Course Description
In keeping with the aims of the UNESCO Chair on Water Heritage and Sustainable Development and the approach to Environmental Humanities of The NICHE Centre for Environmental Humanities at Ca' Foscari University of Venice, this course explores the historical relationships between water, society, and sustainability from the transdisciplinary perspective of historical geoanthropology. Geoanthropology – the emerging field informing the research of the Max Planck Partner Group 'The Water City' in Venice in collaboration with the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology in Jena – investigates the dynamic interrelations between societies and environmental systems across time. Drawing on established approaches from environmental humanities, history of science, and hydrosociology, the course examines water as a material resource, a political object of governance, and a cultural element embedded in social practices and systems of knowledge. Focusing on early modern Venice and its long-term legacies, it emphasizes the role of intangible cultural heritage, from engineered waterways and cultural landscapes to the practices and knowledge communities develop to manage local commons, providing exploring comparable water-society interactions in diverse historical and global contexts.

Building on this conceptual framework, on one hand, the course examines water systems from a broader historical and political perspective, exploring how societies have measured, interpreted, and governed aquatic environments. Special attention is given to the relationship between environmental knowledge and political authority, including the role of technologies such as cartography in shaping the management of water landscapes. In this context, water and its circulation are considered key elements of global metabolic networks, linking ecological processes, economic activities, and political institutions across different scales. From the perspective of hydro-sociology, water emerges both as a material resource essential to sustenance and transportation and as a cultural sign whose meanings have been historically shaped through social practices and systems of knowledge. These perspectives also introduce debates on the governance of common resources and the relevance of both tangible and intangible water heritage for contemporary discussions of sustainable development.

Complementing these broader perspectives, the course investigates specific case studies, often through a microhistorical lens, to examine specific and instructive figures, episodes, and local practices of water management in Venice and the Venetian mainland. Beginning with an overview of Venice as a city shaped by water, attention is given to the actors and institutions whose decisions balanced technical, political, and environmental considerations. The analysis then extends to the mainland territories of the Venetian Republic, where smaller-scale initiatives – including drainage works, river maintenance, irrigation systems, and agricultural water management – demonstrate how environmental governance operated in practice. The course concludes with an exploration of the cultural landscapes of the Veneto villas, where water functioned both as a practical resource and as a symbolic element embedded in architectural design, garden layouts, and fresco cycles. Throughout these case studies, art, architecture, and cartography serve as key sources for exploring how human decisions, material infrastructures, and cultural practices have historically shaped the organization, experience, and meaning of water in urban and rural landscapes.

Syllabus – Weekly Breakdown of Classes and Readings

WEEK 1. Introduction, Prof. Pietro Daniel Omodeo (2 lessons). A basic introduction to the Anthropocene scholarship, intangible water heritage, cultural landscapes and the legacy of early-modern environmental history as the main themes to be treated in the course.

Readings:

Cristina Baldacci, Shaul Bassi, Lucio De Capitani and Pietro Daniel Omodeo (eds), Venice and the Anthropocene: An Ecocritical Guide (Venice: Wetlands, 2022), a selection.

Pietro Daniel Omodeo and Pietro Consolandi (eds), The Anthropocene Waterscapes of Venice (Venice: Edizioni Ca' Foscari, 2025), a selection.

WEEKS 2–3. Part 1, Dr. Erasmo Castellani (3 lessons). The Tigh-knit development of the Venetian society and its environment: how political practices, institutions and myth-making narratives are shaped by the mutual interaction between humans and the lagoon environment; exploration of key elements to historically frame the question of sustainability; introduction to the relationship between tangible and intangible cultural heritage.

Readings:

Dannis Romano, Venice. The Remarkable History of the Lagoon City (Oxford, 2024), introduction and selections.

Karl Appuhn, "Friend of Flood? The Dilemmas of Water Management in Early Modern Venice", in Andrew C. Isenberg (ed.), The Nature of Cities (Rochester, NY, 2006), pp. 79-102.

Elisabeth Crouzet-Pavan, "An Ecological Understanding of the Myth of Venice", in John Martin and Dennis Romano (eds.), Venice Reconsidered: The History and Civilization of an Italian City-State 1297-1797 (Baltimore, 2000), pp. 39-64.

WEEKS 3–4. Part 1, Dr. Meital Shai (3 lessons). Venice as a water city: the development of the lagoon and urban waterways, and the actors who shaped them – authorities, experts, and private patrons. Lessons focus on the construction, maintenance, and regulation of canals, ports, and hydraulic infrastructures, as well as public and private buildings, and explore art, architecture, and early modern cartography as tools and symbols of water management.

Around the end of week 4, a visit is planned to the lagoon, to see Marghera port, the MOSE barriers, Pellestrina museum, and/or the Casone Millecampi.

Readings:

Juergen Schulz, "The Printed Plans and Panoramic Views of Venice (1486–1797)." Saggi e Memorie di storia dell'arte, 7 (1970), excerpt, pp. 13–15, 17–21.

Deborah Howard, "Venetian Architecture," in Eric R. Dursteler (ed.), A Companion to Venetian History, 1400–1797 (Brill 2013), pp. 743–754.

WEEKS 5-6. Part 2, Dr. Erasmo Castellani (3 lessons). Measuring and governing the lagoon: exploring the political economy of knowledge and technology. Focus on cartography: the lessons will include a visit to the Correr Museum and/or Querini Stampalia libraries to start working on early modern drawings and maps of Venice and its waters; students will conduct a small-groups workshop on selected maps of these collections.

Readings:

Aldino Bondesan, Paolo Furlanetto: "Artificial fluvial diversions in the mainland of the Lagoon of Venice during the 16th and 17th centuries inferred by historical cartography analysis", Alluvial Geomorphology in Italy, 18/2 (2012), pp. 175–200.

