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Firstborn of Venice Grubb, James S. Published by Johns Hopkins University Press Grubb, James S. Firstborn of Venice: Vicenza in the Early Renaissance State. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1988. Project MUSE. doi:10.1353/book.67861. https://muse.jhu.edu/. For additional information about this book https://muse.jhu.edu/book/67861 [ Access provided at 26 Sep 2021 19:13 GMT with no institutional affiliation ] This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. HOPKINS OPEN PUBLISHING ENCORE EDITIONS James S. Grubb Firstborn of Venice Vicenza in the Early Renaissance State Open access edition supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities / Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Humanities Open Book Program. © 2019 Johns Hopkins University Press Published 2019 Johns Hopkins University Press 2715 North Charles Street Baltimore, Maryland 21218-4363 www.press.jhu.edu The text of this book is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/. CC BY-NC-ND ISBN-13: 978-1-4214-3189-5 (open access) ISBN-10: 1-4214-3189-0 (open access) ISBN-13: 978-1-4214-3187-1 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN-10: 1-4214-3187-4 (pbk. : alk. paper) ISBN-13: 978-1-4214-3188-8 (electronic) ISBN-10: 1-4214-3188-2 (electronic) This page supersedes the copyright page included in the original publication of this work. FIRSTBORN Of VENICE The Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science l 06th Series ( 1988) l. Pastoral Economics in the Kingdom of Naples by John A. Marino 2. Death and Property in Siena, 1205-1800 by Samuel K. Cohn, Jr. 3. Firstborn of Venice: Vicenza in the Early Renaissance State by James S. Grubb FIRSTBORNop VENICE VICENZA in the EARLYRENAISSANCE STATE James S. Grubb The Johns Hopkins UniversityPress Baltimoreand London The book has been brought to publication with the generous assistance of the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation. © 1988 The Johns Hopkins University Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America The Johns Hopkins University Press, 70 l West 40th Street, Baltimore, Maryland 212 l l The Johns Hopkins Press Ltd., London The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences-Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI 239.48-1984. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Grubb, James S., 1952- Firstborn of Venice. (The Johns Hopkins University studies in historical and political science; 106th ser., 3 (1988)) Bibliography; p. Includes index. I. Vicenza (ltaly)-History. 2. Venice (Italy)-History-697-1508. 3. Renaissance-Italy-Vicenza. 4. Renaissance-Italy-Venice. 5. City-states-Italy-History. I. Title. II. Title: First-born of Venice. III. Series: Johns Hopkins University studies in historical and political science; 106th ser., 3. DG975.V7G78 1988 945'.31 87-33878 ISBN 0-8018-3613-l (alk. paper) Contents Acknowled~ents · vii Introduction· ix PARTI The Making of the CompositeState · 1 Creating the TerritorialState · 3 2 Definitionsof State · 14 3 Dominionand Law · 28 4 Dominionand Empire · 36 PARTII PrivilegedCommune, Commune of the Privileged· 4 7 5 Communeand Governor · 49 6 Communeand Countryside· 63 7 Affirmationof the Patriciate· 73 8 Consolidationof the Patriciate· 86 PART111 Center and Periphery · 99 9 Pacificationand Security · 101 10 Fisc and Army · 113 11 Piety and Morals · 128 12 Appeals and Their Limits· 136 13 ReconstructingLocal Prerogatives· 149 PART IV The RenaissanceVenetian State · 161 14 Unity and Particularism· 163 Epilogue· 185 Abbreviations· 187 Notes · 189 Index · 231 V Acknowledgments It is a pleasure to thank those who have given so much to this book. Throughout years of research and writing, I have enjoyed the unstint ing support of family members, teachers, colleagues, librarians, and archivists . Without their help this book would be meager in spirit and data. I am deeply grateful to them all. Several institutions have aided my research and writing. A Fulbright Fellowship sponsored a year of research in Vicenza, and a grant from the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation allowed a summer in Venice. A summer faculty grant from the University of Maryland Baltimore County gave me the opportunity to complete primary re search . During a year's leave funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, I was able to pursue secondary studies and, finally, to write up a mass of notes into book form. Without that support this project could never have been undertaken. Julius Kirshner of the University of Chicago first suggested Vicenza as a case subject for the study of Venetian territorial expan sion. His guidance has been particularly valuable in fostering histo riographic sensitivity and textual accuracy, and his moral support has provided constant encouragement. The late Eric Cochrane of the same university was a true friend and mentor. His own passion for the Re naissance was an inspiration for my work, and his research and writing set standards to which I can only