Portobuffolè

Portobuffolè sits on both banks of the Livenza, fifty kilometers northeast of Venice, the river dividing the commune in two and giving it its medieval port function. The Roman trading post Septimum de Liquentia stood on the same ground. The medieval port grew under the da Camino lords in the late thirteenth century and passed through the Carrara, the patriarchs of Aquileia and the bishops of Ceneda before Venice took it in 1339, governing through rectors who held court in the town's arcaded loggia until 1797.

The centro storico keeps this layered history in built form: a single main square, brick house facades from the thirteenth century, a former synagogue rebuilt around its original walls into the town's church, and the fourteenth-century home of a poet remembered by Dante now serving as museum and library. A Roman crossing, a river port under successive overlords, a Jewish community whose synagogue became a Catholic duomo, and a noblewoman's house that outlasted them all: the smallest commune in its province holds a larger history than its size would suggest.