A History of Venice: Volume One

HolisticGod · Oct 21, 2002

Folks,

Over the course of the past month or two I've had the time, in a rare fit of frenzied inactivity, to drop by now and again and read (and reread) some of the tremendous work that goes on around here... Though my own participation has been sporadic at best, and my singular individual contribution so scant as to be unmentionable, I feel a certain attachment to (read: I take a certain pleasure in the creations of) a group of people who day after day devote countless hours to scrawling thousands of words across an electronic pane and do so knowing they aren't going to get paid. What's more, and this is the bit that really gets any writer where he lives, knowing there's no possibility of ever getting paid, not even in contributor's copies.

In this Marxian nightmare we've taken to calling life, that's a level of devotion and integrity and pure, honest-to-goodness hobby, pastime, play not often found in such large doses from so many ordinary people. It's almost sickening, really. So healthy, so altruistic. And what's altogether more impressive is that a lot of what goes on here is so damn good a curious look at one of the uber-AAR's can easily end up whiling away a day or two. The "novels" are downright astonishing.

I'm prefacing, in a roundabout way, a desire that nagged at me for a number of weeks and has led to a second attempt at adding a little something of my own to the patchwork of war-stories and melodramas and comedies. In order to ensure that it won't be as abortive as the last, I've taken the liberty of completing Volume One and I've come up with a bit of a posting schedule. In order to ensure that I follow the posting schedule, I've built up an idealization and little melodrama of my own (see the previous two paragraphs). In order to ensure that I remember the idealization and little melodrama, I've used them to justify the amount of time I've already given over to doing something for which I won't get paid or left dozing in a dumpster in Seattle, the two things for which I strive. In order to ensure that I keep that justification in mind, I've saved the contents of this post to my desktop, where it will continue to embarrass me until all the other justifications and counter-justifications and reverse-counter-justifications sort themselves out into a demonstrable product of some kind. Or I "accidentally" reformat my harddrive and forget this ever happened.

To get on with it:

Version: EU II 1.05 with EEP 1.2.2.1. installed (better OE, better Austria)
Country: Venice (for reasons laboriously explained below)
Difficulty: Hard/Furious
Scenario: Grand Campaign
Rules: This is where it gets complicated and distended.

As most longtime fans would agree, even on the hardest settings EU in single player mode has become irritatingly easy with all but the smallest minors (NA Indians, Orleans, Provence), for whom there are very few leaders and events. It's necessary, just to keep things interesting for more than fifty years, to invent rules and checks to keep the player leveled to the AI. Some of these are artificial (no cannon until X; all positive relations with Catholics) and others add a realistic flavor (no more than XXXX infantry and XXXX calvary raised per decade; warships unserviceable for a year after construction; naval caps).

To keep things interesting (to play, anyway) until 1820 requires an enormous number of rules, which I invented over the course of the first twenty or so years of play. Among these:

Army Size: To prevent the levy of huge regiments in rapid succession and, in the beginning, simulate the Italian dependence on mercenaries
-Standing army limited to one-tenth the total population of all national provinces per twenty years (those with no nationalism or possible vassal status).
-Conscripts limited to one-fifth the total population of all provinces per twenty years. (I considered lowering this, but it occurred to me that EU only counts the urban proletariat-mainstay of Italian national, rather than mercenary, armies since Marius. Seems balanced)
-If the number of "conscripts" exceeds the professional soldiers and mercenaries, land support is tacked down to seventy-five percent to lower morale (This, unfortunately, can't be decided on a case by case basis-hence the compromise)
-Calvary is limited to the historical equestrian tradition of Venetian possessions, reset every ten years
-Cannon won't be fielded at any time during the course of Volume One. I've come up with a scheme, however, based on metal producing provinces, land tech, weapons manufactories, infrastructure and random events.

Fleets: To curb Venice's naval superiority before it spins out of control in the sixteenth century, and better represent the necessary investment of time, resources and labor in the construction of warships
-Galleys can be built and serviced immediately, but are limited to four per province (ten per province with naval supplies) per five years
-Transports can be built and serviced immediately, but are limited to one per province (four per province with naval supplies) per eight years, then doubled for every naval manufactory or shipyard
-Warships require one year post construction to be serviced, outfitted and broken in, and are limited to two per province with naval supplies per eight years, then doubled for every naval manufactory and tripled for every shipyard

Combat: To add a little flavor and keep the AI from foolish losses
-Provinces must be fully besieged before an army can progress, to simulate the flanking resistance most generals of the era would avoid, unless the enemy's forces have been completely reduced (in which case covering is enough)
-An army must remain in a province for two months after a successful assault or leave a sizable detachment
-Pitched battles are the rule if enemy armies occupy or beset any provinces or possessions
-Prior to entering a war, only the fortresses of neighboring provinces, or those within site of a fleet, can be surveyed
-Prior to entering a war, only those fleets within site or on the open sea can be surveyed
-A neighbor's tech can only be checked after the first engagement on land or sea, by Venice or her allies
-If stability falls below -1 during wartime, no army or fleet can serve beyond three provinces or sea zones of the national territory (presumably, stability also applies to the army's mood, which is always volatile)
-Armies and fleets must be dispatched whenever possible to assist allies, particularly to protect COT's or other AAR-related interests

