Venezia Foot Ball Club was founded on 14 December 1907 in Venice by about 20 enthusiasts through the merger of the football sections of two Venetian sports clubs: the Martial Gymnastics Society and Costantino Reyer. The place chosen by the founders to give life to the new football club was the restaurant “Da Nane in Corte dell’Orso” near Campo San Bortolomio. In the summer of 2005, the club was re-founded as Società Sportiva Calcio Venezia but the club would be declared bankrupt once again by the end of the 2008-09 season. In the summer of 2009, with Venice in danger of being a city without a football club, mayor Massimo Cacciari personally supervised the foundation of a new club. On July 27, 2009, the club was re-founded as Foot Ball Club Unione Venezia, recognized as the legitimate successor of SSC Venezia, and was admitted to Serie D. In September 2015, a group of American investors led by attorney Joe Tacopina moved to acquire the club out of bankruptcy, and re-founded the club as Venezia FC. Mains rivals of Venezia FC are Udinese Calcio and Verona FC. The symbol of the Venetian club is a winged-lion, commonly mistaken for a griffin. The golden winged-lion is the official symbol carried by the city of province of Venice, the symbol has led to one of the club’s most popular nicknames in the form of leoni alati(“winged-lions”). As the club has been renamed numerous times during its history, the badge has also changed several times; the most common one features the golden winged lion, along with the green and orange club colours with a golden border. As the city of Venice is situated on the Venetian Lagoon, the club is also nicknamed lagunari (“Lagoonal ones”).
