[m. e. mallett, j. r. hale] the military organisat(bookzz.org)

CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN EARLYMODERN HISTORY

EditorsJ. H. ELLIOTT H. G. KOENIGSBERGER

The Military Organization of aRenaissance State

CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN EARLYMODERN HISTORY

Edited by Professor J. H. Elliott, The Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, andProfessor H. G. Koenigsberger, Kings College, London

The idea of an' early modern' period of European history from the fifteenth to the lateeighteenth century is now widely accepted among historians. The purpose of theCambridge Studies in Early Modern History is to publish monographs and studieswhich will illuminate the character of the period as a whole, and in particular focusattention on a dominant theme within it, the interplay of continuity and change as theyare represented by the continuity of medieval ideas, political and social organization,and by the impact of new ideas, new methods and new demands on the traditionalstructures.

The Old World and the New, I4g2-i6^oJ. H. ELLIOTT

The Army of Flanders and the Spanish Road, 1567-165g: The Logistics of SpanishVictory and Defeat in the Low Countries Wars

GEOFFREY PARKERChronicle into History: An Essay on the Interpretation of History in FlorentineFourteenth-Century Chronicles

LOUIS GREENGunpowder and Galleys: Changing Technology and Mediterranean Warfare at Sea in theSixteenth Century

JOHN FRANCIS GUILMARTIN JRReform and Revolution in Mainz 1743-1803

T. C. W. BLANNINGThe State, War and Peace: Spanish Political Thought in the Renaissance 1516-1559

J. A. FERNANDEZ-SANTAMARIACalvinist Preaching and Iconoclasm in the Netherlands I544~i56g

PHYLLIS MACK CREWAltopascio: A Study in Tuscan Rural Society 1587-1784

FRANK MCARDLEThe Kingdom of Valencia in the Seventeenth Century

JAMES CASEYFilippo Strozzi and the Medici: Favor and Finance in Sixteenth-Century Florence andRome

MELISSA MERIAM BULLARDRouen during the Wars of Religion

PHILIP BENEDICTNeostoicism and the Early Modern State

GERHARD OESTREICHThe Emperor and his Chancellor: A Study of the Imperial Chancellery under Gattinara

JOHN M. HEADLEY

The Military Organizationof a

Renaissance StateVenice c. 1400 to 1617

M.E. MALLETTProfessor of History, University of Warwick

andJ.R. HALE

Professor of Italian, University College, London

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ISBN-13 978-0-521-24842-6 hardbackISBN-10 0-521-24842-6 hardback

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Contents

List of illustrations page viiAcknowledgements ixReferences and abbreviations xi

PART i: c. 1400 to 1508M. E. MALLETT

Introduction: the European context 1400-1525 11 The beginnings of Venetian expansion 72 The composition and role of the army in the fifteenth century 203 Military development and fighting potential 654 The organization and administration of the Venetian army 1015 Control and policy making 1536 Soldiers and the state 1817 Venice and war 199

PART 11: 1 509-1617J. R. HALE

8 The historical role of the land forces 1509-1617 2129 The wars

(i) Cambrai, reconquista and retention 1509-1529 221(ii) The Turkish War of 1537-1540 227

(iii) The War of Cyprus 1570-1573 233(iv) The War of Gradisca 1615-1617 241

10 Government: policy, control and administration 24811 The higher command 28412 Manpower

(i) Foreigners 313(ii) Venetians 330

(iii) The militia 350

Contents

13 Cavalry, infantry, artillery 36714 Fortifications in the Terraferma 40915 The defence of the maritime empire 42916 The costs of defence and war 461Conclusion: the European context 1525-1617 485

Appendix: Infantry wages in the sixteenth century 494Select bibliography 502Index 510

VI

Illustrations

MAPS

1 The Terraferma in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries page xiii2 The empire da Mar xiv

FIGURES

1 Military decision and execution: the structure of government 2502 Size and composition of the armies 1509-1530 4733 Army wage bills 1509-1530 4744 Comparative size of armies in wartime 1537-1617 4775 Comparative wartime army wage bills 1509-1617 4786 Costs of defence and war 1530-1617 in relation to revenues and

conjectured total costs 483

Acknowledgements

We started work on this book when we were colleagues teaching for theUniversity of Warwick's term for history students in Venice. It wasconceived from the first as a collaboration. Wanting to cover a period longenough for continuities and changes to become apparent, as well as foranalogies with the practice of other countries to emerge, we divided itchronologically. Even so, given the lack of secondary and printed sources(for too long, we felt, the plash of Venetian oars had obscured the tread ofsoldiers' feet), it has taken a long series of visits to bring it to suchcompleteness as it may be judged to possess.

We have acquired debts in common: to the University of Warwick forunderwriting the idea of a regular term in Venice and to Count BrandoBrandolini for giving us as headquarters the use of the palace on the GrandCanal on whose alt ana this book was planned; to the staffs of the Archivio diStato and the Correr and Marciana libraries; above all to the care shown,from commas to concepts, by the editors of the series in which our bookappears, Professors Helli Koenigsberger and John Elliott, and our vigilantCambridge sub-editor, Mrs Jane Van Tassel.

J.R.H.M.E.M.

I am grateful to the generosity with which Marco Morin shared hisunrivalled knowledge of the sources dealing with the republic's artilleryservices, and with which Peter January helped me, during the revision of thetypescript, from the research for his London Ph.D. thesis on the militaryobligations of Venice's Terraferma subjects 1565-1630. Professor GaetanoCozzi has been a steady support. Robert Finlay commented helpfully on anearly draft, and Professor Felix Gilbert helped me gird my loins for makingthe major changes that were wisely suggested by the editors of this series,Professors Elliott and Koenigsberger. In another vein I want to record mygratitude to Sir Ashley and Lady Frances Clarke for a Venetian home overso many years, and to the Director of Villa I Tatti, Professor Craig HughSmythe, for giving me a Florentine one for a revision that was only possible

ix

Acknowledgements

when I was removed from the temptation of paying yet one more visit to thearchives in the Frari. My work has been helped by the research fund of theUniversity of London and, time after time, by the Arts Faculty travel grantsof my College. Finally, I wish to acknowledge my debt to my colleagueLaura Lepschy for the care and flair with which she helped me correct theproofs.

J.R.H.

During so long a period of gestation as this book has undergone the writerincurs debts so numerous that they are hard to specify. At every stage mycolleagues on the Warwick programme in Venice, John Law in the earlydays, Martin Lowry, Humfrey Butters and Michael Knapton morerecently, have helped me greatly with discussion and clarification of manypoints. The sections on artillery owe much to Marco Morin, while those onorganization and control have assumed their final form only after muchhelpful comment from members of the Venice Seminar and the WarwickRenaissance Seminar. For practical, and particularly financial, support I amindebted to Villa I Tatti for a fellowship in 1974-5, a n ^ t 0 the BritishAcademy and to the University of Warwick for invaluable grants.

M.E.M.

References and abbreviations

All references, unless otherwise indicated, are to documents in the Archiviodi Stato, Venice. When not given in full, such references are abbreviated inthe footnotes as follows:

Council of TenIn references to [Consiglio dei] Dieci, Comune, Misti, Secreta, Criminal orZecca, the series Parti in registers is taken for granted; thus Dieci, Secreta,reg. 4, 128V. Series belonging to the archives of the Capi del Consiglio deiDieci are cited as: Capi, Dieci.

Great CouncilM[aggior] C[onsiglio]. All references are to the names (e.g. 'Novus') ofindividual registers of Deliberazioni.

SenateS[enato], S[ecreta], Mi[sti], Tferra], M[ar], reg[istro]. In citations such asST. reg. 60, i9v[erso], the series Deliberazioni is taken for granted; when areference is to the filze from which the deliberazioni were compiled, this isstated.

Some other fondi are abbreviated as follows:Prow. Gen. in Terraferma Senato, Dispacci di Provveditore

Generale in TerrafermaProw. Fort. Proweditori alle FortezzeEsposizioni Principi Pien Collegio, Esposizioni PrincipiCommemoriali Libri Commemoriali

Other abbreviationsASB. Archivio di Stato, BresciaASF. Archivio di Stato, FlorenceASMa. Archivio di Stato, MantuaASMi. Archivio di Stato, MilanASP. Archivio di Stato, PaduaASVe. Archivio di Stato, Verona

BCV.BMV.DBLPredelli

Priuli

RIS.

RRIISS.

Sanuto

References and abbreviations

Biblioteca Correr, VeniceBiblioteca Marciana, VeniceDizionario biografico degli italianiI libri commemoriali della repubblica di Venezia: iregesti, ed. R. Predelli (Venice, 5 vols., 1879-1901)/ diarii, ed. R. Cessi, RRIISS., xxiv, 3 (Bologna, 4vols., 1912-38)Rerum italicarum scriptores, ed. L. A. Muratori(Milan, 25 vols., 1723-51)Rerum italicarum scriptores, new ed., ed. V. Fiorini,G. Carducci, C. Calisse and G. De Sanctis (Bolognaand Citta di Castello, 33 vols., 1 gooff)/ diarii di Marino Sanuto, ed. R. Fulin et al. (Venice,58 vols., 1879-1903). References are to columnnumbers

Sanuto,Vite de' dogi

ASLASL.Atti 1st. Ven.AV.NAV.RSI.

B*.

n.p.s.a.

Marino Sanuto, Vite de duchi di Venezia, RIS., xxii(Milan, 1723). References are to column numbers

Archivio storico italianoArchivio tforico lombardoAtti delTIstituto veneto di scienze, lettere ed artiArchivio venetoNuovo archivio venetoRivista storica italiana

Busta. Used for all 'packages' of documents whetherbound or loose in boxes or foldersNo pageSub anno

N.B. Folio or page references (given without a preliminary' f.' or' p.') are,in documents, to the old numeration. In unfoliated or unpaginatedcollections the date of a reference (where available) is given.

Xll

Trieste

Capod'lstria

F e l t r e - / . ' Sacile .PordenoheValmareno -j^J k P a | m a n o v a .

negliano. c V 'Praia Fft IULIAsolo ^ ^ ^ ^ V ^ Portogruaro \ Aquilei

/-»^ ?tHar->Z lu l l . * , * Marand'rVw^r

Aqnadello Soncino\ >

LodiV Crema Cavnana

Seniga Asola

\.Ravenna

ROMAGNA Il m o l a * .CastelBoloqnese\

lCervia50 km

Map i. The Terraferma in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Battles are underlined.

xill

BergamoVerona*

Udine

ce r1 Albona.*/^,Segna

Obrovac^ N o v e g r a d

VranaX SibenicoClissa

BuduaV^AntivariAdriatic >Dulcigno

Sea

Mediterranean Sea

XIV2. The empire da Mar.

PART I

c. 1400 to 1508

M. E. Mallett

Introduction: the European context1400-1525

' It is said that the Venetians in all those places which they are recovering arepainting a lion of St Mark which has in its hand a sword rather than a book,from which it seems that they have learnt to their cost that study and booksare not sufficient to defend states.' So wrote Machiavelli from Verona on 7December 1509 as he watched Venice gradually recover from the shatteringblow of Agnadello. His assessment of 1509 as a turning point in Venetianmilitary thinking matches a central theme of this book, but the nature andthe implications of that turning point are here perceived in very differentterms from those which Machiavelli had in mind. The idea that it was onlyin 1509 that Venice was forced to consider seriously the militaryimplications of defence of a land empire and to involve itself directly in thatdefence rather than relying on hired mercenaries is denied by the wholeexperience of the fifteenth century. Similarly Machiavelli's implicationhere, more clearly stated elsewhere in his writings, that not just Venice butItaly as a whole had been shocked into a tardy awareness of oltramontanemilitary developments by the thunder of the French guns and the measuredtramp of Swiss infantry squares is a view which has to be questioned.

The army which Charles VIII led over the Alps in 1494, with itsexperienced and permanent heavy cavalry companies, its large contingent ofconfident and disciplined Swiss pikemen, and its train of horse-drawn guns,was well known to acute Italian observers. It was the product of experiences,experiments and developments in which Italian states and Italian soldiershad shared. It was neither a unique force nor necessarily an irresistible one,but rather an uneasy compromise between various competing trends whichhad dominated European fifteenth-century military development.

The most significant of these trends was that towards permanent,standing forces. The origins of this development lay not in the famousordonnances of Charles VII of 1439 and 1445, but in the whole trend awayfrom feudal military obligations towards paid, contractual service which hadbeen initiated in the thirteenth century and dramatically accelerated duringthe course of the Hundred Years' War. The compagnies d}ordonnance ofCharles VII had their forebears in the similar permanent arrangementscreated by Charles V in the 1360s and 1370s, and in the permanent forces

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

organized by England for the defence of Normandy in the 1420s. They wereperhaps crucially conditioned by the presence and example of veteranPiedmontese companies and captains in Charles' army in the 1420s and1430s. Certainly Italy, and particularly Milan and Venice, was accustomed tothe presence of standing forces contracted to the states from the end of thefourteenth century. What was unique about the French ordonnances was thedetermination to standardize the size of the cavalry companies and to forbidthe recruiting of troops by unauthorized captains. These developmentscame more slowly and more informally in Italy. In the second half of thefifteenth century the French and Italian examples were followed by Charlesthe Bold of Burgundy in his army ordinances of 1468-76, and in a lessstructured way by Ferdinand and Isabella in their creation of permanentforces for the reduction of the last Moorish enclaves in Granada. In Englandthe relative invulnerability of the state and the limitations of its fiscalstructure discouraged the English kings from attempting to maintain morethan token standing forces, while in Germany the ambitions of theemperors, and particularly Maximilian, to follow suit were frustrated bylack of central control and fiscal organization. Thus, in the 1470s Louis XIcould call on a more or less permanent force of 4000 lances, Charles the Boldwas organizing a standing army of 1250 lances and supporting companies oflight cavalry and infantry, and Galeazzo Maria Sforza of Milan had 42,000troops on his books, of which about half could be described as permanenteffectives.

The emphasis of these arrangements was on permanent heavy cavalryforces. The value of such cavalry might seem to have been placed in doubtby some of the battles of the fourteenth century, but in the fifteenth centuryimproved armour, greater discipline and new fighting techniques gave thelances a further lease of life. Thus the highly developed expertise of suchtroops and the potential problems and costs of emergency recruiting of themmeant that they continued to receive priority in the permanent armies. Butthis should not blind us to a growing awareness of the potential role andvalue of infantry forces. The success of the English archers in the battles ofthe Hundred Years' War lay behind the inclusion in Charles VII's reformsof provision for a select militia force of francs archers, while the growingreputation of the Swiss pike squares led to attempts both to imitate themand to monopolize their services. By the later years of the century, despitethe provision of infantry contingents in its arrangements for standing forces,France relied on employing Swiss infantry to maintain a balance in itsarmies. While there was undoubtedly a growing concern about maintaining,and indeed increasing, a national element in the standing armies of the day,the need for troops with special skills and the growth in size of the infantryelement in armies were consolidating the role of the foreign mercenary.

Introduction: the European context 1400-1525

Alongside the growing emphasis on trained infantry went a concern toexploit the new possibilities of gunpowder. The siege trains which hadcontributed so much to ensuring French success in driving the English fromtheir fortified enclaves in France in the later stages of the Hundred Years'War became a feature of all armies. Indeed it was soon apparent thatfortification techniques were adapting rapidly to the new situation, and gunsbecame as important a feature of the defence of cities as in their assault. Thesize of artillery trains accompanying the armies of the late fifteenth centurywas no indication of the number of guns in use or of the number of gunnersrequired by that time. The 400 guns lost by Charles the Bold in his defeat bythe Swiss at Morat were only a small part of the total artillery resources ofthe Burgundian state. At the same time attention was shifting from anemphasis on the size and hitting power of guns to a concern for theirmobility. This was not so much an attempt to increase their role in battle,which still remained negligible, as to ensure rapid deployment and perhapsdecisive advantage in siege warfare.

More important to the fortunes of battle by this time was the extent towhich large contingents of infantry were being equipped with handguns.Such forces were a key factor in the Spanish conquest of Granada, and here,as in many other aspects of military innovation, the Italian states played animportant part. The handgun and the arquebus were rapidly replacing thecrossbow as the main shot weapon of European infantry.

The implications of some of these developments for the broader problemsof control, recruiting, provisioning and cost of armies were also particularlyapparent in Italy. The political and institutional sophistication of the Italianstates quickly responded to the new needs; military bureaucracies emergedto cope with the problems of organization and supply created by thestanding forces; fiscal resources were harnessed to pay the costs; the peasanteconomy and peasant manpower were exploited to provide provisions,billets and pioneers. By the 1480s half the income of the French crown wascommitted to the new permanent military needs, and the same was probablytrue of most western European states with the exception of England.

The French invasions of Italy in and after 1494 and the release of Spanishmilitary energies after the conquest of Granada in 1492 hastened thesedevelopments. The context of the Italian Wars in which large French andSpanish, and to a lesser extent Imperial, expeditionary forces werecommitted to confrontation on distant and foreign ground and for greatimperial and economic prizes led to a temporary phase in which the warfareof attrition and manoeuvre inherited by the fifteenth century from theMiddle Ages gave way to a search for the decisive blow. Collaborationbetween arms reached new levels of sophistication in the conditions ofcontinuous warfare and constant confrontation, and the armies themselves

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

grew to a maximum size for reasonable manoeuvrability - about 30,000. Theproportion of infantry in these armies steadily increased from about half inthe army of Charles VIII in 1494 to about four-fifths by the time of Pavia in1525. This accounted for the growth in the size of the armies and for thedisproportionate rise in the level of battle casualties, as the infantry wereusually less well protected than the armoured knights. It also revolutionizedtactics and ultimately contributed to the slowing down of the tempo ofwarfare which became apparent after 1530. War assumed a fury andfrightfulness which was undoubtedly novel but which was at the same time apassing phase; the characteristics of the military organization of this periodof wars were more deep-rooted and justify the contention that the so-calledMilitary Revolution of the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuriescannot be viewed in isolation from the developments of the previous twocenturies.

In all these developments Italian leaders and Italian troops played theirpart although increasingly rarely as an independent force, except in the caseof Venice. Thus the Italians who have caught the eye of historians are thosewho served France or Spain, and contributed significantly to the innov-ations and developments which emerged from that dynamic confrontation.Men like Fabrizio and Prospero Colonna, the Marquis of Pescara,Gianjacopo Trivulzio, Alfonso d'Este, Giovanni de' Medici, and evenCesare Borgia, have a secure place in the military annals of the period. Thearmy of Venice, which provided the bulk of the Italian forces at Fornovo in1495, fought unaided at Agnadello in 1509, and remained the only large,independent Italian force in the 1520s, has left fewer and more ambiguousmemories. Yet, in terms of the long-term developments of militaryorganization and the relationship between a Renaissance army and the statewhich created, nurtured and employed it, that army has much to tell us.

This book, which explores two centuries of that development and thatrelationship, falls naturally into two parts. Prior to 1509 Venice had foughtforeign powers, not unsuccessfully, on a number of occasions. Hungarians,Germans, even the French at Fornovo and above all the Turks had beenconfronted. But the emphasis and the contextual framework of Venetianmilitary development had been primarily Italian. From the first majorexpansion of the Terraferma state in 1404-5 until the crisis of the League ofCambrai in 1509 Venice had concentrated its military energies on thespasmodic opportunities for territorial gains in Italy and the consolidationof those gains. Its attitudes were by no means consistently aggressive andimperialist, but its military stance was one of preparedness for opportunisticadvance. Large forces of permanent cavalry and mechanisms for the rapidrecruitment and deployment of armies took precedence over investment inpermanent defences. Constantly fluctuating levels of military expenditure

Introduction: the European context 1400—1525

and oscillation between policies of greed and caution led to an erraticdevelopment of the essential substructures of military financing andorganization.

But in and after 1509 the realities of a new world were imposed on Venice;a world in which the overwhelming foreign predominance in Italy and thegrowing threat to the Venetian empire overseas from the Turks placedrestraints on and dictated the course of Venetian military policy. Once theTerraferma state had been largely recovered after Agnadello the emphasis inItaly shifted entirely to defence. In accordance with the general Europeantrends the size of the permanent cavalry force was dramatically reduced, andmoney was poured into the preparation of fortifications and garrison points.The new demands of large-scale galley warfare in terms of the concentrationof infantry and guns for service at sea, and the fortification of the empire daMar, became increasing burdens on fiscal and manpower resources. Aconsiderable proportion of the revenue from the Terraferma state, whichhad in the fifteenth century been largely devoted to maintaining a flexibleand mobile military presence in Italy, was now diverted to the confrontationwith the Turks. Military institutions became increasingly fixed, militaryresponses increasingly predictable. Venice, the most effective militarypower in fifteenth-century Italy, became a second-rate military power insixteenth-century Europe, capable of defending its independence butacquiring its further moments of military glory only in its ability to mobilizefor and check the onslaught of the Ottoman Empire.

The following works are of value in establishing the European context forVenetian military developments in the fifteenth and early sixteenthcenturies: M. Howard, War in European History (Oxford, 1976); J. F.Verbruggen, The Art of Warfare in Western Europe in the Middle Ages(Amsterdam, 1977); the chapters by J. R. Hale on war in the New CambridgeModern History, vols i and ii (Cambridge, 1957 and 1958); A. Corvisier,Armies et societes en Europe de 1494 a iy8g (Paris, 1976); R. Puddu, Eserciti emonarchie nazionali nei secoli XVe XVI (Florence, 1975); M. A. Vale, Warand Chivalry (London, 1981); P. Contamine, Guerre, etat et societea la fin dumoyen age: etude sur les armies des rois de France, ijjy-i4g4 (Paris, 1972);R. A. Newhall, Muster and Review: A Problem of English Military Adminis-tration, 1420-40 (Cambridge, Mass., 1940); C. Brusten, Larmee bourgui-gnonne de 1465 a 1468 (Brussels, 1953); R. Vaughan, Charles the Bold(London, 1973); P. Pieri, // Rinascimento e la crisi militare italiana (Turin,1952); G. Parker, 'The "Military Revolution", 1560-1660 - a myth?',Journal of Modern History, xlviii (1976) 195-214; P. Stewart, 'The soldier,the bureaucrat and fiscal records in the army of Ferdinand and Isabella',Hispanic American Historical Review, xlix (1969) 281—92; M. L. Lenzi,

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

'Fanti e cavalieri nelle prime guerre d' Italia (1494-1527)', Ricerche storiche,vii-viii (1977-8) 7-92, 359-415-

The beginnings of Venetian expansion

The rapid creation of a Terraferma state by Venice in the first three decadesof the fifteenth century gives an impression of a new orientation of Venetianpolicy which is very misleading. The appearance of the Lion of St Mark, thesymbol of Venetian authority, on city walls and town halls from the banks ofthe Adda in the west to the Isonzo in the east, and from the foothills of theAlps to the Po, seemed a dramatic extension of the power and influence ofthe lagoon republic. There were many at the time, and have been since, whospoke of Venetian imperialism shifting its emphasis sharply from east towest in the face of an irresistible Turkish advance and a consequent declineof Levantine commercial interests. But this is to exaggerate both the powerof the Turks in the early fifteenth century and their impact on easternMediterranean trade, and the novelty of Venice's interest in the Italianmainland. Direct rule replaced covert economic and diplomatic influence asthe method of Venice's role in northern Italy in the early fifteenth century,but the innovations were institutional rather than political, and particularlywere they apparent in military institutions. The creation of a standing forceto protect the newly acquired state was the real novelty of the period; theinvolvement which led to that development has to be traced back muchfurther.1

Throughout the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries Venice had kept acareful watch on affairs in northern Italy. While involvement in those affairshad been mainly of a diplomatic nature, there had been a series of militaryflashpoints when Venice committed itself to armed intervention on aconsiderable scale. There was also a growing commitment after 1340 to thecontrol of a hinterland which extended north through Treviso to thefoothills.1 For the main outlines of the history of Venetian expansion and military involvement in the thirteenth

and fourteenth centuries, see S. Romanin, Storia documentata della repubblica di Venezia (Venice, 10vols., 1853-61), vols. ii-iii; H. Kretschmayr, Geschichte von Venedig (Gotha, 3 vols., 1921), vols. i-ii;R. Cessi, Storia della repubblica di Venezia (2nd ed., Milan, 2 vols., 1968) vol. i; R. Cessi, Politico, edeconomia di Venezia nel Trecento (Rome, 1952); D. S. Chambers, The Imperial Age of Venice,1380-1580 (London, 1970) 54-5; F. C. Lane, Venice: A Maritime Republic (Baltimore, 1973) 58-65,172-201; J. E. Law, 'Rapporti di Venezia con le provincie di Terraferma', in Componentistorici-artistiche e culturali a Venezia nei secoli XIII e XIV (Venice, Ateneo Veneto, 1981) 78-85.

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

The origins of this Italian policy have to be sought in the second half ofthe thirteenth century. Prior to that the image of Venice, isolated andinvulnerable in its lagoon, thriving on the rich profits of eastern Mediter-ranean trade and content to sell to all who came to it from the west withouthaving to concern itself with the problems of distribution, can be largelysustained. The domination in the east achieved at the time of the FourthCrusade and the extreme fragmentation of the political scene in northernand central Italy continued to make this position viable. But after the 1240sthe situation began to change. The emergence of the Genoese as effectiveand dangerous commercial rivals after their restoration of the Byzantineemperors in 1361, and the growing economic tensions in Europe associatedwith the end of the great boom of the high Middle Ages, began to putpressure on the Venetian commercial system. Profits began to decline andVenetian merchants turned to active exploitation of Italian and oltramon-tane markets in order to compensate. The opening up of the direct galleyvoyages to northern Europe, a concern for the security of trade routes overthe Alps, and a determination to win control over the markets of Lombardywere all part of this new orientation.2 At the same time Venetian commercialinterests began to diversify and a monopoly of the bulk trades of the Adriaticand the distribution of commodities like grain and salt began to figure assignificant Venetian economic interests alongside the traditional preoccup-ation with spices and Levantine luxury goods. But this emerging Venetianinterest in controlling routes and markets in northern Italy encountered anew tendency towards political consolidation in that area. The activities ofEzzelino da Romano, and of the Este family in Ferrara, inevitably restrictedthe ease with which Venice could carry through the new policy of peacefuleconomic exploitation, and added a political dimension to the confron-tation.3 One of the earliest Venetian military ventures on the mainland wasthe dispatch of an army under Marco Badoer in 1256 to liberate Padua fromthe control of Ezzelino.4

This convergence between economic and political realities strengthenedthrough the fourteenth century. Venice, as far as possible, tried to resolvethe dilemma by peaceful means. War was always seen as a last resort which

2 G. Luzzatto, Storia economic a di Venezia dall' XI al XVI secolo (Venice, 1961) 35-139; Lane, Venice,22-86; F. C. Lane, Venice and History (Baltimore, 1966), particularly the essays 'Fleets and fairs' and'Venetian merchant galleys, 1306-34'; R. Marozzo della Rocca and A. Lombardo, Documenti delcommercio veneziano neisecoli XI-XIII, ii (Turin, 1940). See also M. Knapton, 'Venezia e Treviso nelTrecento: proposte per una ricerca sul primo dominio veneziano a Treviso', in Tommaso da Modena e ilmo tempo (Treviso, 1980) 44-5 and for a very full bibliography on the whole question of Venetianrelations with the Terraferma in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.

3 Lane, Venice, 56-65; R. Cessi, La repubblica di Venezia e ilproblema adriatico (Naples, 1953) 57-83; E.Sestan, 'La politica veneziana nel Duecento', AS I., cxxxv (1977) 295-331.

4 Sestan, 322.


was not only costly but also immensely damaging to the free flow of trade.Venetian policy concentrated on containing the growth of the signorialstates on the Italian mainland by carefully arranged alliances and bysubversion. Economic embargoes and diplomatic pressure were thepreferred weapons, combined with a willingness to extend direct controlover the immediate hinterland of the lagoon, to achieve both politicalsecurity and a certain area of economic latitude. But as the political pressureincreased, and particularly as the danger emerged of anti-Venetian alliancesbetween the states on either side of that narrow hinterland, so Venice wasforced to consider military intervention even to survive.

If the need for a permanent military commitment emerged very slowly onthe Italian mainland, such a commitment was apparent much earlier in theempire overseas. The events surrounding the Fourth Crusade gave Venicecontrol not only of three-eighths of the Byzantine empire, but also of Zaraand the Dalmatian coastline captured by the crusaders before the finalexpedition to Constantinople itself. The key points that now requiredpermanent defensive arrangements included Negroponte, Modon andCoron in the south-eastern corner of the Morea, Crete, and a growingnumber of bases on the eastern shore of the Adriatic.5 In Crete the problemwas solved for the time being by the establishment of Venetian feudatorieson the island with an obligation to produce troops when called upon, butthroughout the empire small permanent garrisons began to appear.6 For themost part the men recruited came from the empire itself, but even duringthe thirteenth century there was some recruitment of Italian leaders andItalian men for service in the garrisons.7 In the second half of the thirteenthcentury Venice was also engaged in the gradual subjugation of Istria in orderto secure complete control of the northern Adriatic. This was carried out bya series of amphibious operations controlled by Venetian galley captains andlargely involving the use of men from Venice and the lagoon. In the 1280sTrieste and Capo d'Istria were subdued and their defensive walls pulleddown.8 This very early commitment to military enterprises and topermanent military defence has to be seen as a factor in the surprisinglymature Venetian responses to military problems which will be a majortheme of this book.

5 F. Thiriet, La Romanie venetienne au moyen age, Bibliotheque des Ecoles francaises d'Athenes et deRome, 193 (Paris, 1959) 63-140; S. Borsari, Studi sulle colonie veneziane in Romania nel XIII secolo(Naples, 1966); Venezia e il Levante fin0 al secolo XV, ed. A. Pertusi (Florence, 1973), vol. i.

6 S. Borsari, // dominio veneziano a Creta nel XIII secolo (Naples, 1963) 27-9; in 1301 the Cretanfeudatories agreed to provide troops for the Venetian fleet (Predelli, i, 14).

7 For the employment of Tiberto Brandolini in Albania in the thirteenth century, see A. Brandolini, /Brandolini da Bagnacavallo (Venice, 1942) 31; for contracts for the employment of mercenaries in theempire in the early fourteenth century, see Predelli, ii, 62-3, 94, 125, 159.

8 A. Tamaro, La Venetie julienne et la Dalmatie (Rome, 1918) i, 272ff.

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

Meanwhile on the Italian mainland control of the Po as a key means ofaccess to the markets of central Lombardy and as the first stage of the routeto France was one of the first priorities in Venice's expanding outlookwestwards. In 1240 a Venetian army led by the doge attacked Ferrara andachieved a temporary dominance over the city.9 By the end of the thirteenthcentury Venice had established a fort at the mouth of the Po at Marcamo andhad brought Ferrara itself under a degree of economic tutelage. Thesuccession crisis which followed the death of Azzo d'Este in 1308 seemed tooffer to Venice a chance of tightening this hold. Fresco, the illegitimate sonof Azzo, sought to establish himself as lord of Ferrara by seeking Venetianassistance and offering in return further facilities for control of the Po. Aforce of Venetian volunteers and militia was sent under Niccolo Querini tooccupy Castel Tedaldo and place Fresco in control of Ferrara. But thelegitimate D'Este claimant, Francesco, countered this move by an appeal tothe pope, who, as overlord of the city, placed Venice under an interdict andsent papal troops to drive out the Venetians. The struggle dragged on forover a year until finally the Venetians were evicted from Castel Tedaldo andwithdrew. The wider implications of the interdict for Venetian commercewere probably more influential in bringing about this result than actualmilitary pressure, and it seems that the Venetian military commitment wasnever large. The troops employed were mostly raised within the lagoon areaand commanded by Venetians, with the exception of one or two Dalmatiancontingents like that of Count Doimo da Veglia. The episode brought hometo Venice some of the problems raised by physical intervention on theItalian mainland, particularly when the interests of the pope were involved,and no doubt served to restrain any rapid development of tendencies in thatdirection.10

A revolt in Zara in 1311 led to a more effective display of militarystrength. A Venetian army was landed from the sea with a significantproportion of foreign mercenaries, including the Majorcan leader Dalmaziode' Banoli, but overall command was still in the hands of Venetian nobles. Itsucceeded in beating off an Hungarian attempt to relieve Zara and finallyforced the city to surrender in 1312. Dalmazio de' Banoli was not only one ofthe first condottieri employed by Venice, but presaged the behaviour ofsome of his more distinguished successors by attempting to betray hisemployers and desert to the Hungarians. However, it seems unlikely that,although his treacherous conduct attracted a good deal of attention from thechroniclers, his example had any significant bearing on the development of

9 Sestan, 321.10 On the war of Ferrara, see Romanin, iii, 11-26; Lane, Venice, 62-4; G. Soranzo, La Guerra fra

Venezia e la Santa Sede per il dominio di Ferrara (Citta di Castello, 1905). See also P. Sambin, 'Lerelazioni tra Venezia, Padova e Verona all'inizio del secolo XIV, Atti 1st. Ven., n.s. iii (1952-3) 205.

10


Venice's attitudes towards the problem of military recruiting. In this periodthe first reaction to a crisis requiring a military solution was to rely on localresources.11

However, the next major crisis on the mainland was of a dimension whichrequired a more intensive military involvement. During the 1320s Venicewatched anxiously the extension of a Delia Scala signoria eastwards fromVerona to Padua, Feltre, Belluno and Treviso. The tightening grip of theDelia Scala on the trade routes over the Alps led to a great debate in Veniceon how to react. The strength of the Delia Scala was such that a militaryeffort to oppose it would inevitably involve hiring large numbers of foreigntroops, a policy which Venice was still anxious to avoid. However, thedanger of Mastino della Scala linking up with Venice's main rival in Friuli,the Patriarch of Aquileia, edged Venice towards war, and at the same time agrowing confrontation between Delia Scala and Florence over possession ofLucca provided a valuable ally in such a war. In 1336 a conscripted armywas called out to resist further Delia Scala expansion eastwards, but thealliance with Florence which quickly followed put the whole enterprise on adifferent footing.12 Florence was already well accustomed to depending onlarge military contracts for its army, and the two states now agreed toemploy Piermaria de' Rossi, an experienced Parmigiano captain whose ownterritorial interests were threatened by Della Scala expansion, as captain-general. Rossi received the baton of command from Doge FrancescoDandolo on 10 October 1336 and immediately left to join the large armywhich was assembling at La Motta.13 Contingents of cavalry arrived fromFlorence, Bologna and Ferrara, but a sizeable proportion of the force wasstill made up of Venetian volunteers and conscripts. Rossi with 4500 cavalryand 10,000 infantry advanced to besiege Treviso. The campaign went well;Treviso, Bassano and Conegliano were taken and the Carrara familyestablished as satellite signori in Padua. The death of Piermaria de' Rossi inthe siege of Monselice in 1337 led to his place being taken by his brother,Rolando. The successes continued and by 1338 Vicenza was beingbesieged.14 This pressure forced Mastino della Scala to sue for peace, andVenice emerged from this first Terraferma war with a considerablyexpanded Terraferma state, including the important city of Treviso, and

11 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 593-8.12 Romanin, iii, 1156°; L. Simeoni, 'Le origini del conflitto veneto-fiorentino-scaligero', Studi storici

veronesi, xi (1961) 3-65; J. Piacentino (ed.), Cronaca dellaguerra veneto-scaligera, Miscellanea di storiaveneta, v (1931).

13 G. Gatari, Cronaca carrarese, ed. A. Medin, RRIISS., xvii, 1 (Citta di Castello, 1909) 18-19; Sanuto,Vite de' dogi, 601-3.

14 Sanuto, Vite de' dogi, 604-5.

II

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

with a relatively happy experience with both mercenary commanders andItalian allies.

However, in the 1340s Venice's problems lay mainly overseas. A revolt ofthe Greek landowning aristocracy in Crete in 1342 was ruthlessly put downby Venetian forces raised in the traditional manner.15 But a further revolt byZara in 1344 proved a greater threat because of the help once again given bythe Hungarians. The recapture of the city took nearly three years, and it wasin this campaign that the future Doge Marino Falier made his militaryreputation, although the honour of finally subduing Zara went to MarcoGiustinian. Once again the bulk of the forces employed seem to have beenraised from Venetian lands, but at least one condottiere, Cecco di TibertoBrandolini, was involved. The campaign was said to have cost 40,000 to60,000 ducats a month, of which 16,000 ducats a month was spent on theland army. The overall cost, reckoned by Sanuto at 3 million ducats, was asignificant contribution to Venice's rising financial problems in the criticalperiod of the late 1340s. But the preservation of control in Dalmatia wasseen as essential to the security of Venetian trade in the Adriatic.16

The loss of Dalmatia was the main outcome of a disastrous series of warsin the 1350s. Defeat at sea by Genoa in 1353/4 was followed by participationin an anti-Visconti league led by Francesco, il Vecchio, da Carrara whichserved only to increase the strength and pretensions of the Paduan signore.Thus, when the Hungarians attacked from the east in 1356 they weresupported by Padua, and Venice was confronted by the ultimate danger ofattack from both sides. In this mainly defensive war the burden was largelyborne by locally raised troops; Conegliano was lost to the Hungarians, butTreviso was saved after seven months of heroic defence led by GiovanniDolfin, who was elected doge during the last weeks of the siege. However, in1357 the Hungarians overran Dalmatia and Venice was forced to make ahumiliating peace.17 In the later stages of this war significant numbers ofGerman troops had been hired to bolster Venice's declining manpowerresources, and the experience with these was by no means uniformlyhappy.18

The next few years were dominated by revolts in Crete and Trieste whichsaw mercenaries drawn increasingly into the maintenance of Venetiancontrol in the empire. The Cretan revolt of 1363 was, unlike its predecessorin 1342, mainly a revolt of the Venetian feudatories against increasedtaxation. It was presumably because the revolt effectively stripped the island

15 Ibid., 607.16 Romanin, iii, 149; Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 611-63; Cessi, Storia della repubblica di Venezia, i, 301-2.17 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 640-3; Romanin, iii, 1976°; A. Simeoni, Storia di Padova dalle origini alia fine del

secolo XVIII (Padua, 1968) 515-16.18 For an example of the difficulties created by German mercenaries, see G. B. Di Sardagna,' II Conte

Armanno di Wartstein al soldo di Venezia', AV., ix (1875) 1-45.

12


of loyal troops that it was quickly decided in Venice to dispatch a largemercenary force led by the prestigious Lucchino dal Verme to suppress it.Lucchino's contract for iooo cavalry and 2000 infantry was signed on 2February 1364, and a large fleet laden with troops left Venice on 10 April.19

The fleet commander was Domenico Michiel, a prominent figure inVenice's military affairs for the next ten years, and the governor-general ofthe army was Pietro Morosini. The campaign which followed thedisembarkation of Dal Verme's troops was swift and decisive. The levies ofthe feudatories were no match for the professional troops, who wereaccompanied by specially recruited Bohemian engineers in case thereshould be any prolonged siege work.20 Dal Verme's army forced its way intoCandia as resistance crumbled, and the rebel ringleaders were quicklyrounded up and executed. Dal Verme himself was given a life pension of1000 ducats a year in reward for his services, and Venice was well satisfiedwith the decisive action which it had taken to secure this essential part of theempire.21

The revolt in Trieste in 1368 was a more protracted affair. On thisoccasion Venice resorted to the more traditional solution of a Venetian-ledand largely native force, although Istrians and Hungarians were recruitedand at least one prominent Italian condottiere, Niccolo d'Este, served as avolunteer. Domenico Michiel led the army in the opening stages but waslater replaced by Paolo Loredan, who succeeded in driving off a relievingforce sent by Duke Leopold of Austria, an old enemy of Venice. Triestesurrendered in 1369 and Loredan was knighted by the republic for hisservices. Niccolo d'Este received a gift of 5000 ducats.22

Throughout this period Francesco, il Vecchio, da Carrara had beenstrengthening his position on Venice's western mainland frontier, andseeking to interfere in affairs in Friuli. In 1372 a renewed threat of an anti-Venetian league between Padua and Hungary led to Venice once againtrying to break out of the stranglehold being imposed upon it. However, thewar got off to a slow start as Venice experienced the difficulties of assemblinglarge numbers of mercenaries quickly.23 It was only in November 1372 that

19 Commemor ia l i , v n , 32 (Predelli , iii, 26 -7 ) .20 Ib id . , v n , 33; 16 Jan . 1364 (Predelli , iii, 25).21 Sanu to , Vite de dogi, 6 5 6 - 9 . Fo r the rewards to Lucch ino dal Verme, see Commemoria l i , v n , 51; 16

J u n e 1364 (Predelli , iii, 31).22 O n the siege of Tr ies te , see T a m a r o , i, 193; Sanuto , Vite de' dogi, 669; Raphayni de ' Caresini ,

Chronica, ed. E. Pastorel lo, R R I I S S . , xii, 2 (Bologna, 1922) 18-19; G. Cesca, Le relazioni tra Trieste eVenezia sino a 1381 (Verona, 1881) 145$; G . G. Caroldo , La guerra di Trieste coi veneziani,1368-70 (Ud ine , 1874). T h e letters of Domen ico Michiel from the besieging camp survive in B M V .Mss . La t . Cl. x, 14. O n Niccolo d 'Es te , see M C . Novella, 124 (17 Jan . 1370).

23 Gatar i , 6 6 - 8 3 ; Sanu to , Vite de' dogi, 6 7 1 - 5 ; Nicolet to d'Alessio, ' L a storia della guerra per i confini ' ,in Gesta Magnified domus Carrariensis, ed. R. Cessi, R R I I S S . , xvii, i (Bologna 1965); P . Sambin , ' L aguerra del 1372-3 tra Venezia e Padova ' , AV., ser. 5, xxxviii-xxxix (1946-7) 1-76.

13

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

the chosen captain-general, Ranieri de' Guaschi, Count of the Maremma,arrived and the main army, 15,000 strong, was able to take the offensiveagainst Padua. A largely Venetian force, bolstered by cavalry hastilyrecruited in the Romagna and led by Domenico Michiel as vice-captain-general, had assembled some months earlier but had been unable to achieveanything positive. Now, with the campaigning season virtually over, Ranieride' Guaschi conducted some half-hearted operations against Brentelle andwas soon squabbling with the proveditors assigned to the army because ofhis inactivity. The proveditors were recalled in disgrace and in February1373 Ranieri was sacked, to be replaced by Giberto da Correggio.Meanwhile a Venetian force covering the rear of the main army against anHungarian attack was overwhelmed by the Hungarians, who marchedthrough to link up with the Paduans. Venice now faced the most seriousmilitary threat of its history to date. Large numbers of additional troopswere hired; 100 nobles were alerted for service as leaders of crossbowmen;and in April Giberto da Correggio arrived to take command. The new armysuffered a further defeat at Lova in May and Giberto da Correggio died soonafterwards of marsh fever. But already the Paduan economy was beingexhausted by the activities of three armies within the area and Francesco ilVecchio was anxious for peace. A victory won by the new Venetiancommander, Pietro della Fontana, on 1 July at Buonconforto, in which boththe Paduan and Hungarian commanders were captured, only hastened theend and gave Venetian morale a badly needed boost. Pietro della Fontanahad won his victory by adopting the English tactics, recently introduced intoItaly, of dismounting his men-at-arms and making them fight on foot.24 Thevalue of professional expertise of this sort no doubt impressed the Venetiansand helped to balance the unfavourable impression left by the earliercommanders in the war. However, once again Venice had felt obliged tocommit itself to war with no hope of sustaining it without the assistance ofmercenaries. The fact that these mercenaries had taken so long to assembleand had proved unreliable and difficult to handle could point to only onesolution - a permanent force. But at this stage both economic difficulties anda reasonable hope that a renewed dual attack could be averted by moreindustrious diplomacy postponed any serious attempt to explore such asolution.

That the Paduan-Hungarian alliance re-emerged in even more danger-ous form before the end of the decade was largely due to the success withwhich Genoa turned another round of the protracted naval confrontationwith Venice into a grand alliance against its old rival. The War of Chioggia(1378-81) saw Venice beleaguered by land and sea; while the Genoese fleet

24 Caresini, 25-6.

14


with Paduan troops stormed into Chioggia in the south-eastern corner of thelagoon, further Paduan forces besieged Mestre and the Hungarians sweptthrough Friuli and over the Livenza.25 All this was in the summer of 1379,and Venice's very existence seemed to hang by a thread. Control of theAdriatic had been lost; Istria was largely overrun by the Hungarians; enemytroops were on the shores of the lagoon. That the republic survived thiscrisis was mainly due to its naval strength; the return of Carlo Zeno's fleet atthe crucial moment re-established naval superiority, and both made anattack on Venice itself impossible and cut off the Genoese from reinforce-ments. In the fight for survival and in the recapture of Chioggia in 1380Venetians themselves obviously played a large part; indeed for a period thecity was largely cut off from the possibility of bringing in additionalmercenaries to assist in the defence. However, mercenaries had a share bothin the humiliations and in the triumphs. The notorious treachery of Robertoda Recanati, hanged between the columns in the Piazzetta for conspiring tohand the city over to the Genoese, was balanced by the bravery of Giacomode' Cavalli, who led the army in the recapture of Chioggia and was made amember of the Great Council as a reward.26

Once Chioggia was recovered and the Genoese fleet destroyed, the landthreat could be parried more easily. Treviso was ceded temporarily to theAustrians to win an alliance against Padua, and Vettore Pisani's fleetcombined with Giacomo de' Cavalli's cavalry to recover most of Istriaexcept for Trieste. The Treaty of Turin involved commercial concessions tothe Genoese in the east but few losses closer to home. However, the financialcosts of the war had been crippling and this factor again delayed any swiftsolution to Venice's military problems.

The last two decades of the fourteenth century saw Venice mobilizingonly once more on a large scale on the mainland, but there was a dramaticextension of the overseas empire. As the Turks advanced through theBalkans Venice was able to move in as the protector of beleaguered coastalcommunities and considerably extend its network of bases on the Adriaticand in southern Greece. The occupation of Corfu in 1386 was the mostsignificant step in this process; but this was quickly followed by theacquisition of Scutari, Durazzo, Lepanto, Patras, Argos and Nafplion.27 Allthese had to be garrisoned and fortified to be of any significance, and the newpermanent military commitments and the expense involved no doubt

25 F o r t h e W a r of Chiogg ia , see Cares in i , 3 3 - 5 8 ; Dan ie l e di Ch inazzo , Cronica de la guerra de veneziani ezenovesi, M o n u m e n t i storici della R. Depu t az ione veneta di storia patria, ser. 1, xi (Venice, 1958);R o m a n i n , iii, 191-216; L a n e , Venice, 191-6 ; L . A. Casat i , La guerra di Chioggia e la pace di Torino(F lorence , 1866); V. Lazzar in i , ' L a presa di Chiogg ia ' , AV., ser. 5, xlviii-xlix (1951) 53-74 .

26 On Cavalli, see DBL, xxii, 727-31.27 Thiriet, 355-63; Lane, Venice, 198-9; Cessi, Politica ed economia, 249-73.

15

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

contributed to Venice's continued reluctance to make any decisive moves onthe Terraferma.

One such move was made, however, and that was the decision to ally withthe rising power of the Visconti and take the opportunity to overthrow thedangerous Carraresi. The treaty of 1388 obliged Venice to field a force of2500 infantry, 300 mounted crossbowmen and 100 men-at-arms. This wasnot in fact an extravagant commitment and it was not felt necessary toengage a captain-general. Jacopo Dolfin commanded the Venetian con-tingent, which was supported by a river fleet of 400 craft. But the mainpressure was exerted on the Carraresi by Jacopo dal Verme and his Milanesearmy from the west. The temporary elimination of the Carraresi broughtVenice immediate gains in the form of Treviso (bought by Francesco ilVecchio from the Austrians in 1383), Feltre and Belluno.28 But there musthave been doubts in Venice about the long-term wisdom of the policy asVisconti power grew. Indeed, there was no serious attempt to prevent thelimited Carraresi recovery in 1390, and throughout that decade Padua actedas a sort of buffer between Venice and the Visconti. It is also in this periodthat one can see Venice seeking to create positive links with a number ofneighbouring satellite princes who had an interest in soldiering. In 1388Alberto d'Este was made a member of the Great Council and in 1390Carlo Malatesta was received with lavish honour in Venice.29 These weremen who could be expected to provide troops quickly if Venice neededthem, and the courting of them was a temporary substitute for themaintenance of significant standing forces.

Nothing is more indicative of Venice's reluctance to abandon a policy inthe Terraferma which put diplomacy before war, covert influence beforemilitary takeover, than its stances in the 1390s.30 Much attention wasdevoted to keeping Friuli disunited and free of systematic foreign control.Venice consistently supported the Savorgnan against the pro-Carrara andpro-Visconti factions, and worked, after the murder of John of Moravia, forthe appointment of a friendly Patriarch to succeed him.31 To the west,although diplomatic encouragement was given, any real commitment to theanti-Visconti league was avoided until 1397 when there seemed to be a

28 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 758; R. Cessi, 'Venezia e la prima caduta dei Carraresi', NAV., ser. 1, xvii(1909) 311-37; G. Collino, 'La preparazione della guerra veneto-viscontea contra i Carraresi', ASL.,xxxiv (1907) 209-89.

29 MC. Leona, 2or-v (Alberto d'Este), 87 (Carlo Malatesta).30 R. Cessi , ' L a politica veneziana di T e r r a f e r m a dalla caduta dei Carrares i al lodo di G e n o v a ' , Memorie

storiche forogiuliesi, v (1909) 127-44 , 193—209; G . Bolognini , ' L e relazioni tra le repubb l i che diFirenze e di Venezia nell-ultimo ventennio del secolo XIV, A V., ix (1895) 5-109; F. Surdich, Genovae Venezia fra Tre e Quattrocento (Genoa, 1970) 23-42.

31 R. Cessi, 'Venezia e la preparazione della guerra friulana (1381-5)', Memorie storiche forogiuliesi, x(1914) 414-73; Tamaro, i, 302-3.

16


danger of the Carrara gaining new strength from their leadership of theleague.32 In that year Venice sent a river fleet under Francesco Bembo to thehelp of Mantua and contributed significantly to the victory at Governolo.33

But even in the last stage of Giangaleazzo Visconti's expansion Veniceremained reluctant to involve itself as long as Milanese ambitions wereturned towards Tuscany.

In March 1402, with the Milanese spring campaign about to be launched,Venice ordered the raising of 300 lances for the defence of Mestre.34 At thispoint Venice had avoided major military commitments in the Terrafermafor fourteen years and was clearly not preparing any serious initiative withthis move. The castle at Mestre was traditionally the focal point of Venice'slandward defence and was normally garrisoned by a small detachment ofpermanent infantry. Similar guards were stationed in Treviso, Belluno andFeltre and at other points in the small mainland state which had beencreated in the fourteenth century. There is no evidence of any permanentcavalry force being maintained in Italy. Venice, at moments of militarycrisis, had certainly outgrown a reliance on its own hastily raised manpowerduring the course of the century, although volunteers and even conscriptsfrom among the lagoon inhabitants had always played a part in thecampaigns. Leading Italian and German condottieri had been employed,with some reluctance perhaps and with varying degrees of success, butalways on short-term contracts. The first surviving set of regulations for theemployment of mercenaries dates from 1336, the moment of the Delia Scalawar, and allowed for the hiring of cavalry lances of two men each on a payscale of 9 ducats a month. The men hired were expected to buy their ownfood and pay rent for their billets and for the stabling of their horses. Theywere to be compensated for any loss of horses whilst in Venice's service. Nolength of contract was stipulated in these early regulations, which bore aclose resemblance to Florentine regulations of the same period.35 By 1373,when a similar set of general regulations was issued to govern recruiting forthe war against Padua, the pay for a cavalry lance had doubled to 18 ducats amonth, but by this time the lance probably consisted of three men.Contracts were to be for four months' service with two additional months dirispetto, i.e. at the discretion of the employing state. This implied that troopswere raised specifically for the campaigning season, and an advance(prestanza) of 40 ducats per lance was to be paid at the moment of hiring,and subsequently deducted from pay. The principle of compensation for

32 R. Cessi, 'Venezia neutrale nella seconda lega anti-viscontea (1392-7)', NAV., n.s. xxviii (1914)2S3-3O7-

33 Sanu to , Vite de dogi, 764.34 S M i . reg. 46, 8v (20 M a r . 1402).35 Commemoriali, in, 138 (Predelli, ii, 68).

17

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

lost horses was now specifically excluded from these contracts, presumablyin the light of the much-increased pay scales.36

Venice therefore at the end of the fourteenth century was conformingexactly, in the employment of mercenary troops, to the standard procedurescurrent in northern and central Italian states. Where it differed was in thepolicy of maintaining considerable numbers of permanent troops in thegarrisons overseas. While the defence of Crete, the major commitment, waslargely entrusted to the expatriate feudatories until their revolt in 1363, thegarrisons of the other bases were a mixture of Balkan troops and Italian andGerman mercenary companies. After the suppression of the Cretan revolt asizeable body of mercenaries was maintained on the island,37 and by 1400,with the recent expansion of the empire, the garrisons must haverepresented a considerable standing force. In that year the garrison of 32crossbowmen in Scutari was to be supplemented by 40 Italian lances,38 andthat of 50 crossbowmen and 25 Albanian cavalry in Durazzo was to bereinforced with 40 Italian cavalry.39 Pandolfo Malatesta with a body ofItalian troops was temporarily stationed in Istria.40

These overseas garrisons were normally controlled by the Venetianrectors on the spot, and there were thus many opportunities for Venetianpatricians to experience the problems of controlling soldiers, quite apartfrom the periodic major expeditions to suppress revolts and counter threatsto the empire. In Italy also, even when the role of Venetian-led native troopshad declined, the periodic mobilizations of hired armies involved Venetiansupervisors at all levels. The provveditore or civilian commissary became afamiliar figure in Venice's military camps as the need to keep a close watchon the temporary and transient mercenaries was fully realized. However,there is no indication that this close supervision enabled Venice to do anybetter than any other Italian state in terms of effective organization of itsarmies. In 1381 a large group of deserters from the camp at Mestre issued apublic statement about conditions in the camp in justification of theirdesertion.41 They complained of poor pay, expensive bread made of inferiorgrain, watered-down wine and putrid salt meat. It could be said that manyVenetians had experience of the problems of provisioning and disciplining

Commemoriali, vn, 167; Mar. 1373 (Predelli, iii, 107).For contracts agreed with Bartolomeo dal Verme, Astolfo da Trieste, Rizzolino degli Azzoni andMatteo Malaspina, see Commemoriali, vn, 29, 53 (Predelli, iii, 39, 44).SMi. reg. 45, 2v and 25V (9 Mar. and 13 Aug. 1400).Ibid., 10 (11 May 1400).Ibid., 20V (22 June 1400).G. G. Di Sardagna, 'Soldati istriani e di altri italiani e forestieri che militarono nell'Istria allostipendio di Venezia nei secoli XIII, XIV e XV, Archcografo triestina, n.s. vii (1880) 88. Amongst thedeserters were sixteen non-Italians, thirteen Milanese, eleven Florentines, eight Parmigiani, fiveBolognese, three Mantuans and three Pisans. Most of the others were north Italians.

18


galley crews, but doubtless those crews would have made exactly the samecomplaints; the difference lay in the fact that they had less chance to desert.

In Venice itself the outbreak of war usually led to the establishment of aspecial war council of 25 to 50 leading patricians which took overresponsibility for the direction of the war from the Senate. While thispractice enabled the government to call on men with relevant experienceeven if they were temporarily not members of the main governing councils,it also tended to slow down the decision-making process when debate had totake place within what was still a large committee.

But the key feature of Venice's military commitment in Italy in thefourteenth century was its sporadic nature. Undoubtedly the experiences ofthe War of Chioggia led to the emergence of a group of younger men in theVenetian ruling class who were acutely conscious of the need for moreorganized permanent defence and the necessity for a more positive and long-term approach to the problem of Italian involvement. The war had revealedhow vulnerable Venice was to a grand alliance against it, and it also served topinpoint Padua as the main threat. The need for a more extensive andbetter-protected hinterland was highlighted by the loss of Treviso and theproblems of provisioning Venice itself which resulted from the temporaryloss of naval control of the Adriatic. These lessons certainly did not gounnoticed, and the birth of a Terraferma faction amongst the nobility can bedated to this period. But for the next twenty years it remained a minority;the crippling financial cost of the War of Chioggia weighed heavily on thesucceeding years, and the traditional approach to Italian involvementprevailed through the 1380s and 1390s. By the early fifteenth century,however, trade had picked up; confidence had been restored by theacquisitions overseas; Treviso had been recovered; but above all theTerraferma faction had gathered strength with the election of MicheleSteno as doge and with the rise to positions of experience and authority ofmen nurtured in the shadow of Chioggia. While the activities of Gian-galeazzo Visconti seemed sufficiently remote not to arouse an immediatereaction in Venice, the new expansion of Carrara power which followed thedeath of Giangaleazzo raised the spectre of encirclement once more, and thistime Venice was ready to take action.

The composition and role of the army inthe fifteenth century

THE CREATION OF A TERRAFERMA STATE, 1 4 0 4 - 2 5

If the occupation of Verona and Padua in 1405 and the overthrow of theCarrara family cannot be described as the results of a revolution in Venetianthinking about Italian involvement, nor technically as the beginning of theTerraferma state, the moment did lead to the emergence of a significantVenetian permanent army. The history of this army in terms of its exploitsand functions will be the concern of this chapter.

The speed and determination with which Venice reacted to the renewal ofCarrarese expansion in 1404, when Francesco Novello by a swift coup addedVerona to his Paduan possessions, are surprising. As recently as 1402 thestrength of traditional opposition to extensive mainland commitment and toexpensive land war had shown itself clearly. In the spring of that year, asGiangaleazzo Visconti prepared for another campaign of expansion, Venice,as we have seen, thought first of strengthening the defences of Mestre. Thenext relevant Senate decision was in May 1402 when authority was given forthe raising of a further 300 lances which were to be sent to the assistance ofPadua.1 With a growing sense of urgency in July Paolo di Leone was givencommand of this force;2 he was a Paduan and a close supporter of theCarrara, and therefore particularly suited to the appointment. However,proposals to offer a condotta to Paolo Orsini and to strengthen the garrisonsof Treviso and Ceneda with 400 crossbowmen were both defeated in theSenate.3

The strong opposition to these moves can be seen both as conservatismand as a reluctance to spend money. However, by early July the threat wastoo insistent to be ignored and full-scale war preparations went ahead. A

1 SS. reg. 1, 6ov (5 May 1402). For discussion of the 1402-5 period, see Fondazione Treccani, Storia diMilano, vi (Milan, 1955) 60-7; D. M. Bueno de Mesquita, Giangaleazzo Visconti (Cambridge, 1941)275-80, 293-302; N. Valeri, Leredita di Giangaleazzo Visconti (Turin, 1938); I. Raulich, La cadutadei Carraresi, signori di Padova (Padua, 1890).

2 SS. reg. 1, 68v (2 July 1402).3 Ibid., 67V-68 (26-8 June 1402).

20

The composition and role of the army

condotta for Orsini was agreed without further question,4 and a five-yearleague with Florence was confirmed on 11 August with Venice committed topaying three-fifths of the war expenses. On 31 August it was announced thatthe Emperor had given permission for Venice to recruit in Germany.5 Theimpression given by all this is that Venice had no standing forces of any size,except for garrison troops, and was virtually arming from scratch.

By November, while Giangaleazzo was now dead, the threat to Padua stillseemed serious and there was a proposal to demobilize only partially for thewinter. The continued threat was one factor here, but the Senate was alsoadvised of the danger of releasing large numbers of mercenaries at once; thesuggestion was to reduce gradually from the 600 lances which had beenassembled to 250, which were to be retained for the time being. However,this modest attempt to create a standing force was defeated, and totaldemobilization of the cavalry was ordered.6

As far as we can tell, this remained the position until April 1404, when theneed for active involvement in the Terraferma re-emerged in a differentform, the threat from a strengthened Carrara lordship. On 9 April a proposalto raise 1000 lances was defeated,7 but three days later a smaller force of500-600 lances was authorized. This decision produced a flurry of activity;Andrea Zeno and Leonardo Emo took charge of the recruiting, and largenumbers of lances and crossbowmen were hired. The export of arms wasstrictly forbidden, and on 29 April four savi were elected to direct the war.Francesco Gonzaga, lord of Mantua, was invited to come with 200 lances,and Jacopo dal Verme, the veteran Milanese commander, was also active inraising troops for Venice.8 Finally, approaches were made to MalatestaMalatesta to come and take command, and meanwhile two Venetiangovernors were responsible for the rapidly growing army at Treviso.9

As the mobilization went forward during the summer it included acontract for the Company of the Rose of about 220 lances, one of the last ofthe traditional companies active in Italy.10 Troops were also brought fromDalmatia and Crete. By the height of the 1404 campaign the army was saidto number 9000 cavalry and 10,000 infantry and militia.11 This sudden4 Ibid., 68v (2 July 1402).5 Ibid., 73 (31 Aug. 1402).6 Ibid., 78V-79 (17 Nov. 1402).7 Ibid., 142V (9 Apr. 1404).8 Ibid., 144-9 (I2~3° Apr. 1404).9 SS. reg. 2, 8v (19 May 1404). Corrado de' Cavalli, a Veronese noble in exile with considerable military

expertise, whose family enjoyed the status of honorary Venetian nobility, and Francesco da Molinwere chosen.

10 SS. reg. 2, 32 (16 July 1404).11 Annales Estenses, ed. G. Delayto, RIS. (Milan, 1731) xviii, col. 1009. Andrea Dandolo put the size of

the army at 30,000, but this seems too high (Andrea Dandolo, Cronaca, ed. E. Pastorello, RRIISS.,xii, 1 (Bologna, 1938-58) 402).

21

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

expansion of the army clearly created great problems for Venetian planning.The appointment of an all-powerful captain-general was a decision of greatmoment, and, in keeping with tradition both in terms of numbers and in orderto avoid creating too dangerous a figure, his condotta was limited to 350lances.12 But, given the very large number of troops which Venice was tryingto raise and the obvious desire to get good men, it quickly became apparentthat some of the other condottieri felt themselves entitled to largercompanies than this. For Francesco Gonzaga and Paolo Savelli the solutionwas limited companies, smaller than that of Malatesta, but with otherattached forces placed under their command. Jacopo dal Verme posed aneven greater problem, but as he was to be operating in a different area fromMalatesta he was eventually allowed to bring a company larger than that ofthe captain-general. For Ottobuono Terzo the solution was a half-paycondotta which placed him and his very large company in a differentcategory. Finally, despite the formal limitations to his condotta, it isprobable that Malatesta was allowed to bring a considerably larger companythan that originally contracted for.13 The conclusion to be drawn from thesearrangements was that in armies of the size which henceforward seemednecessary, it was essential to give real pre-eminence to the captain-generalby allowing him a very large company. Venice gradually learnt to accept thisand to devise other ways of countering any possible internal threat from toopowerful a military commander.

By the autumn of 1404 the position had emerged of a large main armybesieging Padua and divided into two camps. Malatesta, as captain-general,was based on Treviso while Paolo Savelli, his second in command, wasmoving in from the east and south-east. At the same time the siege of Veronawas being conducted by Jacopo dal Verme and Francesco Gonzaga, both ofwl >m had clear personal interests in the successful outcome of the siege.D Verme was himself Veronese and may well have dreamed of establishinga personal lordship in the city; Gonzaga, as lord of neighbouring Mantua,had long aimed at adding Verona to his state. Perhaps because of thesesomewhat suspect loyalties, but also to avoid rivalries between the twocaptains, the Senate vested control of this army in a committee of five whichincluded Gabriele Emo as governor and two proveditors.14 Finally, a thirdforce was required in the Polesine to counter any attempt by Ferrara to cometo Padua's assistance. This army was normally commanded by a Venetian,

12 Commcmoriali, ix, 162V (Predelli, iii, 299-300).13 Gatari, 531 suggests that Malatesta in fact had 1000 lances.14 SS. reg. 2, 6iv (2 Oct. 1404).

2 2


presumably because there was a strong amphibious element in the fightingin this area, and co-operation with a fleet on the Po was essential.15

With the approach of winter Malatesta indicated his wish to retire, andSavelli took over from him. Venice was clearly reluctant to accept anypremature seasonal break in the hostilities and decided to renew all thecondotte and keep the armies in the field. The contracts were, however, stillthose appropriate to a short campaigning season, i.e. two months ferma andtwo months di rispetto. Certainly vigorous fighting went on round Padua inNovember and December, leading to the fall of Piove di Sacco; butfollowing that the winter lull set in and the armies were run down and wentinto winter quarters.

In the spring of 1405 it was decided to employ 1200 lances in the armyfacing Padua; the Verona army was probably about the same size.16 Theneed for a Polesine force had been alleviated by a truce with Ferrara. In JuneVerona surrendered and the Mantuan contingent, now commanded byGaleazzo Gonzaga, Count of Grumello, was immediately transferred to thePadua front. There the ring was gradually closing on the beleaguered city.On the death of Savelli from a combination of wounds and marsh fever,Grumello took over command. On 25 November Padua finally surrenderedand Grumello, surrounded by a large coterie of Venetian nobles, entered thecity.17

The Carrara war was crucial for Venice not only because it finally turnedit into a mainland power with all that this was to involve, but also for themilitary developments of the war itself. It was essentially a transitional war;on the one hand the number of troops involved and the relative continuity ofthe fighting over a period of eighteen months introduced Venice to many ofthe problems of permanent military commitment. On the other hand theshort contracts and hand-to-mouth recruiting and administrative methodsshowed how traditional the Venetian military system still was. Nowhere wasthis clearer than in the large number of Venetian nobles who were directlyinvolved in this war. From Gabriele Emo, governor of the army beforeVerona, down through the levels of the administration to paymasters andprovisioners, captains of crossbowmen and commanders of redoubts in the

15 There have been many confusions in the sources about these command arrangements. The mostcomplete, but in some ways most misleading, account is in 'Cronica di Zorzi Dolfin' (BMV. Mss. It.VII, 794) 270V, which places Malatesta as the successor to Savelli after the latter's death in 1405. BothSanuto and, following him, Romanin (iv, 19) erroneously describe the first captain-general asPandolfo Malatesta. An additional useful source for this period is the 'Cronachetta veneziana dal 1402al 1415', ed. V. Joppi, AV., xvii (1879) 301-25.

16 SS. reg. 2, 99 (21 Mar. 1405).17 For the best account of the military details of the war, see Gatari, 520-71.

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

field, Venetian nobles were everywhere. At a rough computation at least 80nobles served with the army in some significant official capacity during1404-5. This was to be a declining phenomenon in the fifteenth century andone to which we must return at various points in this study.

As soon as Padua had surrendered, and indeed even before, the process ofdemobilization began. The cost of this war had been over 2 million ducatsand there was now a strong feeling in Venice that the army must be reducedto a bare minimum.18 However, that bare minimum, about which there wasconsiderable debate, was still a sizeable force by contemporary standards. Itwas at first agreed, on the urging of Alvise Loredan, that it should be 400lances and 500 infantry.19 However, a few days later the parsimonious groupin the Senate, led by Carlo Zeno, had the better of the argument and amotion was carried to reduce the standing force to 300 lances.20

Such an establishment would have represented little progress towards aneffective permanent force. But the problem was not just one of how large anarmy Venice could afford, nor indeed of how large an army it felt it needed.The immediate problem was how to get rid of the troops who were to be paidoff without them getting out of control. Venice had probably never faced theproblem on this scale before, and the threat was twofold. In the first placethere were large numbers of troops round Verona who were impatient to getaway to new contracts and for whom money had to be found quickly to paythem off. They threatened a mass assault on Verona unless money arrived.The second danger arose once troops had been finally paid off and weremaking their way over the frontiers in independent companies. This was amoment when any authority over them was gone and there was a tendencyfor them to take advantage of their licence and steal and loot anything theycould lay their hands on.21

In February Fantino Michiel, who had already gained considerableexperience with the army during the war, was sent out with a slim purse todeal with these problems.22 Michiel was instructed to offer the dangerouscompanies round Verona, who were mostly Mantuan troops underGaleazzo Gonzaga, Count of Grumello, full payment of what was owed tothem within four months, and even half-pay until that moment, as long asthey would leave Venetian territory immediately and give hostages for theirgood behaviour.23 This amounted in effect to a renewal of their condone, in18 Dandolo, Cronaca, 404.19 SS. reg. 2, 168 (24 Nov. 1405).20 Ibid., 170V (1 Dec. 1405). The vote on this hotly contested issue was 58 for, 46 against and 5 non

sinceri.21 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 832-3.22 SS. reg. 2, 187 (5 Feb. 1406).23 Ibid., 189V (8 Feb. 1406); Sanuto, Vite de' dogi, 832-3.

24


aspetto, for four months, and it indicated once again that negative aspect ofthe condotta in aspetto, i.e. a bribe to keep dangerous troops at a distance asmuch as a means of having protection on call. If this offer was refusedMichiel was empowered to break up the force by offering a full renewal ofcontract to part of them, and then using these men to drive the rest out.24

This is presumably what he did, as the net result of the whole operation wasthat Venice ended up with a larger standing force than it had intended, butthe rest of the demobilized troops were successfully dismissed. On 11 March1406 a standing force of 500 lances was authorized, and indeed some,including Alvise Loredan, wanted to go to 600.25 A week later Taddeo dalVerme was named commander of this force with a personal condotta for 100lances and 100 infantry.26

This force remained fairly constant until the Hungarian emergency in1411, except possibly for August 1409 when the threat from Boucicault ledto a hurried call for the mobilization of a further 250 lances.27 The army wasbilleted in and around Verona, Padua and Treviso. The headquarters ofTaddeo dal Verme were in Verona, but he was obliged to keep a part of histroops in Padua to avoid him becoming dangerously powerful in Verona.28

The standard form of contract for these troops was now four months fermaand two di rispetto.

The extent to which the presence of this standing force quickly becameaccepted is indicated by a Senate minute of 30 April 1409. It being springand the beginning of the normal campaigning season, a number of thecondottieri in Verona and Padua had asked permission to leave Venetianservice. The reaction in the Senate was indignant; these troops had beenmaintained by Venice through the winter, and in some cases for severalyears, and their request was regarded as singularly faithless. Any condot-tiere who left before September was to be blacklisted and never employedagain without specific Senate permission.29

Apart from this small standing army, Venice continued to maintain closecontacts with neighbouring condottiere princes so that reinforcementscould be raised quickly if necessary. Particularly important to the defensivesystem were the Gonzaga in Mantua and Pandolfo Malatesta in Brescia.Both these men were lent Venetian troops and money when they neededthem. Indeed, in 1407 a defensive league was signed among Venice,

24 SS. reg. 2, 190V (13 Feb. 1406).2 5 .SS. reg. 3, 4 ( n Mar. 1406).26 I b i d . , 5V (17 M a r . 1406).27 S S . reg . 4, 53 (29 A u g . 1409).28 S S . reg . 3 , 43V (21 O c t . 1406).29 SMi. reg. 48, 70 (30 Apr. 1409).

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

Malatesta, Mantua and Ferrara.30 On the death of Ottobuono Terzo in 1409Venice put up the money to pay his troops to protect Parma for his children.However, none of these soldier princes had a condotta in aspetto from Veniceat this stage.31

The inadequacy of these arrangements to protect the new Terrafermastate was to be revealed by the Hungarian invasions in 1411-12. These hadbeen sparked off by the sale of Zara to Venice by Ladislas of Naples in 1409,and Venetian operations in Dalmatia to secure control of this city and tosuppress a revolt in Split. King Sigismund was also in contact with theexiled Brunoro della Scala and Marsilio da Carrara.32 Although Hungarianintentions were clear early in 1411, Venice chose at first to make light of thethreat and contented itself with signing contracts with a number of Friulannobles for mutual defence. While these measures might have been sufficientto counter Hungarian raiding parties, they were totally inadequate to facethe massive invasion led by Pippo Spano in the autumn of 1411. However,Venice did, in the late summer, start preparing a line of fortifications on theLivenza river to block the Hungarian advance. This consisted of a series ofearthworks over twenty miles long, and it constituted a remarkable feat ofmilitary engineering which will be described in more detail later.33

The Livenza line certainly seems to have played a part in blunting theHungarian attack, but the preoccupation with this task and perhaps anundue confidence in its effectiveness seemed temporarily to blind the Senateto the need also for more troops. The standing force of 500 lances could nothope to withstand the Hungarian army of about 12,000 cavalry, par-ticularly as the western frontier could not be completely denuded of troops.But it was not until December 1411 that the full extent of the crisis seemedto dawn on Venice, and then within the next four months the size of thearmy was quadrupled. This was achieved by frenetic activity on the part ofrecruiting agents all over Italy, by borrowing troops from Milan and theEste, and by contracting out large-scale recruiting to Uguccione de'Contrari, the chief of staff of the Este and currently papal captain-general.34

This last measure virtually deprived Venice of any control over who washired for her service and must have seemed deeply unsatisfactory to somemembers of the Senate. The fact was that while Venice had quicklyappreciated the need for permanent defences of its new state and the

ASMa., Archivio Gonzaga, B.43, 61 (27 July 1407). Venice agreed to contribute 300 lances to theleague, Pandolfo Malatesta 125, Ferrara 50 and Mantua 40.M. E. Mallett, 'Venice and its condottieri, 1404-54', in Renaissance Venice, ed. J. R. Hale (London,1973) 124.G. Cogo, 'Brunoro della Scala e l'invasione degli Ungari del 1411', NAV., v (1893) 2Q.6ff.See below, 92-3. The best source for this Hungarian war is Joppi, 'Cronachetta veneziana', 319-21.Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1408-13, 58-9 (14 Dec. 1411); SS. reg. 4, 231V (17 Jan. 1412).

26


maintenance of a small standing force, it had not yet solved the problem ofhow to expand that force quickly without losing control over it.