Diplomacy: Realism and AAR-related decisions
-A DOW must be made to protect a vassal, even if it means leaving an alliance and declaring war on its members (for reasons relating more to the AAR than historicity)
-Under the Republics, only one royal marriage can be made per tick toward Aristocracy on the DP slider per decade
-Under the Monarchies, only twelve royal marriages can be made per decade

Economics: To slow down the player's growth and development and to simulate more fully the difficulties involved in maintaining the wealth
-Investments must reflect AAR political and social choices and upheavals, and no slider can be maxed out
-Manufactories must be built to their products; other provinces can build breweries and art schools
-The DP sliders must reflect AAR political and social choices and upheavals-even if it means devoting ticks decades afterward
-Judges and governors can only be appointed in national provinces (no nationalism)

Society, Culture and Politics
-As these will play a big part in the AAR, everything will be simulated as well as it can be, whatever that entails in-game
-Rebellions that attain significance in the AAR will be handled differently and with more difficulty, and to different ends, then they would normally under optimum game conditions-this is a big deal (as will become clear in Parts III and IV)
-Because of the way governments and leaders have been scripted, a big change (to avoid coding events, which is a big hassle. And too deterministic for my taste anyway) will be simulated through a religious conversion and (temporary) maxed out intolerance of the dominant faiths
-Personalities, trends and movements that arise in the course of the writing or through unforeseen happenings in the game will direct the policies, good or bad, and actions of Venice (I know how Volume One went now, but despite the skeleton with which I started a lot of the largest and, in my opinion, best sections arose out of creeping ideas and random events)

In addition to these are lesser, or temporary, restrictions and procedures and the usual (no editing, reloads, peeking). Most of this stuff won't be noticeable in the course of the AAR (unless asked, I won't be providing the usual screen shots or notes-though I will provide any information or clarification I can OOC), but I think it's helpful to know what's going on under the hood.

By the way, this play-style, while largely unsuitable for a regular game, is not as rigid and, well, arduous and miserable as it may seem. Toward the end of the first time frame I'd gotten used to it, and in many ways it's great fun.

Now, a few notes on why I chose Venice and how I've managed the AAR...

First off, I was torn between three different styles, the first of which, the now standard narrative (exmplified most recently by MrT's behomoth), was easily discarded as dauntingly accomplished by many others. I leave it to them, and to HOI (pulp fiction, anyone?)

The second and third, however, came down to a matter of time. I had wanted to try an overarching history of Europe, at first as a multiplayer (the game itself then became too consuming) and then from the perspective of a hands-off non-European minor. But as a one-man show, to do what I wanted to do with either style, it would be too large and too liable to get lost when life takes its inevitable (often getting-paid-or-sleeping-in-dumpsters) toll.

Which left me with a last, moderately less ambitious recourse. A History of X, half college textbook (remember those awfully big things?), half middle-academic. Something beyond a fitted account of the game, even as engagingly draped as it has often been, or a well-researched (primarily because I'm not a well-researching kind of guy) hybrid between the game and actual history.

Now, there are only a very few helpful ways to write histories. They have to be clear, concise, succinct. Redundant, but not repetitive. Objective and even plain. This as opposed to fiction, where the work is not only open to, but served by, violated rules, creative grammar, flowery language, incorrect spelling and pages and pages of text that isn't necessary, doesn't make sense and can't really be called English, or whatever language it happens not to be written in.

There isn't a lot of room to experiment. But that's style. The content of a history can be extremely varied, particularly when, like this AAR or any American high school textbook in common usage not written by Howard Zinn, they're made up. So what I wanted to do, conveniently, was disregard everything that happened in a particular country (and, as it turns out, in several particular countries) between 1419 and 1820, but still provide the cultural, economic and political background for the usual adventures that make the average AAR great.

And that was how I was going to justify scrawling my own meager words across an electronic pane when I haven't had a clean pair of pants or a well-manicured lawn since 1989. I got to invent a whole mess of characters and events just for fun, which sounded to me like a whole lot more fun than figuring out how to use the washing machine or buying a machete and hiring someone, improbably, called a lawn care specialist.

Which left me with one final question to answer (and I heartily thank and applaud anyone still reading; I for one stopped a ways back), which was more a matter of setting than anything else. The choice of Venice had to do with its peculiar situation as the financial master and military mite of Europe, its location between Austria and Turkey, its reliance on a fleet and the standing history of the Republic of St. Mark. I think it worked out rather well, though a passing Venetian would probably have a number of things to say about that. And he would probably say them very loudly.

One thing I was nervous about, and which might strike some as being too planned or ripe for exploitation, was rewriting the monarch and leader files. However, in order to really capture the flavor I was on about, it was pretty much unavoidable. The first three Doges and the attendant leaders are the same (though their personal histories are completely different), but everything else has been changed. To minimize the control I had over stats and so forth, I used the excellent LeaderGen utility and then edited it for dates and (in rare instances) excessive or diminutive abilities where the history would be muddled by it.

I left in the events, for a writing challenge, and kept all province attributes and CB's. Beyond my own rules and the direction of the AAR, nothing in the game mechanics or files was altered.

