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00:01Venice, one of the most iconic cities in the world, home to spectacular medieval structures, all linked by winding canals.
00:12Venice is a city built on water. It's magic and unique.
00:17Constructed on unstable islands in the middle of a lagoon, this impossible city defies all odds.
00:24Can its ancient origins reveal why it is created here and how it is still standing?
00:30Today, scientists use pioneering acoustic imaging technology to scan Venice's canals.
00:37There are signs of stronger oceans. There are big holes created by the propellers.
00:42And dive into the lagoon's deep trenches to hunt for clues to the city's ancient roots.
00:49Is a shocking death pit evidence of Venice's dark history?
00:54We found dozens of skeletons.
00:57And can a revolutionary new megastructure stop Venice from sinking beneath the waves?
01:03To solve these mysteries, we unearth Venice's ancient foundations.
01:09We deconstruct the famous Rialto Bridge.
01:13Uncover sunken ships.
01:17And come face to face with the city's buried victims.
01:22To reveal the secrets of this magnificent floating city.
01:33Venice. An iconic city.
01:38Sheltered in a lagoon in the northeast of Italy.
01:42This spectacular medieval attraction welcomes over 20 million visitors every year to its megastructures and grand canals.
01:54With every inch of the islands covered by building, everyone and everything travels by water.
02:00Canals are its main streets.
02:03And people use them to get around every day.
02:07But this extraordinary city has humble beginnings.
02:121,600 years ago, Venice is just a marshy lagoon.
02:18Today, it's a city like no other.
02:21A patchwork of over 100 islands.
02:25Connected by 400 bridges.
02:28And 30 miles of canals.
02:32At its heart is St. Mark's Square.
02:35Home to the iconic clock tower and basilica.
02:38It's a city brimming with history.
02:41Created from centuries of immense wealth, conflict and power.
02:46How does this extraordinary lagoon city come to be?
02:50Rising from marshland to become this magnificent masterpiece.
02:57Guido Giordano ventures to an uninhabited island three miles from the city center to look for clues to the city's
03:04origin.
03:05He wants to investigate what Venice looks like before people live here.
03:10A lagoon is the environment that forms when major rivers meet the sea.
03:19The lagoon is formed thousands of years ago, when the Po and the Piave rivers reached the Adriatic Sea and
03:27dropped tons of sediment into the water.
03:31Over thousands of years, the sediments pile up to form hundreds of marshy islands.
03:36This material is very soft.
03:40There's also this plant that decompose and they make up that particular type of material that we call peat.
03:53Probably the softest sediment on earth.
03:56How do the Venetians build a city on these seemingly impossible islands?
04:03Knowing their territory and their resources available, they cut wooden piles from the local forest and use them to reshape
04:15the islands.
04:19The ground beneath Venice is riddled with wooden piles.
04:24Millions of them are driven into the waterlogged silt.
04:28Packed tightly just six inches apart, they form a solid foundation in the soft soil.
04:38On top, wooden planks and slabs of limestone create a strong base for the Venetians to build monumental masterpieces like
04:49St. Mark's Basilica.
04:51Are these foundations enough to keep Venice's majestic buildings standing strong?
05:02The millions of wooden posts have stood resilient beneath Venice for centuries.
05:08They are a triumph of ancient engineering.
05:11And they transform the muddy islands into solid ground.
05:15Stable enough for thousands of homes, churches and palaces.
05:20But the 30 miles of snaking canals create fractures across the islands that put the buildings at risk.
05:28Venice's canals are naturally formed by water that flows between the islands.
05:34The largest, the Grand Canal, runs for two and a half miles and has 170 houses along its banks.
05:43The buildings that teeter on the edge of the water are at risk of sudden collapse if the ground gives
05:49way.
05:52Fantina Madricado patrols the canals to hunt for any signs of danger.
05:58It's important to monitor the Canal Grande, mainly because it's the main road of the city.
06:03And also, of course, for its cultural heritage.
06:06The buildings are very precious.
06:09She uses innovative technology to scan the sides and bottom of the canals throughout the year and detect any minute
06:17changes.
06:19Since the water is so turbid, it's impossible to be observed with optical methods or with videos or things.
06:26So you need to use acoustic methods.
06:31Fantina sends sound waves down into the water.
06:36When the sound waves bounce back, she records them to create a 3D image of the canal floor.
06:43We check what is the status of the sea floor of the Grand Canal.
