History and Geography
Contents:
1. Geography.
2. Foundation.
3. Early History.
4, Modern Times.
5. Jews in Venice.Jews in Venice. Shyloick,.
6. Odds and Ends.
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1. Geography
Venice is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the region of Veneto. It is built on a group of 126 islands that are separated by expanses of open water and by canals; portions of the city are linked by 472 bridges.
refugees from other parts of Italy fleeing barbarian invasions who found refuge on the sandy islands the lagoon, learned to build by driving closely spaced piles consisting of the trunks of alder trees, a wood noted for its water resistance, into the mud and sand, until they reached a much harder layer of compressed clay. Building foundations rested on plates of Istrian limestone placed on top of the piles.
As of 2025, the city proper (comune of Venice) has 249,466 inhabitants, nearly 50,000 of whom live in the historical island city of Venice.
Together with the cities of Padua and Treviso, Venice is included in the Padua-Treviso-Venice Metropolitan Area (PATREVE), which is considered a statistical metropolitan area, with a total population of 2.6 million.
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2. Foundation.
The name is derived from the ancient Veneti people who inhabited the region by the 900s BCE. The city was the capital of the Republic of Venice from 810 to 1797. It was a major financial and maritime power during the Middle Ages and Renaissance, and a staging area for the Crusades and the Battle of Lepanto, as well as an important centre of commerce, especially silk, grain, and spice, and of art from the 1200 ca. 1700. The sovereignty of Venice came to an end in 1797, at the hands of Napoleon. In 1866, the city became part of the Kingdom of Italy.
Italian refugees from nearby areas fleeing successive waves of Germanic and Hun invasions (300s to 500s CE) first came to Venice. Earlier settlement had however existed in the area . The twelve founding families of Venice elected the first doge (i.e. Duke), who in most cases trace their lineage back to Ancient Roman families.
It is likely that an important source of the early prosperity of Venice was the trade in slaves, captured in central Europe and sold to North Africa and the Levant.
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3. Early History.
The early history if Venice was dominated by Ravenna which is nearby to the south. it had been founded by the Umbri people. Ravenna consisted of houses built on piles on a series of small islands in a marshy lagoon, a situation similar to Venice several centuries later. it was the capital of the Western Roman Empire (402-476 CE) . Venice on the other hand was associated more with the Eastern Byzantine Empire which also had possessions in the area. From the 800s to the 11000s CE Venice developed as a thalassocracy or maritime Empire. Venice was noted for its sound monetary policies, especially its reliable gold ducat, which underpinned growing confidence in Venetian trade and finance Venice established bases on the eastern shores of the Adriatic hence it traded with Byzantinum and the east. In building its maritime commercial empire, Venice dominated the trade in salt,[39] acquired control of most of the islands in the Aegean, including Crete, and Cyprus in the Mediterranean, and became a major power-broker in the Near East. In the Fourth Crusade of 1204 Byzantium (Constaninople) was sacked by the Crusaders After the fall of Constantinople, the former Eastern Roman Empire was partitioned among the Latin crusaders and the Venetians. Venice subsequently carved out a sphere of influence in the Mediterranean known as the Duchy of the Archipelago, and captured Crete. The attack on Byzantium had been instigayrf by the Venetians. In the late 1200s at the peak of its power and wealth, it had 36,000 sailors operating 3,300 ships, dominating Mediterranean commerce. Venice's leading families vied with each other to build the grandest palaces and to support the work of the greatest and most talented artists. Venice was Roman Catholic in religion but frequently quarreled with the Papacy over its relative religious tolerance.
After the invention of the prining press by 1482, Venice had become the printing capital of the world
Venice sent ships to assist Constantinople against the Truks which however fell in 1453.
The Black Death followed by other plagues killed more much of the population. In 1630, the Italian plague of 1629 - 31 killed a third of Venice's 150,000 citizens.
Meanwhile Portugal became Europe's principal intermediary in the trade with the East by sailing around the Capte of Good Hope.
Venice remained a major exporter of agricultural products and, until the mid-1700s century, a significant manufacturing centre.
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4, Modern Times
Napoleon Bonoparte conquered Venice in 1797 and emoved the gates of the Jewish Ghetto allowing Jews to live where they wished.
Venice was taken by the Austrian-held Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia.
