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76-513: The origins of the gandelow’s name are unknown - it may be connected with that of the Italian gondola ('small boat') or, possibly, be a version of the Viking name for their flat-bottomed boats. Most gandelows were around 7 metres (23 feet) along and were rowed by two or three fishermen whose main catch was salmon . The boats were also used for cutting thatching reeds and for transporting people and

152-426: A "felze", a small cabin, to protect the passengers from the weather or from onlookers. Its windows could be closed with louvered shutters—the original " Venetian blinds ". After the elimination of the traditional felze—possibly in response to tourists' complaining that it blocked the view—there survived for some decades a kind of vestigial summer awning, known as the "tendalin" (these can be seen on gondolas as late as

228-583: A Shannon Estuary Fishing Boat" published in 2005. The fishermen of those times would no doubt be astonished to see that their working boat is now being built again, prized by the Limerick riverside community for its beauty and raced for entertainment and exercise. By the 1950s it was getting harder to find the long spruce boards needed for building the boats and so shorter boats of 21 feet, or even 18 feet long became more common. Eventually, gandelow building faded away as fish stocks declined and limits on fishing on

304-590: A compensation for the fact that the 2nd- and 3rd-person inflections for most verbs, which are still distinct in Italian and many other Romance languages, are identical in Venetian. The Piedmontese language also has clitic subject pronouns, but the rules are somewhat different. The function of clitics is particularly visible in long sentences, which do not always have clear intonational breaks to easily tell apart vocative and imperative in sharp commands from exclamations with "shouted indicative". For instance, in Venetian

380-465: A gondolier, who uses a rowing oar , which is not fastened to the hull , in a sculling manner, and also acts as the rudder . The uniqueness of the gondola includes its being asymmetrical along the length, making the single-oar propulsion more efficient. For centuries, the gondola was a major means of transportation and the most common watercraft within Venice . In modern times, the boats still do have

456-482: A nasal, whereas Italian only uses [ ŋ ] before velar stops: e.g. [kaŋˈtaɾ] "to sing", [iŋˈvɛɾno] "winter", [ˈoŋzaɾ] "to anoint", [ɾaŋˈdʒaɾse] "to cope with". Speakers of Italian generally lack this sound and usually substitute a dental [ n ] for final Venetian [ ŋ ] , changing for example [maˈniŋ] to [maˈnin] and [maˈɾiŋ] to [maˈrin] . An accented á

532-531: A role in public transport in the city, serving as traghetti (small ferries ) over the Grand Canal operated by two oarsmen. Various types of gondola boats are also used in special regattas (rowing races) held amongst gondoliers. Their primary role today, however, is to carry tourists on rides at fixed rates. There are approximately 400 licensed gondoliers in Venice and a similar number of boats, down from

608-528: A special interrogative verbal flexion used for direct questions, which also incorporates a redundant pronoun: Reflexive tenses use the auxiliary verb avér ("to have"), as in English, the North Germanic languages , Catalan, Spanish, Romanian and Neapolitan; instead of èssar ("to be"), which would be normal in Italian. The past participle is invariable, unlike Italian: Another peculiarity of

684-693: A vehicle for a common Italian culture, strongly supported by eminent Venetian humanists and poets, from Pietro Bembo (1470–1547), a crucial figure in the development of the Italian language itself, to Ugo Foscolo (1778–1827). Venetian spread to other continents as a result of mass migration from the Veneto region between 1870 and 1905, and between 1945 and 1960. Venetian migrants created large Venetian-speaking communities in Argentina , Brazil (see Talian ), and Mexico (see Chipilo Venetian dialect ), where

760-427: A weakened or lenited ("evanescent") ⟨l⟩ , which in some orthographic norms is indicated with the letter ⟨ ł ⟩ or ⟨ ƚ ⟩ ; in more conservative dialects, however, ⟨l⟩ and ⟨ł⟩ are merged as ordinary [ l ] . In those dialects that have both types, the precise phonetic realization of ⟨ł⟩ depends both on its phonological environment and on

836-588: Is a Romance language spoken natively in the northeast of Italy , mostly in Veneto , where most of the five million inhabitants can understand it. It is sometimes spoken and often well understood outside Veneto: in Trentino , Friuli , the Julian March , Istria , and some towns of Slovenia , Dalmatia ( Croatia ) and Bay of Kotor ( Montenegro ) by a surviving autochthonous Venetian population, and in Argentina , Australia , Brazil , Canada , Mexico ,

