User:Notteazurra/sandbox

'''Lazzaretto Nuovo ''' Lazzaretto Nuovo is located approximately three kilometres northeast of Venice, at the entrance of the lagoon. The site is under the jurisdiction of the Ministero per i Beni e le Attivitá Culturali (Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities) and is managed and maintained by volunteers belonging to the Sede veneziana dell'Archeoclub d'Italia and the Associazione "Ekos Club" (Archeoclub-d'Italia 2011).

'''History ''' Archaeological finds bear testimony to human occupation since the Bronze Age, while in the Middle Ages it was owned by the monks of San Giorgio Maggiore who erected a church dedicated to San Bartolomeo (Fazzini 2004). The first written document, in which a notarial deed refers to the island as “Vigna Murada” (Walled Vineyard), dates to AD 1015; the island’s assets included approximately 25,000m2 of land, a house, rainwater well, vineyards surrounded by a stone wall, and saltpans at the edge of the lagoon (Mazzucco 2004).

Today the island’s perimeter wall is a trapezoidal area circa 30,600m2, and its southern-most wall is aligned 118.67° (Google Earth). Since ancient times the island had played a strategic role in controlling the waterways in Venice. In 1468, by decree of the Senate of the Serenissima, the island was established as a quarantine station for maritime travellers (Laughran 1998); it was called ‘Novo’ or new to distinguish it from the existing lazaretto located near the Lido where plague infected cases were admitted (Trovabene, et al. 2012).

''Two of them [islands] are set apart for the use of those who come from the Levant, where they are obliged to perform their quarantine in certain large hospitals, called Lazaretti. The first, called Lazaretto Vecchio, is but a mile distant from Venice; but the other, where we are confined, is five miles from the city. (du Mont 1696, p349)''

The Health Office decreed that those who left the hospital on Lazzaretto Vecchio should spend 40 days on Lazzaretto Nuovo before being allowed back into Venice. An additional ten-day home isolation period (on top of the 40 days on the Lazzaretto Nuovo) was introduced in 1541 if the plague was healed without treatment. If the buboes were treated, the quarantine was reduced to 30 days on Lazzaretto Nuovo and ten days in home quarantine in Venice (Byrne 2006).

The island became a quarantine post for ships arriving from various ports of the Mediterranean, suspected of carrying the plague (Osheim 2011). Many buildings were erected to improve the efficiency of the new lazaretto (Crawshaw 2012) and Sansovino describes the island as being castle-like in appearance because of the hundred double storey rooms (with chimneys) used to house merchants and sailors during their quarantine.

A first-hand account from 1691 briefly describes the accommodation: '' 'Tis one continued building, consisting of two storeys, 300 paces long, and divided by high walls into six apartments, each of which has a particular gate that leads into a square court, where there is a well, but the water is so bad, that, we never use any but what is brought from Venice. Every apartment contains twenty chambers, ten above, and as many below, separated like cells, with a chimney in each. … When a Man comes to lodge in one of these rooms, he finds nothing but four bare walls and must therefore buy an entire set of necessary furniture. (du Mont 1696, p350)''

Large sheds (teze), built in 1560-62 at the centre of the island where vineyards used to be located, were used for isolation and decontamination of the goods; most commonly, fumigation with aromatic herbs like juniper and rosemary leaves was employed (Malagnini 2017). Goods that were considered infected (amorbate) were burned, and the Republic paid reparations to the owners of merchandise who came from important trade centres, such as Constantinople and Alexandria (Laughran 1998). As the State was responsible for the merchandise it was decreed that after the goods were declared safe, they were to be removed from the island within eight days. It is said that this edict was instigated as the daughter of a custodian was responsible for a fire that burnt both merchandise and buildings, and the state had to recompense the merchants.

Although for the most part no record of those who died on the island has been recovered to date, there is at least one person known to have died there. The well-known Venetian lutenist and painter, Giorgio Gasparini80 (c1478-1510), commonly known as Giorgione, was sent to Lazzaretto Nuovo81 in the winter of 1510 to quarantine (Segre 2011). Giorgione succumbed to the plague during his stay on the island and almost a year later an unsuccessful request was made for his fur-lined red cloak, which features in one of his surviving paintings Laura (Schier 2014), to be returned to his estate with the remainder of his belongings (Segre 2011).

During the well-documented epidemic of 1576, residents from the mainland suspected of infection entered into the quarantine process and were sent to Lazzaretto Nuovo to await their fate (Archeoclub-d'Italia 2011). Much of the Venetian population thus passed through the island during times of plague, more than could be accommodated in 100 rooms; wood from the Arsenale was used to build temporary houses either on the island, or on floating platforms or stripped galleys tied together at the island edge so that it resembled a floating city (Benedetti 1577; Sansovino 1581). At the peak of the epidemic there were, in addition to the detainees, servants, troops, priests, doctors, surgeons, pharmacists, and midwives available to the micro-community (Crawshaw 2012). Between 8-10,000 people were on the island and 3,000 boats around it (Benedetti 1577; Sansovino 1581).

At the height of the third plague, discipline and order was paramount; at dawn, inspectors would examine everyone for signs of illness and send the infected to Lazzaretto Vecchio. Fresh water, meat and fish was then brought by the boatful and mass was celebrated in the evening. The next day another 50 boats full of people would come to the island (Sansovino 1581). Angelo Frari, president of the Maritime Health Magistrate of Venice (1835–1843), recounts that Lazzaretto Nuovo ceased to be used as a quarantine island in 1759, as the air was so corrupted. It was at this time the Venetian Senate began searching for an alternative island for commercial quarantine (Frari 1837).

The Island’s demise begins with the demolition of the Church in 1762 (Gallo, et al. 1996; Buzzell, et al. 2001) and Howard (1791) recalls the island in a dilapidated shape. In his words, the “sub-prior came and showed me my lodging, which was a very dirty room, full of vermin, and without table, chair, or bed. That day and the next morning I employed a person to wash my room: but this did not remove the offensiveness of it”. According to Howard, the Lazzaretto Nuovo was really only used to house “Turks and soldiers”.

In 1801 Lazaretto Nuovo is no longer used as a quarantine island and the prior begins renting the land out to a farmer to graze his herds (Buzzell, et al. 2001). By 1808 the island was officially replaced by Lazzaretto Nuovissimo and all remaining equipment was relocated to the island of Poveglia. As with the other lagoon islands, the French, Austrians, and Italians utilized and made several alterations to the island for military operations from the 19th century until 1975 when it was finally abandoned (Gallo, et al. 1996; Buzzell, et al. 2001). During this time the chimneyed rooms were demolished, defensive walls were built, and gunpowder stores were erected.

Today’s visitors to the island are shown, as part of the Island tour, a modified interpretation of a map of Lazaretto Nuovo from the 16th-18th century. The drawing shows two adjacent walled cemeteries on the outside of the perimeter wall; one reserved for Christian burials (Camposanto)