In 1866, after the Third Italian War of Independence, Venice became part of the newly created Kingdom of Italy.
On 29 April 1945, a force of British and New Zealand troops of the British Eighth Army, under Lieutenant General Freyberg, liberated Venice, which had been a hotbed of anti-Mussolini Italian partisan activity.[53][54]
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5.. Jews in Venice. Shyloick,.
The first complete and uncensored printed edition of the Talmud was printed in Venice by Daniel Bomberg in 1523. During World War-2 Jews were rounded up in Venice and deported to extermination camps. Since the end of the war, the Jewish population of Venice has declined from 1,500 to about 500.[103] Only around 30 Jews live in the former ghetto, which houses the city's major Jewish institutions.
Venice is famous for being the scene of the play "The Merchant of Venice" by William Shakespeare.
See:
Shylock, the Merchant of Venice
#3. Shylock, the Merchant of Venice. Deconstructing what makes the Bard's play so problematic
https://hebrewnations.com/25/bhr/bhr132.html#a3
#2. Was Shakespeare a Believing Jew?
https://aish.com/was-shakespeare-a-believing-jew/
by Yehezkel Laing
Extract::
One of the world's most celebrated authors, James Joyce, even hints at Shakespeare's Judaism in his famous book Ulysses. When John Wyse Nolan reaches for his Shakespeare book he says, "I'll say there is much kindness in the Jew."
cf.
If you had been Shylock in Shakespeare's 'The Merchant of Venice', what would you have done?
https://www.quora.com/If-you-had-been-Shylock-in-Shakespeares-The-Merchant-of-Venice-what-would-you-have-done/answer/Yair-Davidiy
Shylock is the name of a Jewish Moneylender in Venice. He is a fictional character delineated by William Shakespeare' in his play "The Merchant of Venice" (c. 1600).
The name Shylock is actually an English Gentile family name many of whom traded in gold, etc, or worked as letter-writers, etc. For some reason they were identified as Jews!
See:
If you had been Shylock in Shakespeare's 'The Merchant of Venice', what would you have done?
https://www.quora.com/If-you-had-been-Shylock-in-Shakespeares-The-Merchant-of-Venice-what-would-you-have-done/answer/Yair-Davidiy
The plot of 'The Merchant of Venice' by William Shakespeare concerns a Christian merchant in Venice of the 1500s who must default on a large loan provided by a Jewish moneylender. The Jew is named 'Shylock.' The Christian hero and his friends regularly insult Shylock. The contract says that if the Christian defaults he must pay with a pound of flesh. The Jew demands payment as written. In the end Shylock is denied the right to take the life of the Christian. He is humiliated. His daughter is married to a Christian. The young couple take what remains of his fortune. Shylock is impoverished and forced, on pain of death, to convert to Christianity. The treatment of Shylock by his Christian adversaries is presented as self-obvious and proper though some ambivalence remains.
Previously there had been a TRUE report from Italy (reported by the historian, Cecil Roth) in which a Christian demanded a pound of flesh as payment of a debt from a Jew. This case of Christian vindictiveness may have been transformed into a tale illustrating alleged Jewish rapacity. The transformation from victim to culprit would have already taken place in literary sources before reaching Shakespeare. He may well have believed it. Shakespeare may have been dealing with what he mistakenly understood to have been an historical event.
Heinrich Heine (1839) relates:
When I saw this piece played in Drury Lane there stood behind me in the box a British beauty who, at the end of the fourth Act, wept passionately, and many times cried out, 'The poor man is wronged!' It was a countenance of noblest Grecian cut, and the eyes were large and black. I have never been able to forget them, those great black eyes which wept for Shylock!
When I think of those tears... Shakespeare perhaps intended originally to please the mob... But the genius of the poet... was ever stronger than in his own will, and so it came to pass that Shylock, despite the glaring grotesqueness, expressed the justification of an unfortunate sect which was oppressed by providence....
Shylock was often depicted with red hair.
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6. Odds and Ends.
Venetti in Gaul
https://hebrewnations.com/articles/quora/tentribes/venettii.html
Brit-Am Now no. 3215
#4. Addition to Article. Genoa and Venice in Italy Founded by Philistines!
https://hebrewnations.com/25/no20/3215.html
Added to:
What is the connection between Palestinians and Illyrians?