06:48You can see the depth.
06:49Where it's blue, the bluer part is deeper, the red part is shallower.
06:56When Fantina studies the canals over time, she discovers something surprising.
07:01They're constantly shifting.
07:04We have seen some changes mainly in areas like, for example, at the opening of the lagoon with the sea.
07:11The constantly moving current erodes the banks in some places and deposits new sediment in others.
07:20Changing the depth of the canals and the shape of the islands.
07:24But this is not good for a permanent city.
07:28So medieval Venetians come up with a clever solution.
07:34First, engineers barricade the canal and drain the water.
07:39Then they drive wooden piles into the soft ground along the edges.
07:47On top, they build thick brick walls and face the inner edge with impermeable stone.
07:53To make the walls waterproof.
07:57When they refill the canal, the solid walls prevent the water from eroding the islands.
08:03So the Venetians can build on every bit of land.
08:07The walls still stand to this day.
08:11Along the canal banks, the Venetians construct stunning buildings.
08:16Like the Doge's Palace.
08:18And Salute Church.
08:21They create one of the most magnificent cities in the world.
08:26On land that should be impossible to build on.
08:29And to help reduce the load on the canal walls and foundations, the Venetians have another clever trick.
08:37Instead of heavy stone, they use light brick to construct their buildings.
08:43And build arches into the walls to lighten the load even more.
08:49Creating the iconic facades of Venice we see today.
08:55But modern life in this bustling city creates a new problem.
09:00There are signs of strong erosions due to the engines of the water buses.
09:06You can see there are big holes that were created by the propellers of the boats that were anchoring there.
09:13The boat traffic causes erosion and degrades the walls of the canals.
09:19Fantina's monitoring is crucial to pinpoint areas of walls that need repair.
09:25So they will last for centuries to come.
09:29The medieval Venetians maximize every bit of land.
09:34They turn the city into one of the richest in the world.
09:38How does Venice become so successful?
09:43Can secrets buried beneath its most famous landmark reveal clues?
09:57Venice.
09:58A megastructure suspended above the water.
10:02This engineering marvel becomes one of the richest cities in the medieval world.
10:08Why is it so wealthy?
10:11One of the city's greatest landmarks, the Rialto Bridge, may hold clues.
10:19It's an engineering wonder, standing on 12,000 wooden poles that stop 10,000 tons of bridge from sinking into
10:29the muddy ground.
10:32Massive masonry blocks form strong foundations at either end.
10:37A single arch of limestone blocks spans 94 feet across the Grand Canal, the widest canal in Venice.
10:47And two rows of covered arches turn the bridge into a marketplace.
10:53An engineering masterpiece, one of the first of its kind in the world.
10:59Why is this bridge so important to Venice's success?
11:04In the 7th century AD, the Venetian islands are all separate towns.
11:12Each town has a central square, water well, and church.
11:17But as Venice grows, the Venetians build bridges to connect neighboring islands.
11:24Iconic structures like the Bridge of Sighs and the Bridge of the Three Arches allow residents to move easily across
11:32the city.
11:34But the enormous Grand Canal divides the east and west.
11:38It spans more than 200 feet in some parts, and seems impossible to bridge.
11:44For centuries, the Venetians try, but are met with disaster.
11:49In 1181, they launch long pontoons to create a floating bridge.
11:57It connects the east and west for the first time.
12:01Heavy foot traffic wears it down.
12:04So the Venetians build a wooden tower bridge in its place, allowing ships to pass.
12:12In 1310, it burns down in a revolt.
12:16The Venetians rebuild it, but it collapses again and again from constant use.
12:24Leading architects compete to build a new stone bridge.
12:28But even Michelangelo fails to beat the winning design.
12:34The Rialto Bridge connects the east and west.
12:38Now every Venetian can travel across the city to buy and sell at its beating heart.
12:44The Rialto Market.
12:47International traders sail up the Grand Canal to dock by the famous bridge.
12:54What are the Venetians selling that draws merchants from far and wide?
13:01Giovanni Caniato heads to the west side of the bridge, to the bustling market that continues to this day.
13:08He believes the answer is a surprisingly simple product.
13:12Salt.
13:14In order to preserve fish, preserve meat, and preserve everything, you needed salt.
13:20And salt was needed also for agriculture and for lots of other reasons.
13:24So salt was what's today the petrol.
