Ponte delle Guglie
Why is it significant?
You are on the Ponte delle Guglie, and the guglie are those four small stone obelisks at its corners, standing up like candles on a cake. Lean over the side and find the keystone of the arch: a carved face grimaces down at every boat that passes underneath.
Key Facts
| Place | Ponte delle Guglie |
|---|---|
| Address | Ponte delle Guglie, Rio Terà San Leonardo, Cannaregio, 30121 Venezia VE, Italy |
| Geo Coordinates | 45.44370, 12.32560 |
| Part of Walk | Venice Beyond the Crowds: Cannaregio and the Jewish Ghetto |
| Generated | Generated |
You are on the Ponte delle Guglie, and the guglie are those four small stone obelisks at its corners, standing up like candles on a cake. Lean over the side and find the keystone of the arch: a carved face grimaces down at every boat that passes underneath.
A bridge has crossed here since the Middle Ages, first in wood, as almost every Venetian bridge once was. It was rebuilt in stone in 1580, and the spires that give it its name were added during a restoration in 1777. For a long time this was the only way across the Canale di Cannaregio on foot, so everyone passed over it: fishermen, friars, merchants, and every procession heading from this side of town towards Rialto.
Stay still for a minute and watch the water below. Delivery boats piled with crates of mineral water, a rubbish barge, an ambulance boat with its siren wailing, perhaps a family rowing standing up, Venetian style, facing forward. The canal is a working street and this bridge is its busiest junction. On the far side, the stalls of Rio Terà San Leonardo sell fish, artichokes and peaches to people who live here, not to tourists.
But the reason this bridge matters on our walk lies a few steps away. Once you have crossed, turn left along the Fondamenta di Cannaregio, and after a short stretch a low, dark passage opens in the houses on your right. It looks like nothing at all. For almost three hundred years, it was a door that was locked every night. Behind it lies the Ghetto, the place that gave its name to every ghetto in the world.
Before you go, notice how close it all is: the bridge, the market, the busiest canal on this side of the city. The Jews of Venice were not hidden away in some distant corner. They were shut in at the very centre of the city's daily life, visible and separate at the same time. Cross the bridge, walk along the fondamenta and step into that covered passage, the sotoportego of the Ghetto Vecchio.