The Rialto Bridge Venice: Guide to Rialto Market and Rialto Restaurants

The Rialto Bridge is in an area of the San Polo sestiere of Venice, Italy, known for its markets and for the bridge. What to see and do, restaurants and the Rialto Market on the Grand Canal.

The Rialto is the central point of Venice. It spans the Grand Canal and it is an area that has always attracted merchants from all over the world. In the past it was a center for goldsmiths and Ruga degli Orefici is testament to this, which is down the steps from the Rialto Bridge. Orefice means Goldsmith in Italian.

However, the Rialto didn't always look like it does today. In fact before the stone bridge there used to be a wooden draw-bridge here from the 12 century that used to allow high-masted boats to pass up and down the canal. Antonio da Ponte's design of the present structure was commissioned in 1588 and took 3 years to build. This bridge remained the only bridge that existed where one could cross the Grand Canal until 1854, when the Accademia Bridge was built.

It is probably the most photographed bridge in Venice, and certainly is charming of a night time when the bridge is brightly illuminated. However, many people may be so busy taking photographs of the canal and bridge and in a hurry to cross it to go some place else, that they may miss an attraction that is so close, that it is worth stopping by. And that is the Rialto Market. It is known in Italian as the Erbia dei Tedeschi.

The Rialto Fish Market and Vegetable Market can be found together at the bottom of the Rialto Bridge, next to the canal, down the steps along Ruga degli Orefici. With the Banco Giro on your left, go into the Campo Casare Battisti Gia della Bella Vienna. Straight ahead you will come to the Rialto Market.

The Rialto Market is worth a visit, just for the unique fish and vegetables that you would not necessary see back home. Some really strange looking fish and shell fish can be seen, and some really odd looking vegetables that looks like a radicchio of some sort and is called vendiso tardivo.

Take some time to look around, and also look for interesting fish and seahorse motifs on the columns that cover the area taken up by the Fish Market. There are also buying and selling regulations in the form of boards where fish had to be a certain length before they could be sold. Sardines, for example had to be at least 7 inches long. Nowadays, one is even delighted if you find a sardine when fishing, let alone one that is 7 inches long!

If you are coming by boat get off at the vaporetto stop Rialto Mercato. You must get here early to truly enjoy an authentic experience that has been taking place daily since the 11th century! It is open very early, so if you are here by 7:00 a.m. you will be rubbing shoulders with Venetian chefs and housewives, out to get the best of the best. Most of the stallholders close at midday, so get there early, and enjoy listening to the stallholders singing in baritone voices setting up their stalls and watch the stevedores unload their boats at the canal's edge.

I couldn't say it any better than Elizabeth David, in her description of the Rialto Market:

"In other markets, on other shores, the unfamiliar fishes may be vivid, mysterious, repellent, fascinating, and bright with splendid colour; only in Venice do they look good enough to eat. In Venice even ordinary sole and ugly great skate are striped with delicate lilac lights, the sardines shine like newly-minted silver coins, pink Venetian scampi are fat and fresh, infinitely enticing in the early dawn."

                                                                                       ~ Elizabeth David, Italian Food

RESTAURANTS NEAR THE RIALTO BRIDGE

If you are looking for somewhere to eat and you are sick of paying high prices and you want a little bit of England with an Italian twist, then pop into the Devils Forest Pub which is cheap and not far from the market.

If you are looking for some authenticItalian food, then head off to Il Diavolo E L'Acqua Santa - The direct translation being "The Devil and the Holy Water". It is not far from the Rialto Market and Rialto Bridge, in Calle Dell Madonna. It is a small restaurant with a cozy atmosphere of a pub, but not an English pub, but rather a Venetian pub. Prices are reasonable.

So, if you are heading off somewhere and you need to cross the Rialto Bridge, come and enjoy a little bit of history by visiting the Rialto Market and rub shoulders with the local Venetians.

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