The largest accretion to the Venetian army at this stage was the companyof 500 lances of Carlo Malatesta, who was invited to be captain-general.However, it was the spring of 1412 before these troops began to arrive, as theinitial discussions in Venice and the subsequent negotiations with Malatestahad been more than usually protracted.35 Meanwhile the makeshift defencewas made up of infantry on the Livenza line commanded by Bartolino de'Zamboni, the expanding army camped behind the line commanded byTaddeo dal Verme and Francesco Orsini, a small river fleet, and a bevy ofVenetian proveditors and officials. This, combined with the inability of theHungarians to press home their advantage, produced a temporary stale-mate. The Livenza line was the key to the situation; by abandoning any ideaof defending the lands to the east the Venetians gave the Hungarianssomething to occupy them, and the line itself was clearly sufficientlyeffective a barrier to demand an organized attack which the Hungarianswere slow to prepare.

Various sorties were planned to keep up the morale of the troops andprevent the Hungarians from massing, but when Carlo Malatesta arrived inthe camp in May 1412 he found the situation far from satisfactory. His maincomplaint was that there were not enough men, and although Veniceclaimed that it had already signed contracts for 2400 lances, further effortswere now made to raise more.36 The main result of this was that PandolfoMalatesta, Carlo's brother and lord of Brescia, agreed to come with hisentire force of 1000 lances.37 This was a stroke of luck which was to standVenice in good stead for some years, as Pandolfo had one of the best-organized and most efficient companies in Italy.38 At Pandolfo's request, aVenetian noble, Jacopo Soriano, was sent to Brescia to govern it in hisabsence.39

Pandolfo Malatesta moved with surprising speed, and by late August anarmy which must have numbered about 12,000 men was assembled on theLivenza. On 24 August the Hungarians attacked the Venetian positions atMotta, and after a fierce encounter were driven off. Both Carlo Malatestaand Taddeo dal Verme were wounded in this battle, and Pandolfo Malatestatook over command. He led a brisk counter-attack aimed at Seravalle, Prata

35 Mallett, 'Venice and its condottieri', 133-4. For Malatesta's condotta, see Commemoriali, x, 116(Predelli, iii, 357).

36 S S . reg. 5, 42 (7 Ju ly 1412). Mala tes ta c laimed he had been promised 2000 lances and 3000 infantry.37 Ibid., 44(11 July 1412).38 A good deal of material on the organization of Pandolfo Malatesta's troops survives in Archivio di

Stato, Fano, Codici Malatestiani, esp. nos. 54 and 56.39 SS. reg. 5, 50 (26 July 1412).

27

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

and Sacile,40 but by this time the short condotte were beginning to run outand many of the troops were drifting away, perhaps alarmed at the thoughtof spending the winter in this inhospitable part of Italy.41

At this moment a new Hungarian attack was reported as imminent. Spiessent warning that Pippo Spano was on the move again, and once moreVenice was caught in difficulties as the natural decline of an army in theautumn coincided with a renewed threat. A motion was passed in the Senateauthorizing the raising of an additional 1000 lances.42 The danger wasaccentuated by a suspicion that Pandolfo Malatesta was being courted bythe Hungarians. For a few weeks there was confusion as the Senate tried totake over control and use the army to defend towns piecemeal, whilePandolfo Malatesta argued for giving ground and keeping the army intact inorder to defend Venice itself43 However, by January confidence in Pandolfoand his tactics had been restored, and at the end of that month theHungarians halted their drive eastwards and concentrated on recoveringterritory in Istria where a Venetian force under Ludovico Buzzacarini hadbeen operating with considerable success. On 17 April 1413 a truce wassigned and the war ended in a sort of stalemate which must have seemed asomewhat fortunate conclusion for Venice.

Many of the facts of life about the preservation of a territorial state wereharshly brought home to Venice in this war. Neither the small permanentarmy nor the network of contacts with satellite condottiere princes hadproved effective. Certainly but for the immediate presence of Taddeo dalVerme and his 500 lances the situation would have been even worse in early1412; on the other hand, both the Gonzaga and the Este had been slow incoming to help despite intense pressure on them. The build-up of aneffective field army and the search for and employment of a new captain-general had taken over six months. Nor had the traditional type of short-contract Italian army proved itself fully effective against the Hungarians,who seemed to relish winter campaigning in Italy. The lessons to be learntfrom all this were by no means quickly assimilated or immediately actedupon. The ultimate solution of a much larger permanent force with anaccepted system of rapid expansion, long contracts and a permanentcaptain-general was not to emerge until nearly twenty years later. But thefirst step towards this solution was taken immediately in 1413 with theengagement of Pandolfo Malatesta as captain-general in aspetto.

Pandolfo Malatesta was captain-general until 1416, when he went to the

40 Ib id . , 64V (27 Sep t . 1412).41 Ib id . , 67 (6 Oc t . 1412); ' C r o n i c a Dol f in ' , 284.42 S S . reg. 5, 84 (17 N o v . 1412).43 I b id . , 85V (25 N o v . 1412), 85V-87 (27 N o v . 1412); Col legio, C o m m i s s i o n i Secre te , 1 4 0 8 - 1 3 , 97 (4

Dec. 1412).

28


Marches to arrange for the ransom of his brother, Carlo, from the hands ofBraccio da Montone. This provided Venice not only with a skilledcommander close at hand in Brescia with a large force of cavalry available ifneeded, but also furnished it with a force of 400 lances detached underMartino da Faenza in permanent service. The arrangement was a mutuallysatisfactory one; Venice expanded its standing army with good, reliabletroops and had no longer to provide for the defence of the western frontier;Pandolfo got a part of his company fully paid for him and could rely onVenetian moral and diplomatic support to defend both Brescia and hisinterests in Romagna and the Marches. The condotta was renewed every sixmonths during this period and cost Venice 4000 ducats a month.44 Therewere certainly many in the Senate who resented this expenditure and whoused the biannual debate on the condotta as a moment to try and whittledown the military budget. But even when such votes to reduce the sum weresuccessful, Pandolfo was in a sufficiently strong position to get the decisionquickly reversed by a show of resistance. It was only his departure fromBrescia in the autumn of 1416 which changed the situation and gave achance to get the system suspended. However, on his return in 1417 the offerof the post of captain-general on the same terms was renewed to him, andappears to have been accepted.45

Apart from Pandolfo Malatesta's troops, a number of the condottieri whohad fought against the Hungarians were retained in permanent service.46 Abrief campaign against the Austrians in the Valle Lagra in 1413, and a moreextensive one in 1416 which resulted in the capture of Rovereto, providedactivity and experience for these troops. The permanent condottieriincluded Simone da Canossa, Grasso da Venezia, Antonio de' Roberti andRuggiero da Perugia. In addition to Martino da Faenza's 400 lances inVerona, there must have been 400-500 retained under these men, who weredivided up amongst the main Terraferma cities. The standard condotteremained four months ferma and two di rispetto.

In addition to these cavalry commanders there was now an infantry leaderwho, although he did not yet have the official title of captain of infantry,certainly occupied that position. This was Quarantotto da Ripamortorio, aPisan who had served Venice since at least 1404 and whose peacetime

44 T h i s condotta was first app roved in Apri l 1413 ( S S . reg. 5, 125; 29 Apr . 1413). See also Mal le t t ,'Venice and its condottieri', 140 n. 9.

45 S S . reg. 6, 144 (8 May 1417). Pandolfo had suggested that Venice take over the protection of Bresciaand assume all the costs, bu t the Senate decided that a re turn to the old condotta in aspetto was likely tobe a less dangerous commi tment . In January 1418 Venice, al though realizing that Pandolfo had hisown commi tments defending Brescia against Milan, proposed to renew the condotta in aspetto whichwas clearly still in force (SS. reg. 6, 185V; 10 Jan . 1418).

46 S S . reg. 5, 120V (28 Mar . 1413). As the peace negotiations were in progress Venice declared itsintention of retaining most of the troops in service.

29

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

function was commander of the infantry garrison in Padua. There he had ahouse next to that of the Venetian captain of the city.47 Another figure whoemerged during this period and took part in the 1416 campaign was Taddeod'Este; he was to be a prominent captain in the Venetian army for the nextthirty years.48 Bartolino de' Zamboni, who had supervised and commandedthe fortifications of the Livenza line, took command again of the 1416operations, but he does not seem to have had a formal condotta. He comesinto that category of elderly professional soldiers, like Paolo di Leone, whoacted as advisers to Venice and whose standing was somewhere between thecontract condottieri and the patricians who supervised and directed them.

The five-year truce with the Hungarians was due to run out in April 1418and Venice was well aware of the threat that this posed. As early as Octoberof the previous year preparations for mobilization were being made. For thefirst time special taxes were imposed on the subject cities to pay for troops,and 200 additional lances and 500 infantry were hired.49 In the spring effortswere made on the diplomatic front to extend the truce, but at the same timefortifications were inspected and part of the army was moved to Friuli toresist a Hungarian invasion.50

By this time Pandolfo Malatesta was fully occupied with the defence ofBrescia against Milan, so in July 1418 Filippo Arcelli was hired as governorof the army.51 Arcelli had been in Pandolfo's service in 1415 and at that timehad held a Venetian condotta. So he was known in Venice, indeed perhapstoo well known, as he seems to have been a violent and unpredictable manwhom the Senate always slightly distrusted. Whether this was why he wasnot made captain-general, or whether there was still a hope that Pandolfowould return to that post, is not clear. But Arcelli was remarkably successfulin 1419-20 recovering towns lost to the initial Hungarian assault and indeedconsiderably expanding Venetian possessions in Friuli. It is difficult tojudge how large the army he had at his disposal was; it probably fluctuatedconsiderably during nearly three years of active campaigning. But in June1419 Venice aimed to have 1000 lances under arms, which was a small forceeven by the standards of 1404-5. What is noticeable, however, is that thiswar was fought without the help of any major condottiere prince. The armywas made up of a large number of lesser condottieri, many of whom had

47 Mallett, 'Venice and its condottieri', 127 and n. 39 and Commission! di Rinaldo degli A/bizzi, ed. C.Guasti (Florence, 1867-73) ii, 56, 71-3.

48 Mallett, 125-6.49 S S . reg . 6 , 1 7 5 (30 Oc t . 1417). T h e proposal to raise new t roops was vigorously opposed in the Sena te ,

and a counter-mot ion to postpone the decision was only just lost.50 S M i . reg. 52, 75 (10 Feb . 1418) and S S . reg. 7, 21 (21 June 1418).51 For accounts of this war, see Kre tschmayr , ii, 267-8 and G. Cogo, ' L a sottomissione del Friuli al

dominio della repubblica veneta ' , AttidcF Accudemia di Udine, ser. 2, iii (1896). On Arcelli, see DBL,iii, 751-2 .

30


been serving Venice for some time. Arcelli himself had only 120 lances atfirst, and no other condottiere seems to have had more than 100. This wasperhaps a situation dictated as much by the fact that the better-knowncaptains were all engaged elsewhere, particularly in Naples, as by anyconscious Venetian policy; but the result was a relatively harmonious andhighly successful campaign. At one stage in September 1419, when it wasfelt that more troops were needed, the Senate decided that rather than goout and seek more condottieri they already had sufficient competent leadersand would therefore invite each of these men to expand his company.52 Thiswas to become one of the key features of the Venetian system; mobilizationand demobilization were to be largely carried out within a cadre ofpermanent condottieri, and this seems to be the first time that the idea wassystematically applied.

This war, which saw the occupation by Venice of Cividale, Sacile, Prata,Portogruaro, Belluno, Feltre and finally Udine, culminated in an expeditionto defend Istria in January 1421 led by Taddeo d'Este in the absence ofArcelli, who became ill and died in Capo d'Istria. A truce was finally signedin the spring of 1421, and a defensive treaty was signed with Mantua at thesame moment allowing for military access to the Mantovano in anemergency.53 But already in the summer and autumn of 1420 the size of thearmy was being reduced to 600 lances by a proportional reduction of thecompanies and a pruning of the garrisons.54 By the autumn of 1421 pressurein Venice to reduce military expenditure had clearly become acute, anddemobilization had reduced the army to its lowest level for years. Arcelli wasdead, and no official appointment had been made to replace him; Taddeod'Este was recognized as the senior commander of those who remained, andindeed most of the leaders in the second Hungarian war did remain inVenetian service. But the strength of the cavalry force was now run down toabout 400 lances.

However, this was just a momentary reaction, and perhaps only a lapse ofattention, because in May 1422 the condottieri were all authorized toincrease their companies by 25%, and a further 300 lances were hired inaddition to this increase.55 The expansion of the state in the recent war wasgiven as the justification for this increased peacetime army, and probablynever again was the permanent force of cavalry allowed to fall below 800

52 SS. reg. 7, io8v (26 Sept. 1419). It is interesting that the idea was sharply opposed in the Senate by 45votes to 63.

53 SS. reg. 8, 2 (13 Mar. 1421). Francesco Foscari had a major role in negotiating this treaty.54 SS. reg. 7,169 (18 July 1420) and SMi.reg. 53,9ov(7 Dec. 1420). After some debate it was decided to

reduce the standing force to 600 lances, in addition to those stationed in Verona, Vicenza and Padua.55 SS. reg. 8, 54V (19 May 1422). The details given here indicate that the standing force was about 400

lances prior to these increases.

3 1

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

lances. Doge Mocenigo, in his deathbed oration, referred to a standing forceof 1000 lances and 3000 infantry, which already consumed most of theincome from the new Terraferma state.56 This new concern for militarystrength coincided with the setting up of a permanent group of saviresponsible for the Terraferma lands. The standard condotta used by thistime was six vcvonxhs ferma and six months di rispettof1 in other words year-in, year-out service was now envisaged. The system reflected what hadbecome the standard practice in the Venetian army of reviewing andresigning the condotte in the spring, with less formal extension in the autumnbefore winter quarters, which enabled Venice to reduce its forces if itwished.

The size of the army by this time led to serious consideration of the needfor a captain-general in peacetime, but it was only in 1424 that steps weretaken to fill the post. By this time a tense atmosphere was developing withMilan, which was at war with Florence, and by the autumn of that year thepermanent establishment had risen to 1250 lances after another increase of25% in all the companies.58 At the same time the first one-year-plus-six-month condotte were introduced.59 Various proposals were discussed inVenice, including, before Aquila, the hiring of Braccio da Montone.Eventually Antonio da Montefeltro, Count of Urbino, was offered acondotta in aspetto as captain-general along the lines of that of PandolfoMalatesta in the previous decade.60 Although this condotta was signed,Antonio was never called upon to serve because early in 1425 Carmagnolaarrived in Venice having fled from Milan with a small following of 80cavalry.

Francesco Bussone, Count of Carmagnola, was already one of the mostprestigious soldiers in Italy. Indeed, the possibility of hiring such a mancaused some trepidation in Venice and he was handled with extremecaution. During protracted negotiations in March 1425, Carmagnola askedto be made captain-general with a condotta for 500 lances. The Senateresisted these proposals, more, one suspects, out of a distrust of Carmagnolahimself than out of any fundamental reluctance to appoint a captain-generalin peacetime. Carmagnola was given a condotta for 200 lances, with apromise that it would be quickly increased to 300, and sent to billets inTreviso.61 It was here during the summer that a Visconti plot to murder him56 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 958.57 SS. reg. 8, 22 (6 July 1421).58 Ibid., 174.V (17 Oct. 1424). On 19 Nov. 1424 the College was authorized to increase the cavalry force to

1600 lances (SS. reg. 8, 177).59 Predelli, iv, 57.60 SS. reg. 8, i3 9v (17 Jan. 1424).61 SS. reg. 9, 2-5 (2-22 Mar. 1425). The decision to allow Carmagnola 200 lances was passed in the

Senate by only 84 votes to 62, with 10 nan sinceri. See also A. Battistella, / / Conte Carmagnola (Genoa,1889) 93-103.

32


was uncovered, and this clear evidence of a breach between him and Milanhelped the Senate to make up its mind about him. By the autumn heavyFlorentine defeats at the hands of Milan, and the urgings of Carmagnolahimself, were steadily pushing Venice towards an alliance with Florence andwar with Milan. On 4 December 1425 the league was approved, and thisamounted to a virtual declaration of war, although it was not published until21 January 1426. By this time 800 Venetian lances were already movingforward into the Mantovano.62 From this moment for nearly thirty yearsVenice was to be at war, or on the brink of war, with Milan.63

The first quarter of the fifteenth century had clearly seen the establish-ment of a Venetian permanent army. The period had been punctuated bywars but was certainly not one of continuous war. The prime factor in theformation of that army had been the acquisition of the Terraferma statewhich needed defending, and for most of the period it had been the easternfrontier and the Hungarian threat which had preoccupied Venice. Venicewas certainly not unique in Italy in having large standing forces by 1425, butthe speed with which the phenomenon developed and the degree ofconscious planning and forethought involved did serve to create a moreformalized and highly organized system than can be detected elsewhere.

THE MILANESE WARS, 1 4 2 6 - 5 4

The league with Florence committed Venice to the maintenance of an armyof 8000 cavalry and 3000 infantry in war, and 3000 cavalry and 1000 infantryin peace.64 This meant in practice that Venice had to double the size of itsarmy before the campaigning season of 1426 began. The first moves were tomake Carmagnola captain-general and to launch a recruiting drive in thesouth with galleys ferrying the troops up the Adriatic. The army grewrapidly and soon exceeded by a large margin the formal treaty commitment.Gianfrancesco Gonzaga was named as second in command to Carmagnola,and other notable condottieri who joined the Venetian army at this stagewere Guidantonio Manfredi, Luigi da Sanseverino, Piero Gianpaolo Orsini,Ludovico de' Michelotti and Lorenzo Attendolo da Cotignola.

The brunt of the Milanese attack fell at first on Florence, whose captain-general, Niccolo d'Este, had also been named Venetian lieutenant-general

62 ASMa., Archivio Gonzaga, B.1419, 6-9. I am indebted for this reference to Dr R. A. Roberts, whoseunpublished Ph.D. thesis ('Mantua under Gianfrancesco Gonzaga (1407-44): war, politics anddiplomacy in a Lombard buffer state', University of Warwick, 1981) throws much light on themilitary and diplomatic events of this period.

63 For the preliminaries to this war and an analysis of the opening phase, see I. Raulich,' La prima guerrafra i veneziani e Filippo Maria Visconti', RSI., v (1888) 441-68, 661-96.

64 Ibid., 457. Flavio Biondo's Decades is an important source for this period, particularly as Biondo wasat this stage secretary to Pietro Loredan, one of the Venetians most involved in the war.

33

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

beyond the Po. Venice sent some of its new forces southwards to helpNiccolo d'Este, but then in May 1426 Angelo della Pergola brought themain Milanese army northwards to join Francesco Sforza against Venice,and all its troops were hurriedly recalled. The reason for this Milanese movewas the need to recover Brescia, which had already revolted and admittedCarmagnola's army. Only the fortresses of the city were holding out and theVenetians were rapidly overrunning the Bresciano.65

The campaigns of 1426 were entirely devoted to this task of the reductionof the fortresses of Brescia and the surrounding castles. The combinedVenetian-Florentine army under Carmagnola in Lombardy was said tonumber 29,000 men, of whom about three-quarters were in Venetian pay.66

It was not until 20 November that the castle of Brescia finally surrendered,and the armies immediately went into winter quarters. Carmagnola set uphis headquarters in Brescia, which was to serve as the base for the Venetiancaptain-general throughout the century.

The winter was taken up with peace negotiations which were clearly notseriously intended by either side. The loss of Brescia and the humiliatingdemands made by Carmagnola for the restoration of his family and all hisMilanese lands were quite unacceptable to Filippo Maria Visconti. Venice,fully aware of the situation, renewed all its military contracts withoutformality and instructed Carmagnola to get the army ready for the field inFebruary 1427. The process was an extraordinarily slow one, partly becauseCarmagnola himself had to spend a good deal of time at the baths at Abano,but probably more importantly because of the size of the army beingprepared. In April it was reported that the allies had 16,000 cavalry and 8000infantry under contract,67 and at the height of the summer campaign thearmy was said to number 22,000 cavalry, 8000 infantry and 6000 militia -'the largest army ever seen in Italy in living memory' according to Fazio.68

Whether the combined army actually reached this size must be doubted, butit was certainly slow to assemble, and in April 1427 a sudden Milanese attackon Casalmaggiore, supported by a river fleet, found Carmagnola unable orunwilling to respond, and the town fell. Despite the fact that the rest of theyear's campaign was largely successful for Carmagnola and Casalmaggiorewas itself retaken in July, this reverse was to rankle in Venice and left

65 For a recent description of the events in Brescia and the arrival of Carmagnola's army, see FondazioneTreccani, Storia di Brescia, ii (Brescia, 1964) 11-16.

66 Battistella, 148 n. 1; L. Osio, Documenti diplomatici tratti dagli archivi milancsi (Milan, 1872) ii, 256-7puts the size of the allied army at 18,000, and Sanuto's list of this year gives a Venetian strength of only12,000 men, but the list is clearly not complete (Sanuto, Vitc de dogi, 990-1). See also F. Odorici,Storie bresciane (Brescia, 1858), viii, 174-5.

67 SS. reg. 10, 44V (27 Apr. 1427).68 Battistella, 162.

34


suspicions of Carmagnola in many minds. However, for the momentcriticism was muted as Carmagnola gradually contained and forced back theMilanese. A series of somewhat inconclusive encounters culminated in thedecisive battle of Maclodio in October in which Carmagnola drew theMilanese into an ill-considered attack on a defensive position andcompletely shattered them. Milanese sources tended to play down both thecasualties and the numbers of their condottieri captured at this battle, whilethe Venetians probably exaggerated the figures.69 Thus Carmagnola'sfailure to follow up his apparent advantage was regarded with unwarrantedsuspicion. Carmagnola was certainly a particularly cautious general whoseinsistence on overwhelming strength contributed to the massive build-up ofthe Venetian army in these years. But, on this occasion, he could point to thefacts that winter was approaching, that the crossing of the Adda in order toadvance on Milan was a particularly difficult operation, and that althoughthe Milanese army was temporarily shattered it very quickly recovered andwas re-equipped by an astonishing effort by the Milanese armourers.Anyway the victory was sufficient to make Filippo Maria Visconti onceagain seek peace; a peace which gave Venice Bergamo and the Bergamasco,and restored to Carmagnola all his Milanese lands.70

The Peace of Ferrara which was eventually signed in April 1428 initiatednearly three years of uneasy truce in Lombardy. The addition of Brescia andBergamo to the Venetian state, together with Milan's obvious determinationto recover them, made the maintenance of a large standing force inevitable.There was no question of paying off Carmagnola or any of the leadingcaptains, and in November 1428 all the condotte were renewed despiteproposals from a minority in the Senate that cavalry strength should bereduced by a quarter.71 The army began to settle down into a defensiveposture based on permanent billets spread right across the Terraferma,which was to last for the rest of the century. These dispositions were set outin a Senate minute of 14 July 1429 and involved the quartering of over 6000cavalry under a cadre of named captains of considerable eminence.72

This truce in Lombardy began to crumble in 1430 when Florence,already committed to a fruitless attack on Lucca which was defended byMilan, called on Venice to take up arms again. Venice began to preparesomewhat reluctantly, and it was not until early 1431, when Filippo MariaVisconti tried to take the frontier fortress of Orzinovi by treachery, that waragain became inevitable. On 14 February 1431 an increase of all the condottewas authorized by Venice; Carmagnola increased his company from 500 to

69 Ibid., 190-202.70 R. Cessi, 'Venezia alia pace di Ferrara del 1428', NAV., n.s. xxxi (1916) 321-71.71 SS. reg. 10, 197 (2 Nov. 1428).72 SS. reg. 11, 2ir-v (14 July 1429).

35

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

625 lances and all his captains were allowed similar increases.73 In Marchfighting broke out in various parts of the Bergamasco.

Once again, however, a serious campaign took a long time to get moving,and the crossing of the Adda, a crucial preliminary to any attack on Milan,was prevented in June by the defeat of the Venetian river fleet on the Po. Inthis year Florentine reports suggested that Venice had 24,000 men underarms, but this was almost certainly an exaggeration, perhaps circulateddeliberately to impress Venice's ally.74 A more likely figure at this stagewould be 15-16,000. But this force was to be seriously stretched in theautumn when a Hungarian attack on Friuli, promoted by Milanesediplomacy, was threatened. Large parts of the army were moved fromLombardy and operations in the west came to an abrupt conclusion.

Carmagnola himself was ordered to Friuli for the Hungarian emergency,but he moved extremely slowly, if indeed he went at all. In fact the threatnever materialized, but Carmagnola's reluctance to obey orders with whichhe did not concur added to the growing resentment in Venice about manyaspects of his behaviour. These resentments had been fuelled over the yearsby his over-cautious tactics and apparent failure to take advantage ofmilitary opportunities, by his reluctance to support the river fleet in 1431, bythe strong stand which he took on frequent occasions against the proveditorson administrative issues, and by his constant demands for more money.75 Inmany of these issues individually it is easy to find justification forCarmagnola's intransigence, but taken together they added up to anintolerable burden on Venetian patience; and behind them all lay thesuspicion that the continual attempts by Filippo Maria Visconti to subornhis erstwhile commander might one day bear fruit, or indeed that theremight already be a secret understanding between the two men. What isperhaps surprising in the whole affair is the reluctance with which Veniceacted. On 22 March 1432 a zonta of twenty leading nobles was summoned tojoin the Council of Ten to consider proceeding against Carmagnola.76 Thepossibility had already been discussed in the previous October in the Senate,but without any conclusion. Now the Ten was also uncertain, but on the23rd a secretary was sent to Carmagnola in Brescia to invite him to come toVenice to consult about the impending campaign. This device was preferredto the more straightforward but dangerous proposal to arrest the captain-general in the midst of his troops. As Carmagnola journeyed to Veniceletters were written to all his captains urging them to remain faithful despite

73 Ib id . , 163V (14 F e b . 1431).74 C. C. Bayley, War and Society in Renaissance Florence (Toronto, 1961) 106. Sanuto, Vite de dogi,

1015-16, lists 4151 lances (c. 12,500 cavalry) in the Venetian army in 1431.75 Fo r further discussion of some of these issues, see below, 176-8 .76 Dieci , Mis t i , reg. 11, 37V.

36


the arrest of their leader.77 On 7 April he arrived at the lagoon and wasescorted with full honours to the Ducal Palace. There, once he wasseparated from his bodyguard pending an interview with the doge,Carmagnola was quietly arrested and imprisoned. On 9 April a specialcommission was set up to interrogate, and if necessary torture, him, andprepare charges. For nearly a month the proceedings dragged on; Eastercelebrations intervened, but probably the Ten was reluctant to act until itwas clear that there was going to be no violent reaction in the army. Finallyon 5 May the commission of inquiry presented its report including what wassaid to be a detailed confession of treachery. The result was an almostunanimous condemnation by the Ten, but more uncertainty over thesentence. The death sentence was carried by only two votes, but then withinhours Carmagnola was led out into the Piazzetta and executed between thecolumns.78

None of the evidence collected by the Ten in this case remains to us, butin a sense it is irrelevant. Once the decision to arrest Carmagnola had beentaken it had little choice but to proceed to a final solution. To imprison orexile a man like Carmagnola could only lead to endless problems andpolitical dangers; to execute him publicly had the great advantage ofadministering a salutary shock to his fellow captains and eventualsuccessors.

The obvious successor to Carmagnola was Gianfrancesco Gonzaga, whohad been the second in command for several years. But Gonzaga had not infact seen active service in 1431, and was reluctant, perhaps understandably,to be hurried into taking over Carmagnola's responsibilities. Perhaps a partof this reluctance arose from Gonzaga's anxiety not to offend Sigismund,who remained a potential enemy of Venice and in whose hands lay thedecision to confer the title of Imperial marquis on Gonzaga. So for much of1432 he remained relatively inactive with the rank of governor-general, andthe only significant campaign was fought by a part of the army in theValtelline in the autumn. This ended in disaster in November with thecapture by Milan of the proveditor, Giorgio Corner, and a number of theleading condottieri.79 The effect of this setback was the immediateconclusion of a contract with Gonzaga as captain-general, and an increase ofthe army to 12,000 cavalry, 8000 infantry and 11,000 militia.80

Throughout this winter peace negotiations were conducted in Ferrara

77 Ibid., 40 (30 Mar. 1432).78 Dieci, Misti, reg. 11,45(5 May 1432). See also Battistella, 339-63; DBI.,x\, 6; H. F. Brown, Venetian

Studies (London, 1887) r73~7-79 SS. reg. 12, 135 (24 Nov. 1432).80 Romanin, iv, 164. For the renegotiation of Gonzaga's condotta, see SS. reg. 12,138V-150 (3 Dec. 1432

- 19 Jan. 1433).

37

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

and culminated, in May 1433, with a new peace which added little to theprevious Peace of Ferrara of 1428.81 It did, however, give Venice the chancefor a systematic demobilization which had not been attempted in 1428. On 3June 1433 the Senate ordered a reduction of the army to a peacetimestrength of 5000 cavalry and 2000 infantry.82 This was to be achieved bycutting the size of the condotte by up to half, an unprecedentedly strictapplication of the system developed over the previous ten years. Thecondottieri, who included such influential figures as Luigi da Sanseverino,Piero Gianpaolo Orsini, Alvise dal Verme, Guidantonio Manfredi andLorenzo Attendolo, as well as Gonzaga himself, were extremely resentful.Under great pressure the reduction was limited to one-third instead of ahalf, and on 29 July the new sizes of the companies were announced.83 Thebulk of the condottieri seem to have accepted with bad grace, but a smallgroup of the more senior captains, led by Luigi da Sanseverino and LorenzoAttendolo, did leave Venetian service at this stage. This was only to beexpected, and indeed what is surprising is that the majority remained.Amongst the junior captains, whose chances were perhaps increased by acertain weeding out at the top of the emerging Venetian military hierarchy,was Bartolomeo Colleoni.

In fact the pressure to reduce the military establishment did not last long,and may never have been particularly effective on this occasion. ByDecember the Senate was authorizing new recruiting, and fighting brokeout again in the early months of 1434.84 In this year the main centre ofoperations was the Romagna, and the bulk of the Venetian army wastransferred there. In April a condotta was given to the papal condottiereGattamelata to join Guidantonio Manfredi at the head of this contingent.Gonzaga remained in Lombardy with about 5000 cavalry, and a Mantuansource estimated total Venetian strength at 9657 cavalry and 6272infantry.85 The Romagna army suffered a severe reverse at the hands ofPiccinino and the Milanese at Castel Bolognese in August 1434, and many ofthe captains were captured, of whom some remained in Milanese prisons forseveral years.

This division of the Venetian army into two contingents divided by thePo persisted in the next two years when there was only desultory fighting. It

81 Osio, iii, 1, no. cxxii.82 SS. reg. 12, 182 (4 June 1433): 'Quia factum gentium nostrarum importantie et in eo procedendum

matura cum deliberatione et maxime attento qui infrascripti conductores non ut stipendiarii sedpartialiter nobis serviverunt et honorem et statum nostrum sustinerunt et propea non sunt ullo mododereliquendi . . . ' Fourteen condottieri were then named for retention with renegotiated condotte.

83 SS. reg. 12, 191 (29 July 1433). At this juncture fifteen condottieri were named, including Colleoni;Lorenzo da Cotignola, Antonello da Siena, Pietro Navarino and Battista Capiccio were released.

84 SS. reg. 13, 29 (7 Dec. 1433).85 Ibid., 108 (16 Sept. 1434); ASMa., Carte d'Arco, 131 (23 May 1434).

38


contributed to keeping the total size of the army unusually high, and in thedepths of winter in January 1436 Venice still had 6000 cavalry and 3000infantry under arms, despite efforts to bring about some reductions.86

In 1437 the war in Lombardy flared up afresh. In March Gonzaga hadassembled 6000 cavalry, 4500 infantry and 5000 militia and pioneers, andtried to force a crossing of the Adda.87 He managed to establish an infantrybridgehead over the river, but the high spring level of the waters swept awayhis bridge of boats and prevented his cavalry from crossing. Frustrated inthis design, Gonzaga fell back on the defensive, fearful of being caught inthe open by Piccinino when his army was, in his opinion, under strength.His cavalry strength was gradually built up to about 9000 men, but in theautumn this was reported to be a paper strength which bore littlerelationship to reality.88 Feelings against Gonzaga rose high in Venice, andhe, perhaps fearful of suffering the same fate as Carmagnola, perhaps underdiplomatic pressure from Milan, decided to retire. In December Gat-tamelata was invited to take over as governor-general, and urgent messageswere sent to Francesco Sforza, who had a joint contract with Florence andVenice as captain-general of the league, to come to Lombardy.89

The threat of a massive Milanese assault, which had haunted Gonzagathroughout the summer of 1437, finally materialized in the next year whenPiccinino advanced into the Bresciano and bottled up Gattamelata with apart of the Venetian army in Brescia. Gonzaga, finally won over by Milan,joined up with Piccinino and threatened Verona, while Sforza at last crossedthe Po to come to Venetian aid. The long siege of Brescia, heroicallydefended by Francesco Barbaro and Taddeo d'Este, Gattamelata's escapefrom the beleaguered city, and his famous march through the mountainsnorth of Lake Garda, and the fierce, swift-moving campaigns culminating inPiccinino's surprise attack on Verona and its equally rapid relief byGattamelata and Sforza are too well known to need enlarging on here.90 TheVenetian army, augmented by Sforza's considerable company, numbered

86 SS. reg. 13, 197 (21 Jan 1436).87 Collegio, Registri Secreti, reg. 4, 35 (1 Mar. 1437).8 8 S S . reg . 14, 69V (6 N o v . 1437).89 G. Soranzo, 'L'ultima campagna del Gattamelata al servizio della repubblica veneta (1438-40)', A V.,

lx—lxi (1957) 79—114; G. Eroli, Erasmo Gattamelata da Narni, suoi monumenti e sua famiglia (Rome,1877) 94-100; G. Tarducci, 'L'alleanza Visconti-Gonzaga del 1438 contro la repubblica veneta',ASL., ser. 3, xi (1899) 265-70. Soranzo makes no reference to the events of 1437; the conferment ofthe title of governor-general on Gattamelata he dates to 1438, after the arrival of Sforza and as a sort ofdemotion (102 n. 2). This is the result of a misdating of the crucial Senate discussion of Dec. 1437 forwhich Eroli seems to be responsible (Eroli, 328-9; SS. reg. 14, 84; 23 Dec. 1437). On FrancescoSforza, see I. Toderini, 'Le prime condotte di Francesco Sforza per Venezia', A V., ix (1875) 116-29.

90 Soranzo, 'L'ultima campagna' passim; Cristoforo da Soldo, Cronaca, ed. G. Brizzolara, RRIISS.,xxi, 3 (Bologna, 1938-42) 8-47; E. Manelmi, Commentario/um . . . de obsidione Bresciae, 1438, ed.G. A. Astezati (Brescia, 1728); Storia di Brescia, ii, 52-71.

39

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

16,100 cavalry in 1439, according to Sanuto, and this is a figure which isconfirmed by other evidence.91 Gattamelata, in reward for his services, wasmade captain-general, but in 1440 became too ill to continue an activecareer, and his place was taken by Michele Attendolo. The other Venetiancondottieri, however, remained a remarkably static group in this period.

It has been suggested that in these years Sforza, as captain-general of theleague, and Piccinino, increasingly indispensable to the Visconti, becamethe real arbiters of the political situation, and certainly the evidence suggeststhat Venice was not able to maintain the control over Sforza that she couldover her own troops. It was at Sforza's camp at Cavriana, and very much as aresult of Sforza's initiative, that a peace was finally agreed in November1441. It was to protect Sforza's interests in Cremona, once more threatenedby Milan, that Venice was again drawn into war in 1446. In the interim allVenetian diplomatic activities were directed towards trying to obtain astable peace and isolate Milan, but needless to say it had not dropped itsmilitary guard. The permanent army was now fully established and all thelinks with the independent condottiere princes had been abandoned. Thesenior captains had mostly accepted Venetian fiefs and were permanentlybased within the Venetian frontiers; the princely condotta in aspetto was athing of the past. While there were moves in late 1441 and in 1442 to reducethe size of the army by proportional cuts in company strength, it wasbecoming increasingly common by this time for the original contracts tostipulate smaller numbers of lances to be maintained in peacetime than inwar. Thus captains were expected automatically to reduce the strength oftheir companies in times of peace. At the same time, perhaps by way ofcompensation, contracts of two years' ferma began to become morecommon.92

There was in fact relatively little campaigning between 1441 and 1446,but the army that reassembled in May 1446 to resist the Milanese attack onCremona looked very similar in leadership to that which had retired intoquarters in the autumn of 1441. In September the Milanese were badlydefeated by Michele Attendolo at Casalmaggiore and for the first time forfive years there were significant amounts of booty available for distributionamongst the Venetian captains.93 This puts into perspective the idea thatcondottieri depended on booty for their rewards and for their fidelity.

During the remaining eight years of the Milanese wars fighting wasalmost continuous. Francesco Sforza, increasingly preoccupied with the

91 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 1088.92 For the reductions of the companies, see SS. reg. 15, 136 (23 Aug. 1442); for the new longer condotte,

see Commemoriali, xm, 117V, 139V, 167V and SS. reg. 16, 50V (4 Nov. 1443).93 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 1122; Anonimo Veronese, Cronaca di anonimo Veronese dal 1446 al 1488, ed. G.

Soranzo (Venice, 1915) 5.

40


Milanese succession, could no longer be relied upon, and the Venetianmilitary establishment was maintained at unprecedentedly high levels evenduring winter. In November 1447 when the army was sent into winterquarters there were over 10,000 cavalry and 7000 infantry quartered inLombardy alone, with undisclosed numbers garrisoning the towns fromPadua eastwards.94 The great pitched battle at Caravaggio in 1448 involveda Venetian army nearly 20,000 strong.95 At Caravaggio Michele Attendolosuffered a crushing defeat at the hands of Sforza, and in the flight whichfollowed his troops got completely out of control. It was this breakdown indiscipline, rather than defeat in the battle, that led to Attendolo's dismissalby Venice and his exile to his estates in Castelfranco. In February 1449Sigismondo Malatesta was called upon to take his place, but with the title ofgovernor-general rather than captain-general.96 This reversion to theemployment of a condottiere prince with little experience of Venetianservice was an exceptional move for the period, and one which clearlyencountered opposition in Venice. But the policy of maintaining equalityamongst senior captains under a powerful supreme commander did createinevitable problems if that commander suddenly disappeared. Bringing inan outsider of undoubted reputation was one answer to the problem,although clearly this had to be done tactfully. Sigismondo eventually forcedthe Senate to make him captain-general, but he was always regarded withsuspicion, both in Venice and probably in the army.

Through 1449 and 1450 the army continued to be maintained at aconsistently high level. In January 1449 4000 lances were in winterquarters.97 In April 1450 Cristoforo da Soldo counted 13,500 cavalry and7500 infantry in quarters in the Bergamasco, Bresciano and Veronesealone.98 Malatesta himself, Jacopo Piccinino, who had recently come overfrom Milan, Bartolomeo Colleoni and Gentile da Leonessa with theGatteschi companies were all stationed in the Bresciano. Tiberto Brandolinicommanded the frontier troops along the Adda and round Bergamo, whileCristoforo da Tolentino, Bertoldo d'Este (whose father Taddeo had beenkilled in 1448) and Giovanni Conti were stationed in the Veronese.Cristoforo da Soldo's lists, like those which appear in the Senate records, are

94 Cristoforo da Soldo, 77.95 Anonimo Veronese, 7 reported that the Venetians lost 10,000 horses in this battle, and amongst the

prisoners taken were the proveditors, Gentile da Leonessa, Roberto da Montalboddo and DietisalviLupi. See also E. Ricotti, Storia delle compagnie di vcntura in Italia (2nd ed., Turin, 2 vols., 1893) n\79-82.

96 Commemoriali, xiv, 32 (Predelli, v, 26).97 ST. reg. 2, 99V (22 Jan. 1449).98 Cristoforo da Soldo, 98. Later in the same year an official army list quoted a strength of 3461 lances

and 5144 infantry (SS. reg. 18, 205V; 20 July 1450), but these did not include the large company ofSigismondo Malatesta, who had already departed.

41

Part I: c. 1400 to is08

usually based on contract strength and therefore inevitably give anexaggerated idea of the size of the army; but the extent to which Venetiancaptains were disciplined into keeping their companies up to strength is aquestion which will be considered later.

It was in 1450 that Sigismondo Malatesta fell into disgrace over the affairof the seizure and rape of the Duchess of Bavaria, so that in the winter lull of1450-1 Venice again faced the problem of whom to place in command of thearmy. The war had developed into one of attrition in Lombardy as Venice'sprobable numerical superiority and more efficient organization werebalanced by Milan's decisive advantage in leadership in the person of its newduke, Francesco Sforza, and Florence's change of sides." In February 1451the Senate decided to appoint a commander by a ballot among its threeleading condottieri, Colleoni, Jacopo Piccinino and Gentile da Leonessa.Colleoni was by far the most experienced of the three, but he had alreadydeserted Venice once; Piccinino had only recently joined Venetian serviceand was suspect because of the long-standing Milanese connections of hisfamily. So the vote went in favour of Gentile da Leonessa, who was madegovernor-general.100 The hope that the- apparent equity of the decision-making process would stifle the jealousies among the three was quicklydispelled as Colleoni showed his obvious displeasure and prepared to desertfrom Venetian service. An attempt to forestall his treachery by an attack onhis company by the other condottieri, organized by the proveditors, failed tostop Colleoni himself escaping.101 On the other hand, the rivalry betweenPiccinino and Gentile only ended with the latter's death at the siege ofManerbio in 1453. Without doubt Venice's war effort suffered in these yearsfrom the lack of a generally accepted and respected captain-general. Thearmy seemed to grow progressively larger but more and more divided. Noconcerted aggressive action was organized, and first Gentile da Leonessaand then Piccinino, when he took over from him, were forced onto thedefensive in a desperate effort to protect the extended frontiers of theTerraferma state. The crippling costs of the war to both sides, the failure ofeither army to achieve a clearcut victory in the field, and finally, in early1454, the impending return of Colleoni to Venetian service created thesituation in which a conclusive truce became possible. The Peace of Lodisigned in April 1454 epitomized the military stalemate which had beenreached.

It should be emphasized that the prolonged wars in Lombardy between1426 and 1454 did not create the Venetian standing army. But they provided99 L. Rossi, 'Firenze e Venezia dopo la battaglia di Caravaggio', AS I., xxxiv (1904) 158-79.

100 SS. reg. 19,44-6 (24-5 Feb. 1451). Gentile was related by marriage to Gattamelata and commandedthe Gatteschi companies.

101 Anonimo Veronese, 21-2; B. Belotti, Vita di Bartolomeo Colleoni (Bergamo, 1923) 215.

42


the atmosphere of tension and frequent conflict which institutionalized analready burgeoning system. Contractual and organizational devices whichhad been fragile innovations in 1425 became fixed traditions during ageneration of warfare. Condottieri whose fidelity to Venice had beenwondered at and little understood in the 1420s had become in a certain senseVenetian subjects by 1454. Family traditions of faithful service had beenbuilt up, condottiere fiefs established and a whole military administrationconsolidated. At the same time, and particularly in the final stages of thewars, Venice had learnt the lesson of the brutal economic realities of the costof war, and this was to be very much in the forefront of the minds of itspoliticians in the next decades.

THE DEFENCE OF EMPIRE, 1454-94

That the whole of the period between the Peace of Lodi and the Frenchinvasion in 1494 was one of peace and tranquility in Italy is an idea whichcan be easily exaggerated. Nor can it be said with any great justification thatVenice's military attitudes in these years were entirely defensive.102 Whilethis would be true of the long war fought against the Turks between 1463and 1479, Venice's attitudes in 1467 and during the War of Ferrara weremore ambiguous. Nevertheless the first nine years after the Peace of Lodiwere ones in which Venice's army was first dramatically reduced, and thensettled into a permanent defensive posture.

Immediately after the signing of the peace, demobilization began. In thecase of the senior condottieri there was no question of dismissal, as thiswould have been contrary to the principles of the now well-establishedVenetian military system. Nor could company strength be reduceddramatically and arbitrarily, as by this time the peacetime strengths of thecompanies were clearly stated in most contracts and by the autumn of 1454most of them had reduced to this level. Jacopo Piccinino, the governor-general in the last stages of the war, was the only senior captain whoprepared to take his leave as soon as his current contract ran out. Venicemade no attempt to dissuade him, not only because he had been the last ofthe leading captains to join her service, but also because his loyalty was

102 The diplomatic events and the military tensions of the post-1454 period have been studied frommany angles. The most useful general accounts are: G. Soranzo, La lega italic a (1454—5) (Milan,1924); G. W. Nelson, 'The origins of modern balance of power diplomacy', Medievalia etHumanistica, i (1942) 124-42; E. Pontieri, L'etd deW equilibria politico in Italia (Naples, n.d.); G.Pillinini, IIsistema degli stati italiani (1454^4) (Venice, 1970); M. E. Mallett, 'Diplomacy and warin later fifteenth-century Italy', Proceedings of the British Academy, lxvii (1981) 267-88. On the roleof Venice, see particularly N. Valeri, 'Venezia nella crisi italiana del Rinascimento', in La civiltaveneziana del Quattrocento (Florence, 1957) 23-48 and N. Rubinstein, 'Italian reactions toTerraferma expansion in the fifteenth century', in Renaissance Venice, ed. J. R. Hale, 207-9.

43

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

suspect and his troops were disorderly.103 He was not used to the idea of adramatic cutback in his company in time of peace; he had received no estatesor fiefs from Venice and was determined to make a niche for himselfelsewhere. Furthermore the secret deal with Colleoni had included apromise to make him captain-general as soon as Piccinino had left. Venicehad both troops and a commander waiting in the wings to take Piccinino'splace. Indeed, the fact that Colleoni's 500 lances had now to be paid was anadditional incentive to Venice to disband as many of its existing troops as itcould if expenses were to be reduced at all.

In the years following Lodi a number of senior commanders graduallydrifted out of Venetian service as the full implications of permanentpeacetime service began to dawn on them. In the autumn of 1454 Matteo daCapua left to go southwards, and he was followed in the next four or fiveyears by Orso Orsini, Ludovico Malvezzi and Giovanni Conti. Cristoforo daTolentino retired and died shortly afterwards, and Carlo Gonzaga andCesare da Martinengo also died. This meant that by the early 1460s thecavalry force had been reduced considerably. Bartolomeo Colleoni wasfirmly established as captain-general with his base at Malpaga and apeacetime condotta of 500 lances. Carlo Fortebraccio, the son of Braccio daMontone, garrisoned Brescia with his 200 lances; Bertoldo d'Este was atPadua, and Antonio da Marsciano, the son-in-law of Gattamelata, was atVerona with the remnants of the Gatteschi companies. Apart from theseleading figures a new generation of lesser captains were establishingthemselves, with much smaller companies, as the nucleus of the Venetianarmy.104

In the demobilization of its infantry Venice was able to be much moreruthless. Apart from Matteo da Sant'Angelo, the captain of infantry, PietroBrunoro, and a few exceptionally long-serving constables, the majority ofthe leaders were either dismissed or had their companies disbanded whilethey themselves were given pensions for the duration of the peace. As aresult of this cutback the infantry force was brought down to about 2500men.105

The army of these peaceful years, therefore, numbered about 10,000men, which compares with Venice's commitment according to the terms ofthe Italian League of 6000 cavalry and 2000 infantry in peacetime.106

Throughout these nine years there were few alarms which might have

103 The proposal to release Piccinino at the end of his contract was first made by the Senate committeeset up to reduce expenditure after the war (SS. reg. 20,40: 12 Oct. 1454). For the disorderliness of histroops, see Cristoforo da Soldo, 132.

104 No army list for the years immediately following the Peace of Lodi has survived, and the dispositionshere described have been pieced together from a wide variety of sources.

105 ST. reg. 3, 131 (20 Sept. 1454).106 Soranzo, Lega italic a, 192-3.

44


prompted remobilization. In June 1456 a force was alerted to go to Siena tohelp that city against Jacopo Piccinino, and Bertoldo d'Este was givencommand of it.107 As early as 1459 there was talk of sending infantry to theMorea in the light of a growing Turkish threat. Then in early 1463 the warwith the Turks blazed up, and in the same year an expedition was organizedfor the siege of Trieste. The war machine was activated with a speed thatbelies the apparent lack of concern of the immediately preceding years.

The Turkish War, 1463-79Prior to 1463 Venice's mainland army had been little concerned in thedefence of the maritime empire. This defence was mainly entrusted tolocally raised troops under local commanders and supervised by theVenetian civilian officials. There were a few companies of Italian infantryscattered about, particularly at Negroponte, where each newly appointedVenetian bailo took a fresh company with him and repatriated the leastefficient of the resident constables.108 But the only evidence of a significantcondottiere cavalry force was to be found at Zara. Here there was usually asmall company of men-at-arms commanded by a condottiere captain;Bernardo Morosini had held this post for a long period in the 1430s and1440s. Zara was also the only one of the Venetian-held Dalmatian ports thathad a Venetian captain as well as a conte, the normal patrician officialresponsible for the government of these territories.109

The Turkish capture of Argos in the spring of 1463 sparked off the oneserious attempt by Venice in this period to maintain a large Italian army inthe east. That such an enterprise was attempted at all was partly the result ofthe long period of peace in Italy. A large standing army had been idle fornine years, and there were strong arguments for giving it some fightingexperience and avoiding the cost of raising additional local troops. It is alsopossible, judging by the events of the 1463 and 1464 Morea campaigns, thatVenice saw the opportunity of launching an offensive against the Turks andhence the need for a cavalry army in addition to the garrisons. There was areal hope at this moment, with Pius II enthusiastic for a crusade, that theVenetian contingent would be part of a much larger Christian force. So thedecision was taken to send 5000 infantry and 1500 cavalry to the Moreaunder the overall supervision of the captain-general of the fleet, AlviseLoredan.110 The military commander chosen to lead the force was Bertoldo

107 SS. reg. 20, 94 (3 June 1456).108 SMi. reg. 50, io8v (18 May 1414).109 G. Praga, Storia della Dalmazia (Padua, 1954) 146; id., 'L'organizzazione militare della Dalmazia nel

Quattrocento', Archivio stork0 per la Dalmazia, cxix (1936) 463-77.110 SS. reg. 21, 157V (13 June 1463). For the details of the 1463 Morea campaign, see R. Lopez, 'II

principio della guerra veneta-turca nel 1463', AV., ser. 5, xv (1934) 45-131.45

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

d'Este. Bertoldo was probably third in the Venetian hierarchy of commandat this moment. He was the son of Taddeo d'Este, who had served Venicesince the early years of the century, and therefore his own company was oneof the most seasoned that Venice had. He had been the victor in thetournament held early in the year to celebrate the election of DogeCristoforo Moro. All this helps to explain why he was chosen althoughColleoni himself was said to be anxious to go. Furthermore it was clearly theintention that the army commander was to be subordinate to Venice's ownnaval commander, and it was therefore essential that the condottiere chosenshould not be too senior.

Bertoldo took with him a number of Venice's leading infantry constablesincluding Bettino da Calcinate, Giovanni Grande della Massa, andGiovanni dalP Atella, a large company of handgun men under GiovanniOrtiga, and in addition to his own cavalry the men-at-arms of GuidoBenzoni.111 He arrived at Nafplion early in August 1463 and immediatelycommenced the siege of Argos. Once this was retaken the army movedacross the Morea to the Corinth isthmus, which was quickly fortified with asix-mile-long and twelve-foot-high wall - a new Hexamilion. At thismoment, with Turkish forces actually in the Peleponnese few in numbers,there was a real possibility of a Venetian occupation of the whole peninsula.However a premature assault on Corinth itself led to a Venetian rebuff andthe mortal wounding of Bertoldo. Loredan, frightened by news of a hugeTurkish army advancing on the Hexamilion, drew the demoralized armyback to the south coast, and the chance was gone.

However, despite this disappointing outcome, Venice was determined tokeep the expeditionary force in being, and throughout the winter the searchwent on for a new commander. Most of the leading captains in Italy werenow approached, but eventually only Sigismondo Malatesta, desperatelyanxious to recover both his military prestige and his personal standing withthe pope, was prepared to go.112 The decision to employ Sigismondo cannothave been an easy one for Venice; its experience with him in the past hadnot been happy, and the chances of an easy relationship between him andthe Venetian fleet commanders and proveditors on the spot were not good.They were made worse by the fact that the Venetian proveditor-generalalready appointed was Andrea Dandolo, who had married an ex-mistress ofSigismondo and had a personal feud with the condottiere over his wife'sdowry.

111 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 1171; Domenico Malipiero, Annali veneti daWanno 1457 al 1500, ed. T. Garand A. Sagredo, AS I., ser. 1, vii (1843) 43-6.

112 G. Soranzo, 'Sigismondo Pandolfo Malatesta in Morea e lc vicende del suo dominio', Atti e memoricdella R. Dep. di storia patriu per lc provineie di Romagna, ser. 4, viii (1918) 211-80 has the best accountof the 1464 campaign.

46


It was the Venetian intention to strengthen considerably the cavalrycontingent in the 1464 army. Sigismondo himself had a condotta for 400lances, and he was joined by Deifebo dalPAnguillara and Girolamo NovelloAllegri da Verona with large companies. However, while Bertoldo's force in1463 had been largely made up of veteran Venetian troops, the reinforce-ments were a much more heterogeneous collection of Italian mercenaries.The commitments both of the soldiers to Venice and vice versa werelessened and this added to the problems. Sigismondo, after an initial successin taking Mistra, allowed himself to be bottled up in a defensive position bythe Turks, and lapsed into inactivity. He was worried about papal designs onRimini in his absence, and was able to claim with considerable justificationthat Venice was not keeping his troops either properly supplied or paid. Thedeath of Pius II meant that any hope of a more general Christiancommitment to a crusade was gone, and in Venice enthusiasm rapidlywaned. Finally Sigismondo was recalled in January 1466 and his place wastaken by Francesco da Teano, a relatively minor condottiere. The army wasgradually run down and Venice abandoned any idea of an offensivecampaign.

One of the lessons that had been learnt from these campaigns in theMorea was that for most of the fighting the locally raised light cavalry, thestradiots, were much more effective against the Turks than Italian men-at-arms. They were also far less costly and could be more easily controlled bythe Venetian officials. The problems of supplying and paying an Italianarmy in Greece had proved beyond Venice's resources, and the experiencewas not to be repeated on this scale.

An additional reason for the relative failure of the Morea expedition wasthat in the summer of 1463 Venice was distracted on her own easternfrontier at Trieste. Trieste was held by the Austrians and a series of disputeshad arisen between them and the Venetian officials in Capo d'Istria. It wasdecided in Venice to launch a campaign against Trieste.113 Fifteen hundredcavalry and increasing numbers of infantry, commanded by Count Antonioda Marsciano, were sent to besiege the city. By December 1463, when papalintervention and the weariness of the troops forced Venice to call a truce, thearmy had been built up to 20,000 men, including militia. The maintenanceof this army at Trieste was clearly a severe handicap to the operations inGreece, and it is hardly surprising that both ventures failed in theirobjectives.

For the next few years the main Venetian army played little part in theTurkish War. Any attempts to send large numbers of troops to the east weredefeated in the Senate, although there were certainly small bodies of Italian

113 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 1178-9; G. Cesca, Uassediu di Trieste nel 1463 (Pordenone, 1883).

47

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

troops scattered round the garrisons. Negroponte had an Italian infantrygarrison when it was attacked and eventually taken by the Turks in 1470. Inthe same year the condottieri were asked if any of them would like to go toCrete.114 Considerable numbers of Italian infantry were sent to theDalmatian cities in the 1470s as the Turkish pressure in this area wasincreased.115 The heroic defences of Scutari in 1474 and again in 1478 wereconducted in part by a large garrison of Italian infantry, and by the time thewar ended in 1479 many of Venice's infantry constables had seen serviceagainst the Turks. The end of this war gave Venice the opportunity totransfer these seasoned troops to Tuscany for the later stages of the PazziWar. But the military occupation of Cyprus in 1474 was undertaken bystradiots and infantry companies, and not by a contingent of Italiancavalry.116

This reluctance to commit the mainland army to further adventures inthe east was not on the whole a consequence of any major commitments inItaly. The only campaign of any moment in this period which requiredVenetian mobilization was the enterprise of Colleoni in support of theFlorentine exiles in 1467. This was always represented as a free-lanceoperation by Colleoni carried out when he was technically not employed byVenice between the expiry of one contract and the signing of the next.However, many of the troops used were in Venetian pay and Colleoni'ssecond-in-command, Alessandro Sforza, was given a Venetian condottaspecifically for this campaign.117 On the other hand, Astorre Manfredi'scontract for the same campaign was shared between Venice and Colleonihimself.118 As Colleoni moved his army of 13,000 men from their quartersinto the Romagna in May 1467, more troops were hired by Venice to taketheir place.119 After the indecisive battle of Molinella Colleoni's forces werereinforced by Venice and Venetian diplomacy went to work to patch up apeace.

114 SS. reg. 24, 153 (16 Oct. 1470).115 A badly mutilated file of contracts issued to mercenaries in Zara in 1472 survives in Capi, Dieci,

Lettere di Rettori, 307. It lists 243 infantry under five constables, and 44 lances of the lanze spezzatecarlesche, presumably the old company of Carlo Gonzaga.

116 SS. reg. 26, 68 (10 Jan. 1474). In 1473 a consignment of artillery and handguns together with 200handgunmen were sent to Persia with the ambassador, Giosafat Barbaro, to assist in the Persian waragainst the Turks, and these also played a part in the occupation of Cyprus (N. Di Lenna, 'GiosafatBarbaro (1413-94) e i suoi viaggi nella regione russa (1436-51) e nella Persia (1474-8)', NAV., n.s.xxviii (1914) 47-51).

117 The Senate authorized negotiations to start in Jan. 1467 (SS. reg. 23,23; 20 Jan. 1467), but part of thearmy had already been alerted two months earlier (ibid., 18; 29 Nov. 1466) after a closely contestedvote.

118 SS. reg. 23, 40V-41 (21 Apr. 1467).119 Ibid., 43-4 (2-23 May 1467). A list of the captains in Colleoni's army can be found in Corpus

Chronicorum Bononiensium, RRIISS., xviii, 1 (Bologna, 1910-40) iv, 359.

48


By 1471 a more serious preoccupation for Venice's main army hademerged with the growing Turkish threat in Friuli.120 Deifebodall'Anguillara, who had joined Venetian service in 1464, was thecommander of the army in Friuli in the early stages of the emergency. Butby 1473, when the first serious Turkish invasion took place, CarloFortebraccio with his large company had been moved from Brescia and hetook over the command. At this stage he had only 1400 cavalry to guard thefrontier and could do little in the face of the Turkish attack other thanwithdraw into the fortresses and allow the Turks to ravage the countrysideunopposed. Over the next five years the growing Venetian army in Friuliwas to make a poor showing in the open field against the Turks. This was inpart the result of a permanent inferiority in numbers and of limitations ofmilitary technique; it was never possible to engage the Turks in a large-scalebattle in which the heavier armour and greater discipline of the Italiancompanies might have prevailed. At the same time there is no doubt that theVenetian administration must bear much of the blame. A nagging fear ofMilan led to a reluctance to weaken the defences of the western frontier inorder to concentrate the army in Friuli. The difficulties of raising money ledto a refusal to countenance any dramatic increases in recruiting, and meantthat the Friuli army was badly paid and provisioned. Furthermore the longyears of inactivity had led to a definite decline in the quality of the Venetianarmy which a series of reforms in the 1470s was not entirely able torectify.121 Behind it all there was the belief that the Turkish threat wastransient and could never seriously menace Venice itself. Nowhere morethan in the attitudes to the defence of Friuli and Istria is the slowness withwhich Venetians accepted the full implications of responsibility for aterritorial state more apparent.

The army in Friuli did succeed in preventing any major towns falling intoTurkish hands, but the one major encounter, in October 1477, led to a heavydefeat for the Venetians and the death or capture of a number of leadingcommanders. This defeat occurred during the absence of Carlo Fortebrac-cio, who had temporarily left Venetian service to carry out an independentstrike against Perugia. The Venetian commander, who was killed in thebattle, was Girolamo Novello Allegri.122 However, even before this reversereinforcements were on their way to the eastern frontier. Cola di Monforte,

120 p Musoni, Sulle incursioni dei Turchi in Friuli (Udine, 1890-2) 25-31; A. De Pellegrini, 'Note edocumenti sulle incursioni turchesche in Friuli al cadere del secolo xv', NA V., n.s. xxv (1913) 230; P.Preto, Veneziaei Turchi (Florence, 1975)32-3. Tamaro(i, 348) suggests that the first incursions werein 1470, but there was no reaction in Venice until 1471.

121 See below, 109-10.122 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 1206. A partial list of the captains involved in this disaster is to be found in

Misc. Carte non appartenenti ad alcun archivio, 7, conti ed elenchi di soldati (8 Jan. 1479). Inaddition to Allegri, Anastasio da S. Angelo and Collantonio Zurlo were among the dead.

49


Count of Campobasso, had been hired by Venice and was marching withnearly 700 cavalry. At the same time Carlo Fortebraccio was also returningnorthwards. By the late summer of 1478 6500 troops had assembled and afurther Turkish attack was beaten off easily.123 In the following year a trucewas signed and the threat receded for the time being.

However, three positive developments can be attributed to thesecampaigns; the first was the introduction of the stradiots for the first timeinto warfare on Italian soil as a counter to the Turkish light cavalry. Fromthis moment onwards stradiot companies became an integral part of anyVenetian army. Secondly, the sustained pressure exerted by the Turks led toa greater concern in Venice about militia training, and the institution of aselective conscription system.124 Thirdly, that same pressure produced anawareness of the importance of strong fortifications. All these developmentswill be discussed in more detail elsewhere, but once again one is struck bythe role of the eastern frontier in giving Venetian military institutions anddevelopments their distinctive character.

Wars in Italy, 1478-Q4Throughout the years since Lodi and despite the various Turkishemergencies, the Venetian army must rarely have exceeded 10,000 men instrength. In 1476 Venice was said to have 5030 cavalry under contract inItaly.125 This was just after the death of Colleoni, who had been captain-general for twenty years, but most of his troops were still in Venetian pay.During this period the army had never been fully mobilized. Colleoni's owncompanies had fought in one campaign, that of 1467. Carlo Fortebraccio'scompanies, still known as the Bracceschi, had played a small part in the siegeof Trieste and had been fully committed in Friuli from about 1473. Antonioda Marsciano and the so-called Gatteschi, the remnants of the oldGattamelata companies, had taken part in the siege of Trieste and were sentto Friuli for the very last stages of the Turkish war. Now, in 1478, renewedfighting on a large scale broke out in Italy and the Venetian army became agood deal more active.

The papal-Neapolitan attack on Florence in 1478 following the Pazziconspiracy led to Florence making urgent appeals to its allies, Milan andVenice, to support it. Venice, although still at war with the Turks,responded immediately with efforts to recruit an additional 3000 cavalry,1000 infantry and 1000 Swiss pikemen,126 and by sending a proveditor to

123 Senato, Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24, 3V-4.V.124 See below, 78-9.125 Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, z.226 sup., fasc. 1.126 ST. reg. 8, 19V (10 Aug. 1478).

50


Tuscany to start recruiting locally.127 By the spring of 1479 large numbers ofveteran Venetian troops began arriving in Tuscany, and throughout thesummer the contingent built up as troops arrived from Friuli and from theDalmatian garrisons. Carlo Fortebraccio was the senior commander untilhis death at Cortona in June 1479, when his son Bernardino took over. Butno replacement for Colleoni as captain-general had yet been found, and itwas perhaps with this in mind that the Duke of Lorraine was hired with1500 cavalry. However, these new French troops did not arrive in Tuscanybefore the end of the 1479 campaign; a campaign which closed with theheroic but unsuccessful defence of Colle Val d'Elsa by Venetian infantry.During the winter Venice finally solved the problem of command of herarmy by hiring Roberto Malatesta as captain-general.128

In April 1480 the diplomatic realignments which followed the end of thePazzi War produced a papal-Venetian alliance and a treaty commitment forVenice to maintain 6000 cavalry and 3000 infantry in peacetime.129 The nexttwo years were years of considerable tension in Italy; Venice, alreadysuspected of imperialist intentions in Lombardy and the Romagna, added tothese tensions by its tacit support of Sixtus IV's territorial ambitions and itsrefusal to join any league against the Turks who had seized Otranto. InDecember 1480 it had 8000 cavalry under contract, but they were said to bein a poor state of readiness.130 Nor were there any military signs in 1481 thatVenice was preparing for a major confrontation with the other Italianpowers. The Lorraine contract was allowed to expire and, although relationswith Ferrara were clearly worsening, any preparations that Venice mighthave been making for war were conducted in a very low key.131

However, the flight of Roberto da Sanseverino, one of the mostexperienced and prestigious military commanders in Italy, from Milan earlyin 1482 altered the whole situation.132 Venice hired him as lieutenant-general, thus considerably augmenting its forces, and, spurred on by hispersonal antagonism to the regime of Ludovico Sforza, decided to resolve itsdifferences with Ferrara by force. The situation was not unlike that in 1425

127 L. Landucci, Diario fiorentino dal 1450 al 1516 (Florence, 1883) 2^-128 For details of Venetian military involvement in the Pazzi War, see Lorenzo de' Medici, Lettere, iii-iv,

ed. N. Rubinstein (Florence, 1979-81) passim.129 K. Piva, 'L'origine e conclusione della pace ed alleanza fra i veneziani e Sisto iv', NAV., n.s. ii (1901)

35-69-130 SS. reg. 29, 144 (6 Dec. 1480).131 Mallett,' Diplomacy and war', 278-9. For discussion of the diplomatic tensions of this period, see E.

Piva, 'L'opposizione diplomatica di Venezia alle mire di Sisto IV su Pesaro e ai tentativi di unacrociata contro i Turchi, 1480-1', NAV., n.s. v-vi (1903) 49-104, 422-66, 132-73; F. Fossati,'Alcuni dubbi sul contegno di Venezia durante la ricuperazione di Otranto, 1480-1', NAV., n.s. xii(1906) 5-35; A. Bombaci, 'Venezia e l'impresa turca di Otranto', RSI., lxvi (1954) 159-203.

132 Although Roberto da Sanseverino only finally arrived in Venice in Apr., he had made his firstapproaches in Dec. 1481 (Dieci, Misti, reg. 20, 133V; 11 Dec. 1481).

51

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

when the arrival of Carmagnola changed Venetian attitudes to the prospectof war. The attack on Ferrara was not part of a planned Venetian expansion;it was an opportunist move to settle a local dispute. The dangers of aconcerted defence of Ferrara by Milan, Florence and Naples were obvious.But the sudden accretion of strength provided by Roberto da Sanseverinocreated the possibility that a quick blow at Ferrara could achieve positiveresults before the allies could intervene. According to a Florentineassessment Venice had 12,237 cavalry and 2170 infantry ready for the war,and at the same time the support and encouragement of Sixtus IV andGirolamo Riario lessened the dangers of it having to fight a protracted waron its own.133

In May 1482 Roberto da Sanseverino launched the attack on Ferrara. Hecame close to achieving the immediate success required. A causeway acrossthe marshes of the Polesine was built by the engineers, Figarolo fell, andVenetian troops were within sight of the walls of Ferrara. Assistance forErcole d'Este from Milan and Florence was predictably slow to arrive.However, the plan that Roberto Malatesta should move in on Ferrara fromthe south-east and complete the circle around the city had to be abandonedwhen Sixtus IV, terrified of a Neapolitan attack on Rome, demandedassistance. Without the help of Malatesta and the Romagna army Robertoda Sanseverino had not the strength to launch a final assault on Ferrara.Federigo da Montefeltro arrived to take command of the defence, and marshfever began to take its toll of both armies.

Once the first attack had failed, Venice's chances of gaining anysignificant advantage in this war had gone. Despite Malatesta's victory overthe Neapolitans at Campomorto in the autumn of 1482, Sixtus was inducedto change sides. This enabled Alfonso of Calabria with a large Neapolitancontingent to reach Lombardy, and in 1483 the Venetian forces weresteadily outnumbered. The main centre of operations shifted north of the Poas Milan tried to use the opportunity to recover Bergamo and Brescia. ButVenice, by quickly switching troops from Ferrara while at the same timekeeping up the threat to that city, was able to prevent a decisive build-up bythe allies in the Lombard plain.

In fact the surprising thing about the war is that Venice was able to resistthe combined attack of the other four major Italian states and still emergewith some gains at the Peace of Bagnolo in August 1484. This was certainlyin part due to the failure of the allies to co-operate effectively, and thejealousies within the allied camp. But one should not underestimate the roleof the military efficiency and organization of the Venetian army. Although

133 For the size of the Venetian army at this moment, see Biblioteca Nazionale, Florence., Magi, xxv,161. E. Piva, La guerra di Ferrara (Padua, 1893) vol. i describes the events leading up to the war.

52


the cavalry force probably rarely exceeded 10,000 men, Venice was able tomake the best use of these troops by getting into the field more quickly thanthe allies both in 1483 and in 1484, and by moving its strength quickly fromone danger point to another. In addition the Venetian infantry seemed to beconsiderably superior to that of the allies; and finally there were the stradiotswho were employed in increasing numbers and were a decisive factor in atleast one battle, Argenta.134

Following the Peace of Bagnolo, it was not until February 1485 thatVenice decided to demobilize. At this stage it had 6500 cavalry under armswith the permanent condottieri and three contracts, with leading 'foreign'captains, Roberto da Sanseverino as captain-general, Giulio Cesare Varanoas governor-general in the Romagna, and Guido de' Rossi, Sanseverino'sson-in-law. Demobilization took the form of reducing the permanent forcesto 4130 cavalry and leaving the three big condotte intact.135 This meant thatat this stage Venice was reckoning to pay a standing force of about 7000cavalry in peacetime, which was considerably less than Milanese commit-ments in this period.

The Neapolitan barons' war in 1485-6 did not directly involve Venice butit did draw in Roberto da Sanseverino, who was reluctantly givenpermission to go south and take part. However, it was made clear that hiscontract with Venice was temporarily suspended, and on his return to hisVenetian base at Cittadella in i486 he was not immediately re-employed.However, in the spring of 1487 Venice did find itself at war again, this timewith the Austrians over local issues in the Trentino. The standing forceswere mobilized and Giulio Cesare Varano was summoned from theRomagna to take command. It seems clear that at first this war was not takenvery seriously in Venice and it was not felt that a large army was needed.There was some reluctance to re-employ Roberto da Sanseverino, who wascamped with the nucleus of his company at Cittadella near Padua. However,the loss of Rovereto to the Austrians in May, and the clear incompetenceand indecisiveness of Varano, led to a change of heart in Venice. Sanseverinowas recalled and reinstated as lieutenant-general, and a strengthened armybegan to move up on Trento. At this point Sanseverino allowed himself tobe caught at Calliano by an Austrian counter-attack with his army dividedon both banks of the Adige and the river in spate. This prevented him fromusing his full strength and both he and many of his men were drownedtrying to cross the river after the bridge had collapsed. Guido de' Rossi

134 For the size of the armies, see Sanuto, Vite de' dogi, 1229; for the details of the war, see M. Sanuto,Commentarii dellaguerra di Ferrara (Venice, 1829) and Piva, Guerra di Ferrara, vol. ii. In December1483 there were 6868 cavalry and 1570 infantry billeted in the Bresciano and Bergamasco alone(ASB., Territoriale, reg. A, 78V; 23 Dec. 1483).

135 SS. reg. 32, 119 (10 Jan. 1485), 134V (28 Feb. 1485).

53

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

partially restored the situation with a spirited cavalry charge, and theAustrians were too heavily mauled to follow up their victory. But theVenetian offensive was halted and its military reputation somewhattarnished by this encounter. The reaction of the Senate was, somewhatbelatedly, to authorize an intensive recruiting drive for 5000 new cavalry;but long before a new army could be assembled peace was signed.136

The death of Roberto da Sanseverino left Venice without a suprememilitary commander, and no effective successor was appointed in the nextfew years despite protracted negotiations with a number of candidates.137

There was a clear reluctance to appoint a captain-general because of theexpense of such an appointment and a realization that in the tense Italianpolitical atmosphere the creation of a captain-general would be seen as adeclaration of aggressive intent. On the other hand, the title of lieutenant-general was considered inadequate by many of the potential candidates, ofwhom the most attractive from a Venetian point of view was Niccolo Orsini,Count of Pitigliano.138 Finally in March 1489 a major condotta was agreedwith Francesco Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua, but he was deliberately notgiven a title at this stage.139

The indications, therefore, are that both financial stringency and anawareness of its dangerous isolation in the face of the league among Milan,Florence and Naples led Venice to maintain a low military profile in theyears immediately before 1494. Although the peacetime military establish-ment was estimated at 10,000 cavalry and 7000 infantry by one con-temporary, in this period it is doubtful if, in fact, the standing army reachedanything like these dimensions.140 However, the reappearance at the battleof Fornovo in 1495 of many of the commanders from the War of Ferraraindicates that the by now traditional system was maintained.

The years between the Peace of Lodi and the invasion of Charles VIIIwere years in which a fear of Venetian imperialism and aggression seemed tobecome paramount in the minds of the other Italian states. If one examines

136 Collegio, Lettere Secrete, filza i passim covers this campaign and is an almost unique surviving seriesof letters from military proveditors for the fifteenth century. For secondary accounts, see G.Onestinghel, 'La guerra tra Sigismondo, conte del Tirolo, e la repubblica di Venezia (1487)',Tridentum, viii-ix (1905-6) 1-21, 145-72, 193-237, 321-73 and 213-43 and P. L. Rambaldi, 'Labattaglia di Calliano e la morte di Roberto da Sanseverino', Archivio trentino, xv (1900) 77-108. Anadditional useful source for the battle of Calliano is the reports of the Florentine ambassador inVenice, Paoloantonio Soderini (ASF., Otto di Pratica, Responsive, 3, 489 and 497).

