The Rialto Bridge, that by a wide arch of 28 meters wide and 22 meters high above the line media tide 7.5 meters, crosses the Grand Canal, is and remains the king of all the Venetian bridges.

This bridge sums up in his old name all the glorious history of the life of Venice commercial and seafaring: majestic giant that, as a triumphal arch thrown on the Canalazzo, has always dominated in all popular festivities Venetian and still dominates particularly in Historical Regatta, which assists, silent witness to the passage of the picturesque procession of Bissone, the Gondolas attired in party boats infiorate and fast Gondolini who compete to get the flag, as well as in past centuries was covered with damask drapes to greet the Bucintoro blazing golds and silvers.

Visto da una gondola - Christina Welsh

Replaced several times always in wood, is immortalized in 1500 by Jacopo de Barbari with the central opening with a drawbridge to be able to pass the great tree-lined vessels. At the beginning of the XVI Senate century decided that would be built a stone bridge, but fire, pestilence, and war against the turkish postponed the start of work to 1580.

'Only in 1591 the construction of the bridge we see today was completed and was the only bridge in Venice that crossed the Grand Canal until 1854, year of construction of the iron bridge connecting the Field of Charity in Dorsoduro with Campo San Vidal in San Marco District in front of the Academy Gallery just called Bridge Academy

The twelve thousand trunks of elm wood and a host of larch planks that support it, still hold the single arch of over 28 meters of light and the twenty-four accompanying workshops to groups of six ramps on each side, sharing the climbs on a power station, about twenty feet wide, with broad steps grouped in five, and two sides, each about three meters wide, formed by a single endless ramp from the top of the bridge rests.

Two large arches unite at the center of the rows of shops. South on the archivolt, the carved figures of the Angel Gabriel on the one hand, the other of the Virgin in the act to receive the heavenly message, with the Dove between them, reminiscent of the legendary date of foundation of Venice, which occurred, according to ancient tradition, March 25th, the Feast of the Annunciation, in the year 421.
The date is mentioned, along with the construction of the bridge, the epigraph engraved on the four piers.

«Pascale Ciconia Vene tiarum Duce - anno Cristi MDXCI Vrbis conditae MCLXX - curantibus Aloysio Georgio Proc. - M. Barbaro Eq. et Proc. - Jacobo Foscareno Eq. et Proc.»

San Teodoro - VeniceWiki

San Marco - VeniceWiki

Opposite on the archivolt are carved figures of San Marco with the lion, and San Teodoro, the current and former patron of the city. These aspects are works by Tiziano Aspetti.
The figures of the Annunciation, the Archangel Gabriel, Mary and the dove in the center on the key that seems to transmigrate to Mary by the Archangel, are works by Agostino Rubini, all done just completed the construction the bridge, which was to cost a total of 250,000 ducats, ten times the expenditure for the erection of the previous wooden bridge.