That about sums it up... I'll be posting the Preface and Chapter One shortly, but expect a slow start before the first major action of the Trans-Dalmatian War as I setup the characters and locales. The basic format for Part One will be carried on throughout, as interludes on Venetian family life, society or government take place usually in the beginning and middle. While these will often be wry or even absurd, as such things usually are, I've tried to keep the military and political history, particularly battle and campaign descriptions, up to straight-laced EU II standards, so don't be put-off.

And I've also tried to keep them plentiful. It isn't absolutely necessary to read one or the other, though mutual references have, of course, been made, and there should be enough of both to keep everyone entertained.

Feedback is very much appreciated. Even though I've written Volume One, I'm quite open to suggestions and expect to do some hefty revisions of future installments. And besides, there's always Volume Two...

HolisticGod · Oct 21, 2002

A History of Venice: 1419-1467

Preface

The writing of this book comes one hundred and eighty-two years after the August Pronouncement. Its publication on the bicentennial of the Second Treaty of Geneva.

These two documents are indisputably the harbingers of the modern age, not simply in Italy but in Europe and, effectively, the world. Plainly visible in the Second Treaty of Geneva, much unlike the first, are the stirrings of global imperialism and ideological conflict, dark shadows of the crises to come. Absent from it are the dynastic niceties, the rhetoric of conciliation, that defined international politics and discourse as late as 1794.

Its remarkable global impact and far-reaching legal ramifications are even more noteworthy for their independence of religious or congressional sanction. During the negotiations at Verona in May of 1801, Milan in June of that year and, finally, Geneva in March of 1802, the Fourth Congress of Vienna was not only treated with disregard, but actively dissuaded from overseeing the settlement.

The severity of the terms eventually agreed upon might not have been diminished for its participation, but this collective, relentless drive toward finality was unique in the whole history of European warfare since the Renascence, and the absolute authority of the commanders on both sides to ratify without consultation is, in hindsight, the first glowing ember of military dictatorship.

What it ushered in almost immediately was a period of chaotic disunity without which there could never have been any movements approaching Devolution and Italiano, with which this book concludes.

But while unprecedented in many respects, neither is entirely removed from the nearly four centuries of prelude to the upheaval and disaster they brought about. Indeed, the preamble to the August Pronouncement is taken from Augusto Vespuchi's Rammarico e speranza al Piazzetta, and it created what he and his accomplices envisioned. The settlement at Geneva was one of only a very few possible outcomes to the power struggle of the preceding five decades, and did attempt, in vain, to reconstitute the forgotten tribes and their ancient liberties.

While far from the only major actor in the drama of the early nineteenth century, Venice had a peculiar and often paradoxical role. Its internal progressivism, tolerance and an unrivaled degree of personal liberty was contrasted by fervent, almost bigoted nationalism, constant military activity and an unrivaled degree of personal wealth and communal glut. The condition of the native peoples within its colonial empire was startling in light of its enormous middle class, unstratified economic system and generally well-behaved aristocracy. The free and equal position of women in the political and social life of the Republic made the behavior of its soldiers on campaign all the more heinous-and inexplicable. Where her people were, for a time, the best and most congruous in the world, her subjects, her foes and her unhappy bearers suffered the wrath of any heathen chieftain or crusader king.

When studying the whole history of imperial Venice, these dissonant attributes are accentuated, not resolved, and the questions that arise from them become more puzzling, as "how?" gives way to "why?," and for that no answers are immediately apparent. Instead, we are presented with a series of sweeping victories, crushing defeats, rash and often violent reforms, abortive revolutions and bloody civil wars, and through it all a seemingly steady political and cultural evolution unplanned and often unwanted.

Behind, and often in front, of this evolution are some of history's most repulsive and alluring figures, from the tragic, bedeviled Vespuchi, would-be King and erstwhile Platonist, to the dashing, heroic Dimitri Acceritto, an illiterate Greek pirate and Italian revolutionary who took for his surname the word "friendly." It was their triumphs and failures that moved the city and its possessions, upon which stood the lives of thousands, then millions of men and women, in a land where the ambitions and whims and mercies of a single family, and then a single individual, were the ferment of law and government.

From 1419, at the outset of the Trans-Dalmatian (or First Veneto-Hungarian) War, to 1820, at the reading of the August Pronouncement, this book attempts to reconcile and document the vast accomplishments and stunning failures, the noble kindness' and terrible cruelties of one of history's most fascinating and misunderstood peoples, in all their murky values and sudden manifestations.

To a broader and less conspicuous end, we may find that in understanding the troubles that plagued the beguiled Republic of Venice, we arrive at some conclusions about our own.

That, at least, is my hope.

-Isaac Phillips
London, 2002

Lord Durham · Oct 21, 2002

Welcome back. You've obviously put a lot of thought and work into the background for this project. I'll be curious to see how well this goes. I already know how well you can write.

HolisticGod · Oct 21, 2002

Part One: City and Empire

Chapter 1: Venice In 1419

1. Early History

The Veneto Plain is a remarkable aggregation of debris swept down from the Alps by the rivers Adda, Minicio and Po. Over time a substratum of boulders and silt, covered over by deposits of rich alluvial soil, vastly extended, and continues to extend, the Eastern shoreline of Northern Italy. Its strategic location at both the headwaters of the Adriatic and the juncture of two major population centers led to Roman settlement at such sites as Aquileia and Patavium in the early centuries AD, and subsequently to relentless barbarian activity in the twilight years of the Western Empire.

