ROUGH CUT (NO REPORTER NARRATION)<br/> <br />Waterborne fantasy creatures took over the famed Venice waterways to mark the opening of the lagoon city's annual carnival on Saturday (January 26) evening.<br/> <br />The theme for the 2013 edition is "Live in Colour" and the parade of the fairytale-like characters got things off to a stylish start.<br/> <br />Balls held in Venetian palaces, concerts and gondola parades are organised throughout the 17-day carnival which runs until February 12.<br/> <br />Thousands of tourists from across Italy and the world every year crowd the city's canals, bridges and squares to marvel at the colourful display of masks and costumes.<br/> <br />The Carnevale di Venezia is one of the oldest carnivals in the world.<br/> <br />Carnival madness first began centuries ago as a period of excess before the rigours of lent, the 40 days of fasting that traditionally precede Easter.<br/> <br />Venetians could then hide their identities behind masks and do as they pleased.<br/> <br />It was a pressure valve to ease class tensions, allowing the poor, for a brief and controlled period, to break Venice's rigid, oligarchical social order.<br/> <br />The carnival's end marks the beginning of Lent and signals the start of Venice's tourist season, which runs into the autumn.
