Most of the richer white neighbourhoods lie on natural levees created over centuries.
He pointed out that successful firms depend upon a complex ecology that has been created over centuries.
But many fear that the project could also endanger the lagoon's fragile ecosystems and blight one of the world's unique landscapes, created over "centuries of interaction between the terra firma and the sea," said Marco Parini, national president of Italia Nostra, a group that defends Italy's historical patrimony.
It's ironic that, with many remarkable examples of genuine automatons created over the centuries, probably the most famous is the Turk.
They found a small circular waterhole, probably created over a century ago by the pioneering cattle herders who drove giant augers into the ground to bring water up from reservoirs deep beneath the desert.
These policies were created over the past century to protect the rights of teachers, but they have produced an industrial factory model of education that treats all teachers like interchangeable widgets".
The magnificent exhibition, showcasing 200 dazzling pieces created over the last century by the famous Place Vendome jewelers, rivaled any Christmas display in the sparkle category.
The Fiera cannot replicate the serendipity that makes Italian cities so beloved, and which can be created only over centuries.
Yet what wind and rain had conspired to create over the centuries — crazily beautiful friezes, surreal statuary, squint-and-you-could-be-in-the-Valley-of-the-Gods enormities, and arches galore — would make for a holiday of unreal privilege and glamour.
As the country and its population grew, each collector found he was unable to cover his entire territory effectively alone and so farmed out pieces of it to subcontractors, creating, over these centuries, an early tax-collection Amway.
Italians have made pasta their own, and have over centuries created a multitude of varieties specific to each region: spaghetti carbonara from Lazio, linguine alle vongole from Campania, or world-famous bolognese from Bologna.
