View source for Venetian Arsenal

{{short description|Shipbuilding factory of the Republic of Venice}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2023}}
{{Infobox urban feature
|name = Venetian Arsenal
|owner = [[Italian Republic]]
|location = [[Venice]], Italy
|open = 1104
|place_type = Arsenal
|image_place = File:Campo de l'Arsenal.jpg
|image_caption = The main gate at the Venetian Arsenal
|imagesize = 270
|image_map =
| coordinates = {{Coord|45|26|07|N|12|21|11|E|region:IT-34_type:landmark|display=it}}
| mapframe-marker = museum
}}

The '''Venetian Arsenal''' ({{langx|it|Arsenale di Venezia}}) is a complex of former [[shipyard]]s and [[Armory (military)|armories]] clustered together in the city of [[Venice]] in [[northern Italy]]. Owned by the state, the Arsenal was responsible for the bulk of the [[Republic of Venice|Venetian Republic]]'s [[Venetian navy|naval power]] from the [[Late Middle Ages]] to the [[early modern period]]. It was "one of the earliest large-scale industrial enterprises in history".<ref>{{cite book|title=A Concise Economic History of the World: From Paleolithic Times to the Present|author=Rondo Cameron |author2=Larry Neal |year=2003|publisher=Oxford University Press|page=161}}</ref><ref name=":0">{{Cite book|last=Hanson|first=Victor Davis|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XGr16-CxpH8C|title=Carnage and Culture: Landmark Battles in the Rise to Western Power|date=2007-12-18|publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group|isbn=978-0-307-42518-8|language=en}}</ref>

==Overview==
[[File:Arsenale di Venezia towers.jpg|thumb|left|Venetian Arsenal towers]]
[[File:Gian Maria Maffioletti - The Arsenal of Venice.jpg|thumb|left|''The Arsenal of Venice'', 1797, by Gianmaria Maffioletti ([[Museo Storico Navale|Naval History Museum]])]]
Construction of the Arsenal began around 1104, during Venice's [[Republic of Venice|republican]] era.<ref name=evaluation/><ref>Norris, R.M. "[http://etd.ohiolink.edu/send-pdf.cgi/Norris%20Rebecca%20M.pdf?kent1185214455 Carpaccio's ''Hunting on the lagoon'' and ''two Venetian ladies'': A vignette of fifteenth-century Venetian life] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131204051647/https://etd.ohiolink.edu/send-pdf.cgi/Norris%20Rebecca%20M.pdf?kent1185214455 |date=2013-12-04 }}." ''College of Fine and Professional Arts of Kent State University Master of Arts Thesis.'' August 2007. Accessed 30 January 2010.</ref> It became the largest industrial complex in Europe before the [[Industrial Revolution]],<ref>Tassava, C.J. "[https://web.archive.org/web/20030608233333/http://katie.at.northwestern.edu/etd/tassava/tassava.pdf Launching a Thousand Ships: Entrepreneurs, War Workers, and the State in American Shipbuilding, 1940-1945]." ''Northwestern University Ph.D. Thesis.'' June 2003. Accessed 30 January 2010.</ref> spanning an area of about {{convert|45|ha}}, or about 15 percent of Venice.<ref name=evaluation>Giove, S., Rosato, P. & Breil, M. "[http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/bitstream/46625/2/91-08.pdf A multicriteria approach for the evaluation of the sustainability of re-use of historic buildings in Venice]." ''Sustainability indicators and environmental valuation paper - Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.'' October 2008. Accessed 30 January 2010.</ref> Surrounded by a {{convert|2|mi|adj=on}} [[defensive wall|rampart]], laborers and shipbuilders regularly worked within the [[Arsenal]], building ships that sailed from the city's port.<ref name=labourers>{{cite book |title=Shipbuilders of the Venetian Arsenal: Workers and Workplace in the Pre-Industrial City |last=Davis |first=R.C. |year=2007 |publisher=The Johns Hopkins University Press |location=Baltimore, MD |isbn=978-0-8018-8625-6 |pages=201, back cover |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qRKfhXMMms8C&q=thousand&pg=PT209 |access-date=30 January 2010}}</ref> With high walls shielding the Arsenal from public view and guards protecting its perimeter, different areas of the Arsenal each produced a particular prefabricated ship part or other maritime implement, such as munitions, rope, and rigging.<ref>{{cite book |title=Renaissance War Galley 1470-1590 |last=Konstam |first=A. |author2=Bryan, T. |year=2002 |publisher=Osprey Publishing |location=Oxford, U.K. |isbn= 978-1-84176-443-6 |page=22 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hWjZZR-_3KcC&q=venetian+arsenal+prefabricated+parts&pg=PT9 |access-date=30 January 2010}}</ref> These parts could then be assembled into a ship in as little as one day.<ref>Atauz, A.D. "[http://nautarch.tamu.edu/Theses/pdf-files/Atauz-PhD2004.pdf Trade, piracy, and naval warfare in the central Mediterranean: The maritime history and archaeology of Malta] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210413162349/https://nautarch.tamu.edu/Theses/pdf-files/Atauz-PhD2004.pdf |date=13 April 2021 }}." ''Texas A&M University Ph.D. Thesis.'' May 2004. Accessed 30 January 2010.</ref> An exclusive forest owned by the Arsenal navy, in the [[Montello (TV), Italy|Montello]] hills area of [[Veneto]], provided the Arsenal's wood supply.

