Of the northern states only three deserve special mention |Genoa.| at this time. Genoa, isolated in the north-western corner and surrounded by mountains, plays a very slight part in the general history of Italy, though it has some considerable importance as commanding the direct route from Provence to the peninsula. The energies of its citizens were mainly absorbed in the acquisition of wealth by eastern trade, in maintaining wars with Pisa and Venice, and in the incessant feuds of the great families of Doria and Spinola. Milan, which had long held a predominant position among |Milan.| the Lombard towns, was already beginning to lose its republican independence. There, as in Florence, class divisions were mixed up with the quarrels of factions. In 1259 the Guelf leader, Martino della Torre, headed the citizens in a successful struggle against the Ghibelline nobles, and took advantage of his victory to assume the lordship of the city. The neighbouring towns of Lodi, Como, Vercelli, and Bergamo fell one after another under the rule of the Della Torre. But in 1277 a revolution was effected by the Ghibellines under the Archbishop of Milan, Otto Visconti, to whom the lordship of the city was transferred, and from whom it passed on his death in 1295 to his nephew Matteo Visconti, the ancestor of the later dukes of Milan. But the Visconti dynasty was not yet permanently established, and in 1302 a Guelf league was formed among the chief Lombard towns which forced Matteo to withdraw, and Guido della Torre became the ruler of Milan.
Venice, the last of the important northern states, was even |Venice.| more isolated from Italy than Genoa, both by geography and by its absorbing interests in the Levant. The overthrow of the Greek Empire in 1204 had given Venice a commanding position in the east, but the restoration of 1261 had raised a very formidable rival in Genoa, and for more than a century the two republics were engaged in a series of costly and exhausting wars. But the main interest of Venetian history at this time lies in the building up of that oligarchical constitution which gave to Venice a vigour and consistency of political action quite unique in Italy, and enabled her in the fifteenth century to establish a very formidable power on the mainland.
The institutions of Venice, though sufficiently alien from |Constitution of Venice.| modern usages, were simplicity itself as compared with those of Florence. This simplicity is due primarily to the entire absence in Venice of a landed nobility, whose power had to be overthrown in other Italian cities by a series of revolts on the part of the citizens, and also to the fact that Venice remained completely untouched by the faction fights of Guelfs and Ghibellines. At the head of the state stood the doge, elected for life, and in early |The Doge.| times possessed of almost autocratic power. But his authority had been gradually limited by the compulsory association of councillors, by the exaction of a solemn oath on election (promissione ducale), and by the creation of new institutions. By the fourteenth century the doge had become an ornamental sovereign, surrounded by great pomp and ceremonial, presiding in all assemblies, but possessed of no power of initiation and of no means of exerting more than personal influence. A doge of strong character might still mould the destinies of Venice, but it was by persuading his colleagues, not by the exercise of any regal authority. The election of the doge rested originally with the whole people. In 1172 a council, which grew into the Maggior Consiglio, was intrusted with the task, which was gradually delegated to small committees chosen in various ways. At last, in 1268, the elaborate system was adopted which lasted till the fall of the republic. All members of the Grand Council over thirty years of age drew balls from an urn, and thirty of these balls were gilt. The thirty who drew the gilt balls were reduced to nine by a second drawing of lots. The nine elected forty, seven votes being a necessary minimum. The forty were reduced by lot to twelve, who elected twenty-five, each receiving at least nine votes. The twenty-five were reduced by lot to nine, who elected forty-five, who must each receive seven votes. The forty-five were reduced to eleven, who chose forty-one, each to receive nine votes. The forty-one then took an oath and proceeded to vote for the vacant office. The voting was repeated until some candidate had received at least twenty-five votes, and he became doge. The form of demanding popular approval of the election did not become obsolete until the election of Francesco Foscari in 1423.
