having got the mastery in several other cities, installed Marsilio
Carrara in Padua as his lieutenant and representative. Had Cane della
Scala lived this might have worked well enough; on his unexpected death,
his sons began to contrive how they should get rid of Marsilio; but they
lacked skill and decision, and could neither conceal their intentions
nor agree upon definite action. To make matters worse, one of them,
Alberto della Scala, became madly enamoured of the wife of Albertino
Carrara, and when every means failed to seduce her, took her to himself
by brutal violence. After this outrage, the thirst for vengeance drove
the Carrara further than mere ambition could have done.
The crimes of the Scala, no less than their miserable weakness in all
political matters, had excited the profound resentment of Venice, of
Florence, of Lucca, and of the Gonzaga and Este families; war was
declared, and it was not long before the lords of Padua were reduced to
extremities. Though they had always maintained a haughty bearing
towards Venice, they now attempted a reconciliation, and chose as their
intermediary Marsilio di Carrara, whom they believed to be a traitor to
his own family and devoted to their interests, and for whom the Republic
had always shown a certain partiality, appreciating him, no doubt, at
his true value, and anticipating the time when he might be useful.
But Marsilio, like every other Carrara, dreamt only of revenge upon the
Scala. At a great public spectacle he was seated by the Doge. ‘What will
you give,’ he asked in a quick whisper, ‘to him who places Padua in your
hands?’ ‘The city itself,’ answered Francesco Dandolo without the
slightest hesitation. The unsigned treaty of betrayal was agreed upon in
those few whispered words, and was executed to the letter and at once.
Padua was taken by the Venetians and handed over to the Carrara under a
sort of agreement from which each of the allies derived some advantage,
and there was an exchange of high-flown speeches, amongst which that of
the Venetian Loredano recommended the most serene Republic’s new
favourites to behave with great goodness to her subjects, and to exhibit
much gratitude towards her. On his side Marsilio begged that her ‘kind
offices’ might be continued to him and his.
The consequences of this treaty were soon clear. Venice nominally gave
Padua over to the Carrara in order to obtain the annexation of Treviso,
which was much more important to her, and Alberto della Scala was not
set at liberty till he had ceded the latter city to the Republic.
At the death of Francesco Dandolo, one naval battle lost to the Genoese
represented Venice’s loss during the reign; her gain was an extension of
territory of immense value; the whole result was to involve the Republic
in intrigues which very nearly led to her destruction.
[Sidenote: _Muratori Scrip. xvii. 32._]
At the very end of Dandolo’s reign, according to a strange story told by
Gabaro., a half-comic, half-dramatic incident occurred which showed well
enough that the ‘kind offices’ of the Republic and the ‘goodness’ of the
Carrara were not destined to last for ever. Marsilio was dead and
Ubertino Carrara held Padua as his successor. Before long he was
denounced by certain Venetian senators as a traitor and a secret enemy
to the Republic. The words were reported to him, and he resolved to make
sure, at any hazard, that they should not be repeated. Incredible as it
may seem, he caused the senators who had accused him to be seized by
night in Venice itself, gagged and bound, and at once brought before him
in Padua.
He threatened them at first with instant death, then allowed himself to
be mollified by their entreaties, and finally dismissed them with a
warning. If they ever raised their voices against him in the Senate
again, or if they breathed one word of their nocturnal adventure, he
would have them stabbed without mercy. They promised, and they kept
their word; from that time forward no attack was made upon Ubertino
Carrara in the Senate, the story of their forcible abduction remained a
profound secret, which was not revealed until many years afterwards,
when one of the Carrara’s henchmen, who had helped to carry off the
senators, lay dying and confessed his share in the bold deed.
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 142._]
Dandolo was succeeded by Bartolommeo Gradenigo, during whose reign there
were constant relations between the Republic and England, the latter
continually soliciting the aid of Venice against Philip VI. of France,
who was helped by the Genoese. Gradenigo did not fail to express
gratitude to King Edward III. for the thankful anticipation of an
assistance which was never forthcoming, and took no steps to induce the
Senate to listen to England’s tempting proposals. The king hoped to
obtain from Venice forty ships of war, fully manned and equipped; but
Venice either doubted his ability to pay, or was scared by the
triumphant progress of the Turks in the Levant, which required her to
act sentinel to Europe against the Mohammedan advance, and therefore to
keep all her naval resources well in hand and ready for war; and,
moreover, she was engaged in continual fighting in Candia (Crete), which
was an unceasing drain upon her resources.