Veneto’s flat terrain and treeless expanses make it as difficult to protect as it is malleable to development, and even the medieval advent of the independent city-states, particularly of Verona and Padua, was limited in the region by the large expense and tenuous reliability of its often, and usually inadvertent, collective diplomacy. The only metropolis reprieved from this perpetual threat was eventually its chief and most successful exponent.

Along the coast the encroachment of the land into sea coincides with the formation of dense estuaries at certain places, and the direction of the current has chanced the formation of silt banks some miles distant. Between these and the actual shores of Veneto are a number of lagoons of varying sizes and constitutions, most of which are sparsely populated, even to the present day, by meager fishing villages. The only notice given to them in antiquity came as a consequence of their ideal natural defenses, a series of shallows that proved hazardous to foreign navigators and mud-banks that prevented horse-bound or closely ordered armies, such as those of the Huns and Franks, from fording. In times of crisis the people of the mainland sought refuge particularly in the Lagoon of Venice, the largest and most developed of its kind.

By the beginning of the fifth century, there had a arisen twelve loosely confederated townships* within the Lagoon, made up mostly of the aboriginal fisherman and small minorities of refugees who stayed on when most of their compatriots returned to the cities after the waves of barbarian invaders had fallen back. The animosity between these communities and each new and progressively larger wave of asylum-seekers, not to mention one another, prevented permanent settlement on any substantial scale for centuries.

When Aquileia was razed by Attila in 452, however, the first major emigration of abiding residents from the mainland compelled the Twelve Towns to convene a general election at Grado, the seat of the local Patriarchate, and between them select tribunes to administer each individual community, sewing the first seeds of a greater unity.

In 568 the Lombards, under their King, Alboin, conquered Veneto and made clear their intention to occupy it, spurring a massive influx of displaced peoples. With widely disparate customs, dialects and even languages taking root in the same town, internal disputes led to wide-spread civil disorder and jealousies between the Twelve flared into armed conflict. To curb these growing tensions, a second election was called in 584, occasioning the creation of the 12 Tribuni Maiores, who formed a governing council of sorts that survived in various forms until the end of the Republic***.

These Tribunes were not, however, capable of allaying the central difficulties in governing the lagoon in the long-term, and when in 697 external pressures threatened the whole system of Venice the Patriarch Christopher of Grado convened the people at Heraclea and persuaded them to adopt a single Head of State. The first Doge**, Paulo Lucio Anafesto, held court at the town of his birth and election.

2. The Promise of Venice as a Maritime Power

In the intervening centuries between the first election at Grado and the appointment of the Doge, the Twelve Towns had put a significant fleet to sea, which had such success in monopolizing economic and naval power in the Adriatic that Narses, the imperial commander at Ravenna, several times used it to transport his army.

The Dalmatian pirate enclaves that were to plague Venice’s expansion as a merchant republic in the ninth and tenth centuries had yet to manifest themselves, leaving the Adriatic free of Bulgars and Serbs. This, combined with the lagoon’s natural harbors, made Venice the best entrance point for foreign goods in Northern Italy.

While most trade at this early date consisted of shipping grain and vegetables from the agricultural centers in Asia, Egypt and Sicily to the towns along the riverways in Veneto, small caravans from the East invigorated the Twelve Towns, and demonstrated a forbearance in treating with foreigners that in the future would extend to the infidel.

As Venetian wealth and power grew, the Paduans attempted to assert their ancient authority over the coast and its burgeoning Republic, first through abortive missions to Venice itself and then through an appellate petition of imperial authorities in Italy. They were ignored, however, and when emissaries from the townships argued to Longinus, the Emperor’s plenipotentiary in the West, that possession of the river headways, the lagoon and the coastal basin rightfully fell to those who had domesticated and made them serviceable. His agreement, and Venetian provision of his escort to Constantinople, an act of submission, secured its independence under the nominal sovereignty of Byzantium in the form of its first Diploma, granted in 584.

Varied and lucrative trading commissions and privileges were consequently conferred on Venice by the Emperor in exchange for the use of its navy and its allegiance, extending its reach far into the Eastern Mediterranean while making it a prominent target of Lombard and Frankish aggression, which were to play a pivotal role in the development of its politics and character.

unmerged(11263) · Oct 21, 2002

Simple answer

HolisticGod: wonderful knowledge for non-Italian writers!

unmerged(9046) · Oct 21, 2002

Holistic,

Nice set up. The depth of your work makes it sound like you were there. Maybe your initials portend of a distant ancester in the world of literature!

Norgesvenn · Oct 21, 2002

Wow! Those are some self-imposed restrictions.

And the writing looks so eminent that I'll have to follow this.

Venice is great fun, and I liked the bits about the galley building and the mercenary soldiery particularly well.

unmerged(5361) · Oct 21, 2002

Cheesuz! You are not playing around are you? Very interesting with the detailed geographic and historic start! Good Show!

Is it not hard to keep track off all those personal rules as you play or do you have system to remember them all?

Storey · Oct 21, 2002

I've managed to not start reading another AAR because of my limited free time but I'm going to have to add this one to my list of must reads. Good luck HolisticGod.

