The Rise of Venice During the Renaissance - Essay Example

__________ ID: _____ ID: ______ Venice Trade Ships and Shipmen "It was through trade that the Venetians prospered and accumulated wealth by establishing monopolies and using the crusades as a tool to increase their trading power". (2006a) According to Vidal Gore, "The Venetians never wanted an empire, they just wanted to do business... and business did flourish in sixteenth-century Venice. Venice was indeed the marketplace of the world. Its location on the lagoons and its unique connection with the sea distinguished it among the great commercial centers of the Renaissance. A maritime power of trading emporium, it survived for a thousand years as an independent city-state protected from internal strife and foreign invasion. It gained its power and prosperity neither from the quantity of lands owned by its participate nor from a powerful military force but solely from the mercantile activities of its residents". (Bernstein, 1998, p. 11) The rise of Venice started with the advent of using land route to Northern Europe, when Venetians started to make money by selling salt, which they used to get by dried seawater and fish for their livelihood. This livelihood gradually took the form of profession when by using trading savvy they began trading up the rivers. "With the rise of Byzantium, east-west trade expanded. With this expansion Venetians promoted as middlemen, selling goods from the East to consumers in the West and ultimately appeared as Merchants. Merchants then ran a profitable triangle by exporting timber from Venice to Egypt, then from Egypt they used to export gold to Byzantium and finally bring luxury goods to Venice. As this went round and round, Venice amassed capital and its mercantile fleet grew to be the biggest in the Mediterranean". (Steves Rick) Most of the Venetians who later engaged in trading or shipping were the citizens of those little cities, which were located on the coast of northwestern Europe. The mediaeval shipmen were not permitted to eat any kind of meat except fish. "For those shipmen who lived away from the coast and from the rivers, this meant a diet of eggs or nothing at all. A new discovery was made when early in the thirteenth century a Dutch fisherman explored a way of catching 'herring', a fish that could be transported to distant points. This created another difficulty for those who tried to earn their livelihood this way as that fish could only be caught during a few months each year so, the ships would have been idle during the rest of the time unless they had found another occupation. They were then used to carry the wheat of northern and central Russia to southern and western Europe. On the return voyage they used to bring spices from India, silks, carpets and Oriental rugs from Venice and Genoa to Bruges and Hamburg and Bremen". (2006c) Venetians started their careers as salt-boilers and fishermen, and were dependent on the mainland for the materials of life. There was no seaport in the neighbourhood to send its vessels for the salt which they prepared: they were forced to fetch everything that they required for themselves. They became seamen by necessity: they almost lived upon the water. As their means improved, and as their wants expanded, they bought fields and pastures on the mainland; they extended their commerce, and made long voyages. They learnt in the dock-yards of Constantinople the art of building tall ships; they conquered the pirates of the Adriatic Sea along with the merchants of Syria, Egypt, Barbary, and Spain. Venice Shipbuilding It was in 1320 that the Arsenal became Venice's premier shipbuilding facility at a time when most of Europe had no manufacturing more efficient than the guild system, the slow and tradition-bound way craftsmen had of passing on skills to their sons or apprentices while monopolizing production and sale of craft pieces in a given region. Arsenal at that time served as the shipbuilding centre as a munitions-making industrial powerhouse that allowed the state of Venice to be a world power for 600 years. Peery writes in his article, "During its peak it produced one galley per day and employed some 16,000 workers in a city of 160,000 people. Venice had no army to speak of. If it needed one it bought one to use temporarily. It strength was in its fleets. They were its defense and its offense. It was those fleets that enabled the Republic to project its power into the Adriatic, Eastern and Western Mediterranean, and beyond". (Peery, La Serenissima) "The Arsenal had expanded by the fifteenth century to occupy a huge site of over 60 acres at the eastern end of the island the largest industrial complex of medieval Europe, including a state shipbuilding yard, dry and wet docks, ordnance with cannon casting and forging, rope and sail factories and gunpowder mills. At its peak it employed an elite corps of over 16,000 skilled workmen, the 'arsenalotti'. Here they could convert all the raw material, timber, linen, hemp, tar and iron ore into armed galleys in a well-organized system of specialized covered yards