[Sidenote: _1346. Zara taken back from the Hungarians, Tintoretto; Sala
dello Scrutinio._]
At this critical time, when the position of Venice was by slow and sure
degrees becoming one of great danger, the Doge died, and the great
Andrea Dandolo was elected in his stead. Under the leadership of a less
gifted and brave man, the ship of the Republic might well have foundered
in the storm that broke over her. The King of Hungary disputed with
Venice for Zara and the territory that belonged to it; the Genoese were
exasperated in the highest degree by the commercial success of the
Venetians in the East; the
[Illustration: RIO S. STIN]
Pope was angry with the Republic because its government would not make
obligatory the payment of tithes to the bishops. These were but a few
of the half-grown troubles that were rapidly growing to maturity when
the plague broke out in 1348 and devastated Italy from Genoa in the
north, where forty thousand persons died, to Sicilian Trapani, where not
one soul survived the universal death. In six months Venice lost more
than half her population.
Boccaccio has left a description of the pest in Florence which is the
greatest masterpiece of the kind ever produced by a great writer’s pen;
for his story fills us with horrow, with pity, with sadness, but never
arouses our disgust. The sufferings of Venice in those same six months
have found neither poet nor novelist to describe them, but her careful
chroniclers have left us the details of the defence she made against the
ravages of the sickness, and of the medicines used in the attempt to
save life.
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 156._]
As soon as the first cases of the plague had proved beyond doubt that it
had crossed the lagoons and reached the city, the Council appointed
three nobles, designated as ‘Wise Men of the Plague,’ with power to take
all possible measures to stop the spreading of the contagion. Their
first decree forbade the poor to expose the bodies of their dead in the
street in order to obtain alms. A separate burial-place was marked out
and consecrated for the free burial of the victims of the disease. The
port was closed, and sentinels were placed all along the outer shore of
the islands to hinder all outsiders from landing or from introducing
suspicious merchandise.
[Illustration: A RAINY NIGHT, THE RIALTO]
[Sidenote: _Cecchetti, Medicina._]
[Sidenote: _A. Baschet, souvenirs._]
[Sidenote: _Mutinelli, Less._]
The physicians were at that time already organised in a guild of their
own, and received from the State a modest yearly stipend of three
hundred lire of ‘piccoli,’ about £50. They were now ordered to visit
diligently both the hospitals and private houses, and a formal inquiry
was made into the resources of the public apothecary, whose place was
near the Rialto at the sign of the Golden Head. It was most important to
ascertain whether there was a sufficient supply of ‘Teriaca,’ a medicine
which, in the opinion of all Venetians, could not fail to cure the
plague or any other sickness. The recipe for it, they believed, had come
down from a Greek called Andromachos, and required a mixture of aromatic
herbs, amber, and other ingredients, which were imported at great
expense from distant Eastern countries. The State itself superintended
the concoction of this universal panacea, lest its quality should in the
least deteriorate, and lest the great reputation acquired for it
throughout Europe should suffer. No stranger who could afford to buy it
left Venice without taking at least a small supply, and so great were,
or are, its virtues that it is made to this day, and sold at the same
sign.
But, to the stupefaction of the three ‘Wise Men of the Plague,’ Teriaca
would not cure the malady, and even the sensible precautions of
quarantine which they had taken came too late to be of any use. The
malady was raging, and ran its fearful course to the terrible end. Fifty
noble families were completely destroyed, not leaving one of the name.
It was only with difficulty that a meeting of the Great Council could be
got together, and the Council of Forty was reduced to twenty members. In
a few weeks Venice presented the aspect of a pestilent desert; and when
at last the pest wore itself out, it was necessary to bring in from
neighbouring provinces a great number of families, upon whom all those
privileges were bestowed at once which were generally accorded only in
consideration of some service to the Republic, or after a prolonged
residence in Venetian territory.