Joe

HolisticGod · Oct 21, 2002

Venice In 1419

3. The Concentration of Rialto

During the Conflict of the Images, between Emperor Leo and Pope Gregory II, a Papal appeal was made to the Lombard King, Liutprand, to dispossess the Imperial magistracy of Ravenna. He swiftly did so, expelling the exarch Paul**** and taking the opportunity to extend his rule far beyond the limits encouraged by the Pope.

Gregory became increasingly alarmed, and when Liutprand occupied the Ducato Ramano he sent a plea to Charles Martel, whose triumph at Tours made him a fixture of Christian Europe. His son, Pippin, was crowned King of Italy and took to the field at the head of the Franks. He routed the Lombards at Ravenna and delivered the city and its environs to the Pope, who granted him the authority of a liege-lord.

Pippin's son, Charlemagne, campaigned against Lombardy in the early 770's and annexed the kingdom in 74. He was crowned Emperor by the Pope, now nearly a figurehead, whom he ordered to expel the Venetians from the Pentapolis as a reprisal for their support of the Byzantine exarch.

As the political situation abroad rapidly disintegrated, the domestic polity of Venice was in a similiar, and related, chaos. Two parties had come into being at the start of the eighth century, one, the democratic, at Jesolo and later Malamocco, championing financial liberties, free civic institutions and the church, which tended to support the Franks. The second, or aristocratic, was centered at Heraclea and produced the largest number candidates for the Dogeship, which it several times attempted to make hereditary, and tended to support Constantinople, the source of its noble titles and prerogatives.

After Charlamagne resolved to realize his title, the commons moved decidedly in favor of Byzantium, but not the aristocratic party itself. The source of democratic power at this time was the Francophil Giovanni, Patriarch of Venice, whose temporal authority held sway over large numbers of the poorer townspeople and fishermen. The pro-Byzantine Doge, Giovanni Galbaio, forced a resolution at Grabo, the see, by way of a general assault. He captured the city in a matter of hours and flung the Patriarch from his palace tower.

While his successor, Fortunatus, a strong-willed and fanatically pro-Frankish democrat, plotted with Obelerio, Tribune of Malamocco, to assassinate the Doge, the opinion of the masses was swayed in favor of the aristocrats so that the greater part of the opposition was expelled before any plans could be brought to fruition.

These political exiles, however, proved even more dangerous in the arms of foreigners, and it was Fortunatus who, having been foiled in his personal, and perhaps justifiable, vendetta, brought Charlemagne's army to bear like a cutlass against the throat of his whole people. The Franks gathered a fleet at Ravenna and sailed on the lagoon, capturing Chioggia without difficulty, and commenced making their way methodically up the complicated network of waterways that had begun to take shape between the islands.

At this time the Twelve Towns had fixed their capital at Malamocco, until recently a neutral compromise between the jostling powers of Heraclea and Jesolo. It was not, however, as immune to easy attack as the central land mass of Rialto, to which the Venetians once again moved. It was here that history favored the weak defenders against their seemingly indomitable foe, for the early grid of the intricate canal system so vital to trade and administration in later years proved baffling and dangerous to Frankish ships. A combination of guerilla warfare and the summer heat on the Lido^^ forced their commander, Pippin, to retire.

Charlamagne signed a treaty with Nicephorus in 810, recognizing the Venetians as subjects of the Eastern empire, while securing their sovereign trading rights in the Adriatic and confirming the concessions made to them under Liutprand. It was a stroke of good fortune that established the independence of a now unified and fixed Venice.

The concentration at Rialto was permanent, and it became the center of a city that would grow to be one of the largest and wealthiest in Europe. The first Doge to be elected there was Angelo Particiaco, a noble from Heraclea, who among other things began construction on the original church of San Marco, whose body he had brought from Alexandria and entombed there. It was the cornerstone of an Empire, and signaled the final step in the transformation of the Twelve Towns into a single Republic.

HolisticGod · Oct 21, 2002

Venice In 1419

Footnotes-Sections 1, 2 and 3

*The twelve townships of the lagoon were Grado, notable for its selection as the seat of the Patriarchate until its transfer to Rialto at the construction of the first church of San Marco, Bibione, Caorle, Jesolo, the site of the treacherous pro-Frankish Democratic Party, Heraclea, the original court and assemblage and the captain of the pro-Byzantine Aristocratic Party, Torcello, Murano, Rialto, at the center of the lagoon, its eventual capital and the later site of the city of Venice, Malamocco, important as a naval resource, Paveglia, Chioggia and Sottomarina.

**From the Latin Dux, meaning "leader."

***The Council was enlarged to a 480 man grand assembly, which eventually was diminished in power by an exclusive and oligarchical electoral committee originally within its power to constitute. Its third manifestation was the infamous Council of Ten, established after the Tiepoline conspiracy in 1310, which adjudicated crimes against the state without trial and often through nefarious means. It came to rule Venice in principle after 1335 and in name after 1434, and generally managed to maintain its influence, with brief curtailments under the Vespuchi (1442-1459) and Second Republic (1460-1466), until it was finally disbanded permanently by Dimitri in 1499. Vestiges of the original Council's electoral framework were essential to the Greek, Illyrian and Populars Constitutions, and can still be seen in the municipal bodies of the Venetian commune.