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912-405: Is a "semi-analytical" verbal flexion, with a compulsory clitic subject pronoun before the verb in many sentences, echoing the subject as an ending or a weak pronoun. Independent/emphatic pronouns (e.g. ti ), on the contrary, are optional. The clitic subject pronoun ( te, el/ła, i/łe ) is used with the 2nd and 3rd person singular, and with the 3rd person plural. This feature may have arisen as

988-472: Is a manuscript titled Dialogo de Cecco di Ronchitti da Bruzene in perpuosito de la stella Nuova attributed to Girolamo Spinelli , perhaps with some supervision by Galileo Galilei for scientific details. Several Venetian–Italian dictionaries are available in print and online, including those by Boerio , Contarini, Nazari and Piccio . As a literary language , Venetian was overshadowed by Dante Alighieri 's Tuscan dialect (the best known writers of

1064-635: Is adjacent to a front vowel ( ⟨i e⟩ ). In dialects further inland ⟨ł⟩ may be realized as a partially vocalised ⟨l⟩ . Thus, for example, góndoła 'gondola' may sound like góndoea [ˈɡoŋdoe̯a] , góndola [ˈɡoŋdola] , or góndoa [ˈɡoŋdoa] . In dialects having a null realization of intervocalic ⟨ł⟩ , although pairs of words such as scóła , "school" and scóa , "broom" are homophonous (both being pronounced [ˈskoa] ), they are still distinguished orthographically. Venetian, like Spanish, does not have

1140-630: Is also spoken in North and South America by the descendants of Italian immigrants. Notable examples of this are Argentina and Brazil , particularly the city of São Paulo and the Talian dialect spoken in the Brazilian states of Espírito Santo , São Paulo , Paraná , Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina . In Mexico , the Chipilo Venetian dialect is spoken in the state of Puebla and

1216-544: Is also the New England Gundalow to consider, though this is a barge not a fishing boat. Gondola The gondola ( English: / ˈ ɡ ɒ n d ə l ə / , Italian: [ˈɡondola] ; Venetian : góndoła , Venetian: [ˈɡoŋdoɰa] ) is a traditional, flat-bottomed Venetian rowing boat , well suited to the conditions of the Venetian lagoon . It is typically propelled by

1292-586: Is first attested in writing in the 13th century. The language enjoyed substantial prestige in the days of the Republic of Venice , when it attained the status of a lingua franca in the Mediterranean Sea . Notable Venetian-language authors include the playwrights Ruzante (1502–1542), Carlo Goldoni (1707–1793) and Carlo Gozzi (1720–1806). Following the old Italian theatre tradition ( commedia dell'arte ), they used Venetian in their comedies as

1368-410: Is held in an oarlock known as a fórcola . The forcola is of a complicated shape, allowing several positions of the oar for slow forward rowing, powerful forward rowing, turning, slowing down, rowing backwards, and stopping. The ornament on the front of the boat is called the fèrro (meaning iron) and can be made from brass, stainless steel, or aluminium. It serves as decoration and as counterweight for

1444-405: Is now pronounced either as [ dz ] (Italian voiced-Z ), or more typically as [ z ] (Italian voiced-S , written ⟨x⟩ , as in el pianxe ); in a few dialects the sound appears as [ d ] and may therefore be written instead with the letter ⟨d⟩ , as in el piande . Some varieties of Venetian also distinguish an ordinary [ l ] vs.

1520-618: Is now protected by the Institution for the Protection and Conservation of Gondolas and Gondoliers, headquartered in the historical center of Venice. The profession of gondolier is controlled by a guild, which issues a limited number of licenses (approximately 400), granted after periods of training (400 hours over six months) and apprenticeship, and a major comprehensive exam which tests knowledge of Venetian history and landmarks, foreign language skills, and practical skills in handling

1596-673: Is one of the Italo-Dalmatian languages and most closely related to Istriot on the one hand and Tuscan – Italian on the other. Some authors include it among the Gallo-Italic languages , and according to others, it is not related to either one. Although both Ethnologue and Glottolog group Venetian into the Gallo-Italic languages, the linguists Giacomo Devoto and Francesco Avolio and the Treccani encyclopedia reject

