Pen Holder
San Servolo 1

Alberto Toso Fei narrates...

“Venetian wellheads are an iconic and silent presence, irreplaceable stone jewels, central to courtyards across the city and its islands. They are thousands, each one different from the other: they are the most important testament to how Venice—built on water yet without its drinking water—has survived during the centuries through the ability to adapt of its residents. They created an extraordinary water collection system to ensure not a drop was wasted.

Most wells were owned by private citizens or monasteries; the well on San Servolo quenched the thirst of monks and nuns for a thousand years: from the first Benedictines, who inhabited the island in the 7th century, to the Jesuits who succeeded them, till to the 142 nuns who arrived from Candia, once the island of Crete was lost, in 1647.

After periods of abandonment, San Servolo was converted into a hospital, entrusted to the Brothers Hospitallers of St. John of God in 1716, to care for the wounded from battles with the Turks.
Today, San Servolo is the place of the hospitality; a conference center in the heart of the lagoon, with its historic library, pharmacy, church, and a museum commemorating its past as an asylum, all nestled within one of the largest parks in the Venetian islands”.