Venice: Decline of Venice to the Present

Decline of Venice to the Present

The fall of Cyprus (1571), Crete (1669), and the Peloponnesus (1715; see Greece) to the Turks ended Venetian dominance in the E Mediterranean. Although the dramatist Goldoni and painters such as Tiepolo and Canaletto still made Venice the most original artistic city of 18th-century Italy, they represented to some extent the decadence that accompanied the city's commercial and military decline. Politics in 18th-century Venice was aristocratic and stagnant. When, in 1797, Napoleon I delivered Venice to Austria in the Treaty of Campo Formio, the republic fell without fighting. During the Risorgimento, however, Venice played a vigorous role under the leadership of Daniele Manin; having expelled the Austrians in 1848, it heroically resisted siege until 1849. In 1866, Venice and Venetia were united with the kingdom of Italy.

Since the 1950s, the city increasingly has been swamped by periodic floods, in part because it has sunk due to the withdrawal of water (now ended) from the aquifers beneath it and because sea levels have risen. Increased air pollution from cars and industrial smoke has contributed to the deterioration of the ancient buildings and works of art, and the high phosphorus and nitrogen content of the lagoon has stimulated algal growth, which has depleted marine life. Such environmental problems have led to a steady depopulation of Venice to the mainland over the past several decades. A major international aid program, begun in the mid-1960s by UNESCO, has searched for ways to preserve Venice; several government studies of Venice's problems have also been undertaken. In 1988, engineers began testing prototypes for a mechanical barrage, or sea gate, which could be raised in time of flooding to close the lagoon, and construction of system of sea gates began in 2003. The gates, after construction delays, were first used in 2020.

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