on a production line basis. The high status of the Arsenal was indicated by its administration through a Senate Board directly responsible to the Doge. A fighting galley could be commissioned in a week; as each one was towed out through the Arsenal gates the cordage, arms, mortars, bread everything needed on board were loaded on to it from the windows of the adjoining buildings where it passed into the Lagoon". (Black, 1998, p. 10) "By the 16th century the Arsenal was the most powerful and efficient ships and munitions manufacturer in the world. It was capable of producing one fully equipped merchant or military vessel per day, whereas production of similar sized and featured ships elsewhere in Europe took months. Shipbuilding was slower and less efficient even in the seas-oriented states of England and Spain than in Venice. The Arsenal employees were directly engaged in producing ships and the rope, oars, cloth, storage containers, weapons and other goods they required and often lived close by, in the buildings around the shipyard". (Shipping1) Things Venice traded "The Venetians at first had only timber and slaves to offer in exchange for the wondrous fabrics and rare spices of the East. In raw produce the Venetians, therefore, were driven to invent; they manufactured furniture and woollen cloth, armour, and glass. It is evident, from the old names of the streets, that Venice formerly was one great workshop; it was also a great market city. The crowds of pilgrims resorting to Rome to visit the tombs of the martyrs, had suggested to the Government the idea of Fairs which were held within the city at stated times in which Venetians actively participated by establishing rival fair in honour of St. Mark, whose remains, revered even by the Moslems, had been smuggled out of Alexandria in a basket of pork. They made religion subservient to commerce and declined to make commerce subservient to religion. This might be because of the reason that the Pope forbade them to trade with infidels: but the infidel, trade was their life". (2006b) "The fleets of the Venetians, like the Phoenicians of old, sailed in all the European waters, from the wheat fields of the Crimea to the ice-creeks of the Baltic. In that sea the pirates were at length extinct; a number of cities along its shores were united in a league. Bruges in Flanders was the emporium of the Northern trade, and was supplied by Venetian vessels with the commodities of the South. The Venetians also travelled over Europe, and established their financial colonies in all great towns. The cash of Europe was in their hands; and the sign of three golden balls declared that Lombards lent money within". (2006b) "As a major port of trade, Venice was able to find ready markets for whatever decorative arts Venetian craftsmen could produce. The whole Republic was crawling with ceramists, glassworkers, woodworkers, lace makers and sculptors (in addition to painters), all of whom made entirely satisfactory livings". (Trade1) Venetians were also engaged in slave trade, which indeed, formed then one of the most lucrative branches of Venetian commerce, as it forms the greatest stain upon the annals of that commerce. "The islanders, however, were not alone guilty of this infamous trade in men; other Italian states made profit of it, and it may be said to have been all but universal. But the Venetians were the most deeply involved in it, they pursued it the most unscrupulously, and they relinquished it the last. It is not easy to fix the dates of the rise or fall of this slave trade but slavery continued in Venice, as late as the fifteenth century, and in earlier ages was so common that every prosperous person had two or three slaves". (Howells, 1891, p. 40) Venetians enjoyed a rich culture full of blameless and legitimate forms of commerce, and gradually gathered into their grasp the whole trade of the East with Europe which passed through their hands for so many ages. "After the dominion of the Franks was established in Italy in the eighth century, they began to supply that people, more luxurious than the Lombards, with the costly stuffs, the rich jewelry, and the perfumes of Byzantium; and held a great annual fair at the imperial city of Pavia, where they sold the Franks the manufactures of the polished and effeminate Greeks, and whence in return they carried back to the East the grain, wine, wool, iron, lumber, and excellent armor of Lombardy". (Howells, 1891, p. 32) The Venetians easily cultivated the friendship towards Greeks until, in the twelfth century, they mastered the people so long caressed, and took their capital, under Enrico Dandolo. The privileges conceded to the Venetian traders by the Greek Emperors were extraordinary in their extent and value as Venetians did not lag behind in maintaining friendship with Italians due to the reason that Caesar absolved the Venetians from the annual tribute paid the Italian kings for the liberty of traffic, and had declared their commerce free throughout the Peninsula. "Venetians enjoyed such a trade, even at that day, when the wants of men were far simpler