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1672-454: Is pronounced as [ ɐ ], (an intervocalic / u / could be pronounced as a [ w ] sound). While written Venetian looks similar to Italian, it sounds very different, with a distinct lilting cadence, almost musical. Compared to Italian, in Venetian syllabic rhythms are more evenly timed, accents are less marked, but on the other hand tonal modulation is much wider and melodic curves are more intricate. Stressed and unstressed syllables sound almost

1748-593: Is pronounced the same as Castilian Spanish cena (which has the same meaning). The voiceless interdental fricative occurs in Bellunese, north-Trevisan, and in some Central Venetian rural areas around Padua, Vicenza and the mouth of the river Po . Because the pronunciation variant [ θ ] is more typical of older speakers and speakers living outside of major cities, it has come to be socially stigmatized, and most speakers now use [ s ] or [ ts ] instead of [ θ ] . In those dialects with

1824-595: Is spoken mainly in the Italian regions of Veneto and Friuli-Venezia Giulia and in both Slovenia and Croatia ( Istria , Dalmatia and the Kvarner Gulf ). Smaller communities are found in Lombardy ( Mantua ), Trentino , Emilia-Romagna ( Rimini and Forlì ), Sardinia ( Arborea , Terralba , Fertilia ), Lazio ( Pontine Marshes ), Tuscany ( Grossetan Maremma ) and formerly in Romania ( Tulcea ). It

1900-624: Is used only in Veneto dialects of Venetian language. It will suffice to know that in Venetian language the letter L in word-initial and intervocalic positions usually becomes a "palatal allomorph", and is barely pronounced. Very few Venetic words seem to have survived in present Venetian, but there may be more traces left in the morphology, such as the morpheme - esto / asto / isto for the past participle, which can be found in Venetic inscriptions from about 500 BC: A peculiarity of Venetian grammar

1976-737: The Charles River in Boston, Stillwater (Minnesota), New York's Central Park , and the Providence River in Rhode Island, as well as several in California. The annual U.S. Gondola Nationals competitions have been held since 2011, and feature American Gondoliers competing in sprints and slalom races, Mark Twain visited Venice in the summer of 1867. He dedicated much of The Innocents Abroad , chapter 23, to describing

2052-621: The United States and the United Kingdom by Venetians in the diaspora. Although referred to as an "Italian dialect" (Venetian: diałeto ; Italian : dialetto ) even by some of its speakers, the label is primarily geographic. Venetian is a separate language from Italian, with many local varieties. Its precise place within the Romance language family remains somewhat controversial. Both Ethnologue and Glottolog group it into

2128-593: The geminate consonants characteristic of standard Italian, Tuscan, Neapolitan and other languages of southern Italy; thus Italian fette ("slices"), palla ("ball") and penna ("pen") correspond to féte , bała , and péna in Venetian. The masculine singular noun ending, corresponding to -o / -e in Italian, is often unpronounced in Venetian after continuants, particularly in rural varieties: Italian pieno ("full") corresponds to Venetian pien , Italian altare to Venetian altar . The extent to which final vowels are deleted varies by dialect:

2204-453: The subjunctive mood is widely used in subordinate clauses . Some dialects of Venetian have certain sounds not present in Italian, such as the interdental voiceless fricative [ θ ] , often spelled with ⟨ç⟩ , ⟨z⟩ , ⟨zh⟩ , or ⟨ž⟩ , and similar to English th in thing and thought . This sound occurs, for example, in çéna ("supper", also written zhena, žena ), which

2280-493: The 14th century to some extent. Other noteworthy variants are: Like most Romance languages, Venetian has mostly abandoned the Latin case system , in favor of prepositions and a more rigid subject–verb–object sentence structure. It has thus become more analytic , if not quite as much as English. Venetian also has the Romance articles , both definite (derived from the Latin demonstrative ille ) and indefinite (derived from

2356-429: The 17th and 18th century, but there are only around four hundred in active service today, with virtually all of them used for hire by tourists. Those few that are in private ownership are either hired out to Venetians for weddings or used for racing. Even though the gondola, by now, has become a widely publicized icon of Venice, in the times of the Republic of Venice it was by far not the only means of transportation; on

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2432-691: The 2010 2nd Regional ad hoc Commission of the Regione del Veneto. The Academia de ła Bona Creansa – Academy of the Venetian Language, an NGO accredited according to the UNESCO 2003 Convention for the Venetian language and culture had already worked, tested, applied and certified a full writing system (presented in a scientific publication in linguistics in 2016), known with the DECA acronym ( Drio El Costumar de l'Academia , i.e. literally According to

