Bridge Seventy-Four - Ponte de le Tette

Once out the other end of the sotoportego we reached one of Venice's most facetiously named bridges that invariably finds itself listed in guidebooks: the Ponte de le Tette, or bridge of the tits.

It lies in an area which was once a red-light district in times gone by. But nowadays it's a quiet residential neighbourhood, and if there is indeed a brothel nearby, it is hidden quite well. I cast a wary eye around the mostly closed apartment windows on both sides of the canal from where, according to the much told tale, ladies of the night displayed their… well, the bridge name explains it all.

There's a tapestry of legends, tales and stories woven into the names of Venice's bridges, with the story of the Ponte de le Tette simply being one of the juicier and therefore oft-retold ones. While there may be no visible signs left of what this bridge, and all the others we've seen so far today are allegories for, it's still significant that so much of the city's history has endured, embedded in iron and stone for a thousand years and longer.