137 P. M. Perret, 'Jacques Galeot et la republique de Venise', Bibliotheque de F Ecole des Chartes, Hi(1891) 590-614; id., 'Bofille de Juge, comte de Castres, et la Republique de Venise', Annalesdu Midi,iii (1891) 159-231; id.,' Le marechal d'Esquerdes et la republique de Venise', Annuairc Bulletin de laSociete de Fhistuire de France, xxviii (1891) 193-210.

138 SS. reg. 33, 129 (14 Apr. 1488).139 SS. reg. 34, 2 (11 Mar. 1489) and Commemoriali, xvm, 127-8; 12 Mar. 1489 (Predelli, v, 315).140 Romanin, iv, 354.

54


the military postures and dispositions of Venice in this period one finds verylittle real justification for this fear. There were certainly moments whenVenice showed limited aggressive intentions on the Italian mainland, but itsmain preoccupations were the Turkish threat, a fear of isolation in Italyparticularly vis-a-vis a continual Milanese hostility, and a concern forfinancial economy. The army was maintained at the lowest level possiblewhilst allowing for reasonable security of the state. Apart from the personalaspirations of Colleoni there is little evidence of any significant aggressivemilitary pressure group. The determination to retain the services ofColleoni at great cost stemmed more from a fear of him joining a rival statethan from any potential aggressive intentions. While Venice, on the eve ofthe French invasion, may perhaps have had the strongest military potentialof any Italian state in terms of well-established organization, availablecommanders, and effective wealth, it was very far from being militarily wellprepared for the events of the coming years.

THE ITALIAN WARS, 1494-1508

The growing threat of a French invasion in 1493-4 did not leave Veniceunmoved. However, its relative isolation in the Italian political scene and itslong-standing suspicion of both Milan and Florence made it unlikely that itwould readily join an Italian alliance against the invader. Nor yet was itprepared either psychologically or militarily to turn that invasion to its ownadvantage. Approaches from both sides in these months were politelyturned aside by Venice, which seemed determined to remain neutral, andindeed did little to mobilize its army until the invasion was already welladvanced.

It was, in fact, not until December 1494 that the army was put on a warfooting and the recruitment of an additional 3000 heavy cavalry autho-rized.141 However, the ease with which Charles VIII had penetrated thepeninsula clearly alarmed Venice, and by February 1495 it was willing tojoin the Holy League against the French. The League committed it toproviding 8000 cavalry and 4000 infantry to a combined army.142 Acontingent of light cavalry was sent southwards to help protect the popeagainst Charles' army retreating from Naples, and Francesco Gonzaga wasformally given the title of governor-general. In April Venetian mobilizationplans envisaged an army of 15,000 cavalry and 24,000 infantry, includingmilitia. The permanent companies were expanded by 20-25% a nd a141 ST. reg. 12, 77 (2 Dec. 1494).142 A. Segre, 'LudovicoSforzaelarepubblicadi Venezia dall'autunno 1494 alia primavera 1495', Y4.SL.,

ser. 3, xviii and xx (1902-3) 249-317 and 33-109, 368-443; id., ' I prodromi della ritirata di CarloVIII, re di Francia', ASL, xxxiii-xxxiv (1904) 332-69 and 3-27, 350-405; Romanin, v, 49-50.

55

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

number of new condottieri were hired.143 However, the army that began toassemble in June on the Oglio had a very familiar look about it. Gonzaga wasjoined by Bernardino Fortebraccio, Ranuccio Farnese, Marco da Mar-tinengo, Gianfrancesco da Gambara, Taddeo della Motella, Luigi Avo-gadro, the Colleoneschi and other lesser figures whose names are familiarfrom the War of Ferrara and the war against the Austrians. These were themen who were to be in the forefront of the battle when Charles VIII wasconfronted at Fornovo in July.144

Venetian troops, in fact, made up three-quarters of the combined army onthe day of the battle.145 The Milanese contingent on the right wing underGiovanfrancesco da Sanseverino, Count of Caiazzo, conducted a more orless effective holding operation by engaging the French vanguard. But it wasthe two leading columns of Venetian cavalry led by Gonzaga himself andFortebraccio which bore the brunt of the fighting and suffered the heaviestlosses. Their attack on the French centre and rear was badly disrupted bythe swollen waters of the river Taro which they had to cross, and it was notpressed home because of a failure to bring in the very substantial reserves atthe crucial moment. But it was an heroic effort which failed narrowly tocapture Charles himself and left the French with no great anxiety to renewthe encounter on the following day.

Fornovo was clearly a French victory in the sense that Charles achievedhis aim of breaking through into Lombardy. But it was not the Italianhumiliation which it is sometimes made out to have been. As far as Venicewas concerned, and this is clearly indicated by the Senate's instructions tothe proveditors, the main aim was to avoid defeat and keep the army intactwhile administering a shock to the French.146 The idea that the French armymight be destroyed or even prevented from returning home would haveappeared wildly optimistic to the contemporary Italian military mentality.Therefore the news of the outcome of the battle was received in Venice withimmense relief and rejoicing. Gonzaga and Fortebraccio, himself badlywounded in the battle, were the heroes of the hour.

143 For a complete list of the Venetian army in Apr. 1495, see Malipiero, Annali veneti, 349, and formobilization plans, see ST. reg. 12,90V (27 Apr. 1495). By 18 May it was reported that 5000 cavalrywere more ready than the rest, together with 800 stradiots and 7000 infantry (SS. reg. 35, 103).

144 For further details of this mobilization, see M. Sanuto, La spedizione di Carlo VIII in Italia, ed. R.Fulin (Venice, 1883) 288ff.

145 The bibliography of the battle of Fornovo is considerable and has been summarized in D. M.Schullian (ed.), Diario de Bello Carolina di Alejandro Benedetti (New York, 1967) 239-59. Thisauthor has, however, missed two crucial discussions in P. Pieri, / / Rinascimento e la crisi militareitaliana (Turin, 1952) 341-54 and F. L. Taylor, The Art of War in Italy, 1494-1529 (Cambridge,1921; repr. Westport, 1973) 114-16. See also, for additional discussion, M. E. Mallett, Mercenariesand their Masters: Warfare in Renaissance Italy (L on d on , 1974) 243—7.

146 SS. reg. 35, 130 and 131V (27 and 30 June 1495).

56


Following Fornovo the bulk of the Venetian army followed in the wake ofthe French and settled down to besiege Novara, the last substantial Frenchfoothold in northern Italy.147 At this point Niccolo Orsini, Count ofPitigliano, who had escaped from the French during Fornovo, joined theVenetian army and was to remain the dominant figure in it until Agnadellofourteen years later. The campaign concluded with a truce signed somewhatprematurely, and without consultation with Venice, by Ludovico Sforza.This did not help to dispel the hostility which existed between the two statesand which was to break out again in the following years.

Venice was now free to turn its attention to the two problems left in thewake of the French invasion, the surviving French army in Naples and thePisan revolt against Florence. Its involvement in both these affairs has oftenbeen regarded as further evidence of its ambitious and opportunistic policiesat this time. A fear of Venetian aspirations to hegemony in Italy was deeplyimplanted in Italian minds, and the transition from its attitude of carefulneutrality in 1494 to geographically far-reaching commitment in 1496 doessmack at least of opportunism. However, the change in policy was at least inpart the result of a growing realization that the French invasion wassomething more than a transient threat. To assist in the eviction of thepowerful surviving French army in Naples was a logical continuation ofVenice's commitment to the Holy League in which, in military terms atleast, it had already played the leading part. At the same time the policy ofassisting Pisa as a way of forcing Florence out of its French alliance was onewhich was employed collectively and individually by all the members of theLeague at one time or another. It cannot be part of the scope of this study toprobe deeply into Venice's political and diplomatic postures; however, aninquiry into the nature and extent of its military commitments to these twoenterprises does throw light on the wider issues.

Undoubtedly Venice's decision to send troops to Naples was encouragedby the proposal that it should occupy temporarily the Apulian ports as aguarantee of full payment for its military services. The ports were of greatvalue both as sources of grain supplies and for control of the Adriatic. Giventhe difficulties that all Italian states had in raising money to pay troops, andthe particular economic weakness of Naples, there was a strong possibilitythat Venetian occupation of the ports would be more than temporary.Nevertheless the military assistance offered was limited and cannot be seenas a serious attempt to extend Venetian power. Furthermore when theopportunity came to add Taranto to the other occupied ports it wasdeliberately rejected.

The army sent southwards in the early spring of 1496 consisted of 700

147 A. Rusconi, Uassedio di Novara (14Q5): documenti inediti (Novara, 1884).

57

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

men-at-arms, about 1000 stradiots and 1000 infantry. Francesco Gonzaga,who had been made captain-general as a reward for his services at Fornovo,led the force.148 With him was Filippo de' Rossi, who had served Venicesince the War of Ferrara but was still something of an outsider amongstVenetian condottieri. In addition condone were given to the Duke ofGandia, Giovanni Sforza and Guidobaldo da Montefeltro. The stradiotswere led by Bernardo Contarini and the infantry by Francesco Grassi, whowas captain of the citadel of Verona. The force spent about six months in thesouth, taking Vallata by storm and participating in the protracted siege ofAtella. By October Gonzaga and the bulk of the troops were back inLombardy; by that time both Contarini and Grassi were dead, and there hadbeen no serious consideration of replacing them. None of the remainingcommanders were Venetian in the sense that many of her condottieri were.The job was done; Montpensier and the bulk of the French army hadsurrendered; Gonzaga was anxious to get home and Venice put no pressureon him to stay on.

The involvement in Pisa was a good deal more protracted than that inNaples, but it showed some of the same military characteristics. Thedecision to send military help was first taken in March 1496, and Venetiantroops took part in the defence of Pisa for the next three years.149 At firstonly light cavalry and infantry were sent, as the Milanese condottiere, LucioMalvezzi, was already in Pisa with a force of heavy cavalry. Then in lateApril 1496 Gianpaolo Manfroni was sent with his 200 cavalry, and graduallythe size of the force was built up. However, its strength never exceeded 1400heavy cavalry, about 1000 stradiots, and a fluctuating number of largelylocally recruited infantry.150 There was a marked reluctance on the part ofthe Senate to commit any of its senior permanent condottieri to the venture.Suggestions that Bernardino Fortebraccio should be sent were consistentlyvetoed, and Manfroni's successor in October 1497 was the middle-rankingMarco da Martinengo. The force was supplemented by a condotta given toFerrante d'Este, younger son of the Duke of Ferrara, and in 1498 attemptswere made to get Guidobaldo da Montefeltro to Pisa, but all the accessroutes were blocked by Florentine diplomacy.

The Pisan venture was initiated in conjunction with Milan and in spite of

148 G. Coniglio, 'Francesco Gonzaga e la guerra contro i Francesi nel regno di Napoli', Samnium, xxiv(1961) 192-209. At this stage the diaries of Marino Sanuto become an invaluable source for Venetianmilitary activity.

149 For the Venetian involvement in Pisa, see Sanuto, i-ii passim, G. Scaramella, 'Relazioni tra Pisa eVenezia', Studi storici, vii and ix (1898 and 1900) 233-66 and 145-202, 329-50 and G. Portoveneri,'Memoriali', in ASL, vii (1845) 335~9- The reluctance to commit large numbers of troops and,particularly, good captains is clear from the Senate debates on the subject.

150 Sanuto, ii, 83-5 for an overview of Venetian military strength in 1498 which bears out the limitedcommitment to Pisa.

58


strong and continuing resistance in the Senate. As Milan began to withdrawits interest in 1497, Venice was left as the sole serious supporter of Pisa.There was, without doubt, a strong current of emotional sympathy for thePisans in Venice and this as much as anything kept the enterprise going.However, repeated requests for more troops by the Pisans were largelyignored after the first year, and the Senate contented itself with sendingmoney to hire infantry locally. By 1498 this was costing 17,000 ducats amonth.151 This reluctance to commit any large proportion of the Venetianpermanent army to the Pisan enterprise was not just a matter of limitedpolitical aims. The main requirement for the defence of the Pisan contadowas infantry and these could most easily be recruited locally. Neverthelessthe dimensions of the military commitment do not suggest a serious attemptto take over Pisa.

In both these distant enterprises Venice chose to keep to a minimum thenumber of its picked and faithful troops committed. One of the reasons forthis was undoubtedly the need to preserve its strength intact in Lombardy.In December 1496 there was a renewed threat of French invasion of Milan,and in the next four months large sections of the army led by Pitigliano, nowgovernor-general, were moved over to face the French near Alessandria.152

This rapid commitment of seasoned troops to the defence of Milan is inmarked contrast to the policy in Naples and Pisa. Sheer opportunism wouldhave prompted Venice to ignore the threat to Milan and gloat over the fall ofits rival. But at this stage its commitment to the idea of the League was stillpredominant. However, the League was fast breaking up and by the time theFrench threat re-emerged in 1499 Venetian attitudes had changed.

The speed with which relations with Milan deteriorated in late 1497 and1498 is somewhat surprising. A key factor in this was a growing awarenesson the part of Ludovico Sforza that the French threat was not just aimed atNaples but also endangered Milan. The hostilities of early 1497 showed this,and of course the succession of Louis XII in 1498 with his personal claims tothe Milanese duchy emphasized the danger. Ludovico's response was agradual shift away from his policy of antagonism to France's ally, Florence,towards alliance with Florence against the remaining defender of Pisa,Venice. Venice was not slow to respond to this Milanese hostility,particularly when the movement of its troops through Parma to Pisa wasstopped by Milan. Old antagonisms over the Lombard frontier quickly re-emerged, and by the summer of 1498 rumours of impending war betweenMilan and Venice were rife in the garrison cities of the Lombard plain.153

151 Sanuto, ii, 166.152 SS. reg. 36, 103V and 109V (7 and 30 Jan. 1497); Sanuto, i, 543. In Mar. 1497 806 men-at-arms and

450 stradiots were involved in the defence of Milan.153 Sanuto, i, 984-5.

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

Pitigliano and his captains were once more put on the alert by Venice.Meanwhile in Tuscany Milanese assistance was putting new energy into theFlorentine war effort and Paolo Vitelli began to move remorselessly in onPisa.

This was the moment at which Venice's reluctance, and to some extentinability, to increase its direct military aid to Pisa became most apparent. Tosave Pisa now required large-scale military intervention; the combinedPisan-Venetian forces were being hopelessly outnumbered by Vitelli'sarmy, and the fall of Buti, Cascina and Vico Pisano highlighted theirweakness. Venice had two alternatives open to it. First, it could send in apowerful army which would have to force its way through the Milaneseblockade. With this in mind it turned to Francesco Gonzaga, who had beenabruptly dismissed in the previous year for displaying Francophileaffiliations, and offered to reinstate him if he would take his troops to Pisa.154

Gonzaga at first agreed and then refused to move until he had been formallyre-established as captain-general. Venice was reluctant to agree for fear ofangering Pitigliano, whose services it had begun to prize, and of disrupting apromising negotiation to win over Gianjacopo Trivulzio. Gonzaga'scontinued intransigence led to Venice abandoning any attempt to use him,and at the same time a plan to get Guidobaldo da Montefeltro through toPisa by the southern route through Siena also broke down. Thus the hope ofsending major reinforcements to Pisa was abandoned, as in the last resortVenice was not prepared to send Pitigliano or Fortebraccio or an equivalentforce of its own troops. There remained the second alternative, adiversionary attack on Florence's eastern frontier. This was much easier toorganize, as it did not involve moving key troops so far from Lombardy andbecause it could take advantage of the military operations already launchedby the Medici to recover their lost position. An army was quickly built up inthe Val di Lamone in the autumn of 1498 and drove into the Casentino,taking Bibbiena. The leading spirit in this offensive was Bartolomeod'Alviano, who now passed from temporary service with the Medici intopermanent service with Venice.155

The diversion was a complete success in so far as saving Pisa went. Vitelliand the bulk of his army were moved across to face the new threat, and thePisans and Venetians began to recover lost ground in the Pisan contado. Itwas less successful in itself as winter rains impeded the advance and quarrelsbroke out between D'Alviano and Guidobaldo da Montefeltro, who hadjoined the expedition and now wished to retire promptly to winter quarters.

154 Ibid., 663 reported the dismissal of Gonzaga in June 1497. The decision to re-employ him was takenin Oct. 1498 (ibid., ii, 24).

155 Commemoriali, xvm, 124V; 7 Oct. 1498 (Predelli, vi, 36).

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D'Alviano tried unsuccessfully to push on and won praise from Venice forhis efforts; but by the early months of 1499 his troops were being pushedback by Vitelli. It is against this background of reviving tension with Milan,frustration and uncertainty in the war with Florence, and the growingdanger of a renewed Turkish attack that we must see the Venetian decisionto ally with the French, and the Treaty of Blois of 9 February 1499. In onesense this was a complete volte-face in Venetian policy, in another it was justa new stage in the confrontation between the two leading north Italianpowers and the search for a secure frontier between them. The Treaty ofBlois promised Venice the frontier of the Adda and the key pivotal fortressof Cremona in return for its help in the French occupation of Milan. Itrepresented for Venice the solution of an old problem in the context of anentirely new political situation, the situation of a permanent and overpower-ing foreign presence in Italy.156

However, the Treaty of Blois cannot just be seen as an example ofVenetian opportunism and political realism in Italy. Venice, in late 1498,was aware that a new war with the Turks was imminent. In this conflict toothe rising naval power of France could be a useful support, and in the warwhich ensued between 1499 and 1503 French ships joined the Venetian fleetin the eastern Mediterranean.

In the light of the new understanding with France and the growingdanger in the east Venice in April 1499 abandoned its war with Florence,accepted the unfavourable and unpopular arbitration of the Duke of Ferraraover Pisa, and withdrew its troops back into Lombardy.157 During thesummer the army prepared for its part in the joint invasion of Milan. Venicewas determined that this opportunity permanently to consolidate itswestern frontier was not going to be missed. An army considerably in excessof that required of it by the Treaty of Blois was prepared and the mountingTurkish threat in Friuli was largely ignored in order not to weaken theinvasion force. Only 1300 cavalry under Carlo Orsini were sent to guard theeastern frontier, while Pitigliano and D'Alviano massed 12,000 men on theOglio.158 On 21 August, with the French attack from the west already welladvanced, Pitigliano led the army across the river in five columns. Withinthree weeks Cremona had been taken and Venetian troops had penetrated asfar as Lodi. Resistance to this attack was, of course, slight and the campaigncannot be described as an heroic occasion or a significant military triumph.It was, however, an opportunity for Venice to demonstrate its military

156 Romanin, v, 78; A. Lizier,' II cambiamento di fronte della politica veneziana alia morte di Carlo VIII(il trattato di Blois, 9 febb. 1499)', Ateneo veneto, cxx (1936) 2off.

157 G. Scaramella, 'II lodo del Duca di Ferrara tra Firenze e Venezia', NAV., n.s. v (1903) 5-47.158 SS. reg. 37, 105V (22 July 1499). Sanuto, ii, 1146-8 describes the Venetian army which invaded

Milan.

6 l

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

potential and the reasonably efficient organization of an army made up onthis occasion entirely of permanent elements.

In Friuli, however, it was a different story. The weakened frontiergarrison based on Gradisca could do nothing to stem a Turkish attack acrossthe Isonzo in September.159 Within days Turkish cavalry had reachedMotta on the Livenza. The large forces of local militia proved unwilling totake the field against them without strong professional support, and bothCarlo Orsini and the proveditor Andrea Zancani refused to risk anengagement even when the Turkish army had broken up to loot theunprotected countryside. Once again, however, as in the 1470s the Turkishthreat quickly receded. The countryside suffered appallingly but thefortified centres stood firm, and by October the Turks had withdrawn oncemore across the Isonzo. Zancani, and to a lesser extent Orsini, was made thescapegoat for these reverses, but the real blame lay with an official policywhich had still not come to realize fully that defence of a state meant defenceof subjects as well as defence of political power and control.

However, to see the events in Friuli in 1499 as an exact repetition of thesituation of the 1470s is perhaps to be a little unfair to Venice. Considerableenergies had been devoted to the arming and training of the militia in theinterim, and it would be an exaggeration to say that Venetian attitudes to theproblem of Turkish incursions had not changed at all. At this particularmoment in 1499 Venice was confronted with a very real dilemma. It was notjust a concern to save money or a limited view of its responsibilities whichled to the denuding of the eastern frontier, but a realistic preoccupation withevents on the western frontier. As soon as Milan had surrendered in the faceof the combined attack, troops were moved across to Friuli. In the spring of1500 Gianpaolo Manfroni was put in command of the eastern army, and bythe summer Pitigliano himself and large parts of the army were movedeastwards.160 This was, in fact, to be the last time that Turkish forces wereallowed to penetrate into Venetian territory on a similar scale.

This Turkish War also led to defeats and heavy losses in the easternempire, but these were events in which the army was not significantlyinvolved. A few infantry companies took part in the desperate defence ofModon and Lepanto, but the main fighting was conducted by the Venetiangalley crews and their patrician officers. Even at the siege and taking ofCephalonia, the one substantial success recorded in the war, the professionalinfantry element involved seems to have been small.161

159 G. Cogo, 'L'ultima invasione de' Turchi in Italia in relazione alia politica europea dell'estremoQuattrocento', Atti delta R. Universita di Genova, xvii (1902) 3-115; id., 'La guerra di Veneziacontro i Turchi (1499-1501)', NAV., xviii-xix (1899-1900) 5-76, 348-421 and 97-138.

160 ST. reg. 13, 125V (10 Apr. 1500) and Sanuto, ii, 1362-6 for the first movement of troops eastwards.161 Sanuto, ii, 1340-4.

62


The mobilization of the army for the invasion of Milan in the summer of1499 was the last full-scale mobilization of the Venetian army before theCambrai period. In the intervening years there were a number of briefflurries of activity but no major campaign. The recovery of Milan byLudovico Sforza in early 1500 led to preparations for an attack across theAdda to support the French. But Trivulzio soon had the situation in handwithout significant Venetian assistance. Similarly the activities of CesareBorgia in the Romagna led to a fairly constant state of alert amongst theVenetian garrisons in Ravenna and Cervia between 1501 and 1503. In earlyAugust 1503 the army inspections listed 4833 cavalry in the main billetingareas, excluding the eastern frontier; of these, 301 were in Ravenna.162 Itwas these troops which moved forward in the late summer of 1503 to takeadvantage of the temporary power vacuum in the Romagna after the eclipseof the Borgias.163 This action permanently embittered Julius II and was tobe an important factor in the consolidation of hostility to Venice whichculminated in the League of Cambrai.164 But it did not involve any greatconcentration of troops or significant fighting. At the same moment in 1503D'Alviano temporarily abandoned his formal commitment to Venice inorder to go south to join the Spaniards and play his decisive part in the battleof the Garigliano. He was by this time generally regarded as a Venetiancondottiere, and his intervention against the French was widely seen toreflect a changing Venetian political stance. But it seems that, at leastinitially, his move was regretted and opposed in Venice, and he certainly hadvery few of his own troops with him in the south.165 At the same time LouisXII, while convinced that Venice had encouraged D'Alviano, was unable tomount any serious counter-threat to Venice itself.

For the next few years a political stalemate ensued in Italy with the onlyserious fighting taking place between Florence and Pisa. This was a problemwhich Venice now carefully avoided, and it was only in 1507 as Germantroops began massing on its northern frontier in preparation for accompany-ing Maximilian on his proposed armed march to Rome to receive theImperial crown that the Venetian army was once more alerted. In May 1507all the condottieri were authorized to increase their companies by 25%, andin the next month the target for cavalry recruitment was set at 10,000.166 Bythe autumn papal troops were reported to be moving into the Romagna andthe Germans were concentrating at Trento. Pitigliano was ordered to

62 Sanuto, v, 62-3.63 G . So ranzo , ' I I cl ima storico della politica veneziana in R o m a g n a e nelle M a r c h e nel 1503 ' , Studi

romagnoli, v (1954) 5 1 3 - 4 5 .64 F . Seneca , Venezia e papa Giulio II (Padua , 1962) 17-34 .65 SS. reg. 39, 106V-107 (8 Sept. 1503).66 ST. reg. 15, 157 (3iMay 1507); SS. reg. 41, 22V (10 June 1507).

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

assemble the main army in the Veronese while Gianpaolo Manfroni movedup to the frontier at Rovereto.167

The massing of Venetian strength on the main route from Austriasouthwards led to the Imperialists diverting their attack eastwards.Bartolomeo d'Alviano was given command of a second army in theVicentino and marched north-eastwards up the Piave to meet the Germanthreat. When the Germans occupied Pieve di Cadore, D'Alviano led aforced march with about 2500 men through the mountains and cut off theenemy from their base at Cortina. He then attacked the German force in theopen valley outside Pieve di Cadore and totally defeated them. Followingthis defeat Maximilian was unable to make any move to protect his cities inFriuli and on Venice's eastern frontier. In a swift campaign and deployingpowerful artillery D'Alviano forced the surrender of Pordenone, Gorizia,Trieste and Fiume. On 5 June 1508 a truce was signed and Venice was ableto take pride in one of the most successful military campaigns it had foughtfor years.168

While his successes against the Germans reflected great credit on theelements of the Venetian army he commanded as well as on D'Alviano's ownleadership, they were in fact achieved by a very small section of the army.They engendered a false sense of confidence in Venice, and at the same timecompleted the circle of jealous neighbours round it by finally alienating theEmperor. The army which returned to its quarters in the late autumn of1508 was large; it consisted of more than 8000 heavy cavalry, unusually largeforces of light cavalry, and in addition to the professional infantry a selectcadre of veteran constables whose role in war was to command the militia.169

Thus it was largely made up of veteran troops and captains committed toVenetian service; further experiments in the use of specially hiredcondottieri, and particularly condottiere princes, to boost numbers and manfar-flung expeditions in the period since 1494 had proved ineffective. Venicetherefore had at this stage an army which was very much its own and couldbe compared favourably with that of any one of the powers soon to be rangedagainst it. But the League of Cambrai, signed on 10 December 1508,represented a coalition of forces which if properly co-ordinated was boundto put that army to a supreme test.

167 SS. reg. 41, 52 (30 Nov. 1507).168 The best brief account of this campaign is Pieri, / / Rinascimento e la crisi militare italiana, 448-55; but

see also G. Ciani, Fatto d'armefra i Venezianiegli Imperiali a Cadore nelMDVIII (Venice, 1846);Benvenuto Cessi, La difesa di Cadore nel 1508 (Padua, 1913); I. T. Zanchi, La prima guerra diMassimiliano contro Venezia: Giorgio Emo in Val Lagarina, 1507-8 (Padua, 1916).

169 ST. reg. 16, 61V-63V (23 Dec. 1508) for a complete list of the army at this stage.

Military development and fighting potential

Any discussion of European armies and European warfare in the fifteenthcentury has to take account of the changing balance between cavalry andinfantry which has often been seen as one of the key characteristics of theperiod, and of the impact of the emerging role of artillery and hand firearms.The Venetian army was no exception in this, and an examination of thechanging balance of arms within it affords some interesting insights into thedeveloping nature of European warfare.

THE CAVALRY FORCES

One cannot avoid the impression, when studying military developments infifteenth-century Italy, that in many ways the core of Italian armies, theheavy cavalry, underwent relatively few changes. It was this arm whichcontinued to figure first in any description of an army, and which receivedthe most attention from the government concerned. The socially eminentstill usually served in the heavy cavalry, where the commanders were knownthroughout the century as condottieri and held contracts from the state fortheir troops. The basic structure of the heavy cavalry remained the lanceunit based on the physical and military needs of the single mounted man-at-arms. The equipment and method of fighting of the heavy lancers waslargely unchanged.

It is this impression of conservatism, of an apparent unawareness ofmilitary developments which were taking place elsewhere in Europe, whichlies at the heart of much of the criticism of the Italian military scene. But it isa rather misleading impression both because it suggests that the relativeimportance of heavy cavalry vis-a-vis the other military arms remainedunchanged and because it exaggerates the static quality of the heavy cavalryitself.

In the first place one must remember that by no means all the heavycavalry was organized into condottiere companies. A feature of the fifteenthcentury, and this is particularly relevant to Venice, was the emergence andultimate decline of the lanze spezzate as an alternative form of organization

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

for the heavy cavalry.1 Lanze spezzate are usually thought of as veterans orpicked troops, which in fact they tended to be. However, their origin andreal distinctive quality lay in the terms of their employment. They weremen-at-arms employed directly by the state and organized into companiescommanded by captains appointed by the state. Their appearance in theearly fifteenth century coincided exactly with the first moves by Venice tocreate a standing army. At first the numbers were few and they were clearlyrecruited either as individuals or in very small groups whenever suitablemen presented themselves. At a time when the average condotta still lastedonly months, the lanze spezzate began to take on the appearance ofpermanent troops. By the late 1420s Venice had as many as 200 lances in thiscategory, and in 1432 Gianfrancesco Gonzaga was given command of themin addition to his own company.2

At about this moment and for a variety of reasons recruiting into the lanzespezzate took on a new dimension. Whole companies whose condottieri haddied, deserted or retired were kept in Venetian employment as lanzespezzate. As a result of this development, by the middle of the century and inthe years immediately after the Peace of Lodi, a large proportion of theVenetian army was made up of lanze spezzate directly employed on apermanent basis by the state. This was in the main a result of governmentpolicy to gain greater control over the army and retain the services of goodcompanies which might otherwise have broken up and drifted away.However, two other factors influenced this growth of the lanze spezzate] thegrowing permanence of the Venetian army and the fact that some companieshad spent very long periods in Venetian service and had become settled inVenetian territory meant that if the leader deserted the men were oftenreluctant to follow him, and if he died without an obvious successor it wasthe natural reaction of the men to turn to Venice for employment. Hence,just as in the whole phenomenon of growing permanence of militaryemployment, one must look at this question from the point of view of theinclinations of the soldiers as well as the intentions of the employing state.The second point is that in the later stages of the Lombardy wars and thefollowing period, the rate of mortality amongst condottieri somewhatincreased as a result of the growing use of artillery and handguns. This aidedthe process of the formation of the lanze spezzate as companies were leftsuddenly leaderless before the natural processes of succession to leadershipcould take place.

1 Mallett, Mercenaries and their Masters, 112-13.2 There were Venetian lanze spezzate in Verona in 1418 (SMi. reg. 52, 114), and Sanuto (Vite de dogi,

990) reported 115 lanze spezzate in 1427; Gianfrancesco Gonzaga's condotta as captain-general wasagreed on 12 Mar. 1433 (Commemoriali, xn, 106), and the lanze spezzate were added to his commandin Dec. 1432 (SS. reg. 12, 138V; 3 Dec. 1432).

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The first large company to be absorbed in this way was that of Roberto daMontalboddo, who was killed in 1448. Roberto had 900 cavalry in hiscompany in 1447,3 and the company of the 'Roberteschi' still served amongthe lanze spezzate in the 1470s.4 An even more striking example was that ofthe Gattamelata companies. On the retirement of Gattamelata in 1440command of his company was taken over by his young son Gianantonio andthe somewhat older and more experienced Gentile da Leonessa, who wasa nephew of Gattamelata's widow.5 Both these men died without male heirs inthe 1450s; Gentile was killed in action and Gianantonio so badly woundedthat he was virtually incapacitated for the last three years of his life. Thereremained Antonio da Marsciano, a son-in-law of Gattamelata. But at thispoint, in 1456, Venice decided to enrol the Gatteschi into the lanze spezzate,give them the title of the Societa di San Marco, and appoint Antonio tocommand them in the name of the state.6 The Societa di San Marcosurvived as a coherent company until 1482 when Antonio da Marsciano wascaptured in the War of Ferrara and subsequently took service with Florence.At this point the company was broken up, but elements known as'Gatteschi' were still to be found amongst the lanze spezzate in the 1490s.

In 1471 at least three other companies went to make up the Venetian lanzespezzate'? the Corneschi, who were the remnants of the company ofAntonello della Corna, who had been disgraced and imprisoned in 1469;8the company of Giovanni Conti, who had left Venetian service in the late1450s; and that of Cimarosta, who had died. Cimarosta himself and anumber of his men had at one time formed part of Bartolomeo Colleoni'scompany and had joined the lanze spezzate when Colleoni deserted fromVenetian service in 1452.9

In the 1470s it was apparent that the phenomenon had got somewhat outof hand. It is not clear whether any new recruits at all were brought intothese companies, but certainly the bulk of the men in them were veteranswhose service went back twenty or thirty years and whose military efficiencywas beginning to be in question. At the same time Venice had not createdthe obvious corollary to the lanze spezzate system, an officer hierarchydirectly dependent on the state. Command of the lanze spezzate was decided

3 Cristoforo da Soldo, 77.4 ST. reg. 6, 139.V (22 Aug. 1471).5 Eroli, 35 states that he was Gattamelata's brother-in-law, but this is an error.6 SS. reg. 20, 89 (19 May 1456); M. E. Mallett, 'Some notes on a fifteenth-century condottiere and his

library: Count Antonio da Marsciano', in C. H. Clough (ed.), Cultural Aspects of the ItalianRenaissance: Essays in Honour of P. 0. Kristeller (Manchester, 1976) 204—6.

7 ST. reg. 6, 139V (22 Aug. 1471).8 Ibid., 67 (13 Aug. 1469); it was agreed to take on the Corneschi as lanze spezzate 'quia dominatio

nostra de lanceis spezatis bonum est consecuta fructum et consequitur'.9 SS. reg. 19, 65V and 76 (22 June and 7 Aug. 1451).

67

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

in a rather arbitrary manner; overall command of such companies wasusually given to condottieri who already had their own companies, as a wayof increasing their prestige and in a sense promoting them withoutincreasing their potential independence. On the other hand, Antonio daMarsciano was an example of a man whose main responsibility was as agovernor of the lanze spezzate, although he did also have a small condotta ofhis own. At squadron level the leaders of the lanze spezzate were chosenfrom among the men themselves and often at the request of the men. But inthe 1470s we do find the appearance of Venetian nobles as squadron leadersin the lanze spezzate. Jacopo Badoer and Vettore Malipiero both becamecommanders of lanze spezzate in the 1470s.10 In both cases these were said tohave been chosen as leaders by the men. But the fact that theseappointments coincide with a clear policy of reform and improvement of thelanze spezzate suggests that a part of that policy was the deliberateintroduction of Venetian commanders.

The attempts to reform the lanze spezzate, reduce their numbers,amalgamate companies, and generally improve their efficiency went onthroughout the 1470s. In August 1471 three nobles were elected to reformthe army.11 However, in 1476 the five main companies of lanze spezzate stillsurvived, although many of the men were said to be useless veterans.12 Atthe end of that year the Corneschi, Roberteschi and the company ofCimarosta, which consisted of only 80 surviving men-at-arms in all, wereunited under a single commander.13

However, it was also in 1476 that a new influx into the lanze spezzateresulted from the death of Colleoni. Nevertheless one has the impressionthat on this occasion, although the Colleoneschi continued to have thiscollective name for another twenty years and to be thought of in a certainsense as a single company, the internal structure came to resemble more thatof a number of smaller traditional companies than a coherent body of lanzespezzate. Lorenzo Loredan, who was proveditor-general in 1477-8,described the Colleoneschi as like sheep without a shepherd, and hisdispatches constantly urged that they be split up into companies and placedunder established condottieri.14 As a result of this sort of advice the variousMartinengo dependants of Colleoni were given small condone to absorb themen, and thus they were made the responsibility of the condottieri rather10 Jacopo Badoer, 'nobile civis noster', became commander of the lanze spezzate cornesche on 27 Dec.

1474, having been previously a squadron commander in the company (ST. reg. 7, 61). VettoreMalipiero, also described as a Venetian noble, took over command of the Roberteschi on 4 Apr. 1475(ST. reg. 7, 72).

11 ST. reg. 6, 140V (26 Aug. 1471).12 ST. reg. 7, 140V-141 (30 Nov. 1476).13 Ibid., 143V (7 Dec. 1476).14 Senato, Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24, 22 (Nov. 1477).


than the state. It seems likely that the long period of peace had underlinedthe problems of the lanze spezzate system without a proper officer hierarchyand implying a degree of responsibility of the state for individuals which hadproved ineffective in practice. Nevertheless at the same time as theColleoneschi were absorbed, arrangements were made for recruiting afurther company of 150 lanze spezzate who were to be known as the SocietaNuova di San Marco.15

By the 1480s the problem of the veteran companies was reduced to theColleoneschi. In December 1487 137 men-at-arms survived, and afterrigorous inspection they were pruned still further.16 When the question ofwhat to do with the troops of Roberto da Sanseverino, killed in 1487, cameup it was decided not to make them lanze spezzate but to divide them up asthe Colleoneschi had been.17 In 1502 there was still a compagnia colleonesca egattesca in service and it was attached to the company of BernardinoFortebraccio; but at that moment a further sixteen of its veteran men-at-arms were pensioned off.18

During the second half of the century in which the loyalties of Venetiancondottieri became increasingly established by long habit of service, thephenomenon of the lanze spezzate gradually declined. This had been a steptowards creating an army directly dependent on the state which wasproduced by a continuous war situation before 1454, but was in a certainsense too innovatory for a fundamentally conservative society like that ofVenice, and a fundamentally conservative tradition like that of the heavycavalry. By the first decade of the sixteenth century the Venetian heavycavalry had reverted almost entirely to the old condottiere companyorganization.

Nevertheless there had been another area of development within thesecompanies: in the size and composition of the lance. One of the tendenciesthroughout the fifteenth century was for the equipment and armour of theman-at-arms to increase in weight and complexity. This not only narrowedthe social and economic base of the category but also dictated changes in thefollowing of the man-at-arms, the lance formation. Traditionally the Italianlance had consisted of three men: the man-at-arms, a lightly armed sergeantand a page or mounted servant. The purpose of this group was both to givesome support to the man-at-arms in battle and, more important, to lookafter his equipment, lead and tend his war horse and generally' service' him.The growing weight and cost of arms and armour had a double effect on this

15 SS. reg. 28, 66v (29 Nov. 1477). Recruiting of the new company started in Dec. 1477 (Senato,Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24, 31; 2 Dec. 1477).

16 ST. reg. 10, 69-70 (13 Dec. 1487), 86 (7 Mar. 1488).17 ST. reg. 11, 40V-41V (14 Dec. 1490).18 ST. reg. 14, 109V-110 (25 Sept. 1502).

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

organization. In the first place the prestige and status of the man-at-armsincreased as his equipment became more expensive and he became in acertain sense more invulnerable. After 1454 one increasingly finds thesituation when not all capo lancie were vert armigeri\ the proportion of truemen-at-arms within any body of heavy cavalry tended to decrease.19 Thiswas not just the result of the rising cost of being a fully equipped man-at-arms, but also stemmed from the prolonged peacetime situation in whichthe following of the condottieri tended to be filled out with men who werenot genuine men-at-arms at all but rather personal attendants of varioussorts. However, the term vero armigero was already appearing well before1454, which suggests that the distinction was a military as well as a socialone. Another term which seemed to be almost interchangeable with veroarmigero was elmetto, again suggesting a more completely armed knight thanthe old uomo d'arme. Presumably this term derived from the growing use ofthe completely head-encasing helms rather than the various forms ofbasinets and sallets.

This tendency towards a reduction in the number of fully armed men-at-arms in a cavalry company is clearly seen in the organization of Bertoldod'Este's troops for the Morea campaign in 1463. Bertoldo was to take 170elmetti, which were the equivalent of 1500 cavalry; however, the force wasalso said to include 600 utili.20 The implication is that the proportion ofmen-at-arms was much the same as in a traditional force - one to three; butthat of these fewer than a third were, in contemporary terms, fully armed.This process of restriction together with the growing 'servicing' require-ments of the new fully armed elmetto produced a rationalization of theorganization and a tendency for the size of the lance formation to increase.Not only the added social prestige of the man-at-arms, particularly apparentamongst the lanze spezzate, but also the need for additional warhorses toallow him to change horses when they tired under the weight of the heavierequipment, and the problems of more elaborate armour to clean andmaintain all suggested an expanded following as a natural development. Thelance in the second half of the fifteenth century rose to four, five or even sixmen and became known in some armies as the corazza, although in theVenetian army the term elmetto increasingly took on the same connotation.The basic function of this group did not change, although there was a

19 The renewal of the condotta of Giovanni Conti on 20 May 1454, which laid down that he shouldmaintain 233 1/3 lances including at least 100 veri armigeri, was the first time that this new distinctionformally appeared in Venetian documents (Commemoriali, xiv, 124V-125). Chierighino Chiericati inhis Trattatello delta milizia in G. Zorzi, 'Un vicentino alle corte di Paolo secondo', NAV., n.s. xxx(1915) 425-34 (see below, 106-7) approved the idea and pointed out that Carmagnola had alwayswanted his men-at-arms to have six or seven horses each.

20 S S . reg . 2 1 , 157V (13 J u n e 1463).

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tendency to include a mounted crossbowman, such men being widely usedin the second half of the fifteenth century as bodyguards and personalfollowers. Unlike the French or Burgundian lance, the Italian lance neveracquired an infantry component.

In practice in the Venetian army this expansion of the size of the lanceformation was at first officially recognized only in wartime, and it became anatural part of the mobilization of the companies. However, in 1490 thepeacetime establishment of the lances was finally raised from three to four.21

It also became accepted practice that the lesser members of the formation(the saccomanni and ragazzi) were not to be subject to inspection, and theemphasis shifted more and more to ensuring that the armed men were fit forwar. In November 1494, with the French invasion already in progress, theestablishment of the lance, or corazza as it was called on this occasion, wasraised to five.22 By 1509 it had become the practice for each fully armedman-at-arms to have two lances, the second led by his sergeant who wasequipped as a light cavalryman.23

The tendency of these developments, which were not of coursespecifically Venetian but can be clearly traced in the Venetian army, was toemphasize the distinctive quality of the heavy cavalry. Although lightcavalry elements were included in the expanded lance, the organization oflight cavalry units became increasingly separate, particularly at the very endof the century. Companies of mounted crossbowmen had always had a rolein Italian warfare, but the success of the stradiots after about 1480encouraged the growth of a greater variety of light cavalry companies.

The basic reasons for the development of light cavalry were fourfold.First, the rising cost of heavy cavalry made a less expensive alternative,attractive both for employers and men. Secondly, the growing effectivenessof infantry on the battlefield, and particularly missile infantry, led toexperiments with what was basically a more mobile infantry, mountedcrossbowmen and mounted handgun men. Neither of these weapons couldbe seriously fired from the saddle, but the mounting of such men added anew dimension to their military value. Thirdly, the mounted crossbowmenbecame particularly popular as bodyguards; in the second half of thefifteenth century a large condotta nearly always included provision for acontingent of such troops. They provided more efficient protection to thecaptain or prince in the streets of a city than a squadron of heavy cavalry.

21 S T . reg. 11, 2ov (10 Sep t . 1490); Collegio, Commis s ione Secre te , 1482-95 , 146V-147 (17 Oc t . 1490).By this t ime lances of four m e n or more were , in fact, very c o m m o n in the Venet ian a rmy. T h e newlanze spezzate raised in 1477 were expected to have four m e n in each lance ( S S . reg. 28, 66v; 29 N o v .1477)-

22 S T . reg. 12, 72V (6 N o v . 1494). O n l y th ree of the five were to be mus te red and inspected .23 SS. reg. 41, 158 (14 Apr. 1509).

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

Finally, in an age of military experimentation and cross-fertilization thevalue of light cavalry was increasingly appreciated. Whereas in the earlyfifteenth century a fortress would rarely have included cavalry amongst itsgarrison, by the end of the century a squadron of light horse had become anessential feature of most garrisons.

Venice, perhaps more than any other Italian state, participated in andcontributed to this development of light cavalry forces. When the Senateordered a reinforcement of the army in Friuli after the Turkish victory inthe autumn of 1477, the proposed force of 6000 cavalry was to be dividedequally between heavy cavalry, mounted crossbowmen and light cavalry.24

At this moment Cola di Monforte, who had recently joined the Venetianarmy after his Burgundian service, wrote a memorandum for the Senate onthe needs of the army and in it he placed equal emphasis on the maintenanceand equipping of the three types of cavalry.25 By the early 1490s Pierod'Erba, who had commanded stradiots in the War of Ferrara, was describedas captain of the mounted crossbowmen, thus signalling the presence ofsuch troops as a distinctive arm.26 In 1493, after the death of Piero, the titlewas conferred on Giovanni Greco da San Vitale, an experienced infantryconstable who retained the post until at least 1509. At Fornovo both Grecoand Soncino Benzoni commanded companies of mounted crossbowmen inthe Venetian army,27 and both figured in the defence of Pisa together withsmall companies of the same troops.28 By 1501 Venice was becomingalarmed at a tendency for condottieri to replace men-at-arms with mountedcrossbowmen, a practice which was at first sanctioned and even encouragedat a ratio of one to two. However, although this erosion of the heavy cavalrycompanies became frowned upon, the creation of the new light cavalrycompanies went on rapidly. In 1507 Vitello Vitelli, Guido Guiano, Rinieridella Sassetta and Piero Gambacorti were all hired with 100 mountedcrossbowmen or mounted handgunmen each.29 Early in 1509 the import-ance of the light cavalry was recognized by the Senate, which wasdetermined to avoid the need for such sudden recruitment again andcommitted itself to five large companies of such troops commanded byGiovanni Greco, Vitello Vitelli, Rinieri della Sassetta, Ludovico Battagliaand Franco dal Borgo. Each company of 100 to 130 was to contain at least 30mounted handgunmen.30

24 S S . reg. 28, 71V-72 (15 Dec . 1477).25 Ibid., 7ir-v (15 Dec. 1477), published in B. Croce, 'Un memoriale militare di Cola di Monforte,

Conte di Campobasso', Archivio storico per le provincie napoletane, n.s. xix (1933) 371-3.26 ST. reg. 12, 14 and 75 (24 July 1493 and 26 Nov. 1494).27 Schullian, 96.28 Sanuto, i, 543.29 SS. reg. 41, 43V (20 Sept. 1507).30 SS. reg. 41, 132V (20 Jan. 1509).

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However, the main contribution to the development of light cavalry, bothin terms of numbers and precedence, came from the stradiots. The stradiotswere lightly armed cavalry recruited in Dalmatia, Albania and Greece.Their main arms were the short lance, or javelin, and the bow; but theirsmall, fast and hardy horses were almost as important a feature of theirmilitary value.31 Recruiting was carried out through the local nobility of thearea, and these men also commanded the companies. The stradiots provedtheir worth being hardy, fearless and above all cheap, in righting against theTurks in Dalmatia and the Morea after 1463. After 1465 they seem to havealmost entirely replaced Italian cavalry in this fighting, and in the late 1470scompanies of them were brought to Friuli to face the Turks there.32 On theconclusion of the truce with the Turks in 1479 the leaders of the stradiotsbased in Coron asked to be taken into permanent service, and the decisionwas made to bring 1000 of them to Italy.33 These were presumably thestradioti vecchi who took part in the initial stages of the War of Ferrara,34 butrecruitment of a further 1000 was authorized in late May of 1482.35 Duringthe war the post of proveditor of the stradiots was created and, unlike theother military proveditors, this man was expected to, and did in practice,lead the stradiots in battle.36

In the War of Ferrara the stradiots created a considerable sensation andwere largely responsible for the Venetian victory at Argenta in November1482. Their custom of cutting off the heads of those they killed in battle andbringing them back in order to claim rewards of 1 ducat each was at firstdeplored by Venice but clearly not seriously discouraged.37 At Fornovotheir lack of discipline in turning too quickly to loot the baggage train of theFrench army was deplored, but at the same time their fierce loyalty to theirnatural leaders and their sense of belonging to a kinship community, whichthe companies on the whole were, gave them some similarities to the Swiss.Large numbers of stradiots were used in the Pisan campaign in 1497-9, buttheir long residence in that area led to many of them losing or selling theirhorses, which was a severe restraint on their military value. When theyreturned to Venice in 1499 they had to be reorganized and many senthome.38 During these years the garrisons in Friuli were largely made up of31 ST. reg. 12, 142V-143 (30 May 1496). Stradiots in Pisa were forbidden to sell their horses because of

their special qualities which could not be easily replaced. For the classic description of the stradiots,see Sanuto, La spedizione di Carlo VIII, 313-4.

32 SS. reg. 28, 11 iv (22 Aug. 1478).33 ST. reg. 8, 62 (15 Sept. 1479).34 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 1229.35 S S . reg. 30, 98V (23 M a y 1482).36 S T . reg. 9, 77 (11 M a y 1484).37 Collegio, Le t t e re Secrete , filza 1 (26 Sept . 1487). O n this occasion Venice refused to pay a ducat each

for 42 G e r m a n heads bu t offered suitable presents instead.38 S S . reg. 37, 94V (28 M a y 1499).

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

stradiots, there being as many as 3000 of them at a time.39 In 1508 there wereseventeen stradiot captains in Venetian pay in Italy.40

INFANTRY

Infantry returned to the forefront of European warfare in the fifteenthcentury, although it is usually held that this development was somewhatretarded in Italy. However, Italy too, and particularly Venice, madeconsiderable progress in the employment and use of infantry during thisperiod. Evidence of this is the steady growth of an infantry element in thecontracts of the more important condottieri. By the end of the century it wasrecognized that no military contingent was complete without a stronginfantry component. Such a realization was not surprising in view of thedevelopments in warfare which had taken place, particularly in the crucialyears of the war in Lombardy between 1425 and 1454. The developments inthe use of field fortifications, the slowing down of the rhythm of warfare asarmies grew larger and more encumbered with artillery and baggage trains,the growing emphasis on protracted sieges - all these encouraged the use ofinfantry and the expansion of the numbers of the infantry.41 Venice as one ofthe principal participants in those wars also played its part in this expansion.

In 1400 the main role of infantry was as garrison troops. In this role adegree of permanence was essential, and therefore the first permanent forcesretained by Italian states tended to be small bodies of infantry known asprovisionati because they received a provisione, a monthly wage from thestate. Their standing was similar to that of the cavalry lanze spezzatealthough their role and reputation were very different. Such troops wereconsidered to be of little use on the battlefield. Venice, at that time havingfew possessions in Italy, had few provisionati in Italy, although her defencecommitments in the eastern Mediterranean were growing rapidly.

In time of war infantry companies were also recruited by contract, as werecavalry. Infantry constables were hired and their companies were made upof three types of infantry usually in equal proportions: foot lancers,crossbowmen and shield bearers. Such infantry were regarded as anecessary complement to any large cavalry force, although always inrelatively small numbers and in an essentially subordinate role. AgainVenice, as a relatively infrequent participant in land warfare in Italy at thisstage, had little experience of the problems of this recruiting and few linkswith professional constables.

SS. reg. 36, 142V-143 (10 July 1497).ST. reg. 16, 61V-63 (23 Dec. 1508).Pieri, Rinascimento e la crisi militare, 272-5; Mallett, Mercenaries and their Masters, 155.

74


A third type of infantry was the locally conscripted militia. An obligationto militia service for all men capable of bearing arms was a standard featureof communal statutes in medieval Italy. Although in fact a levee en masse wasrarely used, elements of the local militia, recruited either as volunteers orconscripted on the basis of one man per household or some similarproportion, were frequently called upon to join armies in the fourteenthcentury. Such troops rarely had any training, their arms provided bythemselves or at best by their local communities were usually inadequate,and they could never be relied upon to follow the army far from their homes.Once again in 1400 for obvious reasons Venice had little experience of theseproblems, but the Lombard signori whom it was about to replace had reliedheavily on militias in their small campaigns and the militia tradition wasperhaps stronger in this part of Italy than elsewhere.42

After 1404 Venice's role in the recruitment and use of infantry in Italybegan to change rapidly. The war against the Carraresi, essentially a war ofsieges, involved the use of large numbers of professional infantry, and at theend of the war a few constables, notably Quarantotto da Ripamortorio, wereretained to provide substantial infantry garrisons for the newly acquiredcities. While outlying fortresses could be garrisoned by handfuls ofprovisionati, the cities of Padua, Vicenza and Verona required largecompanies both to defend them and to police them. Similarly one of the firsttasks of Venetian officials sent out to administer the Terraferma was tooverhaul the militia arrangements. New lists of able-bodied men betweenthe ages of 18 and 60 were drawn up43 and quickly put to use in 1411 whenlarge companies of militia from all over the Terraferma were called out toprepare and defend the Livenza fortifications against the Hungarians.44

This employment of the militia as pioneers on large-scale field fortificationswas to be a significant feature of Venetian militia policy in the first half of thecentury and accounts for the very large numbers of militia which usuallyaccompanied Venetian armies.

In January 1420, towards the end of the second Hungarian War, 2900infantry were with the army in Friuli; of these, 1000 were left with the fieldarmy for the final stages of the campaign and a further 1150 were allotted togarrisoning the newly acquired territory.45 In the years following 1425 thenumbers of infantry required increased steadily. The siege of Brescia in1426 and the new expansion of the territory implied new commitments. Thesystem of expanding the condotte of veteran constables as a means ofmobilization was applied to the infantry in 1431, and by 1437 an infantry

42 Bayley, 34-6, 234-7.43 S S . reg. 4 , 79V (5 D e c . 1409).44 Sanuto, Vite tie dogi, 837.45 S S . r eg . 7, 130V (17 J a n . 1420).

75

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

force of 6000 with the army was the aim of the Venetian recruiters.46 Boththe captain-general at that time, Gianfrancesco Gonzaga, and later Colleoniwere great believers in the value of infantry and encouraged Venice toemploy as many as possible. At the same time a new infantry commanderhad emerged to take the place of Quarantotto, who retired in the late 1420s.This was Dietisalvi Lupi da Bergamo, who joined Venetian service withCarmagnola in 1425 and had risen to the rank of governor of the infantry by1433.47 Lupi commanded the infantry until at least the battle of Caravaggioin 1448, at which he was captured and a ransom of 5000 ducats wasdemanded for him. He was knighted by Michele Attendolo after Casalmag-giore in 1446.48

By the 1440s significant numbers of handgunmen were beginning toappear among the Venetian infantry. Lupi was said to have been the first tointroduce handgun companies, and at Caravaggio where the Milanese weresuperior in the use of this weapon it was reported that smoke from thehandguns obscured the battlefield.49 Another innovation which spread fromNaples at this time was the arming of infantry with short sword and buckler,giving greater mobility and flexibility.50 In fact the old type of infantrycompany with its infantry lances, crossbowmen and shield bearers wasgoing out of fashion in favour of a division between 'fire' companies ofcrossbowmen and handgunmen and assault companies equipped withswords or footlances.

In the later stages of these wars the Venetian infantry reached numbers inthe region of 10,000 men with the army, in addition to militia pioneercontingents of about the same size. By 1453 Matteo Griffoni da S. Angelo inVada had emerged as captain of the infantry.51 He had originally been inFlorentine service but had joined Venice in 1447 and remained captain from1453 until his death in 1473.52

The impression of permanence given by the records of long service forVenice of many of her constables at this time is somewhat misleading. Theconstables, unlike the condottieri, did not have guarantees of peacetime

46 S M i . reg. 58 , 96 (19 D e c . 1431); Col legio, Regis t r i Secre t i , 4 , 56V (2 Apr . 1437).47 M . L u p i , ' M e m o r i e per servire alia vita di Diet isalvi L u p i ' , Miscellanea di storia italiana, vi (1865)

487ff.48 Lupi, 514; Dietisalvi Lupi had a condotta for 500 infrantry. Also on Lupi, see A. Mazzi, 'L'atto

divisionale della sostanza di Dietisalvi Lupi, condottiero della fantaria veneziana', Bollettino dellacivic a biblioteca di Bergamo, iv (1910) 1-38.

49 A. Angelucc i , ' G l i sch ioppet t ie r i milanesi nel secolo X V , Politecnico, xxiv (1865) 9. T h e super ior i tyof the Milanese handgunmen at this stage was a matter of concern and debate in the Senate (ST. reg.2, 8iv; 8 Sept. 1448).

50 P. Pieri, 'Alfonso V e le armi italiane', in Pieri, Scritti vari (Turin, 1966).51 Commemoriali, xiv, 119V; 19 May 1453 (Predelli, v, 81).52 For renewals of his condotta, see Predelli, v, 6, 31,49, 64, 86; his death is recorded in ST. reg. 7, 17V (4

Oct. 1473).

76


contracts except in exceptional cases like Griffoni. Demobilization in 1454and on subsequent occasions was therefore much more drastic with theinfantry than it was with the cavalry. An infantry force of about 10,000 wasreduced within a year to about 2500, with many constables paid offentirely.53 However, a system was devised which enabled Venice to recruitagain quickly; this was the retention of certain constables a provisione, that iswith a generous personal salary which enabled them to live and maintain ahandful of followers during peacetime. It was clear that the level of trainingrequired of the ordinary infantryman was not high enough to warrantretaining large numbers in permanent service, but the retention ofconstables was considered important.

There were, of course, also the elite of constables who were retained withtheir companies. Most of these men in the next twenty-five years saw serviceagainst the Turks. The army sent to the Morea in 1463 was largely made upof infantry, and most of the constables were those who had been retained inpermanent service after the Peace of Lodi. Francesco da Teano, who tookover command of the Venetian troops in the Morea after the departure ofSigismondo Malatesta in 1465, was fifth-ranking constable in 1454. Griffonihimself never went to the Morea but he did command the infantry at thesiege of Trieste. Otherwise he spent these years at his headquarters inCrema.54

Both in the Colleoni War and the War of Ferrara the infantry force wasbuilt up very rapidly and just as rapidly demobilized at the end of hostilities.There is no evidence of how many infantry were employed in 1467, but thereorganization of 1468 allowed for the retention of only 1821 men in Italywith 21 constables in active service and 9 a provisione.55 In the War ofFerrara the infantry reached unprecedented numbers;56 demobilization atthe end of the war involved reducing the force from 14,600 to 2500 men.Now 36 constables were retained a provisione and 29 in active service.57

Melo da Cortona, who had been promoted to be captain of infantry in 1479in recognition of his services in Tuscany,58 was killed in this war and hisplace was taken by a recent recruit from the Florentine army, Andrea daBorgo Sansepolero. The dangers of maintaining so small a force of infantryin permanent service were revealed in 1487 when the sudden emergencycreated serious infantry recruiting problems for Venice. One solution to this53 S T . reg. 3, 131 (20 Sept. 1454).54 SS. reg. 21, 191 (3 Oct. 1463); S T . reg. 5, 163V (30 June 1466).55 SS. reg. 23, 121 (21 June 1468).56 The Venetian proveditors Pisani and Pesaro reported on 7 July 1484 on the' . . . fantarie, le quali sono

estimati, et con effetto sono, principal nervo e forteza de li exerciti in questi parti' (Senato, Lettere diRettori, 11, 7 July 1484).

57 S T . reg. 9, 102, 102V and 104 (27 and 30 Aug. , 4 Sep t . 1484).58 S T . reg. 8, 65V (6 Oc t . 1479).

77

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

was to encourage a cavalry commander, Jacomaccio da Venezia, to give uphis cavalry condotta and take on an infantry one, which he did with greatsuccess.59 However, once again after the war only 23 constables with 1684men were retained in active service.60

This policy of rapid mobilization and demobilization of the infantryforces had two important side effects. It encouraged a gradual decline of theindependent infantry company led by its constable serving under contract.This was a general phenomenon in the second half of the fifteenth century inItaly, and the mechanics of it are very clear in the Venetian case. By the1480s more than half the constables employed by Venice were in permanentservice, usually without troops to command in peacetime. When mobiliz-ation came they either took command of provisionati raised by Venetianrecruiting agents, or went out and recruited themselves. But even in thelatter case the men they raised were raised for Venice and paid directly byVenice; they were provisionati in the old sense of the word. Only the mostsenior of the fully employed infantry constables continued to have their owncondotte.

The second important side effect of the occasional need for rapidmobilization was the development of a selective, partially trained militiasystem rather similar to that of the English trained bands. The impetus forestablishing such a system on a national scale came in the late autumn of1477 after the standing forces in Friuli had been badly defeated by theTurks. At first it was thought that the force would number 15-20,000 mento be recruited from all the cities of the Terraferma. They were to be calledthe provisionati di San Marco. All the rectors of the Terraferma wereinstructed to set up committees of citizens to enrol suitable men, who had tobe young and fit. They were to be commanded by constables deputed by therectors and equipped with breastplate, sallet and a suitable offensiveweapon. Recruiting was also to take place in Venice itself where 4000 menwere to be raised by nobles deputed in each contrada.61 In 1478 the numbersenvisaged were somewhat reduced and the major cities of the Terrafermawere called upon to send 500 men each to Friuli.62 The selected men wereexempt from taxes and were expected to undergo periodic training. InMarch 1479 the force was formally disbanded, as the Turkish threat seemedto have passed and Venice felt a greater need for money than for men.63 Butlater in the year when the Hungarians were threatening, a smaller force ofprovisionati di San Marco was again alerted.64

59 ST. reg. 10, 77V (8 Feb. 1488).60 Ibid., 74 (13 Jan. 1488).61 ST. reg. 7, 189V (14 Nov. 1477); Malipiero, Annali veneti, 116.62 ST. reg. 8, i8v (3 Aug. 1478).63 Ibid., 43 (20 Mar. 1479).64 SS. reg. 29, 51 v (5 Nov. 1479).

78


This initiative for a trained militia does not seem to have beensystematically maintained. The title provisionati di San Marco was not usedagain in the official records of the period. But it is clear that some element ofpart-time training of local militia was continued. By the late fifteenthcentury particular emphasis was being placed on the training of handgun-men. In 1490 the Senate deplored the extent to which Venice was dependenton German and other oltramontane handgunmen and appointed eightmasters of the art to go out into the Terraferma to train two men from eachvillage to use the guns. Rectors of the major cities were instructed toestablish biannual competitions to stimulate interest in the use of thehandgun.65 When in 1493 the Lieutenant-General of Friuli was ordered tocall out a select force of 4000 militia, to include 1000 each of handgunmen,crossbowmen, archers and foot lancers, he reported that 900 handgunmenwere already enrolled and carrying out regular practices.66 In the im-mediately subsequent years it is clear that a pool of partly trained men wasavailable, but it was only in 1507, with the German threat mounting, that asystematically organized select militia was once more created. In that yearLactantio da Bergamo started to train 600 men in the Veronese; the basis ofthe training was the use of the handgun and the pike in the Swiss manner.67

In the next year the training scheme was extended to the entire Terrafermaand the intention was to raise 10,000 men; Citolo da Perugia was responsiblefor training 1000 men in Brescia, and similar forces were raised in Bergamo,Padua and other cities.68

By 1508 there was clearly an intention in the Senate that the infantryshould be essentially a national force, i.e. composed of Venetian subjects.This idea had been germinating slowly over the past thirty years as thepermanent professional infantry forces had been kept to a minimum andsporadic attempts made to mobilize on the basis of recruitment within thefrontiers. It was an idea which was still not really practicable in 1508. Thegap between professional infantry and partially trained militia was too widein practice, and even while militia training was in full swing in that year anumber of professional constables were sent out to recruit in their homeareas outside the frontiers.69 At the same time one of the effects of this65 Dieci, Misti, reg. 24,208,222 and 230V (20 Aug., 25 Sept. and 24 Nov. 1490); P. Bembo, Delia historia

vinitiana (Venice, 1552) 11.66 Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1482-95, 151V (30 Sept. and 2 Oct. 1493). For practices oflocal

militia handgunmen in the citadel of Verona in 1506, see C. Ferrari, 'Com'era amministrato unacomune del Veronese al principio del secolo xvi', Atti e memurie dell'Accademia di Verona, ser. 4, iii(1903) 232-3.

67 ST. reg. 15, I6IV (10 June 1507); Sanuto, vii, i n .68 ST. reg. 16, 21V-22 (1 Aug. 1508); C. Pasero, 'Aspetti dell'ordinamento militare del territorio

bresciano durante il dominio veneto', Commentari delPAteneo di Brescia, cxxxvi (1937) 34; G. Celli,'Le ordinanze militari della repubblica veneta nel secolo xvi', Nuova antologia, ser. 2, liii (1894) 99.

69 S S . reg . 4 1 , 131V (8 J a n . 1509).

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

growing emphasis on a trained and select militia was to create a realdistinction between such troops and the conscript pioneers who were alsolevied from the local populations.

Related to this question of the emergence of at least the idea of a nationalinfantry was the extent to which Venice used non-Italian infantry. Onvarious occasions in the century Venice negotiated with the Swiss formilitary assistance; in 1483 the Duke of Lorraine was said to be bringing4000 Swiss into Venetian service,70 and in 1500 a chancellery secretary wassent to recruit 2000 Swiss.71 But there is very little firm evidence of theservice of such large numbers of mercenaries; nothing of the scale andcontinuity of the stradiots. Odd companies of Albanian infantry appeared inthe ranks and Albanian and Dalmatian constables were common, as theywere in fact in all the Italian armies of the fifteenth century. Cretan archerswere also fairly common in Venetian service, and small bands of Englisharchers were still appearing in the 1470s.72 Many of the early handgunmenwere Germans, and in 1463, when Venice needed to recruit handgunmenquickly for the Morea, a company of 400 was raised in Trento.73 There waseven a company of Gascons in Venetian service in Tuscany during the PazziWar.74 But these were the exceptions; Venice's answer to the predominanceof the Swiss and German pike infantry in the late fifteenth and earlysixteenth centuries was to try and train its own infantry in the samemethods. Piero del Monte, who was the last captain of infantry of this periodand commanded the infantry at Cadore, equipped the Venetian infantrywith pikes 60 cm longer than those of the Swiss and tried to instil in themthat discipline which made the pike squares so effective.75 At the same timethere was also a strong emphasis on the use of hand firearms in Venetianinfantry practice. A surprisingly high proportion of the men in the latefifteenth and early sixteenth centuries were equipped with these weapons,which were clearly seen as viable for mass rather than specialist use.

However, perhaps the most distinguishing and interesting feature of theVenetian infantry in the fifteenth century, as with the cavalry, was thecontinuity of command and the emergence of long-serving infantry leaderswith considerable prestige. Dietisalvi Lupi and Matteo Griffoni, bothknighted by Venice, between them led the Venetian infantry for forty yearsin the middle of the century. By the 1470s it was customary throughout Italy

Piva, Guerra di Ferrara, ii, 9.SS. reg. 37, 184 (10 Feb. 1500).Senate, Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24, 56V (3 Feb. 1478). Nine English archers, including aWilliam of Nottingham, were signed up in Padua.ST. reg. 5, 55V (3-5 Oct. 1463).ST. reg. 8, 27 (20 Oct. 1478). The company of 173 men was sent to Ravenna for its winter quarters.Pieri, Rinascimento e la crisi militare, 453.

80


for senior infantry constables to have a small group of lances in their condotteand themselves to be mounted. Matteo Griffoni, when he was made captainof infantry in 1453, had 40 lances and 50 mounted crossbowmen as well ashis 500 infantry. Jacomaccio da Venezia, who became captain of infantry in1495, had earlier been a cavalry condottiere and still retained 200 cavalry inhis condotta. The command of a considerable body of cavalry was anindication of the very real prestige in the army of these men; by the earlysixteenth century the captain of the infantry ranked third after Pitiglianoand D'Alviano, a fact that is not always fully appreciated by those who pourscorn on the development of infantry in fifteenth-century Italy. The captainof the infantry between 1499 and 1508 was the Neapolitan nobleGianbattista Caracciolo, whose wife Dorotea Malatesta,' una delle notabili efamose donne d'ltalia', was kidnapped by Cesare Borgia in 1501.76 The stirwhich this incident caused resulted in large part from Gianbattista'sstanding in Venice. His condotta from 1504 onwards included 100 lances inwartime and 50 mounted crossbowmen.77 He had the right personally toinspect all infantry companies in Venetian service and dismiss useless men;only the captain-general and the collateral-general had similar authority inthe Venetian army.

ARTILLERY

So far we have discussed the traditional elements of the late-medieval armyand seen the gradually changing relationship between the two in thefifteenth century. It is now time to turn to the great novelty of the period,which was having an increasing impact on warfare by the end of the century,and contributed also in part to the growing importance of the infantry.Venice had the reputation, which seems to have been deserved, of being inthe forefront of the development of artillery. It was thought by con-temporaries to have been the first state to use artillery effectively on a largescale - against the Genoese in the War of Chioggia.78 Whether in factartillery was no novelty in Italy at this stage. But Venice, in its Arsenal andthe related furnaces and workshops in the Ghetto, certainly had one ofthe largest and most advanced gunfounding industries and gunpowder

SS. reg. 38, 113V (17 Feb. 1501); Sanuto, iii, 1434; A. Caracciolo, Un ratto di Cesare Borgia (Naples,1921); DBL, xix, 384-6.SS. reg. 40, 1 (2 Mar. 1504).F. Guicciardini, Storia d'ltalia, ed. C. Panigada (Bari, 1929) i, 71-2. On the whole question of thereception of artillery in the fifteenth century, see J. R. Hale, 'Gunpowder and the Renaissance: anessay in the history of ideas', in C. H. Carter (ed.), From the Renaissance to the Counter Reformation:Essays in Honour 0/ Garrett Mattingly (London, 1966) 113-44 a nd M. A. Vale, War and Chivalry(London, 1981) 129-46.

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

factories in the late fourteenth century.79 Venetian government interest wasstimulated not only by the potential of guns in sea warfare, but also by herextended defence commitments in the east. Artillery, commanded in thelater stages by the veteran engineer Domenico da Firenze, played asignificant role in the siege of Padua in 1404-5.80

However, during the first half of the fifteenth century there seems to havebeen surprisingly little official interest in the role of the new weapons onland. There undoubtedly was an artillery train with the Venetian armyduring the wars in Lombardy, and the river fleets were generously equippedwith small bombards. We know that guns were used by Carmagnola in thesiege of Brescia in 1426, and by Attendolo and Colleoni to bombard theMilanese encampment at Caravaggio.81 But references in the Senateproceedings to how the guns were provided, organized and manned are verysparse. Antonio da Fiume was noted as one of the specialist gunfounders inthe Arsenal in 1418, and his skill at repairing cannon was recognized withthe award of a free house.82 Perhaps more significantly, in 1436 MasterJohn, a goldsmith from Ulm, obtained permission from his city governmentto spend two years in Venice studying the republic's artillery technologyand techniques.83 Bearing in mind that a predominance of gunners in thisperiod were Germans, this is undoubtedly an interesting indication ofVenice's reputation in the field. In 1440 a supervisor of gunpowder suppliesto the army was appointed,84 and by the later stages of the Lombard warsgunners were enjoying the same sorts of rewards and pensions from Veniceas other categories of troops.85 However, it was only in the early 1450s, in thevery last years of these wars, that we begin to get any substantial informationon the Venetian artillery. In 1451 Maestro Martino 'ab Ancoris', who hadbeen making bombards for Venice since the mid-i44os, was appointedsupervisor of Venetian gunfounding with an annual salary of 100 ducats.86

Then in the following year one of the most eminent gunfounders of the day,Maestro Ferlino, came to work in Venice. Ferlino had made his earlyreputation working for the Duke of Savoy and had then moved to Milan in

79 B. Z. Kedar, Merchants in Crisis: Genoese and Venetian Men of Ajfairs in the Fourteenth-CenturyDepression (New Haven, Conn., 1977) 163; C M . Cipolla, Guns, Sails, and Empires: TechnologicalInnovation and the Early Phases of European Expansion, 1400-1700 (London, 1965) 25 n. 1.

80 S a n u t o , Vite de dogi, 817.81 Pieri, Rinascimento e la crisi militare, 276.82 S M i . reg. 52, 78 (17 F e b . 1418).83 T . V. Bowdek, 'Soc ie ty and politics in late medieval U l m ' ( u n p u b . P h . D . thesis, Co lumbia

Univers i ty , 1972) 243. I am indebted to D r H e n r y Cohn for drawing my at tent ion to this reference.84 SMi. reg. 60, 248 (1 Sept. 1440).85 When one of the Venetian bombardiers, Filippo, was killed by a handgun shot in 1447 his debt to the

state was cancelled and his daughter given a dowry of 400 lire (ST. reg. 2, 43; 31 Aug. 1447).86 Ibid., 9 (5 Nov. 1446); reg. 3, 4V (28 Sept. 1451).

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1443. The great 300-pounders which he cast for Filippo Maria Visconti andFrancesco Sforza were known as 'Ferline', and it was a matter of greatconcern to Sforza when, in July 1452, his master gunfounder was captured bythe Venetians at Cavenago.87 By November Maestro Ferlino was at work inthe Arsenal on a huge bombard and was assigned a house in the Arsenal forhis accommodation.88 In the next year a noted German gunfounder wasworking on some huge bombards weighing 6000 pounds each and capable ofthrowing stone balls of 400 pounds over a range of two miles.89 The practicerange for these weapons was on the Lido, and in 1454 Ferlino was given landbehind S. Biagio on the Giudecca for his workshop.90

In the second half of the fifteenth century interest in the new weaponsgrew rapidly. Not only did the Italian states begin to build up considerableartillery trains but a number of the leading condottieri also had their ownguns.91 In Venice the Senate on a number of occasions expressed explicitlyits belief in the fundamental importance of artillery in war, and in 1498declared that ' the present wars are being decided more by bombards andartillery than by men-at-arms'.92 That this was not idle rhetoric is indicatedby the growing concern which was shown by the Senate and the Council ofTen over the hiring of gunners and the making of cannon. In 1463 MaestroFrancesco was at work casting six great bombards, one of which was so largethat there was no furnace big enough in the city. The facilities of the Arsenalwere to be improved to keep pace with the new artillery technology.93 At thistime Bartolemeo da Cremona emerged as the key figure in the Venetianartillery organization. He was both a gunfounder and bombardier, as weremany of the early artillery experts, and he was brought over from Bosnia inthe autumn of 1463 to cast guns for the siege of Trieste and the TurkishWar.94 In 1464 he was given a salary of 100 ducats a year,95 and he held thepost of chief gunner and gunfounder in the Arsenal for over twenty yearsuntil his death in 1487, when he was replaced by Maestro SigismondoAlberghetti, who commanded a salary of 200 ducats a year.96 Alberghetti

87 L. Beltrami, La Galeazesca vittoriosa (Milan, 1916) 13-14, 19; M. Morin, 'Lc bombarde del MaestroFerlino', Diana Armi, ix, 6 (1975), 59-63.