and fewer than now, could hardly be overstated; and one nation then monopolized the traffic which is now free to the whole world. The Venetians bought their wares at the great marts of Samarcand, and crossed the country of Tartary in caravans to the shores of the Caspian Sea, where they set sail and voyaged to the river Volga, which they ascended to the point of its closest proximity to the Don. Their goods were then transported overland to the Don, and were again carried by water down to their mercantile colony at its mouth. Their ships, having free access to the Black Sea, could, after receiving their cargoes, return direct to Venice". (Howells, 1891, p. 38) The Wars Venice had fought several wars and treatys for trade which started with the war of Genoa (1353-55) in which the Venetians were defeated by Sapienza. It was followed by another war called war of Chioggia, "fought again between Venice and Genoa (1378-81) in which the Genoese defeated the Venetians at Pola, seized Chioggia, and blockaded Venice". (War1) Meanwhile the implacable rivalry of Venice and Genoa went on. "After the Genoese victory at Curzola in 1298, they sparred and skirmished for half a century without result. After the brief truce of 1348-1349 owing to the Black Death, war broke out afresh, dangerously generalized throughout the Mediterranean by the alliance of Venice with Aragon and of Genoa with the Byzantine Empire. In 1355 peace was foisted on the two contenders by well-meaning intermediaries, but it merely postponed the final showdown". (Brunetti, 1956, p. 18) "The Venetians, under Vittorio Pisano, blocked the channel and starved out the fleet of Pietro Doria, forcing its surrender. From this blow Genoa never recovered". (War1) Venice fought two wars against the Ottoman Turks in 1416 and 1425-30. War with Ferrara (1482-84) was the most successful war which restricted the limit of Venetian expansion on the mainland. "Venice entertained designs on Ferrara which, due to ideal geographical position, controlled the inland water route of the Po, commercial lifeline of northern Italy. No longer satisfied with the large emporium she owned in that city, and the extensive influence she yielded in its affairs, she began hankering after full power. When, early in the 14th century, the Este were quarreling amongst themselves, Venice stepped in and occupied Ferrara, though not for long for the reason the pope issued an ultimatum, the papal armies made a show of force, and Venice discreetly had to withdraw. Thus at a crucial moment Venice was unexpectedly able to bolster her position in the Eastern Mediterranean. On the European mainland the peace of Bagnolo (1484), by putting an end to her guerilla war with Ferrara, renewed her hold on Rovigo and advanced her land frontier to the much-coveted line of the Po, the peace of Lodi having previously sanctioned the boundary of Lombardy and Venetia along the rivers Adda and Oglio. By and large these remained the limits of Venetian territory down to the fall of the Republic in 1797". (Graber, 1963, p. 54) "After seven years' war, and the overthrow of many old alliances, Venice began winning back most of its lost territories on dry land. After this, Venice began to follow a policy of neutrality and, by means of diplomacy, was able to form an alliance with France for mutual assistance against the emperor, or against the Turks, or for the re-conquest of the Milanese. The Turks meanwhile went on gaining victories; Venice joined the league of Spain and the pope, but, believing that she had been betrayed at the battle of Prevesa (1538), concluded an unfavorable peace with the Turks, paying them a tribute for the islands which she still retained. In 1569 the Sultan Selim II set about the conquest of Cyprus, which was heroically defended; Venice, however, making peace on her own account, surrendered her claims to Cyprus". (Trade2) "Venice enjoyed an ideal middle position between East and West, serving as an intermediary both of commerce and culture. Though by now her political autonomy was an established fact, for centuries to come Venetian life owed so much to her Byzantine heritage that Western influence, despite her close contacts with the West, affected it little. She prospered steadily throughout the 11th century. She wisely avoided taking sides in the great dispute over investiture that opposed pope and emperor in the feudal age. Late in the century a momentary danger arose when the Normans, fresh from their Sicilian conquests, conceived the bold idea of entrenching themselves at Otranto and in Albania so as to straddle the gateway of the Adriatic. But Venice, joining forces with the Eastern Empire, vigorously intervened and foiled these plans". (Brunetti, 1956, p. 12) "Venice at the time was but a huddle of wooden dwellings erected on piles driven into the mud banks of the lagoon, an indigent settlement of fishermen, mariners and salters who regarded the sea as an ally and giver of life, for they had as yet no outlet for trade on the mainland, but were hemmed in first by the barbarians, then by the Franks. Egypt was a good trading