The Polesine is the southernmost of the Venetian districts; over the centuries its borders have shifted due to the events of history, but above all due to the changing courses of the rivers. In fact, the Adige and the Po which cross these lands running almost parallel, have often changed their beds.

This land has not been kind to its inhabitants, who have suffered the violence of the rivers, floods; it has been changing in appearance, and disputed by its neighbouring states. In Roman times the most important town was Adria. At that time the sea arrived at its harbour; it has now receded behind a widening belt of dunes. Rovigo was the new Polesine city bound to take the place of Adria; it grew around its castle, which still vaunts two of its ancient towers, becoming the most important town of the region.

But before Rovigo became the economical and cultural centre of the Polesine area, the most famous city was Badia, which owes its name to the famous abbey of Vangadizza. The activities and prestige of the Vangadizza abbey illuminated the dark centuries in the Polesine. The lands then passed under the rule of the house of Este, which had little difficulty in guarding it from the nearby Ferrara. The area was then conquered by the rulers of Padova and then by those of Venezia, too interested in the traffic on the Po to forego controlling the navigation. Eventually Venezia prevailed, and almost the entire Polesine area became part of the Venetian state, but the domination of the house of Ferrara has left numerous interesting traces in the architecture.

Indeed, even this borderland vaunts great names, both architects and painters: from the painters of Venezia and Ferrara from the fifteenth to the eighteenth century (Giovanni Bellini, Palma Il Vecchio, Dosso Dossi, Luca Giordano, Piazzetta, Giovan Battista Tiepolo, Alessandro Longhi) to the great Andrea Palladio who built one of his most important villas at Fratta Polesine, the Badoera, where the porches of its lodge form a semicircle, as if to better define the space in which farming activities and humanistic prestige were to meet. The last stretch of the Po would suffice to distinguish the Polesine from all other Venetian landscapes. The river fans out, and from the top of its banks the lowlands extend, becoming less and less populated

In this landscape, where the sea forms beaches that are still virgin, with very fine sand, surrounded by a lush pine forest, the luxurious hotel facilities of Rosolina Mare and the Albarella island have recently been discovered by tourists.