Until just before Ash Wednesday
The best time to see the most masks and costumes is between St. Mark's Square and the Rialto Bridge, right up until Ash Wednesday.
When is Ash Wednesday this year?
The mask has a long tradition in Venice. Behind it, one could indulge in the illusion of assuming a different identity for a time each year. It also allowed impoverished nobles to beg on the streets unrecognized.
It symbolizes, like nothing else, the dual nature of the Serenissima: one hides oneself and yet, at the same time, puts oneself on display.
How did this come about?
Noble mask
The Noble Mask
This is the name of the typical Venetian mask: Maschera nobile. It consists of a black silk cloak - the tabarro - a hood that covers the entire head down to the shoulders - the bauta - a white wax mask covering the face down to the mouth - the volto - and a black hat with white feathers.
Since 1756, women have also been permitted to wear it. This mask made all wearers equal. The salutation "Sior Maschera" ("Mr. Mask...") sufficed. Only now has it been revived: the season of masks. The modern Signoria of the lagoon city - mass tourism - revived it in 1980 and declared the entire city a stage.
A visitor to the carnival in 1830 described the situation of the former rulers of Venice under their new masters - the Austrians - as follows:
"In the corner of a café, one sees a few figures in modern but completely worn-out clothing, distinguished from the others by their gloomy and haggard features. They are nobili, almost the greatest names in the Golden Book, completely impoverished, too haughty to work, barely proud enough not to beg; the Emperor gives them an allowance (twenty florins a day) for the sake of their names."
"A mask goes with a suit"
This accurately describes what awaited 18th-century visitors on the canals, the campi, the piazzas and piazzettas, and in the calli of Venice. With a population of about 140,000, the city was home to no fewer than 30,000 foreigners in 1701.
This luxury tourism provided the Senate with a new source of revenue and gave former shipyard workers and sailors a new profession. When Napoleon conquered Venice in 1797, the Republic - and with it, the Carnival - came to an end.
What remained could have taken place anywhere:
a few masked processions, a few spectacles, a couple of arias, a noisy, masked mob. The festivities of the state and society, the freedom of the maschera nobile, the intoxication, the revelry - all of that had vanished.
Furthermore, the Venetians had begun to extend the carnival season. Thus, in the 17th century, the actual carnival began as early as October, interrupted only briefly at Christmas, only to be officially opened on December 26 in accordance with old tradition, but by no means coming to a definitive end on Ash Wednesday.
Rather, the masquerade season flared up again and again during annual festivals, political events, public inaugurations, and state visits. By the 18th century, this infiltration of society by the mask had finally taken hold, and masked Venice had become the main attraction of pre-industrial tourism.
"So many shameless things"
No! Yes!! Ooooh!!!
The decree of 1458, which called for action against men who, disguised as women, broke into nunneries during Carnival to engage in "many acts of debauchery," may seem particularly bizarre to us today.
Today, we might chuckle at such circumstances, but in a historical context, Venice was a veritable den of iniquity. The Venetians really knew how to let loose.
It seems that it was precisely during the era of prohibitions that masks and disguises made particularly astonishing progress. In addition to the original typical disguises - such as the wild man, the devil, men in the Gnaga (the women's mask), and faces painted or blackened - fantastic costumes from the realm of mythology came into fashion in the 16th century.
Added to this were the many foreigners from exotic lands, who could only be found in such large numbers in Venice. (Turks, Dalmatians, Cretans, Albanians, Armenians, Moors, Germans, Swiss, plus extravagant professions from all over the world - Persian silk merchants, Dutch sailors, Arab caravan leaders...)
Sior Maschera
History is ever-present in the Venetian Carnival, in its costumes, ceremonies, and celebrations. As in the rest of Italy, ancient masked festivals served as the inspiration for the origins of the Carnival in Venice, foremost among them the pagan Saturnalia, which were celebrated throughout the Roman Empire as a festival marking the turn of the year, offering all the alluring possibilities of a masked orgy.
It is hardly surprising, then, that Venetian courtesans were regarded for centuries as the queens of their trade.
Despite fierce opposition from the Church, the Venetians have celebrated their Carnival since the city's founding. It began on December 26 and ended on Ash Wednesday. Over the centuries, the Senate issued numerous bans, but no one really bothered to follow them.