The Arsenal produced the majority of Venice's maritime trading vessels, which generated much of the city's [[Economy of Venice|economic wealth]] and power, lasting until the [[fall of the Venetian Republic]] to [[Napoleon I of France|Napoleon]] in 1797.<ref>O'Connell, G.C. "[http://eprints.ccsu.edu/archive/00000209/02/tesisep5,2005_(1).pdf Venice, the lagoon and the Adriatic Sea: a historic struggle for survival]{{dead link|date=December 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}." ''Central Connecticut State University Master of Science in International Studies Thesis.'' August 2005. Accessed 30 January 2010.</ref> It is located in the [[Castello, Venice|Castello]] [[Sestiere (Venice)|district]] of Venice, and it is now owned by the state.<ref name=evaluation/>

==History==

[[File:Arsenal venice bacini.png|thumb|Plan of the Arsenal basins with their expansion phases, starting from the Old Arsenal, the New Arsenal (1305), the Newest Arsenal (1473), the Galeazze canal (1564) and the Porta Nova canal (1810).]]The [[Byzantine architecture|Byzantine]]-style establishment may have existed as early as the 8th century, though the present structure is usually said to have been begun in 1104 during the reign of [[Ordelafo Faliero]], although there is no evidence for such a precise date. It definitely existed by the early 13th century.

Initially the state [[dockyard]] worked to maintain privately built [[navy|naval]] ships, but in 1320 the ''Arsenale Nuovo'' ({{langx|it|New Arsenal}}) was built, much larger than the original. It enabled all the state's navy and the larger [[Merchant vessel|merchant ships]] to be both constructed and maintained in one place. The Arsenal became an important center for [[rope]] manufacture, and housing for the Arsenal workers grew up outside its walls.

Venice developed methods of [[mass production|mass-producing]] warships in the Arsenal, including the [[Ancient shipbuilding techniques#Frame-First Techniques|frame-first]] system to replace the [[Hellenistic-era warships|Roman]] [[Ancient shipbuilding techniques#Shell-first|hull-first]] practice. This new system was much faster and required less wood. At the peak of its efficiency in the early 16th century, the Arsenal employed some 16,000 people who apparently were able to produce nearly one [[ship]] each day, and could fit out, arm, and provision a newly built [[galley]] with standardized parts on a [[assembly line|production-line]] basis not seen again until the [[Industrial Revolution]].<ref name=":0" />