****He took refuge in Venice and was later restored by Orso, a Doge of the Heraclean, or Byzantine, party, who in return recieved the title of hypatos, and trading rights in Ravenna.

^Romanesque basilica constructed in the ninth century to house the body of St. Mark, who supplanted Theodore as the city's patron c. 812. It was destroyed by fire in 967; rebuilt through the tutulege of Byzantine architechts, completed in c. 1071; substantially expanded and adorned well into the fourteenth century. It remains one of the foremost examples of gothic and eastern convergance in the world.

^^Venice's principle "river," a body of muddy flats that, though safe when well-managed and wisely used by a civilian population, ravages armies and navies-in-action.

Faeelin · Oct 21, 2002

I don't know. Venice produced entire warships in mere HOURS in the 16th century. So those rules seem a bit absurd. The land, diplomacy, and religious rules make sense, however.

I have but one thing ot say to your City. "Esto Perpetua!"

HolisticGod · Oct 21, 2002

OOC:

All,

I left the footnotes out of the first post (corrected), but in the future I'll usually have a compilation of extra information either unsuitable or unnecessary to the main body of text for every two or three sections. I'll also try to post them at the same time as the regular updates, to prevent confusion.

---Let me know how this works-they're there for your convenience.

Apologies for the slow-going (and rather cursory) setup, but I think it's easier for everyone to get their bearings this way. And the back-story is important to the AAR. After this wraps up, either tomorrow or Wednesday, the installments are heavier, more elaborate and (I hope) more engaging.

I'll respond to the OOC when I get home, as my aging Macintosh laptop is having a rough go at displaying these threads. But thanks in advance, to all who've commented so far.

HolisticGod · Oct 21, 2002

OOC:

LD,

I'll be curious to see how well this goes too... The only thing I hate more than working is working for naught.

Francesco,

Thanks... I'm assuming you're Italian, but I hope you'll keep an eye on my use (read: butchery) of the language, topography and culture of your beautiful country.

Stroph,

And one of these days there will come a resounding shout over the hills and valleys reporting the stunning discovery of a dilapidated Sony Vaio in the midst of an atrophied Pompeiian brothel... Followed a few moments later by a second resounding shout over the hills and valleys with an update on the still more stunning discovery that, on reserve battery power for countless generations, it appears to be running an odd bit of software which features little armored figures chasing each other around a map of Europe... Followed a while after by a third resounding shout over the hills and valleys with the rather humdrum discovery, all things considered, that a mummified, unshaven human male was rolled up in the fetal position under a table. His pants, the voice will continue, in what the folks on the other side of the hills and valleys will think to be bad form, are dirty. And he appears to have been sobbing over a picture of his mother.

Norgesvenn,

Appreciated... The restrictions are less daunting than they appear, but they take some getting used to.

Jarlen,

Thanks...

It was at first, but after a while following them became mechanical... Except during the 1430's when I tried to get cute with scheduled levies, campaign restrictions and so forth... Complete disaster.

The list I came up with before trial and error was quite a bit longer, and it made playing on 1 minute=1 month a pause fest.

Joe,

Much obliged-and I know the feeling.

Faeelin,

Venice's largest naval mobilization, and the fastest (comparatively) maritime construction program in history, was organized at the Arsenal during the Fourth Turkish War. Sixteen thousand men worked a primitive assembly line that produced one galley (though I believe it was of the modernized, sea-ship type) a day for one hundred days. It so augmented the fleet that the Venetians annihilated the entire Turkish navy at the battle of Lepanto in 1571.

This was an exception, however. It involved the conscription of a large segment of the regular workforce, confiscation of private ships and materials and the dedication of a people who saw their sun rapidly sinking. Nor would it have been possible without the inspired leadership of Sebastian Venier, the Doge.

Regardless, Venice's production capacity was greater at the turn of the sixteenth century then I'm giving it credit for (but, if things go my way, not by much

), but preserving game balance is a major factor in setting these rules. The AI is infinitely less capable of handling its fleets, even with the attrition cheat, then a competent human player. The only time I've ever seen the computer deploy an effective blockade was during a run with Napoleon's Ambition, when the Spanish and British sealed off the entire coast of France-and made its perimeter several sea zones deep around ports. A few neat maneuvers, such as Byzantium against the Ottomans off The Morea and some of the flashier Russo-Swedish conflicts in the Baltic, don't compensate for its disadvantages.

If I do Volumes Two and Three, I might have to tweak the formula a good deal, but for number One I think it worked out well...

Thanks all around... The next installment will be up this afternoon or evening, but there should be two in all before the night is out.

Eochaid · Oct 21, 2002

OMG! MrT! Come over here!

*Eochaid pulls the librAARian by the sleeves*

See! It looks like someone is trying to steel your title of "verbose guy of the AAR forum"! I think this is the longest post I've ever seen here!

A very nice start, and the background is welcome! I bid you good luck!

