Just off the shores of Venice is a spooky piece of history that very few have seen in person, and even fewer be able to go to.
Poveglia Island, often dubbed the “world’s creepiest,” is an area that is suffused with mythology, death, and haunting silence.
The island consists of three smaller parts: one is full of abandoned, crumbling buildings (including the psychiatric facility). Another one once was a fort used by the military, and the third is so overgrown it’s hardly evident.
Due to the dangers of the state of the buildings, authorities in the Italian government has restricted access for the general public.
Only those who have specific permission, usually film crews or researchers, are allowed to step foot in the area, the Sun writes.
But it’s more than only the deteriorating structure that has earned Poveglia its terrifying reputation. The island’s 18-acre size has some dark and troubling history.
The 18th century was the time when HTML0 became popular. It was used as an isolation facility during the outbreak of the Black Death.
According to local lore, anyone showing even mild symptoms of the plague was forcibly taken there, often against their will, according to The Little House of Horrors.
It is believed that more than 160,000 people perished in the islands. Many were burnt in a masse in an effort to stop the spread of the disease.
Today, it’s believed that over 50% of the soil is composed of human Ash.
In the years following, Poveglia housed a psychiatric hospital. This chapter isn’t any less bleak.
With the island hidden from the spotlight there were rumors of horrifying medical experiments surfaced, The Mirror exposes.
Patients were said to be exposed to cruel treatment and were left to silently suffer.
The year 2020 was the first time British urban adventurers Matt Nadin and Andy Thompson defied the ban to record their adventure through Poveglia on their channel on YouTube, Finders Beepers History Seekers.
What they discovered was something from the horror film.
“It was really, really eerie,” Matt recalls. Our taxi driver was terrified not only of the police but also of the entire area, and he was unable to leave fast enough.
The island is packed with a dark past; there were a lot of people killed there, and you feel the horrors that occurred in the area while walking.
They burned all the bodies and then left them where they were. The island hasn’t been properly cleared or cleaned; thus, everything has been taken away, he explained.
At one moment during their stay, the pair were able to hear a bell ringing across the island that was abandoned. “That actually freaked me out,” Matt confessed. “It felt like an omen.”
Despite his fear, however, he was struck by the strange beauty of the decaying structures with arching hallways and a tense silence that was unaffected by the passage of time, noting that nature has been in control and it’s really typical of a horror movie, with the creepers and vines.
He concluded: Definitely something I’ll never forget quickly.