Until the eighteenth century the puppets enjoyed celebrity and prestige in Venice. Vittorio Malmani tells us that from the sixteenth century when they became the vogue among Italian nobility, Venetian patricians were accustomed to build elaborate little puppet theatres in their palaces. One example of this was that of Antonio Labia, who exactly reproduced in miniature the huge theatre, S. Giovanni Grisostomo, famous throughout Europe, stage, boxes, decorations, machinery, lighting facilities, costumes--everything precisely imitated the larger theatre. The actors were figurines of wax and wood. The first drama produced here was _Lo Starnuto d’Ercole_ (The Sneeze of Hercules) which we may find described in Goldini’s memoirs. In the Piazza of San Marco and in the Piazzetta until the fall of the Republic, so Malamani tells us, the castelli of the burattini were numerous during carnival time. In the eighteenth century the _casotti_ of Paglialunga and Bordogna were great rival attractions until the former showman died and his little actors went to swell the company of Bordogna, whose descendants continued the theatre throughout the eighteenth century. The casotto of Bordogna has been painted by the brush of Longhi, standing near the great dove of the Ducal Palace. A. Calthrop tells of his recent visit to a rough little place, _Teatro Minerva_, where three-foot burattini, looking life size, were manipulated crudely to the intense satisfaction of the audience. He mentions a well-managed maschere, Guillette and her lover, a clownish dwarf, both speaking in the Venetian dialect, and after the play, the marionette ballet. Another account tells of a pretty little puppet theatre with boxes, galleries and parquet where dolls thirty-five inches high play classic tragedy of four or five acts and comedy and pantomime, including always a marvellous ballet. Here the most admired puppet receives encores, even bouquets and very properly bows in response. The stages of such little theatres are as complete as the most luxurious real stages. The figures can sit on chairs, open bureau drawers, carry objects, and they are carefully and beautifully costumed. The dialogue and subjects are far removed from the triviality of the crude castelli, where the pupazzi are manipulated on the fingers of the showman. It is not unusual to witness _Nebuccodnoser_ performed by fantoccini or Rossini’s operas.