The locals here say that sometimes they can still hear the anguished screams of those who were burned alive, even if they were only slightly feverish and had not yet become seriously ill.
Poveglia Island. Address: Located between Venice and Lido in the Venetian Lagoon, Northern Italy.
Poveglia has earned the grim title of “the most haunted island in the world” – a place that even paranormal researchers find terrifying when they visit. It is not an exaggeration to say that Poveglia is the scariest island on Earth!
What is remarkable is that it is only about 15km away from Venice, yet Poveglia is abandoned and shrouded in many rumors. (Photo: Telegraph).
This small island, measuring only 6 hectares, remains entirely deserted in the northern part, despite its prime location for tourism activities. The locals firmly assert that even if offered gold and treasures, they would not dare to stay here, let alone passionately restore the abandoned buildings.
It is difficult to blame them, for from the very moment we set foot on the island, we felt an unusually cold atmosphere accompanied by a heavy, suffocating feeling with every step, as if this place has borne countless traumas throughout its long history.
Since 421 AD, ancient Italians fled to Poveglia to escape barbaric invasions. Later, it is said that the Roman Empire used this island as a mass grave for anyone who contracted contagious diseases at the time.
By the 9th century AD, the island’s population reached its peak and gradually became a haven for tax evaders. In 1379 AD, war broke out again and this time the island was affected, forcing the residents to relocate and leaving the island deserted.
From the mid-14th to the 15th century, in 1630, the plague (Black Death) broke out in Venice, a contagious disease that spread for a long time across Europe, killing about one-third of the European population.
As a result of the epidemic, Poveglia Island, along with other small islands, became a perfect quarantine point. Many citizens showing symptoms were exiled here and were cremated in the central square after death.
In 1645, to control entry into Venice, the leaders of the time built five octagonal fortresses around this island, four of which still exist today, with the octagonal fortress on Poveglia being one of them.
Poveglia was a quarantine station and graveyard for over 160,000 plague victims. Therefore, there are many rumors that 50% of the land here contains human remains. (Photo: Daily Mail).
In 1776, Poveglia was handed over to the Public Health Office for management and became a control station for ships entering and leaving Venice. In 1793, some plague cases were found on two inspected ships, and from then on, this island officially became a “plague quarantine” site.
Over 160,000 people suspected of having the plague were sent here and cremated during this dark period in Italian history. But the tragic saga of this small island was not yet over. The most terrifying site is the abandoned mental asylum.
In 1805, Napoleon Bonaparte destroyed the San Vitale church and turned the old bell tower into a strategic lighthouse. By 1814, the plague quarantine station was closed. Poveglia was once used as a prison island for war prisoners in the 19th century. From 1922 to 1968, this island was converted into a mental hospital, with rumors that the hospital director conducted lobotomies and other experiments on patients with mental illnesses, after which the director went insane and committed suicide by jumping from the tower.
A corner of the “haunted asylum.” (Photo: Historywalkinvenice).
It is rumored that this insane doctor eventually committed suicide in the bell tower where he tortured patients, amidst the anger and screams of the tormented souls trapped there. To this day, locals occasionally hear faint ghostly screams echoing in the area.
According to a report from the Travel Channel in 2014, some restoration activities on the island were initiated but then “suddenly halted without explanation.” Since then, Poveglia has frequently appeared as a famous location in various paranormal reality shows like Ghost Adventures and Scariest Places on Earth.
The hospital beds of the past are now completely rusted. (Photo: The Sun).
The desolate scene inside the hospital building. (Photo: The Sun).
Moss covers the building that used to be a mental hospital decades ago. (Photo: The Sun).
Poveglia currently does not allow tourists to visit, with only two British explorers having dared to venture there and take photographs. (Photo: The Sun).
The island is divided into 2 distinct parts by a small canal. (Photo: The Sun).