The selection of the immigrants was conducted with the greatest
prudence, and it may easily be believed that the great influx of new and
energetic blood, of the same descent, was of vast benefit to the city
and the Republic. It may even be asked whether, without this wholesome
sifting and renewing of her people, Venice could have performed the
prodigies of courage and endurance which not long afterwards turned the
tide of the Chioggia war.
Andrea Dandolo did not long survive these events. Worn out with facing
the storm, with fighting enemies by land and sea abroad, and pestilence
at home, he died when barely fifty years of age, leaving to posterity
the precious manuscript of his history, which has even now not been
entirely published. His Chronicle is one of the richest sources of
information for the history of the fourteenth century.
Dandolo was succeeded by Marino Faliero.
[Illustration: DOOR OF THE TREASURY, ST. MARK’S]
[Illustration: ZATTERE, THE MORNING MIST]
XI
CONSPIRACY OF MARINO FALIERO
The conspiracy of Bocconio has no very distinct character; it was
neither an attempt at popular revolution, nor an effort on the part of
the burghers against the people on the one hand and the aristocracy on
the other. The outbreak under the leadership of Tiepolo and the Quirini,
although they succeeded in giving it the appearance of a democratic
movement, was in reality an attempt on the part of an ambitious noble to
seize the power wielded by the Doge Pietro Gradenigo, a man perhaps as
ambitious as Tiepolo himself, but who at all events had been regularly
elected to be the head of the Republic. The third conspiracy of which we
find an account during the fourteenth century was undoubtedly meant to
overthrow the government, and to gather into one hand the whole of that
authority which belonged equally to all members of the same class. The
conspiracy of the Doge Marino Faliero has been related in many ways--as
a romance, as a poem, as an instance of political passion, but very
generally without a careful consideration of the facts. Most writers
represent the old Doge as driven to betray his country by outrageous
calumnies against his wife, invented by some youths of the aristocracy.
Others, like Byron, believe that he wished to free his country from the
petty tyranny and real oppression it suffered under the complicated
system of councils:--
We will renew the times of truth and justice,
Condensing in a fair, free commonwealth,
Not rash equality, but equal rights.
In his dramatic upholding of what he believed the truth, Byron was so
far carried away as to cause the Doge to be decapitated in 1355 on the
steps of the ‘Giants’ Staircase,’ which was not constructed until 1485,
between the two colossal statues set up there by Jacopo Sansovino in
1554. A careful examination of historical documents would seem to
destroy almost altogether the common version of the tragedy.
[Sidenote: _Lazzarini, Marin Falier in Arch. Veneto._]
Marino Faliero was born between 1280 and 1285, the son of Marco Faliero
and Beriola Loredan. He belonged to the Falieri of the Santi Apostoli,
so called from the name of the district in which they lived, to
distinguish them from the Falieri who lived in other parts of the city,
some of whom did not belong to the same family, and were not even
nobles. He was called Marino Junior, in order not to confuse him with an
uncle of the same name, who was known as Marino Senior.
Very little is recorded concerning his youth, but Lazzarini finds that
his education was not very different from that of his peers, and was
probably conducted by the sort of tutor then called a Master of Grammar;
and that the young man must have become familiar from his earliest years
with navigation, commerce, and the public affairs of the Republic.
At twenty years of age, by the privilege of the Barbarella, he was
present at the assemblies of the Great Council; and when little more
than thirty we find him one of the heads of the Ten, and he constantly
appears in that capacity, and by alternation in the office of
‘Inquisitor.’ When exercising the functions of the latter, which may
seem strange for one who in later time was to betray his country, he was
charged, with another of the Ten, Andrea Michiel, to bring about,
‘rapidly and diligently,’ the ruin and death of Bajamonte Tiepolo and
Pietro Quirini, who had already been in exile ten years; and he was
authorised to spend ten thousand lire of the ‘piccoli,’ or about £1600
sterling, in order to kill the first, and two thousand for killing the
second.