88 ST. reg. 3, 46 (24 Nov. 1452), 76V (23 Aug. 1453). In 1454 Ferlino was given a salary of 200 ducats ayear (Morin, 63).

89 ST. reg. 3, 67V (17 May 1453).90 Ibid., 107 (20 Mar. 1454).91 For example, Cola da Monforte had five bombardiers in his company when he joined Venetian service

in 1477 (SS. reg. 28, 31V; 28 July 1477).92 'Sono reducte le guerre de' tempi presenti piu in forze di bombarde et artigliare cha de zente d'arme'

(ST. reg. 13, 64V; 27 Dec. 1498).93 S T . reg. 5,51 (2 Sept . 1463). Five years earlier Maes t ro Francesco d 'Antonio was already noted for his

work in the Arsenal and was earning 50 ducats a year ( S T . reg. 4 , 96V; 23 Dec . 1458).94 S T . reg. 5, 63V (4 Dec . 1463).95 Ib id . , 88 (9 Aug . 1464), 93 (29 Sep t . 1464).96 S T . reg. 10, 40V (2 M a r . 1487).

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

was also an Italian, but most of the gunners employed by Venice in thesecond half of the fifteenth century were still oltramontanes. In 1484 duringthe demobilization of the army after the Peace of Bagnolo only five activemaster gunners were retained, and they were all non-Italians.97 Similarlythe Venetian gunners who were captured by Paolo Vitelli at Buti in 1498and had their hands cut off were, so far as their names survive, non-Italiansfrom Burgundy, Holland and England.98

At first these highly prized non-Italian experts were able to commandhigh wages. Antonio da Brabante and Piero da Piemonte in the 1470sreceived 15 ducats a month, while locally trained men could only expect 5ducats a month.99 With the growing availability of suitably trained Italiansin the later years of the century, average salaries came down; but in the firstdecade of the sixteenth century the demand for gunners was such that theirrewards were once more steadily rising. In 1502 a new commander of theartillery, Maestro Antonello da Trani, was employed at 15 ducats a month,while a subordinate gunner, Pierpaolo da Fossombrone, who had been withCesare Borgia, got 8.100 Maestro Giovanni Maria da Treviso got increases insalary from 6 to 8, and then to 10 ducats a month in 1508-9.101

As for the guns themselves, most of the gunfounding for Venice was stilldone in the Arsenal or in associated shops in Venice itself. However, therewas also a thriving industry in Brescia which was encouraged by Venice. In1458 Maestro Almerico de' Nobili was sent to Brescia to take charge of theartillery and the workshops there, and was given a house in the city.102 Asuccessor to De' Nobili as commander in the field must have been theMaestro Donato, who was killed at the siege of Figarolo in 1482 and whoalso had a house in Brescia.103 There was also a shop for the manufacture ofgunpowder in Vicenza in addition to the resources of the Arsenal, where in1494 a Venetian citizen, Paolo da Canal, was the chief explosives expert.104

Another feature of the development of the Venetian artillery in thisperiod was a willingness to experiment. During the War of Ferrara, Alviseda Venezia, who was master of the gunpowder refinery in the Arsenal, wasgiven permission to try out some new metal cannon balls filled with poison

97 ST. reg. 9, nov (5 Oct. 1484).98 S T . reg. 13, 6ov (14 N o v . 1498), 63 (10 Dec . 1498).99 Anton io da Braban te and Piero da P iemonte were bo th employed in late 1472 ( S T . reg. 6, 186 and

189V; 5 N o v . and 4 D e c . 1472); Venet ians t rained by Bartolomeo da Cremona in the Arsenal weregiven 5 ducats a m o n t h after they had become masters ( S T . reg. 6, 145V; 7 Oct . 1471).

100 S T . reg. 14, 106 (27 Sept. 1502).101 ST. reg. 16, 24 (21 Aug. 1508), 85 (27 Feb. 1509).102 ST. reg. 4, 91 (16 Oct. 1458).103 ST. reg. 10, 13V (8 June i486); his family were given a pension of 10 ducats a month and allowed to

keep his house in Brescia.104 For Paolo da Canal, see ST. reg. 12, 79 (28 Dec. 1494).

84


gas at the siege of Figarolo.105 In 1488 Alvise de' Malgariti, a noted miningengineer and gunfounder in Brescia, was authorized to experiment withshrapnel balls.106 But perhaps the most fertile field of experimentation waswith lighter, more mobile guns which could be used on the battlefield.Colleoni was reputed to have had mobile gun carriages for his guns atMolinella in 1467, and certainly by the 1490s Alvise da Venezia wasexperimenting with mobile carriages for the spingards in Verona.107 Thiswas clearly a move to bring the Venetian artillery into line with the Frenchartillery, which was already famous for its mobility in the field, and in 1496,when the one-time commander of the French artillery, Basilio della Scola,had joined Venetian service, this emphasis on modernity was renewed with adecision to make 100 long guns mounted on carriages and firing light 6- to12-lb shot.108 Two years later Sperandio de' Savelli was hired to develop arecoil-less gun which he had invented,109 and then in 1500 came thedecision, no doubt inspired by the example of the Turks, with whom Venicewas by then at war, to develop a new type of mobile heavy gun, thebasilisk.110 This was a cannon more than six metres long which fired 100-lbiron balls. The basilisk was first used at the siege of Cephalonia in 1501 andconsiderably increased the effectiveness of the Venetian artillery. It wasthese guns which enabled D'Alviano to sweep aside the Imperial resistancein eastern Friuli and Istria in 1508 and reduce in rapid succession thefortresses of Pordenone, Gorizia, Trieste and Fiume.

The other essential feature of Venetian policy was a concern with thetraining of gunners. As early as 1471 a scheme was initiated for the trainingof Venetian citizens in the techniques of gunnery. Bartolomeo da Cremonaoffered to train twenty at a time in the Arsenal and this was eagerly taken upby the Senate.111 The trainees were to receive 5 ducats a month salary oncethey became masters. However, it was only in 1500, with the establishmentof the Scuola dei Bombardieri by the initiative of Paolo da Canal, whoseemed to enjoy the unofficial rank of chief gunner at this time, that moreformal training facilities were set up.112 From this moment bombardierswho were not members of the Scuola became ineligible for state employ-ment, and the officials of the Scuola took over responsibility for the training

105 SS. reg. 30,98r-v (30 May 1482); Maestro Alvise was attached to the river fleet in order to conduct hisexperiment.ST. reg. 10, 107-8 (29 July 1488).

07 Belotti, Bartolomeo Colleoni, 387; Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1482-95, 167-8 (7 June 1492).08 Sanuto, i, 146.09 ST. reg. 13, 64V (27 Dec. 1498).10 Pieri, Rinascimento e la crisi tnilitare, 454; P. Giovio, Le vite del Gran Capitano e del Marchese di

Pescara, ed. C. Panigada (Bari, 1931) 57.11 ST. reg. 6, i4 5v (7 Oct. 1471).12 Scuole Piccole, 257, iff (31 Oct. 1500).

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and expertise of the bombardiers. When Zanino Alberghetti succeededPaolo da Canal as head of the Scuola in 1504 it became the custom for thebombardiers to practise four times a month at Zanino's house on theGiudecca.113 In February 1508, in the face of the German threat, a crashprogramme for the training of 100 bombardiers a month by the Scuola wasauthorized. Facilities were to be provided to enable each trainee to fire atleast two shots a day.114 In 1502 Maestro Niccolo da Rota, the chief gunner inVerona, was authorized to set up a school for training 30 apprentices at atime in the citadel in Verona.115 Efforts were also made to set up an artilleryschool in Padua in 1506, but this seems to have been a local initiative byholders of licences for the manufacture of gunpowder, presumably hopingto stimulate the demand for their product.116 Finally in 1508-9 AndreaLoredan, the Lieutenant-General in Friuli, set up a school for 100 traineegunners in Udine under the charge of the veteran bombardier MaestroAngelino da Feltre.117

These indications of the growing demand for trained gunners arereinforced by what we know about the size of the Venetian artillery train. Ofcourse much of the demand came from the war fleet and from the fortressesboth in the empire overseas and on the Terraferma, but the size of theartillery train with the field army had also expanded steadily. In 1500 theCouncil of Ten took over responsibility for all Terraferma artillery, andafter that particular emphasis was placed on the formation of a train of siegeand field artillery for the army.118 Bartolomeo d'Alviano was placed inoverall charge of this in 1503,119 and in the following year a proveditor ofartillery was appointed to supervise the production and storage of guns andsupplies.120 In 1506 the Ten ordered that all guns and munitions stockpiledfor use in the Terraferma should be stored in the Arsenal, but quiteseparately from those intended for the galleys and the Mar fortresses.121

From this new store 44 pieces were available to be sent to Verona inNovember 1507 together with 1000 barrels of gunpowder,122 and in

113 Ibid., 3. Zanino Alberghetti was disgraced in 1507 for selling copper illegally and replaced byGiovanni da Argentina (Dieci, Misti, reg. 31, 199V and 232; 22 Sept. 1507 and 12 Jan. 1508).

114 Dieci, Misti, reg. 31, 241 (24 Feb. 1508).115 Ibid., reg. 29, 125 (31 May 1502).116 Ibid., reg. 31,126 (30 Oct. 1506). Two bombardiers from Bergamo, Bernardino and Santino da Rota,

were initially placed in charge of the Paduan school; but they soon gave up and were replaced byGiovanni Speroni da Caravaggio (ibid., 165V-166; 28 Apr. 1507).

117 ST. reg. 16, 89 (2 Mar. 1509).118 See below, 167.119 Dieci, Misti, reg. 29, 226V (6 May 1503).120 Ibid., reg. 30, 69 (21 Feb. 1504).121 Ibid., reg. 31, 53 (14 Mar. 1506).122 Ib id . , 219V (19 N o v . 1507).

86


February 1508 40 mobile twenty-pounders (passavolanti) were released,presumably to join D'Alviano's artillery train.123

On the eve of Agnadello the Venetian artillery with the army wascommanded by Basilio della Scola, who since the days when he commandedCharles VIIFs artillery in 1494 had spent most of his time in Venetianservice. Under him were four chief gunners and a train of at least 36 guns.The artillery had its own commissary, Baldissare dalle Stagnade da Verona,who was responsible for all the supplies and stores.124 Of the horsesrequisitioned throughout the state for the army in April 1509, half wereallocated to the artillery.125

In the event, this artillery did not distinguish itself at Agnadello and wasgenerally thought to be inferior to the French. This impression of inferioritywas perhaps unduly heightened by the desertion of Basilio della Scoladuring the battle, but it remains probably a correct impression. It is clearthat the French artillery in 1494 was better organized, more mobile andmore effective in certain situations than any Italian artillery train. Venetiandevelopments both immediately before the invasion and in the subsequentyears were crucially affected by the French example. Nevertheless thetraditional picture of a dramatic difference between Charles VIIFs artilleryand that available in Italy must be modified. Mobile gun carriages, the use ofhorses to draw artillery, metal shot and properly trained gunners were notunique to the French in 1494. Venice had shown a concern for and anacceptance of all these developments in the years preceding the invasion, andthe same was almost certainly true of Milan.

FORTIFICATIONS AND ENGINEERING

The corollary to a revised view of the development of Italian artillery by theend of the fifteenth century must be a revised view of the fortificationsagainst which that artillery was directed. The appearance of sophisticatedgunpowder fortifications in central Italy in the second half of the fifteenthcentury bears this out, but it now remains to see whether the sametendencies can be observed in the Venetian state.126

123 Ibid., 237 (8 Feb. 1508).124 ST. reg. 16,93V (23 Mar. 1509). On Basilio della Scola, see G. Zorzi, 'Alcune notizie di Basilio della

Scola, architetto militare vicentino, e delle sue fortificazioni a Vicenza e a Verona', Atti 1st. Ven.,cxvii (1958-9). For the Venetian guns at Agnadello, see C. Promis, Dell'arte dell'ingegnere e dell'artigliere in Italia (Turin, 1841) 179.

125 ST. reg. 16, 98V-99 (16 Apr. 1509).126 p o r a reassessment of the role of Italy in the early development of gunpowder fortifications and

discussion of the work done in central Italy, see J. R. Hale, 'The early development of the bastion: anItalian chronology, C.1450-C.1534', in Europe in the Late Middle Ages, ed. Hale, R. Highfield and B.Smalley (London, 1965) 466-94.

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The Terraferma state which Venice began to extend in 1404 was an areaalready dominated by a series of powerful walled cities, relics of the signorialstates which had always taken a great interest in fortification. In each ofthese cities there were castles of considerable strength and round them wereoutworks of various types reaching out to the frontiers of the old signorie.Nearly every small town had its walls, river crossings were dominated byfortified bridges and castles, and the countryside was provided withearthwork redoubts for the defence of the rural population. Most of themajor cities had a serraglio, a large area of country enclosed by ditches,ramparts and natural obstacles in which armies could be assembled andbilleted safely and to which the country population could be pulled back intime of emergency. Venice also inherited well-established traditions of localcontributions, both in terms of manpower and money, to fortifications.Finally the geography of the whole area was dominated by a network ofrivers which both conditioned attitudes to defence and created specialengineering problems and opportunities.

Such was the Venetian inheritance, and during the first century of its rulethe republic did little to alter the situation. For the defence of the main partof the Terraferma, the Lombard plain, it relied primarily on a strongstanding army and on river fleets. There was little attempt to create stronglyfortified frontiers or to modernize radically the fortifications of the cities.However, Friuli and the eastern frontier presented different problems; heremounting pressure from the Hungarians and then the Turks placed Venicepermanently on the defensive, and a concern for fortification was muchmore apparent.

Between the collapse of the Carrara state in 1405 and the outbreak of warwith Milan in early 1426 the effective frontiers of the Venetian state were theMincio, Tartaro and Adige rivers, and the key to the defence of that frontierwas the city of Verona and its associated fortifications. Hence it is in this areathat we can trace most easily Venice's immediate reactions to the problemsof fortification.127 In Verona itself, although the castle of S. Felice wasgradually completed, the main concern was for the citadel. This was a walledenclave in the south-east corner of the city which had been created by theVisconti as a secure base for the Milanese garrison.128 Its defences facedboth outwards and inwards, indicating its function as the strongpoint of anoccupying force. In 1404 part of the inner walls of the citadel had beenpulled down by the Veronese during the brief period of independence fromCarrara rule, and after the surrender of Verona in 1405 the re-establishment127 J. Law, 'The commune of Verona under Venetian rule' (unpub. D.Phil, thesis, Oxford University,

1974) 279-89; Sandri, 'Castra e bastitae del territorio Veronese', Studi storici veronesi, i (1947-8)59-82.

128 G. Barbetta, Le mura e le fortificazioni di Verona (Verona, 1970) 82-3.


of the all-round security of this area became a prime preoccupation of theVenetians. Between 1413 and the early 1420s the enclave was graduallyrecreated very much in its old form, and the citadel of Verona servedthroughout the century as a base for a large contingent of Venetianinfantry.129

Outside the city extensive surveys were quickly carried out by Domenicoda Firenze, the Venetian chief engineer, and Giovanni Mantelino, who fornearly two decades was the chief engineer in Verona.130 Particular attentionwas paid to the serraglio between the Mincio and the Adige, new gates wereordered for the towns of Nogarolo and Soave,131 and decisions were taken onwhich of the local castles and redoubts to maintain and which to abandon.But a proposal to build a new fortress at Fagnano was abandoned because ofthe cost, which was reckoned to be 25,000 ducats.132 In all this Venice'sinitial concern was to make the local population bear the cost of whateverwork was felt to be necessary. However, the growing reluctance of thecommunal council of Verona to authorize the raising of the necessarymoney, and the clear inability of the rural population to contribute on thescale required both hindered any substantial progress and eventually forcedVenice to make contributions itself. Gradually a situation emerged in which,while local communities were still expected to provide all the labour and tocontribute to the costs of purely local fortifications, Venice assumedresponsibility for the upkeep of certain key fortresses and paid the expensesof major refortification work. From 1429 onwards the chief militaryengineer in the area became responsible directly to Venice rather than to theVeronese council.133

However, despite this gradual emergence of a central responsibility forfortifications, little major work was done in the area throughout the fifteenthcentury. The walls of Verona remained unmodified until the sixteenthcentury and no significant new fortresses were built. This was, of course,partly because the Veronese was no longer on the frontier after 1426, but thesame picture seems to apply to most of the Venetian state in the first half of

129 Ibid., 93-4; SMi. reg. 53, 191 (16 Oct. 1421). After 1451 the garrison of the citadel was strengthenedby the addition of 40-50 lances (SS. reg. 19, 44; 24 Feb. 1451).

130 SS. reg. 3, 81 (12 Nov. 1407). For Domenico da Firenze, see G. Fasolo, 'Domenico de' Benintendida Firenze, ingegnere del secolo xiv', AV., ser. 5, i (1927) 145-80. The engineers took with themMaestro Martino, a painter, 'qui possit loca dipingere' (L. Simeoni,' II giurista Barnaba da Morano egli artisti Martino da Verona e Antonio da Mestre', NAV., n.s. xix (1910) 235).

131 SMi. reg. 50,73 (23 Feb. 1414). Repairs were also ordered in the serraglio of Padua in 1417 (SMi. reg.52, 4; 22 Mar. 1417).

132 SMi. reg. 53, 26 (23 Jan. 1420). An earth redoubt was built at Fagnano, but it proved very difficult toget anyone to garrison it because of the marshy and unhealthy nature of the countryside. This wasanother factor leading to the abandonment of the project.

133 Law, 'Verona', 200-1.

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the fifteenth century. City walls badly damaged during the period ofexpansion were repaired, as were those of Motta in 1413 and those of Bresciaafter 1426.134 The critical years of 1438-41 produced a flurry of reconstruc-tion in Peschiera and some of the surrounding towns which had been at theheart of the fighting.135 But there is little hint of innovation, or indeed of aserious preoccupation with the problems of fortification in these years.Maintenance of the army consumed all the available financial resources, andthere was a reluctance to squeeze the local populations any further for fear ofprovoking unrest.

In the second half of the fifteenth century there was a growing awarenessin Venice of the need for modifications to fortifications in the light of theincreased effectiveness of artillery. There was also more money available forsuch work as the army was reduced to a peacetime footing. But,nevertheless, the work undertaken largely took the form of superficialmodifications to existing defences. The thickening and scarping of walls, thebuilding of ravelins and the clearing of fields of fire: these were thecharacteristics of the work on Venetian permanent fortifications in thesecond half of the fifteenth century. The new requirements were set out indetail in recommendations of the savi della terraferma for the renovation ofthe fortifications of Modon in 1462.136 At that time work on the walls ofAsola along these lines was already going ahead, and subsequently work wasauthorized at Pontevico in 1469 and Orzinovi in 1471.137 All three townswere outlying points for the defence of Brescia, the walls of which were alsoscarped after 1467.138 In 1482 Adria was refortified as soon as it wascaptured from Ferrara, and in the late 1480s considerable work wasundertaken at Crema, Feltre and Rovereto.139 These were all frontier towns,and the work done continued to take the form of modifications, particularlyscarping of the walls, to make them less vulnerable to artillery. In the periodafter 1490 interest was concentrated on Brescia (where a new bastion wasbuilt by Giacomo Contrin), Anfo, Cremona and Caravaggio.140 The only134 Bartolomeo di Benedetto da Piceno worked on rebuilding the walls of Motta in 1412-13 (Collegio,

Commissioni Secrete, 1408-13, ioov; 15 Dec. 1412). For reconstruction in Brescia and the work ofNiccolo Lupi da Vicenza, see Storia di Brescia, ii, 20.

135 ST. reg. 1, 56 (20 Jan. 1442).136 SS. reg. 21, 82r-v (26 Mar. 1462).137 Asola became Venetian in 1441, but work on the fortifications was not authorized until 1458 and not

completed until the end of the century (D. Bernoni, La vicende di Asola (Rome, 1876) 136). Pontevicowas inspected by the engineer Ludovico da Crema in 1469 and reconstruction work was authorized(ST.reg.6,51V; i6Mar. i46o.),whileatOrzinovitheworkbeganin 1471 (ST.reg.6, i28v;2 Apr. 1471).

138 Cristoforo da Soldo, 152-4; Storia di Brescia, ii, 168.139 For Adria, see Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1482-95, 16-17 (12 June 1482). Feltre was inspected

in 1488 by Angelo Emiliani and Dionisio da Viterbo, and detailed plans drawn up (ibid., 122V-23; 9Sept. 1488 and ST. reg. 10, 125V; 31 Dec. 1488). Scarping of the walls of Crema began in the sameyear (ST. reg. 10, 89V; 27 Mar. 1488), and Giacomo Contrin worked on the walls of Rovereto.

140 C o n t r i n ' s torrione at Brescia collapsed short ly after the work was comple ted , and Con t r i n was madeto rebu i ld it at his own expense and was b a n n e d from state cont rac ts for a year until he was finally

90


completely new fortress built in the western part of the Venetian state wasthe Rocca di Brancaleone at Ravenna, which was initiated in 1456 byMaestro Giovanfrancesco da Massa. The original intention here was tobuild a small additional fortress, but in the subsequent years the projectexpanded into a considerable bastioned castle, justified no doubt byRavenna's exposed position on the Venetian flank.141 Apart from this, thefortifications of the main cities were left largely untouched; it was only in1509 in the face of the threatened French invasion that Bartolomeod'Alviano at last initiated a radical refortification of Vicenza.142

However, in Friuli the situation was somewhat different; here thegrowing threat of Turkish incursions in the 1470s and the damaging defeatof the Venetian forces in the area in 1477 led to a completely new appraisal ofthe fortifications of the Isonzo. The first solution tried was a defensive lineof trenches and earthwork redoubts from just below Gorizia to Aquileiaalong the west bank of the Isonzo. This work, commenced in 1474, wasentrusted to Maestro Cittadino de' Conti della Frattina in 1477; but itsinadequacy was proved in that very year by the ease with which the Turksbroke through.143 The emphasis then switched to the creation of strong-points into which the army could be withdrawn and from which it couldstrike out at the Turks on the flank and rear as they advanced. Enrico Lauferda Francia and Giovanni Borella took charge of the construction of aserraglio between Foglianica and Gradisca large enough to hold 2400cavalry,144 and by 1481 it had been decided to concentrate on the twofortresses at the extreme points. Gradisca was converted from the isolatedfortress originally envisaged into a fully equipped garrison town with a newchurch, a castle and extensive barracks for troops.145 Six hundred survivorsof the siege of Scutari who had to be evacuated when that city wassurrendered to the Turks in 1479 were resettled in the new fortress town.146

In 1497 Giacomo Contrin, one of Venice's most experienced military

cleared of responsibility (Died, Misti, reg. 26, 131 and 22iv; 31 July 1494 and 18 Nov. 1495).Modifications to the fortifications at Cremona were authorized in 1502 to specifications drawn up byVetturino Moron (Died, Misti, reg. 29, 97; 3 Mar. 1502), and consideration of the needs ofCaravaggio was initiated in the same year (ibid., 133; 20 June 1502).

141 SS. reg. 20, 113 (31 Dec. 1456), 145 (20 Mar. 1458). For details of the fortress which eventuallyemerged in Ravenna, see L. Marinelli, La rocca di Ravenna (Bologna, 1906); C. Ricci, 'Per la storiadella rocca di Ravenna', Felix Ravenna, i (1911) 1-7; F. Mancini and W. Vichi, Castelli, rocche e torridi Romagna (Bologna, n.d.) 180-1; S. Bernicoli, Le torri della citta e del territorio di Ravonna(Ravenna, 1923) 47, 73.

142 Zorzi, 'Basilio della Scola', 161-4.143 A. Mosetti, 'La rocca di Gradisca', Studi goriziani, ix (1933) 133-7; Malipiero, Annali veneti, 115.144 ST. reg. 8, 31 (14 Dec. 1478).145 Ibid., 119 (8 Mar. 1481); see M. Sanuto, Itinerario nella terraferma (Padua, 1847) 183 for a plan for

the new fortress.146 Romanin, iv, 383.

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engineers, completed the circuit of walls and added an additional bastion.147

However, once again in 1499 the fortifications of the Isonzo provedinadequate in the face of a Turkish invasion, and Leonardo da Vinci, whowas sent to inspect the defences in 1500, pronounced them insufficient.148 In1508 part of the work of Laufer and Borella was pulled down as outdated,149

and the occupation of Gorizia and Trieste by D'Alviano in the same yearmade the siting of a key base at Gradisca something of an anachronism.150

If Venice's concern with expensive permanent fortifications for specifictowns and castles seems to have been limited in the fifteenth century, herinvolvement in the development of field fortifications was a good deal moresignificant. While permanent fortifications were seen as a substitute for largestanding forces in the fifteenth century, field fortifications very muchaccompanied the development of standing armies. They required not onlylarge numbers of men to prepare them but also when used strategically inthe form of defence lines, large numbers of men to defend them. In tacticalterms also they were usually used in association with large armies. The fieldfortification came into its own in the wars in Lombardy in the first half of thefifteenth century when large, relatively slow-moving armies, operating inopen country with considerable forces of auxiliaries and pioneers available,resorted to extensive works of earth ramparts, ditches and wooden palisadesin a variety of situations. The growth of artillery also speeded up thedevelopment of field fortifications, both to protect troops in the open againstthe new weapons, and to protect the guns themselves, particularly in siegesituations.151

The strategic use of field fortifications by Venice is best illustrated by thedefence of the Livenza line in 1411-12 against the Hungarians. At that timethe river Livenza roughly marked the frontier of the Venetian state, but evena century later when Venetian frontiers were far to the east the architectSanmicheli recommended that Venice should concentrate her defencesagainst the Turks on the Livenza.152 The river flows from the foothills to the

147 S S . r e g . 3 6 , 167 (6 O c t . 1 4 9 7 ) ; S a n u t o , i i , 7 0 0 , 9 0 2 , 9 6 4 . O n C o n t r i n ' s w o r k see a l so A . M o s e t t i , ' I Itorrione della Campana nella fortezza di Gradisca', Memorie stork he forogiuliesi, xxvi (1930)189-204. This stage of the work was completed by 1499 when Contrin was reported to beunemployed, and his services were once again engaged by Venice for 20 ducats a month (ST. reg. 13,90; 30 Aug. 1499).

148 Leonardo da Vinci, / / Codice Atlantico, ed. Augusto Marinono (Florence, 1979) viii, 31-4; F.Savorgnan di Brazza, Leonardo da Vinci in Friuli e il suo progetto difortificazione dell1 Isonzo (Udine,1935); E. Solmi,'Leonardo da Vinci e la repubblica di Venezia, nov. 1499-apr. i$oo\ASL., ser. 4,x (1908) 327-60.

149 S S . reg . 4 1 , 45V (5 Oc t . 1507), 62V-63 (23 J a n . 1508).150 Tamaro, i, 369-70.151 Mallett, Mercenaries and their Masters, 168; Pieri, Rinascimento e la crisi militare, 276-7.152 M. Sanmicheli,' Discorso circa il fortificar la citta di Udine', ed. V. Joppi in Alcuni documenti di storia

friulana, AS I., n.s. xiv (1861).

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sea some thirty miles east of Venice. The upper stretches between Sacile andMotta are fast flowing with high banks; defence works were needed at only afew places where there were fords. Below Motta the river begins to flowacross marshy land, and again the approaches and the crossings are few. On20 July 1411 detailed instructions were given by the College to BertolinoZamboni, an experienced soldier with some skill as an engineer, to preparedefences over a 22-mile stretch of the Livenza.153 The banks were to beheightened in places with wooden palisades, and all the fords covered byditches and ramparts. Earth redoubts were to be built at the key points, andbunkhouses for the defending troops and pioneers. Fields of vision were tobe cleared on the east bank. Pioneers and carpenters were called in from allover the Terraferma to carry out the work, and four engineers, includingAndrea Bon from Venice, and Giovanni d'Este and Jacobino da Pavia fromPadua, were enlisted to supervise. The line certainly served to check theHungarian advance, although they did succeed in crossing in the autumn of1412. However, the speed with which they then swept into the Vicentinoindicated how valuable the Livenza line had been to Venice in the earlystages of the war.

Field fortifications on this scale were certainly not common, and the onlyother occasion when we find something similar was in 1451 when Venice wasfortifying the line of the Adda against Milan.154 In 1463 the new Hexamilionrebuilt across the isthmus of Corinth to defend the Morea was somethingmore than a field fortification. It consisted of a wall twelve feet high and adouble ditch, with 136 towers. For fifteen days 30,000 workmen laboured toreconstruct this basically very traditional type of strategic fortification.155

The other main use of large-scale field fortifications was in the serragli, ofwhich the most important for Venice was that of Verona. Although theserraglio of Verona ceased to serve as a frontier defence to the west in 1426, itstill fulfilled that function to the south-west and south for most of thecentury. In the late 1460s there was a renewed burst of interest in its upkeepand effectiveness which enables us to get an impression of what sort ofdefences were involved. Between 1473 and 1477 the chief military engineerin Verona, Giorgio Sommariva, presented a series of reports on the state ofthe serraglio.156 The key to the system lay in linking up natural obstacles,particularly rivers and naturally marshy areas, with man-made fortifications

153 SS. reg. 4, 174 (15 May 1411); Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1408-13, 47-9 (20 July 1411). InSeptember a committee of military experts was sent to inspect the progress of the fortifications (SS.reg. 4, 192; 1 Sept. 1411).

154 SS. reg. 19 passim.155 Lopez, 'II principio della guerra veneta-turca', 79; Romanin, iv, 316.156 C. Cipolla (ed.), 'La relazione di Giorgio Sommariva', NAV., vi (1893) 111-216. A similar report is

also to be found in the Gonzaga archives (ASMa., Archivio Gonzaga, x, 3668).

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in the form of castles, walls and earth ramparts and redoubts. Sommarivapointed out that there was no point in keeping up the castles and earthworksif some attention was not also paid to preserving the marches. This, in fact,had not been done, as the local Veronese landlords had been busy drainingthe marches to provide good agricultural land, and diverting the streams torun their mills. As a result whole stretches of the natural defences of theserraglio were no longer effective. Following this report the Council of Tenordered that the new irrigation ditches and river diversions should bebroken down, to the intense resentment of the local landowners.157 Thecontroversy raged on into the 1480s and it was only in i486 that Venicerecognized that defence based on putting whole areas of agricultural landout of use was a somewhat anachronistic concept.158 However, the idea ofthe serraglio was not dead, and in 1492 Venice set about creating a new one inthe Polesine round Badia Polesine where marches remained a naturalfeature of the landscape and local landowning interests were perhaps lessvociferous.159

Examples of more localized engineering work employed for militarypurposes are abundant in this period. Fortified camps were a commonplace,as were earthwork redoubts and fairly complex systems of field fortificationsto protect besieging armies. Carmagnola, in 1426, dug a ditch five miles longround Brescia to assist in his siege of the castles of the city, and the elaboratequality of the siegeworks used at Novara in 1495 indicate that such methodswere no novelty in Italy.160 Mining and countermining were techniques thatwere employed throughout the fifteenth century, and indeed as early as 1405Domenico da Firenze is said to have mined the Paduan fortress atCastelcarro.161 Similarly, bridging techniques were an essential part of themilitary engineer's art in Lombard warfare. In 1437 Gattamelata tried to gethis troops across the Adda on a bridge of boats but was foiled by a suddenspate of the river.162 In the War of Ferrara the crossing of the Po was the keyto Venetian success or failure in her attack on Ferrara. For this purpose twogreat floating bridges were prepared in Venice by Dionisio da Viterbo andtaken down to the scene of operations by Bartolomeo Bon,163 while theVeronese engineer Maestro Bassano built a great permanent bridge at

57 Died, Misti, reg. 20, 127V (24 Oct. 1481).58 Ibid., reg. 22, 130 (29 Dec. 1484), i75r-v (28 May 1485); reg. 23, 63 (12 July i486).59 SS. reg. 34, 141 (4 Dec. 1492).60 Schullian, ii passim.61 C. Promis, 'Biografie di ingegneri militari italiani dal secolo xiv alia meta del xvm', Miscellanea di

storia italiana, xiv (1874) 30.62 Eroli, 92-3.63 Sanuto, Commentarii della guerra di Ferrara, 50; Romanin, iv, 406. For Bon's role in this enterprise,

see Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1482-95, 27V (13 Nov. 1482).

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Lagoscuro, which was the focal point of the Venetian attack, protected bytwo triangular bastions with walls twenty feet thick.164

The War of Ferrara was also the occasion for another famous feat ofimpromptu military engineering, the creation in two nights of a causewayacross the marshes of the Tartaro for Roberto da Sanseverino's army tocross unexpectedly into the Ferrarese in May 1482.165

The significance of such works lay as much in the feat of organizing largecontingents of local labour as in any actual engineering skill. For the majorcampaigns the labour force was collected from all over the Terraferma, ruralcommunities being obliged to furnish labour for defence works, particularlyif they had no troops billeted on them. The pioneers were provided withtheir keep and a nominal wage, and often could be away from their homesfor weeks at a time.166

The engineers and architects themselves are somewhat elusive figures inVenetian military history of this period. Domenico da Firenze, who assistedVenice during the siege of Padua after his capture, was an engineer ofconsiderable reputation, but most of the other figures were essentially localand little-known men. In the first half of the century they were usually menwhose main responsibility was as engineers employed by the communalcouncils of one or other of the Terraferma cities. However, in the secondhalf of the century Venice does seem to have created the beginnings of acentral military engineer's office. Ludovico da Crema was working onfortifications in various parts of the state between at least 1469 and the mid1480s, and the Frenchman Enrico Laufer was another important figure ofthis period. Dionisio da Viterbo, Giovanni Ludovico da Imola, who hadbeen with Federigo da Montefeltro, and Giacomo Contrin all held anunofficial position as chief engineer in turn through the last two decades ofthe century.167 In 1506 Venice acquired a military engineer of international

164 ST. reg. 11, 91 v (3 Jan 1492). According to some accounts, a new type of marble-sheathed wall wasused on the bastions at Ponte Lagoscuro (A. Hershey, Alfonso II and the Artistic Revival of Naples,New Haven, Conn., 1969, 86).

165 Piva, Guerra di Ferrara, i, 76-9.166 In 1482 300 guastat or i were collected from the villages of the Bresciano and taken to work at Figarolo

for two months (ASB., Territoriale, reg. A, 5; 7 July 1482).167 Dionisio da Viterbo was employed in the War of Ferrara when Ludovico da Crema and Enrico

Laufer were said to be getting too old (ST. reg. 8, 162V; 19 July 1482). He worked at Feltre in 1488and was finally declared redundant in 1491 (ST. reg. 11, 86v; 17 Nov. 1491). There seems to be nojustification for Rawdon Brown's suggestion (Sanuto, Itinerario nella terraferma, xi n. 12) thatDionisio was a classical nickname for the better-known Francesco Aleardi. Giovanni Ludovico daImola was taken on full time in 1489 having previously worked for the Venetians at Cervia (ST. reg.10,146; 1 June 1489). He was still one of the leading Venetian engineers in 1500 when he was sent toinspect fortifications in Friuli (ST. reg. 13, 120V; 13 Mar. 1500). Giacomo Contrin worked atRovereto, Brescia, Gradisca and Candia, and was also responsible for frescoes in SS. Faustina eGiovita in Brescia (Mosetti, 'Torrione della Campana', 190).

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standing when the Council of Ten employed Fra Giocondo, until recently inFrench service, and dispatched him to inspect fortifications in Corfu and theMorea.168

These engineers worked closely with the senior condottieri and infantryconstables, and sometimes committees of soldiers, engineers and Venetiannobles were set up to plan and supervise fortification improvements. In 1500such a committee, made up of Gianpaolo Manfroni, a senior cavalrycommander, Gorlino da Ravenna, the captain of infantry, four engineersand two Venetian nobles, toured Friuli inspecting the fortifications andmaking decisions about their improvement.169 Luigi Avogadro was one ofthe soldiers whose advice was particularly sought about fortification work inthe Bresciano.170

When in 1513 Sanmicheli was called upon to advise on the fortificationsof Friuli against the Turks and the Germans he proposed that there shouldbe a good castle at Udine which would safeguard the city for Venice (ratherthan new walls which would protect the inhabitants), strong fortresses onthe main access routes through the mountains, and a fortified line on theLivenza to which the army could fall back to protect Venice itself.171

Embodied in this advice were the principles which had dominated Venice'sthinking about fortifications throughout the fifteenth century. What wasmissing was the most essential point of all - that Venice's main defence lay ina strong standing army.

RIVER WARFARE

A description of Venice's military activities and development in the earlyRenaissance would not be complete without some reference to the riverfleets which at this stage played a considerable role in the land fighting. It isscarcely surprising that a city like Venice with its maritime traditions andthe resources of expertise in the field of naval warfare should seek to utilizethat experience in its land campaigns, and the Lombard plain with its wide,usually slow-flowing rivers was ideal terrain for the deployment of riverfleets in support of the armies. The mouths of the two main rivers in thesystem, the Po and the Adige, were firmly under Venetian control, and fleetsbuilt and assembled in Venice could be dispatched quickly to the scene ofthe fighting in central Lombardy. Entering from the Po, the main tributariesof the Mincio, Oglio and Adda could be navigated by small craft for much of

168 Died, Misti, reg. 31, 74 (28 May 1506); Sanuto, vi, 442.169 ST. reg. 13, 120V (13 Mar. 1500).170 Dieci, Misti, reg. 29, 97 and 133 (3 Mar. and 20 June 1502).171 Sanmicheli, 'Discorso' passim.

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their length, while such fleets could also be introduced from the Adriaticinto the main rivers of Friuli.

The components of these fleets were oared craft of all types from full-sizewar galleys on the Po and Lake Garda down to barche, which were littlemore than rowing boats. Specifically designed for river use was the galleon,which was probably a small galley with an upper deck over the oarsmen onwhich troops and guns could be carried.172 Also used were ganzaruoli androdeguardi, the latter having a crew of 24.173 The barca in 1404 had a crewof 5, 2 crossbowmen and 3 oarsmen, and was equipped with a smallbombard.174 By 1482 barche carried crews of 10.175

The crews of these fleets varied relatively little from those of the mainVenetian sea-going fleets: oarsmen from the lagoon and increasingly fromDalmatia, crossbowmen from Venice itself, and a leavening of professionalinfantry. The commanders of the river fleets were always Venetian nobles,as were the patrons of the galleys and larger craft; even contingents of barchehad a noble in command of each flotilla often craft. Here indeed was an areain which Venetians in large numbers played a significant role in landwarfare.

In the very first campaign of the fifteenth century the fleets were verymuch in evidence. A mixed fleet commanded by Marco Grimani wasoperating on the Po by June 1404, while 150 barche were patrolling themarshy Polesine area to prevent help reaching Padua from Ferrara.176 Bythe autumn of that year another fleet had appeared on the Adige to assistwith the siege of Verona, and in 1405 a fleet of 100 barche on the Brenta co-operated with the army besieging Padua.177 In the peaceful years thatfollowed this war a small Po fleet was kept in being to patrol the river andprotect Venetian merchants using it. It consisted of one galeot of 22benches, three of the larger galleons and six barche.118 In 1412 a fleet on theLivenza under Pietro Loredan assisted in the defence of the fortified line,carrying supplies to the army and bombarding the Hungarian positions.179

This fleet consisted of 3 galleys, 3 galleons, 28 ganzaruoli and 50 barche.180

Floating gun platforms were used in 1419 to bombard the walls of Prata.181

172 F. C. Lane, Navires et constructeurs a Venise pendant la Renaissance (rev. ed., Paris, 1965) 47; A. Jal,Glossaire nautique (Paris, 1848-50) s.v. 'galion'.Malipiero, Annali veneti, 253.Joppi, 'Cronachetta', 307.Malipiero, 253.SS. reg. 2, 21 (23 June 1404); Joppi, 307.SS. reg. 2, 66 (15 Oct. 1404); Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 809, 817.SMi. reg. 48, i6v (16 June 1408).SS. reg. 5, 6 (18 Mar. 1412); Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1408-13, 71 v and 76 (May-June 1412).Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 862.Cogo, 'Sottomissione del Friuli' 19.

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With the outbreak of war with Milan in January 1426 a fleet of 10 galleys,40 galleons and 20 barche was ordered and began to assemble on the Pounder Francesco Bembo; this fleet operated as far as the mouth of the Ticinojust below Pavia.182 Bitter fighting took place with the Milanese river fleet,and indeed in June 1431 the Venetian Po fleet, then under the command ofNiccolo Trevisan, was badly defeated below Cremona. Trevisan had 100boats under his command, which was considerably more than the Milanesefleet. But his fleet was caught in a cross-fire from the river banks, and he lost28 galleons and 8000 men. Carmagnola, who had supreme command overboth land and river forces, was blamed in some quarters for not movingquickly enough to help the Po fleet, and this was a potent factor in thegrowing suspicion of him in Venice. But at the time it was Trevisan and hissenior commanders who were sacked and disgraced.183

In the crucial campaigns between 1438 and 1441 river fleets again playeda major part. At this time fleets were operating on both the Po and the Adige,but it was the Milanese with Mantuan support who, in 1439, succeeded ingetting a fleet on the Adige by means of a canal dug for the purpose betweenPanego and the river.184 Gattamelata failed to stop this operation, and withthe help of the fleet Piccinino captured Legnago and Porto and establishedcontrol over the middle reaches of the Adige. In response to this Venicebuilt a new fleet of galleons in Verona, and this fleet, co-operating withFrancesco Sforza and Gattamelata driving up from the south, managed tore-establish control of the river.185

Meanwhile an even more ambitious amphibious project was beingconducted on Lake Garda. A small fleet had been operating on the lake forsome years, but in late 1438 it was decided in Venice that the only way tokeep besieged Brescia supplied was by establishing superiority on the lakeand sending in supplies by water. The shipbuilding resources of the lakesidetowns were limited, and so Niccolo Sorbolo, a Cretan architect, was giventhe task of getting 80 craft, including at least 2 war galleys, from the Adigeinto Lake Garda overland. The difficult operation was completed in fifteendays in February 1439 under the cover of Gattamelata's army. It took 120oxen to haul each galley over the five-mile isthmus which separates the riverfrom the lake.186 However, this first fleet was defeated on the lake by the

182 SS. reg. 9, 64 (12 Jan. 1426), 65 (13 Jan. 1426).183 Battistella, 273-89; A. Baldrighi, 'La battaglia navale sul Po del 1431', ASL., ser. 10, iii (1977)

331-6.184 G. Soranzo, 'Battaglie sul Garda nella guerra veneta-viscontea', Nova Historia, xiv (1962) 50. In the

previous year Venice ordered the preparation of 60 galleons and 5 galleys for use on the rivers (SS.reg. 14, 131V; 14 July 1438).

185 SS. reg. 15, 25 (10 June 1440); Leo, a Cretan master shipbuilder, was sent from Venice, and 15-20carpenters from Padua, to prepare 25 galleons in Verona.

186 Soranzo, 'Battaglie sul Garda', 46ft; id., 'L'ultima campagna del Gattamelata', 92-4.

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Milanese under the experienced naval commander Biagio da Assereto, andit was decided to create a second fleet by sending the prepared timbersoverland and assembling them in the lakeside port of Torbolo. The new fleetwas planned to consist of eight galleys and four small sailing ships, and itsucceeded in winning control of the lake in August 1440.187 Thecommander, Stefano Contarini, was then ordered to proceed down theMincio for a co-ordinated attack on Mantua, but this never materialized.188

The Garda fleet remained in being for the remainder of the war and when itwas finally laid up in 1454 there were still two war galleys in service.189

In the summer of 1448 a fleet of 256 craft was being prepared to enter thePo and give support to Attendolo's army. The veteran Pietro Loredan was tocommand it. But the death of Loredan and the news of the defeat atCaravaggio, which effectively ended campaigning for the year, broughtpreparations to a halt.190

The War of Ferrara saw what was to be a final flurry of activity in thisinteresting field of warfare. An unprecedented number of craft wereprepared in April 1482 for the campaign against Ferrara, which, with theproximity of the Po to the objective and the marshy nature of the land acrosswhich the Venetian armies had to move, was likely to be ideally suited toamphibious warfare. Over 400 vessels of all types and sizes were involved, inaddition to the two huge floating bridges which were to be used for gettingthe army across the Po.191 However, it was becoming increasingly apparentin this war that river fleets were ineffective against well-directed artillery firefrom the banks.192 There was no way in which small craft could be adaptedto meet this new threat, and the days of effective river warfare were clearlynumbered.

Venetian river fleets in the fifteenth century made a significant contri-bution to the republic's strategy. They maintained essential supply lines inan area where the most useful routes were the water routes. Theycontributed to the defence of the state, the natural frontiers of which wererivers. But above all they brought a new dimension to the increasinglycomplex world of war: they provided a mobile platform for the bombard-ment of enemy positions and cities, they were able to infiltrate behind enemy

SS. rcg. 14, 230-3 iv (10 Oct. 1439).188 SS. reg. 15, 37V (29 Aug. 1440).

ST. reg. 3, iiiv-112 (26 Apr. 1454).190 Soranzo, 'Battaglie sul Garda', 41-3.

Malipiero, Annali veneti, 253; Romanin, iv, 405. Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1482-95, 17-50,contains many of the commissions given to commanders of river fleets during this war.

192 The fate of the river fleet on the Po in late 1509 was final convincing evidence of thevulnerability of river fleets by this time (R. Finlay,' Venice, the Po expedition and the end of the Leagueof Cambrai, 1509-10', Studies in Modern European History and Culture, ii (1976) 37-72).

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lines and cut communications, and they could assist armies in the assault ofriver positions. Finally they brought large numbers of Venetians, bothnobles and common seamen and crossbowmen, into direct contact with theland war from which Venice itself was sometimes dangerously remote.

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The organization and administration of theVenetian army

Throughout the fifteenth century the organization of the Venetian armycontinued to be based largely on the condotte between individual captainsand the state. However, presented in these stark terms this gives an undulystatic and conservative picture of that organization. During the century thenature of the contractual relationship changed considerably; contracts grewlonger, embracing both war and peace service, and the large majority of thecondottieri became accustomed to permanent service with the renewal oftheir contracts a formality. This increasing degree of permanence meant agrowing need for a permanent administration which supervised thecontracts, carried out inspections and provided centrally for the needs of thearmy. Inevitably the self-dependence of the companies was eroded, andmany of the support services which had, in the fourteenth century, beenhandled by companies themselves as they moved from one employ toanother became the responsibility of the employing state. At the same timeconsiderable sections of the army were no longer organized on the basis ofcontractual employment, and these involved a centralized administrationeven more closely. Hence the starting point for this chapter must be adiscussion of the emerging military administration.

During the wars of the early years of the century military administrationwas in the hands of Venetian nobles, elected for short terms, and a group ofmilitary advisers, mostly men from the Terraferma nobility who hadprevious military experience. These men, among them such figures asLudovico Buzzacarini and Paolo di Leone, both Paduans and formeradvisers of the Carrara, were employed in various capacities ranging fromsubordinate military commanders to recruiters, inspectors and informalmilitary advisers.1 But it was Venetians who predominated and took the

1 On Buzzacarini, see DBL, xv, 643-6. Paolo di Leone was married into the Venetian Soranzo family,and after his capture, while fighting for the Carraresi in 1405, he served Venice in a variety of advisorycapacities, particularly during the first Hungarian War. He advised on the Livenza fortifications andwas frequently Venetian representative at the camp of Pandolfo Malatesta (see, in particular, SS. reg.5, 56, 84 and 124V; 1412-13). Another of these early figures was the Veronese Frignano da Sesso, whocompleted his active life as captain of the citadel in Verona (SMi. reg. 54, 88v; 18 Feb. 1423).

IOI

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

main responsibility for the organization of the army. In addition to theproveditors, whose role was well established as the civilian advisers to thearmy commander and therefore his link with Venice, there appeared thegubernatores, who were also usually Venetian nobles. Their task was camporganization: the supervision of provisioning services, the maintenance ofdiscipline and occasionally military command. In 1413 two officials knownas executores were appointed, both Venetian nobles, to fulfil a variety ofadministrative functions in the army.2 In addition the title 'proveditor' wasused loosely to apply not only to the senior civilian representatives whoseduty was to stay close to the captain-general, but also to younger nobles sentout from time to time to help with provisioning, enrolling of troops andinspections. In the autumn of 1404, and again in the spring of 1405, fournobles were elected to go out to the camp and supervise the inspections ofthe army.3 The civilian paymaster was also in evidence from the start; he wasthe man who actually brought the money out from Venice and wasresponsible for its distribution. At first the paymasters had fairly wideresponsibilities in the military administration, but gradually they becamedistinct from the officials who arranged the condotte and decided how muchwas actually to be paid to each individual or company.4 It was this latterfunction which became the basis of the growing responsibility of thecollateral (collaterale).

The first mention of a collateral with the army in the field was in March1405.5 Prior to this the collateral was a resident official to be found in manyLombard cities responsible for local recruiting and payment of garrisontroops. There were many precedents for such officials in the Milanese state;they presided over the banca, the desk at which men were enrolled and atwhich they received their pay.6 The need for a semi-permanent officialwatching over the condottieri, attending to the renewals of their condotte inthe field, keeping an eye on their companies, assessing their pay on the basisof their actual strength, and having a particular responsibility to preventdesertion - all this was clearly the outcome of a long campaign. For a briefcampaign of one season renewal of condotte was not needed and whatrecruiting was required was carried out away from the campaigning area byspecially dispatched recruiters. Pay did not become a complex problem; abrief inspection would reveal what a company was owed for what wasprobably its one and only payment. But 1404-5 produced the situation of a

2 SS. reg. 5, ioov(i2jan. i4i3)andCollegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1408-13, i i o v - m (28 Jan. 1413).3 SS. reg. 2, 67 and 93 (19 Oct. 1404 and 2 Mar. 1405).4 For a description of the role of the paymaster in these years, see the instructions given to Niccolo

Baseggio and Giovanni Dolfin in 1412 (SS. reg. 5, 22; 10 May 1412).5 SS. reg. 2, 95V (8 Mar. 1405).6 C. Santoro, Gli uffici del dominio sforzcsco (Milan, 1947) xxvii-xxix.

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large army in the field for nearly eighteen months, with the contracts allbeing renewed to the companies in active service on at least two occasions.In this situation the role of the collateral assumed new dimensions.

The man appointed to carry out these new and more onerous re-sponsibilities in 1405, Antonio Belegno - a Venetian noble - had a salary of100 ducats a month and was expected to employ seven followers: threearmed men, two pages and two notaries. He was also allowed to engage up tofour informers amongst the troops who would keep him alerted todisaffection and impending desertions. In addition he was allowed 50infantry as his personal bodyguard.7 Belegno, in fact, coupled the duties ofpaymaster with those of collateral, but in the subsequent years the twotended to become distinct.

In the years of peace between 1405 and 1411 the collaterals reverted tobeing resident in the Terraferma cities, and the known holders of the officewere no longer Venetians. In Verona Domenico Bonaconte (or Bonagiunta)da Fondi, a Veronese lawyer, was collateral from at least 1406 onwards,while the parallel figure in Padua was Antonio Facino da Vicenza. It wasBonaconte who was sent in 1411 to the Romagna to enrol the company ofCarlo Malatesta and who, on his return, acted as collateral with the armyalongside a Venetian noble in 1412.8 Antonio Facino had a long career inVenetian service and was still acting as a special emissary for recruitingpurposes as late as 1431.9 In the two wars against the Hungarians there wasagain a tendency to place Venetians in this key role, but the emergence oflong-serving professional administrators had clearly begun.10

The situation therefore in the first quarter of the century was one inwhich traditional signorial and Visconti methods were fused with a Venetiandesire to control as much as possible. The growing need for continuity in theorganization of a permanent army, the expanding dimensions of theVenetian state, and the tendency for financing to become decentralized asTerraferma cities assumed more responsibilities for army pay all weakenedthe case for direct Venetian control. By the 1420s, and particularly after1425, the problems of army administration had assumed new proportions.

At this stage the variety of categories of civilian officials attached to the

SS. reg. 2, 95V (8 Mar. 1405).Ibid., 181 (14 Jan. 1406); Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1408-13, 63V (28 Dec. 1411), 81 (17 July1412); SS. reg. 5, 59 (31 Aug. 1412).Antonio Facino was inspecting troops in the Padovano in 1407 (SS. reg. 3, 52V; 20 Jan. 1407), wascollateral in Padua in 1410 (SMi. reg. 48,133V; 23 Apr. 1410), was special emissary to Jacopo Caldorain the Marches in 1426 (SS. reg. 9, 132; 19 June 1426) and was still serving as a recruiter in 1431 (SS.reg. 11, 189V; 7 May 1431).The collateral elected to work with Filippo Arcelli in 1419 was Delfino Venier (SS. reg. 7,72V; 2 May1419).

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army had been reduced to four: the proveditors and paymasters, who werealways Venetian nobles; the collaterals, who by this time were non-Venetians; and the supply officers, who were drawn from a number ofsources. Of these the proveditors were essentially supervisors and advisersand their role will be discussed in the next chapter; the paymasters andsupply officers were subordinate officials. It was in the hands of thecollaterals that the main responsibilities for army administration wereconcentrated.

That the collaterals achieved in the next thirty years the authority andimportance that they did was, of course, in part due to the circumstances ofthe wars. But perhaps even more it was due to the personality and activitiesof one man, Belpetro Manelmi da Vicenza. Manelmi came from a Vicentinenoble family and was probably trained as a notary or lawyer. He took over ascollateral in Verona from Domenico Bonaconte in 1416.11 But prior to thathe had already been concerned with military affairs in his native city ofVicenza. In November 1413 he was sent by the Venetian podesta in Vicenzato Venice to communicate certain facts and recommendations about thedefences of the Vicentino, which had recently been inspected. In suchcircumstances it was usual that the emissary would himself have first-handknowledge of the report he was presenting and probably had carried out theinspection himself. As a result of Manelmi's recommendations certainfortification repairs were authorized and some replacement of obsoleteequipment ordered.12 From 1416 until the late 1420s Manelmi remained inVerona. In 1419 he was again in Venice to explain that the Porta dei Calzolaineeded repairs.13 In 1424 he emerged victorious and vindicated from aconfrontation with Giovanni Contarini, the Venetian camarlengo in Verona,who had accused him of financial frauds. The subsequent investigationshowed that it was Contarini himself who was at fault, and Manelmi wasbeginning to gain a reputation in Venice for administrative efficiency andprobity.14 In 1425 his salary was increased to allow him to employ a notaryin his office; the relevant Senate minute described him as 'prudens','discreto' and 'fidelissimus'.15 Even earlier we find his name mentioned in afamiliar fashion in correspondence between the Venetian Niccolo Leonardi

11 ASVe., Archivio Camera Fiscale, reg. 98, 31 (15 Jan. 1416). His salary was to be 10 ducats a month. Iam indebted for this reference and for a number of others from the Veronese archives on Manelmi toDr John Law.

12 SMi. reg. 50, 44V (3 Nov. 1413).13 SMi. reg. 52, 140 (2 Jan. 1419).14 ASVe., Antico archivio del Comune, Reg. litterarum ducalium, reg. 9, 101 and n6v (27 May 1423

and 13 Mar. 1424).15 SMi. reg. 55, 126V (13 June 1425).

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and Guarino Guarini, which suggests that he had influential contacts inboth Venice and Verona.16

The next stage of Manelmi's career came with the outbreak of war inLombardy. The first collateral attached to Carmagnola's camp in April 1426was Jacopo da Varano, but by early 1429 this post was held by Manelmi.17

By 1431 he enjoyed the title of collateral-general, suggesting a position ofpre-eminence in a burgeoning organization.18 This position he held until hisdeath on 16 February 1455.

The duties which Manelmi carried out during these three decades inwhich he was chief administrator in the Venetian army were manifold. Hisfirst responsibility was to keep a record of all the contracts, many of which heplayed a part in negotiating, to carry out inspections and to enforce theregulations which governed the employment and service of the condottieri.While the ultimate decisions concerning the employment and control ofcavalry captains lay with the captain-general and the authorities in Venice,Manelmi had almost a free hand in the regulation of the infantry forces.When Florentine infantry arrived in Lombardy to join the Venetian army in1431 it was Manelmi who inspected them and wrote an angry report to thedoge on their wretched state of preparedness.19 When some demobilizationwas in progress in 1433 it was again Manelmi who made the crucialrecommendations on which infantry constables to dismiss and which toretain.20 As a result of his part in the reductions of the army in that year hewas blamed in some quarters for the desertion of Antonello da Siena andsome of the other leading condottieri who had taken umbrage at the ruthlessway in which numbers were pruned. The Council of Ten categoricallyrejected these suggestions and recognized that 'Belpetro is most faithful toour state and with how much diligence he has exercised and continues toexercise the office entrusted to him.'21 In the following year when he wasproposed for the job of negotiating the vital condotta with Gattamelata andBrandolini, Paolo Venier opposed the idea in the Senate on the grounds thathe was 'unwelcome and hateful to all our men-at-arms', and called for hisdismissal.22 Venier was decisively overruled, but it is scarcely surprising

R. Sabbadini, Epistolario di Guarino Veronese, in Miscellanea di storia veneta della R. Dep. di storiapatria, ser. 3, xiv (Venice, 1919) 123. Niccolo Leonardi's letter from Murano is dated late Sept. 1420.SS. reg. 9, ioov (9 Apr. 1426); reg. 10, 227 (24 Jan. 1429).SS. reg. 11, 202V (22 June 1431).F. C. Pellegrini, Sulla repubblica Jiorentina al tempo di Cosimo il Vecchio: appendice di documenti trattidal R. Archivio di Stato di Firenze relativi alia tesi (Pisa, 1891) xxviii, lxxxviii.SS. reg. 12, 182 (4 June 1433).Dieci, Misti, reg. 11, 87 (23 Sept. 1433): 'Belpetrus est fidelissimus nostri dominii et cum quantadiligentia exercuit et exercet officium sibi commissum.'SS. reg. 13, 63V (17 Apr. 1434): 'ingratus et odiosus omnibus nostris gentibus armigeris'.

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that Manelmi's methods should arouse the resentment of some of thecondottieri. His efficiency and diligence became a legend for the rest of thecentury; his practice of constantly riding round the billets carrying outregular inspections and probing into all the traditional malpractices of thecondottieri made him the target of much abuse amongst the soldiers, but theobject of grateful nostalgia in the collective memory of the Venetians.23

It is probable that this unpopularity with the captains gradually subsidedas they became accustomed to Manelmi's methods and realized that in thelast resort he was on their side as his reports and activity pressured Veniceinto according reasonable treatment to its soldiers. Certainly he was a closeconfidant of successive captains-general, and every proveditor who was sentto the camp was urged to listen carefully to his advice. Throughout theconstant alarms and excursions of the wars in Lombardy, and particularly atthe moments when Venetian troops were being withdrawn into quarters,one catches glimpses of the figure of Manelmi moving about with hisfollowing of vice-collaterals, notaries and guards, keeping his eye on everyaspect of the army's life.24

Continuity and the effective utilization of accumulated experience are, ofcourse, the keys to Venetian success in the fifteenth century, and nowhere isthis more true than in the story of Belpetro Manelmi and his assistants.Under him were five vice-collaterals, theoretically based on the main citiesof the Terraferma but in fact almost as ubiquitous as their chief. In so far asone can judge these men seem to have been hand-picked by Manelmi andthey drew their remuneration not from central funds but from smallauthorized retentions on all financial transactions which they organized.The most prominent of the vice-collaterals was Chierighino Chiericati,another Vicentine noble, who appeared as Manelmi's secretary in the early1430s and by 1437 was vice-collateral in Verona. Chiericati remainedManelmi's right-hand man until the latter's death and the dismantling of hisdepartment which followed. During that time he was responsible for theinspection and pay of Michele Attendolo's company in the 1440s and for theorganization of the attempted coup against Colleoni at Isola della Scala in1451. Later in his career Chiericati, who had known Pietro Barbo when hewas bishop of Verona, was summoned to Rome when Barbo was elected

23 For an example of this frequent recollection of Belpetro's services, see ST. reg. 8,136V (31 Dec. 1481).For further eulogies, see B. Pagliarino, Croniche di Vicenza (Vicenza, 1663) 176, 226.

24 In the year 1435, for example, Manelmi's activities included going to the Romagna to inspect troopsand dispatch contingents to Brescia to strengthen the army in Lombardy (SS. reg. 13, 133V; 20 Jan.1435), Visiting Gattamelata in Castel S. Giovanni and persuading him to co-operate with Niccolo daPisa, and then negotiating a condotta with Niccolo (SS. reg. 13, 143; 7 Mar. 1435), inspecting thecompany of Giovanni Malavolti (SMi. reg. 59,106; 7 Apr. 1435), paying off troops in Brescia (SS. reg.13, 183; 1 Oct. 1435), and finally carrying out a large-scale pruning of the army prior to winterquarters (SS. reg. 13, 187V; 3 Nov. 1435).

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Pope Paul II to become inspector-general of the papal army. He waspreceded in this post by two other Venetian subjects who had probablygained experience in Manelmi's office, Stasio Gritti and Giovan NiccoloManzini da Vicenza. The unusual completeness and efficiency of papalarmy records during the pontificate of Paul II may perhaps be attributed tothe supervision of a man of Chiericati's experience, and certainly directlyfrom his pen we have an important and revealing Trattatello della milizia.Chiericati wrote this treatise in 1471 in an attempt to retain his positionunder Sixtus IV, but it was to no avail and he returned to Vicenza for the lastyears of his life. Some sources suggest that he returned also to Venetianservice as collateral-general in the late 1470s, but the main documents do notbear this out; however, both his brother Valerio and his son Ludovico wereVenetian collaterals in this later period.25

Another of Manelmi's vice-collaterals was Andrea di Aureliano, who laterbecame chancellor of Bartolomeo Colleoni, and whose son, Gianfilippo,having been associated with his father in Colleoni's service, returned tobecome one of Venice's leading collaterals in the later years of the century.26

A third figure who emerged under the tutelage of Manelmi was his brotherEvangelista, who also held the rank of vice-collateral. Evangelista was aprotege of Francesco Barbaro and was with him at the siege of Brescia in1438/9. His account of that siege - the De obsidione Bresciae - was dedicatedto Barbaro but does not reveal whether he was already a collateral at thatstage.27 By 1446 he certainly was when he was sent to inspect troops inCremona, and his career as a Venetian collateral was to be a long one, as hereappeared in that position in the 1470s.28

The death of Belpetro Manelmi in February 1455, which coincidedneatly with a period of reduction and reorganization of Venetian militaryand financial commitments after the Peace of Lodi, provided the excuse for acomplete transformation of the office he had presided over. As soon as thenews reached Venice the Senate resolved that he should not be immediatelyreplaced.29 A few days later the rectors in Vicenza were instructed to takecharge of all the records of the collateral's office and send them to Venice.Manelmi's vice-collaterals were suspended pending their replacement byelected Venetian nobles, and the office was henceforth to be responsible to

25 On Chiericati, see DBL, xxiv, 673-4, a n ^ also G. Zorzi, 'Un vicentino alia corte di Paolo secondo:Chierighino Chiericati e il suo Trattatello della milizia\ NAV., n.s. xxx (1915) 369-434, whopublished the Trattatello.

26 References to Andrea's activity as vice-collateral date from 1447-50 (ST. reg. 2, 17; 3 Jan. 1447 andSS. reg. 18, 162; 2 Feb. 1450). For Gianfilippo, see below, i n n. 48.

27 M a n e l m i , Commentariolum.28 S S . reg . 17, 17V (9 M a y 1446) a n d be low, 109.29 ST. reg. 3, i46v (20 Feb. 1455).

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the provveditori sopra le camere.30 In the next month the arrangements forthe election of five nobles for three-year terms of office were approved. Thenew collaterals were to be of equal rank and were to have their offices inBergamo, Brescia, Verona, Padua and Treviso. Although their responsibi-lities were said to be the same as those of Manelmi and his assistants, it wasclear that they were likely to be much more strictly controlled from Venice,and they were expressly forbidden to hold inspections without the presenceof a Venetian rector.31

This reorganization of the office responsible for army administration wasclearly the result of a number of interlocking factors. Undoubtedly theenormous prestige gained by Manelmi and the independent authority whichhe had built up for his office did cause concern in Venice, particularly withthe war now over. However, the change must also be seen in the context oftwo broader trends in Venetian policy at this moment. First, a rigorouseconomy drive was in progress in an attempt to stabilize the finances afterthe ruinous expenses of the wars. The death of Manelmi was an opportunityfor a careful check of army accounts to see what savings could be made, andindeed for the abolition of the expensive post of collateral-general itself.There is no hint that the inspection of Manelmi's accounts revealed anysigns of fraud or peculation. Manelmi's reputation remained unsullieddespite the speed with which his activities were investigated. The secondpoint is that at this moment there was considerable concern in Venice aboutthe extent to which all sorts of posts in the Terraferma had fallen out of thehands of Venetian nobles.32 There was clearly a feeling that the Venetianpatriciate was in danger of losing its exclusive grip on state affairs, and in themilitary field the focus was on the office of collateral and on castellanships.

There can be no doubt that the experiment of revived noble control ofthis crucial area of military organization was not a success. The newcollaterals, who were eventually only four in number, were reluctant to goout to their posts and even more reluctant to stay there for three years;33 thejobs were unpopular and ended up in the hands of relative nonentities; theessential continuity of experience and contact with the soldiers were lost. Tothis had to be added the fact that the army inevitably went through a certaincrisis of morale in its first long period of peacetime service. While clearly theduties of the collaterals were going to be reduced in peacetime, they werestill not going to be carried out efficiently by men sitting at their desks inBrescia, Verona or Padua, and still less by men on long leave in Venice. By1463, at least, non-Venetian vice-collaterals were to be found in the

30 Ibid., 148-9 (28 Feb. 1455).31 Ibid., 154V (8 Mar. 1455).32 Dieci, Misti, reg. 15, 41V-42 (11 Apr. 1455).33 ST. reg. 3, 166 (12 Aug. 1455). The post at Bergamo had not been filled by this time.

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Terraferma cities again, acting as assistants to the noble collaterals andconducting the business of local military organization, but not creating thatessential coherence which Manelmi's office had achieved. By 1471 there wasrising preoccupation in Venice about the state of the army.

Concern was also expressed in Rome by Chierighino Chiericati in hisTrattatello. His opinion of the nobles who had replaced him and hisprofessional colleagues was predictable, but justified by other evidence: 'theexample can be seen from the Venetian nobles elected every three years, howthe state to which they have reduced those men-at-arms of the mostIllustrious Signoria bears out the popular proverb, that he does not play thebutcher who does not know how to cut up carcases'.34 He questioned thevalue of the large numbers of aging lanze spezzate, divided into unequalcompanies, which made up the bulk of the Venetian army by this time. Hepointed to the failure of the expedition against Trieste in 1463 as the resultof sending discontented, badly organized and poorly led troops.35

In 1471 action was finally taken. Three nobles were sent out into theTerraferma to carry out a thorough inspection of the army and put all therecords into order. With them went Evangelista Manelmi, who had alreadyreappeared as collateral in Ravenna in 1469. The commission reported backin July 1472.36 Its report was a black one of administrative chaos, of accountsnot properly kept, of inspections not carried out and regulations not obeyed.All, it said, was now in order thanks to the diligence of Evangelista Manelmi,but it was up to the collaterals and the rectors to keep it so. The noblecollaterals were, in fact, given another chance, although in Ravenna, whichseemed to have been overlooked in the original arrangements, a non-Venetian collateral continued to hold office. In 1475 this was ValerioChiericati, a brother of Chierighino who had at one time been the chancellorto the Venetian condottiere Antonello da Corneto.37

It was only in 1476 that the end of the experiment with noble collateralsfinally came. The confusion in the largest company in the army followingthe death of Colleoni, rising political tensions in Italy, and the growingTurkish threat in Friuli contributed to the decision to initiate another large-scale inspection of the army. This time the two inspecting proveditors wereto be accompanied by Giovanni Niccolo Manzini da Vicenza, who had thetitle of vice-collateral and was very experienced in military affairs,34 Zorzi, 'Chiericati', 428: 'lo exemplo se vede per li zentilomeni venetiani facti de tri anni in tri anni,

como hanno bene reducto quele zentedarme de la Illustrissima Signoria e uno proverbio vulgare, chenon se faci becharo chi non sa scorticare'.

35 Ib id . , 429.36 S T . reg. 6 ,171 (27 Ju ly 1472). F o r evidence of Evangelista M a n e l m i installed as collateral in Ravenna

as early as 1469, see Collegio, Nota to r io , reg. 11,58 (30 Aug. 1469) and S T . reg. 6,134V (10 J u n e 1471).T h e three provedi tors were actually elected in the Senate on 26 Dec . 1470 ( S T . reg. 6, 115V).

37 Zorzi, 'Chiericati', 423.

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

Andrea Aureliano and Piero Camuccia.38 The links with the past wereslowly being taken up again, and as confirmation of this we have thepreamble of a Senate minute of 26 May 1477: 'because the order and qualityof our men-at-arms has so deteriorated, with very great damage to us, fromthat which prevailed in the time of Belpetro, that if steps are not taken it is tobe feared that in the event of any disturbance our state will sufferdamage . . . '39 In the circumstances a senior proveditor was to be appointedand sent out with an experienced collateral-general, who was not to be aVenetian noble. The proveditor chosen was Lorenzo Loredan, whoseaccount of his year of office will be discussed later in this chapter; the newcollateral-general was Manzini.40

By the time Loredan and Manzini set out on their tour in the autumn of1477 all the vice-collaterals they encountered in the course of their workwere non-Venetians. Francesco da Lodi held the post in Bergamo,Giovanmarco da Arzignano in Brescia (where he was still vice-collateral in1495) and Giovanantonio da Galesio in Treviso.41 However, it would bewrong to assume that because the idea of using Venetians as collaterals hadbeen abandoned the system of Manelmi had been completely restored.Manzini and his successors as collaterals-general never had the independentauthority that Manelmi had enjoyed, even though some of them held theoffice for a number of years. The reason for this lies partly in the moresettled conditions in which they found themselves, but also in the expandingnumbers and activities of Venetian proveditors with the army, which is aphenomenon which will be discussed in due course.

Manzini retired because of ill health in November 1478 and was replacedby his assistant, Piero Camuccia.42 In 1481 the Senate decided that acollateral-general, with a salary of 500 ducats a year and a large staff, wassomething of a luxury in peacetime, particularly as the vice-collateralsseemed to be functioning reasonably efficiently. So the post wasdowngraded to a salary of 200 ducats and put up for election again.Camuccia lost his job and Manzini, presumably restored to health,returned.43 In 1483 Ludovico Chiericati took over but was killed in thefighting round Lagoscuro;44 by the end of the War of Ferrara another

38 SS. reg. 27, 89-90 (7 June 1476). Manzini had been revisore generale of the papal army prior toChiericati, and had almost certainly got his experience in Manelmi's office before 1455.

39 SS. reg. 28,10 (26 May 1477): * perche Pe tanto deteriorado l'ordene et qualita de le nostre zentedarmecum nostro gravissimo danno da quello che le ierano in tempo di Belpiero che se questo non eproveduto Pe da temer che occorendo alcuna novita el stado nostro non patisca sinistro . . .'See below, 147-52.Senato, Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24, 42 and 56V (7 Jan. and 3 Feb. 1478).ST. reg. 8, 28 (9 Nov. 1478).Ibid., 136V (31 Dec. 1481).Ibid., 194V (15 Mar. 1483).

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figure had emerged, Mariotto da Monte, who had been a chancellor ofGattamelata and treasurer of the Societa di San Marco since 1456.45 Inthe cut-backs that followed the Peace of Bagnolo Mariotto's staff in thebanco dey stipendiari was reduced to eight assistants: three chancellorsresponsible for issuing toilette, two accountants and three inspectors. Inaddition to these the vice-collaterals in the main Terraferma citiescontinued to have local responsibilities.46

From this moment onwards it is possible to chart a remarkable degree ofcontinuity in the collateral staff. Mariotto da Monte died in office in 1493and an election was held in the Collegio to appoint his successor. The list ofcandidates is an interesting indication of the depth of expertise in this fieldavailable to Venice.47 Six of the men were currently vice-collaterals,including Mariotto's son Hieronimo; Giovanmarco da Arzignano, who hadbeen vice-collateral in Brescia since the 1470s; and Gianfilippo Aureliano,whose father had been one of Manelmi's assistants and whose experienceincluded a spell as one of Colleoni's chancellors and a long period as vice-collateral in Ravenna.48 Four were sons of collaterals, Hieronimo da Monte,Gianfilippo Aureliano, Francesco di Piero Camuccia and Belpetro diLudovico Chiericati. Two others had long experience as chancellors in thecompanies, and a number had direct military experience, including GiorgioSommariva whose report on the Veronese serraglio has already beendiscussed and who had for a time been governor of Gradisca. At this timethere was no formal appointment of a successor to Mariotto, nor was onemade two years later when another election was held.49 Hieronimo daMonte seemed to hold the post unofficially until 1502, when in yet anotherelection Gianfilippo Aureliano formally supplanted him.50 On this occasionthere were again six candidates from among the vice-collaterals, all of whomcould claim over twenty years' service in the office. Aureliano died in 1505and was replaced by Hieronimo da Monte, by this time a very old man.51

45 S T . reg. 4, 10 (11 June 1456). He was a Tuscan from Monte S. Savino.46 S T . reg. 9, io8v (16 Sept. 1484).47 Collegio, No ta to r io , reg. 14, 82 (6 M a r . 1493).48 G iovanmarco da Arz ignano was already vice-collateral in Brescia in 1477 (Senato , Provvedi tor i da

T e r r a e da M a r , 24, 42; 7 J a n . 1478). Gianfi l ippo was the son of Andrea Aurel iano (see above, 107),w h o also served Colleoni as chancellor for many years. His long service as collateral in Ravenna isrecorded in Dieci , Mis t e , reg. 20, 124V (9 Oc t . 1481) and Collegio, Commiss ioni Segrete , 1482-95,102 (10 M a y 1487).

