Historic events

During the Roman era Ceggia's territory was a lively and productive area, crossed by an important route as the 'via Annia', which connected Padua with Altino and Aquileia. With the decline of the Roman Empire, the Barbarian invasions, the neglect of the farmlands and the gradual ground sinking, with the advance of waters as a result, brought about a long process of decay, which lasted all through the early Middle Ages.
At the beginning of the 10th century A.D., after the devastating invasion of the 'Ungari', all area was covered by marshes and the population, looking for an healthier place, withdrew in the northerner part of the territory. The birth of Ceggia dates back right to this period and according to the tradition it takes its name from the Latin cilia maris, that means 'edges' or better 'seashores'.

For over three centuries the village remained a land which different 'seigniories' competed for, until it went in 1389 under the rule of the Republic of Venice. Yet the 'Serenissima' Republic was very busy with its own hydraulic problems and didn't take care to reclaim the acquired areas, on the contrary it encouraged the expansion of the marshlands, as they could represent a very good defensive bulwark in the hinterland.
We must wait till the end of the 18th century - first under Napoleon and then under Austria - for the reclamation and braking up works to be started, which then went on from 1866 under the Italian Kingdom, also thanks to the important intervention of private persons.

From then on Ceggia will experience further difficult periods, connected with the crisis of the small property, with the emigration and with the spreading of diseases due to the poverty afflicting its countryside; anyway it was by this time on its way to being a small but very active agricultural and industrial town, as it is today.