Chioggia, ITALY – Every year, on the third weekend of June, Chioggia goes back in time to the Middle Ages.
The city celebrates Palio della Marciliana, a festival that remembers the Middle Ages, as does the more famous Palio di Siena, an event that gathers thousands of participants each year and culminates in a bareback horse riding race.
Listen to the author read this story:
The 2026 Palio della Marciliana, or Marciliana for short, is the 36th edition of the three-day festival – one of the central summer events in Chioggia.
Palio, originally meant a piece of embroidered fabric that was given to the winner of a competition. In Chioggia’s case, it is crossbow shooting – the central event of the festival.
Marciliana is a Venetian boat mostly used to transport salt in the Mediterranean.
The first night of this year’s festival began with a blessing in the San Giacomo Basilica of five Chioggia neighborhoods that would be competing in crossbow shooting on the last day of Marciliana.
The procession then poured out into the street and marched to the Vigo square, surrounded by people wanting to get a closer look.
When the procession arrived, they put on a lively musical performance with bagpipes, tambourines, and Medieval dances recreated based on ancient manuscripts of the époque.
The second day offered visitors a spectacular fire show and a reconstruction of a battle fought between the Genoese and the Venetians during the War of Chioggia. It took place in the 14th century and saw the Genoese win and occupy the city.
The spectators could see the “Genoese” cross the bridge, accompanied by explosions and smoke, and push the “Venetians” towards the square where the battle was fought, switching between duels and group clashes, all executed with great realism.
The last day of the festival commemorates how the Venetians liberated Chioggia, a little less than a year after the Genoese occupied it in 1379.
One of the most important events of the day is the crossbow shooting tournament, where five neighborhoods compete, trying to hit the target on the cathedral square.
The competitors are invited to one of the two shooting spots and try to make as many points for their team as possible by aiming for the center of the target.
At the end of the contest, points are then carefully evaluated by the counting commission, which examines the target pierced with arrows.
The winner this year was the San Giacomo neighborhood with 128 points – only two points ahead of the second place, San Michele Arcangelo.
In the images above: At left, the two pieces of the cuttlebone are divided and the tin rough casting is taken out to be polished. This picture shows the ready figurines. Center: Another stall illustrated the art of making tiny metal sculptures using cuttlebone. This photo shows the first step – pouring tin between two previously carved cuttlebone pieces. Right: At the festival, many people exhibited Medieval professions, such as pottery. (Sofiia Yakymenko/YJI).
I overheard a woman at the festival say to her child, who was leaning over the fence surrounding the square to make space for the performers: “Be careful. If you fall over, you will end up in the Middle Ages.”
And this is exactly how I felt. It seemed like Chioggia had really travelled almost 650 years back and transformed into a vibrant trade center where musicians played in the streets, noblemen courted ladies in lively dances, and the city was being rebuilt from the ashes, more beautiful than ever.
Sofiia Yakymenko is a Junior Reporter with Youth Journalism International.