HolisticGod · Oct 22, 2002

Venice In 1419

4. Expansion in the Republican Era

The period between 812 and 1204 was one of remarkable growth and vitality for Venice and her burgeoning Empire. It added, in that space, the strategic coast of Dalmatia, and later its inland straits, Tyre and Sidon, Zara and the Adriatic islands to her territorial possessions, and obtained dispensation for a number of specially constituted and self-governing "quarters" in cities throughout the holy land, Asia and Italy. Its material wealth abounded far beyond the limits of its borders, so that it was in addition to richest the most vibrant and diverse in goods of all the cities of Europe.

The Navy of St. Mark was first outfitted for open combat in the late ninth century, to protect its merchant marine from piracy. From that point it became the best equipped, constructed and captained fleet in the Mediterranean, if not the world, well into the later half of the millennium. It served, from time to time, as a ferry for the vying armies of East and West, at great expense to their masters, and was generally at the service of any who could pay for it.

The Venetian army, similarly, was well-supported and typically commanded by the ablest men in the Republic. While small, it served in the gradual acquisition of rich or important towns, and in the occasional defense of the city herself, which was still mostly given over to the fortunes of the lagoon.

Though several wary attempts were made to expanded into the Veneto, the might and alliances of Verona and Padua disuaded her each time from that course, lulled into the security of her maritime superiority. This policy was to have far-reaching consequences, for had she mobilized some League at this juncture, rather then in 1339, it mightn't have forged the powerful coalition of enemies that arose out of the disadvantaged.

Elsewhere, however, her government was sound. In walking a knife's edge between the leagues of perennial crusaders and the Byzantine Empire, the Venetians maintained both their primacy in trade and their income as mercenaries and pilots, and secured a second not insignificant benefit in the uncertainty this caused among potential invaders.

The constant enlargement of economic interests and influence, while certainly a fountainhead of considerable jealousy in peninsular Italy, was handled with care and diplomacy, and was safe in its delivery of handsome rewards to nations and tribes of Germany, Hungary and the Alps, which might otherwise have been inflamed by their relative poverty. Wherever it was impossible for the fleet and standing of the Republic to realize its aims, the ever-ready appeal to avarice was wisely accorded and almost always successful.

This good administration was mostly the work of a young and ubiquitously merited aristocracy, which was not without its vices and failures. For the outward stature of the city, veiled in the pomp of its social life and the decisiveness of its policies, concealed a silent, sedimentary struggle between the two parties brought together in her name, yet still divided over her future.

unmerged(6777) · Oct 22, 2002

Gotta hand it to you HG, that's one kick-ass set of posts so far to work as a perfect set-up to the utter destruction of Venice by the Hungarians and Croats...or did you buy your way out of that one with an unholy alliance with the HRE, Pope or God of Gold?

I'll certainly be reading since I've very much missed your superb writing skills over the past months. Onwards and forever forwards...

HolisticGod · Oct 23, 2002

Venice In 1419

5. Politics and Society in Late Medieval Venice

After the concentration of Rialto, the character of the Republican government was progressively aristocratic. The stalwarts of the democratic party had been discredited by their support of the Franks, and especially by the betrayal of Fortunatus, and the city's newfound security and unity changed its central elector from survival to trade.

In this, the leading men of Venice found consensus. Those who had favored abrogation of the treaties with Byzantium in favor of the growing might in the West had done so out of a perceived necessity, not any greater affection for the rude and uncivilized Catholic world. When the danger had subsided, these men, who were, after all, members of the nobility too, realigned themselves with the majority and with the Empire.

Once the breech over diplomacy was healed, there were few determined differences between them, and at the close of the ninth century the domestic polity was almost exclusively unilateral in its dealings.

This did not mean they were always successful. The chief ambition of the ruling families of Venice had always been the creation of a hereditary Doge, but their several attempts were repulsed, first by their own differences, and then by the collective will of the people.

Though the three primary instigators, the Particiachi, the Candiani and the Orseoli, achieved the office fifteen times* in succession, they were unable to eliminate the concione** or even to check its power sufficiently to prevent it, in 1032, from ostracizing the whole Orseoli***. With this act, the dynastic tendency was rendered dormant for centuries.

The aristocracy did, however, manage to obsolete the general assembly in 1171. After the disastrous war with Emperor Manuel I, which was fostered by a popular outrage at his treatment of Republican citizens, both the army and navy were in ruins, and the trading power of the Diploma had been revoked. Thus sensing a need for greater prudence and experience in deciding matters of state, the people consented to the creation of a deliberative body intended, ostensibly, to represent their interests.

This early constitutional reform resulted in a 480 member council elected in each of the six divisions of the city (taken from the original Twelve Towns), which on the conclusion of its term appointed two deputies for each sestiere to nominate the successors. As this body adopted the duty of electing all the officers of the state it greatly reduced the constituent influence of the citizenry, who acted merely to confirm. And as it was more and more delivered into the hands of the aristocracy, it became the germ of the Maggior Consiglio, and was rendered strictly oligarchic in 1297.

A second triumph for the noble class were its laws limiting the authority of the Doge and taking on his regal trappings itself. In the space of the eleventh and twelfth centuries two offices, the consiglieri ducali (privy council) and the pregadi (the invited, or the senate), came to assume many of his duties, and often superseded him, as they did in forbidding the election of a a ducal consort in 1032.

These conflicts and reforms were rare, however, and largely foreign to the daily lives of individual Venetians. They had come to obtain unprecedented wealth and power, which was delineated to all but the poorest classes, and these had gone to the establishment of libraries, schools, hospitals, entertainment, public vessels and churches.

