The Ponte Vecchio was built in 1345 and is the oldest stone bridge in Europe. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the suspended houses of the bridge were occupied by butchers and slaughterhouses, but when the court moved to Palazzo Pitti, Fernando I ordered the closure of these commercial activities due to the bad smell emanated from the dead cattle. Since then, these shops have been occupied by jewellers and goldsmiths. Another interesting fact concerns the construction of the Vasari Corridor, a passage that runs through the eastern part of the bridge, from Palazzo Vecchio to Palazzo Pitti. During the Second World War, Ponte Vecchio was the only bridge in Florence not to be demolished by German troops. In addition to its suspended houses, the elements that have characterized the bridge over the years, are its numerous locks, hooked by passers-by as a gesture of love. Nowadays this popular rite persists unchanged but, for the security of the structure, the local authorities remove the locks from the bridge from time to time.