Marino Faliero was a man of uncommon intelligence and resistless energy,
as may be seen from the fact that the Republic, which certainly had a
considerable choice of such men, constantly made use of him, sometimes
giving him important posts at home, and sometimes as ambassador to the
Pope or to foreign sovereigns; sometimes, again, as military governor or
podestà of cities under the Venetian dominion, once at least
commissioning him as commander-in-chief of the fleet. He was the first
podestà of Treviso after that city became subject to Venice in 1339. A
podestà was a sort of foreign governor, whom the independent
commonwealths chose for themselves in order to assure the peaceable
execution of their own laws without party prejudice; but conquered towns
were required by their conquerors to submit to this officer. He was
generally named for two years; he was not allowed to bring his wife or
children with him; he could not absent himself for one day without
special permission from the Senate; he was never to form any close
friendship among the citizens, lest his impartial authority should be
compromised by his surroundings. There was a podestà in almost every
city of central and northern Italy, and Venice imposed one on each city
she conquered. But he had no power to change the statutes of the city in
his charge; his office was to see that those statutes were approved by
the Most Serene Republic and were properly enforced.
When it seemed likely that an understanding might be brought about
between the Venetians and the Genoese,
[Illustration: CALLE OCCHIALERA]
the former sent Marino Faliero, being well aware that the result of the
mission would depend largely upon the character and gifts of the
ambassador; but, owing to quarrels which broke out in the East between
merchants of the rival Republics, the embassy was abandoned in 1350, and
Faliero turned back before reaching the end of his journey. At the siege
of Zara he distinguished himself so much that a contemporary chronicler
attached to his name the epithet Audax, the Brave; and when in 1352 the
fleet commanded by Niccolò Pisani left Venice to sail against the
Genoese, Marino Faliero was designated beforehand to succeed the admiral
in case the latter should fall ill. He was in no less esteem abroad than
in the Republic itself. The Carrara, who were lords of Padua, chose him
twice, in 1338 and 1350, as podestà of their city.
A chronicler of Treviso in the fifteenth century accuses Faliero of
having been exceedingly overbearing and violent, and most historians
have followed this writer. The latter narrates that when Faliero was
podestà of Treviso in 1346, it was his duty on one occasion to assist at
a procession of the ‘Corpus Domini.’ The Bishop came to the ceremony,
carrying the sacrament and accompanied by the clergy, but kept the
procession waiting so long that Faliero, losing his temper, gave the
astonished prelate a resounding box on the ear, which was heard to the
end of the church. No contemporary documents can be found to prove or
disprove this tale, which may be historical or legendary; yet the
chroniclers of the fourteenth century constantly reported such
anecdotes, although the Venetians were ardent in their faith and
generous in the endowment of churches and convents. There is much
evidence to prove that Faliero ruled his own family with despotic
authority, as may be seen from many documents. He made marriages and
distributed inheritances as he pleased, though it does not necessarily
follow that he did so in an unlawful manner. On the contrary, in spite
of his overbearing character, he seems to have enjoyed the esteem and
affection of all the members of his house.
Petrarch, who, if not his friend, was at least an intimate acquaintance
of his, wrote not long after his death that he had enjoyed during many
years the reputation of a wise man, and Matteo Villani says that he was
a man of high character, wise and magnanimous. The Giustiniani
chronicle, which judged his conspiracy very harshly, admits that as a
man he was generous, wise, and brave. The chronicler Caresini regrets
that a man so virtuous by nature should have so far departed from
virtue.
From evidence recently discovered, it appears that Marino Faliero had
two wives, and some have even said that he had three. Of the two whose
names we know, the first was Tommasina Contarini, and the other, who was
afterwards the Dogess, was Ludovica Gradenigo. He had a daughter, Lucia,
by the first wife, and no children by the second. Some of the later
chroniclers, who may be said to have constructed the fable of Marino
Faliero, say that the Dogess belonged to the house of Contarini, and it
is not hard to understand how a superficial examination of the papers of
that time should either have confused the first wife with the second,
or have confused the Doge Marino with Marino Ordelafo, who was his
nephew, and dear to him as his own son. This confusion resulted in
mistaking Cristina Contarini, who at the time of the conspiracy must
have been young and beautiful, with the Dogess, who was then undoubtedly
nearly forty-five years of age.