The staff of the Arsenal, who were united by their distinct professional identity,<ref>{{Cite journal|title = Pestilence, Poverty, and Provision: Re-evaluating the Role of the Popolani in Early Modern Venice|last = Iordanou|first = Ioanna|date = 2015|journal = The Economic History Review|volume = 69|issue = 3|pages = 801–822|doi = 10.1111/ehr.12131|s2cid = 143028544|hdl = 10.1111/ehr.12131|hdl-access = free}}</ref> also developed new [[firearm]]s at an early date, beginning with [[Bombard (weapon)|bombards]] in the 1370s and numerous small arms for use against the [[Republic of Genoa|Genoese]] a few years later. The muzzle velocity of [[handgun]]s was improved beyond that of the [[crossbow]], creating armor-piercing rounds. Arsenal-produced arms were also noteworthy for their multi-purpose utility; the Venetian ''[[condottieri]]'' leader, [[Bartolomeo Colleoni]], is usually given credit as being the first to mount the Arsenal's new lighter-weight [[artillery]] on mobile carriages for field use.
[[File:Arsenale (Venice) - The Lion of Venice on the pediment of the arsenal.jpg|thumb|left|Stone [[Lion of Saint Mark]] above the main gate at the Arsenal]]
[[File:Arsenale di Venezia gate.jpg|thumb|right|180px|Venetian Arsenal main gate]]
The Arsenal's main gate, the ''Porta Magna'', was built around 1460 and was one of the first works of [[Venetian Renaissance architecture]]. It was based on the Roman [[Arch of the Sergii]], a [[triumphal arch]] in [[Pula]] in [[Istria]], now in Croatia but then Venetian territory.<ref>Wolters, Wolfgang and Huse, Norbert, ''The Art of Renaissance Venice: Architecture, Sculpture, and Painting, 1460-1590'', p. 13, 1993, University of Chicago Press</ref> It was perhaps built by {{Ill|Antonio Gambello|it}} from a design by [[Jacopo Bellini]]. Two marble lions looted from [[Piraeus]] near Athens, situated beside it were added in 1687. One of the lions, known as the [[Piraeus Lion]], has notable [[Runic alphabet|runic]] defacements that were probably carved into it by Scandinavian mercenaries in the 11th century.

In the late 16th century, the Arsenal's designers experimented with larger ships as platforms for heavy naval guns. The largest was the [[galleass]], already used at the [[Battle of Lepanto (1571)]] against the [[Ottoman Turks]], and developed from the old merchanting "great galley". It was huge, propelled by both [[sails]] and [[oars]], with guns mounted on wheeled carriages along the sides in the modern fashion. It was slow and unwieldy in battle, however, and few were ever built. The [[galleon]], also developed at the Arsenal, was an armed sailing ship, a slimmer version of the merchant "round ship". It was useful in major naval battles, but not in the small bays and off the extensive [[lee shore]]s of the [[Dalmatia]]n coast.

Significant parts of the Arsenal were destroyed under [[Fall of the Republic of Venice|Napoleonic rule]], and later rebuilt to enable the Arsenal's present use as a [[naval base]]. It is also used as a research center and an exhibition venue during the [[Venice Biennale]], and is home to a historic boat preservation center.

<gallery mode="packed" heights="150px">
File:Ponti, Carlo (ca. 1823-1893) - Venezia - Portale dell'Arsenale.jpg|Entrance to the Arsenal ca. 1860–70. Photo by [[Carlo Ponti (photographer)|Carlo Ponti]]
File:View of the entrance to the Arsenal by Canaletto, 1732.jpg|''View of the Entrance to the Arsenal'' by [[Canaletto]], 1732
File:Venice arsenale 2 1724.JPG|Venetian Arsenal, 1724 engraving by [[Joan Blaeu]]
</gallery>

==Mass production==
The Venetian Arsenal's ability to mass-produce [[galley]]s on an almost [[Assembly line|assembly-line process]] was unique for its time and resulted in possibly the single largest industrial complex in Europe prior to the [[Industrial Revolution]]. So much so, that it was mentioned in [[Dante Alighieri|Dante]]'s ''[[Inferno (Dante)|Inferno]]'':
{{poemquote|As in the Arsenal of the Venetians
Boils in winter the tenacious pitch
To smear their unsound vessels over again
For sail they cannot; and instead thereof
One makes his vessel new, and one recaulks
The ribs of that which many a voyage has made
One hammers at the prow, one at the stern
This one makes oars and that one cordage twists
Another mends the mainsail and the mizzen…<ref>H.W. Longfellow trans. from Canto xxi of Inferno, quoted in Lane, ''Venice, a Maritime Republic'', 163</ref> }}

