History
Waterways
Around the half of the 15th Century, the Serenissima was interested in developping the trade using the waterways in Friuli and began the works, lead by Liberal from Oderzo, in 1440 of escavation of a canal (no more existing), which had to join The Piave to the Revedoli, making it possible for crafts to sail from Venice to Caorle or Grado, without going out at sea. The opening of the canal (spring of 1441), favoured the birth of stores and houses for workers or keepers as well as nobles who invested their fortunes on the territory. At the end of the 15th Century the nobles Gradenigo, Malipiero, Soranzo and others began to bonificate the lands and easied the settlement of many colons. On the 3rd of January 1495 the Patriarch of Venice, Tommaso Donà, accepted the requests of the nobles and workers and estabished the Parish of San Giovanni Battista, the most ancient in the Basso Piave.
The new urban centre left the old location next to the Mura and developed at about 700, 800 metres from there, in the crossing between river and canal, next to the new church. After a few years the upkeeping of the canal was given to Alvise Zucharin and his heirs (November 20, 1499) and that surname gave slowly a new name to the old Equilio-Jesolo, which would become Cava (canal) Zucharina (from the name of the family Zucharin), reported in various manners in the venetian documents: Cava Zuccherina, Cavazucharina, Cavazuccherina. The name was maintained by the town and by the Commune (established by Napoleon on the 22nd of December 1807) until the 28th of August 1930, when endly the king Vittorio Emanuele III allowed the re-use of the historical name Jesolo.
Deviation of the Piave and of the Sile
In order to eliminate the frequent floods of the Piave which threatened the lagoon, on the 7th of March 1534 the Serenissima Republic decided to build a bank (San Marco bank, ended in 1543), beginning from Ponte di Piave going South, arriving to Tower Caligo in the territory of Jesolo.
But the work did not solve the problem of security neither for the law lands of Jesolo nor for the Venetian Ports, therefore in order to better the connection with Friuli and Istria, a new canal was began, the Cavetta, which had to let flow the Piave directly to Cortellazzo. The new work favoured the trading but did not prevent the silting up provoked by the river, of the Venetian port San Nicolò.
Even the Sile damaged the Northern part of the lagoon, above all the area around Torcello, so the Venetian Government decided to divert both the rivers. Thousands of navvies coming from every place in the State were employed and began in 1642 the works to deviate the Piave towards Palazzetto (South of San Donà) barring its ancient course with a "testadura" and leaving dry the last 20 kilometres. But the river after covering with its waters a large expanse (lake of the Piave), instead of in Santa Margherita (Caorle), found its way out to sea (autumn 1683) in Cortellazzo. On the old mouth of the lagoon three large passes (Portegrandi), connecting the river with the old bed of the Piave (Capo Sile) the Sile had finally in 1684 a new course which lead it to Jesolo.
The great works of divertion of the rivers, which did not had the large banks of today, did not better the environment of Cavazuccherina which was considered, for the following four centuries, cradle of the tremendous malaria, defeated with the bonification of the lands that lasted until the 30's of this century.
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