13:27Salt is commonplace now, but in the Middle Ages, it's one of the most precious commodities in the world.
13:34Its global importance is equivalent to that of oil today.
13:40Salt was one of the reasons why Venice was so powerful and so rich.
13:47The shallow waters of Venice's salty lagoon are ideal for the production of this valuable mineral.
13:55The Venetians cleverly use their land to produce it.
14:00They find themselves at the heart of a global salt trade.
14:05People come from all over the world to buy it.
14:10The riches transform Venice into a magnificent Renaissance city.
14:16Visionary architects design the Doge's Palace.
14:20The immense bell tower and the spectacular basilica.
14:25Buildings unlike anything the world has seen before.
14:31But Venice isn't only a beautiful destination.
14:34It becomes a global powerhouse.
14:39Can an astonishing underwater discovery reveal how Venice expands its reach
14:44and becomes the most powerful navy in Europe?
14:58Venice.
15:00In the Middle Ages, it's a global powerhouse.
15:03How does this city become so influential?
15:07A clue may lie in an astonishing discovery found in the lagoon.
15:14Eros Turquetto knows these waters better than anyone else.
15:21Every week, he heads out to search for clues of Venice's past.
15:27Our work consists of investigating the foundation of the lagoon
15:32in the search of archaeological interests.
15:37To map them, photograph them, raise them
15:40and put them inside a great archaeological card of the lagoon of Venice.
15:47On one survey, Eros makes an incredible discovery.
15:54Three miles southwest of Venice, preserved in the muddy bed of the lagoon,
16:01Eros uncovers the hull of a Rascona, a flat-bottomed medieval transport ship.
16:09And next to it, the skeleton of an even bigger boat,
16:14125 feet long, dating from the early 14th century.
16:23On its bow, a carving reveals a clue
16:27to what the vessel looks like in its prime.
16:30What is this mysterious ship?
16:33And what can it reveal about the rise of Venice?
16:43I was surprised because it doesn't happen every day
16:47to find a relict in the lagoon of Venice.
16:51The team of marine archaeologists erects enormous steel walls around the site
16:57and analyzes the discovery.
17:04The lack of oxygen under the mud helps preserve the remains of the ship.
17:10The team records every detail.
17:15It's long 38 meters, it's long 5,30 meters, and it's certainly the ship of a galea.
17:23This is the only boat of its kind discovered in Europe.
17:36This is no ordinary fisherman's boat, but a warship from the 14th century.
17:46What does this incredible vessel reveal about the rise of Venice?
17:52Stefano Medas is an expert in Venice's medieval history.
17:56He heads to a gigantic complex in the city to find answers.
18:08In the city center, just half a mile from St. Mark's Square.
18:13These massive buildings cover over 5,000 square feet.
18:17One-sixth of Venice's entire land area.
18:23It's here that the Venetians build ships like the one unearthed in the lagoon.
18:28This is the Arsenal of Venice.
18:30The Arsenal is a big factory, fundamentally.
18:34It's a big factory of ships.
18:36And since the beginning, it was created by a sequence construction.
18:41An arsenal is where the military makes weapons and equipment.
18:46Normally, a warship would take many months to build.
18:50But this enormous factory allows the Venetians to revolutionize shipbuilding.
18:59In a dry dock, master shipbuilders first build the frame.
19:04And then clad it with wooden boards.
19:09Next, they fit the ship with masts.
19:12And tow the hull to the next station.
19:15To hoist the sails.
19:19And, as if on a conveyor belt,
19:22the ships pass from dock to dock to be loaded with guns,
19:26ropes, anchors, and oars.
19:30This efficient system enables the Venetian military
19:34to build a whole ship in a single day,
19:37making Venice a formidable naval power.
19:43The Venetians pioneer one of the world's first production lines.
19:48We make a very innovative structure
19:51because it allows us to build a sequence of ships
19:57that are worked at relatively fast times.
20:01This is one of its characteristics,
20:04which has become even legendary.
20:06Thanks to this arsenal, the Venetians are able to build the most powerful navy in Europe.
20:12They rule territories as far as modern Croatia, Greece, and Cyprus.
20:19But their success comes at a cost.
20:24A discovery on a secluded island in the Venetian lagoon reveals a deadly catastrophe.
20:32How can Venice survive its greatest setback?
20:44Venice.
20:45Six hundred years ago, it's one of the richest cities in the world.
