I libri di Viella 156 Stephan Karl Sander-Faes Urban Elites of Zadar Dalmatia and the Venetian Commonwealth (1540-1569) viella Copyright © 2013 - Viella s.r.l. Tutti i diritti riservati Prima edizione: xxxxxxxx 2013 ISBN 978-88-6728-###-# Questo volume è stato pubblicato con il contributo del Dipartimento di Studi Umanistici dell’Università di Venezia nel quadro del progetto nazionale di ri- cerca PRIN 2009 dal titolo «Forme di statualità fra medio evo ed età moder- na. La dimensione mediterranea e il dominio sulla terraferma nel “modello” veneziano». viella libreria editrice via delle Alpi, 32 I-00198 ROMA tel. 06 84 17 758 fax 06 85 35 39 60 www.viella.it Contents Acknowledgements 7 Abbreviations 8 Note on Names and Dates 10 Preface. New Perspectives for an Important Adriatic Center by Gherardo Ortalli and Bernd Roeck 11 Introduction 15 1. The Setting 27 1. Venice’s Maritime State (1358-1570) 27 2. Administration 33 3. Economy 35 4. The Adriatic Context 37 5. “Zara è metropoli et chiave” 40 6. Zadar under Venetian Rule (1409-1570) 42 2. Zadar’s Society: Geographical Distribution and Social and Occupational Fault Lines 64 1. Zadar as Communication Centre 64 2. Trans-Adriatic Networks in the Sixteenth Century 66 3. Procuratorial Networking 66 4. Economic, Legal, and Social Incentives 73 5. Secular and Ecclesiastical Elites 76 6. Intellectual Elites 82 7. Ecclesiastical Activities 88 3. Actors: Political, Ecclesiastical, and Economic Elites 111 1. Political Elites: Venetians and the Local Nobility 111 2. Ecclesiastical Elites: Convents, Hospitals, and Monasteries 116 3. Economic Elites: Actors and Commodities 126 6 Urban Elites of Zadar 4. Case Study: Zadar’s Interwar Property Markets 143 1. Property Sales 143 2. Planting Concessions/Land Grants 150 3. Rental and Leasehold Contracts 156 5. Urban Elites and Everyday Life 171 1. Zadar’s Urban Nobility 171 2. Geographical and Social Mobility 171 3. Material Culture 178 6. Urban Elite Groups and Zadar’s Urban Landscape 189 1. Venetians 190 2. Non-Noble Elites 192 3. Croats and Jews 194 4. The Cityscape 198 Conclusion 213 Appendix Glossary 221 Units of Measurement 222 List of Toponyms in Zadar’s Jurisdiction 223 Maps 227 Sample Transcripts 230 Bibliography 243 Index 271 Acknowledgements As this manuscript goes to print, I am indebted to the contributions of a num- ber of individuals and institutions. Everyone listed below has in some way assisted enormously in the research, writing, and improvement of this book. None is re- sponsible for any errors or inaccuracies, which are my personal responsibility. I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Oliver J. Schmitt, University of Vienna, whose courses awakened my interest in the history of the western Bal- kans and of Venice’s Stato da mar in particular; Marko Trogrlić, University of Zadar, and the staff at the Croatian State Archive in Zadar (Državni arhiv u Zadru), whose help facilitated my research stay enormously; my two dissertation advisors, Karl Kaser and Harald Heppner, University of Graz, for all the support they have given me; and Bernd Roeck, University of Zurich, and Gherardo Ortalli, Univer- sity of Venice Ca’ Foscari, who helped in many ways to see me through the months of preparation of the manuscript. I thank my colleagues and friends Rebecca Darley, University of Birming- ham, David Starr-Glass, University of Maryland/Empire State College, Sascha Attia, University of Vienna, and Jose Cáceres Mardones, University of Zurich, for all their comments on and proof-reading of my manuscripts; my parents Karl and Ursula Sander and my grand-aunt Wilhelmine Bauer for their support throughout the years; and my parents-in-law Rosina and Helmut Faes for their interest and support. Throughout this project, I have relied on the work of others and I sincerely hope that I have represented their work accurately and duly acknowledged them in the appropriate places. If I have failed anyone in this regard, I offer my unreserved apologies. For the past years, this book and the PhD thesis it is based on have been a constant companion. Even more enduring has been my partner-turned-wife, Dorothea Faes, to whom I am enormously indebted for all her care, patience, and support over the years and who now knows a lot about the Urban Elites of Zadar around the mid-sixteenth century. Dorothea, I hope you will enjoy the book and it is to you that it is dedicated. Zurich, July 2012 Abbreviations DAZd (Državni arhiv u Zadru) State Archive in Zadar BZ (Bilježnici Zadra) manuscripts of Zadrani Notaries c. (carta) original pagination of archival material f. (folio) pagination applied to archival material by archivists s.p. (sine pagina) without pagination r (recto) right-hand page of a manuscript v (verso) left-hand page of a manuscript m.v. (more veneto) the Venetian calendar year starting on 1 March cap. (capitulum, capitolo) chapter tit. (titulus) title Lib. (Liber) book Ref. (Reformationes) amendments Published Sources Commissiones Commissiones et Relationes