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Grado The Sunny Island

THE ORIGINS
The destiny of Grado was to be born and to live in relationship with the bigger and older town Aquileia. Grado is the extreme part of the port of Aquileia, first call for the ships that from the Adriatic sea to Aquileia went upstream the river Natisone which wounding to some extent the city offered a defence against dangers but also an easy link to the sea. The river Natisone was richer in water than the present river Natissa that flows more or less in the same bed of the old Natisone, and reached the sea branching out at its mouth and disappearing in the lagoon. In Grado lived in the Roman Age a little community of workers of the port and a colony of merchants. There are still several pre-Christian archaeological ruins in Grado. The most important are the foundations of a building of the 4th century under the basilica on Piazza della Vittoria.
ATTILA
It is sure that the inhabitants of Aquileia with the Bishop Secondo da Niceta flew to Grado when the capital of Venetia and Histria fell under the Huns of Attila in 452. The tradition of Grado as well as of Aquileia and Veneto, concentrated on the terrible name of Attila the irrecoverable misfortune of Aquileia and the beginning of the grandeur for the town Grado. Grado was born as a daughter-town of Aquileia, it saved the mother-town and inherited its glory. At the same time it is also mother of Venice and provides it for nobility. Grado was then a model of situation that became emblematic as far as the civil and cultural history of the whole region is concerned: survival in precariousness, success despite the dramatic events.
THE TWO PATRIARCHATES
During the centuries the power and the glamour of Venice obscured the importance of Grado. Yet during the barbarian invasions Grado was the only town exercising a sort of power because the ecclesiastic function as well as the Aquileia citizens were living in Grado. The precariousness of the situation is overcome by the great power of the ancient tradition of Aquileia. In this period the bishop of Aquileia began to claim for himself and his successors the Patriarchate because the Church of Aquileia descended from the predication of St. Markus. The quarrel led to an open fight with the Pope and the Emperor. That is why on a small territory there were in this period two Patriarchs: the Patriarch of Grado (who was actually the Patriarch of Aquileia on exile, as Grado was just a provisional seat) who had power over the Byzantine dioceses, and the Patriarch of Aquileia , who later escaped to Cormons and Cividale and who had power over the longobard dioceses. It was a period of raids that from Aquileia that wanted to take away the legitimacy of the Patriarch of Grado.
THE DECLINE
When the Longobard Reign began its decline under the strokes of King Charles of the Franks, in the same period began also to grow the power of Venice. Since the 8th century Grado has been a prestigious larva the politicians could use for their hegemonic purposes. The Council of Mantova (827) decided the end of the Patriarchate of Grado: it did not disappear but it identified itself with the interests of Venice. The castle of Grado continued to show its efficiency during the attacks of Slavic and Saracen people coming from the Adriatic coasts. Yet for centuries Grado had not been in the middle of any important events. Instead of the Patriarch there was a Lord governor who represented the authority and was elected among the members of the main Council. Since 1400 Grado has been a fisher village with less than 200 inhabitants and very few interest except fishing. A village that lives on memories that are fading away. Grado is today an isolated village with its peculiar traditions, its regulations and a dialect that reflects a noble and ancient culture.
THE MODERN AGE
Since 1815 Grado has been part of the Habsburg Empire, its administration more strictly bound to the county of Gorizia rather than to Venice. On 24th May 1915 it was conquered from the Italian troops. Today it is a part of the Province of Gorizia and like Aquileia it belongs to the Diocese of Gorizia., that was born in 1752 from the abolition of that patriarchate of Aquileia that had represented for Grado an antithetic pole of crucial importance.