The quote is from Goldoni. In fact the Baruffe chiozzotte (“Chioggia Scuffles”) begins with a group of chattering knitting women, waiting for a fishing boat to come in and wondering what the weather is going to be like. Naturally the hope is for a favourable wind to run before. This incisive one-liner from Goldoni plunges us into a situation – that of the anxiously awaited return of fishermen, experienced by wives, mothers, sisters and lovers – conditioned by the climate. This is the premise for a research project that will range from considering the bora (cold north-east wind) in the literature of Trieste to the scirocco (warm south wind) in the Venetian lagoon, from big freezes to heatwaves, ice to drought, and from the more instinctive and intuitive reactions to meteorological phenomena and the first attempts to understand them through the systematic collection of data to be used in subsequent interpretations.