The Republics of Ideas: Venice, Florence, and the Defence of Liberty (1525-30) (original) (raw)
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The Republics of Ideas: Venice, Florence and the Defence of Liberty, 1525–1530
History, 2000
The sixteenth century has often been regarded as a crucial period in the history of political events in Italy, and in the history of political ideas. The contributions of Florence and Venice to this process have long been acknowledged. Florentine admiration for the Venetian political system reflected internal political instability in the former city. The evidence for Venetian-Florentine contacts, and for a Venetian concern or admiration for Florence has been less noted. This article aims to show that there is evidence that Venetian concern for the defence of republican liberty after 1525 was allied to an awareness of Florentine political events and their significance for Venetian political practices. This awareness was stimulated by the pressure of imperial intervention on the peninsula after 1525.
The Immortal Republic: The Myth of Venice during the Italian Wars (1494-1530)
Sixteenth Century Journal 30/4, 1999
The well-known myth of Venice--the notion that the Venetian Republic embodied an ideal amalgam of freedom, justice, and stability--was paralleled by a counter myth which emphasized the imperialism and treachery of the state.These positive and negative perceptions of Venice were not sharply distinguished, however, for contemporaries in the sixteenth century saw them as delineating common aspects of Venetian reality. Both allies and enemies of Venice took the supposed immortality of its republican structure into account when making political decisions between 1494 and 1530.
I quaderni del m.ae.s, 2020
Despite Giuseppe Pardi's judgment that Borso d'Este lacked the ability to connect single parts of statecraft into a stable foundation, this study suggests that Borso conducted a coherent and successful foreign policy of peace, heightened prestige, and greater freedom to dispose. As a result, he was an active participant in the Quattrocento state system (Grande Politico Quadro) solidified by the Peace of Lodi (1454), and one of the most successful rulers of a smaller principality among stronger competitive states. He conducted his foreign policy based on four foundational principles. The first was stability. Borso anchored his statecraft by aligning Ferrara with Venice and the papacy. The second was display or the politics of splendor. The third was development of stored knowledge, based on the reputation and antiquity of Estense rule, both worldly and religious. The fourth was the politics of personality, based on Borso's affability, popularity, and other virtues. The culmination of Borso's successful statecraft was his investiture as Duke of Ferrara by Pope Paul II. His success contrasted with the disaster of the War of Ferrara, when Ercole I abandoned Borso's formula for rule. Ultimately, the memory of Borso's successful reputation was preserved for more than a century.
Aspects of Venetian Sovereignty in Medieval and Renaissance Dalmatia
Venezia nel tardo medioevo. Economia e società / Late Medieval Venice. Economy and Society, 2021
The reader is forewarned that this paper (first published in 1996), which maintains the character of the original oral presentation, makes no attempt at covering completely such a vast subject, on which there is an extensive bibliography much of it in Serbo-Croatian, a language I do not know. My intent is simply to offer for discussion some little-exploited historical materials on well-known themes that exemplify contacts between the two coasts of the Adriatic Sea, especially but not only during the Quattrocento. Following an overview of the history of Venetian sovereignty in that part of the Stato da mar, attention will turn to aspects of politics and society, that is, to the political, financial and monetary administration of the subject territories and to the movement of people and peoples across the Adriatic.
History of European Ideas, 2021
Italian historiographers of the second half of the seventeenth century often establish parallels between early modern republics, comparing Genoa and Venice with the United Provinces, considered as similar political entities despite their evident political differences. The article, taking into account four different sources, investigates the meaning of those comparisons, published when the absolutist model was taking root all around Europe. In the twilight of the republican state, when the power and reputation of the Italian republics was maybe at its weakest, those comparisons served both as a way to boost a supranational republican identity, and to question the strength of the classical republican constitution. This survey explores how these authors claim that, in order to survive in the Europe of absolute monarchies, those republics have to undergo a radical political change. Only by avoiding splitting the sovereignty among too many subjects, and reinforcing the monarchical element in their constitution, these republican states, no more based on the principle of equality, could compete in the new seventeenth-century political scenario. For this reason, Italian authors looked with great interest, and often celebrated the Dutch republic, considered a stronger government than that of Venice, even if it was regarded as an imperfect republic. If you want to read the full article please follow this link: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01916599.2021.1910192
A Companion to Venetian History, 1400-1797
2013
The field of Venetian studies has experienced a significant expansion in recent years, and the Companion to Venetian History, 1400-1797 provides a single volume overview of the most recent developments. It is organized thematically and covers a range of topics including political culture, economy, religion, gender, art, literature, music, and the environment. Each chapter provides a broad but comprehensive historical and historiographical overview of the current state and future directions of research. The Companion to Venetian History, 1400-1797 represents a new point of reference for the next generation of students of early modern Venetian studies, as well as more broadly for scholars working on all aspects of the early modern world.
Venetian warfare in the age of Palmanova: Paolo Paruta’s Discorsi Politici (1599)
In his Discorsi Politici (1599) the Venetian Ambassador Paolo Paruta (1540-1598) analyzes several topics from ancient and modern History. Writing during the passage from Late Renaissance to the Age of Raison d’État, Paruta has the opportunity to face the new Renaissance warfare: mercenary troops, modern State armies, gunpowder and fortifications. As Ambassador of the Most Serene Republic in Rome, he announced to Pope Clement VIII the building of Palmanova fortress (1593); as political writer, he shows a deep aware of this historical turning point for Venice. The Lion Republic, harshly defeated in the Battle of Agnadello (1509), can aim no more for an offensive war, it has just to try to defend its territory from the Hapsburg and the Turks. So politics and military tactics match together: as mouthpiece of the Venetian neutrality, he opts for defensive tactics. This basic choice works as historiographical criteria, too: Charles V was right in not attacking Suleiman the Magnificent during the two Sieges of Vienna (1529, 1532); the Venetian Republic was betrayed during the Italian Wars by its offensive commanders, such as Bartolomeo d’Alviano. The last sentence of Paruta’s book («[W]here the business is doubtful and difficult, we must rather adhere to that which holds us from doing any thing, then to what eggs us on») is very far from the final, offensive exhortation of Machiavelli’s Principe: Venice and Florence have different points of view not only in the Parliament, but in the battlefield too. Yet the whole Italian Renaissance is on its last legs, under the Spanish dominion of the Peninsula. No more place for Scipio Africanus: the wise Parutian politician should follow the example of Fabius Maximus in his struggle to save the borders of the State.