Commune of Venice

Who rules

Name

Enrico Dandolo

Title

Doge of Venice (dux Venecie, Dalmacie atque Chroacie)

Since

Elected 21 June 1192 (it.wikipedia), after his predecessor Orio Mastropiero died on 14 June 1192 (Treccani)

Born

About 1107, so about 92 on 1 January 1200

Family

Dandolo of the San Luca parish (confinio); son Ranieri, brother Andrea; his second wife Contessa Minotto ran the family property in 1183 (it.wikipedia); whether she is alive in 1200 is not pinned

Confidence

high

Treccani, Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (DBI), DANDOLO, Enrico; it.wikipedia

Overlord

None. Venice acknowledges no lord: the Empire's kingdom of Italy does not reach the lagoon, and the old Byzantine tie is only a matter of titles and privileges.

What the realm holds

• The lagoon duchy (dogado): Grado, Caorle, Cittanova (Eraclea), Equilo (Jesolo), Torcello with Burano, Mazzorbo and Ammiana, Murano, the Rialto islands (the city), the Lido and Malamocco, Chioggia, Brondolo and Fossone, Cavarzere on the Adige and Loreo near the Po mouths
• The salt pans of Chioggia and the lagoon
• Quarter, churches, quays and trading rights in Constantinople (chrysobull of Alexios III Angelos, November 1198, renewing the privileges of 1082)
• A third of Tyre and a quarter in Acre in the kingdom of Jerusalem (the Pactum Warmundi of 1123-24)
• The oaths of fidelity of the Istrian coast towns (sworn 1145-1150: Capodistria, Isola, Pirano, Parenzo, Rovigno, Umago, Cittanova, Pola) (fri records the towns)
• Ossero and Cherso and Arbe in the Kvarner, and the Frankopan counts of Veglia as Venetian vassals (fri records the islands)

How it was acquired

The duchy is the old Byzantine province of the lagoons, independent in practice since the ninth century; the bounds from Grado to Cavarzere and Loreo are those of the Pactum Lotharii (840). The commune (Commune Veneciarum) and its councils grew under Doge Sebastiano Ziani (1172-78). Dandolo was chosen in June 1192 as an old, blind and respected compromise between the great families and the merchant body (Treccani).

Allies and rivals

Treaties with Verona and Treviso (1192), with Pisa (1196) (Treccani), an agreement with Treviso on legal procedure (1198) (it.wikipedia, Storia di Treviso). Pisa is the rival in the Adriatic: it backed the rebels of Zara (1188) and seized Pola in 1195 until the Venetians drove it out (it.wikipedia). Hungary under King Emeric holds Zara. The patriarch of Aquileia is a neighbour and rival on the Friulian shore (a pact follows in 1200, likely course).

The pope wants Venetian ships for the crusade.

The realm that morning

Dandolo rules with his councils from the ducal palace at San Marco. The Great Council (Maggior Consiglio) and the Minor Council of the doge's councillors govern day to day; a council of Forty (Quarantia) existed since Ziani's time; the people's assembly (concio, arengo) in San Marco still approves great decisions, as it will approve the crusade treaty in 1201. The doge's oath (promissione) of 1192 is the oldest that survives: he swore to rule by the laws, to act with the consent of the Minor Council and the majority of the Great Council, not to meddle in choosing the patriarch of Grado or the lagoon bishops, and not to deal privately with foreign powers (Treccani).

The patriarch of Grado, the Venetian church's own head, is Giovanni Signolo according to the campaign notes [thin]; he lives in Venice at San Silvestro, and the lagoon bishops of Castello, Torcello, Chioggia, Caorle, Equilo and Cittanova are under him (Church map records). The papal legate Soffredo, cardinal of S. Prassede, was sent to Venice in 1198 to win it for the crusade; whether he is still in the city that morning is not pinned (campaign notes).

On the mainland Venice governs only the duchy's own strips of shore; Mestre and the land behind the lagoon are Treviso's, the Brenta mouths and Oriago Padua's.

Wealth

Shipping and long-distance trade with Constantinople, the Levant and Egypt (Innocent III let the Venetians trade in goods other than arms, iron and timber with Egypt in 1198 [fair]), salt from Chioggia and the lagoon sold up the rivers, fish, glass, the Rialto market, and the tolls on goods entering the lagoon. Money: the Venetian penny (denaro); the silver grosso is dated to about 1193-94 by most accounts, but some numismatists put its first striking in 1201-02 to pay the crusaders (not pinned).

Military

The fleet is raised from the parishes and the shipowners and commanded by the doge or his kin; Venice fought Pisa in the Adriatic and the rebels of Zara in the 1180s and 1190s, and in 1193 Dandolo recovered Pago and the Kvarner islands but not Zara (it.wikipedia). No reliable figure for ships or men in 1199-1200.

Threats

• Zara in Hungarian hands and Hungarian ambitions on the Dalmatian coast
• Pisan ships and Pisan friends in the Adriatic
• The patriarch of Aquileia and the Friulian lords on the eastern shore
• The mainland communes (Padua, Treviso) if they choke the river trade or the salt
• The crusade, which the pope wants Venice to carry and which will cost and pay enormously

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

In 1200

1. 1200 (day not pinned)A pact between Venice and Patriarch Pellegrino II of Aquileia (Treccani lists a treaty with the patriarch in 1200).Depends on: The patriarch needing peace on his Venetian flank while his war with Treviso goes to arbitration in spring 1200. Stopped by: A Venetian quarrel with the patriarch over the Friulian shore or the Istrian towns.