49 Collegio, No ta to r io , reg. 14, 121 (6 M a r . 1495).50 Collegio, No ta to r io , reg. 15 ,61 (19 Jan . 1502). T h e fact that H ie ron imo da M o n t e had been filling the

post unofficially was recorded in the account of the next election (see n. 51 below).51 S S . reg. 40 , 126 (18 Sept . 1505); Collegio, Nota to r io , reg. 15, 154V (21 Nov . 1505). At this stage

amongs t the candidates were still G iovanmarco da Arzignano; Gianjacopo Vimercato da Crema , whohad been a vice-collateral for 22 years; Antonio Gis lardi , who had served in that capacity in theempi re , and part icularly at Zara , for 29 years; and Belpetro Chiericat i .

I l l

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

The final change of our period came in 1508 on the death of Hieronimo.52

On this occasion a proposal to promote one of the vice-collaterals was turneddown by the Senate, and Antonio Capodivacca, an influential Paduan noble,was given the post of collateral-general. This was an exceptional appoint-ment as Capodivacca had no previous experience in the office, and therewere suggestions that he had been successful as a result of paying largebribes to influential politicians.53

Capodivacca's appointment is an indication of the decline of the activeinfluence of the collaterals. Throughout these later years their functions hadremained basically the same, but they had inevitably become less onerousand more routine than fifty years earlier as more and more real responsibilitywas being assumed by the proveditor-general.

While the collaterals supervised and participated in all aspects of armyadministration, there were other categories of officials involved in the work.The most prominent of these were the paymasters, who were alwaysVenetian nobles. Their responsibilities were purely concerned with thehandling of money and paying the troops on the instructions of, andaccording to the records kept by, the collaterals. According to the paysystem established, only certain sections of the army were paid directly bythe official paymasters, and these men were usually only responsible formonies supplied from central funds. There were moments, as will bediscussed later, when army financing was centralized and the contributionsmade to army pay from the Terraferma treasuries were sent to Venice. Atthese times the role of the paymaster became more important and all-pervading. The paymasters also played a more active part on detachedexpeditions like those of the 1490s, or in the Morea. Gianpaolo Gradenigo,for example, was both paymaster and inspector with the Venetian troops inPisa in the winter of 1497.54 They received pay and expenses of 50 ducats amonth in the first half of the century, and more often 60 in the second. Thishad to cover the costs of employing at least one book-keeper, a servant andone or two armed guards. The paymasters were usually young noblesembarking on their political careers and getting their first experience of whatwas involved in the administration of the Terraferma and the army.

The practice of sending out young nobles to assist the proveditors wasalso continued occasionally. This was probably usually done informally by aproveditor including a young protege in his following and paying his livingexpenses, but on at least one occasion the Senate officially appointed

52 ST. reg. 16, 53 (2 Dec. 1508); Sanuto, vii, 679-80.53 On Antonio Capodivacca, see DBL, xviii, 641-3. The election of Capodivacca, unlike those of his

immediate predecessors, is not recorded in the Notatorio del Collegio, which already suggests that itwas conducted in an unusual way.

54 SS. reg. 36, 158 (5 Sept. 1497).

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equitatores who fulfilled this function.55 When, towards the end of thecentury, a large number of junior proveditors were appointed with veryspecific responsibilities the need for such assistants presumably declined.

Finally, a variety of supply officers were attached to the army. The mostconsistent and common of these appointments concerned the supply ofmunitions, and in 1440 the maestro delle munitioni was receiving theconsiderable sum of 100 ducats a month for salary and expenses.56 By thelater years of the century munitions supply was handled by the collateral'soffice, and the man responsible had the title of vice-collateral. But generallysupply officers were appointed either from among the chancellery staff orwere elected in the Collegio from among Venetian nobles and citizens. Theywere essentially subordinate officials taking their orders from either theproveditors or the collateral-general.

Chierighino Chiericati in his Trattatello claimed that at one time he had'governed' 10,000 cavalary and 6000 infantry in the Venetian army.57 Hewas referring presumably to the early 1459s when the aging Manelmi leftmore and more of the work to his chief subordinate; but at that time thecollaterals really did see themselves as governing the army, as opposed toleading it, which was the job of the captain-general. He also claimed, andagain not without justification, that it was the superior organization andconsistent pay system imposed by the collaterals over a period of five years'truce which accounted for the Venetian success in 1446 and the great victoryat Casalmaggiore. To test further the effectiveness of the administrativestructure which has been described we must now look more closely at thevarious activities and services which were involved.

The basis of Venetian army organization were the ordines a banca, theregulations which governed the employment and discipline of soldiers. In1418 the Senate noticed that the regulations in force in Verona, which was atthat time the headquarters of the army, were still those which had beendrawn up during the Visconti occupation of the city in the 1390s. Itrequested that Belpetro Manelmi, the collateral in Verona, should puttogether all the individual instructions he had received from Veniceconcerning army organization and bring them, together with the Viscontiregulations, to Venice so that a comprehensive set of Venetian regulationscould be drawn up.58 How soon this work was done and when the firstcomplete set of new regulations went into force is not clear. The onlyeditions of Venetian army ordinances which survive for the century date

55 SS. reg. 14, 60 (26 Sept. 1437).56 SMi. reg. 60, 248 (1 Sept. 1440).57 Zorzi, 'Chiericati', 417.58 SMi. reg. 52, 133V (1 Dec. 1418).

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

from the early 1430s, which was a moment when a good deal of consciousreorganization and reform of the army was going on.59 One must assumetherefore that these are revised editions of earlier ordinances, although it isnot impossible that throughout the 1420s Manelmi and his colleaguescontinued to work with interim and piecemeal instructions, awaiting theannouncement of the new and complete code.

The army regulations which have come down to us from the early 1430sare contained in a very substantial and comprehensive document. It has 56clauses and an appendix concerning the arms which cavalry and infantrywere expected to possess and the penalties to be imposed for anyshortcomings. The main clauses cover the procedure for the employmentand mustering of troops, regulations for inspections and the time limitsallowed for the making up of numbers of men and horses before fines wereimposed, and regulations concerning pay. They go on to describe the oathsof fidelity and obedience which soldiers had to take. They were expected toswear to be faithful to Venice, to observe the regulations, not to consort withthe enemy, to cause no civil disturbance, to hand over important prisoners,not to ride through the towns without permission and finally not to abusethe collaterals. The regulations then cover the duties of castellans and thepractices which were specifically forbidden such as trading with the localpopulation, leaving their posts without permission and taking on otheremployment. Finally come the clauses concerning desertion and thepenalties to be imposed, and the obligations on the collaterals to enforce theregulations and not seek to defraud the troops.

The early 1430s, from which the surviving editions of these regulationsdate, were undoubtedly an important moment in the history of the Venetianarmy. The sense of unease felt in Venice at the burgeoning size of the armyand the fact that it seemed to be slipping out of its control certainlycontributed to the spate of legislation on the subject in late 1431 andprobably also to the downfall of Carmagnola in the following spring. InOctober 1431 the Senate called for proper recording of the condotte in a bookwhich could be inspected in Venice, and for close adherence to the principlethat all contracts and extensions of contracts had to be approved by theSenate.60 In the next month attention was turned to the accountingprocedures with the demand that here too all transactions should berecorded in books in Venice.61 The attempts at large-scale demobilization in1433 brought a further spate of instructions about army organization with

59 Two sets of the orders have come to light. One, dated 5 Dec. 1433, is in the Carte di Conte FrancescoSforza (ASMi., Archivio ducale, Visconteo, 20) and the other, dated 1434, is in Commemoriali, xn,136-9 (Predelli, iv, 186-7). The two are virtually identical, with only small variations of arrangement.

60 SMi. reg. 58, 90 (30 Oct. 1431).61 Ibid., 91V (18 Nov. 1431).

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particular emphasis on the procedures for the taking up of the extensionclauses in contracts.62 It was in this context that the new editions of theordines a banca appeared. Clearly major decisions about army organizationhad always been taken in the Senate, but from this moment onwards there ismuch more evidence of a concern for detail in the Senate minutes.Nevertheless, one cannot yet talk of an effective centralization of all militaryorganization in the hands of the Venetian councils because it is veryapparent that until 1455 much of the initiative still lay at the armyheadquarters with the captain-general and the collateral-general.

The first concern of the army administration was with the selection ofgood captains and the hiring of troops. In the early years of the century mostof the major contracts were discussed in the Senate and the negotiationswith the condottieri were conducted by emissaries sent with full instructionsfrom Venice. When there was a captain-general his advice was sought onwhich captains should be hired. Frequently the discussion took the lines ofhow to hire a company out of the service of another Italian state; thefurnishing of guarantees, either in the forms of cash retentions or hostages,for good behaviour and fidelity was a frequent topic in the negotiations. Bythe late 1420s as rehiring became the rule it was the collaterals who playedthe key role, and the whole process became more of a formality. Thechancellors of the condottieri would still appear occasionally in Venice tonegotiate new contracts, but usually only if their masters wished to alter theterms. Most renewals seem to have been arranged between the collateralsand the captains on the assumption that unless there was an adverse reportfrom the collaterals on the state of the companies concerned, renewal of thecontract was a formality.

The surviving contracts themselves illustrate this development. Theearly condotte are elaborate and detailed instruments often containingclauses which obviously relate to particular condottieri. Gradually thenature of the contracts became more formalized and much shorter. Clauseswhich spelled out in detail the obligations on both sides were replaced bygeneral formulae calling for adherence to the regulations. Detailedrecording of the rates of pay offered gave way to general promises of 'thesame rates as our other troops'. At the same time came the features of thepermanent condotta which have already been discussed: the lengtheningcontracts and the arrangements for different company strengths in peaceand war.63

62 SS. reg. 13, 28V (3 Dec. 1433).63 The best source for Venetian military contracts are the Libri Commemoriali, where these

characteristics of growing formalism can be easily observed. However, outlines of contracts oftenappear also in Senate parti, and occasionally in the early years also the full details of a major contract.Neither source can be relied upon to record all contracts in any particular period.

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

It would be wrong to suggest that individual deals between condottieriand their Venetian employers disappeared completely. The gradualemergence of the condotta a provisione for certain favoured condottieri,which tended to permit greater responsibility to the captain for paying hismen and greater laxity in rules governing their inspections, will be discussedlater.64 But there was also an increase in the use of secret clauses to modify inone direction or another the details of the contract. Venice was desperatelyconcerned to avoid jealousies and rivalries amongst its condottieri, and alsoto avoid creating public precedents for exceptional concessions. The mostcommon type of secret agreement concerned the number of men allowed inthe company. There is evidence of secret deals with condottieri to maintainboth more and fewer men than the number publicly inscribed in thecontract. An allowance of extra men was usually prompted by the anxiety ofVenice to placate a particular captain without arousing jealousies andcreating precedents; on the other hand, a condottiere would sometimesagree to maintain fewer men as long as his public reputation was upheld bythe higher figure in the contract.65 Obviously an awareness that these secretagreements were common must lead one to distrust the evidence providedby the contracts in the second half of the century. This makes it all the moreunfortunate that the surviving administrative records for the whole of thecentury are so sparse.

The emergence of the lanze spezzate as a cavalry force outside thecondotta system has already been discussed, and clearly this developmenthad considerable implications for the organization. While the collateralswere spared some of the paperwork when hiring such men, theirresponsibilities for the control of them became even more extensive thanwith the companies. While most of the republic's lanze spezzate had takenservice, or rather had continued their service on a different basis, in largegroups after the death of their condottiere leader, there was always a trickleof individual recruits to be dealt with. When a condottiere left Venetianservice after some years of employment, there were usually a few of his menwho chose to leave his company and seek a place in the lanze spezzate ratherthan uproot themselves and their families.

With the infantry the evolution from a force consisting mainly ofconstables with their own contracts and companies to one in whichconstables were in permanent employment while the bulk of their men wererecruited centrally was the key development. Again this had obviousimplications for the work of the collaterals, and the task of infantryrecruiting was one of their major responsibilities. But in fact when large

64 See below, 118, 123-4.65 A typical example of this is the arrangement with Cristoforo da Tolentino in 1450 (ST. reg. 2,153V; 18

Sept. 1450). After protests about the reduction of his company he was offered 250 lances dafama butcould not enrol more than 200.


numbers of new infantry were required in the later years of the period itremained common for long-serving Venetian constables to be sent off torecruit them outside the state.

It would be pleasant at this stage to be able to make some observationsabout the social and geographical origins of the troops hired by Veniceduring the fifteenth century. This, however, would only be possible if a largeproportion of the muster rolls, both of companies and of the lanze spezzateand infantry, had survived. As it is we have very little of this sort of material,and while it is possible to make some generalizations about the leadership ofthe army, next to nothing can be said about the rank and file. There wasclearly a process of aristocratization and naturalization of the cavalryleadership during the century. While it was true that a condottiere hadalways required some wealth and standing (unless he was extremelyfortunate) to set himself up with a company, the tendency for the cavalryleaders to become a sort of elite during the fifteenth century is clearlyapparent. Venice certainly encouraged this process by instituting per-manent service and by making greater use of the nobility of the Terraferma.A man like Bernardino Fortebraccio, although of Umbrian origin, was a'Venetian' cavalry commander in the most complete sense of the word. It isprobably true that by the first decades of the sixteenth century the majorityof the men in his company would have been to all intents and purposesVenetian subjects. The tendency which seems to come in in this later periodfor Senate discussions on recruiting to emphasize the need for nationaltroops as opposed to forestieri was the result of gradual evolution, not of anyconscious change in policy.66 This was much more true of the cavalry forcesthan of the infantry, where traditions of permanent service were less wellestablished. Nevertheless, the growing role of a select militia, the creation ofa group of permanent constables, and the increased prestige of infantryleadership all tended to produce the same results.

After the signing of the condotta the next step was the formal musterparade and the drawing up of the muster roll. The importance of accuratemuster rolls was stressed by all military writers of this period. They had toinclude details of men, equipment and horses so that at subsequentinspections any substitutions could be detected. The timing of this initialmuster parade depended on whether the company was being brought from adistance, in which case it was mustered on entering Venetian territory,67 or

66 In 1500 Taliano Pio and Lazzarino da Rimini were dismissed because their companies were made upentirely of foreigners (ST. reg. 13, 130; 30 May 1500). In 1506 the recruitment of Riminesi andFaentini was encouraged because they were now Venetian subjects (ST. reg. 15, 126V; 7 Oct. 1506).

67 A typical example was the mustering of Sigismondo Malatesta's troops in 1437. Belpetro Manelmiwas informed that the company was on its way from the Romagna and he was instructed to send acollateral to meet it when it crossed the Po north of Ferrara in order to carry out the muster parade(Collegio, Lettere Secrete, 4, 104V; 3 June 1437).

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whether the condotta was a renewal of one to an existing company, when themuster would follow closely on the signing of the contract. In the early yearsof the century it was sometimes the practice to hold this initial inspection inVenice; the companies would parade with their arms and musicians in thecourtyard of the Ducal Palace. In 1431 this practice was forbidden bothbecause of the disturbance caused and because it was regarded as a ratherdangerous custom.68 Henceforth any musters held in Venice were held inthe Camera degli Armi, but in fact the large majority of musters wereconducted in the Terraferma by the collaterals.

After the initial muster periodic inspections were held to maintainefficiency and facilitate accurate payment of the companies. For most of thefirst half of the century monthly inspections were the rule and sometimescaused considerable resentment amongst the condottieri. Both Carmagnolaand Francesco Sforza urged that during the campaigning season troopsshould be excused inspections as it was unreasonable to expect captains tomaintain numbers and parade-ground efficiency in the field.69 By the 1440sthe inspections of the captain-general's company had been reduced to six ayear, but for the rest of the troops monthly inspections remained in force.70

However, the introduction of the new two-tier condotta in the early 1440sseemed to carry with it the implication that inspections would be waived inpeacetime when the companies reduced their strength.

In 1459 the condotta given to Jacopo Piccinino, which was an exceptionalone in many respects, excused him all inspections.71 While this was tobecome a fairly common concession in most Italian armies in the second halfof the fifteenth century, it remained very exceptional in Venetian organiz-ation. Only two other contracts are known to have excluded inspectionscompletely, that of Roberto da Sanseverino in 1487, which was anemergency contract to get him into the field against the Germans quickly,72

and that of Francesco Gonzaga in 1489, which, being given to a rulingprince in peacetime, did not demand residence within the frontiers.73 Therewas, however, a compromise solution arrived at for prestigious condottieriin the later years of the century. They were sometimes excused the formalityof muster rolls and hence the close link between inspections and pay, butwere still expected to parade their troops for inspection periodically' for thehonour of the state'.74

68 Dieci, Misti, reg. n , 27 (30 Aug. 1431).69 For Carmagnola's protests on this subject, see SS. reg. 11, 202V (22 June 1431); in 1440 Pasquale

Malipiero was sent to Sforza to discuss the issue and point out the importance of inspections in thefield (SS. reg. 15, 51V-52V; 30 Nov. 1440).SS. reg. 16, 79 (17 Mar. 1444).Commemoriali, xiv, 57; 7 Mar. 1450 (Predelli, v, 47).Ibid., XVII, o,6r-v; 27 July 1487 (Predelli, v, 306).Ibid., 128-9; I 2 Mar. 1489 (Predelli, v, 315).Ibid., XVIII, 26-27V; 20 Oct. 1495 (Predelli, vi, 13).


However, a tendency to reduce the number of inspections generally wasclearly apparent in the years of peace after 1454. Both because of theineffectiveness of the collaterals in those years and because of the precedentsfor no inspections in peacetime which had already been established, it seemslikely that very few inspections were in fact carried out in the periodbetween 1454 and 1469. Then followed the years of intensive concern forand reform of the army, which served to remind the captains thatinspections were still expected.75 In 1472, after the first completeinspections to be held for many years, it was announced that there should infuture be four inspections a year.76 In 1475 this was reduced to three, but bythis time it was no longer the practice to inscribe the junior member of thecavalry lance, the saccomanno, in the muster rolls or expect his presence atinspections.77 This was justified on the grounds that it was the fighting menin the lance who were important and whose efficiency had to be maintained;but nevertheless in a period when captains were being increasingly leftresponsible for the pay of their men and the inspections were becomingmore concerned with fighting efficiency than with the maintenance ofnumbers and accurate pay, it was a concession which could lead to seriousabuses. However, Lorenzo Loredan, when he was proveditor-general in1477/8, gave very precise directions to the collaterals as to what to look outfor in the inspections. He stressed the need to check arms and equipment,the physical condition of the men and horses, and their skill in handlingarms.78

In 1490 the need for four inspections a year was reiterated and in the nowfashionable four-man lance only three were formally mustered.79 By thistime it was clearly the practice to hold large-scale inspections rather thanhave the collaterals riding round the billets. Furthermore the mainresponsibility for the inspections now lay with the Venetian rector, for whoma collateral acted as a sort of adjutant. The current practice was clearly setout in a Senate minute of October 1490: the Lieutenant of Friuli was to holda review of troops at Sacile, the Captain of Padua at Montagnana, and theCaptain of Brescia at Chiari. All troops were to report to the nearest of theseparades.80 The inspections held in the autumn of 1490 resulted in the75 T h e concern began in Jan . 1469 when a r igorous inspection of the lanze spezzate was ordered ( S S . reg.

2 3 , 1 6 0 ; 16 Jan . 1469). T h e r e followed the appo in tmen t of three esaminatori of the a rmy in December1470 ( S T . reg. 6, 115V; 26 D e c . 1470). T h e three nobles chosen, who eventually s tar ted the greatinspect ion in early 1472, were Paolo Moros in i , Antonio Priuli and Andrea D iedo ( S S . reg. 25 ,116 ; 28F e b . 1472).

76 ST. reg. 6, 171 (27 July 1472).77 S T . reg. 7, ioov (30 Dec. 1475); the three inspections were to be held between Mar. and Oct. For the

practice of omitt ing the saccomanno from the muster rolls, see ibid., 150 (10 Feb . 1477).78 Senato, Provveditori da Ter ra e da Mar , 24, i 6 5 r - v (30 Jan. 1478). For further discussion of Loredan,

see below, 150.79 S T . reg. 11, 20V-21 (10 Sept. 1490).80 Ibid., 27 (9 Oct. 1490).

1 1 9

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

dismissal of 128 useless men-at-arms. The inspections were particularlysevere on the Colleoneschi, although some of these veterans were foundposts as gate guards.81 These mass inspections were to remain the practicefor the remainder of this period, although it was quickly accepted that therecould only be two a year because of the expense involved.82 However, theinspection in quarters did not entirely disappear although it was difficult tomake it very effective because by this time some of the larger companies hadbillets all over the Terraferma.83

While one of the intentions of the mass parade was to make it moredifficult for captains to lend troops and horses to each other in order todeceive the inspectors about shortfall in numbers, evasive practices of thissort clearly remained very common. Manelmi and his collaterals in the1430s and 1440s had been able to maintain reasonable control by frequent,unexpected inspections of individual companies and by the personalknowledge of the companies which the long-serving collaterals had built up.They probably relied as much on memory as on the muster rolls to detectsubstitutions in the ranks they were inspecting. But this was a system whichbecame impracticable in the years after 1454; even the same collaterals couldnot have expected to find the companies ready for inspection in the way thatthey had been during the wars. So the system was allowed to break down,and the new arrangements which emerged towards the end of the centurywere more fitted to the requirements of a large peacetime army. The large-scale biannual parade enabled the inspectors to weed out useless troops andensure that numbers and equipment roughly approximated to the levelscontracted for.

The inspections, with the dismissals of useless men and the fines imposedfor missing men and horses which theoretically accompanied them, wereseen as the key to maintaining a well-disciplined army. The refusal of acaptain to present his troops for inspection struck at the roots of the wholesystem and produced some of the most notorious conflicts between Veniceand her condottieri. The classic case was that of Gaspare da Sanseverino,better known as Fracassa, who in 1489 was accused of refusing to obey81 Ibid., 43 (31 Dec. 1490).82 In 1501, for example, there appears to have been only one inspection, which was postponed from the

summer to the autumn because of lack of money to pay the troops after the inspection (ST. reg. 14,i6v; 12 June 1501 and 35V; 26 Aug. 1501). However, the decisions which followed the report of theinspectors in Nov. showed clearly that two inspections a year were normal practice (SS. reg. 38,175-6; 15 Nov. 1501). On the inspections in Aug. 1503, see Sanuto, v, 62-3.

83 The inspections in 1505 were held en masse at Montechiari and Ghedi for troops beyond the Adige,and at San Bonifacio and Lonigo for those to the east of the river (SS. reg. 40,125; 18 Sept. 1505). Butin 1508 the intention was to hold the inspections in the quarters allotted to each company; this provedimpractical because of the dispersal of the companies, but nevertheless the inspectors did actually visitall the quarters to inspect whatever troops they found there (SS. reg. 41, ii5v;26 July 1508 and 117; 1Aug. 1508. Also ST. reg. 16, 35V-36; 25 Sept. 1508).

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orders and of'maltreating' his men.84 Fracassa had been under suspicionearlier in the year for conspiring against the state, and he was clearly beingwatched very closely.85 The 'maltreatment' of the troops consisted of notpaying them any money; as a result of this the company had largelydwindled away. Fracassa, and his brother Antonmaria who spoke up forhim, claimed that this was because Venice had not paid him any money. Tothis Venice replied that of course it had not, because he had refused to allowthe company to be inspected. One can see that the situation was a viciouscircle; presumably Fracassa's pay had got into arrears, a very commonsituation, and he had allowed his company to run down. Then he refused toallow it to be inspected because of the fines and loss of reputation that heknew would ensue. At this point Venice could accuse him of refusing to obeyorders and breaking his contract, and so the decision was taken to dismisshim.86 Thus, in Venetian eyes, inspections were at the heart of the matter.But it was not as simple as that; regularity of pay and the broader dimensionsof the relationship between the condottieri and the state were clearly alsoinvolved.

A broader look at the whole question of discipline will help get the role ofinspection into perspective. The inspections, in fact, only covered certainaspects of discipline. Discipline within the companies, the behaviour oftroops amongst themselves, was entirely the responsibility of the condot-tieri; they alone had the right to discipline their men for brawling amongstthemselves, cheating and robbing each other, etc. If trouble occurredbetween the troops of different companies then the captain-general and hismarshals became involved, particularly if the army was in the field.87

Discipline in the camp was maintained on the basis of camp regulationsissued by the captain-general.88 Carlo Malatesta in 1412 was authorized toemploy a special provost company to enforce camp discipline.89 However, if

84 SS. reg. 34, 42V (26 Oct. 1489). At this stage the matter was postponed, but in November the Senateagreed to pay one month's wages on condition that an inspection was held immediately (ibid., 44; 5Nov. 1489).

85 Dieci , Mis t i , reg. 24, 9 8 - 9 (21 and 27 F e b . 1489).86 S S . reg. 3 4 , 6 4 (14 M a y 1490). T h e vote was a narrow one; 92 senators voted for dismissal and 71 for a

coun te r -mot ion to pos tpone the decision. T h e reasons for the Senate decision were amplified whenAntonmar i a ' s protes ts over his b ro the r ' s dismissal were discussed two mon ths later; however, thedismissal was confirmed ( Ib id . , 68; 8 Ju ly 1490). I t is interest ing to note that when , on the eve ofAgnadel lo , Fracassa ' s n a m e was pu t forward as one of the new captains to be hired, the Senate agreedwi th a good deal of re luctance and a vote of 119 to 67 ( S S . reg. 4 1 , 162; 20 Apr . 1509).

87 Venet ian rectors were ordered not to intervene when fighting broke out between men in thecompanies of Gat tamela ta and Brandol ini . T h i s was a prob lem which had to be left to the twocondot t ier i (Commemor ia l i , x i n , 123-4 , I 2 F e b . 1442; Predell i , iv, 268).

88 Fo r an example of c a m p orders issued by the a rmy commande r , see those issued by Francesco Sforzaand Gat tamela ta in 1439 (Commemor ia l i , x m , 54r -v , 23 J u n e 1439; Predell i , iv, 222).

89 Commemoriali, x, 116; Feb. 1412 (Predelli, iii, 357).

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fighting amongst the troops took place in a Venetian city, or even more if theill discipline of the troops involved civilians or was directed against civilians,then the Venetian rectors and the collaterals had responsibility for dealingwith it.90 This complex system of overlapping responsibilities for disciplineled to confusion and clashes. There clearly had to be close co-operationbetween the army commander and the Venetian officials if discipline at thislevel was to be maintained, and this meant that those officials frequentlyfound themselves having to be lax over the enforcement of the inspectionsystem in order to keep the good will of the captains. In fact the mostnotorious cases of poorly maintained companies were reported by thecollaterals to the Senate, but there the matter was frequently dropped toavoid difficult confrontations.91

Another area that needs to be considered is that of desertion. Theultimate responsibility for preventing desertion from the ranks of thecompanies lay with the condottieri themselves; it was up to them to keep upnumbers and to issue passes to any of their men moving about thecountryside as individuals. Any member of the companies found away fromhis company without a pass could be arrested by a Venetian official and sentback to be disciplined by his captain. With the lanze spezzate and theinfantry the situation was somewhat different; here Venetian officials couldtake direct action against deserters, action which could take the form ofeither mutilation or hanging.92 However, it was not the desertion ofindividual soldiers which was the main problem, but the infidelity anddesertion of captains. This could both erode the morale of the whole armyand be militarily dangerous. At the same time it was notoriously difficult todo anything about such defections once they had taken place. The Senatetended to give as much publicity as possible to such events in order toblacken the reputation of the deserter and hopefully to prejudice his chancesof gaining other employment. It could offer rewards for his recapture anddecree that he should never again be accepted into Venetian service. It couldseize his estates and possessions, and sometimes even his family if thedeserting condottiere had been unwise enough to leave them behind. But in

90 In 1440 Francesco Sforza was called upon to stop troops bullying the local citizenry, but it was hisbrother Alessandro's troops who were involved and so this could be seen as a special plea (SS. reg. 15,51V-52V; 30 Nov. 1440).

91 In 1458 a proposal to retain Cristoforo da Tolentino, despite a highly critical collateral report on hiscompany, was passed in the Senate by an overwhelming majority (SS. reg. 20, 144V; 23 Feb. 1458).Similarly in 1506 the Senate found it hard to do anything about an inspector's report that BernardinoFortebraccio had only 39 effective men-at-arms in a company of 204 (SS. reg. 40, 143; 21 Feb. 1506).

92 After the defeat at Calliano in 1487 one of the vice-collaterals was sent round the countrysideretrieving unearned pay from select militia men who had deserted; in cases where the men had beenreceived back into their families, their fathers were to be held responsible for paying back the money(Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1482-95, i n ; 17 May 1488).

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the last resort the best way to prevent such desertions was by maintaininggood relations with the captains, and making it worth their while to remainin Venetian service.93 Once again, therefore, strict enforcement of theinspection system could militate against such a good relationship. Onthe other hand, the collaterals argued, through their spokesman ChierighinoChiericati in his Trattatello, that the secret of securing faithful and effectiveservice lay in regular and fair distribution of pay, and this in turn dependedon the inspection system.94 Here lay the dilemma; a dilemma one might saybetween a politician's solution and a bureaucrat's solution. On the whole thebureaucrats got their way in the first half of the century, the politiciansincreasingly in the second half. Or perhaps it would be fairer to say that thesolutions worked out in the second half of the century were a sort ofcompromise. Anyway the time has come to move on to the question of pay,which was so intimately linked to inspections.

Venice used two methods of paying condottiere troops during thefifteenth century. The first was based on the ordines a banca and theinspections. The collaterals authorized monthly payments to the companycalculated on the basis of the actual number of men presented for inspection.In addition to the sum thus arrived at the condottiere received a caposoldo, apercentage over and above the figure for his men, usually i ducat per lance,for his own expenses and as a bonus for his officers. Finally, in special casesthe condottiere would receive also a personal salary (provisione) out of whichhe was expected to maintain a personal retinue in addition to his contractedcompany strength. The size of the company, sometimes the rate of pay, andthe arrangements for caposoldo and provisione would all be laid down in theoriginal contract. The essential instrument by which the collateral autho-rized payments was the bolletta which the condottiere presented to therelevant paymaster or treasurer.

The second method was embodied in a much simpler type of contractwhich just stated a total annual sum which would be paid for a certainnumber of troops. This sum, again known as the provisione, was paid ininstalments to the condottiere. Again in very special cases even the numberof troops was not specified and it was left to the captain to maintain an'appropriate' number.

The implications of the former method were that paymasters actuallypaid the troops individually, while in the latter payments were clearly left tothe condottiere. But this further distinction did not necessarily apply; insome cases, either as a result of specific concessions to the condottiere or oflaxness in the system, the computed amount was collected in bulk by the

93 F o r discussion of some of the more notor ious cases of deser t ion, see below, 182-4 .94 Zorzi, 'Chiericati', 428.

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Part I: c. 1400 to

condottiere and distributed by him. However, clearly the or dines a bane amethod (which does not, as some historians have suggested, mean banker'sorder) imposed much stricter control, even if it did not involve actualsupervised pay parades.95

Historically this first method was the prevalent one for most of the firsthalf of the century. Condotte a provisione were used only for very smallcompanies when the force was regarded as no more than a personal retinue,or for detached companies and condotte in aspetto when frequent inspectionsand the presence of a paymaster were impracticable. The only records whichhave survived for the payment of a large company in this period are thoserelating to Michele Attendolo's company in the 1440s, and these suggestthat the system was carefully enforced and the payments accurate andregular.96

The condottieri themselves obviously preferred to receive provisioni, andthere was increasing pressure, initiated by Carmagnola, for a shift towardsthis method. Carmagnola argued that if condottieri were left completelyresponsible for their companies then better companies resulted, as thereputation of the condottieri was at stake.97 But this was not an argumentcalculated to appeal to the collaterals, and by 1454 only certain veryprestigious captains had won the right of provisione payments. FrancescoSforza's condotte took this form, but they were contracts shared by Veniceand Florence.98 Jacopo Piccinino's 1450 condotta and its renewals was theonly major provisione contract awarded by Venice alone in this period, andhe was specifically excused inspections of his troops.99

After 1454, in the prolonged periods of peace when inspections becameless necessary and frequent, and the condottieri more settled and trusted,there was a steady growth in the use of the provisione system.100 Theprovisione gradually became known as the stipendio, and it becameincreasingly recognized that condottieri would not employ the full companycontracted for, but leave a number of places unfilled {paghe morte) in orderto provide themselves with a personal income to replace the old caposoldo. Atthe same time the growth in the proportion of lanze spezzate and infantry95 The two systems of paying troops are clearly apparent from the surviving contracts, and their detailed

implications emerge from a variety of miscellaneous sources. No clear statement of the distinctionshas come to light, although a later manuscript in the Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, gives a summary(Perret, 'Boffile de Juge', 2iqn).

96 Arezzo, Archivio della Confraternita dei Laici, carte di Francesco di Viviano, nn. 151, 156, 157.97 SS. reg. 10, 22 (10 Feb. 1427).98 For one of these contracts, see G. Canestrini (ed.), Documenti per servire alia storia della milizia

itialiana, ASL., xv (1851) 146-55.99 Commemoriali xiv, 57; 7 Mar. 1450 (Predelli, v, 47).

100 Following the agreement of a condotta a provisione with Giovanni Conti in May 1454, the Senateproposed that similar contracts should be given to all the leading condottieri (SS. reg. 20, 2ov; 17May 1454).

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provisionati, who were always, by the very nature of their employment, paiddirectly by the state paymasters, meant that the pay organization was fullyextended to deal with these troops and was consequently more prepared toleave responsibility for the companies to the condottieri.101

Parallel to this development was the increasing use of advances(prestanze). Initially the prestanza, an advance of several months' pay on orshortly after the signing of the contract, was a special payment conceded toallow the captain to prepare his troops and bring them, often considerabledistances, to join Venetian service. If the advance had not been used up bythe time the company reached Venetian territory, then it was paid off by areduction of monthly pay during the early months of service.

With the growth of permanent service it became customary to payadvances on the re-signing of each contract even though no specialmobilization or journeying was involved. By the 1440s it was also becomingthe practice to pay advances both each spring to enable captains to preparetheir troops for active campaigning and after any action which had involvedlosses of horses and equipment. After the defeat at Caravaggio in 1448 thecondottieri were paid advances of 30 ducats a lance to enable them to buyhorses and re-equip their troops quickly.102

With the increasing use of advances pay became more irregular and themonthly pay parade was no longer necessary. In fact the whole developmentmeant that inspection and pay became steadily separated.

Two other facets of pay need to be briefly considered. All payments totroops, whatever system of pay they were on, were subject to a retention bythe state of \ ducat per lance per month for the so-called onoranza di SanMarco. Retentions of this sort were a traditional device used by all Italianstates to involve soldiers in some aspects of the life of the state. In theVenetian case the money was intended to assist with the upkeep of the fabricof the Basilica di S. Marco. On the other hand, another payment to troopswhich became increasingly common in the later years of the century wasfrom the proceeds of the so-called tassa dei cavalli or horse tax. The originsof this tax are extremely obscure in Venetian practice, although wellestablished in Milan. Basically it was a commutation of foddering andpasturage rights conceded to cavalry troops in the condotte, and as such itsevolution will be considered in more detail later in this chapter.103

101 The almost complete lack of surviving material relating to the pay of Venetian troops in the fifteenthcentury makes it impossible to be more specific about trends in this area. A collection of bolletteissued by the vice-collateral Giovanmarco da Arzignano in Brescia in 1495 gives some idea of thepaperwork involved, but it is an isolated survival (Miscellanea carte non appartenenti ad alcunarchivio, 7, conti ed elenchi di soldati). A proposal in 1505 by the inspectors that all troops should bepaid individually rather than through their captains was withdrawn (Sanuto, vi, 248).

102 SS. reg. 19, 185 (7 Feb. 1452).103 See below, 137.

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

The picture which emerges of rates of pay in the Venetian army is one of aslow fall during the first half of the century to a level which remained fairlyconstant from 1454 onwards. However, this is a picture which iscomplicated by the increases in the size of the cavalry lance in the later yearsof the century. In 1404 15 ducats per lance per month was the standard rateof pay; infantry received 3! ducats per man.104 By 1411 the rate had fallen to13 ducats per lance, and by 1425 the average was 11-12 ducats per lance,although there was a growing practice of paying different rates in differentparts of the Terraferma.105 By this time it was rare for the actual rate toappear in the contract, and rates of pay were fixed from year to yeardepending on the costs of food and supplies. In 1444 Michele Attendolo'stroops were getting 10 or 11 ducats per lance depending on whether theywere billeted in the country or in cities. If they were billeted within citywalls then the costs of food were increased by gabelles; hence the higher rateof pay.106 By 1452 Carlo Gonzaga, one of the most prestigious condottieri,was getting 10 ducats per lance for his troops, and many of the smallercompanies were down to 8 ducats.107

For the remainder of the century pay became standardized at around 7 or8 ducats per lance, although the number of payments was accepted as beingten rather than twelve. Hence the rate of pay was frequently expressed as 70or 80 ducats per year. Infantry got 2-2^ ducats per man per month andstradiots 4 ducats per month plus two sacks of corn.108 Sometimes the pay ofthe smaller companies was calculated in florins rather than ducats, whichmeant a lower rate of pay, as the florin was worth rather less than the ducat.In such cases a change from florins to ducats was a form of concession orpromotion granted to a minor condottiere. In the 1490s the standard rate ofpay was increased to 100 ducats per lance per year to take account of theincreases in the size of the lance from four to five men.109 However, theevidence suggests that pay rarely reached this level in fact, and at the sametime the number of payments dropped to eight a year.110 There are someindications that reductions in the number of payments meant reductions inpay. By i486 only four payments were made in peacetime, and one has theclear impression that troops received less pay in peace than in war.111 But

104 Chierighino Chiericati summed up the trends in Venetian pay levels in his Trattatello delta milizia(Zorzi, 428), and his figures are confirmed from the contracts and other surviving material.

105 In 1409 Venice had hoped to reduce the rate of pay to 12 ducats per lance per month, but found that itwas necessary to pay 13 (SS. reg. 4, 74V-76; 12-26 Nov. 1409).

06 SS. reg. 16, 79 (17 Mar. 1444).07 Commemoriali, xiv, 95; 18 Feb. 1452 (Predelli, v, 68).08 ST. reg. 8,76V-77 (14 Dec. 1479) is one of the more explicit statements on pay rates at this time. For

the pay of stradiots, see ST. reg. 9, 79V (21 May 1484).09 C o m m e m o r i a l i , x v m , 124V; 7 Oc t . 1498 (Predel l i , vi, 36).10 S T . reg. 14, 107V-108 (24 Sep t . 1502); reg. 15, 6v (30 M a r . 1504).11 ST. reg. 10, 20 (27 July i486).

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once again without the evidence of the administrative records themselvesone cannot finally determine what Venetian troops actually received around1500. The issue is further complicated by the practice of paying troops inkind. To issue cloth to captains in lieu of a part of their pay was a commonpractice in all Italian armies. In the early fifteenth century some captains gotlands in payment of arrears of pay, and in 1474 Marco Pio got one-quarter ofthe pay of his company in salt from Cervia.112

The problems of discovering how much money troops got from theiremployers and how much individual men got from their captains are mademore difficult by the undoubted abuses in the system. Endless complaintsreached Venice about captains not paying their men what was due to them.But what was due to them in actual cash? Food had to be paid for, and theindications are that these accounts were settled by the treasurers of eachcompany in bulk and the men's pay docked accordingly. Of the 15 to 8ducats allowed per lance how much was reasonably deducted by the captainto pay for upkeep? At what point could troops feel justifiably aggrieved atthe small amount of cash in their pockets? Another characteristic abusestemmed from captains selling their bollette to third parties for sums wellbelow their face value. When such a transaction took place - and they wereformally forbidden by the Venetian authorities - the captain clearly had lessthan the proper amount to pay his troops. But such practices were forced onthe captains by the failure of the relevant treasuries to honour the bollette aswell as by the convenience of using a paper credit system.113 There were alsoinstances of captains and chancellors paying their men in forged money,which seemed to circulate freely in the Veneto.114

This leads us to the central question of how far the abuses and deficienciesin the pay system stemmed from the corruption and cupidity of the captainsand how far from the inability of Venice to produce the sums promised.There can be no doubt that a chronic inability to provide for the proper payof troops was a fundamental weakness of fifteenth-century Italian states.Venice prided itself on being reasonably efficient in this respect in the firsthalf of the century, and the evidence of the payments to the Attendolocompany and the obvious popularity of Venetian service amongst thecondottieri suggest that this pride was at least partly justified. But in thesecond half of the century troops were frequently months, or even years, inarrears with their pay. It is possible to suggest that there was an element ofdeliberate policy in this, as captains who were owed large sums of money by

SS. reg. 26, 102V (24 May 1474).The prevalence of this particular abuse was stressed in a Senate parte of 1475 (ST. reg. 7, 8iv; 27 JulyH75)-For an example, see Dieci, Lettere, 1, 364 (5 May 1475), which ordered the arrest of Bernardo daCrema, chancellor of the lanze spezzate Corneschi, for this fraud.

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a state thought twice before deserting and writing off that credit. But themain cause of the problem was straightforward shortage of cash and anoverstretching of the financial resources of the state. It is therefore necessarynow to look at the wider horizons of war finance and how the money to paytroops was raised in the Venetian state.

Prior to 1417 the army was paid for out of whatever funds were available,both in Venice and the Terraferma, with the traditional device of forcedloans as the main form of extraordinary income. At times of rapidmobilization the bankers were called upon to advance funds, and speciallevies were placed on goods carried on the galleys to pay off the debtsincurred.115 Andrea Priuli put up 26,000 ducats to pay an advance to CarloMalatesta in February 1412 and was again called on in 1417 to provide thenecessary payments for Pandolfo Malatesta.116 However, in November 1417systematic direct taxation was imposed on the Terraferma cities to help payfor the army. The occasion for this new development was the need tomobilize the army as the truce with the Hungarians came to an end, andPadua, Verona and Vicenza were each called upon to raise the moneynecessary to pay 100 lances and 100 infantry; this was reckoned to be about12,000 ducats a year each.117 This tax, known as the collect a lancearum etpeditum or later the dadia delle lanze, was based on the estimo and was leviedthroughout the century, and was always only regarded as a contribution tothe total expenses of the army. Indeed, the proceeds of these taxes tended todecrease as tax exemptions were granted, particularly to Venetians buyingup land in the Terraferma.118 However, it was clearly Venetian policy inthese early years to make the Terraferma largely responsible for paying theexpenses of its own defence, and all surpluses from the Terrafermatreasuries tended to be used for this purpose.119

With the large-scale mobilization going on in 1424/5 it was clear thatTerraferma revenues could not support the increased expenditure, and thesalt office and the officials of the Rialto were called upon to provide extrafunds.120 As the military expenses of the period between 1428 and 1438 were

115 SMi. reg. 50, 82 (10 Mar. 1414).116 SMi. reg. 49, 94 (22 Feb. 1412); reg. 52, 14 (16 May 1417).117 SS. reg. 6,175V-176V (4 Nov. 1417). There was some discussion in the Senate about how to go about

persuading the Terraferma cities to make this contribution, but complete agreement on the need totake such a step and the justice of making the Terraferma subjects responsible for meeting the costsof their own defence. Also on the collecta lancearum, see E. Besta (ed.), Bilanci general! della repubblicadi Venezia, i (Venice, 1912) clxxvii, and C. B. C. Giuliari, Documenti dell''antico dialetto Veronese nelsecolo XV (1411-J2) (Verona, 1879) 6-13.

118 The history of the tax in Verona was summed up in a Senate pane of 1503 from which it was clear thatfor half the century Verona had been paying only half the originally intended sum. This was theresult of a concession granted in 1449 because of the damage done in the Veronese by the armyretreating from Caravaggio, and never effectively revoked (SS. reg. 39, 105; 1 Sept. 1503).

119 Apart from the preambles of the 1417 legislation, see Sanuto, Vite dey dogi, 958.120 S M i . reg. 55, 75 (22 Dec . 1424).

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reckoned at 7 million ducats, and the Terraferma produced less than \million a year for all expenses, this situation certainly continued.121 Duringthe next fifteen years a system by which companies were allotted toindividual Terraferma treasuries for their pay gradually evolved. Theallotment was based on the billeting arrangements, and captains sent theirbollette to the appropriate treasury as soon as the collaterals had carried outtheir inspections. It became the practice to insist that payment of theallotted companies was the first claim on each Terraferma treasury, andgiven the close relationship between good pay and good discipline it wasclearly in the interests of the local authorities to make the system work sothat troops billeted in the area would remain satisfied. In 1442 8100 ducats amonth was being raised in the Terraferma cities for the army, and threeyears later the Terraferma had surpluses of 84,940 lire a month (about15,000 ducats) which went straight to pay the army.122 But frequent resortto loans from Venetian bankers and from the Jews of Mestre show that it wasonly in peacetime that military expenses could be met from Terrafermarevenue.123 In 1448 the army was reckoned to be costing 75,000 ducats amonth, a figure far in excess of that available from the Terrafermatreasuries.124 In the early 1450s the cost of the land war was estimated to be550,000 ducats a year.125

In the later stages of the wars in Lombardy, therefore, a considerable partof the money required for the army was being raised in Venice, and constantcampaigning meant that the companies often spent months away from theirnormal billets and out of touch with the treasuries which were responsiblefor their pay. At the same time a steady decline in the rates of interestavailable on bonds in the Monte Vecchio meant that forced loans werebecoming in effect direct taxes, and this process was to be formalized afterH53-126 This was the context for a proposal in 1449 that the pay systemshould be centralized and all monies should be sent from the local treasuriesto Venice for distribution to the army.127 However, the suggestion receivedlittle support in the Senate at this stage, and the old system of the companiesdrawing their pay direct from local treasuries was largely maintained up to

121 For the estimate of Venetian military expenditure in these years, see Romanin, iv, 219; the figure forTerraferma revenue comes from the Mocenigo oration (Besta, 95).

122 ST. reg. 1, 55r-v (9 Jan. 1442); Collegio, Notatorio, reg. 8, 5V-6 (5 May 1444).123 In 1439 Moses the Jew, of Mestre, was forced to lend 4000 ducats at 12% to pay the arrears of

Gattamelata (SMi. reg. 60,156V; 6 July 1439). Large-scale dependence on the Soranzo and Garzonibanks for advances to cover army pay were a feature of the 1440s (F. Ferrara, 'Documenti per servirealia storia de' banchi veneziani', AV.y i (1871) 111-14).

124 ST. reg. 2, 75V (18 July 1448).125 Besta, 118-19. Army pay in 1450 was reckoned to consume about 36,000 ducats a month, of which

almost half was paid from central funds (SS. reg. 18, 207V; 20 July 1450).126 L a n e , Venice, 238 .127 ST. reg. 2, 100 (7 Jan. 1449).

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Part I: c. 1400 to

1454 and in the first years of peace which followed. But by the later 1460s theidea of a centralized pay system was being aired again, and from then untilthe end of the century there was a constant fluctuation in the method used.

Undoubtedly the main factor which prompted a shift to centralizedfinancing of the army was the war with the Turks. The concentration oftroops in the Morea and on the eastern frontier made it increasinglyimpracticable to expect companies to maintain direct links with thetreasuries in Lombardy and to draw their pay from them. With the warcosting 1,200,000 ducats a year Venice was having to dig deeper and deeperinto its pockets to survive.128 In 1469 the system of direct payments totroops from the Terraferma treasuries was suspended; loans were raised inVenice to provide the necessary cash, and the treasuries then sent theirsurpluses to Venice to pay off the loans.129 In 1473 and 1474 the same stepshad to be taken, although they were always regarded as emergencymeasures.130 The fact that throughout these years large sections of the armyremained based in Lombardy made it difficult to envisage a completetransformation of the old system. It was also clear that pressure from Veniceon the local treasuries to send in as much money as possible had led to thesuspension of payments of all kinds at local level, accompanied bywidespread complaints and distress. In March 1474 it was reported that thearmy was eight months in arrears with pay.131 The new dimension of theTuscan campaign of 1478/9 continued the need for centralized financing,but on 14 December 1479 the Senate ordered a complete restoration of theold system of local responsibility for the paying of troops.132

In the following years it was the norm in peacetime for the old system toprevail, but the War of Ferrara, the German War and the Fornovo crisis allbrought about returns to centralized financing. The mobilization for theWar of Ferrara cost Venice 400,000 ducats in one month at a time when thetotal annual contribution of the Terraferma treasuries was not expected tobe more than half that figure.133 However, it was in July 1488, a moment of

128 Romanin, iv, 350. For some idea of the extraordinary fiscal measures needed to pay these sums, seeBesta, 135-9.

129 S T . reg. 6 , 6 8 (18 Aug. 1469); in addi t ion to the problems of dispersal of t roops at this stage, Colleoniclaimed tha t he was owed 34,000 ducats in back pay (SS . reg. 24, 30V; 9 J u n e 1469).

130 S T . reg . 6 , 1 9 4 v - i 9 5 ( i 4 j a n . 1473); reg . 7 , 2 ( 1 M a r . 1473); A S P . , D u c a l i , reg . B , 164 (16 J u n e 1474).A step towards more organized central accounting of army finance was taken at this time, butdemands for payment to Venice of all funds destined for the army always included numerousexceptions for local garrisons, etc.

131 ST. reg. 7, 31 (5 Mar. 1474).132 ST. reg. 8, 76V-77 (14 Dec. 1479). In the reallocation of companies to individual treasuries which

accompanied this decision, Bergamo, Brescia, Verona and Vicenza alone were responsible for paying19,041 florins a month to troops.

133 Malipiero, Annali veneti, 253; the Lippomanno and Pisani banks were heavily involved in advancingmoney for war expenses at this stage.

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peace, that an attempt was made to centralize army finance on a permanentbasis. An acute pay crisis had arisen despite the peacetime situation; theTerraferma treasuries were failing to fulfil their obligations, and the troopswere getting restive, as they had received only one and a half months' paysince the signing of the peace with the Germans in the previous autumn.134

For two years all payments for troops originated in the central treasury inVenice, and provincial rectors were expected to ensure that all localsurpluses were sent in to meet the costs. But once again it was soon apparentthat the central officials could exercise even less pressure on the localtreasuries than the soldiers themselves. Receipts fell off and the army wasnot better paid. In September 1490 the decentralized system was introducedonce more; the obligations of the provincial treasuries for army pay were setat 167,400 ducats a year, and all other creditors of those treasuries had totake second place to the army.135 For the remainder of this period up to 1508there was continual doubt and dissatisfaction in Venice about the army paysystem, but no systematic attempt to centralize it again was made. Themobilization in the spring of 1495 involved large sums being raised centrallyand a call for repayment from the local treasuries, but little came in.136

Frequent inspections of local accounts were ordered to try and improve cashflows to the troops. Finally in 1508 the sum required from the Terrafermatreasuries was raised from 172,450 to 211,550 ducats, which was recognizedto be still somewhat short of the total amount needed to pay the peacetimearmy.137 At this point the standing army cost about one fifth of the totalrevenue of the state, which was reckoned at 1,150,000 ducats.138

After pay the next most important concern for the troops was billets, andit was this area of administration which caused the greatest tensions betweenthe army and the civilian population. The problem of billeting assumed twodistinct dimensions; temporary billets during the campaigning season andthe permanent quarters allocated to the companies for the winters andduring peacetime. On campaign, while it was sometimes the case that thearmy would be camped in the open, it was more usual for at least aproportion of the troops to be billeted on the local population. The camp

134 SS. reg. 33, I47r-v (24 July 1488). Hieronimo Valier led the opposition to the proposal on thegrounds that centralized financing had been tried many times in the past and had never worked well,but he got little support.

135 ST. reg. 11, 21 (12 Sept. 1490), 36-7 (8 Dec. 1490). The funds set aside in the provincial treasuriesfor priority payments to the army were known as the limitationi.

136 ST. reg. 12, 95 (8 June 1495).137 S T . reg . 16, 57 (12 D e c . 1508), 57V-58V (16 D e c . 1508), 61V-63V (23 D e c . 1508).138 Lane, Venice, 237. The total needed for the standing army was reckoned to be 235,134 ducats, while

surplus income from the Terraferma at this stage was estimated at just over 200,000 (Besta, Bilanci,164-5). I n I5°4 25>000 ducats a year was being spent on the garrisoning of Rimini and Faenza alone(SS. reg. 40, 41; 11 July 1504).

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

orders issued by the captain-general included provision for a specialbilleting squadron made up of representatives from all the companies toaccompany the army commander at all times and assist in the allocation ofbillets each night.139 The presence of the army in an area could lead tounusually heavy billeting burdens on the local population, and it was in thissituation that the greatest tensions arose. It was particularly difficult for thecollaterals and the company chancellors to ensure that fair payment wasmade for billets and food in such temporary conditions. Troops were muchmore likely to cause damage and take what they wanted without paymentwhen they were in transit. However, this was the exceptional situation; formost of the time billeting was far less intensive and onerous.

When not on campaign the army was spread out in permanent billetsright across the Terraferma. This was a system which had developed by theearly 1430s and continued throughout the century.140 For the purposes ofbilleting the Terraferma was roughly divided into three areas. The frontierzones, the Bergamasco, Cremonese, Friuli and the Romagna, usuallysupported relatively few troops in permanent billets but tended to bear thebrunt during campaigning seasons. There was a tendency for the size ofgarrisons in the main frontier towns like Ravenna, Crema, Bergamo andGradisca to increase in the latter part of the century, but the country areas ofthese zones seemed to get off fairly lightly. The main permanent billetingareas were the Bresciano, Veronese, Vicentino and Trevigiano. Here thebulk of the companies were concentrated during peacetime. Finally, thePadovano and the countryside immediately surrounding Mestre and thelagoon seems to have been regarded as a reserve area. Relatively few of thepermanent companies had billets here, although there did tend to be one ortwo large companies based on old garrison towns like Montagnana andMonselice. But the billeting capacity of the area was mostly reserved fornewly arrived companies awaiting inspection and for companies in transitfrom the western to eastern frontier or vice versa. The main point of thisdispersal was to facilitate the provisioning of the army and particularly toease the problem of finding fodder for the horses, and to reduce the burdenon the civilian population, rather than any particularly sophisticatedstrategic plan. No doubt one of the reasons for leaving the areas closer toVenice relatively free of permanent troops was to protect the food suppliesof the city itself. Nevertheless, the billeting pattern undoubtedly conformedto some extent to strategic requirements. The area between Treviso and

139 Commemoriali, xm, 50; 23 June 1439 (Predilli, iv, 222). See above, 121-2.140 One of the first occasions when the system was specifically spelled out was at the end of the

campaigning season of 1431, when shortage of supplies was given as the reason for the wide dispersalof the army into quarters (SS. reg. 12, 19; 14 Sept. 1431).

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Sacile became increasingly important in the second half of the century, as alarge part of the army was required to watch the eastern frontier.

The responsibility of the employing state to provide suitable billets fortroops was usually spelled out in the contracts, but billets were provided freeby Venice only to certain specific companies.141 The captain-general couldusually expect to get free billets for his men, but this was the exceptionrather than the rule. Nevertheless the obligation on most troops to pay a fairrent for their quarters was not always easy to enforce. The collaterals hadoverall responsibility for supervising the billeting system, but very quicklylocal communes began to appoint civilian officials to assist with theallocation of billets and represent the interests of the householders on whomtroops were quartered. The problems inherent in the system were quicklymade clear by the extent to which it became the practice for local authoritiesto levy special taxes on those who did not have troops billeted on them inorder to provide compensation for those who suffered undoubted damagefrom the system, and those who had to provide free billets to favouredcompanies. These taxes soon came to resemble a sort of protection money,an avoidance levy, which in some cases the troops collected themselves as abribe to go elsewhere.142 Such practices were naturally frowned upon by theVenetian authorities, and troops were specifically forbidden to exact moneyfrom the civilian population under any circumstances.143 However, theemergence of these organized compensation systems, which one can observein the Veronese and the Bresciano in the 1440s, eased the traditionalbilleting burdens on local communities considerably. They also probablyhad the effect of taking the pressure off troops to pay their own rent. It wasno doubt easier to raise money from householders anxious to avoid havingtroops billeted on them than it was to get it out of captains and chancellorswho were already having difficulty collecting their pay in full. This wouldparticularly have been the case after 1454 when the organization was clearly

141 This was made clear to Michele Attendolo when he approached Venice for a condotta in 1430. Heasked for free billets and was told firmly that he would have to pay - 'as do our other troops' (SS. reg.11, 109V-110V; 18 May 1430).

142 For discussion of the problems of billeting in the Veronese in the first half of the century, see Law,'Verona', 283-9. While the surviving archives of the Terraferma cities yield a certain amount ofdisparate material on the question of army billeting in the fifteenth century, no sustained series ofrecords has come to light. For an example of a formal agreement on billets with Michele Attendolo in1444 which brings out the extent to which compensation systems had grown up, see Giuliari,Documenti dell'antico dialetto Veronese, 8-9. I am indebted for information on this subject, as on anumber of others related to the Padovano, to the kindness of Dr Michael Knapton, who showed methe preparatory drafts of some chapters of his thesis ('Capital city and subject province: financial andmilitary relations between Venice and Padua in the later fifteenth century', Oxford D.Phil., 1978).

143 ST. reg. 6, 28V-29 (5 July 1468). One can follow these instructions being transmitted to theBresciano on 9 July in ASB., Territoriale, reg. M1, 24-5.

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Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

beginning to creak.144 It is also in the context of informal changes of this sortthat one has to see the decline in formal rates of pay.

On the whole it was the country areas that had to bear the main burdens ofaccommodating troops. In the early years of the century there was a greatertendency to hold large garrisons in the cities for reasons of internal security.The surrender of Verona in 1405 meant an immediate influx of soldiers, andthe communal council responded by appointing a citizen to supervise thebilleting arrangements within the city.145 He was expected to check housesbefore troops took them over and keep a record of damage done. However,by 1408 the size of the garrison was being limited and efforts were beingmade to accommodate it entirely within the citadel. This meant in factremoving those Veronese families which had settled within the walls of thecitadel.146 But once this had been achieved an acceptable degree ofseparation between troops and civilian population was established and theproblems within the city were considerably reduced. The same process canbe seen taking place in Padua, where by 1408 troops were being withdrawninto a compound round the Palazzo del Capitano and the citadel itself.147

Within these citadels the normal form of accommodation for troops wasin ordinary houses which the men rented either for families or in bachelorgroups. There is no indication at this stage of the building of specialbarracks for them. Special temporary barracks were built for the pioneersand troops constructing and manning the Livenza fortifications in 1411, butthis was an exceptional situation.148 By this time, and increasingly after 1420as the size of the army really began to expand, billeting normally took theform of the allocation of companies, or parts of companies, to rural villageswhere the men were either billeted with families or took over housesentirely. By the middle of the century it is clear that billeting obligations andthe emerging complementary tax systems were primarily a rural problem;the cities were largely insulated from them.149 The exceptions to this generalpractice in the later part of the century were the frontier garrison towns.During the 1470s the troops garrisoning the eastern frontier wereincreasingly concentrated in Gradisca and Foglianica, while householdsthroughout Friuli were called upon to contribute to the expenses of thegarrison through special taxes.150 In Gradisca special accommodation for

144 Alvise Querini reported a case of exactly this sort from Rovigo in 1484 when the men-at-arms werebusy collecting bribes off the countryfolk to go and billet themselves elsewhere (Senato, Lettere diRettori, 11; 7 Sept. 1484).ASVe., Archivio del Comune, 395 at 31 July 1405.SMi. reg. 48, 2 (29 Apr. 1408).Ibid., 39 (16 Oct. 1408), 72V (19 Apr. 1409).SS. reg. 4, 219V (18 Dec. 1411).Pasero, 'Aspetti dell'ordinamento militare', 25.

150 ST. reg. 7, 39V (17 May 1474); reg. 8, 107 (12 Sept. 1480).

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the troops was built, although it still took the form of small houses ratherthan large barrack blocks. Ravenna, which was also being converted into agarrison town at this stage, presented different problems because of its largeindigenous population. When in 1462 it was planned to increase the garrisonwith the addition of Cristoforo da Tolentino's company there was a greatoutcry, because this would have involved commandeering 60 houses inaddition to those already occupied by Bertoldo d'Este's troops.151 As a resultthe strengthening of the garrison was postponed and work went ahead on thefortress, which was to include accommodation for a considerable number oftroops within its outer walls. In Rimini, which by 1506 had temporarilybecome a Venetian garrison town, arrangements were made to convert thecortile della gabella vecchia into a barracks complex with 52 rooms forsoldiers.152

One of the main problems associated with the growing permanence of thebilleting arrangements was that troops tended to become too integrated intolocal communities. Some of the companies were clearly sinking their rootsdeep into local life; soldiers bought property, although expressly forbiddento do this, married local girls and even took up occupations within the localeconomy. Chierighino Chiericati saw it as one of the main responsibilities ofthe collaterals to organize a move round of the companies every two years toavoid these dangers.153 But there is little evidence of this happening in anyorganized way. While in the first half of the century the local collateral mighthave had sufficient authority to move troops round his own area, thegrowing tendency to centralize military administration in the second half ofthe century meant that the administrators became more remote from theselocal problems. By the 1490s the savi della terraferma claimed respon-sibility for billeting arrangements, but there are no signs of any periodic andlarge-scale reallocation of billets.154 As a result companies could becomewidely dispersed, and there were even cases in frontier areas of troops beingbilleted by their captains outside Venetian frontiers altogether.155

A related issue, and one to which we shall return, was the extent to whichthe development of permanent quarters affected the attitudes of the troopsin the field. The prospect of getting back to their established billets, theirfamilies and even their 'civilian' occupations weighed heavily with thecompanies towards the end of the campaigning season. The issue of when todisperse the army to quarters was one that was fiercely contested between

151 ST. reg. 5, 26 (10 Dec. 1462).152 ST. reg. 15, ioov (22 Apr. 1506).153 Zorzi, 'Chiericati', 432.154 ST. reg. 11, 65V (21 May 1491). In 1505 a proposal to rationalize the billeting system and reallocate

billets was decisively defeated in the Senate (SS. reg. 40, 127V; 25 Oct. 1505).155 ST. reg. 11, 117V (3 Aug. 1492).

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

successive captains-general and the Venetian authorities, and it wasprobably considerably influenced by pressure from below to get back to thecomfortable and organized life of the permanent quarters.156

While the main responsibilities for billeting the troops seemed to restwith the collaterals, when it came to provisioning and munitions a widevariety of lesser officials were involved. However, one aspect of provision-ing, the provision of fodder and straw for the horses and wood to keep thetroops warm, was closely linked to the condotte and to the billetingarrangements, and therefore did involve the collaterals directly. The detailedcontracts which survive from the early part of the century make it clear thatcavalry troops were entitled to free allocations of bedding straw andfirewood provided by the communities on which they were billeted. Theprovision of free straw was justified by the fact that the eventual stablemanure was considered to remain the property of the landlords and familieson whom the troops were billeted, and therefore there was a balancedmutual advantage in the arrangement.157 Wood was usually a freecommodity anyway in country areas, as it was largely cut on common land.The normal allocation of these commodities was ten cartloads of wood andfour or five of straw per lance each year. It was not usual for infantryconstables to get even the supply of firewood, although in 1469 Matteo daSant'Angelo, the captain of infantry, was regarded as a special case andgiven a free allocation of wood in his billets in Crema.158

On the question of fodder for horse the issues were rather more complex.The normal contract did not specifically allow either free allocations offodder or pasturage rights. Favoured companies, such as those of thecaptains-general, sometimes got concessions, as they did free billets; indeedthe two tended to go together. However, in practice strictly controlledpasturage rights were allowed. Troops were normally allowed to put theirhorses on non-agricultural land such as marshland or woodland at any time,and on stubble from the middle of June until October. An exception to thiswas stubble sown with clover, which was protected.159 They were also, insome circumstances and in some areas, given access to grass pasture in Mayand early June, but this seems to have been the result of special negotiationand special concession.160 Normally, at least until the middle of the century,

156 See below, 178.157 The importance of this exchange of'goods and services' was emphasized in billeting regulations

issued in the Bresciano in 1467 (ASB., Territoriale, reg. M1, 23; 20 May 1467). See also on thissubject Commemoriali, xv, 112 (Predelli, v, 160-1). However, once again captains-general tended toget special concessions, and in his 1468 condotta Colleoni was allowed to sell his stable manure(Commemoriali, xv, 110-11; 24 Oct. 1468 - Predelli, v, 176-7).

158 ST. reg. 6, 66v (n Aug 1469).159 Giu l ia r i , Documenti dell'antico diuletto, 8 -9 . Be lpe t ro M a n e l m i was negot ia t ing over these r ights wi th

local representatives in the Bresciano in 1444 (ASB., Territoriale, reg. M1, 12; 16 May 1444).160 For example, see ASB., Territoriale, reg. M1, 12 (29 May 1443).

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the line was taken that if they wanted grass or hay then they had to pay for it.However, there was an increasing tendency after the 1440s to allocatelimited supplies of hay free to troops, normally a cartload per lance permonth, and to compensate the suppliers out of taxes.161 This in turn threwup a host of related disciplinary problems, as troops were sometimes foundto be selling their free supply of fodder at a profit, and claiming more thanthey were entitled to by citing contract strengths rather than actualstrengths.

This gradual and rather informal extension of the concessions allowed totroops, and the subsequent increased pressure on the rural population, ledin the second half of the century to an equally informal process ofcommutation. Clearly also troops took what they required in defiance of allregulations, thus accelerating the process. Increasingly in the second half ofthe century one finds reference to horse taxes, a system of commutationalready well established in the duchy of Milan. Like the billetingcompensation levies, these were in theory collected by local rectors andprobably imposed initially on those of the rural population who were notinvolved in providing fodder for the cavalry.162 But by the late fifteenthcentury it is clear that some general horse tax system, in lieu of commitmentto provide for the needs of the horses, was beginning to operate, and oftenthis must have been levied by the troops themselves.163 So well establishedwas the idea of a horse tax by 1500 that some men, not necessarily soldiers atall, were authorized to draw their entire salaries in the form of an equivalentamount of horse tax. Ettore di Ridolfo Gonzaga, who was given a provisioneof 8 ducats a month for life after his father's death at Fornovo, asked in 1503that this be converted into tax proceeds for twenty horses.164 This formula,twenty units of horse tax being the equivalent of 8 ducats per month, was notan unusual one, and clearly as horse taxes could be collected directly fromthe local population they represented a more secure form of income than aprovisione which had to be squeezed out of a local treasury. The extent towhich, by the early years of the sixteenth century, horse taxes were beingused to provide perquisites and salaries for a wide range of posts makes onewonder how far one can see here a genuine shift of the real tax burdentowards the rural population.

His horse was the most valuable item of equipment that a man-at-armspossessed. His war horse could cost anything from 20 ducats, a price which161 Ibid., fols. 1 iv, 20, 23; Ferrari, 'Com'era amministrato una comune', 235-6.162 The informal arrangements which were emerging were referred to in a Senate minute of 1468 (ST.

reg. 6, 28V-29; 5 July), but the tassa de cavalli was not formally recognized and regulated until 1517(M. Knapton,' II fisco nello stato veneziano di terraferma tra '300 e '500: la politica delle entrate', in/ / sistema fiscale veneto, ed. G. Borelli et al. (Verona, 1982) 21-2).

163 Giorgio da Martinengo, billeted in Asola and sent to Friuli, was instructed to continue collecting histaxes in Asola (ST. reg. 7, 167V; 10 June 1477).

164 ST. reg. 14, 142V (14 Mar. 1503).

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would scarcely distinguish it from the nag ridden by his sergeant, to the 200ducats paid for each of the four great Hungarian war horses which HermesBentivoglio sold to Pandolfo Malatesta in 1507.165 However, the averageprice for a standard mount was 30-40 ducats, which already representednearly half the annual wage for the entire lance formation.166 In thesecircumstances it is not surprising that the inspectors concentrated a gooddeal of attention on the horses when drawing up the muster rolls and usingthem, and that condottieri felt particularly keenly the problem of how toreplace horses lost in battle. In the muster rolls the horses of a company weredescribed as carefully as the men, indeed often with greater care. Frequentlytheir value was also recorded, and all the horses in a company were brandedwith the condottiere's emblem. These precautions were taken to avoidimproper substitution and to make the task of inspecting the companies andensuring their battleworthiness easier. The collateral was usually ac-companied on his inspections by a marshal who was supposed to know abouthorses, and any well-established condottiere company also contained amarshal who presumably also doubled as a vet.

The growing tendency in fifteenth-century warfare to concentrate one'shostility on the enemies' horses, a practice supposedly initiated by theSforzeschi in the early part of the century, considerably exacerbated theproblem of replacement. Horses figured prominently amongst the bootyshared out after any battle, and they were also extremely vulnerable to thegrowing fire-power of fifteenth-century armies. Horse armour was aninevitable but costly innovation, and initially few could afford it. In thesecircumstances the replacement of horses was a burning issue. Early-fifteenth-century condotte always contained clauses imposing strict timelimits within which lost horses had to be replaced if the condottieri were toavoid heavy fines. These regulations were framed at a time when it was stillcommon practice for the employing state to pay the cost of replacement ofhorses, and therefore they were less harsh than they appeared. But already inthese early years of the century employers were rejecting this obligation,which had been standard in the fourteenth century, and this caused risingfriction and genuine hardship to the condottieri. Venice, when confrontedwith these problems in the early years of the wars in Lombardy,compromised in various ways. Sums were paid secretly to favouredcondottieri to help them out of their difficulties without, hopefully, creating

165 Venice advanced half the money to Pandolfo, who was currently in its pay (ST. reg. 15, 166; 10 July1507).

166 This was the average price in 1477-8 when Lorenzo Loredan was concerned with the re-equipping ofthe army after the defeat by the Turks in the autumn of 1477 (Senato, Provveditori da Terra e daMar, 24, 175-7).

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precedents;167 the time limits for replacing horses were extended. In 1432 itwas agreed that condottieri would not be fined for failing to replace losthorses until they had been in winter quarters for a month.168 Gradually thepractice evolved of giving advances to condottieri who had lost horses inbattle to enable them to replace their mounts quickly. Like so manyVenetian solutions, this seemed fair and reasonable in theory, but quicklyled to distortions of pay arrangements which had far wider and more seriousramifications.

The actual process of replacing lost horses was supposed to be checkedvery carefully by Venetian officials. They were concerned not only to ensurethat the horse had been lost legitimately, particularly if some form ofcompensation was in question, but also that the replacement was a suitableone. Condottieri were expected, when practicable, to take the skin of thedead horse to a Venetian rector to show him the branding and prove boththeir ownership of the horse and its value. The replacement horse had to beinspected and branded at the earliest possible opportunity. In practice, ofcourse, such regulations were impossible to enforce effectively, particularlyafter a disaster like Caravaggio, in which 10,000 horses were lost.

The problem of replacing horses was not just one of cost, but also oflimited supply. The rearing of horses does not seem to have been awidespread occupation in Italy. A certain amount went on in the Kingdomof Naples, and, at the top of the market, the Gonzaga were noted breeders offine war horses. But the main sources of supply for Venice were Germanyand Hungary. German horse dealers were often to be found in the Venetoand at times they were encouraged in their trade by special bonuses from theVenetian government for horses imported into the state. Herman ofNuremburg & Co. was a particularly active firm of horse dealers in the 1470sand 1480s, sometimes supplying over 100 horses at a time to the army.169

But the problem remained acute, particularly with regard to good warhorses. A small source of supply which was tapped with some reluctance wasthe horses acquired by each Venetian rector in the Terraferma at thebeginning of his term of office for himself and his entourage. It was thenormal custom for the dozen or so horses needed by each official to bebought in Venice or Padua, and then disposed of at the end of the tour ofduty. Such rectors were strictly forbidden to sell to soldiers direct, but it wascommon practice to sell to the collaterals at an agreed valuation, and the167 Venice, under pressure from Carmagnola, put up iooo ducats to help replace lost horses in 1427, but

urged him to pretend that it was his own money (SS. reg. 10, 55; 20 June 1427).168 SS. reg. 12, 126 (5 Sept. 1432).169 ST. reg. 8, 63 (23 Sept. 1479); reg. 9, 7V (4 June 1483), 94V (23 July 1484). Horse dealers were

exempted from paying duties after Caravaggio (ST. reg. 2, 84; 24 Sept. 1448), and were offeredspecial bonuses for supplying the army in 1479 (ST. reg. 8, 39; 9 Feb. 1479).