20:49It attracts merchants from all over the globe.
20:54But could a macabre discovery on a nearby island reveal that in the Middle Ages,
20:59Venice is on the brink of collapse?
21:06The tiny Venetian island of Lazaretto Vecchio hides a chilling secret.
21:15Buried beneath the courtyard
21:19is a mass grave.
21:21Hundreds of bodies cast into a pit,
21:25one on top of the other.
21:27Forensic analysis shows the bones belong to men, women, and children.
21:33A mix of Europeans, Africans, and Asians.
21:37Why are more than 1,500 people from across the world buried on this tiny island?
21:44And what is the cause of their death?
21:50Lara Meneghini leads a death pit investigation.
21:57Close examination of the bones reveals no sign of cut marks or blunt trauma to the skulls.
22:04There's no evidence of murder.
22:07Lara believes it must be an invisible killer.
22:11We found dozens of skeletons.
22:13We think they died for the plague.
22:17The hundreds of people are all victims of bubonic plague,
22:21a contagious bacterial disease that begins in Central Asia in the 14th century
22:27and repeatedly hits Europe.
22:31Death pits like these have been discovered on multiple islands within the lagoon.
22:37Why are these people all buried together on these islands?
22:43Lara searches for clues in a warehouse on Lazaretto Nuovo.
22:48In the corner of the building, she discovers medieval graffiti.
22:53Here we have the drawing of a ship, some trademarks, and also a part of a writing telling us that
23:02the ship came from Constantinople.
23:06Merchant ships carrying goods to Venice are diverted here.
23:11Can the graffiti reveal why the ships stop and leave their crew on this tiny island?
23:18So this graffiti tells us the story of a ship which arrived in Venice from Greece.
23:25The ship had to stop and people were here for quarantine.
23:31The 16th century graffiti is the first use of the term quarantine,
23:37discovered anywhere in the world.
23:38It's proof that as the Venetians are designing their iconic buildings,
23:43they also invent this disease control tactic.
23:48In Italian, quarantena means 40 days.
23:53So incoming ships must dock here at these isolated islands and wait for 40 days,
23:59before continuing into Venice.
24:03This island is the place where the quarantine system was invented.
24:08From here, it was adopted then all over the Mediterranean and then all over the world.
24:16The Venetians apply this meticulous quarantine system to every incoming boat.
24:24Ships destined for Venice first unload their crew and cargo,
24:30on an island at the edge of the lagoon.
24:35The goods are laid out in long warehouses and smoked with herbs,
24:41in the belief this will eradicate traces of the plague.
24:48Any sailors showing symptoms are sent to the plague hospital on a neighboring island.
24:57After 40 days of quarantine,
25:00plague-free sailors and their cargo are allowed to continue on to the city.
25:09A tall brick wall surrounds the island to make sure that no sailors escape their 40-day quarantine.
25:18But Lara's excavations reveal that the Venetians tried to maximize the chance of survival for the sailors.
25:25There were about 100 houses.
25:29High walls were used to divide the island in different isolation areas
25:35in order to keep separate people that arrived at different times or from different places.
25:41The island is cleverly designed to reduce the chance of infection between ships' crews.
25:48The houses contain everything needed for a comfortable 40-day stay.
25:53The houses were small and basic, but could host between two to four people.
26:00These are the ground floors of two houses divided by this wall.
26:07And this area is the area of the fireplace.
26:11Despite their clever tactical planning,
26:13the city does not escape the killer plague.
26:17In the 1630s,
26:19as many as a third of Venice's 140,000 citizens died.
26:24Today, bubonic plague is treated by antibiotics.
26:29But quarantine is still a vital weapon in the battle against untreatable infectious diseases.
26:35The isolation system, the quarantine system, is still the public health response in news today.
26:44This resilient city is determined to thrive on isolated islands.
26:50Thanks to its unique construction in the lagoon, Venice overcomes the deadly plague,
26:56builds thousands of warships, and gains immense wealth.
27:01The Venetians establish a floating metropolis with buildings suspended above the water by wooden foundations.
27:09But why are people so determined to live in such an unusual setting?
27:15Can new discoveries on the edge of the lagoon reveal what draws the first settlers here?
27:29Venice, an extraordinary floating city.
27:32The buildings in this engineering marvel are suspended above the water by wooden foundations.
27:39Who are the first settlers of Venice?
27:42And why are they so determined to live here, on these seemingly inhospitable islands?
