Dolo is a town and ''
comune
The (; plural: ) is a local administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality. It is the third-level administrative division of Italy, after regions ('' regioni'') and provinces (''province''). The can also ...
'' in the
Metropolitan City of Venice
The Metropolitan City of Venice ( it, Città Metropolitana di Venezia) is a metropolitan city in the Veneto region, Italy. Its capital is the city of Venice. It replaced the Province of Venice and includes the city of Venice and 43 other municipal ...
,
Veneto
Veneto (, ; vec, Vèneto ) or Venetia is one of the 20 regions of Italy. Its population is about five million, ranking fourth in Italy. The region's capital is Venice while the biggest city is Verona.
Veneto was part of the Roman Empire unt ...
,
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
. It is connected by the SP26 provincial road and is one of the towns of the
Riviera del Brenta
The Riviera del Brenta is an area of the Metropolitan City of Venice of particular tourist-cultural interest due to the great architectural heritage of the Venetian villas built between the 15th and 18th centuries by the nobles of the Venetian Rep ...
.
The growth of the town of Dolo is due to the gradual downsizing of the maritime power of Venice which was historically oriented towards
Dalmatia
Dalmatia (; hr, Dalmacija ; it, Dalmazia; see #Name, names in other languages) is one of the four historical region, historical regions of Croatia, alongside Croatia proper, Slavonia, and Istria. Dalmatia is a narrow belt of the east shore of ...
, the
Aegean Sea
The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi (Greek language, Greek: Αιγαίο Πέλαγος: "Egéo Pélagos", Turkish language, Turkish: "Ege Denizi" or "Adalar Denizi") is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea between Europe and Asia. It ...
and the
Middle East
The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabian Peninsula, Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Anatolia, Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Pro ...
, which occurred concurrently with the fall of the
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
, the Islamic expansion and the new opening of navigation routes to the Americas. As a consequence, Venice had to address inland its new commercial interests.
At the beginning of the 15th century, documents testify to the existence of a village which, developing, gave rise to the economic importance of Dolo, always linked to the presence of its water mills collecting wheat from the nearby agricultural lands and then grinding the flour and embarking some into cargo boats pulled by horses along the banks of the Brenta Canal to the lagoon, from where they continued directly up to the
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
island settlement.
Drinking water, too, was carried from Dolo to the centre of Venice by cargo boats with big barrels filled directly from the springs of the little river Seriola.
The territory was affected by massive hydraulic works that led to the diversion of the main bed of the river Brenta through an artificial canal with new mouths along the southern sea approaches of the port of
Chioggia
Chioggia (; vec, Cióxa , locally ; la, Clodia) is a coastal town and ''comune'' of the Metropolitan City of Venice in the Veneto region of northern Italy.
Geography
The town is situated on a small island at the southern entrance to the L ...
, while just one part of the old Brenta still flows into the lagoon near Fusina.
The purpose of these megalithic hydraulic works was primarily to prevent the progressive flooding of the lagoon by the freshwater of the rivers and thus maintain a high degree of salinity necessary to make possible the navigation and the very existence of Venice.
Until 1405, the jurisdiction of Dolo was under
Padua
Padua ( ; it, Padova ; vec, Pàdova) is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the ...
, and then passed definitely under the dominion of Venice.
A boat, called the Burchiello, transported Venetian noblemen directly to the Riviera sailing along the river Brenta, which was considered a natural extension of the
Grand Canal, to spend the summer in the villas.
An old marble table is still on display nearby to show toll tariffs for the transit in the locks for each type of boat coming from or going to
Padua
Padua ( ; it, Padova ; vec, Pàdova) is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the ...
.
The origin of the name ''Dolo'' is quite uncertain and controversial. One theory asserts the name comes from the contraction of "
Dandolo
The House of Dandolo () was a patrician family of the Republic of Venice, which produced four Doges of Venice. The progenitor of the family was a merchant named Domenico. The family became more successful by the beginning of the 12th century.
Me ...
", the surname of a noble Venetian family who gave a
doge
A doge ( , ; plural dogi or doges) was an elected lord and head of state in several Italian city-states, notably Venice and Genoa, during the medieval and renaissance periods. Such states are referred to as " crowned republics".
Etymology
The ...
to the city of Venice and had properties here. From old maps, it appears that the town’s name was sometimes reported as ''Dollo'', which in archaic Italian language could also mean a tower which was probably demolished thereafter unless it refers to the church’s belfry which is the highest in the region of Veneto, second only to
St. Mark’s belfry in Venice.
2015 tornado
On July 8th, 2015, the town was impacted by a devastating F4
tornado
A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with both the surface of the Earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. It is often referred to as a twister, whirlwind or cyclone, altho ...
. Initially touching down in
Pianiga
Pianiga is a town in the Metropolitan City of Venice, Veneto, Italy. It is east of SR515.
Pianiga is located in the extreme southwestern edge of the Metropolitan City of Venice, in part bordering on the province of Padua and in part with the mun ...
at 17:25
CEST CEST or cest may refer to:
* Central European Summer Time (UTC+2), daylight saving time observed in the central European time zone
* Cognitive-Experiential Self-Theory
* Chemical Exchange Saturation Transfer, a subset of Magnetization transfer in ...
, the tornado grew in size and strengthened as it moved southeastward. The tornado then hit Dolo, causing high-end F3 to low-end F4 damage. In Dolo, many buildings were severely damaged or leveled, with several buildings sustaining
F4 damage. Vehicles were mangled and tossed into buildings, fields & into the river. One person was killed when their car was thrown and severely mangled as the tornado exited the town. In the 11 km the tornado tracked, 72 were injured and 1 was killed. Damage totals were at around €100 million.
References
Sources
(Google Maps)
{{authority control
Cities and towns in Veneto