S. Marcuola are all former canals. In total, roughly forty canals were filled in. [11]

The other method of increasing the land area was by outright landfill. Much of the Cannaregio district was created by this means: the northwestern ends of all the islands east of the Cannaregio canal are landfill. [12] Originally, these areas had been marsh or open water. As may be seen on a map, these areas were filled in in a regularized fashion, so that they gained the appearance of areas that had undergone centuries of intermittent infill. Canals were straight and narrow, and the islands had the maximum land area possible. It should, of course, be fairly obvious that the more building that has taken place on an island, the less of its early character remains, as may be seen in tracing the development of the island on which the Miracoli church stands. In the earlier stages, the sightlines involving water may be quite clearly seen. Later infill removed these sightlines, giving a much more land-oriented feeling. The entire central area of the island was not built up until sometime after 1400, so that before the construction of the church, there were many views to the "open" water, some in two directions (northwest and southeast) simultaneously. Afterward, these views no longer existed. [13]