The Venetian Gondola Historical Timeline

Origins

The earliest written reference to the gondola dates to 1094, in a letter from Doge Vitale Falier -- making it one of the oldest continuously used boat designs in the world. By the late 15th century, gondolas appear regularly in Venetian paintings, and at the height of the Republic's wealth, private gondolas were often lavishly decorated in bright colors, gold, and silver as a visible display of their owners' status.

The 1562 black-paint law

That changed in 1562, when Venice passed a sumptuary law -- legislation aimed at curbing extravagant, competitive displays of wealth -- requiring that gondolas be painted plain black, with decoration limited to just a few permitted metal flourishes: the multi-pronged prow ornament known as the ferro, a curled stern ornament called the rico, and a pair of small seahorse figures. The law is still followed today, though by tradition rather than legal requirement at this point; by the time it passed, an estimated 10,000 gondolas were in use across the city.