The Arsenal's capacity for production was rare in a time when "most of Europe had no manufacturing abilities more efficient than the guild system, the slow and tradition-bound way craftsmen had of passing on skills to their sons or apprentices while monopolizing production and sale of craft pieces in a given region... The Arsenal was something different, a harbinger of future times."<ref name="almyta.com">Dolinsky, Anton. "Inventory Management History Part Three: Venetian Arsenal - Ahead of Their Time". Almyta Systems. http://www.almyta.com/Inventory_Management_History_3.asp</ref>

The Venetian Arsenal was not the mass production facility that it was to become until about 1320 with the creation of the ''Arsenale Nuovo''. The ''Arsenale Nuovo'' was simply a larger and more efficient version of the original. Prior to this time the Arsenal had served mainly as a place to maintain privately built ships. With the creation of the ''Arsenale Nuovo'', and the development and introduction of the Great Galley, the Venetian Arsenal would start to take on its industrial form. The invention of the Great Galley itself is significant because they were able to be built frame-first. This process used less timber than the earlier hull-first building system, resulting in much faster build times. This was crucial to the process that would lead to the Arsenal becoming a mass-production center. By the 16th century, the Arsenal had become the most powerful and efficient shipbuilding enterprise in the world. Not only did it supply ships, rigging, and other nautical supplies, it was also a major munitions depot for the Venetian navy and was capable of outfitting and producing fully equipped merchant or naval vessels at the rate of one per day.<ref name="almyta.com"/>

In the rest of Europe the production of a similar sized vessel could often take months. This large production capacity was a result of the massive number of people that the Arsenal employed, almost 16,000, and the streamlining of production within the Arsenal itself. Production was divided into three main stages: [[Framing (construction)|framing]], planking and cabins, and final assembly. Each stage employed its own workers who specialized in that particular stage of production as well as using standardized parts to produce an almost assembly-line process. The Arsenal often kept up to 100 galleys in different stages of production and maintenance. That way, once a galley was launched, another could be immediately put into the finishing stages of production. The layout of the Arsenal itself was modified to enable minimal handling of materials during the stages of production. The Arsenal also saw the use of standardized, interchangeable parts.

One revolutionary aspect of the Arsenal was its employment of the moving assembly line. The galleys, through the use of a [[canal]], were moved along during their stages of construction, allowing them to be brought to the materials and workers, instead of the materials and workers going to the galley itself. This assembly approach was repeated in the rest of the world only starting from the early 20th century when [[Ransom E. Olds]] began using the modern assembly line, which was later changed into a moving assembly line by Henry Ford.

==Galileo==
[[File:Galileo Galilei01.jpg|thumb|upright|left|Statue of Galileo Galilei]]
In 1593, [[Galileo Galilei|Galileo]] became a [[consultant]] to the Arsenal, advising [[military engineer]]s and instrument makers and helping to solve shipbuilders' problems, many of them relating to matters of [[ballistics]]. He was also responsible for creating some major innovations in the production and [[logistics]] of the Arsenal. As a result of his interactions with the Arsenal, Galileo published a book later in his life addressing a new field of modern science, that concerned with the [[Strength of materials|strength]] and resistance of materials. This science largely saw its roots in the knowledge of the [[Shipbuilding|shipwrights]] of the Venetian Arsenal. It is also supposed that [[Galileo Galilei|Galileo]]'s initial visits to the Arsenal were as a result of his initiative to further investigate [[Aristotle]]'s questions concerning shipbuilding and navigation, found in the Mechanical Questions of Aristotle. As a result of these investigations, which were pursued by observing the work of the shipwrights, Galileo was asked to help in resolving a specific problem with the rowing units of the galleys. As a result of his study of Aristotle, and in particular Question 4 regarding the [[Marine propulsion|propulsion]] of ships by oar, Galileo was able to produce a response to this question and ended up becoming a major source of information for the shipbuilders of the Arsenal concerning matters of rowing, instruments, and [[ballistics]].<ref>Valleriani, Matteo. ''Galileo Engineer''. Springer: New York, 2010</ref>