27:49Carlo Beltrame is on a mission to find out who builds this incredible place.
27:55His team explores the waters to the north of the city for clues.
27:59We are conducting an underwater survey in a very murky water
28:05for the investigation of archaeological structures.
28:09They hunt for signs of ancient building works, lost over time.
28:14Okay.
28:15The divers use innovative high-resolution underwater cameras to map the bottom of the lagoon.
28:22Hidden on the sea floor, they discover something remarkable.
28:28A long, narrow stone plinth that looks man-made.
28:33The team analyzes samples of the masonry for clues to what this mysterious structure is, and who builds it.
28:43The
28:44Carlo believes details locked inside the masonry hold the answer.
28:52which was composed by stones melted with mortar to produce a concrete structure,
29:01what we believe to be a pier of the Roman age.
29:07Carlo uses evidence from the survey to date the Roman pier's construction.
29:14The structure could be dated between the 1st and 1st century A.D.
29:20This discovery is significant.
29:22The dating suggests the area around Venice is inhabited by the Romans 2,000 years ago.
29:32Fellow archaeologist Paolo Mozzi believes the newly discovered pier
29:37could mean that more Roman cities lie hidden in this area.
29:46This evidence indicates that this was not an isolated settlement,
29:51but it was part of a network of settlements that was covering the northern lagoon.
29:57Paolo takes to the air to hunt for more clues to Venice's origins.
30:04He uses aerial photos captured with state-of-the-art multi-spectral cameras to scour the coastline.
30:12The cameras detect the water content in the soil, highlighting any solid structures hidden beneath the surface.
30:20In the northern part of the lagoon, Paolo finds evidence of lost Roman infrastructure.
30:27This means that, as a sort of a negative of the image, we could see the plan of a city.
30:34Complete with temples and theaters, this lost Roman city covers an area the size of Pompeii.
30:43There was a settlement consisting of houses of water wells and a pier.
30:51This means that people were really living here.
30:54Paolo believes this site provides clues to why Venice is founded.
31:00He launches a full excavation.
31:05As his team unearths the city piece by piece, its identity comes to light.
31:11This is the lost city of Altinum.
31:14We are now in the heart of the ancient city of Altinum.
31:24Altinum is one of the wealthiest cities in the Roman Empire in the first century AD.
31:32Paolo's team excavates the structures to decipher the entire plan of the city.
31:38This street was connecting the city center, where the public monuments were, to the harbor on the shores of the
31:46lagoon.
31:46In the aerial image, you can see the trace of this street that was going towards the lagoon and the
31:54harbor from the city center.
31:58One structure catches Paolo's attention.
32:01It's much wider than an ancient road.
32:04And the aerial images suggest it's a deep trench.
32:08It leads straight into the lagoon.
32:12Paolo thinks there's only one explanation.
32:15We could also identify a major canal.
32:19Just like Venice today, Altinum is built around canals.
32:24Is this proximity and similarity a coincidence?
32:27Or can Altinum's ruins reveal the origins of Venice?
32:32Paolo scours the ruined houses and buildings for clues.
32:37He analyzes the condition of these structures and reaches an extraordinary conclusion.
32:43Only the floors remain, because after the abandonment, the walls were destroyed.
32:50This destruction reveals the shocking end of Altinum and the birth of Venice.
32:59In the second century AD, just seven miles from where Venice is today, the port of Altinum flourishes under Roman
33:08rule.
33:10But in the fifth century AD, the barbarian Huns attack the Roman city.
33:17And the people of Altinum flee for their lives.
33:21They settle in the marshy islands of the lagoon, building their houses on stilts and relying on the water for
33:30survival.
33:32Over hundreds of years, the islanders flourish.
33:36They build a city naturally protected from invasion by the waters of the lagoon.
33:44The fall of Altinum marks the birth of Venice.
33:47The refugees salvage the stone and bricks from their destroyed city and use them to build their new island homes.
33:55Venice rises against all odds.
33:59It begins as a simple refuge from barbarian attack.
34:03And today, it is one of the most iconic cities on the planet.
34:07This floating metropolis thrives for 1600 years.
34:11But can new research reveal a threat to the survival of Venice in the future?
34:26Venice, a medieval and Renaissance masterpiece.
34:31It rises from humble beginnings as a refuge for Romans fleeing the invading Huns.
34:38But now another threat is on the horizon for future generations.