aspire. Richard Goldthwaite of the Johns Hopkins University pointed out several useful secondary works and kept me up to date especially with Tuscan monographs. The Veneto is an extraordinarily friendly region for historical studies. The professional hospitality and personal warmth of those engaged in Venetian research has been gratifying. Senior scholars such as Gaetano Cozzi, Reinhold Mueller, and Gherardo Ortalli of Venice, Paolo Sambin and Giorgio Cracco of Padua, Giorgio Borelli of Verona, and Giorgio Chittolini of Milan suggested sources and lines of enquiry, provided information on related topics, and welcomed me into that lively community. Archivists and librarians in many cities were patient in explaining manuscript holdings and most cooperative in making documents available. The staff of the Biblioteca Civica Bertoliana in Vicenza, above all Dottoressa F. M. Galante, Giovanni Dal Lago, and Vll vm Acknowledgmen/5 Renato Zironda, fulfilled my requests with skill and forbearance . Ugo Solda, formerly of the Vicentine state archives, revealed some of the valuable yet ill-catalogued resources of that rich repository. Four young scholars merit special thanks. John Law of Swansea, Gian Maria Varanini of Verona, and Michael Knapton and Claudio Povolo of Vicenza gave freely of their time and friendship in assisting my research. Their unparalleled knowledge of sources immensely fa cilitated my entry into a complicated field, and their own studies pro vided invaluable points of comparison and perspective. This book is dedicated to my family, which gave me a deep appre ciation of the past, supported my choice of a historical career, and provided the moral and material support for the long haul of research and writing. The late Augustus and Julia Farnsworth encouraged fur ther education and facilitated particularly my graduate studies. Thom as and Patricia Crawford shared their love for the Veneto and provided a marvelous base from which to work. My parents, Edward and Anne MacBurney, instilled in me a love for learning and for European culture . To them, as to my in-laws and grandparents, I owe my vocation. Anne Crawford Grubb introduced me to Italy and directed my attention to the Renaissance. She has been my companion in tourism and study for many years, and her passion for Italian culture has enriched my own. Without her patience and unfailing support, the pleasure of historical discovery would have been seriously dampened. Thomas Edward Farnsworth Grubb is our firstborn, a fine young man whose delight in the world is unbounded. I love and thank them both. Introduction Venice's sea trade and overseas dominion are famous; the mainland dominion is much less so. The prevailing image of a maritime republic has obscured the fact that, by 1500, Venetian control extended over much of northern Italy, from Crema and Bergamo in the west to Friuli in the east, to the Polesine and Ravenna in the south. Governance of that dominion is little known compared with Venetian diplomacy in Italy and the wider European and Mediterranean theaters. General histories acknowledge that territorial expansion signaled a crucial turn in Venetian fortunes, but only a handful of specialists, most in the past two decades, have actually explored the internal workings of the main land state. This book examines that state through a case study of the gover nance of the city and countryside of Vicenza. The time is the fifteenth century, loosely defined: from 1404, when Vicenza's incorporation into the dominion began a quarter-century of Venetian territorial ac cumulation, to 1509, when the forces of the League of Cambrai shat tered (albeit temporarily) that dominion. The approach is com parative, matching the Vicentine situation with that of other terraferma subjects and matching the Venetian state with Lombard and Tuscan counterparts. The enquiry moves beyond the traditional viewpoint of the state from the capital outward and seeks to give equal status to the perspective of the periphery, looking both at relations between Venice and Vicenza and at the location of power within Vicentine society. The issues involved are political in the broad sense: institutions and admin istrative praxis, certainly, but also the social bases of power, cultural differences and exchanges, fiscal policy, ecclesiastical management, and the ideologies that both defined authority and conditioned its exerose. THE HISTORIOCRAPHICPROBLEM Niccolo Machiavelli, for one, was well aware of the importance of what he termed composite states, those consisting of formerly free polities brought under a dominant authority. He especially noted the lessons of lX x Introduction Venice's disastrous defeat at Agnadello in 1509, and he used the Vene tian experience as a pointed example of ill-advised territorial expan sion and administration. Francesco Guicciardini's rebuttal stressed Venice's wisdom in subjugating its neighbors, thereby securing a mili tary buffer and a fiscal windfall.' Still, in declaring the didactic value of the mainland state, Machiavelli and Guicciardini pursued a solitary path.