2508-496: The 20th century also saw many Venetian-speakers settle in other regions of Italy, especially in the Pontine Marshes of southern Lazio where they populated new towns such as Latina , Aprilia and Pomezia , forming there the so-called " Venetian-Pontine " community ( comunità venetopontine ). Some firms have chosen to use Venetian language in advertising, as a beer did some years ago ( Xe foresto solo el nome , 'only

2584-455: The Gallo-Italic branch (and thus, closer to French and Emilian–Romagnol than to Italian ). Devoto , Avolio and Ursini reject such classification, and Tagliavini places it in the Italo-Dalmatian branch of Romance. Like all members of the Romance language family , Venetian evolved from Vulgar Latin , and is thus a sister language of Italian and other Romance languages. Venetian

2660-831: The Gallo-Italic classification. Although the language region is surrounded by Gallo-Italic languages , Venetian does not share some traits with these immediate neighbors. Some scholars stress Venetian's characteristic lack of Gallo-Italic traits ( agallicità ) or traits found further afield in Gallo-Romance languages (e.g. French, Franco-Provençal ) or the Rhaeto-Romance languages (e.g. Friulian , Romansh ). For example, Venetian did not undergo vowel rounding or nasalization, palatalize /kt/ and /ks/ , or develop rising diphthongs /ei/ and /ou/ , and it preserved final syllables, whereas, as in Italian , Venetian diphthongization occurs in historically open syllables. On

2736-740: The Renaissance, such as Petrarch , Boccaccio and Machiavelli , were Tuscan and wrote in the Tuscan language) and languages of France like the Occitano-Romance languages and the langues d'oïl including the mixed Franco-Venetian . Even before the demise of the Republic, Venetian gradually ceased to be used for administrative purposes in favor of the Tuscan-derived Italian language that had been proposed and used as

2812-474: The Shannon were applied. The 23-foot boats of the traditional Shannon type are specialised craft which evolved different forms in various parts of the estuary over the centuries. These variations enabled the fishermen to deal with the challenges of the river with its exceptional tidal range. The different forms are described in the book "Traditional Boats of Ireland" (2008). The gandelow has 'butterfly planks' at

2888-737: The Use of the Academia ). The DECA writing system has been officialized by the Veneto Region under the name Grafia Veneta Internazionale Moderna , by unanimous vote of the Commissione Grafia e Toponomastica (i.e. Script and Topononymy Committee of the Venetian language on December 14, 2017, and available at portal of the Venetian Regional Council dedicated to the Venetian language . The same writing system

2964-566: The annual Festa degli asparagi (Asparagus festival). This was also an opportunity to directly compare the gandelow with local Italian boats of a similar design (such as the 's'ciopon' - meaning 'big gun'- or a 'sandolo'). Indeed, when seen side by side, there were many similarities in design and methods of construction which lent some support to the theory, voiced anecdotally in Ireland, that the names gandelow and gondola were somehow connected. However, no conclusive evidence has been found yet. There

3040-758: The central–southern varieties delete vowels only after / n / , whereas the northern variety deletes vowels also after dental stops and velars; the eastern and western varieties are in between these two extremes. The velar nasal [ ŋ ] (the final sound in English "song") occurs frequently in Venetian. A word-final / n / is always velarized, which is especially obvious in the pronunciation of many local Venetian surnames that end in ⟨n⟩ , such as Mari n [maˈɾiŋ] and Mani n [maˈniŋ] , as well as in common Venetian words such as ma n ( [ˈmaŋ] "hand"), piro n ( [piˈɾoŋ] "fork"). Moreover, Venetian always uses [ ŋ ] in consonant clusters that start with

3116-430: The city and region, which is why the modern language has a similar name, while their language may have also left a few traces in modern Venetian as a substrate . The main regional varieties and subvarieties of Venetian language: All these variants are mutually intelligible, with a minimum 92% in common among the most diverging ones (Central and Western). Modern speakers reportedly can still understand Venetian texts from

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3192-446: The clitic el marks the indicative verb and its masculine singular subject, otherwise there is an imperative preceded by a vocative. Although some grammars regard these clitics as "redundant", they actually provide specific additional information as they mark number and gender, thus providing number-/gender- agreement between the subject(s) and the verb, which does not necessarily show this information on its endings. Venetian also has