34:45Many fear that by the end of this century, Venice will be permanently flooded.
34:51The rising water will slowly erode the foundations of Venice's iconic structures and put them at risk of collapse.
34:59The city will sink into the water and eventually vanish, disappearing back into the lagoon.
35:08Is this really the fate of Venice?
35:13Four miles across the lagoon from Venice, a small island may hold clues.
35:21In 1328, the island of Boca Lama is home to a monastery, whose monks realize their home is disappearing into
35:30the lagoon.
35:34The city of Venice sends the monks two ships, each laden with tons of earth and sand.
35:44The monks sink the ships on the side of the island to act as a breakwater, hoping to slow erosion
35:51from the sea.
35:55But it doesn't stop the island from sinking.
35:58And by the 1500s, the monastery is completely underwater.
36:06Will Venice suffer the same fate?
36:11Guido Giordano heads to one of the most iconic piazzas in the city to investigate.
36:19Venice is a densely urbanized city with buildings very close to each other and magnificent masterpieces like the church in
36:31this square.
36:31The way of all these buildings loads their foundations and, in turn, the soft sediments beneath, squeezing and compacting them.
36:45Here in the piazza, Guido finds alarming signs that Venice is in real danger.
36:50This staircase is evidence that this area is sinking.
36:56It was certainly built at a higher level and definitely not to lead people to fall in the canal.
37:04In Venice, we measure subsidence at one millimeter per year.
37:10Venice is slowly subsiding into the mud.
37:14Experts believe the city's streets will be submerged by the end of the century.
37:20But as well as the long-term dangers of sinking, the city faces a much more imminent threat.
37:28Georg Umgeiser works at the Marine Research Center of Venice.
37:33He studies the city's water levels.
37:38Every year, Venice is hit by high tides known as the Aqua Alta.
37:44We always had storm surges, we always had high water.
37:48Normally, high water is during wintertime, November, February and so on.
37:55Georg and his colleagues have launched a state-of-the-art research and monitoring system.
38:00We have an oceanographic platform out in the sea.
38:04It's about 15 kilometers away from the coast.
38:07We have wave measurements.
38:08We have tide measurements.
38:11And we are then able to create forecasts.
38:15Knowing when a flood may hit helps the Venetians to prepare for it.
38:20The forecasts give locals time to raise flood barriers in the doorways of their shops and homes.
38:28Today, Georg carefully monitors the water level as a freak storm hits Venice.
38:34The flood waters start to rise dangerously.
38:38This graph shows us the water level of the last week.
38:43And you can see normal water levels up to two or three days ago.
38:47And then we have a storm.
38:48And you can see yesterday evening we had high water above one meter at Sermark Square.
38:58As the storm rages into the evening, Georg heads out to assess the flooding.
39:06This is Sermark Square and this is the place where you will see high water at its very best.
39:12Because it's the lowest point of Venice.
39:16The waters here can reach more than four feet above sea level.
39:21Covering most of Venice's streets.
39:24Here, we have a little bit of water. It's rising now.
39:27But this could be a situation of every day in the next 50 years.
39:33Georg's data reveals that the rising waters are a devastating threat to the city.
39:40Over the last 50 years, Venice has seen regular flooding.
39:45However, in the last two years it has seen an increase in exceptionally high level flooding.
39:50In 2019, water levels hit a record high of six feet above the normal sea level.
39:58Something is changing. Climate change is happening.
40:03Climate change is a direct threat to the city of Venice.
40:07It causes rising sea levels and increased flooding.
40:13In an attempt to save the city, engineers are nearing completion of 78 retractable flood barriers in the lagoon.
40:23When the sea level rises during a storm, the barriers will rise with it to block the water.
40:30Now, the barriers have successfully risen in unison.
40:34A monumental milestone for the project.
40:38The magnificent city of Venice is safe, for now.
40:43Venice stands strong for hundreds of years in the face of adversity.
40:49Now, this resilient city is ready to thrive for hundreds more.
40:55Venice.
40:56From humble beginnings as an island refuge.
41:01It evolves into a global powerhouse.
41:04Building thousands of warships.
41:07And inventing quarantine islands to safeguard its people.
41:11The city flourishes for 1600 years.
41:17And rises to become the spectacular city we see today.
41:24And with ingenuity and determination, the people of Venice will ensure that it survives for hundreds of years to come.
41:43That
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