Venetae: Mletačka i uputstva i izveštaji [Venetian Directives and Reports]. Edited by Simeon Ljubić and Grga Novak. Zagreb: Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Art, 1876-1977. Statuta Iadertina Zadarski statut sa svim reformacijama odnosno novim uredbama donesenima do godine 1563 [Zadar’s Statute with all Amendments and New Regulations Adopted by the Year 1563]. Edited by Josip Kolanović and Mate Križman. Zagreb: Matica Hrvatska, 1997. Abbreviations 9 Terminology Used jurisdiction (Contado, county, distrikt) the countryside or hinter- lands controlled by an urban centre district (districtus, distrikt) administrative subdivisions of Nin, Novigrad, and Vrana governed by castellans but sub- ject to Zadar’s jurisdiction. territory (ager publicus, Astareja) general term for public lands in the immediate vicinity of an urban centre Note on Names and Dates Given the linguistic characteristics of Venice’s Stato da mar and the geo- graphical scope of this book in particular, the following method of naming indi- viduals and places has been chosen. All names directly quoted from primary sources are spelled as they appear in the notarial manuscripts. In all subsequent references the standardised Latin ver- sions of the names are used. I have added the standardised spelling for Venetian names. For consistency, I have used only present-day toponyms, i.e. Croatian names in Dalmatia, Italian names on the Apennine peninsula, etc. Exceptions are places generally familiar, e.g., Venice, Rome, etc. For places within Zadar’s jurisdiction, detailed maps and tables are provided in the Appendix that include their original spelling in the primary sources, present-day Croatian toponyms, and if available, their Italian versions. The Venetian year, which began in March, is referenced with the abbreviation “m.v.” (more veneto). Calendrical norms in the rest of the Adriatic are less clear; unless indicated otherwise all dates are reproduced as they appear in the cited sources. Preface. New Perspectives for an Important Adriatic Center The path of knowledge proposed by Stephan Sander-Faes in his thor- ough and well-documented study merits attention for a series of reasons, beginning with the selection of the title of the book and the reference to a Venetian Commonwealth. This is not merely a figure of speech but pro- poses a new interpretation of the Republic of St Mark as a reality marked by particular relationships and connections between Venice the metrop- olis and the many components of her composite state. Because of these highly-varied relationships Venice was able to acquire, institutionalise, and maintain her positions in Italy and the Mediterranean over the long term: in the Terraferma and her maritime dominions, via informal colonies of citizens in foreign lands, formal delegations throughout the Mediterranean and elsewhere, and in regions where Venetian prerogatives and de facto- dependence substituted direct control. Sander-Faes authoritatively articulates this new interpretation of Vene- tian historiography and the characteristics of the fragmented and varied components of Venice’s rule. His book offers an original, well-researched, and at times surprising contribution. The history of the Serenissima and her commonwealth has always been and continues to be the object of an extensive and growing body of scholarship by a large number of scholars from all over the world and from very different spheres. In addition to certain well-studied regions and epochs there are others that, while not entirely neglected, offer ample room for further examination. Within this context, Sander-Faes’ book is distinctive for the period under survey, in the perspective it offers, and in the articulation of the investigative methods it employs. 12 Gherardo Ortalli and Bernd Roeck The years on which the book focuses constitute a period in which the heyday of the Most Serene Republic had passed. The first two decades of the sixteenth century mark a decisive shift in Venetian fortunes. The ignominious defeat by the troops of the League of Cambrai at Agnedello in 1509 heralded a dramatic change to Venice’s position and her waning role on the international chessboard. The ensuing decades witnessed the indisputable decline of the Serenissima. The area and period under survey in this volume, which centres on Zara, is circumscribed by two traumatic events in Venetian history. In 1540, after thirty years of continuous clashes with the Ottoman Empire, conflict temporarily ceased. Venice’s separate peace imposed by Suleiman II the Magnificent brought about the loss of important centres in the Aegean, the Peloponnese, and Dalmatia where, in Zara’s jurisdiction, the two strategic castles of Vrana and Nadin came under the control of the Ottomans. If 1540 was the year of the unfavourable peace treaty with the Most Sublime Porte 1569 marked the advent of renewed Ottoman-Venetian con- flict., It began in 1570 and came to a close in 1573 with Venice’s loss of the large island kingdom of Cyprus.