3268-537: The corresponding words of Italian. Venetian includes however many words derived from other sources (such as ancient Venetic, Greek, Gothic, and German), and has preserved some Latin words not used to the same extent in Italian, resulting in many words that are not cognate with their equivalent words in Italian, such as: Since December 2017 the Venetian language adopted a modern writing system, named GVIM (acronym for Grafia del Veneto Internazionale Moderno , i.e. Writing system for Modern International Venetian ) thanks to

3344-542: The curiosity of urban life with gondolas and gondoliers. The first act of Gilbert and Sullivan 's two-act comic operetta The Gondoliers is set in Venice, and its two protagonists (as well as its men's chorus) are of the eponymous profession, even though the political irony that makes up the core of the piece has much more to do with British society than with Venice. Venetian language Venetian , wider Venetian or Venetan ( łengua vèneta [ˈɰeŋɡwa ˈvɛneta] or vèneto [ˈvɛneto] )

3420-440: The dialect of the speaker. In Venice and its mainland as well as in most of central Veneto (excluding the peripheral provinces of Verona, Belluno and some islands of the lagoon) the realization is a non-syllabic [e̯] (usually described as nearly like an "e" and so often spelled as ⟨e⟩ ), when ⟨ł⟩ is adjacent (only) to back vowels ( ⟨a o u⟩ ), vs. a null realization when ⟨ł⟩

3496-405: The families where such expertise was a considerable asset. As a result, templates and plans were jealously guarded and so few records remain. The boat-builder's shed would be a modest affair - nothing like a modern workshop. Nevertheless, the boats were made with care and became handy craft which could last up to twenty years if maintained well. The construction techniques were simple and effective,

3572-543: The gondola. Such skills are necessary in the tight spaces of Venetian canals. Gondoliers dress in a blue or red striped top, red neckerchief, wide-brimmed straw hat and dark pants. A gondolier can earn the equivalent of up to US$ 150,000 per year. In August 2010, Giorgia Boscolo became Venice's first fully licensed female gondolier. There are about a half dozen cities in the United States where gondolas are operated as tourist attractions, including New Orleans ,

3648-521: The gondolier standing near the stern. According to a popular urban legend with no factual basis, every detail of the gondola has its own symbolism. The iron prow-head of the gondola, called "fero da prorà" or "dolfin", is needed to balance the weight of the gondolier at the stern and has an " Ƨ " shape symbolic of the twists in the Canal Grande. Under the main blade there is a kind of comb with six teeth or prongs ("rebbi") pointing forward standing for

3724-483: The language is still spoken today. In the 19th century large-scale immigration towards Trieste and Muggia extended the presence of the Venetian language eastward. Previously the dialect of Trieste had been a Rhaeto Romance dialect known as Tergestino . This dialect became extinct as a result of Venetian migration, which gave rise to the Triestino dialect of Venetian spoken there today. Internal migrations during

3800-683: The language is the use of the phrase eser drìo (literally, "to be behind") to indicate continuing action: Another progressive form in some Venetian dialects uses the construction èsar łà che (lit. "to be there that"): The use of progressive tenses is more pervasive than in Italian; e.g. That construction does not occur in Italian: *Non sarebbe mica stato parlandoti is not syntactically valid. Subordinate clauses have double introduction ("whom that", "when that", "which that", "how that"), as in Old English : As in other Romance languages,

3876-526: The late 19th century. The people of Chipilo preserve their dialect and call it chipileño , and it has been preserved as a variant since the 19th century. The variant of Venetian spoken by the Cipiłàn ( Chipileños ) is northern Trevisàn-Feltrìn-Belumàt. In 2009, the Brazilian city of Serafina Corrêa , in the state of Rio Grande do Sul, gave Talian a joint official status alongside Portuguese . Until

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3952-465: The map of Venice created by Jacopo de' Barbari in 1500, only a fraction of the boats are gondolas, the majority of boats are batellas, caorlinas, galleys, and other boats. Now, only a handful of batellas survive, and caorlinas are used for racing only. The historical gondola was quite different from its modern evolution; the paintings of Canaletto and others show a much lower prow, a higher "ferro", and usually two rowers. The banana-shaped modern gondola

4028-408: The mid-1950s, in the film Summertime (1955)). While in previous centuries gondolas could be many different colors, a sumptuary law of Venice required that gondolas should be painted black, and they are customarily so painted now. The gondola has existed in Venice since the 11th century, being first mentioned by name in 1094. It is estimated that there were eight to ten thousand gondolas during