Andrea Dandolo died on the night of the seventh of September 1354; and
on the day following steps were taken to begin the election of his
successor, and to introduce as usual a number of corrections and
improvements in the ducal oath of allegiance. The five correctors
elected for the latter purpose, in a meeting of the Great Council from
which all members under the age of thirty were excluded, presented on
the next day the list of their proposed amendments. These were numerous,
and were all intended to restrict the authority of the Doge, which was
already sufficiently reduced. The yet unchosen successor of Dandolo was
to be forbidden to receive an ambassador, or any foreign emissary, or to
give any answer to such an one, except in the presence and with the
approval of his counsellors and the heads of the Forty. On the same day,
the ninth of September, at the ninth hour, the ‘Arengo’ was summoned,
which was the general assembly of the people, and which still gave the
lower classes the illusion of participating in the affairs of State.
This assembly was now called upon to ratify the proposed changes in the
ducal oath of allegiance.
Even before the commencement of the election there was talk of Marino
Faliero for the office; and he was at that time Venetian ambassador to
Pope Innocent VI. in Avignon, being there to treat for peace with Genoa
and the Visconti, lords of Milan. On the eleventh of September his name
was pronounced before another assembly of the people, and contemporary
historians say that his election was extremely well received by all
classes of Venetians. Until the Doge-elect should reach the capital, it
was decreed that the government should remain in the hands of the ducal
counsellors and the heads of the Forty; two counsellors and one of the
heads of the Forty remaining by turn constantly in the ducal palace.
Faliero had left Avignon before he received notice of his election, so
that he was in the neighbourhood sooner than was expected. On the
twenty-eighth of September twelve ambassadors, chosen for each of the
offices of the city, went out to meet him. Each one of these was
accompanied by a noble and three young gentlemen, who altogether
received daily a salary of forty ducats of gold. The actual value in
gold of a Venetian ducat is now usually estimated at about fifteen
shillings English money, rather less than the equivalent of the French
twenty-franc piece. The purchasing power of the coin was, however, very
much larger than at the present day.
[Sidenote: _Rom. iii. 181._]
The delegates met the Doge at Verona, and accompanied him thence to
Padua, where the Carrara received them all with great honour. Taddeo
Giustiniani, son of the podestà of Chioggia, met the whole company there
with fifteen of the small barges called ‘ganzaruoli,’ splendidly
decorated, in which the Doge embarked with all his company. On the fifth
of October, at a small distance from Venice itself, he was met by the
famous Bucentaur, which bore the ducal counsellors and a great number of
nobles. A remarkable circumstance which accompanied this journey is
narrated by Lorenzo dei Monaci, whom Lazzarini calls a grave and
contemporary historian. The Doge, on reaching Venice, landed at the pier
of Saint Mark’s, instead of going to the other side, to the Riva della
Paglia, according to former custom; and in order to reach the ducal
palace he passed between the two columns where malefactors were often
executed. At the time no one paid any attention to this, but after his
tragic death the incident was reputed to have been a presage of the evil
future; so that Petrarch, writing from Milan on the twenty-fourth of
April 1355, a few days after the Doge had been decapitated, alludes to
the fact in these words: ‘Sinistro pede palatium ingressus,’ _i.e._
‘Having entered the palace with ill-omened step.’
In the church of Saint Mark’s he was presented to the people, and
received the usual threefold laudation and salutation. It is worth
noticing that Faliero was the last doge who was saluted by the pompous
title of ‘Lord of a quarter and an eighth of the Roman Empire.’ Then,
according to the regular ceremonial, he was carried round the square
amid the acclamations of the multitude, to whom he threw money, and at
last he was crowned upon the landing of the staircase that descended
into the courtyard of the palace. This staircase was of stone, and led
down from the hall of the Great Council to the story where was the
covered loggia, and thence continued downwards in the open air, entering
the courtyard, and following the same direction as the modern ‘Giants’
Staircase,’ but at the opposite extremity. It was demolished in the
fifteenth century. Upon the same landing of the staircase the Doge took
the oath of allegiance, with the amendments of which we have already
spoken, and we may well believe that the new restrictions contained in
the ‘Ducal Promise’ were unwelcome to his despotic nature.