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-connection-between-Palestinians-and-Illyrians/answer/Yair-Davidiy
ps. It is worth noting that the Biblical Commentators and International statesman Don Isaac Abarbanel (1437-1508) claimed to have found in ancient books the information that the Philistines of old had founded the cities of both Genoa and Venice. The area of Venice adjoins and to some degree overlaps with that of Illyria.
German Intentions to Annex Venetia
In our work,
"Esau. Edomites Today"
http://www.britam.org/Esau.html
we discuss the case of Venice. In the Middle Ages and after them Venice was a very powerful and influential entity.
Venice appears to have been founded by Edomites descendants of Esau. As such it shares features with part of the population of Germany, Russia, Japan, and other places.
In light of the above we found the following sentence of interest:
Allan Bullock, " Hitler: A Study in Tyranny", 1952, Revised Edition, NY, 1962,
p.713:# In October [1943] Mussolini had to surrender Trieste, Istria, and the South Tyrol to Germany, and there was even talk of incorporating Venetia in Greater Germany. #
Venice and the Philistines and Others.
What is the connection between Palestinians and Illyrians?
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-connection-between-Palestinians-and-Illyrians/answer/Yair-Davidiy
The Philistines are mentioned in the Bible. They were related to the Egyptians but had dwelt in Crete and Anatolia (present-day Turkey) see Genesis 10:4, Amos 9:7. Their culture was basically Canaanite though they had acquired some cultural features from Mycenean and Minoan civilizations. Linguistic evidence also suggests a connection with ancient area of Illyria on the east Adriatic coast (Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Albania). The original Philistines eventually disappeared. They had dwelt to the southwest of Ancient Israel i.e. in Philistia which included Gaza. The Arab incursions have taken the place pf the Philistines in public consciousness as well as their name. Even the Bible uses the name "Philistine" to refer to the Palestinians in our time. There is a prophecy (Isaiah 11:13-14) that Ephraim and Judah in the End times will join forces to evacuate them by wing and fly the Palestinian -Philistines to some place in the west.
SEE:
https://www.quora.com/Why-doesnt-Israel-relocate-its-Jewish-citizenry-from-the-West-Bank-and-Gaza-close-its-borders-and-call-it-the-end-of-the-story/answer/Yair-Davidiy
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-Philistine-and-Palestine/answer/Yair-Davidiy
At all events there does not seem to be any connection between the Palestinians and Ancient Illyria though one never knows.
ps. It is worth noting that the Biblical Commentators and International statesman Don Isaac Abarbanel (1437-1508) claimed to have found in ancient books the information that the Philistines of old had founded the cities of both Genoa and Venice. The area of Venice adjoins and to some degree overlaps with that of Illyria.
https://hebrewnations.com/articles/sources/rabbisquoted.html
ABARBANEL, Abravanel. Isaac ben Judah Abarbanel (1437-1508), commonly referred to as Abarbanel, also spelled Abravanel, Avravanel or Abrabanel, a Portuguese Jewish statesman, philosopher, Bible commentator, and financier. Wrote an extensive verbose commentary on the entire Bible, along with philosophic works. Don Isaac Abarbanel says that his forebears were descended from King David. King Afonso-5 of Portugal employed him as Treasurer. When Alfonso died Abarbanel fled to Castile (Spain) in 1483. He was employed by Queen Isabella as financier. He left Spain in 1492 when the Jews were expelled. Abarbanel went to Naples, Italy, died in Venice in 1508. Abarbanel writes often about the Ten Tribes. He says that belief that the Ten Tribes are now in Exile but will return and re-unite with Judah. This, he declares, is one of the Principles of Belief in the Bible. He also emphasizes the presence of descendants of Israel being among the English.
#20. Other Philistine Possibilities. Poland, Italy.
Orjan Svenssun ("Philistines in Poland?"tells us:
# A Polish author claims that the alternate/old name of Poland, Lechia, see Lechia, may have something to do with Ramat-Lechi of the Philistines mentioned in Judges 15:9. #
Philistines in Poland? [4595]
https://hebrewnations.com/articles/gis/poland.html
Craig White quotes Lempriere that at the mouth of the Po River in Italy there was a place name "Fossae Philistinae?"