The Bridge of Sighs (Italian: Ponte dei Sospiri) is one of many bridges in Venice.
The enclosed bridge is made of white limestone and has windows with stone bars.
It passes over the Rio di Palazzo and connects the old prisons to the interrogation rooms
in the Doge's Palace. It was designed by Antoni Contino (whose uncle Antonio da Ponte
had designed the Rialto Bridge), and built between 1600 and 1603.
The view from the Bridge of Sighs was the last view of Venice that convicts saw before
their imprisonment. The bridge name, given by Lord Byron in the 19th century, comes
from the suggestion that prisoners would sigh at their final view of beautiful Venice
out the window before being taken down to their cells. In reality, the days of inquisitions
and summary executions were over by the time the bridge was built,
and the cells under the palace roof were occupied mostly by small-time criminals[1].
A local legend says that lovers will be assured eternal love
if they kiss on a gondola at sunset under the bridge.
This legend played a key part in the 1979 film A Little Romance.