In 1000, the population of Venice exceeded eighty-thousand on the islands, and some five thousand more farming and developing the coast. The greater part of these occupied Rialto, which had become an ornate and unsleeping jumble of markets, docks, palaces, temples and carnivals.

In addition, Venetians in the hundreds of thousands^, if not the millions, occupied trading quarters at the center of every major city on the Eastern Mediterranean. All of them were considerably better off then the average townspeople of Europe, with access to the spices, silks and metal-works of the East and the foods and textiles of the West. They were comparatively well-educated in the first glimmerings of the humanist tradition, and, while it was far from an aggressively egalitarian regime, their Mercantile Republic proffered riches and glory at the square of every town.

In their values, by contemporary standards, the subjects of St. Mark were enlightened, leaving marriage, rituals of courtship and family life, except in the leading classes, to individuals. While its reputation for sexual permissiveness and even encouragement was made in a later age, it was even then relaxed in its communal views of intimate acts. The famous Prohibitions, though written and published here, were not, it seems, widely read by the general populace.

Though painting and the other fine arts were slow to take hold in Venice, the styles which would influence such masters as Titian, Tintoretto and Vecchio were already fermenting in the schools and studios of the Piazzetta. While she never produced a genius of the highest order in any form, she acquired the greatest collection of sculpture and manuscripts in the world, and was for centuries the most consistent supporter of the expressive crafts.

The early architecture of the city was a mix of east and west, Gothic and Renascence, and she had yet, with the exception of the Arsenal, to construct a truly unique or daunting civic building. But the flavor and sumptuousness of her palaces, cathedrals and unplanned avenues, together with the special, appealing form those avenues took, made her even then one of the most beautiful and captivating metropolises in the world.

6. The 4th Crusade

Despite damage done to their trade and military by Manuel in 1171, Venetian commercial interests and maritime might flourished at the end of the twelfth century. It was, by 1200, the best choice to provision transport and supply for the 4th Crusade, proclaimed at Soissons. At a cost of 85,000 silver Marks of Cologne, she agreed to convey 4,500 horses, 9,000 knights and 20,000 infantry across and down the Adriatic.

The money was not forthcoming, however, and Doge Dandolo postponed the receipt in exchange for crusader support in the reduction of Zara and the recapture of Dalmatia, which had not been subdued since their general revolt 1166. He personally commanded the joint forces in this task, which was accomplished by 1203.

Here, however, the leaders of the crusade resolved to sack Constantinople for private gain, which proved momentous for the course of history. Thanks largely to the Venetians, Constantinople fell in 1204 and a Latin emperor, Baldwin of Flanders, was established there.

At the settlement, Venice received a full half quater of Imperial possessions, among which were the Cyclades, the Sporades, the islands and shores of the Adriatic, the littoral of Thessaly and the shores of the Euxine and Propontis. To cement her control over Black Sea, the Eastern Mediterranean and the trade routes therein, she also purchased Crete from the marquis of Monferrat.

This expansion, together with the reestablishment of control over the Illyrian coast, was the single largest in the history of the Republic up to the fifteenth century, and gave her nearly complete control over commerce in Europe.

It was to be the source of much triumph-and defeat.

HolisticGod · Oct 23, 2002

Venice In 1419

Footnotes-Sections 5 and 6

*The Orseoli 3, the Candiani 5 and the Particiachi 7

**An assembly of the whole population of the lagoon, which elected the officers of the state and decided matters of great importance; apparently convened by the Doge and other notable persons, though no specific record exists

***While a wise policy on the whole, it should be noted that this included many men of the same caliber as their ancestor, Pietro Orseolo II the Great, who defeated the powerful Liburnian pirate fleets in 1000, taking Lagosta and Curzola and assuming the Duchy of Dalmatia.

^The sovereign Venetian population in Constantinople before 1371 had reached 200,000

HolisticGod · Oct 23, 2002

OOC:

Eochaid,

Brevity is the soul of wit they say...

Which I've always found to be remarkably insightful, particularly since I'd previously considered brevity to be part of the dialectic or ubersoul of cleverness, which, though subtly, is quite incompatible with being the soul of wit. Unless one grants the principles of dualism on face, of course, but such metaphysical dribble is as laughable as the Postmodernists these days...

It reminds of something Gibbon used to tell me about declining and falling, which he'd originally written as reclining and falling and then abandoned as too personal. Now, while strolling on the Moors he'd come by a little town in the province of...

MrT,

Well, now you've gone and spoiled it... Yes, Venice is reduced to Veneto by Croatia and the Turks by 1423 and annexed by Hungary a year later...

This first volume is a history of Venice to 1467, but the later chapters are a bit thin...

A History of Venice: Volume One

Beware of the HoG

Beware of the HoG

The Father of AARland

Beware of the HoG

Sergeant

CatAARstroph1c moderator

LurkAAR

Taskenspiller Extraordinaire

StoreytellAAR

Beware of the HoG

Beware of the HoG

Banned

Beware of the HoG

Beware of the HoG

CareBear

Beware of the HoG

Field Marshal

Beware of the HoG

Beware of the HoG

Beware of the HoG