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horses were then passed on to the army.170 This practice was stopped in1491, as it was clear that the rectors were in fact selling direct to the troops atinflated prices.171 By this time the requisitioning of horses at times ofmobilization was the standard way of solving the problem quickly; but ascivilians were, in theory, forbidden to possess war horses unless they hadbeen formally released by the army as unsatisfactory or surplus torequirements, such requisitioning should not have produced very effectivemounts and was presumably intended to provide horses for the baggagetrain and artillery.172

The obscurities and difficulties which surrounded the system ofproviding and maintaining horses largely disappear when we turn to theprovision of supplies to the troops themselves. However, although the broadoutlines are clear, relatively little detail on provisioning can be gleaned fromthe surviving records. Troops were always expected to pay for their foodsupplies in Venetian territory, although living off the land in the truest senseof the word was one of the advantages to be gained from invadingneighbouring territories. In quarters the companies dealt directly withcivilian suppliers in a normal way; it was only when the army was assembledin the field that provisioning became a problem for the military adminis-tration. Basically there were two ways to solve it; either the officialprovisioners could buy supplies in bulk and sell them to the troops, or theycould encourage merchants to come and sell to the army. The latter methodrequired a fairly static camp to be effective on a large scale; a siege situationwas a typical one in which merchants would receive concessions on thenormal sales and transit duties if they would supply the besieging camp.173

The army provisioners frequently resorted to ferrying bulk supplies fromVenice by sea and river, but occasionally they requisitioned supplies of grainfrom local communities at artificially low prices. Predictably, we know moreabout the abuses in the system than about the system itself, so it is difficult tosay more than that provisioning worked effectively on some occasions butnot on others. Similarly, although we know that all castles were supposed tobe stocked with considerable quantities of food supplies and munitions at alltimes, the only moments when the records mention the problems ofmaintaining these supplies is when, due to some fraud or inattention, thesupplies dropped below the expected levels. However, the provisioning ofcastles was the responsibility of local Venetian rectors and not of the armyprovisioners.170 ST. reg. 2, 82V (11 Sept. 1448); reg. 6, 143 (16 Sept. 1471).171 ST. reg. 11, 59V (20 Apr. 1491).172 For the ban on the civilian possession of war horses, see ST. reg. 8, n 8 v (22 Feb. 1481).173 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 813. In the War of Ferrara, merchants were encouraged to come and sell

provisions in the camp by the lifting of duties, but it was soon discovered that some of the provisionsexempted from duty were being sold in Venice (ST. reg. 9, 10; 23 June 1483).

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The supply of munitions and arms was only partly organized centrally.Traditionally condottieri were responsible for arming their men properly,and they bought the necessary equipment wherever they could. However,with the growing permanence of the army there was an obvious tendency tomaintain some central supplies, and by 1431 at least there was a member ofthe Venetian chancellery staff, Carlo Riversi, with the army and responsiblefor munitions.174 In moments of crisis quantities of arms, particularlyhandguns, were sent from Venice in bulk; these tended to come either fromthe Arsenal or the armoury of the Council of Ten. Throughout the centurythe Arsenal, and the proveditors of the Arsenal, were responsible for thesupplies of artillery, powder and shot needed for the army. Saltpetre formaking gunpowder was imported in bulk, usually from southern Italy. Bythe 1480s one of the vice-collaterals was responsible for munitions supply tothe army, but probably even by this time his main concern was with theartillery train rather than with maintaining a full stock of replacementequipment.175 But around 1500 the Council of Ten began to take a keeninterest in the artillery and ordered that guns, powder and shot should bestockpiled at various points in the Terraferma.176 Venice was also fortunatein having the arms industry of Brescia close at hand to furnish the army inthe field.

On the provision of clothing to the army we know nothing apart from thepractice of paying a part of what was due to the companies in cloth. This wasoriginally a matter of convenience and shortage of specie rather than thebeginnings of the establishment of a uniform for the army. But by 1509 atleast the Venetian provisional were clothed in red and white striped jerkinswhich were presumably issued centrally.

Apart from provisioning there were few services that were organizedcentrally in the Venetian army. Traditionally the larger condottierecompanies contained such figures as chancellors, marshals, musicians,chaplains, and even doctors or barber-surgeons. Certainly the captain-general would have been attended by such men as part of his suite. MaestroVinciguerra was Carmagnola's doctor and Antonio Cermisone attendedGattamelata, although whether actually in the field is not known.177

174 S M i . reg. 58, 57V (19 M a y 1431).175 ST. reg. 10,7 (20 Apr. i486). For the military equipment offered by Venice to Pius II for the crusade

in 1463, see ASF., Strozziana I, cclvi, 2. The list included 1500 bombards, 14,000 handguns, 7000breastplates, 2 shiploads of lances, 6000 spades, 3000 scaling ladders, 7000 barrels for bridge repairs,etc.

176 D iec i , Mi s t i , reg. 28 , 112V-113 (28 F e b . 1500). See below, 167.177 Vinciguerra claimed 434 ducats off Carmagnola's estate after his execution (Dieci, Misti, reg. 11,85V;

27 Aug. 1433). The Bergamasque humanist Giovanni Michele Alberto Carrara was doctor to Robertoda Sanseverino during the war of Ferrara (DBL, xx, 685).

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However, in 1437 Pietro Loredan, the proveditor, was instructed to find adoctor and a barber-surgeon to serve in the army, and undoubtedly suchprovision was common in fifteenth-century armies. In this case the doctorwas to be paid 15 ducats a month and the barber-surgeon 6.178 In October1482 Giovan Antonio da Feltre, prior of the college of doctors in Venice, wasconsulted by the Collegio on the salaries to be paid to doctors serving in thearmy.179 Alessandro Benedetti at Fornovo also seems to have been acting asarmy doctor rather than attendant on Gonzaga or any of the leadingcondottieri. But he offered his services on this occasion in order to gainexperience of treating war wounds and adding to his anatomical knowledge;there is no indication that he held a regular appointment as a militarydoctor.180

Similarly there was a lack of centralized control for most of the fifteenthcentury in the whole question of the training of the army. Condottieri wereresponsible for the skill and training of their men, and undoubtedly informaljousting and tilting were an essential part of life both in the camp and inquarters. The tournament remained a very popular form of publicentertainment and ceremony in the Veneto, and even in Venice itself, andwas an occasion for the troops to show off their skills. There are indicationsthat at least some of the inspections were intended to be military exercises aswell as formal parades.181 The initial muster of a company had this dualpurpose from an early stage, but this is very different from any sort of centralconcern for day-to-day training. At a different level, of course, there hadlong been such a concern in Venice with regard to promoting the skill ofindividual Venetians in handling the crossbow. This skill was fostered byfrequent public competitions at which prizes were offered; but these wereprimarily intended to provide trained men to defend the galleys. However,when in 1490 formal training was introduced for the handgunmen of theselect militia, competitions and prizes were an essential feature of thearrangements. Regular training sessions under approved masters of the artwere established at the same time, and, as we have seen, concern for theformal training of bombardiers was also a feature of the later years of thefifteenth century.182 By the turn of the century this interest in encouragingindividual skills was being translated into a concern for regular militaryexercises of whole companies and divisions of the army. The tendencytowards mass parades and inspections in the late 1490s certainly carried, with

78 Col legio , Commiss ion i Secre te , reg. 4 , 102V (1 J u n e 1437).79 Collegio, No ta to r io , reg. 13, 19 (9 Oct . 1482).80 In addi t ion to his diary of the campaign edited by Schull ian, see R. Massalongo, 'Alessandro

Benedet t i e la medicina veneta del ' 400 ' , Atti. 1st. Ven., lxxiv (1916-17) 197-259.81 See below, 148, 149-50.82 See above, 85-6.

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it the implications of occasional large-scale manoeuvres, and the 1507/8militia regulations contained provision for the sort of company trainingwhich was essential for pike infantry.183 By this time the condottieri werebeing encouraged to take on apprentices, although this was only theformalization of a very traditional practice.184

A final area of day-to-day concern of the military organization was thehandling of prisoners and booty. Here once again we must refer to thecontracts for a view of the traditional practices. Prisoners and booty were theproperty of the condottiere companies who took them, with certain clearlydefined exceptions. As regards prisoners, rebels of the employing state,enemy princes and their families, and senior captains were all regarded asprisoners of the state if captured and had to be handed over by the captors inreturn for an agreed ransom paid by the state. Booty was divided betweenmovables, which belonged to the captor and his men, and property,fortresses, city walls, buildings, etc., which had to be handed over to therepresentatives of the state intact and without recompense.185 Furthermorea levy of 10% was imposed by the state on all booty captured. Theenforcement of these contractual arrangements was a part of the duties ofthe collaterals and proveditors.

In practice the fate of a prisoner depended largely on his economic andsocial standing. Rank-and-file soldiers were usually released immediately bytheir captors after being stripped of their arms and horses; neither thecompanies nor the state had the facilities to keep them as prisoners, norindeed was there any interest in setting up such facilities. In a mercenarysystem there was no concern with depriving the enemy of potentialmanpower, as this could always be recruited afresh; the damage was done byforcing him to re-equip and rehorse his troops. For the same reasons therewas little point in killing or mutilating prisoners; such practices would onlylead to reprisals and were rare except in particular circumstances whenknown deserters were involved, or specially trained men who would be hardto replace, like bombardiers and handgunmen.186 Men of any socialstanding were held for ransom. Such prisoners tended to gravitate into thehands of condottieri, as a man-at-arms usually found it easier to sell aprisoner to his captain, who was more likely to have the facilities for keeping

Q3 for manoeuvres in the Bresciano in 1498.184 ST. reg. 15, 22(3 July 1504).185 Ma l l e t t , Mercenaries and their Masters, 8 5 - 6 .186 The classic case was the mutilation of Venetian bombardiers and handgunmen by Paolo Vitelli after

the fall of Buti in 1498, but it is clear from Venetian sources and from the rewards and pensions givento such men that the practice of mutilating and killing captured gunners was fairly common in thelate fifteenth century. After Buti the Venetians thought of retaliating by offering the stradiots 3ducats for each head of a Florentine mounted crossbowman they brought back, but the idea wasvoted down in the Senate by a small majority (SS. reg. 37, 38V; 29 Aug. 1498).

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him and negotiating the ransom. Sometimes the negotiations took aconsiderable time and in these circumstances the condottiere would oftenhand his prisoner over to the state for safekeeping while retaining his rightsto that part of the eventual ransom which was not consumed in maintenancecharges.187 Thus the prisons in the Ducal Palace often contained prisonersof war, although it was also sometimes the practice to release such men onbail after they had taken an oath not to leave the city.188 The distinctionsbetween the prisoners of the condottieri and those of the state were carefullyobserved, not just because the latter tended to command higher ransoms butalso because it could often be a matter of state policy not to ransom them atall for the time being. State prisoners of war when released were required totake an oath not to fight against Venice for a specific period. This wasstandard practice in Italy, and the oaths were more often honoured than not,as the personal dangers involved if one broke the oath and was subsequentlycaptured again were considerable.189 Venetian condottieri who returnedfrom an enemy prison in this situation were allowed to retire temporarily onreduced salaries until the terms of the oaths expired.190 It was not normallythe practice for Venice to pay the ransoms of its captured condottieri,although the state would help to arrange an exchange if that was practicable.A Venetian condottiere who was recovered by exchange was normallyexpected to pay his ransom to the state, through reductions in pay, tocompensate for the ransom which the state had lost in negotiating hisexchange.191

The capture of booty on a large scale made surprisingly little impact inthe surviving Venetian military records, and we have no means of knowinghow far the 10% levy was enforced. The large number of horses captured atCasalmaggiore in 1446 and divided up amongst the condottieri seems tohave been an unusual windfall worthy of note; but on this occasion there isno reference to the state's share.192 Otherwise it is clear that the state movedquickly to claim its rights in respect of captured towns and castles, and there

187 Gattamelata sent Gaspare de' Canedoli to Venice for safekeeping in 1434, and was expected to pay hisexpenses (SS. reg. 13, 140; 23 Feb. 1435).

188 Cesare da Martinengo was held prisoner in Venice for some months in 1440, although at the requestof Francesco Sforza he was allowed his freedom within the city on bail of 20,000 ducats (SMi. reg. 60,208; 12 Apr. 1440).

189 The Milanese infantry constable Cristoforo da Montecchio, who was captured in the War of Ferraraby Sanseverino and released on oath, found a very different fate awaiting him when he was capturedfor a second time before the oath had expired. He was imprisoned by the Council of Ten, torturedand strangled in his cell (Dieci, Misti, reg. 22, 65-6; 31 May-i June 1484).

190 For the case of Giovanni Malavolta in this situation, see SS. reg. 13, 253 (25 July 1436).191 Venice paid 1500 ducats to ransom the condottieri captured by the Turks in 1477. This money was

subtracted from the back pay which had accumulated during their imprisonment (ST. reg. 8, 14; 1July 1478).

192 S a n u t o , Vite de dogi, 1122.

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is no evidence that the division of booty raised any particular tensionsbetween soldiers and the state. Nor is there any indication that access tobooty had any effect on the normal pay procedures of the republic.

One of the major problems in the relations between any late-medievalarmy and its employer was demobilization. Demobilized troops, par-ticularly if released in complete companies, were liable to prey on thecivilian population and become organized bands of outlaws. Venice in thefifteenth century largely avoided this through the precocious developmentof its permanent army. Only in 1405 did Venice face the problem of large-scale demobilization involving the paying off of large numbers of condot-tieri, and this moment has already been discussed.193 After this, demobiliz-ation usually took the form of reductions of companies; this could beaccomplished without difficulty, as it was only a trickle of disorganized menwho were concerned, and they naturally tended to be the oldest and leasteffective members of the companies. The collaterals were expected to keep acareful note of all men dismissed, particularly if they were dismissed forinefficiency, and circulate details to their colleagues to ensure that theywould not be re-employed elsewhere in the Venetian state.194 Infantrycompanies were frequently disbanded in their entirety, but this posed fewerproblems, as any danger from such a source could be quickly stifled by usingcavalry against them.

There remained the problem of breaking up the company of a captured,disgraced or dead condottiere. In the case of captured condottieri the policywas always to wait some time before taking any decision to dissolve theleaderless company. Temporary arrangements would be made for itscontrol in the hope that the condottiere would soon be ransomed orexchanged. Much depended, both in such cases and in cases of the death ofthe condottiere, on whether there was a natural successor - son, brother,nephew, brother-in-arms, etc. If there was, and if the company was notnotably inefficient, then the change of leadership would be accepted andformalized without question. When there was no natural successor or whenthe company was unsatisfactory for some reason, then it was quietlydisbanded. Usually the best men were invited to join the lanze spezzate, andsometimes other condottieri would be invited to take over sections of thecompany and add them to their own. But in such circumstances there wasalways a fairly ruthless weeding out of the poorer-quality troops. In 1432Carmagnola's company was broken up without difficulty by the proveditorsoffering full pay, and employment to all those who wished to stay on inVenetian service. Some of the squadron leaders were given their own

193 See above, 24-5.194 SMi. reg. 55, 69 (18 Nov. 1424).

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condotte, and many of the men were drafted into the lanze spezzate.195

Similarly after Gianfrancesco Gonzaga's retirement in 1437 the bulk of hiscompany was broken up by allotting sections of it to other condottieri.196

When Carlo Gonzaga died in Venetian service in 1457 his 63 men-at-armswere inspected by the Lieutenant of Friuli; 13 were found to be useless andwere dismissed, and the rest were formed into two small companies underhis leading squadron commanders.197

The exceptional circumstance was when a condottiere had to be disposedof forcibly because he was threatening desertion or consistently disobeyingorders. In such cases, and Colleoni's impending desertion in 1451 was themost outstanding one, the captain-general and the proveditors were calledupon to mobilize faithful troops, and particularly lanze spezzate, against thesuspect company and if necessary destroy it by force. In 1451 Colleonihimself escaped such a coup at Isola della Scala, but most of his troops wererounded up and large numbers of them were drafted into the lanze spezzatebecause they were basically good men.198

In 1484 and 1485, after the Peace of Bagnolo, demobilization on a fairlylarge scale was ordered. Large numbers of infantry were dismissed, but thisposed no great problems. Amongst the cavalry a number of minorcondottieri were dismissed altogether after individual balloting in theSenate, but the main device employed, as usual, was either reducing thecaptains to personal provisioni, or merely reducing the size of theircompanies.199

So far this discussion has been largely confined to the field army; itremains to say a few words about the organization of garrison troops. Tosome extent, of course, the units were interchangeable; infantry companiesin peacetime usually served as garrison troops, and when fighting broke outthe garrisons in rear areas were stripped of men to fill up the ranks of theinfantry. But some element of permanent guard had also to be provided.The citizens of the cities of the Terraferma were expected to play their partin guarding the walls, but gates and key points in the defences wereentrusted to Venetian-appointed castellans and provisionati. Similarly,outlying castles had their castellans appointed centrally, although whetherthe appointment was actually made in Venice or in the nearest provincialcentre depended on the strategic importance and size of the castle.Castellanships allotted in Venice were divided among Venetian nobles,Venetian citizens and professional infantry constables. Responsibility for

195 SS. reg. 12, 80 (14 Apr. 1432).196 SS. reg. 14, 84 (28 Dec. 1437).197 SS. reg. 20, 114V (20 Jan. 1457); ST. reg. 4, 26 (22 Jan. 1457).198 Belotti, Colleoni, 211 and SS. reg. 19, 65V (22 June 1451).199 ST. reg. 9, 100 (25 Aug. 1484), 103 (30 Aug. 1484); SS. reg. 32, 96 (2 Oct. 1484).

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inspecting castles and garrisons and for maintaining standards of disciplineand the necessary stocks of provisions and munitions for each lay withprovincial rectors. A whole section of the army regulations covered thegarrisons, and particularly the relations between garrison troops and thecivilian population, which were intended to be kept to a minimum.200

On the whole Venetian garrison troops were of poor quality; many ofthem were semi-retired infantry veterans or men whose standing as soldiersat all could be questioned. Standards tended to be higher in the frontierareas, where there was a greater tendency to use permanent infantrycompanies as garrisons. In 1502 there was a major inspection of all garrisonsby Vincenzo Valier, the proveditor-general, and Gianfilippo Aureliano, thecollateral.201 The result of their report was a dramatic pruning of thegarrisons and castle guards throughout the Terraferma. Many small castleswere stripped of their garrisons altogether and put up for rent to Venetiannobles and others who became responsible for their maintenance. The mainmotive for this overhaul of the system was economy, and the effects ofValier's proposals were to save c. 11,500 ducats a year. But certainly thesmall country stronghold guarded by perhaps two men must have seemed ananachronism by the sixteenth century, and this review of the whole garrisonorganization was long overdue.202

Because of the nature of the surviving records it is very difficult to get anoverall impression of how the military organization which has beendescribed in this chapter actually functioned in practice. Judging by theadmiration bestowed on Belpetro Manelmi later in the century, he didachieve something special in the way of making the system work. However,the one moment at which we can look closely at the operation of theVenetian military system is in the difficult period of the late 1470s. Theextent to which the organization had been allowed to run down since 1455and the imminent threat from the Turks produced a surge of reform activityin Venice. A series of powerful proveditors-general were elected tosupervise the reforms and get the army back into order. On 28 August 1477Lorenzo Loredan was elected to this post,203 and a letter book containingcopies of all the official letters which he wrote during the thirteen months ofhis tenure has fortunately survived to us.204 During those months Loredantravelled all over the Terraferma inspecting troops and garrisons, trying to

200 p o r 1;^^ regulations, see above, 113-14.201 S T . reg . 14, 96V-101 (24 A u g . 1502), 115—17 (29 O c t . 1502).202 In 1493 it was reported to the Council of Ten that the castellan at Belluno had turned the castle into

an inn, where Germans stayed on their way to and from Venice (Dieci, Misti, reg. 26, 72; 27 Sept.1493)-

203 S S . reg. 28 , 4 3 v (28 Aug . 1477).204 Senato, Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24 passim.

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mobilize an effective force in Friuli to resist the Turks, and, together withthe new collateral-general, Giovanni Niccolo Manzini, dealing with a widevariety of problems of military organization.

The two immediate problems facing Loredan when he set out for Bresciain early September 1477 were the condition of the recently arrived companyof Cola da Monforte, Count of Campobasso, and that of the long-servingbut now leaderless Colleoneschi. Cola da Monforte had only recentlyarrived in Brescia after his long march from eastern France, and the initialimpression which Loredan received of the troops was a poor one. Inappearance and equipment they were more like servants than men-at-arms,he remarked sadly, and their horses were painfully thin after the journey.205

However, within ten days of his arrival he started to muster them. Cola daMonforte had a condotta for 500 cavalry, and by 5 October 482 had beenentered in the muster rolls, including 132 men-at-arms. On that dayLoredan rode with the company into the country for the second part of themustering procedure, military exercises. By this time he recorded grudgingadmiration for the way Cola had got his troops into order. The number ofhorses was almost complete, although some were still very thin; the menwere now fully equipped with many new arms, and Cola had clearly spentmoney heavily amongst the armourers of Brescia.206 The company was nowready to go to Friuli, where its presence was urgently needed, and in earlyNovember the new march started. Loredan caught up with the companyagain in January 1478 at Conegliano. By this time a number of men haddeserted and Cola tried desperately to avoid inspection, as he knew hisnumbers were well down. Loredan insisted on inspecting what he could,and finding only 408 horses refused to issue a pay bolletta for any more thanthat, even when ordered by Venice to pay Cola in full in order to keep himhappy.207 One of the factors in Venice's anxiety to placate Cola da Monfortewas that after a brief period in which he had commanded the Friuli army,following the death of Girolamo Novello fighting the Turks in the previousyear, he was now being subordinated to Carlo Fortebraccio, who hadreturned from Umbria to take command. Loredan thus found himself in themiddle of one of those delicate issues of precedence and ruffled personalfeelings which so often affected military relationships. This problem wasonly resolved by the death of Cola in mid July 1478, when his company, onLoredan's advice, passed immediately to his sons.208

While Cola da Monforte was preparing to move to Friuli in October 1477,Loredan turned his attention to the Colleoneschi. Here was a large body of

205 Ib id . , 3 v (27 Sept . 1477).206 Ib id . , 6v and 13V (6 and 26 Oct . 1477).207 I b id . , 49V and 57 (11 J a n . and 3 F e b . 1478).208 Ibid., 138V-139 (15 July 1478); ST. reg. 8, 26v (12 Oct. 1478).

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veteran troops who had lived for years in the southern Bergamasco and whowere reluctant to accept the command of anyone after the death of theirbeloved leader. At the start Loredan regarded them with a mixture ofsuspicion and exasperation; his answer to the problem was to divide them upunder experienced condottieri, but this encountered a sort of mulish espritde corps which foiled all his attempts at rational organization.209 Eventuallyhe got part of the company together and sent them off to Friuli in the wake ofCola da Monforte, but by the following spring most of them seem to havedrifted back to their billets in the western part of the state. By this timeLoredan's sympathies for them had somewhat increased; he had begun torealize that most of the defects with which he was wrestling sprang frompoor and erratic pay. The very fact that the Colleoneschi now had norecognized leader to speak out for them meant that they were amongst theworse-paid sections of the army. So Loredan made great efforts to get somemoney to them and seemed gradually to win their confidence. By 24 April1478 he was able to report that 750 cavalry of the Colleoneschi had crossedthe Mincio on their way to Friuli and that they were now a fine body ofmen.210 He begged Venice to pay them regularly from now onwards in orderto keep them this way; otherwise they would begin to sell their horses anddrift home to their billets, where they could at least maintain themselveswithout pay. However, the optimism was short-lived; by mid July nofurther pay had arrived and the muttering had started again. Oaths werebeing taken in the company not to turn up to inspections and not to allowthemselves to be split up; Loredan left his post in October with the problemstill unresolved.211

The other major company with which Loredan had to deal during histerm of office was that of Carlo Fortebraccio, which assembled at Noale aftera march from the Romagna in May 1478. Count Carlo was an old-stylecondottiere who both kept a fairly tight rein on his men and knew exactlywhat had to be done to maintain a working relationship with Venice. As soonas he arrived his troops started bullying the local population, and thisquickly produced results; chancellors scurried from Venice with money andLoredan moved in to start the mustering.212 Within a fortnight the wholeprocess was complete; Carlo had 720 cavalry out of a condotta for 778, and on7 June they exercised at Mestre, where any interested Venetians couldwatch. In addition to the heavy cavalry Carlo had a company of mounted

209 Senato, Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24, 22 and 30 (6 Nov. and 1 Dec. 1477).210 Ibid., 52 and iogv-nov (21 Jan. and 24 Apr. 1478).211 Ibid., 136 and 138V-139 (10 and 15 July 1478).212 Ibid., 119 (22 May 1478). The Senate immediately despatched 2000 ducats to Loredan to keep

Fortebraccio happy (ST. reg. 8, 9; 22 May 1478).

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crossbowmen and one of infantry which he paid for himself.213 Immediatelyafter the parade he set off for Friuli to take charge of the rest of the army, andhis presence there also began to have beneficial results, although Loredancontinued to have doubts about the way in which he treated his owncompany.214

Although Loredan frequently complained that he was doing the jobs ofthe collaterals for them, and he showed himself to be particularly strict onthe whole issue of relating pay to detailed inspections, there were otheraspects to his activities. Whenever he had a moment he inspected garrisonsand fortifications. When in Padua in February 1478 he inspected thegarrison in the castle and found that the castellan had enrolled, amongstothers, his own three-year-old son and a twelve-year-old servant ascrossbowmen, eight pensioners over 64 years of age (Loredan himself was 65at this stage, so perhaps the implications of aged incapacity were a littleunfair) and a paralytic Greek who was incapable of bearing arms. Thiscastellan had just been dismissed for other infringements of the garrisonregulations, so the state of the garrison can have been no great surprise toLoredan.215 On the whole, however, he found the garrison troops heinspected in good order although very much in arrears with their pay.216 Atthe end of March, while in Brescia, he took the opportunity to ride over andsee the new fortifications being erected at Pontevico and was considerablyimpressed with the work. When he inspected the garrison he found that oneprovisionato had set up a school for local children in the castle, and he wasinstantly dismissed; but otherwise again the men were in good order. Thecastle had eight spingardelle and fifteen old galley bombards, which heconsidered inadequate for so important a site, and there was also an almostcomplete lack of the provisions of food which were supposed to bemaintained.217 When Loredan finally arrived at the front line in Friuli inMay 1478 he also reported extensively on the fortifications at Fogliano andGradisca. His impression on the whole was a poor one, although he fullyendorsed the strategic importance of the two places.218

Another area of interest for Lorenzo Loredan was the militia, and thenewly formed provisionati di San Marco. He entirely approved of the idea ofthe select and trained militia, as he regarded the normal levies as worse than

213 Senato, Proveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24, 122V, 124 and 125V-126 (30 May, 3 and 8 June 1478).214 On 10 July 1478 Loredan reported that Carlo Fortebraccio had got the army organized in a way that

it had never been before (ibid., 136), but his own troops complained that he did not pass pay on tothem and behaved in a thoroughly arrogant way.

215 Ib id . , 57V-58 (5 F e b . 1478). Fo r the dismissal of the castellan, see Dieci , Mis t i , reg. 19, 90 (28 Jan .1478).

216 Sena to , Provvedi tor i da T e r r a e da M a r , 24, 58V-59 and 90V-91 (9 F e b . and 27 M a r . 1478).217 Ib id . , 91V-92 (31 M a r . 1478). F o r the refortifying of Pontevico, see above, 90.218 Senato, Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24, 116-17 (13 May 1478).

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useless.219 But his experience with the new provisionati was not a positiveone. The Terraferma cities were reluctant to provide the necessary arms andthe recruiting went slowly.220 In Friuli itself the 800 provisionati sent fromPadua quickly melted away, and when Loredan came to inspect them inSeptember 1478 he found only 122 left. Despite the reluctance of the localproveditor to pay so ineffective a force at all, Loredan insisted that those fewwho had served faithfully should be rewarded.221

The last few months of Loredan's term of office were spent at the frontand often in the field with the army. Having spent the winter and springdesperately trying to get an army together, he was able now to see the resultsof his efforts. By July 1478 about 5000 cavalry, including Milanese andFerrarese contingents, and 1500 professional infantry had assembled. Allwere inspected by Loredan, and none of the companies were more than 5%under par in terms of numbers.222 Carlo Fortebraccio had got everythingorganized in a way that impressed him; the camp marshals had beenappointed, and for a brief moment one has the impression of a machineworking smoothly. A Turkish raid was easily repulsed and the main body ofthe Turkish army moved off southwards, clearly reluctant to try conclusionswith Fortebraccio's troops.

However, there was another side to the picture. The quarters in the frontline were wretched and proper supplies of provisions were not gettingthrough. On 15 August Loredan received instructions to go to Foglianohimself to be with the troops; it was pouring with rain and he had no tent;the quarters were swimming in mud and many had no roofs. After spendinga night sharing a room with Count Antonio da Marsciano, he found a bed forhimself 'in quarters which would be more suitable for fools or evenastrologers who have to gaze at the stars than for me'.223 As soon as theTurkish threat had passed he hurried back to Udine with relief. By this timethe even more fundamental problem was emerging again - pay. Loredanhad repeatedly urged that at least for the three summer months Veniceshould send regular pay. But the days passed and money arrived only inhundreds rather than thousands of ducats. By September the army wasbreaking up fast;224 troops were selling their horses in order to live andborrowing fresh mounts off the Milanese and Ferrarese for inspections, asneither of those states insisted on branding their horses.225 Loredan tried219 Ib id . , 24 a n d 150V (15 N o v . 1477 and 18 Aug . 1478).220 Ibid., 106 (14 Apr. 1478).221 Ibid., 159 (27 Sept. 1478).222 Ibid., 130-4 (25 June-5 July 1478).223 Ibid., 148-54 (15-27 Aug. 1478): 'in stantia che sarebbe molto piu apto a zanocchi over ad astrologi

che hanno a contemplar lo stelle che a me'.224 Ibid., 155-60 (3-20 Sept. 1478).225 Ib id . , 137V (12 J u l y 1478).

Part I: c. 1400 to 1508

disciplining one of the captains in an attempt to make an example; hearrested Giorgio della Massa, an infantry constable who had married agranddaughter of Roberto da Sanseverino, for disobeying orders, notpaying his men and maintaining his company at only one-sixth of thecontract strength. Giorgio was sent to Venice under armed guard butsubsequently was allowed quietly to leave Venetian service.226 But there isno evidence that Loredan's action did anything to stem the tide.

Lorenzo Loredan left office on 12 October 1478 an exhausted anddisillusioned man.227 His disillusionment lay not so much with the soldiersthemselves as with the behaviour of the government in Venice. He had takenup his office a year earlier never having had a similar appointment with theland army but with a strong belief that handling soldiers would not be verydifferent from handling galley crews, that all that was needed was a firmhand and a good leadership.228 By the end he had come to realize that theproblems were infinitely more complex, that professional soldiers weremuch more independent and used to very different standards than galleyoarsmen; they could not be fed on ship's biscuit.229 He developed during theyear a good deal of sympathy for the soldiers he alternately bullied andcajoled; above all he fought for their rights over pay. It is clear from hisletters that the centralized pay system was just not working; the one momentwhen he managed to collect together a reasonable sum of money was whenhe was authorized, despite the current regulations, to draw direct from thetreasuries of Brescia, Bergamo and Crema. This enabled him to raise severalthousand ducats quickly and get the mobilization moving in the spring of1478.230 But his frustration at the difficulties was expressed in the form ofthe almost ritual reference to the 'days of Belpiero'.231 Once again,therefore, it must be remembered that Loredan was facing exceptionalproblems; morale and organization had been crucially affected by the longyears of peace and neglect; the financial system in force at the time was anaberration which was abandoned in the following year; the collaterals, whoat one time clearly had exercised a salutary degree of continuous control, hadonly just recovered their influential positions. In the Loredan reports thereis, therefore, not just a view of the Venetian army at a nadir in its fortunes,but also an indication of the determination with which the system of militaryorganization could be enforced and had been enforced in the past.226 Ib id . , 142V, 145 and 163 (27 Ju ly , 8 Aug. and 10 Oct . 1478).227 He had to stay on beyond his appointed span because his successor, Niccolo di Ca' Pesaro, was slow

to take up the post (ST. reg. 8, 23 and 25V; 18 Sept. and 1 Oct. 1478).228 Sena to , Provvedi tor i da T e r r a e da M a r , 24, 73 (28 F e b . 1478).229 Ib id . , 132-3 (2 Ju ly and 22 Aug. 1478).230 Ib id . , 76V-77V and 8 2 - 3 (9 and 12 M a r . 1478). Some infantry in the Bresciano were as m u c h as

eighteen m o n t h s in arrears with their pay.231 Ibid., 88v (23 Mar. 1478).

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Control and policy making

The army created by Venice in the fifteenth century was a cumbersome andunreliable instrument the effectiveness of which depended very largely onhow it was wielded. The organization already described was the means ofcontrol in peacetime, but in war dynamic and effective leadership in the fieldand swift and informed decision making in Venice were essential adjuncts tothat organization. Above all, perhaps, what was essential for effectivemilitary action was the smooth passage of orders and advice from thecouncils in Venice to the commanders in the field so that policy could betranslated into action. How far did Venice in the fifteenth century achievethese desirable goals?

Lorenzo Loredan in his tour of duty as proveditor-general in the late1470s commented frequently on the necessity for firm leadership in militaryaffairs.1 But in fact he never had to deal with a captain-general, as Colleonihad died quite recently and had not been replaced. Hence he was notdirectly confronted with that crucial dilemma inherent in all emergingstanding armies of how to maintain control from the centre and yet at thesame time entrust the precious weapon to a prestigious and often ambitiousmilitary commander. Venice, as a state committed to a practice of collectivedecision making, found it particularly difficult to accept that success in wardepended to a large extent on the authority and determination of one man,the military commander. On the other hand, Venetian nobles as individualswere more than usually accustomed to the necessity for strong personalleadership in their maritime experience. Hence Venetian policy on this issuetended to fluctuate during the fifteenth century. For the fifty middle years ofthe century, from the appointment of Carmagnola in 1426 to the death ofColleoni in 1475, there was an almost continuous series of prestigiouscaptains-general. During the middle years of the century the appointmentof a captain-general, with all the authority that the title carried, was felt to benecessary both to attract men of sufficient calibre and to maintain controlover the coterie of condottieri who were being welded into a permanentarmy. But in the first and last quarters of the century acceptance of this

1 Senato, Provveditori da Terra e da Mar, 24; see above, 147-52.

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necessity was far less apparent. Prior to 1425 the army was rarely largeenough, nor its permanent features sufficiently delineated, to make it clearthat a powerful permanent commander had to be accepted. After 1475 andthe death of Colleoni the very static nature of the army and the relativefreedom from war once more seemed to erode the necessity.

The problem of how to reconcile firm leadership in the field with effectivecontrol from Venice was particularly apparent in the early years of thecentury. Although a captain-general was quickly appointed for the war withthe Carrara in 1404, his authority was effectively limited to one of the threearmies employed, and the size of the personal company allowed to him didnot give that pre-eminence which his rank required.2 Command of the armybefore Verona was vested in a committee made up of Venetian nobles as wellas the two leading captains.3 There was a constant tendency to suggest,despite traditional preconceptions to the contrary, that armies might be bestled by Venetians. As soon as the war was over the post of captain-generalwas left vacant for six years of relative peace.

The Hungarian crisis of 1411 caused the debate to be reopened. On 12December a proposal to move immediately to the appointment of a captain-general, Carlo Malatesta, was defeated in the Senate.4 It was clear from asubsequent debate that the hesitation was caused as much by an inability toagree on a suitable leader as by reluctance to concede the principle ofsupreme command.5 Two days later a proposal to appoint a Venetian tocommand the army was defeated even more heavily, and the Senatecontented itself with appointing proveditors pending a final decision on thecaptain-generalship.6 Finally, on 24 December the nettle was grasped andSanto Venier dispatched to open negotiations with Malatesta.7 Even so thecompany offered to him was absurdly small and it was clear that the Senatehad not recognized the principle that the captain-general had to be given aneffective pre-eminence based on the size of his own following. Malatesta,with the excuse that he was still bound by contract to Ladislas of Naples,was able to spin out the negotiations until he had won a contract for 500

2 Zorzi, 'Chiericati', 432; Chierighino Chiericati suggested in 1470 that the captain-general should have1500 cavalry and 300 infantry, and no other captain more than 1000 cavalry.

3 See above, 22.4 SS. reg. 4, 217 (12 Dec. 1411). The voting figures were 37 in favour and 54 against.5 Ibid., 217V-218 (14 Dec. 1411).6 Ibid. The chosen Venetian captain was to be given a condotta for 100 lances and 100 infantry, and a

salary of 400 ducats a month. The proposal came from Antonio Contarini but received only 17 votes.Eventually, at the end of a long debate Barbone Morosini and Jacopo Trevisan, the elder, were sent asproveditors.

7 SS. reg. 4, 222 (24 Dec. 1411). Venier had a commission to negotiate a condotta for 300 lances and 300infantry.

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lances; but even so he was in danger of having his company outnumbered bythose of some of the captains who were hired as his subordinates.8

After the first Hungarian War Pandolfo Malatesta, who had replacedCarlo during the campaign, was able to hang on to the title of captain-general but only with a contract in aspetto.9 In practice the standing forcesduring the five years' truce with Sigismund were once more under the directcontrol of the Senate. As has already been seen, in the second HungarianWar the title of captain-general was never conceded to Filippo Arcelli, butcircumstances enabled him to conduct an effective campaign without it.10

Even as late as 1432, in the period of uncertainty which followed theexecution of Carmagnola, Venice once more probed the possible alterna-tives to the appointment of an all-powerful captain-general. Once again thehesitation stemmed as much from a disagreement over the availablecandidates as from a dislike of the principle, but nevertheless thepossibilities of appointing a Venetian to command the army or of entrustingthat command to a committee of nobles and condottieri were seriouslyconsidered.11 Indeed, the latter alternative was actually put into effect, but itwas clearly by now a temporary arrangement. By the end of the yearGianfrancesco Gonzaga's decision to offer his services as captain-generalresolved the problem and was generally accepted as the right solution.12 Bythis time it was clear that the new dimensions of the Terraferma state after1421 and the war with Milan had made the continuous employment of acaptain-general a necessity. Once the need for that continuity andcommitment was recognized it also became more likely that the choicewould fall not on the sort of princely adherent who had been employed inthe first quarter of the century, but on a stateless professional soldier whoseoutside interests and commitments would be more limited.

At this stage one must explore briefly in what the authority given to thecaptain-general consisted. The main lines of this authority were laid downin the special contracts given to the captains-general.13 They included theright to obedience from all land forces, and complete jurisdiction in civil and

Ibid., 24ir-v (13 Feb. 1412). In July it was heard that Gianfrancesco Gonzaga wanted to join Venicewith 600 lances, and this was declined (reg. 5, 37V; 1 July 1412).See above, 28-9.See above, 30-1.SS. reg. 12,91 (7 June 1432), 95 (21 June 1432). The committee set up on 21 June consisted of the twoproveditors, Guidantonio Manfredi, Luigi da Sanseverino and Piero Gianpaolo Orsini. The threecondottieri were to take it in turns to be supreme commander for one month each.Ibid., 138V (3 Dec. 1432). Gonzaga was given a condotta for 600 lances and in addition command of200 of the lanze spezzate.For the best accounts of the authority of the captain-general, see the condotte of Malatesta Malatesta(Commemoriali, ix, 162V; Predelli, iii, 299-300), Carlo Malatesta (Commemoriali, x, 16; Predelli, iii,357) and Carmagnola (Commemoriali, xi, 67; Predelli, iv, 151; also published in Ricotti, ii, 446-9).

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criminal cases over the soldiers except in places where Venetian rectors hadauthority, i.e. specifically, cities and major fortresses. The captain-generalhad the right to participate in the formulation of war policy and was entitledto a full briefing on the republic's political and military intentions. He didnot normally have authority to hire and dismiss condottieri, but his advicewas frequently sought and he had a general responsibility for maintainingstandards within the companies.14 His own contract frequently containedspecial clauses which allowed him the right to pay his own troops, andentitled him to free billets and supplies of straw and fodder. The officialemblem of his authority was the baton, a broken lance shaft about five feetlong, which was formally handed to him either during a state reception inVenice or by specially appointed nobles in the field.

Undoubtedly, despite the clear contractual statements of the captain-general's authority, the real nature of his relationship both to Venice and tothe army which he commanded depended on the current military andpolitical situation, and on his own personality and prestige. The captains-general from Carmagnola onwards all had differing relationships withVenice. Carmagnola himself, and even more so Francesco Sforza, who ascaptain-general of the League occupied a peculiarly independent positionvis-a-vis Venice, were men of great prestige and political ambition who hadto be treated with extreme delicacy. Their periods of command, coincidingas they did with moments of intense military activity, were ones in which notonly control of the army but also control of policy seemed to be largelyvested in the captain-general. Gonzaga and Sigismondo Malatesta, on theother hand, although both having independent bases outside the territory ofthe republic, were unable to claim the same sort of authority and wereregarded with some suspicion and reserve because of their outsidecommitments. Michele Attendolo and Jacopo Piccinino, although ex-perienced captains without states of their own, were both accepted byVenice with some reluctance and under pressure. Attendolo was appointedbecause of pressure from his cousin Francesco Sforza, and after the latter'sdeparture was fairly strictly controlled by Venice until his dismissal afterCaravaggio. Piccinino owed his appointment to the sudden death of Gentileda Leonessa and the urgent military needs of the last years of the wars. Healso was discarded abruptly as soon as possible. Gattamelata and Gentiledella Leonessa represented yet another phenomenon, the faithful Venetian

14 The point about the responsibility for hiring and firing is not made clear in the condom. But in 1427Carmagnola tried to dismiss one of his captains, Bernardo Morosini, and was told firmly that he didnot have the power to suspend contracts in this way. Morosini was allowed to complete his contractand was then quietly dropped (SMi. reg. 56, 139; 30 Nov. 1427). During the demobilization of 1420the advice of Filippo Arcelli was sought about which condottieri to retain and which to dismiss (SS.reg. 7, 170V; 24 July 1420).

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captain promoted to supreme command. In both cases the ultimateauthority of the captain-generalship was delayed (and in Gentile's casenever in fact given) not because of the usual suspicion but to avoid arousingjealousies amongst former colleagues and equals. With Colleoni Venice hadfound a captain-general who was attached by long-standing links to thestate, enormously prestigious, and yet relatively modest in his ambitions.But in the last resort it was the long period of tense yet peacefulconfrontation after Lodi which made the relationship a lasting one. Venicecould not risk being without a captain-general, and yet the opportunities forColleoni to claim real independent authority were limited. A captain-general in permanent quarters could never expect to exercise the authorityover the army which was possible in the field.

Colleoni's famous deathbed advice to his employers that they shouldnever again entrust so much authority to their captain-general was, even ifnot apocryphal, unlikely to have carried much weight on its own. But by themid 147os the enormous cost of the Colleoni condotta and the extent towhich a substantial part of the standing army had become dependent on oneman were undoubtedly an embarrassment.15 It was certainly the case thatfor the remainder of the century Venice rarely appointed a captain-general.The feeling seems to have grown among the Italian states after Lodi that acaptain-general was essentially a war appointment, and indeed that to makesuch an appointment was already an expression of bellicose intent. Thedistinction between the necessary authority of the commander in war andthe greater responsibility and control exercised by the civil authorities overthe standing army in peace was a natural development following the growingacceptance of standing armies. The result was a proliferation of lesser titles -conferring less authority; the Venetian army commander of the last quarterof the century was more frequently ranked as lieutenant-general orgovernor-general than as captain-general.16

Roberto Malatesta was given the title of captain-general in December1479, four years after the death of Colleoni, but this was with the Pazzi Warstill in progress and with the threat of the Turks barely subsiding.17

Malatesta in fact initially refused to fight in Friuli if called upon, but wascajoled out of this clause of the contract. While Malatesta was still alive both

15 B. Belotti, Studi colleoneschi (Milan, 1939) 131-3.16 There was in fact some confusion in contemporary minds about the exact significance of, and

distinction between, the titles of captain-general and lieutenant-general. Franchino Castiglione in1430 advised Filippo Maria Visconti that the lieutenant was supreme in all matters concerningadministration, quarters, garrisons, etc., while the captain commanded in the field (Osio, ii, 466-7). AFrench manuscript cited by Perret (Bibliotheque Nationale, ms. fr. 5599) states, on Venetian militaryorganization, that the lieutenant-general was senior to the captain-general, but this was clearly not thecase, and all Venetian evidence suggests the contrary in the fifteenth century.

17 SS. reg. 29, 63-4 (16 Dec. 1479).

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the Duke of Lorraine and Roberto da Sanseverino had the title oflieutenant-general, and even when Malatesta died after Campomorto in1482 Sanseverino remained lieutenant-general for the remainder of the Warof Ferrara. But, interestingly enough, when the Colleoni heirs soughtpermission to rent Malpaga on a long lease to Roberto da Sanseverino in1484 the Council of Ten refused.18 Sanseverino already had his own fief ofCittadella in the Padovano by this time, and Venice did not wish to see arepeat of Colleoni's immense local authority in the Bergamasco.19

When Roberto da Sanseverino was briefly reinstated in Venetian favourin 1487 after his Neapolitan adventure, he still did not receive the title ofcaptain-general;20 and after his death at Calliano in that year Venice had nocaptain-general for a number of years. By these later years of the century itwas clearly a matter of policy to avoid such an appointment in time of peace.It was also an economy measure at a time when the costs of the army werecausing rising concern.21 In fact the next captain-general was FrancescoGonzaga, who received the title only after Fornovo in 1495, when he had, ina sense, proved himself. It is probably true to say, however, that the fact thatVenice did not immediately appoint a captain-general at the time ofmobilization in the spring of 1495 was because the right man was notavailable, i.e. Pitigliano or Trivulzio.22 Gonzaga was relatively inex-perienced, and indeed one of the conditions of his contract was that heshould have his uncle, Ridolfo, with him because he was a man with adistinguished military record.

But again after Gonzaga's disgrace in 1497 Venice did without a captain-general until Pitigliano was promoted to the title in 1504. The 1499campaign in the Milanese was conducted by Pitigliano as governor-general.Obviously the delay in promoting Pitigliano was again not just a matter of agrowing reluctance to appoint captains-general except in an emergency. Butnor was it a matter of waiting for Pitigliano to prove himself — exceptperhaps in terms of fidelity. Pitigliano was already by the late 1480srecognized as the leading soldier in Italy, and Venice was very fortunate tohave him. There was, it is true, still talk of a secret negotiation withTrivulzio in 1498, and it is probably the case that Venice was trying to keepthe key appointment vacant for as long as possible in case it could be used to18 Died, Misti, reg. 22, 45 (7 Apr. 1484).19 The grant of Cittadella to Roberto da Sanseverino is in SS. reg. 31, 117 (17 Dec. 1483).20 SS. reg. 33, 82V (12 June 1487).21 For some abortive negotiations between Venice and potential commanders in this period, see the

articles by Perret on Jacopo Galeotto, Boffilo del Giudice and Marshal d'Esquerdes cited in ch. 2, n.137-

22 Francesco Gonzaga took service with Venice in 1489 but with no title (SS. reg. 34,2; 11 Mar. 1489); hewas made governor-general on the eve of Fornovo (Dieci, Misti, reg. 26, i88v; 5 June 1495) andcaptain-general after the battle (Commemoriali, xvm, 2iv; 20 Oct. 1495; Predelli, vi, 13).

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win over a figure like Trivulzio.23 Such a policy depended, of course, onPitigliano not getting restive, and by 1504 he was doing just that; hence hispromotion at that moment.24

For the last five years up to Cambrai Venice did then have a captain-general and the army was fully used to his authority. Pitigliano's base was athis fief and palace of Ghedi in the Bresciano, a site perhaps chosen morewith an eye to the annual muster of a standing army than the defence of athreatened frontier as Malpaga had been. Ghedi was well placed as anassembly point for troops quartered all over the western half of theTerraferma. This perhaps even suggests the beginning of the resolution ofthe problem of what to do with a captain-general in peacetime; he was to begiven a role in the supervision of army organization in a way that had clearlynot been formulated in the time of Colleoni.

At this stage in the discussion of control and policy making it is necessaryto leave the army, which has been the main focus of all that has been said sofar, and come in to Venice itself, to the councils and committees which atleast by the second half of the fifteenth century were taking an increasingand continuous interest in military affairs. It is important to re-emphasize atthis point that the Venetian commitment to a mainland policy, and hence toits military implications, was to some extent of accidental and casual growth.Venice did not plan a standing army and a coherent military policy in thefifteenth century; Venetian councils had gradually to take more and moreaccount of mainland affairs and of the problems of military organization.Hence it has seemed logical to discuss first the emerging phenomenon of amilitary commitment, and then to look for the impact on Venetian policyand decision making, and ultimately on Venetian society as a whole.

Throughout the fifteenth century decisions concerning peace and war,and the major diplomatic and military issues, were discussed and concludedin the Senate in the traditional manner. This was the relatively restrictedcouncil made up of about 200 experienced nobles, partly elected, partly co-opted and partly ex officio.25 The Great Council, on which all nobles over theage of 25 had a seat, had little role in this area of decision making, confiningitself to electing to minor military posts, castellanships, etc. On the otherhand, the doge, who had no formal or independent power in any sphere ofpolicy making, could deploy very considerable personal influence. Fran-cesco Foscari is always credited with being the leader of a mainlandexpansionist group, and his dogeship, 1423-57, embraced the entire period

23 Died, Misti, reg. 27, 224V (28 July 1498).24 Commemoriali, xix, 23-5; 24 Mar. 1504 (Predelli, vi, 73-4).25 G. Maranini, La constituzione di Venezia dopo la serrata del Maggior Consiglio (Florence, 1931)

192-225; A. Da Mosto, UArchivio di Stato di Venezia (Rome, 2 vols., 1937-41) i, 34-8; E. Besta, / /Senato veneziano: origini, attribuzioni e riti (Venice, 1899); Lane, Venice, 254-6.

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of the wars in Lombardy. There can be no doubt that Foscari did have aconsiderable interest in mainland policy and expansion. He was involved inthe 1404-5 war and was the first man to be named as one of the savi superterris de novo acquisitis in 1421,26 This said, it remains a matter of conjecturehow much influence on war policy he exercised as doge, or how consistent apromoter of warlike policies he was. However, his successor, PasqualeMalipiero, had also played a leading part in Terraferma and military affairsbefore his election, and Cristoforo Moro, whose dogeship covered the firstyears of the long Turkish war from 1463, was noted for his religious zeal andcrusading fanaticism.27 That Venice should commit itself for the one andonly time in the fifteenth century to large-scale land operations in theBalkans at the moment when the doge was a man of such qualities may notbe entirely coincidental.

However, whatever one may conjecture about the personal influence ofthe doge, military decision making was ultimately the responsibility of theSenate. Day-to-day executive authority was delegated by the Senate to theCollege, which acted as the steering committee of the Senate. At times ofcrisis the College was in almost constant session and inevitably at times itseemed to assume an almost independent authority. But that authority wasderived from the Senate and could be checked by the Senate. A typicalexample of the way in which the decision-making process worked can befound in the whole area of recruiting. A decision to increase the size of thearmy could only be taken by the Senate, and the Senate also had to discussand approve any large contracts. But the day-to-day business of implement-ing Senate decisions on overall numbers was conducted by the College,which had the authority to conclude small contracts.28

The College was made up of the doge, the six ducal councillors, the Headsof the Council of Ten and the Quarantia Criminal, the main judicial council,and three groups of savi elected by the Senate. It was the savi who acted asthe real executive in Venetian government, and as far as military andTerraferma matters were concerned it was that group of five savi knownultimately as the savi delta terraferma who had the most influenceon policy. It was they who tended to initiate proposals in this area of policyand who, within the College, implemented Senate and College decisions.Given this concentration of influence, not to say authority, in militarymatters in the hands of five men at any one time, it is important to examine alittle more closely the emergence and function of the savi delta terraferma.29

26 SMi. reg. 53, ioov (14 Jan. 1421). See below, 161.27 On Pasquale Malipiero, see below, 172; on Cristoforo Moro, see Romanin, iv, 228-9.28 It is striking that in 1404-5 the Senate showed great reluctance to delegate day-to-day conduct of the

war to the College; but in 1412 there was a clear vote in favour of doing this (SS. reg. 5, 86v; 28 Nov.1412), and this method continued for the rest of the century.

29 On the institution of the savi della terraferma, see Da Mosto, i, 22 and Besta, Senato, 65-6.

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By about 1400 two groups of savi were elected every six months by theSenate; the savi agli ordini concentrated on maritime and commercial affairs,and the more influential savi del consiglio on internal affairs and foreignpolicy. The wars of the first two decades of the fifteenth century, and theconsiderable expansion of mainland and military business which theyengendered, led to the creation of a series of temporary groups of savi toassist the savi del consiglio. These were variously known as the sapientes superguerra, sapientes super rationibus guerrae and sapientes ad providendum adcustodiam, dijfensionem et conservationem terrarum et locorum acquisitorum denovo. The election of groups of savi specifically responsible for the directionand financing of war, and for the custody and organization of the newconquests, was haphazard and unco-ordinated.30 In the last resort respon-sibility for these affairs remained with the savi del consiglio. Even as late as the1418-20 war with the Hungarians the successive groups of savi alia guerraelected to concert military policy were seen essentially as a wartime andtemporary phenomenon. However, at the end of this year, which had seen aremarkable expansion of Venice's eastern frontiers, there was a clear changeof mood in Venetian policy. This has already been noted in terms of militaryorganization and it also manifested itself in institutional terms in Venice. InJanuary 1421 the five savi alia guerra in office since July of the previous yearwere replaced by five sapientes super terris de novo acquisitis who had acombined responsibility both for military organization and control of themainland state.31 At this point the new savi were not expected to be fullmembers of the College and only attended when matters relating to theirspecific areas of responsibility were being discussed. However, it was soonapparent that Terraferma business was of such weight and importance thatthe savi responsible were quickly accepted as full members of the College.From January 1421 onwards the elections of the savi responsible for theTerraferma fell into the same pattern of continuity as those of the other twogroups of savi, and one can say that the new office had been established. Theactual title 'savi della terraferma' became the accepted one in the 1430s.Also by the 1430s a system of rotation had been established which ensuredthat a savio normally served for a year, with two or three changing every sixmonths. Prior to that it had been customary to re-elect at least some of theprevious group at each six-monthly election, and indeed some men servedfor rather more than a year at a time.32

30 A proposal to reappoint savi alia guerra in the autumn of 1413 just after the truce with the Hungarianshad been agreed was defeated by 44 votes to 40 (SMi. reg. 50, 42V; 2 Oct. 1413). But in theimmediately subsequent years there was an office known as the offitiales in terra nova (ibid., 53V; 30Nov. 1413).

31 SMi. reg. 53, ioov (14 Jan. 1421). The two men who survived from the five savi alia guerra appointedin the previous July (ibid., 60; 13 July 1420) were Francesco Foscari and Niccolo Giorgio.

32 Lists of the savi della terraferma can be reconstructed from the Senate minutes.

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The principles of Venetian government by which all decisions were takencollectively in committees, with constant rotation of office and a built-insystem of contumacia by which individuals were prevented from holding thesame office for long periods, sometimes obscure the very real continuity ofexperience and authority which individual Venetian nobles could achieve.The broader implications of this will be discussed later, but as far as the savidella terraferma went it is clear from an analysis of those elected that at leastuntil about 1460 the office tended to rotate among a relatively restrictedgroup of Venetian nobles. It was on the whole true that the office of saviodella terraferma was not regarded as a senior political appointment, and evenmen who held it a number of times tended to concentrate that experiencewithin a ten- or twelve-year period of their political careers. This tendency,while ensuring that savi were usually men in their 30s and 40s, also had theeffect of concentrating the attention of ambitious and interested nobles onthis office for a specific period. There are a number of examples of menholding the office seven, eight or even nine times within a period of less thantwenty years. It is particularly clear that at moments of military crisis thesavi elected tended to be men with long experience in the office, while inmoments of peace more inexperienced men were introduced to the peculiarproblems involved.33

Thus in the period up to 1460 the savi della terraferma were the Venetiansmost involved in the military organization and the process of militarydecision making. In any decade of that period about 40 nobles held theoffice, and in most decades five or six men held the office in five of the tenyears. After 1460 the pattern begins to change subtly; the office of savio dellaterraferma clearly became less important; election more than three times in aman's career became increasingly rare; the introduction of inexperiencednobles more frequent.34 Various reasons can be adduced for this changingatmosphere. Obviously the long period of peace after 1454 led to a decline inthe interest of Venetian nobles in Terraferma military affairs; with theorganization established in the army, and the relationships between motherand subject cities laid down, there was less interesting and innovatory workfor the savi della terraferma to do. It is also true that from the 1470s onwardsthe authority which had been concentrated in the hands of the savi seemed

33 Tommaso Michiel was savio nine times between 1426 and 1441; those holding the office eight times inapproximately the same period were: Vito da Canal, Marco Lippomanno, Federico Contarini, AndreaBernardo and Niccolo da Canal. There were also six men who held the office seven times during thewar years, and seven who held it six times.

34 I t is obviously difficult to make a sha rp dis t inct ion be tween the war t ime and the post -war years,because of an over lap of exper ience . T w o m e n achieved unpreceden ted records of service be tweenabou t 1450 and 1470: Paolo Moros in i and Niccolo da Canal bo th served eleven t imes , b u t bo thcomple ted abou t half these t e rms of office in the last years of the war. Actually in the period 1454-84only Anton io Pr iul i served eight t imes; th ree men had seven per iods of office, and four had six.

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to be gradually dispersed. Collaterals and proveditors on the spotproliferated in the later years of the century, and matters which previouslyhad been referred to Venice got more instant attention. Finally, it is clearthat by the end of the fifteenth century a new focus of authority for certainaspects of military policy was emerging in Venice, the Council of Ten, andthis undoubtedly cut into the traditional supremacy of the Senate and itsexecutive committees in this field.

The question of the increasing role of the Council of Ten in politicalaffairs is a vexed one, particularly for the fifteenth century.35 There is apopular tendency to regard the Ten as an overpowering influence almostfrom the moment of its creation in the early fourteenth century, whereascontemporary evidence suggests clearly that it was only in the later fifteenthand early sixteenth centuries that the Ten began to assume a role ofpredominance among Venetian councils. In 1497 Domenico Malipierocommented on the extent to which the Ten seemed to be exceeding itspowers: 'under cover of doing the most secret things it meddles with manymatters which are none of its business'.36 The field of military affairs is agood one in which to chart the progress of the authority and interference ofthe Ten in the fifteenth century.

At the beginning of the century the competences of the Ten were clearlyunderstood and adhered to. The council had been established to deal withproblems of internal security; faction within the political class, conspiraciesagainst the state, and popular unrest and uprising were its specific concerns,and the necessary advantage which it enjoyed in dealing with these matterswas the secrecy which surrounded its deliberations and activities. Given thereputation of the Ten for secrecy, and the difficulties which inevitablyattended the maintenance of secrecy in the larger and more open Venetiancouncils, it is scarcely surprising that there was a tendency to allot to the Tenany matters which required discreet and confidential handling. But it was atendency which should not be exaggerated; there was a strong element ofconservatism, and a desire to protect the traditional constitutional forms,among the Venetian nobility. While there were undoubtedly specificoccasions when the Ten was brought into affairs which were normallyoutside its competence, it cannot be said that that competence had beenallowed to extend very far by 1400. The security of the state was certainlybeing seen in an external as well as an internal context, but this did not meanthat the Ten had as yet any role in diplomacy or military affairs. It meantonly that conspiracies against the state - or indeed on behalf of the state -

35 Maranini, 412-46; Da Mosto, i, 52-5; G. Cozzi, 'Authority and the law in Renaissance Venice', inHale , Renaissance Venice, 3 0 4 - 5 .

36 Mal ip iero , Annali veneti, 492.

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were investigated or initiated by the Ten, whatever their source or objective.It was on these grounds that the Ten took the lead in the arrest andexecution of Carmagnola, and also in the action taken against the defectingcondottiere Alvise dal Verme. It was also on these grounds that the Tenspent a good deal of its time in the 1430s and 1440s hatching up plots tomurder Filippo Maria Visconti and Francesco Sforza.37 But in the first halfof the century the Ten's time was still mostly devoted to problems ofinternal security — a category which had been extended around 1400 toinclude cases of sodomy, an offence which was seen as disruptive of themoral fibre of the state and which became one of the major preoccupationsof the Ten in the first half of the fifteenth century. Throughout the period upto the Peace of Lodi there is no indication that the Ten had any role to play inthe day-to-day administration of the army or the formation of military andforeign policy.

At exactly this moment, however, there was a significant episode whichbrought the Ten into military affairs, the final defection of Colleoni fromMilanese to Venetian service. This was a move which had been prepared forsome months, and the secret negotiations involved had been handled by theTen. As a result of this prior involvement the Ten had a major share in thedrawing up of the condotta which completed the whole manoeuvre, andsubsequently over the next twenty-five years claimed the responsibility forall further negotiations relating to renewals of Colleoni's condotta?* Thatthe Council of Ten should be involved in the handling of Venice's topmilitary contract over this whole period was indeed a significant extension ofits authority. In part it had come about by accident because of thecircumstances of the initial negotiation; but at the same time the tenacitywith which the Ten defended its right to participate in subsequent years isan indication both of the internal pressures behind the extension of thecompetences of the Ten in this period and of the wider political significanceattached to the Colleoni condotta. This was not just another militarycontract; it was a matter of prime concern to the security of the state and in acertain sense the hinge of Venetian foreign policy.

By the time this episode ended in 1475 the Ten was already concerned in anumber of other areas relating to the military sphere, particularlyfortifications and provisioning. As has already been suggested, the Venetiangovernment showed little concern for fortifications before 1454 andtherefore one should perhaps see the growing involvement of the Ten in this

37 V. Lamansky, Secrets d'etat de Venise (repr. of 1884 St Petersburg ed., New York, 1968), i, 6-9.38 Dieci, Misti, reg. 14, 193 (20 Feb. 1454) for the discussion of the original contract by the Ten, and

ibid., reg. 15, 49V (2 May 1455) for the determination of that council to keep control of dealings withColleoni. See also Belotti, Colleoni, 257-8, 289, 301, 321-5, 363.

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area in subsequent years as part of a general change in Venetian interests. Atthe same time this was obviously a natural extension of a concern for thesecurity of the state, and increasingly in the second half of the century theTen took the lead in matters relating to fortifications in the Terraferma. In1470 on the death of Borso d'Este it was the Ten which discussed a series ofmeasures relating to the defence of the frontiers facing Ferrara,39 andthroughout the 1470s there is growing evidence in the archives of the Ten ofan interest in the maintenance of fortifications. Closely associated with thiswas the question of keeping fortresses well provisioned, which was anessential feature of the maintenance of their defensive capability, and whichlinked up with a long-standing concern of the Ten for grain policy as a facetof internal security.

That there was already an awareness of the dangers of the extension of theauthority of the Ten is clear from the legislation of 1468 which sought todefine the Council's competence in traditional terms.40 But the atmosphereof secrecy and deception which pervaded Italian diplomacy in the periodafter Lodi was an inevitable encouragement to the intervention of the Ten ina broader spectrum of political affairs. In this sense the first half of the 1480swas a particularly significant period, with the intense diplomatic activity of1480-2, followed by the War of Ferrara. An articulate concern for themaintenance of secrecy in political discussion and decision making wasmuch more apparent at this time than during the Visconti wars. Thecloseness of links between Venice and Ferrara meant that a number ofVenetian nobles were suspected of divided loyalties, and there are manyindications that the confidentiality of Senate debates could no longer berelied on.41 The later stages of the war, when Venice was pitted against therest of Italy, produced an atmosphere close to paranoia about security. Inthese circumstances it was not surprising that the Ten intruded more andmore into diplomatic and military affairs. Zaccaria Barbaro, the ambassadorin Rome, was writing direct to the Ten in 1480 on the intentions of papalpolicy in the Romagna;42 proveditors in the field were also, for the first time,in direct contact with the Ten.43 The huge costs of the war quickly alsoabsorbed the limited financial resources of the Ten and drew the Councilinto fiscal policy. The early stages of the peace negotiations in Cesena inApril 1484 were directed by the Ten,44 but on the other hand the reports of

39 D i e d Mis t i , reg. 17, 145V, 146, 149 (14 M a y , 18 Ju ly , 3 Sept . 1470).40 Cozzi , 304.41 Dieci, Misti, reg. 20, 141-2 (23-8 June 1482).42 For the discussion of the first of these dispatches, see ibid., 42V-43 (23 June 1480).43 Ibid. , regs. 2 0 - 2 passim.44 Ibid. , reg. 22, 51V-52 (24-6 Apr. 1484).

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Roberto da Sanseverino's negotiations in June which ultimately led to thePeace of Bagnolo were passed on to the Senate.45 A comparison of the rangeof activities of the Ten before and after the War of Ferrara presents a veryclear contrast. From this moment onwards it is clear that the Ten wasprepared to enter almost any field of public policy if there was anysuggestion that security was at stake, and it is no longer possible to predictwhat sort of issue is likely to appear in the minutes of Ten discussions.

In the remaining years preceding 1494 the interests of the Ten inTerraferma fortifications increased steadily. Discussion in the Councilranged from physical improvements and dealings with engineers andarchitects to concern for provisioning and the appointment of suitablecastellans. But intervention in the area of appointments brought the Teninto conflict with the traditional prerogatives of the Great Council, and thiscould lead to an abrupt check to the development of its authority. Aninteresting example of this is the discussions which took place over the castleat Anfo in the early 1490s. The importance of Anfo as a shield for theBresciano against a German attack had been made apparent in 1487, and thecastle had been considerably strengthened at that time. In 1491 the Councilof Ten selected it as being of special strategic importance and decided totake full responsibility for the castle and to elect a noble castellan for it.46

This discussion produced a considerable reaction in the Great Council, andin August 1492 the Ten was forced to abandon its attempt to make theappointment independently and to allow an election to take place in thenormal way in the Great Council. The castle of Anfo remained, however,under the protection of the Ten.47

Following this confrontation, the Ten observed a discreet formality overthe appointment of castellans to those fortresses in which it took a specialinterest. The needs of the post would be pointed out to the Great Council,which would be invited to make an election - as in the case of Rovereto in1493.48 In 1499 the takeover of Cremona and its surrounding castles was animmediate concern of the Ten, although the brief campaign in the Milanesewhich had led up to that takeover had not been. The castles concerned wereadded to the list of those regarded as of special importance, and constableswere appointed by the Ten to take them over. In February 1500, during thebrief crisis of Ludovico Sforza's revival, the Ten again intervened andappointed special proveditors to supervise these castles. However, it wasclearly stated that this was an emergency action, and in April 1500 the Ten's

45 Ib id . , 70V (16 J u n e 1484). T h e key documen t s for the Venetian side of the negotiat ions at Bagnolo areto be found in Sena to , Le t t e re di Ret tor i , 11. See also Cessi , ' L a pace di Bagnolo ' , 277-356 .

46 Dieci , Mis t i , reg. 25 , 39 and 47V-48 (21 M a r . and 28 Apr. 1491).47 Ib id . , 152 (25 Aug. 1492).48 Ib id . , reg. 26, 71 v (27 Sept . 1492).

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appointees were withdrawn and constables were elected in the normal wayby the Great Council.49

Linked to the growing concern for fortifications was a parellel and evenmore comprehensive concern for artillery. Here was another area of militarypolicy which represented something of a vacuum, in that Venetian concernfor artillery before 1454 had been haphazard and probably more related tothe naval than to the military side of its policy. In the second half of thecentury it was the Ten which began to co-ordinate the manufacture, storageand allocation of artillery and the recruitment and training of gunners. Theformal takeover of all responsibility for artillery did not come until 1500, butprior to this the Ten's interest was clear and on the whole did not seem toprovoke a conflict with the prerogatives of any other Venetian council.50

The decision taken in 1490 to equip and train considerable numbers ofmilitia throughout the state with handguns was a decision of the Ten, aswere a series of consequent decisions to establish local competitions topromote the skills of the handgunmen and stockpile arms for them.51

After 1495 the Ten became involved in military activity at various levels,but it was still usually over specific issues in which security was involved andsecrecy essential; there is little evidence before 1509 of major new extensionsof competence. When military proveditors did decide to send reports directto the Ten on some particularly confidential issue, the Ten tended to replyafter consultation with the College. An exception to this was the move intothe Romagna after the death of Alexander VI, when the Ten with a specialzonta acted as the directing authority.52 On the other hand, the Ten tendedto keep out of any discussion of condotta negotiations, but sometimes itinevitably became involved because of the secrecy in which such negoti-ations were often conducted. The search for a commander-in-chief in 1495is a typical example of the way in which responsibilities in such matters werenow divided up. Originally in 1489, when the possibility of employingFrancesco Gonzaga had first been discussed, the Ten had specificallyhanded the matter over to the Senate, asking at the same time that the debatebe conducted in conditions of the tightest possible security.53 By early 1495the need to make a decision on a supreme commander was urgent, and it wasthe Senate which was expected to make that decision. However, beforedoing so it asked the Ten for any relevant information it might have on

Ibid., reg. 28, 96V, 104, 106 and 127V (30 Dec. 1499, 5 Feb., 10 Feb. and 29 Apr. 1500).Ibid., reg. 28, 112V-113 (28 Feb. 1500).Ibid., reg. 24, 208, 222, 230V and 236 (20 Aug., 25 Sept., 24 Nov. and 29 Dec. 1490); reg. 25,103 and119V (26 Jan. and 11 Apr. 1492).Ibid., reg. 29, 250V (3 Sept. 1503); reg. 30, 242-54, where the discussions on this episode are collectedtogether. See also G. Soranzo, 'II clima storico della politica veneziana in Romagna' passim.Dieci, Misti, reg. 24, 102V (7 Mar. 1489).

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Trivulzio and Pitigliano, two of the possible candidates. The Ten obligedwith details of a negotiation in 1484 with Trivulzio and with secret reportsfrom Rome on Pitigliano.54 Finally, in June 1495 Gonzaga was appointedgovernor-general by the Senate after the Ten had once more urged thegreatest confidentiality.55 But it was the Ten in June 1497 which voted todismiss Gonzaga for negotiating with the French,56 while a decision onwhether or not to re-employ him in September 1498 was passed by the Tento the Senate.57

The conclusion must be, therefore, that by the early sixteenth century theTen had considerably increased its areas of competence and had alsoestablished precedents for playing a part in most areas of decision making.The increased use of special zonte, which turned the Ten into a broader andmore inclusive committee, made this a more acceptable process to the othercommittees. As far as control of military policy went, the War of Ferrara hadbeen a crucial stage in these developments; but even in the early sixteenthcentury it remained undisputed that the Senate decided on matters of peaceand war, and that appointments at all levels remained largely out of thehands of the Ten. An interesting debate in September 1480 in the Tenthrows the whole question into sharp relief. The matter at issue was aproposal to occupy Gorizia; a majority in the Ten came to the conclusionthat if the affair could be arranged by negotiation then it fell within thecompetence of that council, but if force was envisaged then only the Senatecould make the ultimate decision. Whether this principle could have beenstated quite so clearly thirty years later is doubtful, but it remained broadlytrue as a statement on the final control of policy.58

Just as the Senate on the whole retained control over the main lines ofmilitary policy throughout the fifteenth century, so certainly it retainedcontrol over the appointment of the men largely responsible for coordinat-ing the execution of that policy, the proveditors in campo. The proveditorswere elected in the Senate, and their function was to accompany the captain-general, pass on to him instructions from the Senate, advise him on thepolitical implications of military developments, and report back to theSenate on the conduct both of the army and of the captain-general.59 Thepost was a long-established one and in fourteenth- and early-fifteenth-century condone of captains-general it was formally written in that the

54 Ibid., reg. 26, 162 (5 Jan. 1495).55 Ibid., i88v (4 June 1495); SS. reg. 35, 113 (5 June 1495).56 Dieci, Misti, reg. 27, 135V, 136, 124 and 144 (17 May, 19 May, 21 June and 26 June 1497).57 Ibid., 230V (12 Sept. 1498).58 Ibid., reg. 20, 22 (6 Sept. 1480).59 J. R. Hale, 'Renaissance armies and political control: the Venetian proveditorial system, 1509-29',

Journal of Italian History, ii, 1 (1979) 11—31.

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captain-general had to accept these civilian commissaries in the camp.60

Prior to 1404 it was probably the case that the duties of the proveditors werelimited to these essentially 'civilian' functions. Ricotti's famous judgementon the role of the proveditors reflects this early period and the undoubtedresentment felt by the military at the presence of these men in the camps:' aninconvenient, and indeed damaging, official in any energetic campaign, andsuch that he seemed more able to spy out and punish failures than tofacilitate victories '.6I But as the fifteenth century advanced and the Venetianmilitary commitment became more continuous, the proveditors took alarger share in various aspects of military organization and became moreintegrated into the military scene. At the same time the number of civilianofficials with the army proliferated, and the proveditors in campo assumedsome responsibility for this burgeoning structure of military organization.However, it is as difficult to define precisely at any moment the relationshipbetween the temporary but extremely prestigious proveditor and thepermanent collateral-general, as it is that between them and the soldiercaptain-general. Proveditors were, for much of the century, purely wartimeappointments; both the soldiers and the military organization run by thecollaterals continued in peacetime without them. Hence, although theyundoubtedly had considerable powers of interference, their role wasprimarily as supervisors, inspectors and co-ordinators rather than asexecutive agents. They sometimes handled army pay and certainly had somefunds at their disposal for subversion and information-gathering activities,but on the whole money was handled by the paymasters, over whom theproveditors exercised only an informal authority. On occasion they assumeddirect responsibility for provisioning and the commissariat, but this sphereagain was usually in the hands of specially appointed officials. On otheroccasions they actually commanded troops, although usually only incircumstances of a small force detached from the main army, or in theabsence of the captain-general on leave. The picture is to some extentcomplicated by the fact that the title of provveditore was used at certain timesfor lesser civilian officials responsible for specific aspects of militaryorganization or for special territorial areas; but the men whose role we areparticularly concerned to examine at the moment were the proveditors incampo, usually two in number, who acted as the direct link between theSenate and the army.

In 1404-5 both the dispersal of the armies and a natural desire in Veniceto keep a tight hold on what was an exceptional and novel level of military

60 See the condotta of Lucchino dal Verme (Commemoriali, vn, 32; 2 Feb. 1464; Predelli, iii, 26).61 Ricotti, ii, 18: 'magistrate incomodo, anzi dannoso, in ogni robusta impresa, e tale che sembrasse piu

atto a spiare e punire i falli che a facilitare le vittorie'.

