Capitolo 2 The smaller shipbuilding activity in Venice

1 - Origins
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"squeraroli" at work	Talking of the Venetian naval activity of building ships , and in particular of the minor one, where minor indicates only the dimensions and not the quality of the product, is like entering the back door into the real essence of the city. Many have been, in fact, the links that it has had with the most intimate tissue of Venice. The influence on the commercial development and on the Venetian life itself of the "Art of Squeraroli" has been huge. The squeraroli were those who worked in the "squeri", as they were called in Venice the shipyards for the building of crafts.
	The birth, the building, the development and the same life of the city have been possible only solving in the best way the problem of the water transport; from always with boats the city has taken provisions, from always the water way allowed the trades and nowadays the water viability is essential for the city life. In the first half of the sixth century , the prefect Cassiodoro, turning to the maritime tribunes of the Venetia, the greatest civil authorities of the lagoon, uses these words:".. and as usually they link to the housedoors the animals, you to your houses of wicker and reeds, link your boats". One can risk the hypothesis that the Venetian of the origins (see the subsection"HISTORY OF VENICE", ch.1), and how and perhaps before him the other lagoon inhabitants of Ravenna and Aquileia, before being fisher or trader must be builder and naval carpenter. Little by little this inhabitant of lagoons, who builds and uses his boat to fish or trade, elaborates and perfects the constructive technique.
	In the time, with the expanding of the trades in the Adriatic and the Mediterranean and with the contacts with the naval Byzantine techniques, we arrive at the slow passage from the boat to the ship. And now the "squerarolo" remains artisan to produce those great crafts that contribute to make of Venice the serenissima Republic.