The great council included all the nobles who had attained the age of twenty-five. We have already seen the artifices by which this noble body shut the door of the assembly against all whose names were not registered in the Golden Book. But during the famous war of Chioggia the door was again unbarred; and faithful to her promise Venice admitted into her nobility those thirty citizens who were adjudged to have exerted themselves most strenuously in defence of their country. In this illustrious assembly the real sovereignty of Venice existed; from the great council emanated the senate and other councils; and it absorbed all other assemblies, since only its own members were eligible to the important departments of government. Its peculiar office was to make or repeal laws; to ballot for magistrates; and to approve of, or annul, the taxes proposed by the senate. The residue of the sovereign functions it was content to leave to the senate; and as the senators were themselves members of the council no great risk was incurred of any violent collision.
Bronze Well in the Ducal Palace, Venice
The chief restrictions imposed upon the nobles related to their intercourse with foreign powers. They were forbidden to acquire foreign property; to accept foreign presents; to hold communication with any foreign ambassador. All intermarriages of themselves and their children with foreigners were prohibited; but as too strict an adherence to this prohibition might have deprived the state of advantageous alliances, an ingenious evasion was contrived; and when the daughter of a Venetian noble was sought by a foreign potentate, the state adopted her as its own, and gave her in marriage as the daughter of St. Mark. Attempts were made from time to time to prohibit the nobles from trading; but the impolicy of such a restriction in a commercial state was too strongly felt to render the interdiction available.
The senate, which originally consisted of sixty members, elected annually by the great council from their own body, was afterwards increased by the addition of sixty extraordinary members: and the admission of various public functionaries, in virtue of their office, at length swelled this body to three hundred. To the senate the immediate functions of government were entrusted; and they deliberated and decided upon many important points without any reference to the great council. They made war or peace; entered into treaties; appointed ambassadors and commanders; coined money; raised loans; and regulated the distribution of the finances. But they had no authority to make laws or impose taxes, unless these were afterwards approved and confirmed by the great council.
The executive power was vested in the seigniory which consisted of the doge and the six red counsellors nominated by the great council, one for every quarter of the city. To these were associated the three chiefs of the criminal quarantia, and sixteen sages; and this assembly of twenty-six was styled “the college.” They gave audiences to ambassadors of foreign princes; received memorials and manifestoes; and opened all public despatches, which they were bound to transmit for the perusal of the senate. To them also belonged the convoking of the senate; and by them the resolutions of the senate were to be effectuated.
The supreme judicial authority was lodged in a criminal tribunal of forty judges, and two civil tribunals, each also consisting of forty. These judges were all nominated from among the patricians by the great council; those of the criminal quarantia were ex-officio members of the senate; and as the judges of the civil courts passed on to the criminal, all became senators in rotation. These tribunals formed courts of appeal from others of inferior jurisdiction; and administered justice according to the civil law, modified by statutes and local customs. Their proceedings were encumbered by formalities, and were consequently tardy; but their decisions (which were given by ballot) are admitted to have evinced sagacity and integrity. In criminal matters, indeed, the friends of the accused were permitted to use private influence with the judges; but such culpable attempts at the perversion of justice were strictly forbidden in civil proceedings.
A Venetian Nobleman
[1454 A.D.]