Later, on the likely course

1. Early 1201Six envoys of the crusade barons (Geoffrey of Villehardouin among them) reach Venice and ask for ships; the treaty is sealed in April 1201.Depends on: The crusade going ahead under Theobald of Champagne (elected at Ecry on 28 November 1199) and choosing the sea route. Stopped by: The crusade collapsing, or the barons choosing Genoa or Pisa.
2. 1202Dandolo takes the cross; the crusade fleet sails against Zara (November 1202).Depends on: The crusaders failing to pay the sum agreed in 1201. Stopped by: Full payment, or a Venetian settlement with Hungary over Zara.

Places of note

• Ducal palace and San Marco: Seat of the doge and councils
• Chioggia salt works: Second town of the duchy

Where the sources disagree

• Election date: it.wikipedia gives 21 June 1192; some lists give 1 June 1192. Treccani places the election after Orio Mastropiero's death on 14 June 1192, which fits 21 June.
• campaign notes name the patriarch of Grado as Giovanni Signolo [thin]; nothing found against it. Part 11 ruling 11 says the name is the campaign's to fix.

Evidence: Dandolo's life, oath and treaties are well documented (Treccani DBI); the exact councils' membership in 1200 and the grosso's date are not.

On the map: The duchy was islands, littoral strips and lagoon; the modern comuni used here take in mainland ground that was not Venetian in 1200, above all Mestre and Marghera inside the comune of Venezia (Treviso's in 1200) and the inland parts of Jesolo, Eraclea and Caorle. The Istrian and Kvarner rights are in fri's records and are not drawn here.

Primary sources for this realm

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

• History of the bishops of Salona and Split, by Thomas the Archdeacon, Thomas of Split (about 1266). Written two generations later by a Split churchman born about 1200. Read online
• History of the doges of Venice (about 1229, with a continuation). The earliest surviving Venetian narrative close to the events. Read online
• The Conquest of Constantinople, Robert de Clari, knight of Picardy (about 1205 to 1216). A rank-and-file crusader's account that begins with the preaching of the crusade and the taking of the cross in 1199 to 1200 by the counts of Flanders, Blois and Champagne and by the Picard lords, among them Peter of Amiens, Robert's own lord, then the negotiations with Venice. Read online
• The Conquest of Constantinople (Villehardouin), Geoffrey of Villehardouin (about 1207 to 1213). Opens with the preaching of Fulk of Neuilly and the tournament at Ecry (28 November 1199) where Theobald III of Champagne and Louis of Blois took the cross, then the taking of the cross by Baldwin of Flanders, Hugh of Saint-Pol, Geoffrey of Perche and others through early 1200, the assemblies at Soissons and Compiegne in 1200, and the six envoys sent to Venice in the winter of 1200 to 1201. Read online
• The Registers of Pope Innocent III for 1199 to 1201, Innocent III and the papal chancery (22 February 1199 to 21 February 1201). The pope's outgoing letters for the year, in his chancery's own copy, touching nearly every realm in the atlas. Read online
• Charters of the kingdom of Croatia, Dalmatia and Slavonia, volume 2, 1101 to 1200 (documents of 1101 to 1200, edited 1904). The Croatian and Dalmatian charters to 1200: the acts of Duke Andrew as lord of Croatia and Dalmatia (1197 to 1204), the Hungarian kings' grants, the Templars and the bishops of Zagreb, Split, Zadar and Trogir, the communal statutes of the coastal towns, and the papal letters of 1200 to Emeric about Ban Kulin of Bosnia and heresy. Read online
• Documents on the Early Commercial and Political History of Venice, including the Partitio Romaniae of 1204 (documents 814 to 1299, edited by G. L. F. Tafel and G. M. Thomas, 3 vols (Vienna, 1856 to 1857)). Volume 1 (814 to 1205) prints Venice's treaties with Byzantium, the chrysobull of 1198 to Venice with its list of imperial provinces, the Venetian treaty with the crusaders of April 1201, and the Partitio terrarum imperii Romaniae of late 1204, which divides the Empire by its fiscal districts and so records the provincial structure (themes, episkepseis, estates) that was in place in 1200. Read online
• Greek Acts and Documents of the Middle Ages, Sacred and Secular (documents of the 9th to 15th centuries, edited by F. Miklosich and J. Muller, 6 vols (Vienna, 1860 to 1890)). Volume 3 (Acta et diplomata res Graecas Italasque illustrantia, 1865) prints the imperial chrysobulls to Venice, including Alexios III's of November 1198 with its list of the provinces and towns of the Empire where Venetians traded, the best single picture of the imperial provinces as they stood on 1 January 1200, together with the Pisan and Genoese privileges. Read online
• Documents on the older commercial and political history of the Republic of Venice, part 1, 814 to 1205 (documents of 814 to 1205, edited 1856). Venice's treaties and privileges in full text. Read online