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commitment led to a large number of proveditors being sent out. However,each of the main armies had proveditors in campo attached to it, and it isamongst these that we can see emerging some key figures whose experiencein this capacity extended both forwards and backwards. Carlo Zeno, one ofthe heroes of the War of Chioggia, was with the army before Padua for mostof the war.62 Gabriele Emo and Jacopo Soriano were with the army beforeVerona throughout the siege of that city.63 Fantino Michiel and FrancescoBembo served as proveditors throughout the war and directed thedemobilization which followed it.64

In the first Hungarian crisis of 1411-12 it was Michiel and Bembo whowere immediately chosen to accompany Carlo Malatesta's army.65 By thistime the pre-eminence of the proveditors in campo was clearly established,and the use of the title for lesser officials to a large extent disappeared. In1418-20 the leading figure in this capacity was Niccolo Giorgio, who hadserved in 1412 and was to be one of the key personalities in the establishmentof the savi della terraferma in 1421-2.66

But it was in the period 1426-54 that one gets a striking impression ofcontinuity in this key office, and of the emergence of a group of about adozen men who dominated the ranks of the proveditors in campo for a wholegeneration of war. Fantino Michiel, whose experience with the army wentback to 1404, continued to serve regularly as proveditor until 1432, andSanto Venier, who had first appeared in this capacity in 1411, also extendedhis service into the early 1430s.67 Tommaso Michiel, another of theproveditors in the Carraresi war, was one of the savi della terraferma nine

62 Zeno was appointed, along with Pietro Emo, on i July 1404 (SS. reg. 2, 23). For a description of hisactivities during the war, see Jacopo Zeno, Vita Caroli Zeni, ed. G. Zonta, RRIISS., xix, vi (Bologna,1941) 114-20.

63 Gabriele Emo was a key figure in Venetian relations with Verona and had a long-standing interest inthe latter city (Law, 'Rapporti di Venezia con le provincie di Terraferma', 83). He was a governor ofthe army throughout the siege and received the Veronese surrender on behalf of Venice.

64 F a n t i n o Mich ie l was appo in ted provedi tor of the condone on 21 M a r . 1405 ( S S . reg. 2 ,99 ) and brieflyc o m m a n d e d a r iver fleet on the Adige in Apr . ( ibid. , 107). H e became a governor of the c a m p besiegingPadua on 30 July 1405 (ibid., 13 iv). Francesco Bembo was active throughout the war, first asproveditor at Bassano (ibid., 15V; 6 June 1404), then as governor of the main army between Feb. andJuly 1405 (ibid., 131 v). The activities of these two men during the demobilization period are discussedabove, 24-5.

65 S S . reg. 5, 59 (31 Aug. 1412).66 Niccolo Giorg io had been sent as orator to Carlo Malatesta on 5 July 1412 (ibid., 41 v). H e was

appoin ted provedi tor wi th Arcelli on 27 Ju ly 1419 (reg. 7, 94), and the appo in tment was renewed on19 J u n e 1420 (ibid., 160). Fo r his role as savio, see above, 161.

67 Michiel went as orator to Carmagnola in August 1426 ( S S . reg. 9, 152V) and remained with the a rmyunti l early s u m m e r 1427. H e also spent most of 1431 and 1432 as proveditor (reg. 11, 178 and 191 v).San to Venier had been the original negotiator of the condotta of Carlo Malatesta in 1411/12 (reg. 4 ,222), was provedi tor in 1419 (reg. 7, 94) and special orator to Carmagnola to congratulate h im on hisvictory at Maclodio in 1427 (reg. 10, 92V). H e then spent most of 1432 with the a rmy as proveditor ,and at t imes c o m m a n d e r (reg. 12, 78V and 127V; S M i . reg. 58, 131).

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times between 1426 and 1441 and during that period was also proveditor ona further four occasions.68 Pietro Loredan, the hero of Motta in 1412 andGallipoli in 1416, had his share of land experience as proveditor and actuallycommanded the army during the absence of Carmagnola at the baths in1428. He eventually died while commanding the Po river fleet in 1438.69

Giorgio Corner, the man more than any other responsible for the fall ofCarmagnola, was an experienced proveditor who had been with the armyfrequently since 1426.70 The career of Andrea Giuliano, about whom weknow more than about most of these men, indicates the extent to whichexperience as proveditor in campo tended to go with a broader experienceand specialization in Terraferma offices.71 Giuliano, a pupil of GasparinoBarzizza and associate of Francesco Barbaro, had his first militaryexperience in 1414 when he led 25 lances from Verona to Parma to join theD'Este forces. Subsequently he was five times proveditor in campo and heldrectorships in most of the major Terraferma cities. Francesco Barbarohimself, whose name is enshrined in the annals of Venetian military historyas the defender of Brescia during the long siege of 1438/9, seems to havebeen proveditor only once; but he also had an impressive record of service asa Terraferma rector.72

The second half of the wars produced a new crop of Venetian patricianswhose careers were completely bound up with the army for a number ofyears. Gherardo Dandolo was seven times proveditor between 1435 and1453;73 Federico Contarini combined six spells as proveditor with eightterms as savio delta terraferma between 1427 and 1448, when he died of

68 For Tommaso Michiel's outstanding record as savio delta terraferma, see above, 162. He wasproveditor in 1405 (SS. reg. 2, 103V); 1420 (reg. 7, 160); 1427 (reg. 10, 41V), when he was present atMaclodio; and in 1441 (reg. 15, 86v). He was also twice sent as special orator to Francesco Sforza in1435 and 1439 (reg. 13, 169V; reg. 14, 2oov).

69 Fo r L o r e d a n ' s formidable naval record, see C. Argegni , Condottieri, capitani e tribuni (Milan, 1936) ii,106. H e was with the a rmy in 1426, when he was accompanied by Flavio Biondo as his secretary (SS .reg. 9, 150V and 161; B . Nogara , Scritti inediti e rari di Flavio Biondo (Rome, 1927) xlvi-xlix), in 1428( S S . reg. 10, 130V and 170) and in 1437 (reg. 14, 28v).

70 Giorgio C o r n e r was wi th the a rmy in 1426,1427 and 1431 for long periods (SS . reg. 9 , 8 1 ; reg. 10,92V;reg. 12, 34V and 63V). H e re tu rned to his post after the execution of Carmagnola and remained withthe a rmy t h r o u g h o u t the s u m m e r of 1432 until his capture by the Milanese in the Valtelline.

71 On Andrea Giuliano, see S. Troilo, Andrea Giuliano: politico e letterato veneziano del Quattrocento(Biblioteca dell 'Archivum Romanicum, ser. 1, xvi-xviii, 1931-2).

72 P. Gothein, Francesco Barbaro: Fruh-Humanismus and Staatskunst in Venedig (Berlin, 1932) 332-41;N . Carott i , ' U n politico umanista del Quattrocento: Francesco Barbaro ' , RSI., ser. 5, ii (1937) 18-37.

73 Gherardo Dandolo was proveditor at the successful siege of Lizzana in Sept. 1439 (SS. reg. 14, 222V)and took over as governor of Piacenza from Taddeo d'Este in 1447. He defended the cityunsuccessfully against Francesco Sforza and at its fall was briefly a Milanese prisoner ( S T . reg. 2, 42and 66; SS . reg. 17, 170). In addition he was proveditor in campo in 1435 (SS. reg. 13, 183V), 1439(SMi. reg. 60 ,143 ; SS . reg. 14, 213), 1441 (ST . reg. 1,14V), 1448 (ST . reg. 2, 8iv) and 1453 (SS. reg.17,231).

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rabies in the camp on the eve of Caravaggio.74 Andrea Dandolo, who firstserved as proveditor in 1441, profited from his considerable experience inthe later stages of the wars in Lombardy to get the appointment asproveditor with Sigismondo Malatesta's army in the Morea in 1464.75 Butthese later years were dominated above all by two men, Pasquale Malipiero,the future doge, and Jacopo Antonio Marcello. Malipiero was often deridedby Venetian chroniclers as an unsuccessful doge and a man of peace incontrast to his formidable predecessor, Francesco Foscari; but his career as aproveditor indicates not only considerable experience of military affairs butalso a reputation amongst his fellow patricians as the man to send out in acrisis. He was seven times proveditor between 1440 and 1453, and in the lastsix years of this period he was rarely absent from the army.76 Marcello wasone of the most distinguished men of his generation and must have beenvery close to the dogeship on a number of occasions. A noted humanist andartistic patron, he started his military career at the siege of Brescia in 1438.He accompanied Gattamelata on his famous escape march from thebeleaguered city, and returned by the same route in the next year with therelief army.77 It was he who was sent to take over Ravenna in 1441, and hewas proveditor at the victory of Casalmaggiore in 1446, after which he wasknighted by Michele Attendolo.78 In 1448 he was called in to organize theshattered army after Caravaggio and was with it almost continuously for thenext six years.79 In 1463 he was elected again to act as proveditor for thearmy sent to besiege Trieste, and was finally killed by a cannon shot leadingVenetian amphibious forces in Apulia in 1484.80

74 Federico Contarini was also a Milanese prisoner for a spell in 1439 after the surrender of Porto (SS.reg. 14, 199), and was with Gattamelata and Francesco Sforza during the early part of the siege ofBrescia in 1438 (ibid., 151V). In addition he was proveditor in 1433 (SMi. reg. 58,192), 1437 (reg. 60,37), 1446 (SS. reg. 17, 64V) and 1448 (ST. reg. 2, 76). For his death on the eve of Caravaggio, seeSanuto, Vite de dogi, 1128.

75 Andrea Dando lo ' s per iods of service as proveditor wi th the army in L o m b a r d y were in 1441 (SS . reg.15, 80), 1449 ( S T . reg. 2, 111), 1450 (ibid., 140V), 1451 (ibid., 199V), and 1452 (reg. 3 , 25). For theM o r e a campaign , see Soranzo , ' S ig i smondo Pandolfo Malatesta in M o r e a ' passim.

76 Pasquale Mal ip ie ro ' s service in the early 1450s was so cont inuous that it is difficult to sort out differentt e rms of office. H e was with the a rmy th roughou t the s u m m e r of 1440 (SMi . reg. 60, 211; S T . reg. 1,5), from a u t u m n 1447 to m i d s u m m e r 1448 ( S S . reg. 17, 185; S T . reg. 2, 61 and 76), in spr ing 1449(ST. reg. 2, io6v) and for much of 1450 (SS. reg. 18,201), 1451,1452 (SS. reg. 19, i28vand 160) and1453 (ibid., 191; ST. reg. 3, 93V).

77 A very eulogistic and rather distorted picture of Marcello as the great war hero emerges from Argegni,ii, 200. But his involvement in the siege and relief of Brescia is clearly documented (SS. reg. 14,151V,197, 213 and 236).

78 W . Barbiani , La dominazione veneta a Ravenna (Ravenna, 1927) 3 6 - 8 . His role at Casalmaggiore isment ioned in Sanu to , Vite de' dogiy 1122-3 , a n d a^ s o m S S . reg. 17, i8v .

79 H e was with the a rmy th roughou t 1447 ( S T . reg. 2, 17 and 26; S S . reg. 17, 185). At the t ime ofCaravaggio he was Capta in of Verona; bu t he was sent to join the army dur ing the retreat . Hispresence with the a rmy is further documen ted in 1449 ( S T . reg. 2, 110), 1450 (ibid., 127; S S . reg. 18,201), 1452 ( S S . reg. 19, 128V, 133V and 151V) and 1453 (ibid., 191; S T . reg. 3, 93).

80 For his presence at Trieste, see Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 1178, and on the Apulia campaign and his death,see Romanin, iv, 415. For his extensive activities as a humanist patron and his relationship particularly

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Marcello was to take his place alongside some of Venice's great navalcommanders as a war hero, and was popularly regarded in Venice as thevictor of Casalmaggiore. This was undoubtedly a distortion of the role of theproveditors in this period; although they certainly did command troops onoccasion, their main function was as advisers and administrators. Neverthe-less, the considerable and often continuous experience acquired by a smallgroup of Venetians in the first half of the fifteenth century must haveaffected the reputation and standing of these men both in Venice and in thearmy. These were not just civilians sent out with no knowledge orexperience other than the instructions they had received from the Senate.They were nobles with considerable experience of both military andTerraferma affairs; most of them had served as rectors in the Terrafermacities and they would have been particularly aware of the logistical anddisciplinary problems involved in the creation of a standing army. Theiroffice carried considerable prestige, not least because of the high salarieswhich were paid. In the early years of the century 50 ducats per month forsalary and the expenses of a small following was a fairly standard rate of payfor proveditors.81 But in the late 1420s 100 ducats per month was standard,and in the exceptional circumstances of the late summer of 1428 whenCarmagnola retired to the baths, Pietro Loredan, who took over virtualcommand of the army, got 200 ducats per month.82 In 1437 and 1438 200ducats per month was again the rate offered to proveditors, and this wasexpected to cover the expenses of sixteen followers.83 But by the 1440s therewas growing opposition to these high emoluments. When in April 1440there was debate on the selection of a prestigious proveditor to be sent to joinFrancesco Sforza, a proposal to offer a salary of 160 ducats per month wasdefeated, and Pasquale Malipiero, who eventually went, had to be contentwith ioo.84 Later in that year the Senate specifically decreed that salariespaid to any Terraferma officials, including proveditors, should not exceed50 ducats per month, and two years later this limit was reduced to 30ducats.85 But in the crisis of 1448 these laws were suspended and theproveditors were offered 170 ducats per month.86 In 1452 100 ducats was

with George of Trebizond and Battista Guarino, see M. Meiss, Andrea Mantegna as Illustrator: AnEpisode in Renaissance Art (Hamburg, 1957) passim; J. Monfasani, George of Trebizond: A Biographyand a Study of his Rhetoric and Logic (Brill, 1977) 174-6; H. Martin, 'Sur un portrait de Jacques-Antoine Marcelle, senateur venitien', Me'moires de la Societe nationale des antiquaires de France, lix(1900); Vale, War and Chivalry, 59-61.

81 SMi. reg. 48, IOIV (2 Sept. 1409).82 SS. reg. 10, 51 (16 May 1427), 170 (23 Aug. 1428).83 SS. reg. 14, 118 (21 June 1438).84 SMi. reg. 60, 210-11 (26 Apr-3 May 1440).85 SMi. reg. 60,240V (8 Aug. 1440); ST. reg. 2,69 (20 May 1448). The latter discussion referred back to a

decision of 1442.86 ST. reg. 2, 7 5v (18 July 1448).

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again regarded as too high, and the proveditors got 60 ducats per month,with an obligation to maintain fifteen cavalry out of this sum.87

The main purpose of these high salaries was to enable the proveditors toemploy a respectable following of essential assistants and of armed men.Such a retinue was seen by those with experience of the post as a necessarycontribution to the prestige and standing of the proveditor, but at the sametime was regarded with deep suspicion by the ordinary Venetian nobles.Hence the frequent debates on the issue of Terraferma salaries in the Senatereflected considerations other than purely economic ones.

Obviously, however, after 1454 the situation with regard to theproveditors changed in a number of important respects. With onlyspasmodic and usually brief outbreaks of war, the appointment ofprestigious war proveditors became much more rare, and inevitablycontinuity of experience in this role tended to disappear. However, thegrowing central concern with army organization and discipline which beganwith the great inspections of the 1470s led to the emergence of proveditors,and particularly the proveditor-general, as civilian officials with morespecific administrative responsibilities. Increasingly proveditors were ap-pointed in peacetime and began to take over many of the responsibilities ofthe collaterals. At the same time at the highest level the proveditor-generalmaintained and even increased his standing as the representative of theemploying government with the military captains. Thus by the end of thecentury the proveditor-general occupied a much less ambiguous position inthe army than his predecessors before 1454. He virtually controlled all theadministrative services, was responsible for getting the army into the field inan emergency, and, even in war, assumed a role which could no longer bedescribed as just civilian adviser to the captain-general. His control of manyof the essential support services together with his position as therepresentative of the government made it possible to see him in certaincircumstances as more important to the army than the captain-generalhimself.88

At the same time proveditors appointed by the Senate began to takecharge of certain arms. The Balkan light cavalry, the stradiots, from themoment of their introduction into Italy in the late 1470s were always led by aproveditor,89 and by the 1480s a proveditor was also responsible for the87 SS. reg. 19, 128V (24 Mar. 1452).88 The range of activities of Lorenzo Loredan, proveditor-general in 1478/9, has already been discussed

above, 147-52. In 1496 the Senate declared categorically that it was the proveditor who commandedthe Venetian contingent in Pisa (SS. reg. 36, 84V; 25 Nov. 1496), and by 1508 all bollette had to becountersigned by the proveditors (ST. reg. 16, 1; 1 Mar. 1508).

89 See the commission of Niccolo Contarini, proveditor-general of the stradiots, in 1484 (ST. reg. 9,89; 6July 1484). On this development of the role of the proveditors, see Hale, 'Renaissance armies andpolitical control', 14-15.

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artillery. In the spring of 1509, when proveditors were appointed tocommand the light cavalry and the artillery, the men chosen wereGiustiniano Morosini, who had been a proveditor in the German War in1487 and later led the stradiots in Pisa in 1496, and Vincenzo Valier, whohad also led stradiots during the Pisan campaign and had been proveditor-general in 1502.90 Therefore, by the end of the period some of the proveditorswere beginning to get a deserved reputation as soldiers.

Inevitably in the circumstances described above there is less evidence oflong continuity of a handful of men in the office of proveditor in the secondhalf of the century. Antonio Loredan, who seemed the natural choice asproveditor-general at the beginning of the War of Ferrara, had longexperience of the office in the Balkans, but he died at his post in the autumnof 1482.91 Of the proveditors elected to confront the German attack in 1487Hieronimo Marcello had experience in the role going back to 1478, LucaPisani had served during the War of Ferrara and was to reappear asproveditor at Fornovo in 1495, and Giustiniano Morosini was still availableto lead the light cavalry at Agnadello.92 Of the key figures in 1495 Pisani,Marcantonio Morosini and Piero Marcello all had previous experience ineither the War of Ferrara or the German War; Marcantonio Morosini wasagain chosen as proveditor in 1499 for the campaign against Milan, andMarcello also reappeared frequently in subsequent years.93 However, in1508-9 the key men were Andrea Gritti, Giorgio Corner and Giorgio Emo -all leading political figures but, apart from Gritti, with considerably lessexperience of military affairs than their counterparts in the 1450s, JacopoAntonio Marcello and Pasquale Malipiero.94 But of course at Agnadellothere were also proveditors of subordinate rank leading the light cavalry andthe artillery who were among the most experienced Venetians available.

Having considered the personalities and role of the proveditors in thefifteenth century in some detail, we can now return to the problem of their90 ST. reg. 16, 92V (23 Mar. 1509). These men got 80 ducats a month for expenses. For Morosini see

below; for Valier's appointment as proveditor-general, see ST. reg. 14, 69 (26 Feb. 1502).91 Antonio Loredan was proveditor in the Morea in 1466 (SS. reg. 22,189V) and distinguished himself as

the commander of the defence of Scutari in 1478 (Romanin, iv, 380). He died of marsh fever at thesiege of Ferrara in August 1482 (SS. reg. 30, 114; 10 Aug. 1482).

92 For the appointments for the German War, see SS. reg. 33,74V and Collegio, Lettere Secrete, filza 1,219. Hieronimo Marcello had been proveditor in Conegliano in 1478 during the Turkish invasion(ST. reg. 8,11 v) and was responsible for the big inspections of 1485 (SS. reg. 32,145). For Luca Pisaniat Fornovo, see Schullian, pp. 8iff. Giustiniano Morosini commanded the stradiots in Pisa in 1496(SS. reg. 36, 26).

93 Marcan ton io Morosini and Piero Marcello had both been with the army in 1482 (SS. reg. 30, 1 iov;S T . reg. 8, 181 v). Marcel lo took over in Friuli from Andrea Zancani after the defeat by the T u r k s inthe a u t u m n of 1499 (SS . reg. 37,138) . Marcantonio Morosini and another of the Fornovo proveditors,Melchior Trevisan , were the two proveditors chosen to accompany Pitigliano's army which invadedthe Milanese in 1499 (SS . reg. 37, 105V).

94 Sanu to , viii, 22.

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relationship with the captains-general, and wider questions of the control ofthe army which could be exercised through these men. Undoubtedly therewere frequent tensions between the army commanders and their civilianadvisers. Both Carmagnola and Gianfrancesco Gonzaga were on occasion atloggerheads with their proveditors, and Sigismondo Malatesta and AndreaDandolo were scarcely on speaking terms in the Morea in 1464. But theextent of these dissensions can be exaggerated, and the causes of them werecomplex. Obviously an important potential area of dispute was over thestrategic conduct of the war. If it was a question of taking the offensive thenthere were always two schools of thought about whether to attack with aswift blow deep into enemy territory or to launch a careful staged advanceinvolving reducing all the enemy strongpoints on the way. In the Venetiancontext this debate usually centred on the Adda frontier and how to attackacross it. In June 1427 it was Carmagnola who persuaded the Senate to agreeto a sudden thrust across the river;95 but four years later in December 1431the roles were reversed and the proveditors were urging Carmagnola tostrike.96 Carmagnola's reluctance on the latter occasion is easily explainedby the lateness of the season and the uncertain state of the river swollen byautumn rains, just as the urgency of Venice's demands stemmed from adesire to make quick gains before a truce was signed. The same issue cameup in 1437 when, after initially counselling caution, Venice began to exertpressure for an offensive across the Adda. Gianfrancesco Gonzaga claimedthat he was not strong enough to attack, and once again it was clear that adesire to achieve some positive success before the impending truce was afactor in the Venetian thinking. The proveditor on this occasion was theimperious Pietro Loredan, who could certainly not have been accused ofbeing rash and inexperienced in military affairs; but at the same time he wasunlikely to be the best man to cajole a reluctant captain-general intoattacking before he was ready.97

Another contentious issue connected with an offensive strategy was thatof devastation. On the face of it one would expect condottieri to be only toowilling to agree to a systematic plundering campaign, but the issue was notas simple as it appears. In 1412 Carlo Malatesta was instructed to ravageFriuli in order to punish the local lords who had allied with the Hungarians,and to make it difficult for the Hungarian army to live off the land.98 ButMalatesta was reluctant to carry out this policy, partly because it meant alsodevastating the lands of the Patriarch of Aquileia, and Malatesta was

95 S S . reg . 10, 59V (2 J u l y 1427).96 SS. reg. 12, 46V-47 and 56 (28 Dec. 1431 and 28 Jan. 1432).97 Tarducci, 'L'alleanza Visconti-Gonzaga', 265-70. See also Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 4, 120 (7

July 1437) and passim.98 SS. reg. 5, 27V (3 June 1412).

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personally committed to a policy of restoring Church unity. Furthermore, athoughtful captain-general was always concerned about the provisioningand foddering of his own troops and horses in a devastated area, and thiscould lead him to oppose a scorched-earth policy. In the second HungarianWar Venetian policy had totally changed; now there was a real possibility ofmajor territorial gains in Friuli, and Venice was anxious not to antagonizethe local population or cripple the resources of the area. Hence FilippoArcelli was ordered to avoid doing any more damage than was necessary,particularly in the cities which he occupied." Such restraint clearly wentagainst the grain with a man like Arcelli, and once again there were seeds oftension here.

In a defensive situation the main strategic issue was whether to keep thearmy together and concentrate on harassing the enemy army and thusslowing up his advance, or whether to divide up the army and use it togarrison strongpoints in order to prevent them falling into the hands of theenemy. Once again it is impossible to say that the commanders tended tochoose one solution and the Venetian government another. PandolfoMalatesta in the winter of 1412 came under heavy Hungarian pressure andwas urged by the Senate to concentrate on defending the towns. He chose toignore these instructions and followed a policy of strategic withdrawal,keeping his army intact and using it to harass the Hungarian supply lines.Tempers rose in Venice and the Senate tried to go over Pandolfo's head andorder the army to break up. But, probably as Pandolfo had anticipated, theHungarian advance soon came to a halt and his policy was vindicated.100

Indeed, his success on this occasion was quoted by the Senate to Gonzaga inthe autumn of 1437 when he found himself in the same position,101 and itseems to have been a lesson in defensive tactics which was applied again in1509.

Disagreements over strategy there undoubtedly were, but no generalpattern of over-cautious soldiers confronted by rash and inexperiencedcivilian advisers emerges. The disagreements stemmed from basic dif-ferences of approach to given situations and roles could be quickly reversed.

Another potent source of tension was the role played by armycommanders in negotiations with the enemy. Here one has to distinguishbetween negotiations aimed at suborning the general himself and thosewhich were genuine attempts to end the fighting. Obviously one of the maintasks of the proveditors was to detect and stop any attempt to win over thegeneral to whom they were attached, and as such attempts were extremelycommon they tended to generate an atmosphere of suspicion even if the

99 SS. reg. 7, 160 (19 June 1420).100 SS. reg. 5, 85V, 90 and 98 (27 Nov. and 13 Dec. 1412, 2 Jan. 1412).101 SS. reg. 14, 69V (6 Nov. 1437).

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general concerned had no intention of changing sides. Frequently whatappeared to be a direct approach by an enemy emissary to the captain-general was a preliminary to the opening of genuine peace negotiations, andthis was where ambiguities and misunderstandings arose. The Senate, ofcourse, had ultimate responsibility for decisions on peace and war, and yetinevitably in some circumstances these questions were opened at armyheadquarters itself. Particularly was this so when the captain-general was aman of international standing like Carmagnola or Francesco Sforza. In1440/1 after much initial suspicion and reluctance the Senate accepted thatthe peace was to be negotiated at Sforza's camp largely by Sforza.102 Thesituation at Bagnolo in 1484 was somewhat similar, although in that case theleading political figures on the side of the League, except for Lorenzo de'Medici, were all present, and on the Venetian side it was the proveditorsrather than Roberto da Sanseverino who did the actual negotiating.103

But perhaps the most contentious issue of all in the relations betweencaptains-general and proveditors, and the most frustrating one for theSenate in Venice, was that of getting the army out into the field andwithdrawing it to winter quarters. This was a complex issue, partlyreflecting the willingness of the general to fight, but more importantly linkedto logistical problems like the state of fodder and provision supplies, andconditions of pay. An army which was underpaid and poorly supplied couldlive more easily dispersed in winter quarters, and no general was going tobring it out of those quarters unless pay and supplies were guaranteed. Thiswas the main issue at stake between Carmagnola and his proveditors as eachyear he announced his intention of dispersing the army to quarters in earlyautumn and the proveditors, urged on from Venice, pointed out thepotential dangers of early dispersal and tried to bully him into keeping thecampaign going.104 Undoubtedly the conflict was in part the teethingtroubles of a newly created permanent army; Venice was obviously seekingto gain greater control over the new and expensive instrument it had created,while Carmagnola was pointing out the problems of providing fodder inAugust and September and keeping unpaid soldiers disciplined. Althoughlater commanders occasionally clashed with proveditors over the same issue,there is no doubt that after the early 1430s the latent tensions considerablyeased.

This easing of tensions applied generally to the whole sphere of relationsbetween army commanders and their Venetian employers. A number of102 SS. reg. 15, 29V, 30V and 36 (18 July, 30 July and 20 Aug. 1440).103 Cessi,' Pace di Bagnolo' passim. For the dispatches of the proveditors, see Senato, Lettere di Rettori,

11.104 See particularly SS. reg. 10, 76V-78 and 8gv (1 Sept. and 6 Oct. 1427) and reg. 12, 7-8 (17-20 Aug.

1431). See also Battistella, Carmagnola, 293-5.

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factors contributed directly to this, not least the growing experience of theproveditors in the 1430s and 1440s, which made them more sympathetic tothe problems of the army leaders and more able to present these problems tothe Senate. The continuity of experience of these men has already beendiscussed, and undoubtedly proveditors like Jacopo Antonio Marcelloenjoyed wide respect in the army.

Proveditors returning from the front were always invited immediately tojoin the Senate and contribute to its discussions so that the most recentinformation and observations were available. Above all the Senate and theCollege usually showed an acute awareness of the difficulties of militarycontrol from a distance. Discussions of military affairs frequently endedwith a vote to leave the decisions to the men on the spot; if instructions weresent they were usually phrased as advice. Sometimes instructions sent to theproveditors were presented in the form of two or three alternatives, and theproveditors were left to pass on the one that seemed most appropriate in theactual conditions when the letter arrived. When in September 1431 theSenate heard that a part of the Milanese army had been moved to Genoa itfelt that the moment was auspicious for an attack. But two letters were sentto the preveditors, Giorgio Corner and Andrea Giuliano; one gaveinstructions for an attack on Soncino, but the other was to be used andshown to Carmagnola if it was discovered that the rumour about Milanesetroop movements was false; this merely encouraged him to keep the army inthe field and await an opportunity.105 This sort of approach gave themaximum flexibility to the proveditors and the commanders in the field. Onthe eve of Fornovo in 1495 the Senate wrote at one point to the proveditors:' You must, in the name of the Holy Ghost, carry out what is decided andagreed amongst yourselves without waiting for any further orders ormandates from us.'106 This leads to another point, the extent of consultationthat went on in the army before a decision was made. It was traditional for acaptain-general to consult with a council of his senior condottieri, and in theVenetian army such discussions were always joined by the proveditors. Theproveditors were frequently told by the Senate to canvass the views of someof the condottieri before putting a particular course of action to the captain-general. Famous and probably typical was the great debate before thedecision to attack was taken at Caravaggio in 1448. It was often said that thatfatal decision had been imposed on Michele Attendolo by Venice, but it isclear that a large group of the condottieri were in favour, and this gave theproveditors the determination to overrule the cautious captain-general.107

105 SS. reg. 12, 15V (10 Sept. 1431).106 SS. reg. 35, 129V (26 June 1495): 'Dobiate, nel nome del Santo Spirito, exeguir quanto fra vui sera

determinato et concluso senza expectare altro nostro ordine et mandate'107 Ricotti, ii, 80; Cristoforo da Soldo, Cronaca, 83.

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Finally, the point needs to be restated that there were not fundamentaldifferences in the approach of the military and the civilians to militaryproblems. The basic attitude of the Senate and the captains-general wassimilar; caution always pervaded their decisions. Pitched battle was alwaysthe last resort, only to be risked if all the conditions were favourable. Thiswas the fundamental thinking of most condottieri, and also of mostgovernments. Instructions from the Senate contained constant reference tothe dangers of risking the army in battle. Both politicians and soldiers werecommitted to the same type of warfare; attrition and manoeuvre were thetechniques, with battle as the last resort, the final flourish in a campaign orthe coup de grace to a totally outmanoeuvred enemy.

The execution of Carmagnola is not to be seen as symbolic of Venice'sdealings with its captains. It was a particular moment in the emergence ofthe standing army, and a particular confrontation with a captain who hadbecome impossible to deal with in any other way. On the whole the system ofcontrol worked as well as could be expected given the state of communi-cations and the problems of converting collective decisions into effectiveaction.

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Soldiers and the state

Doge Mocenigo, witnessing the growth of a standing army in the early yearsof the fifteenth century, warned Venetians on his deathbed of the dangers ofbecoming vassals of the military.1 This danger, added to that which hadalways affected Venetian thinking - the fear that the involvement ofindividual nobles in military affairs would give those men pretensions andprestige out of keeping with the traditional corporate spirit of the Venetiannobility - led to an official policy designed to keep the army at a distance andfirmly under control. In a certain sense, therefore, Venice encouraged astrict separation between the military and civilian spheres, and seemedunaffected by humanist and Machiavellian rhetoric about the dangers of amercenary system and of such a separation leading to a sapping of the moralfibre of the civilian population. It is this formal sense of separation whichhas pervaded the preceding chapters. But beneath this lay a whole series ofinformal links, and indeed what might be described as an implicit policy ofintegration, which distinguished the Venetian approach to military prob-lems from that of most of the other Italian states, and particularly Florence.The Machiavellian critique was a critique of Florence, and when he himselfsought to apply it to Venice he did so on the basis of very little realunderstanding of the situation in Venice.2

Undoubtedly Venice had its problems with soldiers; it suffered its shareof treacheries and infidelities; it had cause for complaints about ill disciplineand poor service. Nor can it really be said that it achieved notable successwith the formal methods of control of such problems and the punishment ofoffenders. The execution of Carmagnola was an exceptional event, just aswas the killing of Baldaccio d'Anghiari by Florence, of Tiberto Brandoliniby Milan and of Jacopo Piccinino by Naples. It was carried out only after amotion to arrest the captain-general had been initially defeated in theCouncil of Ten, and with an eventual majority of two in that council and itszonta; the doge and three of his councillors voted against the death

1 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 946ff; Romanin, iv, 93-5.2 Machiavelli's lack of perception on Venetian military affairs comes out in a number of his works; for

detailed reference, see below, 200 n. 5.

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sentence.3 It was probably true that an episode like that of the execution ofCarmagnola had a deterrent effect on the leading condottieri in the yearsimmediately following, and certainly the Venetian proveditors achieved amore sustained and effective control over the captains than the commissariesof other states. Nevertheless the problems continued. In 1436 Alvise dalVerme rejected orders to reduce the size of his company and abandonedVenetian service.4 An initial hope that he would retire southwards and joinNaples proved premature, and within a few months he was in the service ofMilan and righting against Venice.5 This was regarded by Venice as aparticularly flagrant desertion, because Dal Verme was Veronese and evenhad an honorary seat on the Venetian Great Council. His estates wereconfiscated and sold.6

No sooner had the echoes of this scandal died away than in 1437 thecaptain-general, Gianfrancesco Gonzaga, came under suspicion of render-ing half-hearted service and negotiating with the Visconti. His conflicts withhis proveditors have already been discussed, and it was said that he was sofearful of some Venetian reprisal against him that during the last months ofhis service he never slept in a town and took all his meals on horseback.7 Hiswithdrawal from service and subsequent realignment with Milan againinfuriated Venice, which regarded him as a bitter enemy for the rest of hislife.

The dismissal of Michele Attendolo after Caravaggio was probably morethe result of the ill-disciplined behaviour of his troops in the retreat than oflosing the battle. But a problem arose when he subsequently took servicewith Florence. There was no question of a broken contract in this case, but itwas clearly unacceptable that an enemy commander should be a Venetianfeudatory, and Attendolo had been given Castelfranco as a fief. This causedparticular embarrassment, as Attendolo's estates were managed by his son-in-law, Bartolomeo Pisani, a prominent Venetian noble. At first theVenetian reaction was to cut off the income from the fief in the hope thatAttendolo might be persuaded to abandon his Florentine employment; butin the end the fief was confiscated.8

Colleoni, with his two notorious desertions in 1442 and 1451, was anotherexample of the fragility of Venice's relations with some of its senior captains,

Dieci, Misti, reg. n , 37V and 45 (28 Mar. and 5 May 1432).SS. reg. 13, 189V and 228 (26 Nov. 1435 and 4 May 1436).G. Cornaggia-Medici, 'Per la condotta di Luigi dal Verme ai servigi del Duca Filippo Maria', ASL., lx(1933) 193-8; see also G. M. Varanini, II distretto Veronese nel Quattrocento (Verona, 1980) 110-11.SS. reg. 14, 25V and 74V (23 Mar. and 30 Nov. 1437).Tarducci, 'L'alleanza', 273; see above, 176.For Attendolo's dismissal, see SS. reg. 18, 39 (24 Sept. 1448); for the debate over the fate of his fief, seeST. reg. 2, 198V (1 July 1451), reg. 3, 2ov (14 Feb. 1452) and SS. reg. 19, 129 and 131V-132 (27 Mar.and 18 Apr. 1452).

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and its apparent impotence when confronted with condottiere infidelity.Undoubtedly had the attempt to arrest him in 1451 been successful hewould have suffered the same fate as Carmagnola; but he survived to add anentirely new dimension to the concept of the permanent captain-general.9There was also clearly a disciplinary factor in the decision to end thecontract of Jacopo Piccinino in 1454, as his troops were notoriously illcontrolled.10 But at the same time the captain-generalcy had beenpromised to Colleoni, and Piccinino had to be removed. That this wasachieved without rancour was due as much to the restless ambition ofPiccinino as to the tact and discretion of the Venetians responsible.11

Tact and discretion were not qualities which were obvious in some of thelesser episodes of condottiere infidelity and ill discipline with which Venicehad to deal. In 1452 Evangelista Savelli surrendered Cerreto to the Milaneseand deserted. A sum of 5000 ducats was offered for his capture alive and3000 for his dead body.12 In 1469 Antonello da Corneto was arrested andimprisoned for unspecified dereliction of duty,13 and in the previous yearthe Count of Pisa was dismissed for refusing to serve in the Morea.14 Giorgioda Martinengo was tried by the Council of Ten for desertion in the face ofthe enemy in 1478 and imprisoned.15 In 1485 Luca Savelli was suspected ofpaying his company in forged money and two of his men were arrested forpassing the coins. It was clear where the responsibility lay, but presumablySavelli left hurriedly, because his men were released and compensated out ofhis abandoned goods.16

The final flurry of our period came in 1499 when the family of Roberto daSanseverino were ejected from their fief of Cittadella.17 Presumably thecrisis here was provoked by the war between Milan and Venice, in whichmost of the Sanseverineschi were fighting against Venice, but the behaviourof the family in Cittadella had aroused suspicions earlier when in 1489Antonmaria da Sanseverino was reported for behaving like an independentsignore in the town and distributing his livery to the townsmen.18

Perhaps one of the most revealing episodes was that which came to lightduring the War of Ferrara and concerned Galeotto Pico della Mirandola. In

9 For the instructions sent to Niccolo da Canal by the Ten to seize Colleoni dead or alive and destroy hiscompany, see Dieci, Misti, reg. 14, 47V-48V (12 May 1451).

0 Cristoforo da Soldo, Cronaca, 89.1 Commemoriali, xiv, 146; 19 Oct. 1454 (Predelli, v, 104-5).2 ST. reg. 3, 49V (8 Dec. 1452).3 ST. reg. 6, 67 (13 Aug. 1469); SS. reg. 25, 22V (18 Apr. 1471).4 Zorzi, 'Chiericati', 403.5 ST. reg. 7, 192V (7 Dec. 1477).6 Dieci, Misti, reg. 22, 150 and 155 (11 and 26 Mar. 1485).7 Ibid., reg. 28, 81 (23 Oct. 1499); Sanuto, iii, 39, 44, 58.8 Collegio, Lettere Secrete, filza 1, 40 (11 Aug. 1489).

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September 1483 Galeotto appeared before the Council of Ten at his ownrequest and made a long statement which showed neither himself nor someof the other captains of the day in a very good light.19 He reported that in theprevious year, with the consent of the proveditor Loredan, he had made anapproach to Gianjacopo Trivulzio, an old comrade in arms, who hadexpressed his willingness to abandon his senior position in the Milanesearmy and join the Venetians. This had come to nothing, as Trivulzio hadfallen ill; but in the spring of 1483 the negotiation had been renewed.According to Trivulzio the Milanese were angry with Galeotto because hehad not warned them that Roberto da Sanseverino was planning to attackacross the Adda. Added to this expectation that a Venetian condottiereshould pass secrets to the enemy, and the knowledge that the Milanesecommander was prepared to desert, came also the information that Robertoda Sanseverino himself had been negotiating a change of sides in return forthe lordship of Cesena. No doubt the heads of the members of the Council ofTen were whirling at this point, particularly when Galeotto also told themthat he had had to report all this direct to them because any report to theSenate would be immediately leaked to the Duke of Ferrara by hissympathizers on that council. No action was taken by the Ten as a result ofthis report, and no dramatic changes of side in fact took place. One gets theimpression that the long years of peace since 1454 had not so much erodedthe fighting spirit of the Italian captains as created an atmosphere of socialcohesion and camaraderie amongst them which made it difficult to take thebrief outbreaks of war seriously, and made communication between friendsin the opposing armies almost a matter of course. Even the Council of Tenseemed to take the possibility of the desertion of its commander-in-chief lessseriously than it would have done fifty years earlier. This is not to say thatthere were not serious issues at stake in the War of Ferrara, and undoubtedlyfor the duke himself, and for his subjects, it was a matter of life or death.

The story of Galeotto Pico has an epilogue which again is revealing. Ini486 he was suspected of bribing Venetian chancery officials and nobles andof trafficking in state secrets. A warrant was issued for the arrest of hischancellor, Francesco da Fino, and a number of Venetian nobles andsecretaries were arrested.20 As a result of the inquiries, and the torture ofGiovanni Diedo, sentences of exile or deprivation of office were passed onDiedo himself and others; Francesco da Fino, who was never caught, wasbanished in perpetuity; and Galeotto Pico was dismissed from his condotta,never again to be employed.21 It seems that nothing was actually proved

19 D iec i , M i s t i , reg . 2 1 , 136—g\ (6 Sep t . 1483).20 Ibid., reg. 23, 32V and 43 (22 Mar. and 5 May i486).21 Ibid., 46V-7 (13 May i486).

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against Galeotto and his chancellor, but the possibility of an attempt by asenior condottiere to interfere in the running of the state was sufficient toprovoke a violent reaction.

With the growing power of the Council of Ten in the second half of thecentury the machinery for dealing with difficult captains undoubtedlyimproved. Earlier there had been frequent resort to the device of infamypainting in the cases of treacherous condottieri whom Venice had failed tocatch. The practice of painting an effigy of the offending captain, usuallyhanging upside down, on the walls of public places, particularly the publicbrothel at the Rialto, was of course always accompanied by an offer of areward for the capture of the traitor. Boldrino da Gazo was 'painted' forbetraying Oderzo to the Hungarians in 1412,22 and the same was ordered forPiero Navarino after his desertion in 1427.23 Evangelista Savelli, thebetrayer of Cerreto in 1452, also appeared in effigy hanging upside down onthe walls of public buildings throughout the state.24 While such devicesmight appear no more than admissions of failure, this would be to neglectthe potent impact of public ridicule in the fifteenth century, particularly onsoldiers.

In all the cases so far discussed it was the fidelity of the captain which wasat issue, and while it could be argued that Venice took a firmer line withcondottiere disloyalty and disobedience than other Italian states, thedifferences were certainly not great. A much more difficult and continuousproblem was presented by the behaviour of the troops themselves,particularly vis-a-vis the local population on whom they were quartered orthrough whose lands they were marching. While a low murmur of complaintis apparent in Venetian official sources throughout the century about theimpact of billeting troops in the state, it reached a crescendo in the 1440s.The behaviour of the troops of Francesco and Alessandro Sforza in theVeronese in 1440 brought a request from the Senate to Francesco tointervene and stop his men from forcing civilians to sell goods at lowprices.25 In 1443 there was a clash in the Trevigiano between some ofGentile da Leonessa's men and the local population in which three soldierswere killed.26 In this case, as in 1450 when Colleoni's company was causingtrouble in the Veronese, the answer was quickly to move the troops to a lesspopulous area.27 Undoubtedly a particularly black moment came with the

22 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 861.23 SMi. reg. 56, 126 (6 Sept. 1427).24 ST. reg. 3, 49V (8 Dec. 1452).25 S S . reg. 15, 51V-52V (30 N o v . 1440); ASVe . , Archivio del C o m u n e , 58, 75 (8 N o v . 1440).26 ST. reg. 1, IOIV and 104V-105 (27 July and 23 Aug. 1443).27 Ibid., 137V (10 Aug. 1444). For similar complaints and action about Colleoni, see SS. reg. 19,12V and

22V-23V (12 Oct. and 19 Nov. 1450) and Anonimo Veronese, Cronaca, 21-2.

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retreat after Caravaggio, when the damage done by ill-disciplined soldieryin Peschiera and parts of the Veronese left its mark for years. Thecontributions of Verona to the dadia delle lanze were reduced permanentlyas a result of these episodes.28

In the long run the answer to these problems lay not in local palliativeslike moving companies round, nor even in occasional retribution against thesoldiers concerned, which was in fact very difficult for Venetian rectors tocarry out. Exceptional seems to have been the case of the two soldiers fromAntonmaria da Sanseverino's company who were summarily hanged by theCouncil of Ten for trying to murder a young Venetian noble on the steps ofthe Rialto.29 The answer lay in the gradual tightening of the whole system ofinspections and control, in effective pay which kept the companiescontented, and above all in creating an atmosphere in which the captains feltthemselves under a permanent obligation to Venice and took a pride in theeffectiveness of their companies to carry out that obligation. The Venetianshad a precocious awareness of this solution from early in the fifteenthcentury, and alongside the pattern of lengthening contracts and tighteningadministration there grew up a complicated rewards system, which mustnow be examined.

The rewarding of soldiers for success in a siege or battle was, of course,commonplace in Italian warfare; indeed, the normal allocation to the armyof the bulk of movable booty was in itself a standard form of reward. Venice,like all other states, was accustomed to offering carefully scaled rewards toan army faced with a particularly obstinate siege. This happened at the siegeof Padua in 1405, just as it did at that of Rovigo in 1482.30 At Trieste in 14631000 ducats was offered to the first man over the walls, which was anunusually high rate.31 In 1439 the Senate offered a total of 15,000 ducats tobe distributed to the army of Sforza and Gattamelata if they relievedBrescia.32 Similarly there was a flood of rewards to the successful condottieriafter both Maclodio and Casalmaggiore. But what was peculiar to Venicewas a much more systematic system of rewards, designed not so much toencourage isolated acts of bravery as to turn fidelity and long service intonorms. 'Because the condition of our men-at-arms is of the greatestimportance and also to proceed in that matter with mature deliberation and28 SS. reg. 39,105 (1 Sept. 1503). Evidence for the ill discipline of the army on this occasion comes from,

among other places, Peschiera. The local council asked for relief from the obligation to provideguastatori for fifteen years in compensation for the damage done to them, but this was refused (ST.reg. 2, 93; 30 Nov. 1448).

29 D iec i , Mis t i , reg. 22, 138 (27 J a n . 1485).30 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 828-9. For the rewards offered at the siege of Rovigo, see Piva, Guerra di

Ferrara, i, 83.31 SS. reg. 21, 194 (11 Oct. 1463).32 SS. reg. 14, 239V (24 Nov. 1439).

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maximum attention in order that the below-mentioned condottieri serve usand maintain the honour of our state not as mercenaries but frominclination' ran the opening of a Senate decision in 1433 to retain 5000cavalry and 2000 infantry in permanent service.33 Clearly the emphasis ofsuch a policy was on the captains, of both cavalry and infantry, but itextended also to rewards to faithful and long-serving rank-and-file troops.

The most effective way of retaining the services of a condottiere was tomake him a feudatory of the state. In this way he was not only provided witha place for his family to live and an area in which to quarter his troops,produce his own provisions, and even recruit replacements for his company,but he was also given some responsibility for civic administration. He waspresented with a miniature signoria, which in fifteenth-century Venetianparlance was known as a 'nest'. In fact the degree of control and autonomyconceded in a condottiere fief varied greatly and was rarely extensive.Captains-general were often rewarded with enclaves which included asmall town and over which they had very considerable authority, at least tothe point of appointing local officials if not actually administering justice.But the normal fief was essentially a rural area over which the authority ofthe condottiere feudatory was little more than that of an influentiallandowner. But this, in fifteenth-century Italy, was already considerable,and undoubtedly the allocation of such fiefs served to satisfy one of the basicneeds of the condottiere.

The practice of enfeuding condottieri became standardized in the early1430s. Prior to that the gift of Chiari and Roccafranca to Carmagnola as fiefsin 1429 was an exceptional reward to a successful commander-in-chief.34 In1432, as the Venetian intention to create conditions of permanent servicebecame increasingly clear, a number of the leading condottieri asked forfiefs, and in December of that year the Senate accepted the practice for thefuture.35 During late 1432 and 1433 Luigi da Sanseverino receivedFontanella; Colleoni, Bottanuco; Piero Gianpaolo Orsini, Bariata; andCesare da Martinengo, Orzivecchi.36 Later in the 1430s Cavalcabo de'Cavalcabo was given Seniga, and Gattamelata and Brandolino Brandolinishared Valmareno.37 Michele Attendolo was rewarded with Castelfranco as

33 SS . reg. 12, 182 (4 June 1433): 'Quia factum gentium nostrarum est maxime importantiae et in eoprocedendum matura cum deliberatione et maxime attento que infrascripti conductores non utstipendiarii sed partialiter nobis serviverunt et honorem et statum nostrum sustinerunt ' .

34 Commemoriali , xn , 65; 27 Feb. 1429 (Predelli, iv, 152-3).35 SS. reg . 12,141 (15 Dec. 1432). Alvise dal Verme had an inherited fief at Sanguinetto (Varanini, 65-8).36 For these enfeudations, see Commemoriali , xn , 124 and 134; 1 June and 1 Aug. 1433 (Predelli, iv, 168

and 180 - Luigi da Sanseverino and Cesare da Martinengo); SS. reg. 13, 2v (7-8 Sept. 1433 - PieroGianpaolo Orsini); Belotti, Colleoni, 82-3 .

37 SMi. , reg. 59, 94V (7 Mar. 1435 - Cavalcabo de' Cavalcabo); SS. reg. 13, 200 (17 Feb. 1436) andCommemoriali , xn , 151 (Predelli, iv, 196 - Gattamelata and Brandolini).

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a fief in 1447,38 and another spate of enfeudations came in the early 1450swith Gentile da Leonessa receiving Sanguinetto; Guido Rangoni, Cor-dignano; Cristoforo da Tolentino, Aviano; and Giovanni Conti, Ragogna.39

All these fiefs were located close to Venice's frontiers, initially mostly in theBresciano and Bergamasco, but later in the Trevigiano and Friuli. Theexception, both in timing and location, was the fief of Cittadella given toRoberto da Sanseverino in 1483.40 Cittadella was one of the main garrisontowns in the Padovano and hence much close the heart of the Venetianstate than was normally allowed for a condottiere fief. It was also the onlymajor fief conceded in the period 1454 to 1494.

Undoubtedly the large-scale distribution of fiefs to condottieri was afeature of the years between 1430 and 1454. This was both the period whenthe army was at its largest and when land was more readily available after theexpansion of the Terraferma state. It was also the period in which thegreatest effort was made to secure the loyalty of a military group made uppredominantly of foreign captains. After 1454 the more limited leadershiprequirements of a peacetime army were met out of the families alreadyenfeoffed, and increasingly from families of Terraferma nobility which wereencouraged to take up military careers. From this moment onwards it wasonly the occasional foreign general who received fiefs from Venice. Robertoda Sanseverino was one example, and after 1494 there were the examples ofNiccolo Orsini, Count of Pitigliano, who was given Ghedi, and Bartolomeod'Alviano, who received Pordenone 'in feudo nobile e gentile' after hisvictory over the Germans in 1508.41

Much has been written about a new feudalism in the fifteenth centurylinked to and encouraged by the emerging princes, and at first sightVenetian policy seems to fit into this picture.42 Not only were fiefs granted tosoldiers, but also Venetian patricians were allowed to buy up and take overexisting fiefs in the Terraferma. In addition many of the incumbentfeudatories were allowed to continue to enjoy their feudal rights andprivileges, particularly in the frontier areas of the new state. This was

38 Commemoriali, xm, 193; 9 Jan. 1447 (Predelli, iv, 307).39 S S . reg. 19, 157 (26 Sept . 1452 - Gent i le da Leonessa) ; Commemor ia l i , xiv, 145, 161 and 137V-138

(Predell i , v, 68 , 7 1 , 106 - Cristoforo da To len t ino , Giovanni Cont i and G u i d o Rangoni) .40 Commemor i a l i , x iv, 24V-25 (Predell i , v, 282).41 Pi t igl iano mus t have been given G h e d i soon after he joined Venet ian service in 1495, b u t I have not

found any formal document of investiture. For D'Alviano's investiture, see SS. reg. 41, io6v (20 June1508); Commemoriali, xix, 121 v-i 22v; 15 July 1508 (Predelli, vi, 99-100); A. Battistella,' Pordenonee i D'Alviano', Memorie storiche forogiuliesi, ix (1913) 246.

42 See particularly D . Bueno de Mesqui ta , 'Ludov ico Sforza and his vassals ' , in Italian RenaissanceStudies, ed. E. F . Jacob (London , i960) 184-216. For discussion of the Venetian situation, see G.Fasoli , 'L ineamen t i di politica e di legislazione feudale veneziana in Ter ra fe rma ' , Rivista distoria deldiritto italiano, xxv (1952) 61-94; A. Ventura , ' I I dominio di Venezia nel Qua t t rocen to ' , in Florenceand Venice: Comparisons and Relations, i (Florence, 1979) 176.

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frequently done in return for specific military commitments like that agreedwith Parisio da Lodrone in 1439 to provide 600 infantry when called upon todo so.43 This was all part of the defensive system of the Terraferma state;apart from anything else a feudatory could be expected to maintain hiscastles in reasonable condition. But it would be wrong to imagine that thispolicy represented either a significant feature of Venetian control over thestate or a sort of disintegration of that control. The areas involved wereeither isolated enclaves or the rural fringes of the state, and the authorityand degree of civil control conceded in the new enfeudations were strictlylimited. Those conceded to soldiers were primarily intended to conferprestige and emolument, not be a means of local control.

Enfeudation was not, of course, the only means by which soldiersacquired land in the Venetian state. Condottiere 'nests' were also built upby gifts of land without any feudal implications, and by encouraging soldiersto buy confiscated estates of rebels at favourable rates, or receive them aspart of their pay. Infantry captains like Dietisalvi Lupi, Scaramuccia daForli and Battista Grosso da Mandello were often given lands both asoutright rewards and in lieu of pay.44 Again such grants were much morecommon in the first half of the century than in the second. Associated withthe acquisition of land was also the granting of palaces and houses in theTerraferma cities to soldiers. The quartering of troops in the cities was notencouraged, but it was attractive to a captain, and in some sensesadvantageous to Venice, to allow favoured condottieri to have city bases.Colleoni's palace in Bergamo and that of Carmagnola in Brescia are obviousexamples, but in addition Taddeo d'Este was given a palace in Padua in 1435,and Antonello da Corneto had a palace in Vicenza which was seized at thetime of his disgrace.45 Along with the palace often went citizenship of thecity in question, which allowed the condottiere to enjoy the same gabellereductions as other residents. Again in the second half of the century, asmore and more of the established Terraferma nobility, most of whomalready had city bases, became involved in the Venetian army, this militarypresence in the cities became an even more natural part of the urban scene.

The most prestigious, if not necessarily the most effective, form of rewardwas reserved for captains-general and other very senior commanders, and

43 SS. reg. 14, 194 (6 Apr. 1439).44 Fo r Dietisalvi L u p i , see Mazzi , ' L ' a t t o divisionale della sostanza di Dietisalvi L u p i ' , 7 -9 ; these

estates were in the Bergamasco, as were those given to Scaramuccia da Forli in 1442 (Commemorial i ,X I I I , 189V; Predell i , iv, 273). Battista Grosso was rewarded in 1453 ( S T . reg. 3, 55V; 15 Jan . 1453).

45 For Colleoni 's activities in Bergamo and the bui lding of his palace, see Belotti, Colleoni, 266-7 .Carmagnola was busy bui lding a palace in Brescia in 1430 (SMi . reg. 57, 257; 6 July 1430), bu t bo thT a d d e o d 'Este and Antonello da Corne to acquired existing palaces (Dieci, Mist i , reg. 11, 130V; 6Apr . 1435 and S T . reg. 6, 109V; 5 Nov . 1470).

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this involved conferring a position within Venice itself. All the captains-general and a number of other leading condottieri in the fifteenth centurywere elected honorary members of the Great Council and hence Venetiannobles. Among those who enjoyed this privilege without actually beingcaptain-general were Jacopo Cavalli, Taddeo d'Este, Roberto da Sanse-verino and Bartolomeo d'Alviano.46 Nobility was conferred in perpetuity,but in fact relatively few of the privileged condottiere families survived bythe end of the century. Carmagnola, Gattamelata and Colleoni all had nosons; the line of Taddeo d'Este died out in 1463; and Michele Attendolo,Alvise dal Verme and the sons of Roberto da Sanseverino were all expelledfrom the ranks of the nobility for desertion. The privilege, while largelyhonorary, had a practical purpose in that it allowed the captain-general toappear as of right in the relevant Venetian councils when consultation onmilitary affairs was required. Girolamo Riario, when he was made aVenetian noble during his visit to Venice in 1481, was invited to participatein a session of the Great Council and to make a nomination in the election ofthe Captain of Ravenna.47 His nominee, Bernardo Bembo, was elected, butalthough Riario had a condotta from Venice at this time his special treatmentwas that accorded to a nephew of the pope rather than a Venetian soldier.Normally such nobles were excluded from playing a role in Venetianpolitical affairs.

However, election to the Great Council was on special occasionsaccompanied by the gift of a palace in Venice. This again had a practicalfunction in providing a place of residence for the captain-general when hecame to consult with the Senate, and the very fact of the gift was intended togive the impression that Venice intended the relationship to be a long one. Itwas also in terms of value one of the most extravagant rewards that Venicecould bestow, as such a palace could be worth as much as 6000 ducats.Pandolfo Malatesta was promised a palace when he was made a noble in1413, and the promise was honoured three years later when a palace of theLion family in S. Eustachio on the Grand Canal was bought and given tohim.48 It was this palace which passed in 1427 to Carmagnola as part of hisrewards after Maclodio, and was then confiscated and sold in 1433. Anothersuch palace was that known as 'Del Cagnon' in Calle Corner, S. Polo. Thiswas given to Jacopo dal Verme in 1388 and passed to his son Alvise. AfterAlvise's defection in 1437 it was confiscated and given to Gattamelata in1439 49 The palace then passed to Giovanantonio di Gattamelata, and on his

46 Sanu to , Vite de dogi, 4 4 3 - 4 .47 A S F . , Archivio Mediceo avanti il Pr incipato , x x x v m , 330 (23 Sept . 1481): letter of Fra Ma t t eo da

For l i , who accompanied Riario to Venice, to Lorenzo de ' Medic i .48 S S . reg. 5, 125 (29 Apr . 1413); G . Tass in i , Curiosita veneziane (Venice, 1897) 670.49 Tassini, 196.

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death without heirs it reverted to Venice, which immediately gave it toFrancesco Sforza.50 Sforza subsequently exchanged it for the Ca' del Duca,which was being built by Marco Corner in S. Samuele. The other notablecondottiere palace of this period was the' palazzo delle due torri' built by theGiustiniani in the late fourteenth century at S. Pantalon and bought by therepublic for Gianfrancesco Gonzaga in 1430.51 After Gonzaga's defection in1438 it was seized and given to Francesco Sforza, who lost it in his turn whenhe was fighting against Venice in 1447. This was the palace which wasauctioned in 1452 to the Foscari and was then rebuilt as the existing Ca'Foscari. Finally there was the palace bought from Domenico Pieri in 1483and given to Roberto da Sanseverino. This was in S. Agnese and wasconfiscated in 1500 from Roberto's heirs.52

The appearance of the captain-general in Venice was always the occasionfor considerable ceremony and festivity, and everything possible was doneboth to impress the soldier with the magnificence and power of the state andto reassure him of the high regard and confidence extended to him. Themost celebrated of all such visits was probably that of Colleoni in 1458, butmost of the fifteenth-century captains-general had the opportunity tosavour the delights of a ceremonial visit to Venice.53

Alongside the fiefs, lands and palaces which were showered on Venice'ssenior condottieri, particularly in the first half of the fifteenth century, therewere inevitably cash bonuses and cash pensions. The record of theserewards is probably by no means complete, as it was always necessary forVenice to exercise a degree of discretion and secrecy in the matter to avoidprovoking jealousies amongst the captains. But the evidence of large cashrewards in addition to normal contractual provisions is clear-cut. GaleazzoGonzaga, Count of Grumello, and Pandolfo Malatesta each received lifepensions of 1000 ducats a year as special rewards for their services in the earlywars.54 Filippo Arcelli in 1419 got 500 ducats a year for life and the gift of asuperb silver helmet worth 1000 ducats.55 Carmagnola was promised a lifepension of 2000 ducats a year after Maclodio,56 and as late as 1508 D'Alvianoreceived a gift of 1000 ducats and all the captured German artillery after hisvictory at Pieve di Cadore.57 Sometimes the cash gifts were in fact

50 SS. reg. 20, 97 (14 June 1456).51 Tassini, 280; Commemoriali, xn, 83V (Predelli, iv, 160).52 Priuli, ii, 7; Romanin, iv, 417.53 On Colleoni's visit, see A. Angelucci, Ricordi e documenti di uomini e trovati italiani per servire alia

storia militare (Turin, 1866) 77-9 and Mallett, 'Venice and its condottieri', 121-2. For thepreparations for Roberto Malatesta's visit in 1480, see ST. reg. 8, 93 (14 Apr. 1480).

54 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 830 (Gonzaga) and SS. reg. 5, 125; 29 Apr. 1413 (Malatesta).55 S S . reg. 7, 103V (11 Sep t . 1419).56 Commemoriali, xn, 66v; 17 Oct. 1427 (Predelli, iv, 121).57 SS. reg. 41, 78v (4 Mar. 1508).

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compensation for losses in battle, like the 100 ducats given to Niccolo daTolentino after his quarters were burnt down during the siege of Brescia in1426.58 Nor did the gifts always stem from Venice itself; Terraferma cities,grateful for the protection given them by Venice's army, were sometimescajoled into such generosity. After Francesco Sforza and Gattamelata hadrescued Verona from the assault of Piccinino in 1439 the city council offereda gift of 10,000 ducats to Sforza and 3000 to Gattamelata.59 There was nodoubt an element of coercion in this transaction, but the coercion came atleast in part from Venice, whose proveditor Andrea Donato played a leadingrole in arranging the gifts. Gifts of cash to the chancellors of leadingcondottieri were also common as a reward for getting or retaining theservices of their masters for Venice.

The allocation of a life pension was particularly appropriate at themoment when a condottiere retired from active service, although in mostcases it is not possible to identify a precise moment of retirement in thecareer of a fifteenth-century captain. In 1440 when Antonio da Martinasco,who had been Carmagnola's senior squadron leader, finally retired still inVenetian service, he was already enjoying a life pension of 200 ducats a yearconferred in 1437. However, it was calculated that he was owed back pay ofover 2000 ducats, and this was to be rapidly paid off at the rate of 150 ducatsa month.60 Other notable retirements were those of Deifebo dalPAnguillarain 1488, when he received a pension of 800 florins a year,61 and of Piero daCartagena in 1499 with a pension of 20 florins a month.62

It was one of the rhetorical conventions of Venice's relationship with itscondottieri that both parties referred to the contracts between them as beingbinding for life. Whether or not that had in fact been the case, Venice waswell aware of the need to honour faithful soldiers at their death and to makeit clear that the state accepted a responsibility for their families. The statefunerals ordered for captains-general who died in service were furtheroccasions for Venice to convince soldiers of the respect in which they wereheld. Paolo Savelli, who died during the siege of Padua in 1405, was given astate funeral in Venice attended by the doge.63 He was subsequentlycommemorated by the wooden equestrian statue in the Frari, thought to bethe work of Jacopo della Quercia.64 Another famous military funeral inVenice was that of Bertoldo d'Este, the hero of the Morea campaign of 1463

58 SS. reg. 9, 164 (10 Sept. 1426).59 ASVe., Archivio del Comune, 58, 41 and 116V-119V (28 Dec. 1439 and 7 Nov. 1441).60 SS. reg. 14, 77 (5 Dec. 1437); SMi. reg. 60, 217 (23 May 1440).61 ST. reg. 10, 78V (11 Feb. 1488).62 ST. reg. 13, 88 (5 Aug. 1499).63 Romanin, iv, 26.64 W. Valentiner, 'The equestrian statue of Paolo Savelli in the Frari', Art Quarterly, xiv (1953) 280-92.

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and particularly dear to Venetian hearts because of the very long service ofhis father Taddeo.65 On this occasion a funerary oration was pronounced byBernardo Bembo. The state funeral of Taddeo d'Este himself was held inBrescia in 1448,66 while those of Gattamelata, Gentile da Leonessa andColleoni also took place in the Terraferma. The Senate voted 250 ducats forthe expenses of Gattamelata's funeral in Padua,67 while the cost of theobsequies for Colleoni in Bergamo were met out of his legacy to the state.68

The famous equestrian monuments erected in honour of these two faithfulservants of the republic both occasioned some debate and doubts in theSenate, and in the case of Donatello's monument to Gattamelata the costswere met by Gattamelata's son, Giovanantonio. But with the Colleoni statuethe state could afford to be more generous in the light of the considerablefinancial advantages accruing to it from his will.

The events surrounding the death of Colleoni throw a good deal of lighton the practical background behind the rhetoric of the state funerals and thelaudatory funerary orations. While it was important to do honour to thedead captain and to be seen to be respecting commitments made to him andhis family during his life, it was even more important in this particular caseto ensure the security of the state and to take full advantage of the greatfinancial windfall which resulted from Colleoni's death. The proveditorswho hastened to the bedside of the dying captain had three immediatepractical objectives: to make arrangements for the future of his companiesand the maintenance of discipline amongst what amounted to the core of thearmy on the western frontier, to ensure continuity of local administration inColleoni's extensive fiefs and estates, and to secure control over his treasure.This last objective seemed the most urgent one and led to the mostimmediate results; within a month 232,000 ducats had been sent to Venicefor safekeeping and preparations were in hand for selling off Colleoni'smovable effects to raise more money.69 Colleoni in his final will left 100,000ducats to Venice for the purposes of the war with the Turks; in fact the netfinancial gain to the republic must have been considerably greater than this,and in this respect Venice has always been accused of not keeping faith withits prestigious employee. However, these stark figures do not give the wholepicture; considerable sums were spent by Venice on the funeral of thecondottiere, on legacies to his family and dowries to his two remainingunmarried daughters and on back pay to his troops. In the matter of

65 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 1172, 1179.66 Cristoforo da Soldo, 79.67 ST. reg. 1,85V (16 Jan. 1443) and Eroli, Gattamelata, 148. LauroQuerini gave the funerary oration on

this occasion, and Mantegna is said to have done a painting of the death of Gattamelata.68 Belot t i , Colleoni, 5 2 6 - 7 .69 Dieci, Lettere, 1, nn. 416-54 (19 Oct.-30 Dec. 1475); Belotti, Colleoni, 533-5.

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Colleoni's fiefs and estates the failure of Venice to honour its obligations andthe testamentary wishes of the captain-general was more clear-cut. Only twoof his ten fiefs passed to his heirs although all had been granted inperpetuity; the rest were reintegrated into the state.70 The formal excuse forthis breach of faith was that the local populations had asked for it, but thereality of the situation was that this conglomeration of fiefs had been createdspecifically for the maintenance of a large section of the Venetian army, andwithout that justification their continued alienation from the state could notbe tolerated. Colleoni's troops, after inspections and some dismissals ofveterans and incompetents, were largely enrolled into the lanze spezzate.71

His heirs, the sons of his daughter Ursina and Gherardo da Martinengo,were given small condotte befitting their modest standing as soldiers, and inthese circumstances they could hardly expect to continue to enjoy the vastterritorial jurisdictions exercised by their grandfather. Raison d'etat tookprecedence over keeping faith with Colleoni and his family in theseexceptional circumstances, and there is no evidence that Venice's decisionsat this time either surprised or particularly vexed the rest of its militaryhierarchy.

In fact, while Venice was prepared to allow companies to pass from fatherto son, and indeed encouraged such a process in the right circumstances,there was always a concern to ensure that the heir was a proper person toexercise military command. Family traditions of service were encouraged,and the son of a faithful condottiere enjoyed favourable treatment and couldexpect to inherit at least a part of his father's condotta; but the size of thatpart depended entirely on Venice's view of the military usefulness of theheir.72 Bernardino di Carlo Fortebraccio was able to succeed naturally to hisfather as leader of the Bracceschi companies because he was a proved andestablished captain by the time his father died in 1479. But on the death ofGuido Rossi Venice insisted that his younger son, Beltramo, should share areduced condotta with the elder, Filippo Maria, because he was a bettersoldier.73

This point leads us to the broader discussion of Venice's concern for thefamilies of its condottieri, both during and after their lifetimes. As part ofthe move towards permanent captains in the 1430s and 1440s it becameaccepted that such men were entitled to claim allowances and pensions fortheir wives and families. At a time when most of the captains were of foreign

70 Belotti, 537.71 Died, Lettere, i, n. 423 (6 Nov. 1475).72 Antoniazzo da Doccia's company passed to his sons after his death in 1493 (ST. reg. 12, 11; n June

1493), but Giuliano di Giovanbattista dall'Anguillara was allowed to inherit only a part of his father'scompany in 1481 (ST. reg. 8, 136; 28 Dec. 1481).

73 SS. reg. 34, 78-9 (5 Nov. 1490).

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origin it was natural that Venice should seek to ensure their permanentallegiance by making arrangements for them to settle their families withinVenetian frontiers. As early as 1431 Italiano Furlano had been given an extra200 ducats a year to maintain his family in the Veneto,74 and in 1439Colleoni was given a house in Padua and a special allowance of 20 ducats amonth for his wife to live there.75 By the 1450s Giovanni Conti, Cristoforoda Tolentino, Guido Rangoni, Orso Orsini, Antonello da Corneto andLudovico Malvezzi all had their families settled in Terraferma cities withsuitable allowances.76 Indeed, in 1455 it was discovered that Cristoforo daTolentino was drawing two allowances for his wife: one of 1200 lire a year inPadua and another of 600 lire a year in Treviso. The allowance paid in Paduawas promptly stopped.77 In 1484 Roberto da Sanseverino was getting 100ducats a month for his wife living in Padua.78

State support for the families of deceased condottieri was an even moreextensive phenomenon, involving not only the continuation of pensions forthe newly widowed, but also allowances for sons and dowries for daughters.The sons of Guerriero da Marsciano, a faithful condottiere who died in1440, all received life pensions of 50 lire a month,79 and in 1491 one of hisgranddaughters, Bernardina di Berto da Marsciano, was confirmed in a lifepension of one-third of this sum from the treasury of Treviso.80 Thedaughters of Giovanni Villani, who had served Venice for fifty years,received dowries of 300 ducats each after their father's death in 1488,81 andthose of Jacopo Catalano, killed in action in 1450, got 500 ducats each fortheir dowries.82

But in fact specific evidence for the support of widows and bereavedchildren of soldiers is more apparent for the lower ranks, as the families ofthe captains were on the whole provided for for life during the lifetimes ofthe captains themselves. Small pensions allotted to wounded, mutilated,retired and deceased soldiers of junior rank and their families werecommonplace and must have amounted to a very considerable drain on thetreasuries of the Terraferma cities. Frequently the provision took the formof a minor post conferred for life on a retired soldier, but straight cash

74 SMi. reg. 58, 91 (12 Nov. 1431).75 S M i . reg. 60, 124 (19 Feb . 1439).76 S T . reg. 2, 200(11 July 1451 - C o n t i ) ; reg. 3, I 5 i v ( i 3 Mar . 1455 - Tolentino); SS . reg. 14,159V (23

Oct . 1438 - Rangoni); S T . reg. 4, 25 (18 Dec . 1456 - O r s i n i ) ; SS . reg. 21 , 13 and 15V (1 July and 16Aug. 1460 - Corneto and Malvezzi).

77 S T . reg. 3 , 151V (13 M a r . 1455).78 S T . reg. 9, 88 (1 July 1484).79 S T . reg. 3, 82 (28 Sept. 1453).80 Dieci, Mist i , reg. 25, 58V (22 June 1491). Descendants of Guerr iero were still being given posts in

recognition of their ancestor's services in 1507 (Dieci, Misti , reg. 31 , 200; 22 Sept. 1507).81 S T . reg. 10, 117 (30 Oct. 1488).82 S T . reg. 2, 142V (18 May 1450).

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allowances were also very common. Retirement pensions of between 5 and10 ducats a month were usual for cavalry squadron leaders and infantryconstables like Angelo da Roma, a former squadron leader of GiovanniConti who had stayed on in the lanze spezzate; Bernardo d'Arezzo, anothersquadron leader of the lanze spezzate; and Rodrigo Spagnuolo, a long-serving constable.83 For the rank and file with good records of service or whohad retired as a result of war wounds, pensions of 6-12 lire per month werestandard. Ferrando da Spagna, an infantry corporal in the company ofTiberto Brandolini who had his right arm shot off in the siege of Soncino in1446, was offered a retirement pension of 6 lire a month which he refused, ashe said that he wished to continue serving with his left arm only; he wasgiven a gift of 40 ducats instead.84 But in fact infantry constables were lesslikely to retire than were cavalry soldiers, partly because they were more ableto continue to serve in some nominal capacity than was a cavalryman who ata certain stage could no longer ride. Hence the emphasis here was onprovision for wives and families of dead soldiers, many of whom died inVenetian service in the Balkans.

The extent of Venice's concern with rewarding faithful service is welldemonstrated by the measures agreed after the battle of Fornovo in 1495.85

In addition to a large lump sum normally set aside after a major battle forassistance to the families of the dead, a wide variety of specific rewards andcompensations were offered. Francesco Gonzaga was made captain-general,had his personal allowance increased by 2000 ducats a year, and received1000 ducats a year allowance for his wife and a lump sum of 10,000 ducats ascompensation for the losses in his company. Bernardino Fortebraccio, whowas badly wounded, had the size of his company doubled and got a personalallowance of 500 ducats a year. The family of Ridolfo Gonzaga, who waskilled, got a pension of 1000 ducats a year, and in 1501 his daughter receiveda dowry of 1600 ducats.86 The sons of the dead captains Ranuccio Farneseand Vincenzo Corso were promised condotte when they grew up, while theirdaughters got allowances of 400 ducats a year each. Francesco Berardi andCarlo Strozzi inherited the small companies of their brothers who werekilled in the battle. Niccolo da Nona, the captain of the stradiots, had thesize of his company increased, and the family of the dead constable GiovanniBlanco got a house in the citadel of Verona and a pension of 6 ducats amonth.

A final form of reward deserves attention although little information on it

83 ST. reg. 5, i49v(4Feb. 1466 -Angelo da Roma); reg. 3,17V (14 Jan 1452-Bernardo d'Arezzo); ibid.,131 (20 Sept. 1454 - Rodrigo Spagnuolo).