With the doge were associated six ducal councillors, who were necessarily consulted on every subject and without whom the doge could do nothing. In fact, the ducal functions were really discharged, not by the doge, but by a committee of seven of whom the doge was one. The Collegio or cabinet of ministers (savii), conducted the routine work of administration, and prepared all business for the other public bodies. The business of every department passed through the Collegio, in which the six savii grandi presided in weekly terms. The Quarantia, or Forty, was originally created in the twelfth century to act as a permanent senate, but it was gradually limited to judicial functions, and became the great law-court of Venice. The functions of the senate fell to the Pregadi, a body of a hundred and sixty members, whose name was derived from the originally voluntary consultation of prominent citizens by the doge. The Pregadi became a permanent part of the constitution in 1229. Their chief business was the first consideration of all legislative proposals, the appointment of ambassadors, and the general supervision of foreign affairs.
At the basis of the constitution was the Maggior Consiglio, |The Great Council.| which had gradually taken the place of the primary assembly of all citizens. The council was originally elective, and its rise was a natural result of the growth of Venetian population. But in 1297 a law was carried which finally changed the government of Venice from a democracy to a close oligarchy. A list was drawn up of all who had sat in the Great Council for the last four years, and their names were put up to ballot in the Quarantia. All who received twelve votes were to be members of the council. Three electors were to be appointed every year to make a list of any other candidates, and their names, if approved by the doge and his councillors, were to be balloted by the Quarantia. For a few years the addition of names was frequent, though few candidates were successful unless their ancestors had at some time or other had a seat in the council. But in 1315 the names of all eligible candidates were drawn up once for all and placed in a book, and in 1319 the three annual electors were abolished. Henceforth membership of the Great Council became a hereditary privilege, and the admission of a member’s son as soon as he had reached the age of twenty-five was regarded as a matter of course. The serrata del Maggior Consiglio, or closing of the Great Council, divided the Venetian population into two sharply defined classes: the nobles, who had the privilege of membership, and the lower classes, who were for ever excluded from any voice in the government.
Although the abolition of popular election in 1297 was a change to which things had long been tending, it could hardly take place without exciting considerable discontent. Several conspiracies were formed against the new oligarchy, and after the failure of a formidable plot under Bajamonte Tiepolo in 1310, it was determined to devise some new machinery for the detection and repression of future revolts. Ten members were chosen by |Council of Ten, 1319.| the Great Council to act as a sort of committee of public safety. So useful did they prove that they were renewed year after year, and in 1335 they were made a permanent part of the constitution. The Council really consisted of seventeen, as the doge and his six councillors were associated with the Ten. The latter were elected yearly, and could not hold office again till a year had elapsed. The proper function of the Ten was to act as a court of exceptional jurisdiction, somewhat like the Star Chamber in England. In this capacity they served as the efficient bulwark of the Venetian aristocracy, and coerced the inferior citizens into passive acquiescence in the rule of their superiors. As time went on, the Ten became more and more powerful, and began to interfere in the general conduct of affairs. So great became the passion for secrecy in the Venetian government, that in the sixteenth century the Ten began to delegate their functions to a sub-committee, the three Inquisitors of State.
For sixty years Italy had been allowed to take its own course without any attempt at interference on the part of its nominal suzerain in Germany. The news that Henry of |Henry VII. in Italy, 1310-1313.| Luxemburg, elected in 1308, was preparing to visit Italy and to revive the imperial power, made a profound impression in the peninsula, where the Guelf and Ghibelline parties were as active and bellicose as ever. These party names had by this time ceased to express any essential difference of principle. The imperial suzerainty in the north, and the papal suzerainty in the south were equally shadowy, and neither seemed substantial enough to fight for. The idea that the Guelfs were the champions of republican liberty as against aggressive despots, had ceased to have any real foundation in facts. A Della Torre was just as dangerous to the liberties of Milan as a Visconti. Since the Popes had called in the House of Anjou, and especially since a Pope had fixed his residence in Avignon, it was impossible to contend that the Guelfs were the champions of Italian independence against foreign domination. The anomalous relations of Italian parties were reflected in the equally anomalous position of Henry VII. A German prince elected by German princes to the throne of the Hohenstaufen, he seemed destined to revive the principles of Ghibellinism and to assume the headship of a revived Ghibelline faction. On the other hand, Henry was French by education and sympathies, he owed his election to the clerical partisans of France acting under papal influence, and he was accompanied in his march by legates whom the Pope had authorised to confer upon him the imperial crown in Rome. It was no empty pretence of moderation, but the expression of a real policy, when Henry professed that he belonged to neither faction and intended to act as a mediator between them. And his actions corresponded with his professions. As he passed through the Lombard cities he insisted on the return of all political exiles, whichever party they belonged to. In Milan, where he received the iron crown of Lombardy (January 6, 1311), he recalled Matteo Visconti without overthrowing the rule of Guido della Torre. But the Italians themselves had no sympathy with his impartiality. Henry VII., like most of his German predecessors, was in need of money, and the attempt to levy a contribution of 100,000 ducats provoked a rising in Milan. The rising was suppressed, but it resulted in an inevitable alliance between the Emperor and the Ghibellines. Guido della Torre and his family were driven into exile, and an attempted rebellion in the Guelf cities was suppressed. Brescia alone made any lengthy resistance to the German army. Before leaving Lombardy, Henry appointed imperial vicars in the chief cities, and in Milan he intrusted the office to Matteo Visconti, thus finally establishing the dynasty which ruled Milan for a century and a half, and at one time seemed likely to unite the whole of northern Italy under its sway.
