But Venice had something else; even before the carnival established, it was already a kind of perpetual carnival, a glowing magma of things to see, hear and smell. The almost secret gardens blossoming between tall fortresses of mansions were full of flowers that filled the city with their perfume. This mingled with the sharp, stunning smell of salt water, very different from the unpleasant smell of today. Every colour of gondola cut across the greenest of water. Conversations in Eastern languages, German, French, English and above all in Venetian blended into a babbling game, echoing from alley to alley. Venice of sublime decadenze, the Serenissima with its masks and the most unexpected disguises, the unique city which invented the most famous carnival in the world lives again in the wonderful images of Fulvio Roiter.