Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 24.djvu/160

Rh 142 VENICE [HISTORY. of commerce, had entered into close relations with the Venetians took advantage of these to stir up troubles, and sought to conciliate the doges with a view to the enlarge ment of their trading privileges or the concession of mono- War polies. Between 712 and 810 various struggles arose with which called for the intervention in the lagoons of the Pippin. g enera i s O f Pippin and his son Charlemagne. Doge Obe- lerio, a declared partisan of the Franks, allowed a war to break out between the Venetians and the Lombards, in the course of which Pippin seized Grado, the see of the patri arch, burnt Caorle, Jesolo, and Heraclea, encamped in Albiola, and, forcing his way into the lagoon, threatened Malamocco itself (see map, p. 157 below). Peace was afterwards concluded, and the danger to which the last refuge of the fugitives from the mainland had been exposed led to their increased security. For, whether from the instinct of self-preservation or from a growing conscious ness of the idea of fatherland, these fishermen became drawn together more closely than ever for purposes of common defence, and found themselves possessed of a power hitherto unsuspected, so that they were able to com pel their enemies to respect their independence and enter Founda- into commercial relations with them. The year 810 was tion of one O f the most important in the annals of Venice : it was y then that the people finally abandoned the mainland in order to make the Kivo Alto with its surrounding islets the permanent seat of their government. The same year witnessed the beginnings of the basilica of St Mark. Angelo Partecipazio, who had proposed the migration to the Rialto, was chosen doge, and the town of Venice may be said to have been then founded. Early From 811 to 1026 there was a succession of eighteen doges, doges, of whom no fewer than fifteen were selected out of three leading families, political power thus plainly tend ing to become hereditary. It was no uncommon thing, however, for the people again to dismiss those whom they had thus placed in power. Murder, exile, cruel punish ments, closed the career of more than one of the doges who had been called to the supreme authority by a unani mous vote ; whole families connected with rulers who had been deposed or put to death were compelled to quit the islands, and sought the help of the emperor Otho II. That emperor was preparing an expedition against Venice at the very moment of his death ; and now once more the Venetians found safety in the very greatness of the danger which had threatened them, for the peril itself indicated to them the future at which they ought to aim if they would live and rule. Suppres- From the necessities of its geographical position the 8 / n .f. new state was bound to become a maritime power and to look to the East. Towards the end of the 10th century Adriatic pirates. the doge Pietro Orseolo by a vigorous effort cleared the sea of pirates, who dwelt on the eastern coast of the Adri atic and seriously harassed the Venetian commerce, and pursued them into the recesses of Quarnero and the islands of Istria. On 20th May 998, having advanced as far as Dalmatia, he came upon them in their apparently inac cessible retreats, and inflicted upon them a great slaughter. Having thus given full security to trade, he constituted himself protector of the sea from Trieste to Albania, re ceiving in consequence the title of duke of Dalmatia. It was to symbolize this dominion that Venice instituted the superb ceremonial of the espousals of the doge with the Adriatic, which was annually observed on Ascension Day. Period of The republic began henceforward to undertake the busi- crusades. n ess of transporting to the East the successive armies of crusaders, to whom she lent on hire the fleets which were built in her arsenals ; and these bold enterprises, at once religious, commercial, and military, procured for her in exchange important stations on the east of the Adriatic and in the islands, as well as colonies and factories advan tageous for her commerce. The whole littoral from Trieste to Albania became in this way a sort of prolongation of the Venetian coast. The Byzantine emperors could hardly fail to become jealous of this great though pacific influence, and of the wealth thus created under their eyes and at their expense; and in the spring of 1171 Manuel 1. ordered the sequestration of all Venetian goods and of all Venetians who had settled within the empire. Such a high-handed act at once called forth an outburst of enthu siasm, and the doge, Vitale Michieli II., sent out against Constantinople an imposing fleet to avenge the cause of the Venetian colonists. An outbreak of plague, however, on board the fleet compelled him to return to port ; in so doing he brought the scourge to the town itself, a dis aster which led to his death at the hands of the infuriated populace. Even this catastrophe was not without its uses, for it led to the introduction of reforms fitted to give greater internal stability to the state. Under Sebastiano Ziani, Michieli s successor, the con- Consti- stitution underwent a further modification. The citizens, tution already divided into quarters (sestieri), nominated twelve the sta1 electors, who in their turn made choice of forty picked citizens in each of the divisions of the city. The 480 thus chosen constituted the great council, a body possessing at once deliberative and executive functions. Before this period certain intimate councillors, two of them perma nent, had been summoned to act as advisers of the doge in matters of importance ; but now their number was in creased and they were requested (hence the name pregato) to assist the head of the state in all circumstances. The two permanent councillors of the doge, increased to six and conjoined with the supreme magistrates on whom the administration of justice had always devolved, formed the lesser council, which afterwards came to be known as La Signoria. If we add, finally, to the powers already enu merated the council of ten, which was instituted later, and also take into account the increasing body of secretaries and the magistracies which were gradually created as need arose, we shall have an adequate conception of the per fected instrument of government by which the republic was controlled from the 1 3th century until its fall. While the political organization was thus rapidly developing, the change which was also passing over its democratic spirit must not be overlooked : the simple citizen gradually lost his privileges, and the increasing restrictions laid upon freedom ultimately made the government essentially aris tocratic. Towards the end of the 13th century (1297) the important measure known as the &quot; Shutting of the Great Council&quot; (compare vol. xvii. p. 527), and subsequently the inscription in the Golden Book of the names of all branches of the noble houses, for ever shut against plebeians every avenue to power. For a long time before this the right of electing the doge had been restricted to certain care fully-selected citizens, a constitutional change of capital importance, which had caused much discontent and raised such a ferment in the mind of the masses that the first doge who was thus chosen, realizing the danger of the situation, refused to accept the dignity. The number of the electors was consequently increased and the election made subject to a number of ballots intended to safeguard the integrity of the vote ; but it remained none the less true that to the people had been left nothing more than the illusory right of approving by acclamation in the basilica of St Mark each new doge after his election. The aristocracy, as it felt its growing force, proceeded to en large its powers, and did not fail to guard them down to the fall of Venice by constantly increased restrictions. It was not long, it is true, before the danger attaching to so great a power separated from the living forces of the nation