From this time the difficulties of Henry VII. rapidly increased. The force of circumstances had compelled him to become a Ghibelline against his will. The hopes which that party built upon his arrival are expressed in the De Monarchia of Dante. Peace could only be bestowed upon Italy by a strong monarchy, and such a monarchy could only be established by a German king with the traditions of the Empire at his back. But the more enthusiastic the Ghibellines became, the more resolute was the opposition of the Guelfs. Robert of Naples, the close ally of Clement V., did not venture to embark on open hostilities, but he was rendered both jealous and uneasy by Henry’s progress, and did not hesitate to intrigue against him. Henry VII. succeeded in obtaining the lordship of Genoa and Pisa, the latter of which was always on the Ghibelline side. But Florence, the leading Guelf city in Tuscany, obstinately refused to admit the German king or his troops, and he was compelled to pass on one side on his journey to Rome. There he found the greater part of the city occupied by the Guelf family of Orsini, assisted by a Neapolitan force. A battle would have been necessary to obtain possession of St. Peter’s, and the coronation ceremony had to take place in the church of St. John Lateran (June 29, 1312). Henry VII. was now convinced that the reduction of Italy to obedience could only be accomplished by force of arms. King Robert had as yet avoided any declaration of war, and it would have been dangerous to attack Naples while the Guelfs in the north were strong enough to cut off communications with Germany. It was decided to strike terror into the Guelfs by the reduction of Florence. The German troops advanced to the city walls in September, 1312, but they found them too strong and too well garrisoned to venture on an attack. Henry retreated to Pisa to await reinforcement. Against Robert of Naples, who was preparing to give active assistance to Florence, he issued the imperial ban, and concluded an alliance with the Aragonese king of Sicily. Henry had commenced his march to meet the Neapolitan troops, when he suddenly died of |Death of Henry VII., 1313.| fever at Buonconvento, twelve miles from Siena (August 24, 1313). The Ghibellines believed that he had been poisoned by a Dominican monk in administering the sacrament. The schemes of Henry VII. were entirely out of date: the Holy Roman Empire, as Dante understood it, was already an anachronism: and the Emperor’s death is only important as marking the failure of the last serious attempt to reduce Italy to obedience to a German king. The forces of disunion were strong enough to break up any monarchy; it was only an added weakness that the monarchy was claimed by a foreigner.
CHAPTER III
FRANCE UNDER THE LATER CAPETS, 1270-1328
Progress of the French Monarchy—Its difficulties—Philip III.—The inheritance to Toulouse, Champagne, and Navarre—Wars with Castile and Aragon—Accession of Philip IV. and the importance of his reign—His War with England and Flanders—His relations with the Papacy—The suppression of the Templars—His policy of annexation—His domestic government—The King’s Court and its departments: the conseil du roi, the chambre des comptes, and the Parlement of Paris—The States-General—Financial maladministration—Death of Philip IV.—Louis X.—His death and the succession question—The Salic Law—The short reigns of Philip V. and Charles IV.