ally of Venice, was the initial target of the Fourth Crusade, and Venetian Doge Enrico Dandalo agreed to the Egyptian requests to divert the Crusaders". (Brunetti, 1956, p. 25) Venice Trade Barriers Venetians had access to the exclusive commercial privileges, state owned galleys and protected convoys along with the stable rights to create economic rents. So, Venetians where on one hand allowed the merchants to keep their affiliation with the city, generating effective barriers to exit, on the other hand they had to exclude foreigners from Venetian markets for overseas trade. "Yet, since Venetian merchants traded on their own account under 'commenda' contracts, as opposed to commission agents who shipped in the names of those for whom they acted, foreigners still had an opportunity to benefit from Venetian overseas trade by investing in commenda contracts. To stop this, a new law prohibited any Venetian to import Levantine wares of more value than the amount of personal wealth for which he was assessed for fiscal purpose. The law, to be enforced by the newly created 'Officium de Navigantibu's', was in force only a few years at a time, coinciding with period of overabundance of Eastern merchandise in Venice (Howells, 1891, p.74). Venice Fleet of Ships "The private enterprise of citizens was in every way protected and encouraged by the State, which did not, however, fail to make due and just profit out of it. The ships of the merchants always sailed to and from Venice in fleets, at stated seasons, seven fleets departing annually, one for the Greek dominions, a second for Azof, a third for Trebizond, a fourth for Cyprus, a fifth for Armenia, a sixth for Spain, France, the Low Countries, and England, and a seventh for Africa. Each squadron of traders was accompanied and guarded from attacks of corsairs and other enemies by a certain number of the state galleys, let severally to the highest bidders for the voyage, at a price never less than about five hundred dollars of that time. The galleys were all manned and armed by the State, and the crew of each amounted to three hundred persons". (Howells, 1891, p. 40) While the Republic was thus careful in the protection and discipline of its citizens in their commerce upon the seas, it was no less zealous for their security and its own dignity in their traffic with the continent of Europe. "The Venetians, therefore, were forbidden by the State to trade in some parts; and the Bohemians, Germans, and Hungarians, who wished to buy their wares, were obliged to come to the lagoons and buy them at the great marts, which were held in different parts of the city and on the neighboring mainland. A triple purpose was thus served, the Venetian merchants were protected in their lives and goods, the national honor was saved from insult, and many an honest zecchino was turned by the innkeepers and others who lodged and entertained the customers of the merchants". (Brunetti, 1956, p. 32) "The transactions in trade were carefully supervised by the servants of the State. Among the magistracies especially appointed for the orderly conduct of the foreign and domestic commerce were the so-called Mercantile Consuls, whose special duty was to see that the traffic of the nation received no hurt from the schemes of any citizen or foreigner, and to punish offences of this kind with banishment and even penalties. They measured every ship about to depart, to learn if her cargo exceeded the lawful amount; they guarded creditors against debtors, and protected poor debtors against the rapacity of creditors while punishing thefts sustained by the merchants. (Howells, 1891, p. 42) "Venice ended its competition and war with Genoa in 1353 and with Syria and Egypt in 1343 and unquestionably became the most powerful city-state of Europe. Venice's power and prosperity started to decline after the Ottoman Turks captured Constantinople in the 15th century". (Soe, Global Media Journal) "Taking advantage of the wars that had paralyzed the commercial life of so many cities in Northern Italy, Venice in the sixteenth century took the lead in wool manufacture and established herself as the foremost industrial center of Italy. Much of the wealth made available by the curtailment of overseas trading ventures invested in property and in land improvement". (Graber, 1963, p. 164) Works cited Bernstein A. Jane, 1998. "Music Printing in Renaissance Venice: The Scotto Press, 1539-1572": Oxford University Press. Place of Publication: New York. Black Joseph, April 1998. "Saving the Lagoon" in "History Today". Volume: 48. Issue: 4. Brunetti Mario & Emmons James, 1956. "Venice": Skira. Place of Publication: New York. Gore Vidal, Vidal in Venice (New York, 1985), 48 Graber Andre & Muraro Michelangelo, 1963. "Treasures of Venice": Skira, created by A. Skira for Horizon magazine. Place of Publication: Cleveland. Howells Dean William, 1891. "Venetian Life": Houghton Mifflin Company. Place of Publication: Boston. Peery Larry, La Serenissima Soe Younei, Global Media Journal Steves Rick, 2006a, 2006b, 2006c, Trade1, Trade2, War1, Shipping1, Barriers1, Read More