4104-693: The middle of the 20th century, Venetian was also spoken on the Greek Island of Corfu , which had long been under the rule of the Republic of Venice . Moreover, Venetian had been adopted by a large proportion of the population of Cephalonia , one of the Ionian Islands , because the island was part of the Stato da Màr for almost three centuries. Venetian is a Romance language and thus descends from Vulgar Latin . Its classification has always been controversial: According to Tagliavini, for example, it

4180-401: The name is foreign'). In other cases advertisements in Veneto are given a "Venetian flavour" by adding a Venetian word to standard Italian: for instance an airline used the verb xe ( Xe sempre più grande , "it is always bigger") into an Italian sentence (the correct Venetian being el xe senpre pì grando ) to advertise new flights from Marco Polo Airport . In 2007, Venetian

4256-452: The noun in gender and number, but it is important to mention that the suffix might be deleted because the article is the part that suggests the number. However, Italian is influencing Venetian language: In recent studies on Venetian variants in Veneto, there has been a tendency to write the so-called "evanescent L" as ⟨ł⟩ . While it may help novice speakers, Venetian was never written with this letter. In this article, this symbol

4332-535: The numeral unus ). Venetian also retained the Latin concepts of gender (masculine and feminine) and number (singular and plural). Unlike the Gallo-Iberian languages, which form plurals by adding -s , Venetian forms plurals in a manner similar to standard Italian. Nouns and adjectives can be modified by suffixes that indicate several qualities such as size, endearment, deprecation, etc. Adjectives (usually postfixed) and articles are inflected to agree with

4408-509: The occasional cow or sheep. In Limerick , some boats were used to take pilots out to the ocean-going vessels or acted as small lighters transporting goods to the docks. The boat's variations in form reflect the unique different conditions up and down the Shannon estuary. In Limerick, the fishing village was on Clancy Strand opposite King John's Castle . The story of the gandelow has been described in Jim McInerney's book "The Gandelow:

4484-543: The other hand, Venetian does share many other traits with its surrounding Gallo-Italic languages, like interrogative clitics , mandatory unstressed subject pronouns (with some exceptions), the "to be behind to" verbal construction to express the continuous aspect ("El ze drio manjar" = He is eating, lit. he is behind to eat) and the absence of the absolute past tense as well as of geminated consonants . In addition, Venetian has some unique traits which are shared by neither Gallo-Italic, nor Italo-Dalmatian languages, such as

4560-435: The performance of the boats with two simple sails based on the traditional design: a Square rig and a standing Lug sail . The School also tried a Spritsail , but this time steering with a conventional rudder. This arrangement was harder to control because the 'centre of effort' of the sail was too far aft. In 2014, at the invitation of the mayor of Venice , four gandelows were taken there to take part in

4636-475: The pronunciation [ s ] , the sound has fallen together with ordinary ⟨s⟩ , and so it is not uncommon to simply write ⟨s⟩ (or ⟨ss⟩ between vowels) instead of ⟨ç⟩ or ⟨zh⟩ (such as sena ). Similarly some dialects of Venetian also have a voiced interdental fricative [ ð ] , often written ⟨z⟩ (as in el pianze 'he cries'); but in most dialects this sound

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4712-492: The same; there are no long vowels, and there is no consonant lengthening. Compare the Italian sentence va laggiù con lui [val.ladˌd͡ʒuk.konˈluː.i] "go there with him" (all long/heavy syllables but final) with Venetian va là zo co lu [va.laˌzo.koˈlu] (all short/light syllables). As a direct descent of regional spoken Latin, Venetian lexicon derives its vocabulary substantially from Latin and (in more recent times) from Tuscan, so that most of its words are cognate with

4788-405: The side of the craft so as to allow the slight drag of each return stroke to pull the bow back to its forward course. Because of the vessel's flat bottom it may also be "drifted" sideways when required. Contrary to popular belief, the gondola is never poled like a punt as the waters of Venice are too deep. Until the early 20th century, as many photographs attest, gondolas were often fitted with

4864-565: The six districts or " sestieri " of Venice (however, this is contradicted by the fact that old photographs and paintings show gondolas with 4 or 5 teeth). A kind of tooth juts out backwards toward the centre of the gondola symbolises the island of Giudecca. The curved top signifies the Doge's cap. The semi-circular break between the curved top and the six teeth is said to represent the Rialto Bridge. Sometimes three friezes can be seen in-between

