Venice

(věn'is,) [It. VENEZIA,] a N.E. p. of Italy, b. E. and S.E. by the Adriatic, and having its coast-line threaded by a net-work of lagoons, extending a length of 25 m. bet. the Lile and Brenta rivers, and dotted with small islands, on which the city of Venice, the cap., is built. Pop. 294,650.- VENICE, a famous city, C. of above p., and of the whilom Republic of Venice, at the head of the Adriatic Sea, 70 m. W. of Trieste, lies in N. Lat. 45° 25' 9", E. Lon. 12° 20′ 2". This city is of unique construction, being built upon wooden piles resting upon a series of 80 small islets separated from one another by canals, and divided from the main waters of the Adriatic by the Littorale, a kind of sandy causeway connecting by a viaduct with the mainland. The canals between the islands are spanned by 450 bridges, and form, so to speak, the public thoroughfares traversed by means of gondolas. The Grand Canal, constituting the great dividing artery of this labyrinthine water-system, is cro ed by the Rialto, the finest of Venetian bridges, consisting of a single arch, and with its upper surface divided by two ranges of shops into three narrow parallel streets. The chief architectural features of V. are concentrated in and around the great square of St. Mark, which contains the cathedral of that name and the fine old palace of the doges. The churches of V. are replete with works of pictorial art of inestimable value, the production of the great painters of the Venetian school. The great library, with its museum and cabinet of objects of virtu, is one of the finest in Europe. The naval dockyard and arsenal are also noteworthy objects. V. is the centre of a considerable foreign commerce, and is largely engaged in the manuf. of jewelry, silk and velvet stuffs, porcelain,gla , .-This city dates its foundation from 421, when it arose from the sea to serve as an asylum for those whom the irruption of the Huns under Attila had driven from the mainland. In 697 it was constituted an independent state, under an elective prince who po tic powers were for a long time delegated, that is to say, until the appropriation of the executive authority by the Council of Ten, a body of senators of oligarchical origin. V. was at its zenith of pride, power, and prosperity during the 13th cent., being then the foremost naval and commercial state in Europe. Her rivalry with Genoa, however, and wars with the Turks resulting in the lo of many ofher Levantine colonies, gradually lowered her prestige and weakened her potency, so much so that after the Portuguese discovery of the ocean-route to India round the Cape of Good Hope, she ceased to be longer the mistre of the sea, and declined slowly but surely into a condition of decadence. Napoleon I. gave the finishing blow to her fall by his creation of the Cis-Alpine republic and absorption of V. into his newly created Italian kingdom. At the peace of 1815, V. was ceded to Austria, and was held by the latter until her surrender of the Venetian pro vs. to Italy after the Pru o-Austrian war of 1866. Pop. 113,525. [s. 932]