Il Progetto Arca Adriatica e la memoria del patrimonio nautico tradizionale a Venezia. Mestieri e attività in delicato equilibrio

This article is part of the activities of the Arca Adriatica project (Interreg Italy-Croatia programme), about the knowledge, the management and the valorization of the traditional maritime heritage in the Upper Adriatic Sea. Among the various actions of the project, the Department of Studi Umanistici of the Ca’ Foscari University (partner of the project) has carried out an activity of documentation, through video interviews, involving both the active craftmen and some old professionals of the navigation, of the fishing and of the connected activities, testimonies of a cultural and professional horizon risking a fast disappearance, often already definitively disappeared. In this article, after an introductive part about the value and the meaning of the Venetian and Adriatic maritime tradition, three interviews/cases have been selected, in particular the testimony of the last Venetian rope maker (not in activity any more), of an old Istrian mariner who worked in the traffics with Venice, of the gondoliers de paràda, that is devoted to ferry passengers from a side to the other side of the Canal Grande. A panorama characterized by fast and radical changes, happened in the last forty/fifty years both on the social and on the professional level, appears. This offers interesting food for thought about the future of the local nautical tradition and about the jobs connected.