My Favorite Little Island: Poveglia Isand

Poveglia island is a place that until recently few people knew about. Now thanks to shows such as Scariest places on Earth and Ghost Adventures, a few more people may know about it. In case you're not familiar with it, Poveglia is a small island found in the Venetian Lagoon, located between Venice and Lido.

Source? D:

Why is this my favorite?  The legends surrounding this place are really fascinating, true or not. There's also the fact that it's full of abandoned buildings that have all sorts of things left in them. But the thing that really sparks my interest is the fact that the local government has banned any visitors from visiting the island and has police boats patrolling the waters nearby. 

Now, before I get down to all the gritty details, here's a disclaimer: there's not a lot of information out there about the island and most of it is pretty fuzzy. There are some details that could be fiction or the hard truth. All i'm saying is take everything you read on the internet with a grain of salt, i'm just telling you what i've read.

Ok, let's get to the cool part. Legend claims that Poveglia island was used as a site for massive body dumps during the Roman era. It was used as a quarantine zone and plague pit to those that were infected with the Black Death. Versions of the legend claim that the bodies were burned on the island along with plague victims that were still alive. It's said that there were so many bodies burned that the center of the island still had ash covering the ground. Fishermen apparently steer clear of the island due to the fact that bones are still getting caught in their nets along with their hauls (Grain of salt: Apparently untrue, fishing nets can be seen around the island.) Over 160,000 people are said to have died on the island throughout it's history.  (Grain of salt: Sources say that Poveglia wasn't used during the plague but another island, Lazzaretto Nuovo, was.)

Source

But we haven't even gotten to the best part yet! The Insane Asylum. No, i'm not kidding. In 1922 a building was erected on the island that was used for many purposes including a home for the elderly and a mental hospital. Legends say that the mental patients who were housed there often complained of seeing ghosts, apparently those of the plague victims. These claims were brushed off as a side effect of thier mental illness. The doctor who ran the mental institution was interested in making a name for himself by finding out what caused madness. He attempted to do so included everything from torture to lobotomies. He often preformed these procedures with crude tools such as hand drills, hammers, and chisels. Apparently after years of these "treatments," the doctor himself began to lose his mind, he then climbed up the bell tower were he threw himself off.

Eventually the hospital was abandoned and the island is currently uninhabited. What parts of the legend are true is up for speculation. But true or not, it makes for one hell of a good story, no?

Links!

• Blog of a visit to the island (lots of pretty pictures of your enjoyment!): [link]

• View of the island via Google maps: [link]