Fascism Obliterated (and Reborn)

St. Mark's lion and his open book on one side of the flag pole base in Campo San Polo.

As America's Republican Party has now gone fully fascistic in his embrace of eugenics, scapegoating of ethnic minorities, threats of violence, promises of retribution and imprisonment of political opponents and all those it declares its enemies, censorship, and relentless dissemination of known lies (both big and small), it seemed like a good time to share something a friend of mine pointed to me out about the recessed blank circles you can find carved around Venice and always paired paired with a second circle of the same size with a relief of St Mark's symbol inside it. 

Sometimes, as in the example below, the surface within the circle will have been ground smooth. Other times the surface within the circle will be rough, showing clear evidence of something having been chipped off.

In either case, what was once carved into the stone, and what was subsequently obliterated, was the fascio (or bundle of rods) symbol of the Fascist Party, my friend told told me. As such these now-empty circles, along with the pietre d'inciampo or brass "stumbling stones" set into the pavement before the doors of those Jewish Venetians whom the Nazis deported and murdered, serve as reminders of one of the darkest periods of Venetian and European history. They are very easy to miss, but worth keeping an eye out for, as a reminder that Venice is not merely a theme park, or a touristic or aesthetic fantasy land. As a reminder, too, of the vigilance needed to forestall the recurrence of such criminal parties and the violence they inevitably commit against humanity. 

A vigilance, however, that seems to be largely lacking in both America and Italy these days, where both Trump's fascists and Meloni's neo-fascists threaten to reawaken the kind of horrors that World War II was supposedly fought to vanquish.

The other side of the flag pole base, in which the fascio (or bundle of rods) symbol of the Fascist Party has been obliterated (both images from 2 August 2024).