==Venice's naval power==
[[Venice]]'s wealth and power rested in its ability to control trade in the [[Mediterranean Sea|Mediterranean]]. This would not have been possible without an extremely large navy and merchant force. By 1450, over 3,000 Venetian merchant ships were in operation, both as supply ships for Venetian merchants and as [[warship]]s for the [[Venetian navy]]. The fleet required constant maintenance and outfitting. The Venetian Arsenal was not only able to function as a major shipyard, but was also responsible for these routine maintenance stops that most Venetian galleys required. This required financing, for which the Venetian government spent almost 10% of its revenues. This naval power resulted in the domination of Mediterranean commerce. Venice's leading families, largely merchants and noblemen, were responsible for creating some of the grandest palaces and employing some of the most famous artists ever known. This opulence and wealth would not have been possible without the naval force constructed by the Arsenal. With the creation of the Great Galley and the mass production capacity of the Arsenal, "the fleets of Venice were the basis for the greatest commercial power the European world had yet seen".<ref>Frederic Chapin Lane, ''Venice: A Maritime Republic'' (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1973): 1-2.</ref>
{{clearleft}}

==Current use ==
After years of disuse and neglect, parts of the Venetian Arsenal complex have been modernized and repurposed to serve as the operations centre for Venice's [[MOSE Project]], a flood defence system intended to protect the [[Venetian Lagoon]] from tidal flooding.{{citation needed|date=April 2023}}

==Other arsenals==
[[File:Venetian Shipyard in Gouvia, Corfu.jpg|thumb|The [[Venetian arsenal, Gouvia|Venetian Arsenal]] at Govino Bay, [[Corfu]]]]
Venice built also a network of Venetian arsenals, serving primarily the purpose of repair, and naval stations in [[Greece]], including shipyards in the [[Aegean Sea]], [[Epirus]], the [[Peloponnese]] and the [[Kingdom of Candia]] (modern [[Crete]]). Such locations included [[Corfu]], [[Methoni, Messenia|Methoni]], [[Koroni]], [[Chalkis]], [[Preveza]], [[Chania]] and [[Heraklion]].<ref name="Damianidēs1997">{{cite book|author=Kōstas Damianidēs|title=Nautikḗ parádosē sto Aigaío: tarsanádes kai skariá|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=l4hYAAAAMAAJ&q=%CE%92%CE%B5%CE%BD%CE%B5%CF%84%CF%83%CE%B9%CE%AC%CE%BD%CE%B9%CE%BA%CE%B1+%CE%BD%CE%B1%CF%85%CF%80%CE%B7%CE%B3%CE%B5%CE%AF%CE%B1+%CF%83%CF%84%CE%B7+%CE%9A%CE%AD%CF%81%CE%BA%CF%85%CF%81%CE%B1|year=1997|publisher=Hypourgeio Aigaiou|page=26|isbn=978-960-7859-03-7|quote=ή τεχνίτες εργάζονται όμως και στα βενετσιάνικα ναυπηγεία και τους ναυσταθμους στο Αιγαίο (Χανιά, Ηράκλειο, Μεθώνη, Κορώνη, Χαλκίδα, Πρέβεζα και Κέρκυρα) όπως επίσης και στο ναύσταθμο της ίδιας της Βενετίας}}</ref>

==See also==
* [[Venetian arsenal, Gouvia]]
* [[List of buildings and structures in Venice]]

==Further reading==
* Robert C. Davis (1991). ''Shipbuilders of the Venetian Arsenal: Workers and Workplace in the preindustrial city'', Johns Hopkins University Press.

==References==
{{reflist|30em}}

==External links==
{{Commonscatinline}}
* [http://arsenale.comune.venezia.it Arsenale di Venezia - Official webpage by the Municipality of Venice]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20041023215413/http://www.thetis.it/UK/arsenale/arsenale.htm thetis - What is the Arsenale]
* High-resolution 360° Panoramas of [https://mcid.mcah.columbia.edu/art-atlas/venice-and-its-lagoon/arsenale Arsenale | Art Atlas]

{{Sequence
| prev = [[St Mark's Basilica]]
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| curr = Venetian Arsenal
| next = [[Bridge of Sighs]]
}}
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[[Category:Venetian Arsenal| ]]
[[Category:Arsenals]]
[[Category:Military history of Venice]]
[[Category:Industrial history]]