4940-544: The six prongs, indicating the three main islands of the city: Murano, Burano and Torcello. This symbolism is likely influenced by the need to explain the shape to tourists, rather than the shape being influenced by those symbols, as they are not mentioned in any writings about the gondola prior to the current evolution of the shape of the Fero. The gondola is also one of the vessels typically used in both ceremonial and competitive regattas, rowing races held amongst gondoliers using

5016-551: The speech of the common folk. They are ranked among the foremost Italian theatrical authors of all time, and plays by Goldoni and Gozzi are still performed today all over the world. Other notable works in Venetian are the translations of the Iliad by Giacomo Casanova (1725–1798) and Francesco Boaretti, the translation of the Divine Comedy (1875) by Giuseppe Cappelli and the poems of Biagio Marin (1891–1985). Notable too

5092-482: The stern and this design feature (seen in the photograph) differentiates it from the Dory which is superficially similar. Gandelow building requires the kind of long, clean planks that were available in Limerick's timber port - maybe that's one reason why gandelow building became popular there. Most fishing families had at least one member who had the skills and eye to be a boat-builder. These skills were handed down within

5168-495: The technique of Voga alla Veneta . During their heyday as a means of public transports, teams of four men would share ownership of a gondola – three oarsmen ( gondoliers ) and a fourth person, primarily shore-based and responsible for the booking and administration of the gondola ( Il Rosso Riserva ). However, as the gondolas became more of a tourist attraction than a mode of public transport all but one of these cooperatives and their offices have closed. The category

5244-418: The thousands that travelled the canals centuries ago. However, they are now elegantly crafted, as opposed to the various types of homemade boats of the past. The gondola is propelled by a person (the gondolier) who stands on the stern facing the bow and rows with a forward stroke, followed by a compensating backward stroke. The oar rests in an elaborately carved wooden rest ( forcola ) shaped to project from

5320-475: The tools used minimal and a great deal of 'eye' was used to fair the lines. Each boat was therefore unique with parts shaped to fit the minor variations caused by the quality of wood available and whether the builder used any moulds, frames or templates (many did not). Gandelows are being built again in Limerick. Four were built at the Ilen School and Network for Wooden Boat Building in 2014. The build process

5396-459: The town of Chipilo . The town was settled by immigrants from the Veneto region, and some of their descendants have preserved the language to this day. People from Chipilo have gone on to make satellite colonies in Mexico, especially in the states of Guanajuato , Querétaro , and State of Mexico . Venetian has also survived in the state of Veracruz , where other Italian migrants have settled since

5472-466: The use of the impersonal passive forms and the use of the auxiliary verb "to have" for the reflexive voice (both traits shared with German ). Modern Venetian is not a close relative of the extinct Venetic language spoken in Veneto before Roman expansion, although both are Indo-European , and Venetic may have been an Italic language, like Latin , the ancestor of Venetian and most other languages of Italy . The ancient Veneti gave their name to

5548-400: The word "gondola" has never been satisfactorily established, despite many theories. Today's gondola is up to 11 m long and 1.6 m wide, with a mass of 350 kg. They are made of 280 hand-made pieces using eight types of wood (lime, oak, mahogany, walnut, cherry, fir, larch and elm). The process takes about two months; in 2013, the cost of a gondola was about 38,000 euros. The oar or rèmo

5624-412: Was carefully documented and a book produced which serves as a record for future generations. Traditionally the gandelows had no standing rigging. On the occasions when the westerly wind was right to blow the boats back up the Shannon then a simple sacking sail would be fastened to an upright oar (as Jim McInerney's book explains). Another oar would be tied over the stern as a rudder. The Ilen School tested

5700-459: Was developed only in the 19th century by the boat-builder Tramontin, whose heirs still run the Tramontin boatyard. The construction of the gondola continued to evolve until the mid-20th century, when the city government prohibited any further modifications. In the 1500s an estimated 10,000 gondolas of all types were in Venice; in 1878 an estimated 4000 and now approximately 400. The origin of

5776-496: Was given recognition by the Regional Council of Veneto with regional law no. 8 of 13 April 2007 "Protection, enhancement and promotion of the linguistic and cultural heritage of Veneto". Though the law does not explicitly grant Venetian any official status, it provides for Venetian as object of protection and enhancement, as an essential component of the cultural, social, historical and civil identity of Veneto. Venetian

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