San Michele Island

The only cemetery in Venice is the island of San Michele, also known as the Island of the Dead. Once on this island there was a monastery, and the dead were buried in the city at churches and chapels. Burying people in the city was forbidden by Napoleon, who captured Venice in the late XVIII century. Then two islands of San Cristoforo and San Michele were allocated for the cemetery, but later they were united, filling the canal that separated them.

Now the island is surrounded by a red brick wall, on top of which is a wall of cypresses, which shows the white dome of the fifteenth century church of San Michele in Isola. San Michele is one of the greenest islands of the Venetian lagoon and certainly the quietest.

Here there is peace and order, many well-groomed flower beds and neatly trimmed trees, the cemetery itself is divided into parts according to the religion of the people buried there. For example, in the Protestant cemetery are the graves of Joseph Brodsky, the American poet Ezra Pound and his wife violinist Olga Raj, as well as the grave of Sergei Diaghilev.