P. Omodeo, S. Trevisani, S. Babu, "Benedetto Castelli's Considerations on the Lagoon of Venice", Earth Sciences History, 39/2 (2020), pp. 420–446.

WEEKS 6-7. Mid-course summary and conclusions of library workshop, Prof. Pietro Daniel Omodeo (2 lessons).

WEEKS 7–8. Part 2, Dr. Meital Shai (3 lessons). Historical case studies of small-scale water management in the Venetian mainland, including drainage works, river maintenance, and irrigation systems. Lessons examine the conflicts that typically arose in these initiatives and the factors influencing decision-making among authorities, locals, and technical experts. Cartography and local practices will be used to illustrate the organization and governance of water in rural territories.

Readings:

Salvatore Ciriacono, "Chapter 1. Water and Agricultural Production in the Venetian Terra Firma in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries", in Building on Water: Venice, Holland and the Construction of the European Landscape in Early Modern Times (Oxford and New York: Berghahn Books, 2006), pp. 19–61.

Denis Cosgrove, "Mapping New Worlds: Culture and Cartography in Sixteenth-Century Venice", Imago Mundi, 44 (1992), pp. 65–89 (here pp. 65–75).

Rachele Scuro, "Water-Power in Pre-industrial Veneto. Management and Transformation of Hydraulic Energy through the Archives of the Venetian Magistrate of the 'Provveditori sopra i Beni Inculti'," Journal of Energy History, 13/2 (2024), pp. 1–16.

WEEK 9–10. Part 3, Dr. Erasmo Castellani (3 lessons): Regulating the commons: governance of the waters and practical knowledges; considering the socio-ecological legacies of the Venetian Republic, expressed as traditional, often artisanal practices, and their criticalities: what is the role of intangible water heritage in current discourses of sustainable development?

Readings:

Solene Rivoal, "Enclosure within a closed Sea? The fisheries of the early modern Republic of Venice in the 18th century", Journal for the History of Environment and Society, 6 (2022): pp. 35–62.

David Gentilcore, "The Cistern-System of Early Modern Venice: Technology, Politics and Culture in a Hydraulic Society", Water History 13 (2021), pp. 375–406.

Lidia Sciama, A Venetian Island: Environment, History and Change in Burano (New York: 2003), excerpts.

WEEK 10–11. Part 3, Dr. Meital Shai (3 lessons). A historical inquiry into the Veneto villas, focusing on the role of water within the estate and its surrounding environment. Lessons will examine how the villa's physical infrastructure functioned as a control system for nearby agricultural landscapes and how hydraulic design and water-related features were integrated into architectural and artistic programs. Students will explore how technical knowledge, social priorities, and aesthetic ideals shaped water management, highlighting the symbolic and practical significance of water in early modern Venetian territories.

Readings:

J. S. Ackerman, Palladio's Villas, Institute of Fine Arts J. J. Augustin, 1967, pp. 1-3, 8-17.

Sören Fischer, "The Allegorical Landscape. Alvise Cornaro and His Self-Promotion by the Landscape Paintings in the Odeo Cornaro in Padua", Kunstgeschichte. Open Peer Reviewed Journal (2013), pp. 1–11.

Meital Shai, "Architecture and the Venetian Waterscapes. The Fresco Decorations of the Veneto Villas and the Anthropocene." In The Anthropocene Waterscapes of Venice, edited by Pietro Daniel Omodeo and Pietro Consolandi, Edizioni Ca' Foscari, Venice 2025, pp. 21–24.

WEEK 12. Conclusion, Prof. Pietro Daniel Omodeo (2 lessons).

At the end of week 12, an excursion to a Veneto villa/province will take place.

Readings:

Pietro Daniel Omodeo, "The Aquaformation of Modern Venice: Powers of Nature and Water Worlding," in The Pavilion – Architecture of Stewardship, ed. Ella Kaira and Matti Jänkälä (Stockholm, Arvinius + Orfeus Publishing, 2025)

Learning Outcomes
The course will provide students with a conceptual framework and vocabulary in line with the values and goals set in the Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. Students will be able to critically evaluate sustainability and water governance at multiple scales, from global networks and political institutions to local practices and individual case studies. They will also proactively engage with early modern documentation, maps, architecture and art, learning the fundamentals of historical interpretation of primary sources. The course fosters the capacity to understand questions of heritage as both a cultural and environmental practice, emphasizing the interplay between technical knowledge, social priorities, and aesthetic ideals in shaping water management. The course will develop a situated understanding of human-environment interactions, in view of the ecological, political, and cultural challenges faced by the Water City within the lagoon and in its mainland territories. In general terms, the students will be introduced to the educational, scientific, and cultural mission of UNESCO and the Chair for Water Heritage and Sustainable Development.

Bibliography
See above, included in the Syllabus.

Teaching and Evaluation Methods
25% – participation
25% – project presentation
50% – final project

In addition to in-class participation (25%), students will develop and present their project idea (25%) by the middle of the course. The final project (50%), likely an oral presentation, will be delivered after the lecture period.

For the project, each student will be required to select a geographical area of interest worldwide in which water heritage plays a central role, such as an urban center, a region, lake, or river. Students can choose from a list proposed by the professor or suggest their own case studies. Students will also be required to select a visual medium – such as a historical map, image, or video footage – that will form the core of their discussion. Each student will have to examine the case using the concepts and frameworks developed throughout the course, analysing past and present environmental challenges and potential pathways for sustainable management, with comparative references to the Venetian case.

Course duration: 40 hours of tuition
Credits equivalence: 6 ECTS

Last updated: June 12, 2026