84 ST. reg. 2, 41V-42 (18 Aug. 1447).85 SS. reg. 35, i44r-v (24 July 1495).8 6 S S . reg . 38 , 157V (4 A u g . 1501).

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has come down to us from the fifteenth century. This was the award ofknighthood - the title of Cavaliere di San Marco - which seems to have beenreserved for middle-rank soldiers, particularly infantry captains, and nobleswho had rendered conspicuous military service. Among the small number ofsoldiers who received this honour were Giovanni di Beltramino, whodistinguished himself at the siege of Padua in 1405, Dietisalvi Lupi, thecaptain of infantry in the 1430s and 1440s, and Dionigi Naldi, adistinguished infantry captain who joined Venetian service in 1504.87 Theknights were given a surplice of cloth of gold lined with crimson silk, butevidence is lacking to suggest that there was a sufficient number of them toconstitute an active military order.

Given this evidence of the conscious and systematic integration of thearmy into the economy and society of the Venetian state, one can scarcelycontinue to talk of a sharp separation between the military and civilianspheres. Certainly the economic and social impact of the standing army wasmuch more apparent in the Terraferma than it was in Venice itself. Theallocation of large bodies of troops to permanent quarters in certain areas ofthe Terraferma inevitably affected economic and social relations in thoseareas. The captains, whether formally enfeuded or not, took their place inthe ranks of the local landed nobility; their troops integrated themselves intolocal society at all levels. The men took over property and land, andprovision of the needs of the companies became a key element in the localeconomies. While there were undoubtedly local tensions inherent in thissituation, particularly in the early days, the gradual formation of local'garrison economies' soon led to a situation of mutual interdependence. Inthe cities, where the presence of the troops themselves was less apparent, thefrequent residence of their captains, the growing involvement of Ter-raferma noble families in military command and administration, and thecommitment of the treasuries and bureaucracies to military expenditure andorganization could not but affect the local scene. In 1458 the practice whichhad grown up of Venetian rectors bringing in the troops from all over theirjurisdictions to turn their entry into a city into a great military display wasseverely discouraged by the Senate. In future only troops quartered withinthree miles of the city were to be used for this purpose.88 Apparent here, asin the later shift from large-scale inspections and manoeuvres to localparades, was a realization that it was the movement of large bodies of troops,rather than their sustained local presence, which caused unrest and tensions.

Nor could Venice itself remain unaffected by these developments. In acentury when Venetians became increasingly aware of the political

87 Sanuto, Vite de dogi, 829, n 23 (Beltramino and Lupi); ST. reg. 15, 2ov (10 June 1504 - Naldi).88 ST. reg. 4, 77V (24 July 1458).

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implications and economic possibilities of Terraferma expansion, the wholequestion of military defence became one of fundamental importance. AsVenetian nobles took posts as rectors in the Terraferma cities, as theirclerical brothers filled the bishoprics and high ecclesiastical posts, and asindividuals and families spread their landholding commitments in everwidening circles, they were confronted at every turn by the complexmechanism and problems of the standing army. In June 1403 the Senatedecreed that no Venetians were allowed to buy or rent property from anylord or foreign state. In 1431, the moment at which a policy of settlement ofmilitary captains on the land became clear, this ban was extended to noblesbuying or renting land from captains of over 100 lances.89 Here again we seethe formal attempt to preserve a separation between the Venetian rulingclass and its new employees. But by 1433 this policy was abandoned and the1431 law was repealed.90 The formal reason given for the change of directionwas that Alvise dal Verme had a good deal of property and it was unfair tohim to restrict his freedom to sell or lease to whom he wished. While thisconcern for the interests of a powerful soldier is indicative, it was alsoobviously not the only reason why Venetian policy changed. The acquisitionof Terraferma land was becoming too important an issue for many Venetiannobles to be fettered in this way; and at the same time the extent of the landsbeing acquired by Venice's soldiers was too great to be isolated andprotected. However, it remained Venetian policy throughout the century tomonitor closely the relations between prominent Venetians and the soldiers.In July 1487 another Senate decree called on all members or ex-members ofthe Senate and the College to declare what dealings they had had withsoldiers since the beginning of the War of Ferrara. Failure to do so was to bepunishable by ten years' exile.91 The timing of this decree suggests a directresponse to the affair of Galeotto Pico della Mirandola already referred to;but the introduction to the decree conveys a more general impression of acontinuing concern for control over the relations between Venetians andtheir soldiers.

89 SMi. reg. 58, 92 (22 Nov. 1431). This decree referred back to that of 1403.90 I b i d . , 232V (26 A u g . 1433).91 ST. reg. 10, 57V (23 July 1487).

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On 4 September 1497 Caterina Cornaro, the Queen of Cyprus, visited herbrother Giorgio when he was podesta of Brescia. The visit was the occasionfor a series of splendid pageants; Brescia had for years been more or less theheadquarters of the Venetian army, and the military played a full role in thefestivities. In the procession of entry for the queen rode Albanian stradiots,the mounted crossbowmen of the governor-general, Pitigliano, and thecompanies of men-at-arms of Marco da Martinengo, Luigi Avogadro andGianfrancesco Gambara, all themselves Brescian nobles and Venetiancaptains. There followed the clergy of the city and a cortege of Venetiannobles. Alongside the podesta rode the governor-general himself. Caterinawas escorted to the palace of Ludovico da Martinengo where she was toreside; this was the palace which had belonged to Colleoni, to whom it owedits redecoration and splendour.1

A few days later Francassa and several of his brothers, the sons of Robertoda Sanseverino, arrived from Milan with their men. Some of theSanseverineschi had until recently been in Venetian service and theirpresence gave an edge of military rivalry to the great joust that was to follow.This was fought out on 10 September among the Sanseverineschi, thetroops of the governor-general and the companies of the local Bresciancaptains. It was rumoured that the Marquis of Mantua, himself recentlyVenetian captain-general, was present in disguise.

All this portrays eloquently the fusion of civilian and military which wascharacteristic of life in the ex-signorial cities of Lombardy in the late MiddleAges, and which to a large extent Venice had absorbed by the end of thefifteenth century. Giorgio Corner himself was one of those Venetian nobleswho had a deep commitment to military affairs and was to be one of theproveditors at Agnadello.2 The court of Caterina at Asolo included soldiers,notably the Venetian captain Tuzio Costanza, who had distinguishedhimself at Fornovo and now played an important part in the social andartistic life of that old condottiere fief of Castelfranco.3 The military parades

1 Sanuto, i, 762-4.2 See above, 175.3 L. Puppi, 'Le case di Tuzio Costanza', Italia medievale e umanistica, xiii (1970) 253-64.

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and jousting were spectacles scarcely less common in Venice itself than theywere in the Terraferma cities.

Venice is a city of myths, and we are confronted here with two apparentlycontradictory myths. On the one hand, there is the tradition of the merchantcity, isolated and remote from land affairs, and keeping military commandout of the hands of its citizens. Gasparo Contarini remarked in the Demagistratibus that it was only in his own time in the early sixteenth centurythat the old tradition that Venetian nobles could not command detachmentsof more than 25 soldiers had been abandoned, and this tradition wassupposed to go back to the twelfth century and Venice's first involvement inland warfare.4 This was the tradition which Machiavelli denounced in theIstorie Florentine', 'the Venetians, as they turned to the mainland, put asidethose arms which had achieved glory for them at sea, and, following thecustom of the other Italians, placed their armies under the command ofothers'.5 On the other hand, there was the rather more recent myth ofVenetian imperialism, of a Venice avid for territorial gain in Italy, switchingall its considerable expertise and resources into a programme of nakedaggression in the fifteenth century. This was the image created byFlorentine and Milanese propaganda from the middle of the centuryonwards and culminating in the diatribes which preceded and accompaniedthe League of Cambrai.6

In fact, of course, these myths reflect conflicting realities in Venetianattitudes. There was in the fifteenth century a constant tension betweenconservative ideas, usually associated with the older patricians of eachgeneration, of protecting Venetian trade and eastern interests, and avoidingmainland entanglements, and the more radical attitudes of youngergenerations of politicians, often described as the giovaniy who had asindividuals accumulated experience of the realities of the Terrafermacommitment, and who tended to see aggression as the best method ofdefence of a new and important alignment.7 At a number of moments in thefifteenth century there is evidence of open conflict between these twopositions. In 1404-5 the war party was led by the doge himself, MicheleSteno, supported by men like Rosso Marino, Paolo Zeno and FrancescoFoscari.8 In the years that followed, one of the principal proponents of a

4 G. Contarini, De magistratibus et Republica Venetorum (Basle, 1547) 179-82. See also B. TamassiaMazzarotto, Le feste veneziane (Florence, 1961) 286.

5 N. Machiavelli, Istorie fiorentine, 1, xxxix. For similar comments by Machiavelli, see II principe, xii;Discorsi, in, xxxi; L'arte della guerra, 1. See also I. Cervelli, Machiavelli e la crisi dello stato veneziano(Naples, 1974) 68, 78-80.

6 Rubinstein, 'Italian reactions to Terraferma expansion' passim; Valeri, 'Venezia nella crisi italiana'passim.

7 For one of the best expressions of the conservative position, see D. Morosini, De bene instituta republica, ed. C. Finzi in Collectanea Caralitana (Milan, 1969) 49-56, 120-2, 157-66, 209-12.

8 British Library, Add. Ms. 27,430, 'Corona venetorum', 63V.

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strong military stance in the Terraferma, in addition to Foscari, was AlviseLoredan. With the ducal election which followed the death of DogeMocenigo in 1423 the antagonisms seemed to come to the fore again. Acombination of the recent extensions of Venetian frontiers in the secondHungarian War and the rising threat of a renewed Milanese quest forhegemony in northern Italy gave a keener edge to the arguments of thegiovani, and the election of Foscari undoubtedly prepared the way for a full-scale Terraferma commitment. It is probably equally true that theenormous costs of the wars which followed 1426, together with a growingpreoccupation with events in the eastern Mediterranean, strengthened theopposition of the conservatives and contributed to the discrediting ofFoscari in the 1450s. By the early 1480s the tensions were well to the foreagain. The Senate was bitterly divided over the policy towards Ferrara, withonce again the older politicians, led by Francesco Venier, urging caution andretrenchment, while the giovani, for whom Francesco Michiel was the chiefspokesman, pressed for an armed confrontation.9 Even during the War ofFerrara there was plenty of evidence of lukewarm attitudes towards the warand the expenses and dangers which it involved. Of course theseantagonisms were not just a matter of conservative eastern Mediterraneaninterests versus a policy of Terraferma expansion. There were few inVenice, even amongst the giovani, who seriously supported a policy ofunlimited aggression in Italy. The issue over Ferrara was more one ofwhether greater economic advantage in the crucial lower Po area was to begained by direct takeover or by the traditional policy of covert influence.The issue was complicated after early 1483 by the appearance of the papacyamongst Venice's enemies, which added to the ranks of those opposed to thewar within the city. Finally both the decision to seek a French alliance andattack Milan in 1498-910 and the decision to take the offensive in theRomagna in the autumn of 1503 provoked the same bitter debates in theSenate.11 By this time there can have been few in Venice who seriouslythought of dismantling Venice's military machine or abandoning aTerraferma commitment; the debate was about the scale of militarypreparedness and the nature of the commitment. The army had become animportant part of the fabric of the Venetian state, but the degree of interestin, and commitment to, it among Venetian politicians varied widely.

Venetian attitudes towards the army seemed to be little affected by thehumanist dilemma which beset the Florentines. Humanists were, amongother things, the propagandists of the emerging state; they preached the

9 Romanin, iv, 2946°.10 SS. reg. 37, 43, 59, 63 (8 Sept., 17 Nov., 21 Nov. 1498).11 SS. reg. 39, 126 (8 Nov. 1503) and Soranzo, 'II clima storico della politica veneziana in Romagna'

passim.

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need for strength in war and for commitment of the citizens to thepreservation of the state. They were also, for the most part, committed to anhistorical viewpoint and they were aware that the emergence of small,professional armies was a relative novelty. They thus found themselvesdeploring the excesses of the mercenaries and the extent to which theirpresence undermined the willingness of citizens to fight, and at the sametime praising the military virtues displayed by contemporary condottieri.12

However, humanists were also, particularly in Venice, realists. Theyappreciated that they lived in an age of growing professionalism andtechnical sophistication, in which the amateur and the part-timer had littlechance. Most of them were able to appreciate that strength in war and areliance on citizen militias for that strength were contradictory aims in thecircumstances and that the former was more important. In a city whichmade a fetish of republicanism like Florence the debate tended to bedistorted, as mercenaries were associated with signoria, and their undoubtedutility had to be set against the fear of a military coup. But in Venice therewas little of such fear both because of the natural security of the city andbecause the Venetians had the means to defend that city against any landarmy - their sea power. Certainly the acquisition of the Terraferma statelaid Venetians open to some of the same doubts and worries which beset theFlorentines, but on a much reduced scale.

A potent factor in this more uninhibited approach to mercenaries andstanding armies was undoubtedly Venice's long-standing commitment tothe defence of an overseas empire. Petrarch, who was in Venice in 1364 andwitnessed the great joust staged to celebrate the end of the Cretan revolt,remarked: 'one must admire this race of sailors not only for their expertise innaval matters, but also for their efficiency and brilliant skill in all the arts ofsoldiering and field camp organization'.13 A tradition of individual trainingfor defence of the state and its fleets was deeply ingrained in Venetians. Allmale citizens had been expected to practise with the crossbow since thethirteenth century. Targets were regularly set up in many of the main campifor this practice under the tuition of master archers, and regularcompetitions were held on the Lido to stimulate enthusiasm and confirmskills.14 The main purpose of this training was to provide bowmen to defendthe galleys, but companies of Venetian archers also quickly made theirappearance in the mainland wars. The gradual decline of the relative utility

12 For assessments of these contrasting views, see Bayley, War and Society in Renaissance Florencepassim and D. J. Wilcox. The Development of Florentine Humanist Historiography in the FifteenthCentury (Cambridge, 1969) 97-8.

13 Petrarch, Lettere seniles (iv.3), ed. G. Fracasetti (Florence 1869), ii, 227.14 P. Molmenti, La storia di Venezia nella vita privata dalle origini alia caduta della repubblica (6th ed.,

Bergamo, 3 vols., 1922-5) i, 170; Romanin, ii, 394.

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of the crossbow in the fifteenth century contributed to a lessening in theenthusiasm for this training. In 1418 it was noted in the Senate that the postsof noble bowman on the galleys (four were nominated to each galley) werebeing monopolized by a small number of men who were the only ones whobothered to keep up the training. This was seen as being not only damagingto the defensive capabilities of the city's population, but also a dangerouslyoligarchical sociopolitical trend, as the post of noble archer was regarded asone of the first rungs on the ladder of a political career. It was decreedtherefore that henceforth a noble who went as archer on a galley could not bechosen again until two years had elapsed.15 Thirty years later it was oncemore noted that the habit of archery practice was declining amongst thenobles and that the obligation to compete in the biannual competitions onthe Lido was not being observed. Efforts were made to ensure that the 150nobles who went each year as archers on the galleys were suitably skilled inthe use of the crossbow.16 In 1460 a third annual competition wasintroduced, on the feast of St Bartholomew in August, and although this wassuspended during the plague years of 1464 and 1465 it was revived in 1490.17

By that time it was being recognized that the crossbow was being supersededby the handgun even at sea, and so in 1506 similar competitions wereintroduced for the new weapon.18

But if there was some decline in this traditional form of military activityfor Venetians in the fifteenth century, there was a dramatic increase inpublic and private concern with land warfare and all that this involved forthe state. The creation, maintenance and increasing institutionalization of astanding army affected Venetian life at all levels. As evidence of this at thehighest level one has only to look at the increasing amount of time spent bythe Senate on discussing military affairs. Here was a forum in which the coreof the nobility became involved with and informed about the state of thearmy and the nature of its role. The variety of semi-military posts held byVenetians has already been extensively discussed in the previous chapters.In this context one has to remember that it was not just the proveditors,paymasters and administrative commissaries attached to the army, and thecastellans of the fortresses, who imbibed this experience, but every rectorwho took up office in the Terraferma. Detailed research into the careers ofprominent Venetian nobles of the fifteenth century is still in its infancy, butenough has been done to suggest that the accumulation of'military' andTerraferma offices was becoming a major avenue to high political office inthe republic. This was certainly an area of specialization to which a

15 SMi. reg. 52, 84V (31 Mar. 1418).16 Died, Misti, reg. 13, 89 (10 Jan. 1448).17 Ibid., reg. 24, 185 and 203V (14 Apr. and 4 Aug. 1490).18 Ibid., reg. 31, 100 (18 Aug. 1506).

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significant number of senior Venetian politicians devoted much of theircareers. Many of the men who emerged as Venice's leading ambassadors hadserved a political apprenticeship on the Terraferma, and there also seems tohave been a strong link between Terraferma experience and a developmentof humanistic interests.19 Most of those fifteenth-century Venetian nobleswho were noted as humanists, like Francesco Barbaro, Andrea Giuliano,Jacopo Antonio Marcello, Ludovico Foscarini, Bernardo Giustinian andBernardo Bembo, were men whose political careers had been largely takenup with mainland affairs and who had been actively involved with the army.The exact nature of these connections needs to be examined more closely,but it is clear that prolonged residence in a city with an active intellectual lifeand a strong sense of a local classical tradition, like Verona, had aconsiderable influence on some of these men.

An inevitable result of the proliferation of offices connected with thecontrol of the army was the growth of links between individual Venetiannobles and the republic's long-serving captains. Many of the leadingcondottieri had their particular supporters and patrons in the Senate, andusually one can trace such a relationship to a period when the Venetianconcerned had been proveditor with the army or a Terraferma rector.Tommaso Malipiero was a confidant of Carmagnola, and in 1426 thecaptain-general asked that Malipiero's term of office as proveditor beextended because of their good working relationship.20 Ambrogio Badoerhad a long-standing friendship and political relationship with Gianfran-cesco Gonzaga. It was he who negotiated the condotta of 1432 and who wasusually sent by the Senate whenever there was need for consultation withthe captain-general.21 Andrea Morosini conducted the secret negotiationswith Colleoni in 1453-4 a nd w a s chosen for this task by the Senate becausehe was known to be on good terms with the condottiere. There was even asuggestion that Colleoni's daughter, Caterina, should marry Paolo diAndrea Morosini and that he should have a condotta in Colleoni'scompany.22 When he went to Venice in 1458 Colleoni stayed in the Morosinipalace. Niccolo Trevisan spoke up on a number of occasions in the Senateon behalf of Bernardino Fortebraccio in the late 1490s.23 At times theserelationships could cause very considerable suspicion, as in the case ofAndrea Donato and Francesco Sforza in 1447. Donato was brought back inchains from Crete, where he was doge, to give evidence to the Council of

19 For confirmation of these ideas, see Margaret King, 'The patricians and the intellectuals: power andideas in Quattrocento Venice', Soctetas, iv (1975) 295-312.

20 SS. reg. 9, 140V (8 July 1426).21 SS. reg. 12, 138-40 (3-11 Dec. 1432).22 SS. reg. 19, 153 (1 Aug. 1452); Belotti, Colleoni, 224, 245, 254-9.23 See, for example, SS. reg. 37, 22V (20 June 1498).

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Ten about his dealings with Sforza. It transpired that he had, among otherthings, received a gift of 900 ducats from Sforza; he was sentenced to a yearin prison and ten years' deprivation of office.24 Donato had been proveditorwith Sforza in the early 1440s, and this was probably the beginning of theircontact.

Contacts between soldiers and Venetian nobles were not alwaysconnected with holding office; increasingly after 1433 the quest forTerraferma estates brought them together. The Pisani family, leadingbankers, were particularly interested in land acquisition and bought upmuch of the land confiscated from Alvise dal Verme in 1437; subsequentlyBartolomeo Pisani married the daughter of Michele Attendolo and managedthe condottiere's fief at Castelfranco.25 One also finds Venetians owningproperties leased to soldiers, as in the case of Francesco Querini's wife, whowas a Marcello; she owned a house in Gradisca leased to Carlo Orsini.26

Bankers like the Pisani and the Soranzo also had a considerable part to playas the financiers of soldiers, both on an official basis when requested toadvance pay by Venice, and unofficially as moneylenders. Many of Venice'scaptains were in debt to Venetian nobles, and this is perhaps the clue tomany of the contacts and much of the interest in Venice in their activitiesand welfare. However, owing to the paucity of private business recordssurviving in Venice it is difficult to document this phenomenon.

In April 1482, as the army was being mobilized for the War of Ferrara,Roberto da Sanseverino was bombarded with petitions from Venetiansconcerning military posts for particular soldiers and help with militarycontracts of various sorts.27 That Venetians should be interested in thebusiness potential of the army is hardly surprising, and there is a good dealof evidence of war profiteering by Venetian nobles in this war. But thatVenetians should be acting as patrons for soldiers and seeking prefermentfor them is more striking, and the Senate ordered that this should stopimmediately. Any soldiers who appeared to have been employed as a resultof a petition from Venice were to be dismissed.

But it is the evidence of the direct involvement of Venetians in militaryactivity which most convincingly erodes the myth of Venice's detachmentfrom the affairs of the army. It was not unusual for proveditors to take overcommand of the army during the temporary absence of the condottiere-general, with full authorization from Venice. In May 1420 Marino Loredan,who was captain of Treviso, commanded the army during the absence of24 Died, Misti, reg. 13, 61-65V, 72V-76 and 96 (29 Mar-12 Apr. and 28 May-22 June 1447, 13 Mar.

1448).25 See above, 182.26 Collegio, Notatorio, 15, i8v (9 Feb. 1500).27 ST. reg. 8, 144 (1 Apr. 1482).

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Arcelli, who had gone to fulfil a vow at the shrine of S. Antonio in Padua.28

In 1427 Pietro Loredan commanded in the absence of Carmagnola at thebaths, and in 1432 Giorgio Corner and Santo Venier led the campaign in theValtelline.29 An expedition against the Germans in the Alto Adige in 1413was led by Francesco Bembo.30 In addition the river fleets, the co-operationof which with the army was such a feature of warfare in Lombardy in thefifteenth century, were always commanded and officered by Venetians.

Nor can one detect any serious animus against Venetians serving as minorcondottieri in the fifteenth century, and although there was clearly somerestraint on such men rising to high command the maximum figure of 25soldiers imposed by tradition on the size of their military commands wasoften ignored. One of the most distinguished of such Venetian soldiers wasMichele Gritti, who was given a condotta for 100 cavalry in 1432 and rose tothe command of 100 lances in 1437.31 He served as a middle-rankcondottiere for fifteen years until his desertion to Milan in 1447 provoked amove in the Council of Ten to confiscate his estates. But even then hiskinsman, Benedetto Gritti, was instructed to write to him to say that he hadtwo months to return to Venetian service before the confiscation would takeeffect.32 A contemporary of Gritti was Bernardo Dandolo, who was asquadron leader in the company of Michele Attendolo; after 1448 he joinedGentile da Leonessa in the same capacity.33

In the second half of the century the examples of Venetians as long-serving condottieri multiplied, and it seemed to be almost a policy to insertsuch men into positions of importance in the lanze spezzate. Jacopo Badoerand Vettore Malipiero commanded squadrons in the lanze spezzate in the1470s;34 Giovanni Gradenigo started as a captain under Guido Rossi in 1487and by 1495 had his own company of 100 cavalry;35 Alvise Valaresso joinedthe company of Carlo Fortebraccio in 1478 and served for twenty-four yearsbefore he finally gave up his condotta for 80 cavalry in 1502;36 and GiovanniDiedo was another who finally gave up a condotta in 1500, having previouslyserved with Pitigliano.37 All these men were clearly described in the recordsas Venetian nobles and their presence in the army seems to have beenregarded as a desirable rather than a suspect factor.

28 SS. reg. 7, 150 (5 May 1420).29 See above, 37, 171.30 S S . reg . 5, 132V (30 M a y 1413).31 SMi. reg. 58, 124 (20 May 1432); SS. reg. 14, 70V (16 Nov. 1437).32 Died, Misti, reg. 12, 78 (28 June 1447).33 S T . reg. 2, 90 (19 N o v . 1448); S S . reg. 19, 148V (20 J u n e 1452).34 S T . reg. 7, 61 (27 D e c . 1474), 72 (4 Apr . 1475).35 Collegio, Le t t e re Secrete (1490-4) , 113V (15 Sept . 1491); S T . reg. 12, 90V (27 Apr. 1495).36 Sena to , Provvedi tor i da T e r r a e da M a r , 24, 121 (29 M a y 1478); S T . reg. 14, 107V-108 (24 Sept .

1502).37 ST. reg. 13, 4V and 130 (7 July 1497 and 30 May 1500).

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However, in terms of numbers the most significant involvement ofVenetians in the land wars was when contingents of crossbowmen from thecity joined the army. There was undoubtedly a feeling, particularly in theearly years of the century, that in moments of greatest military stress thepopulation of Venice itself should be pressed into service alongside themercenaries. After all, many Venetians were proficient in the use of thecrossbow and were accustomed to the form of discipline of the galleys.Hence in 1404-5 large numbers of Venetian crossbowmen were sent both tothe river fleets and to defend the camps and forts round Padua. Contingentsusually numbered 100 to 200 crossbowmen divided into companies of 25,each commanded by a noble. In December 1404 200 were sent to the campat Piove di Sacco commanded by Giovanni Diedo; further contingentsarrived in the camp in April, June and October 1405.38

On the outbreak of war with the Hungarians in December 1411 one of thefirst reactions in Venice was to prepare 250 crossbowmen commanded byten nobles,39 and in July 1419 100 Venetians were sent to the army underMarino Contarini.40 In 1427 Jacopo Barbarigo led the Venetian contingentwhich fought with the army throughout the summer.41 In this case there wasno conceivable threat to Venice itself, and the practice of strengthening thearmy with experienced fighters from the city seemed as natural as theextensive use of the less well-trained Terraferma militias. In 1431 therewere 700-800 Venetian crossbowmen with the Po fleet, and these men wereselected on the basis of their performance in archery practice in the city.42 In1437 150 crossbowmen were present with the army on the Adda, and in 1438450 were raised for service in Verona and Padua.43 In 1440 300 men weresent from Venice to Padua to serve in this capacity.44

By 1440, however, there seemed to be a change in Venetian policy on theuse of the crossbowmen. There is no further evidence of contingents ofVenetians joining the army before the end of the wars in 1454, althoughnaturally the presence of them in the river fleets continued. It seems thatwith the standing army now fully established and maintained at a high levelof mobilization, and with the war concentrated in the plains beyond theAdige, there was no longer a need to involve contingents from the city. Fromthis moment onwards the presence of the Venetian crossbowmen, com-manded by nobles, was an exceptional occurrence in Venice's land wars. In1463 300 were sent from Torcello to the siege of Trieste commanded by

38 SS. reg. 2, 77V (16 Dec. 1404), 107, 121V and 159-60 (18 Apr., 18 June and 20 Oct. 1405).39 SS. reg. 4, 224 (25 Dec. 1411).40 SS. reg. 7, 89V and nov (18 July and 2 Oct. 1419).41 SS. reg. 10, 42 and 105V (16 Apr. and 30 Nov. 1427).42 SMi. reg. 58, 50 (16 Mar. 1431).43 S S . reg. 14, 23 and 124 (16 Mar . 1437 and 4 July 1438).44 S S . reg. 15, 21 (3 M a y 1440).

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Alvise Lando, the podesta of Torcello,45 and in 1474 free pardons wereoffered to convicts who would go to help to defend Scutari from the Turks.46

In 1482, after the capture of Figarolo, it was decided to garrison that townwith 50 Venetian crossbowmen because of its great importance.47 After thatit was not until the famous defence of Padua in 1509 that Venetians wereinvolved once more in such numbers in the defence of the Terrafermastate48

Once again one is left with the impression that in the fifteenth centuryVenetians were very much involved in the military problems of the defenceof the Terraferma, but that the main weapon for that defence was a trained,professional standing army. Once that had been established and as long as itremained effective the level of direct personal involvement by Venetians wasreduced, just as concern for fortifications as an alternative means of defenceremained at a low level. But this did not mean that interest in military affairsin Venice declined. Evidence from the early days of printing and from bookcollecting in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries suggests thatwarfare was a major concern of the literate elite in Venice.49 The writings ofthe northern Italian humanist educators which emphasized the importanceof military exercises and discipline as a part of a balanced education were amajor component of any fifteenth-century private Venetian library. Thedreams of Aldus Manutius and his patrician connections for an academyseem to have included this long-standing preoccupation.50 Even a con-servative like Domenico Morosini devoted large sections of his De beneinstituta re publica to the problems of war and the need for powerfuldefences.51

A further indication of the interest in military affairs in Venice was theprevalence and popularity of the jousts and tournaments in the city. Thecustom of holding jousts in Piazza S. Marco to celebrate military victories,the election of doges and weddings in ducal families went back to thethirteenth century; one of the earliest recorded was that held in 1253 tocelebrate the election of Doge Ranier Zeno. On that occasion a company ofIstrian cavalry fought against one from the Veneto and Lombardy. Thiselement of a full-scale mock battle was to be a standard feature of Venetiantournaments, and it was the seriousness and the genuine military purpose of45 Malipiero, Annali veneti, 207.46 S T . reg. 7, 45 (12 Ju ly 1474).47 S T . reg. 8, 163 (29 July 1482).48 See below, 333.49 J . R. Hale, 'P r in t ing and the military culture of Renaissance Venice ' , Medievalia et Humanistica, n.s.

viii (1977) 21-62 .50 Willibald Pirckheimers Briefwechsel, ed. E. Reicke, i (Munich , 1940) 280-2: letter of John Cuno to

Pirckheimer of 21 Dec . 1505. I am indebted to D r Mart in Lowry for drawing my attention to thisreference.

51 See above, 200 n. 7.

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the proceedings which impressed Petrarch in 1364. In 1381 a tournamentwas held to celebrate the end of the War of Chioggia and the admission of 30new families to the Great Council.52

This tradition was continued for most of the fifteenth century. Notableamong the recorded tournaments were those of 1400 to mark the election ofDoge Michele Steno, 1406 to celebrate the fall of Padua, 1415 for theelection of Doge Mocenigo, when 460 knights accompanied the marquisesof Ferrara and Mantua to the proceedings, and 1441 in honour of themarriage of Jacopo Foscari, the son of the doge.53 On this occasionFrancesco Sforza, Gattamelata and Taddeo d'Este all were present withtheir leading captains. The best-known of fifteenth-century tournamentswas that held in May 1458 to celebrate the election of Doge PasqualeMalipiero.54 Colleoni presided over two days of martial display of which thefirst was devoted to individual jousts between condottieri, and the second toa mock battle for possession of a wooden castle erected in the Piazza. Seventymen fought on each side, with Bertoldo d'Este and Antonello della Cornacommanding one contingent and Orso Orsini and Ludovico Malvezzi theother. Bertoldo d'Este was again the hero of a joust in 1463 on the eve of hisdeparture for the Morea.55 The last serious tournament held in Venice tookplace in 1485 to celebrate the end of the War of Ferrara; it was attended byRoberto da Sanseverino, Giulio Cesare Varano, Ercole d'Este and otherleading condottieri.56 At about this time horses were banned from the calli ofVenice, as stone was increasingly used for the bridges and for paving, andthis was presumably a factor in the ending of the tournament tradition.

The significant point about all these occasions was that the mainparticipants were all professional soldiers. While there was undoubtedly atendency in the fifteenth century for the tournament to become a greatpublic spectacle devoid of real military significance, it also remained animportant form of exercise and training for the soldiers themselves.Venetian tournaments, unlike those held with increasing frequency inFlorence, were not occasions for the urban patriciate to show off theiraristocratic accomplishments. Although conducted against a background ofgreat pomp and display, they were primarily genuine military exercises inwhich the soldiers practised their skills and displayed their talents under thediscerning eyes of the employers.57

52 Tamass ia , Le feste veneziane, x iv-xv; Romanin , ii, 256.53 Tamass ia , xiv; R o m a n i n , iv, 266; Tass in i , Curiosita veneziane, 392; Sanuto , Vite de dogi, 833, 894,

noo-i.54 Angelucci, Ricordi e documenti, 77-9.55 Molmenti, Storia di Venezia, i, 190.56 Malipiero, Annali veneti, 296-7.57 For valuable remarks on the joust in fifteenth-century Italy, see M. Tosi, // torneo di Belvedere in

Vaticano e i tornei in Italia nel Cinque cento (Rome, 1946) 26-36.

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After 1485 martial display and activity in the city were limited to mocknaval battles, the archery and handgun competitions, and the 'battles of thebridges' fought out amongst the artisans and working classes. However, thetournament tradition continued in the Terraferma cities, closer to themilitary encampments but still attended by many Venetians in both officialand unofficial capacities.

An awareness of the military traditions in Venice itself and therelationship at various levels between Venetians and the emerging militaryelite in the fifteenth century is essential to an understanding of theprecocious growth of the standing army. Undoubtedly there were strategicand geographical factors which helped to explain Venice's acceptance of theneed for a permanent army and its comparative success in establishing it.The permanent threat from aggressive oltramontane powers on thenorthern and eastern frontiers in addition to the problem of defending theinternal Italian frontiers placed Venice in a unique position, while theterrain of Lombardy called for particular solutions which only Milanshared. But equally important factors for understanding Venetian militarydevelopments lay within the city itself. A superficial explanation mightsuggest that the mercantile attitudes of the Venetian nobility led to anexpectation of value for money and a determination to monitor closely thisexpensive investment. But such an explanation leaves unsolved the problemof the marked contrast between Venice's achievement in the military sphereand that of Florence, where one might expect similar attitudes to prevail.58

More important, therefore, one has to consider the sense of discipline whichseemed to prevail in Venetian society, the maturity of the republic'sbureaucratic and political organization, and above all its military traditionsformed in the previous centuries.

The German invasion of 1508 and Venice's effective counter to it showedthe military organization which had been built up at its best. Speedy andeffective mobilization for the defence of the frontier, the availability ofseasoned commanders and troops, and effective collaboration between thearmy and civilian officials all contributed to the victory at Pieve di Cadore.The rewards given to D'Alviano and others after the success were also partof the pattern. However, the events of 1509 were to reveal the weaknesseswhich still existed in the system, and were to cast a shadow over Venice'sachievements in the sphere of military organization in the previous century.It is necessary to avoid the hindsight of Agnadello if one is to get thoseachievements into perspective.

58 M. E. Mallett, 'Preparations for war in Florence and Venice in the later fifteenth century', Florenceand Venice, i (Florence, 1979) 149-64.

2 1 0

PART II

I5O9-l6l7

J. R. Hale

8

The historical role of the land forcesi509-1617

Throughout the sixteenth century the Mediterranean was dominated by theOttoman Turks, Spain and Venice. All were imperial powers. Only one,however, was named after a mere city. Remarkable as had been the creationof the Venetian empire overseas, more remarkable still was its survival. Andthis was dependent on the retention by Venice of control over its second,later empire, that of the mainland. After wars that left by 1530 the otherpolitical units of Italy either the subjects or the nervous satellites of Spain,Venice, uniquely, maintained its independent status.

This independence added a final element to the pre-existing admirationfor the stability and rationality of the city's constitution and for the harmonythat prevailed among its social groups. Exaggerated both by the republic'sown propaganda and the envy of other states, these elements formed thecore of what has been dubbed the Myth of Venice. But this myth could nothave elicited the fascinated admiration of other states, even of imperialpowers like seventeenth-century England and the Netherlands,1 had Veniceitself not remained the capital of an empire. Slight as its presence was tobecome among the burly contestants of the European political scene,Venice's power over the imagination was due to its power by land and sea.And at the base, the fulcrum of that power, were the armed forces, therepublic's soldiers.

In the changed conditions of the sixteenth century, when Venice was nolonger challenged overseas by a weak Byzantine empire and a remotelybased Genoa but by the expansionist Ottoman Turks, the navy could nothave defended the republic's possessions without the manpower of theTerraferma: not simply sailors and oarsmen and untrained scapoli, ormarines, but, as the techniques of galley warfare developed, professionalfighting men drawn from the army. Venice's military administrationsupplied deterrent garrisons for the bases overseas from the mainland forces

1 Z. N. Fink, The Classical Republicans (2nd ed., Evanston, 1972); E. O. G. Haitsma Mulier, The Mythof Venice and Dutch Republican Thought in the Seventeenth Century (Assen, 1980).

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as well as through supplementary contracts. And in other ways theTerraferma came to overshadow the empire da Mar. Not only in the broadeconomic view did its increasing exploitation provide agricultural andindustrial compensation for Venice's decreasing income from trade with theLevant, but its resources offered an essential security for the loans neededfor mobilization in times of crisis or war. Again, to protect its empire da MarVenice needed allies: its diplomats would have carried little weight if theyhad not negotiated as the agents of a European territorial power. And thatterritory would not have existed had it not been guarded by the republic'sland forces.

Their size and expense, remarkable for a minor European power, areoutlined in chapter 16. In composition they remained as they had beenbefore Agnadello: a standing army, recovering slowly from c. 4500 to c. 9500overall and reflecting in its novel concentration overseas both theincreasing threat from the Turks and the confidence that on the Terrafermaa non-aggressive stance and modernized fortifications would ensure abreathing space for the obtaining of mercenaries. Stand-by contracts withmilitary entrepreneurs were designed to produce for mobilization at shortnotice an 'extraordinary' force of up to 10,000 men, almost exclusivelyinfantry. In actual war numbers could be inflated still further to contributeto overall totals that went as high as c. 2O,,ioo2 in 1509, c. 29,700 in 1529 andc. 35,800 in 1570 and 26,000 in 1617 through additional contracts negotiatedfrom scratch on the manpower market. And, finally, as a fourth tier withinthe mobilization process, there were native militias comprising an averagestrength on the Terraferma of 20,000 and overseas, from the 1560s, ofc. 18,000. Seldom used as combat soldiers save in 1509 and during themanpower shortage that characterized the 1615-17 War of Gradisca, theywere envisaged as an essential defensive supplement to the standing force inaccess routes and garrison towns pending the arrival of professional'extraordinary' troops.

Any consideration of manpower, moreover, must embrace the pro-gramme of re-fortification that, as part of the republic's increasinglydetermined policy of armed neutrality, was intimately linked to the purposeof the land forces and, less clearly, to their size. At first it was believed thatthe stronger a city's walls the smaller a garrison need be. But because up-to-date fortifications were planned not only to absorb shock but to mount amaximum of offensive firepower, this turned out not to be the case.Reviewing the progress of the programme in 1545, the senior officer LuigiGonzaga said that some were already deploring it because ' it means that we

2 Excluding a militia force of c. 10,000. Field army, 22,660; garrison force, 6,445. For this and thesucceeding figures and sums, see ch. 16.

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have to maintain a standing army at great expense'.3 Instead of increasingthe standing army on the Terraferma, however, the republic built it up onlyoverseas (and then chiefly because of the delays involved in transportingreinforcements), relying instead on militia drafts and on increasing thenumber of volunteer subjects inscribed and trained in a fifth combat tier, thegunnery 'schools' (scuole) of the mainland towns and cities; by 1606 thiscorps comprised on the Terraferma 104 full-time professionals and 4755part-timers, unpaid save when called out for service in garrison, in the fieldor on shipboard.

All these considerations suggest the use of the phrase 'land forces' ratherthan the word 'army' - save in the sense of a heterogeneous body underarms at any one exceptional moment. And they point to the links amongthese forces, the functioning of government and the life of the people. Fromone point of view the historical role of the land forces was to preserve Veniceand its empire so that they continued to have an independent history; fromanother, it is that of a component of the society they were protecting.

Their narrowest, if quintessential, function was to fight. Between theopening campaigns of the War of Cambrai in 1509 and the settlement of theWar of Gradisca in 1617 Venice was four times involved in open warfare.Between 1509 and 1529 it first lost, then regained and then, equallycrucially, hung on to its Terraferma, which thenceforward remained intactuntil the coming of Bonaparte. Between 1537 and 1540 the republic stavedoff heavy Turkish pressure on the empire da Mar and secured, albeit withthe loss of some Peloponnese and Aegean ports-of-call, thirty years of peacein the Mediterranean. The War of Cyprus in 1570-3 led to the loss of thatisland, but thanks to the naval victory, in association with Spain and thepapacy, of Lepanto, and the evidence that Venetian garrisons couldeffectively face the Turks' advantage of having interior lines of communi-cation in the Balkans, Venice secured a respite from further pressure thatlasted until Sultan Ibrahim's attempt on Crete in 1645. The last conflict, theWar of Gradisca, was the first of Venice's own choosing. Thoroughlyinglorious, it was also successful. Above all, the republic's freedom to wage awar in territory - Friuli and Istria - marching with Habsburg and Turkishlands without either of these powers choosing to escalate the conflict to itsown advantage indicates the respect granted to Venice's ability to protect itspossessions by land and by sea.

For the broader function of the armed forces was to supply a deterrentwhich, together with fortifications, preserved the peace by supplying theteeth within the fixed smile of armed neutrality. Venice emerged from thepeace settlement of Bologna in 1529 ringed by potential enemies. Its western

3 Capi di Guerra, Ba. 3, sub nomine.

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and northern borders confronted, from Milan to Austria, Habsburgterritory. Southwards were lands - Mantua, Ferrara - too small not to deferto Habsburg policy as, a year later, did Florence on the extinction of its LastRepublic. The same shadow of deference to the Empire clouded theindependence of the papacy, part of whose state constituted another of theVenetian Terraferma's southern neighbours. The western shore of Venice'scommercial highroad, the Adriatic, was in papal or Neapolitan hands - andthe Kingdom of Naples was a Habsburg colony. Within Italy Venice was ananomaly, as it was within the ever more Ottomanized Mediterranean. Bothby land and sea its empire was encircled by powers covetous of the wealthgenerated by the republic's possessions and the greater ease they could giveto communications within their own.

By sea Venice had no political choice: it was either to coexist or perish. Byland there was the possibility of playing the balance-of-power game byinvoking the repeatedly baffled but persistently alert Italian interests of theFrench. But Venice had played this game, repeatedly, before 1529 and hadcome to distrust it. While maintaining, indeed intensifying, a Europeandiplomacy designed to reassure other powers of the harmlessness ofVenice's anomalous position and gain information about the minutest threatto it, the republic determined to stay out of power politics, and this meantdemonstrating that it had the power to defend itself.

This stance did not emerge in any clearly defined way in the yearsimmediately following the Bologna settlement. They were years ofexhausted stock-taking. It was the Turkish War of 1537-40 that turnedcaution into a deliberate policy of armed neutrality. Venice itself hadinsufficient warships to maintain a guard squadron in the north Adriatic inaddition to patrols and a battle fleet capable of matching a Turkish armada.It was forced to seek allies with naval strength, Spain and the papacy, andbecame convinced that the war's unsatisfactory conclusion was due todisparate aims and delay-haunted mutual antagonisms. If war meant alliesthen war must be avoided.

During the last throes of the diplomacy that produced the 1559international settlement of Cateau-Cambresis, Bernardo Navagero, themajor historian of the Turkish War,4 was the republic's ambassador inRome. Stimulated by the parallels he saw, the relazione5 he presented on hisreturn to Venice was also a cogent definition of the lessons learned in1537-40. From his observation post beside the pope he had come, he said, toa number of conclusions. First, it was folly to go to war without a preciseknowledge of the forces available to wage it with. This pointed to the second

4 See below, 227 n. 7.5 E. Alberi, Relazioni degli ambasciatori veneti al Senato (Florence, 1834-63) ser. 2, ii, 404-9.

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conclusion, ' that all alliances are full of difficulties because each party hasdifferent aims, and as each is out for his own advantage, problems arise fromthe moment a treaty is signed; thus many opportunities for attacking theenemy are lost and, besides, the forces promised not being, in practice,actually raised, either for lack of pay or irreconcilable differences of opinionamong the commanders, the enemy gains time and you lose reputation,which is important in all affairs'. It was essential, he went on, to be free toseize the opportunity either to press home an attack or negotiate for peace, assoon as a propitious moment arrived. Besides, friendships and antipathieswere not necessarily lasting. 'It is better, in my view, to treat all enemyrulers as potential friends, and friends as potential enemies.' Neither thestatements of potential allies, nor the value accorded them by Venice'sdiplomats, were to be trusted, for 'men often deceive themselves in speakingof what is a very secret thing, a man's mind: for this can change according tosituation and chance'. In another conclusion, ' I have also noted that it iswise to overestimate the enemy's strength and to underestimate that ofoneself and one's allies.' And, he sums up, ' I have become convinced, MostSerene Prince, that wars are always to be avoided for the disadvantages theybring.' In its remarkable steadiness as an expression of Realpolitik,Navagero's report represents the mood in which Venice had determined tostay out of trouble and put up with abuse. In 1536 the Duke of Urbino hadtaken for granted that Venetian policy included the possibility of renewedexpansion.6 In 1559, Venice's new commander-in-chief recognized as anarticle of faith that' he who has the command of your army has to look to thedefence and conservation of your state and not put it to the hazard ofbattle'.7

Given the axis-seeking, dynasty-establishing and - with the Infidel orProtestant in mind - occasionally ideologically nuanced tone of currentinternational political life, Venice's colourless isolationism, gilt as it was onthe outside by a robust diplomacy that took for granted the republic's placeabove the salt at Europe's conference tables, was bound to be an affront. Itsagents were not surprised to be told by Pope Pius V in 1569, on the eve of thenext Turkish War, that' all other rulers, from the greatest to the least, hateand speak ill of you. All resent your attitude and say that the republic showsno interest in nor cares to esteem or favour anyone else.'8 But neither werethey particularly dismayed. Isolation had been constantly troubled byeddies from European rivalries or Turkish predation. The years 1542,1544,1546, 1551, 1552, 1554,1561, 1566, 1568, 1569 itself: all these were years of

6 Died, Secreta, reg. 4, 128V.7 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 7, 77-77V.8 Cessi, Storia della repubblica di Venezia, ii, 121.

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impending crisis on land or sea or both and had involved some degree ofmobilization; successful as its diplomacy in Europe or in Constantinopleseemed to be, the republic was never tempted to trust it.

These precautionary mobilizations had the effect of keeping thefortification programme moving, the permanent army expanding, at leastoverseas, the stand-by contracts refreshed, the militia and artillery scuolesystems tested. But because of the financial cost of military preparation therelationship between diplomacy and the armed forces was not consistentlyor logically thought out. The Venetian patriciate's instinct was to surviveand prosper on the cheap. 'Armed neutrality' became a considered policybut only when it had been judderingly induced by successive scares. AsPaolo Paruta, like Navagero an ambassador, and the historian of the nextTurkish War, remarked, 'the years of peace felt uncomfortably like years ofwar' so that neutrality had perforce to be armed by a seagoing fleet and itsreserve and by expenditure on fortresses and garrisons.9

By the time Venice had affronted its Habsburg and papal allies bywithdrawing unilaterally from the War of 1570-3, the deterrent role of thearmed forces and of an evolving programme of fortification had becomeaccepted as a routine, if constantly grudged burden. Overseas this positionreflected the lesson of the loss of Cyprus: that were the Turks to attack Creteit was uncertain that reinforcements could be transported in time to save theisland. On land it reflected the consciousness that any war with theHabsburgs would have to be fought on two fronts, the Milanese and theAustrian, and possibly, given the pro-Spanish sympathies of the rulers ofMantua and Ferrara and the latent hostility of the papacy, on three.

Indeed, while it is artificial to make too sharp a division between land andsea forces (a 'great' war galley in 1601 required 132 soldiers as part of itscrew), from the War of Cyprus to the War of Gradisca that opened in 1615Venice was more preoccupied with territorial than maritime defence, withmen and bastions rather than ships. And in spite of an information servicethat stimulated activity in the Arsenal whenever the Turks were reckoned tobe free from major commitments against Persia or in central Europe, and adiplomacy which kept the republic to a reprobated neutrality when otherItalian powers were sending forces to aid the Empire in the Turkish wars of1593-1606, the powers most feared were those bordering the Terrafermaand beyond the reach of oars. The new fortress town of Palma was begun in1593 with defence against both Austrian and Turkish armies in mind, butafter the Habsburg-Turkish Peace of 1606 it was Austria that was seen asthe greater threat. Long-standing frontier disputes in Friuli and the northernVicentino were treated with new seriousness, as were Austrian claims to

9 Delia historia vinetiana della guerra di Cipro (Venice, ed. of 1645) 7.

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Marano and other ex-Imperial enclaves and to free navigation in the'Venetian' Adriatic. It was archducal protection of the Uscock pirates ofSenj that goaded Venice in 1615 into the anti-Austrian War of Gradisca.

Equally a cause of defensive expenditure on the Terraferma was theSpanish occupation of Milan. Agitating concentrations of troops built upthere because it was the point of departure for troops taking the 'Spanishroad' to the Netherlands. Troop movements and improvements tofortifications near the frontier produced spasms of alarm in Venice,especially as relations with Habsburg Austria became more uneasy at a timewhen the success of Venice's sole potential ally near enough to be of anyhelp, Henry IV of France, brought the focus of a renewed Franco-Spanishrivalry southwards: to Savoy, and to a tense diplomatic squabble for controlover the Valtelline. The valley was as important for the continuity of the'Spanish road' and communications between Milan and the Tyrol as it wasfor Venice's contacts with France. A condition of the republic's indepen-dence, it seemed, as viceroys in Milan and Naples rattled their sabres, wasSpain's preoccupation - and who knew how long it would last? - with theNetherlands.

All the same, without the news of the sailing of an unusually largeTurkish fleet, or of Spanish ships massing in Naples and Messina for arumoured attack on Dalmatia, or of troop movements on the northern oreastern frontiers, the instinct to save money would probably have rusted thetiers that constituted the armed forces into a futile diagram. As it was,precautionary mobilizations in each of the years 1574-7, in 1580, 1582,1599, 1606-7 (when during the Sarpi crisis Venice scraped togethercontracts for 12,350 additional troops10 and learned, in a shrinkingmanpower market, how necessary it had become to mobilize its own subjects- militia, artillery scuole, volunteers - on an unprecedented scale)11 and 1613kept the defence procedure in rehearsal. The unnaturalness of distinguish-ing too clearly between war and peace when describing the historical role ofthe armed forces was clearly enough put in 1575 by Venice's professionalcommanding officer, Sforza Pallavicino, when he told the College thatmilitary planning should envisage only three situations. One, obviously, waswar. The others were 'lesser danger' and 'greater danger'.12

Like other European military organizations, Venice's took account of yetanother role of the armed forces: their police function. For most of theCinquecento this calls for no special comment. But the late sixteenth andearly seventeenth centuries represented a minor crisis in the realm of law

10 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 46, 14 Aug., 8 Oct.; no Polesine or Friuli figures.11 See below, 327 seq.12 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 3, n.p., 17 May.

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and order in the Veneto as elsewhere in Italy. The exiles of earliergenerations could no longer find support from other governments, whosepolitical allegiances had become both fixed and more delicate. The rough-and-ready use of outlawry by an overworked judiciary had banished somany that, unable to find a niche abroad, they crept or blustered their wayback. It was the time of the sponsored bravo, so magnificently evoked inManzoni's / Promessi Sposiy and of the brigand.

The government had traditional means of dealing with domestic violence.The availability of arms in private houses or municipal armouries meantthat subjects could turn out prepared when the bells sounded the hue andcry.13 One of the functions of the militia was to provide posses to huntcriminals.14 Rectors' guards could be supplemented by garrison units.Corsican troops came to be particularly relied on in the earlier seventeenthcentury, because they had no local affiliations, and bands of them wereraised to scour whole areas for bandit gangs, especially in the sparselypatrolled areas of the Polesine and Friuli.15 The problem was grave enoughfor individuals to offer to raise units specifically for police duties - offerslooked on disapprovingly, as the government suspected that the man whowanted to catch a thief often wanted to be a bigger one himself.16

The problem in the capital itself was sensitive but reasonably easy to dealwith. The arsenalotti were available to supplement the normal guards in thePiazza and at the Rialto. As well as the boat patrols of the Council of Tenthere were fast armed vessels based on Chioggia and specifically designatedas 'contra fuorusciti (exiles)'.17 At the height of the Sarpi crisis in 1606, tokeep a check on strangers and would-be plotters against the state, threeproveditors ' sopra il quieto et pacifico stato della citta' were appointed overtwelve patricians chosen from those living nearest the Piazza, and onepatrician and one citizen in each of the 69 contrade. Householders wereenlisted for street patrols and so many arms were handed out that as late as1611 the Arsenal was still missing 1032 arquebuses and 3225 helmets.18

It was harder to deal with the 'many assassinations and crimes committedby the outlaws and other evil-living persons who infest the countryside andterrorize travellers and our subjects'. In 1584 the Senate received so manycomplaints of the breakdown of law and order in the Terraferma that itappointed a proveditor 'per la quiete del stato', with the duty of rounding

E.g. SS. reg. 85, 122V (16 Apr. 1586).E.g. ST. reg. 77, 49 (7 June 1607).E.g. SS. reg. 99, 109V-110 (13 Dec. 1608); reg. 100, 63V (31 Oct. 1609); ST. reg. 81, 146V (22 Nov.1611).E.g. ST. reg. 76, 98 (10 Oct. 1606).SM. reg. 52, 32 (27 Apr. 1591).ST. reg. 76, 24V-26V, 43; Collegio, Notatorio, reg. 68, 37; SM. reg. 69, 173V.

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up brigands. He took 2 captains, a lieutenant, n o light horse and 40infantry and was given authority to call on men-at-arms and garrisonsoldiers.19 The procedure was repeated in August 1610 when 2 proveditors'sopra la quiete et pacifico viver nello stato nostro di terraferma' wereappointed, one for each side of the Mincio. Each took 100 Corsican infantryand could call for additional support from the militia and the capelletti20 whowere employed in war but whose chief peacetime function was to assist localauthorities to 'round up cutthroats and assassins and keep the countrysecure'.21 While this indicates the strain that brigandage was putting on thenormal law-and-order services of the Terraferma it also shows thegovernment's reluctance either to arouse militiamen's fear of reprisal bysending them against the retinue of some robber landlord, or to worsen thelocal image of an always resented, because expensive, soldiery in garrison.The police role of the standing army was thus a minimal one. Venice'sarmed forces were raised not with a view to the surveillance of a populationwhose loyalty was cautiously but increasingly taken for granted after1517, but for independent political survival both in war and in what mustnot too readily be called 'peace'.

19 SS. reg. 84,87-87v (18 Apr.). The quotation is from a similar proposal that was not accepted (reg. 85,123-4.V; 16 A p r . 1586).

20 SS. reg. 100, 146-7V, 154-6V.21 SS. reg. 95, 122-122V (16 Apr. 1586).

2 2 0

The wars

(i) CAMBRAI, ' RECONQUISTA ' AND RETENTION 1 5 0 9 - 1 5 2 9 1

The aim of those who signed the aggression treaty of Cambrai in December1508, or subsequently joined it, was to turn back the clock of Venetianhistory on the Terraferma by a century. France, through Louis XIFs' right'to Milan which had led him to invade Italy in 1499, was to recover citiesfilched from that duchy: Cremona, Crema and the Ghiaradadda, Bresciaand Bergamo. Maximilian, on behalf of the Empire and of his own house ofAustria, was after not only Verona, Vicenza and Padua but also Treviso andFriuli. The Marquis of Mantua wanted the towns - notably Peschiera,Asola and Lonato - his predecessors had been forced to cede in 1441; theDuke of Ferrara those he had surrendered in 1484, among which Rovigo wasthe largest. Further afield, Pope Julius II claimed the Romagnol towns ofFaenza, Rimini, Ravenna and Cervia as the property of St Peter, andFerdinand of Aragon the string of ports from Trani to Otranto as part of'his' Kingdom of Naples.

The success of the initial pounce of this league of combatants wastraumatic - defeat at the battle of Agnadello on 14 May 1509, and theconsequent loss by Venice of the whole of its Italian possessions exceptTreviso and the villages on the fringe of the lagoon.

From 1509 to January 1517 Venice was chiefly engaged in thereconquista? The process was halting and subject to repeated reversals.1 This chapter may be skipped by readers familiar with the political history of Venice. It is designed to

provide chronological reference points for the thematic chapters which follow, and to compensate forthe absence of any conveniently available narrative of these wars.

2 Two summaries have been helpful in compiling what follows: the chronological table in theFondazione Giorgio Cini volume La civiltd veneziana del Rinascimento (Florence, 1958) and theadmirable 'Historical abstract' in L. A. Burd's edition of // Principe (Oxford, 1891) 131-65.Otherwise: Romanin, Storia documentata delta repubblka di Venezia; Kretschmayr, Geschichte vonVenedig; Pieri, //Rinascimento e la crisi militare italiana; Robert Finlay, 'Venice, the Po expedition andthe end of the League of Cambrai, 1509-10', Studies in Modern European History and Culture, ii(1976) 37-72; A. Bonardi,' Venezia e la lega di Cambrai', NA V., ser. 3, vii (1904) 209-44; M. Brunetti,'Treviso fedele a Venezia nei giorni di Cambrai', AV., xxiii (1938) 56-82; A. Santalena, Veneti eimperiali: Treviso al tempo della lega di Cambrai (2nd ed., Venice, 1901); V. Marchesi, 'II Friuli altempo della lega di Cambrai', NAV., vi (1903) 501-37; F. Seneca, Venezia e papa Giulio II (Padua,1962); C. Pasero, Francia, Spagna, Impero a Brescia, 1509-1516 (Brescia, 1958); A. Ventura, Nobilita epopolo nella societd veneta del '400 e '500 (Bari, 1964).

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Thus in July 1509 the remains of the army of Agnadello reoccupied Padua,and most of the towns in the strip of mainland running from Este toMonselice up to the mountains at Feltre and Belluno either were reoccupiedor declared for Venice. In August they were lost again as a German armymoved down to besiege Padua. Unsuccessful in assault after assault, thatarmy withdrew in October. A Venetian detachment had already, through ahappy accident in August, captured one of the Cambrai signatories, theMarquis of Mantua. Now, in November, Venice moved against Ferrara, butits fleet on the Po suffered a second important defeat in late December atPolesella. In 1510, peace in February and then alliance in October with PopeJulius II (who had become increasingly nervous of the initial success of theleague he had helped call into being), especially as his new Holy Leagueincluded another Cambrai signatory, Ferdinand of Aragon, augured well.But by June almost the whole of the area from Este to Belluno (this timeincluding Vicenza) that had once more declared for Venice after the Germanwithdrawal was again in enemy hands. In August the army tried and failed toretake Verona. The year 1511 was consumed in policing what little remainedof the Terraferma in Venetian hands - the area between Padua and Trevisoand the lagoon - and aiding Julius IPs inconclusive war against Ferrara. InFebruary 1512 Brescia, impatient with the exactions of the Frenchoccupiers, revolted and declared for Venice, suggesting the wisdom of therepublic's longer view: that allies would fall out (supported by the pope'sand Ferdinand's defection) and subject cities pine for the lighter rein withwhich they had become familiar before 1509. Within two weeks, however, aFrench army under Gaston de Foix recovered and sacked it with a savageryand a dispatch that cast doubt on the outcome of any policy of wait-and-see.Yet in April de Foix was killed at the battle of Ravenna by a papal andSpanish army. The main French force (though not its garrisons in Venetianterritory) withdrew from Italy and the republic negotiated a truce withMaximilian, albeit an uneasy one. In September Venice regained Crema -through treachery, not by force of arms - but a winter blockade of Bresciawas fruitless.

Under the Treaty of Blois in March 1513 which linked Venice to Franceagainst the Emperor, Venice promised Cremona and the Ghiaradadda toLouis XII, plus support for helping him to regain Milan, in return forFrench assistance in the Terraferma. On 6 June, however, the defeat of theFrench army at Novara meant that Venice's forces (which had not beenpresent) were left alone to confront the pope's Italian and Ferdinand'sSpanish troops as well as the Germans of Maximilian, who released himselffrom his truce with the republic. Milan, now governed by MassimilianoSforza under vigilant Swiss protection, allowed free passage for Spanish andGerman troops. With their army penned in Treviso and Padua, the

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inhabitants of Venice once again, as in 1509, saw in September the farmsand villages across the lagoon sacked and fired. In early October,Bartolomeo Alviano, Venice's commander-in-chief, struck north-west fromPadua to draw off the marauders by threatening to cut them from their basein Verona. In this he was successful, but they arrived at Vicenza in numbersand order sufficient to inflict a major defeat on his army at La Motta, a fewmiles from the city itself. After this third major defeat of the wars Venicewas left in control only of Padua, Treviso and Crema.

Throughout 1514, with Venice assisted by no ally, the Terraferma wasopen to whichever of Venice's enemies, German, Spaniards, or Milanese,chose to exert pressure or relieve it when applied by Venice. Thus aVenetian force successfully defended Crema and then broke out to takeBergamo - which was rapidly retaken and Alviano's main army hunted backagain to Padua. Similarly, much of the Polesine was reconquered and lostagain. Only in Friuli, where a spring campaign first stopped a German armybound for Treviso and then counter-attacked to regain almost the whole ofthe region except Gorizia and Gradisca, was reoccupation lasting. That noGerman riposte followed the withdrawal of Venetian troops in the summerwas due to the great Friulian landlords whose pro-Venetian sympathiescalled for a larger army of occupation than Maximilian could afford to havepinned down there.

With the accession of Francis I, help from France, on the terms specifiedin the Treaty of Blois, was again at hand. The new French invasion of theMilanese, now with the active support of Venice's main army underAlviano, was successful; the Swiss protectors of Massimiliano were defeatedat Marignano on 13-14 September. By this time the withdrawal of Spanishtroops to aid Milan and massive desertions from Maximilian's underpaidgarrisons had led to Venice's reacquisition of Vicenza. When Francis was infull occupation of Milan in October, Bergamo admitted a Venetian garrisonand Venetian and French troops went into winter quarters in the Brescianoand manned blockading trenches around the more strongly defended cityitself; Brescia rather than Verona, which the displaced Massimiliano hadmade his headquarters and which was reinforced by Spanish troops inNaples through the trapdoor that throughout these campaigns had providedaccess into the Terraferma: the zone between Mantua and Ferrara. Bresciasurrendered in May 1516 and the Franco-Venetian force moved to besiegeVerona in August, a siege conducted with little nerve by Venice, which knewthe cost of destroying walls whose repair bills it would have to face afterreoccupation. It was the diplomatists who did most of the fighting in 1516,Francis, by the Treaty of Noyen of 13 August, coming to terms with the heirof Ferdinand of Aragon (d. 23 January), Maximilian's grandson Charles ofBurgundy. This agreement between the most active foreign contenders for

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Italian territory gradually had a quieting effect on the anti-Venetian forcesrepresented in Verona. Leo X was won over to France by an ecclesiasticalsettlement, the Concordat of Bologna of 18 August. Massimiliano acceptedthe Frenchy^Y accompli and relinquished his interest in the duchy of Milan.Maximilian, after a blustery gesture towards the relief of Verona in October,reconciled himself to signing the Treaty of Noyen, and on 17 January 1517Venice reoccupied the city without a shot being fired. This completed thereconquest of the Terraferma, though Cremona remained henceforward inthe hands of the rulers of Milan; Gradisca and Gorizia, as a concession toMaximilian, in those of successive heads of the house of Austria.

From January 1517 to June 1521 Venice, like the rest of Italy (apart fromLeo X's war against the state of the republic's future commander-in-chiefDuke Francesco Maria della Rovere of Urbino), was at peace. The Treaty ofBlois still held, binding France and Venice to give military aid towhichever's possessions were threatened by another power. In June 1519Charles became Emperor in succession to Maximilian and capable ofmobilizing an army to fight in Italy both from Spain and Naples and fromGermany. In May 1521 Leo X, after much uncertainty as to which of theforeign presences in Italy, France and the Empire, he was to back, given thenear inevitability of their falling out, concluded a secret treaty with Charles.Then began a new phase of activity for the republic's land forces, this timefor the purpose of conserving, in association with allies, the regainedTerraferma.

In July a papal-Spanish army moved against Parma where it was held upby the French garrison, giving time to France to send reinforcements intothe Milanese and Venice to mobilize and by September send an army to aidLautrec, the French commander-in-chief, that was up to the strength set bythe terms of Blois. All the same, with the active support of the inhabitants,Milan surrendered in November (though the French garrison held out inits citadel) and after a long period in which both armies sparred for positionthe French, supported by Venetian cavalry (the infantry remaining to guardthe western Terraferma), were brought to battle at Bicocca on 27 April 1522.The Swiss infantry on whom Lautrec principally depended were terriblymauled by the arquebus fire of the Spaniards and the day ended with thewithdrawal of the French from the Milanese. Though the retreat of its allyleft Venice in an equivocal position, no attempt was made by Charles torevive Imperialist claims to Venetian territory, and from July 1522 therepublic demobilized its army to a peacetime garrison strength.

It was believed on all sides, however, that the French would return. Andnow, by a pact of 29 July 1523, Venice changed sides, allying with Charles(and, to protect the northern frontier and Friuli, with his brother, ArchdukeFerdinand of Austria) and agreeing to provide an army to maintain the status

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quo in the Milanese were it to be challenged. Such an army had to be raisedwithin two months of signature, when a new French force appeared. Fromthat autumn until the defeat of the French at the battle of Pavia on 24February 1525 (when Francis I himself was taken a prisoner to Spain)Venice's troops seldom left the Terraferma and were never engaged in anymajor action: while the Imperial alliance was deemed a necessity thegovernment was determined to do as little as possible to be put at riskthrough it. However, though numbers were cut down in the monthsbetween the withdrawal of one French army in June 1524 and thereappearance of another under Francis in October, the republic kept to itstreaty obligations and the period was edgy with the possibility of beingcommitted to a major conflict. Even after Pavia demobilization was onlypartial.

On 22 May 1526, by the Treaty of Cognac, Venice changed sides again.3After three years of an Imperialist alliance, there were to be three with therepublic in harness again with France and the papacy. Francis had returnedto France in March, was absolved by Pope Clement VII from his oath toCharles to abstain from interfering in Italy, and the Treaty of Cognac boundhim, the pope (with Florence) and Venice to restore the Duchy of Milan toits legitimate claimant, Francesco Sforza, and to bring such militarypressure to bear on Naples, under its viceroy Lannoy, that Charles would beforced to agree to hold it not in his own right but as a fief of the Church.Venice built up its army fast to its highest numbers (16,225) sinceAgnadello, captured Lodi for the league in June, took part in anunsuccessful attack on Milan itself in July and with part of its forcesinvested the Imperialist-held Cremona from early August until 22September, when the city surrendered. On the other hand, it failed to stopGerman reinforcements for the Imperialist army crossing the Terrafermaand passing on southwards through the haven of Mantuan territory.

In 1527, with the papal forces' failure that spring to make any impressionon Naples, and with no fresh troops coming through France, Venice wasresponsible for virtually the whole of the league's army of nearly 29,000men, and its own captain-general, the Duke of Urbino, was commander-in-chief. From February onwards the duke with the main body of this armycautiously shadowed the Imperialist army that wandered, increasinglymutinous for lack of pay and beyond the control of its own commanders,

For what follows: F. Bennato, 'La partecipazione militare di Venezia alia lega di Cognac', A V., ser. 5,lviii-lix (1956) 70-87; Judith Hook, 'The destruction of the new "Italia": Venice and the papacy incollision', Italian Studies, xxviii (1973) 10-30; V. Vitale, 'L'impresa di Puglia degli anni 1528-29',NAV., xiii-xiv (1907) 5-68, 120-92, 324-51; Guicciardini, Storia d'Italia. For individual militaryactions, Pieri, Rinascimento e la crisi militare, gives both the best short accounts and the fullestbibliographies.

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past Bologna, through Tuscany and towards Rome which, with a whollyunforeseen determination and success, it stormed on 6 May and sub-sequently so notoriously sacked. Until late in June the league army waited inTuscany lest the Imperialists should try to return northwards; then, whenthey left Rome for Naples and the long-awaited French army crossed theAlps in July, the duke moved to join it in the Milanese, and after a number ofinconclusive joint actions the Venetian troops went into winter quarters inNovember at Cassano, on the Adda between Bergamo and Lodi, due east ofMilan. Meanwhile, taking advantage of the pope's helplessness, two of theRomagnol cities lost to Venice in 1509, Ravenna and Cervia, had offeredthemselves to the republic in late June and mid July and were sent garrisonsin acknowledgement of these unviolent but provocative gains.

The winter campaigning in the north was inconclusive partly because ofthe Imperialists' decision to concentrate on the defence of the capital ratherthan keep an army in the field, and partly because a major part of the Frencharmy left in the winter to besiege the other Imperialist capital, Naples. Withthem had gone a detachment of Venetian troops. Initially this was with theintention of creating a diversion on the other side of the kingdom butincreasingly it became that of permanently reoccupying that other group ofpossessions lost in 1509, the Apulian ports which, like the Romagnol towns,were initially happy to offer themselves back to their previous owners. Butwith the failure of the French siege of Naples in the summer of 1528, theApulian ports had to be defended against Imperialist troops now freed forservice elsewhere, and for the rest of the year, and throughout the next,Venice's troops conducted a war of small sieges and defences, amphibiousraids and minor skirmishes, against an enemy never numerous or well paidor sufficiently trenchantly led to expel them. But the Apulian war was aminor affair compared with the number of troops Venice was forced tomaintain in order to cooperate with the French in the Milanese (as at thedefence of Lodi in the summer of 1528) while maintaining both a field armyand garrison forces for the defence of the Terraferma. The year 1529,indeed, the year in which Francis I recognized the hopelessness of his causein Lombardy and contracted the separate Peace of Cambrai in August withCharles V, involved the republic in expending in military wages the secondhighest sum of the entire period. Only with its signature on 23 December ofthe general peace settlement of Bologna did Venice feel secure enough todemobilize a force which approached 30,000 men.4 By the terms of BolognaVenice gave up Cervia and Ravenna and the Apulian ports; from 1521, eightyears of warfare conducted mainly in association with allies had left therepublic with precisely the possessions it had regained by January 1517. But

4 See below, 473.

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the tightest corner in its history since the War of Chioggia had beensuccessfully and - until 1797 - permanently turned.

From this account what emerges with especial force is the unremittingnature of Venice's military commitment throughout the period. Betweenthe build-up that began in January 1509 and the demobilization that tookeffect from January 1530 there were, out of 252 months, only 8 when thearmy was on stand-by strength and only 62 during which it was fullyreduced to a peacetime level. Nor were the seasonal cut-backs in short-contract troops so marked as in the past. The field army went into winterquarters, but nevertheless skirmishes and troop movements during siegestook little account of the weather. In the winter of 1521-2 Landsknechtscame through the passes into the Bergamasco 'in heavy snow';Frundsberg's first reinforcements for the Imperialist army crossed into theTerraferma in November 1526 'with snow up to their knees'.5 The battle ofPavia opened on a February dawn. After a century, it was these twenty yearsof military effort, financial expenditure and political reappraisal that at lastreally opened the patriciate's eyes to their reliance on and concern for theTerraferma. Thenceforward Venice can no longer be adequately termed 'AMaritime Republic'.6

Yet the maritime empire remained, and both sentiment and financialcalculation backed the resolve to protect it. Both the next two wars wereagainst the Turk. Naval wars, therefore: but since the Turk now had fleetslarge enough to transport armies, and had land lines of communication fromConstantinople to Venice's Dalmatian-Albanian coast which led throughsubject regions able to provide reinforcements, the republic's land forcesplayed as important a part as its navy. Troops were used to supplement thearmed crews and the scapoli of galleys; more were shipped to supplement thegarrisons of threatened bases; still more were transported to act as field andsiege units da Mar.

(ii) THE TURKISH WAR OF 1537-154O7

The year 1536 opened with the news of a marriage of convenience betweenthe Most Christian King Francis I and the sultan Suleiman (now muchunder the influence of his warrior minister Khair-ad-Din) and the obviousbut unannounced preparations for a struggle over the succession to Milanafter the death of Charles V's puppet, Francesco Sforza. Called upon by the5 Sanuto, xxxii, 486; xliii, 218.6 Lane, Venice.7 See Romanin and Kretschmayr. But what follows is chiefly based on Senate regs.; Bernardo Navagero,

' Istoria delle tre guerre de Veneziani con Turchi. . .', BCV., ms. 3757; and the anonymous chronicle(and the synopsis of it, which differs in some details) in BMV., mss. It. vn, 785 (= 7292).

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Emperor in March to raise the 6000 infantry promised at need under theterms of the treaty of 1529, Venice did so. The struggle was limited to Savoyand Piedmont, however, and the government seized the excuse of thecoming of winter to dismiss all but 800, who were distributed among thegarrisons of the Terraferma. More urgent in Venetian eyes was Francis'scalling in the Turks to redress the balance between Valois and Habsburg. Itrendered Venice's own treaty agreements with Constantinople not onlyvulnerable but meaningless, especially when in January 1537 Suleiman sentenvoys to invite Venetian aid against the Empire. Correctly interpreting thegovernment's calculated hesitation as a deliberate rebuff, he ordered amassive build-up of troops and munitions at Valona.

In August 1537 the sultan, realizing that Francis was not supporting himby cutting at Italy in the north, turned against Corfu, investing it with hisfleet of 350 vessels and with troops brought down from Valona and ferriedacross to the island. The attack failed, thanks to adequate fortifications, apreviously reinforced and resolute garrison, an indecisive Turkish com-mand and torrential rain that clogged the besiegers in their trenches. BeforeVenice even received the news of the siege the Turks sailed off to investNapoli di Romania. Anticipating this alternative target, Venice haddispatched reinforcements and a message to the inhabitants and garrisonurging them to fight valiantly for the Christian faith and the lion of St Mark'in the cause of the devotion they have for us, who will not be ungrateful'.8But the sluggish communications system da Mar brought men and messagetoo late; the Turks had already begun an investment that was to last fornearly a year. Though no formal proclamation had been made, the Turk hadforced Venice into war.

While it was possible to raise troops on the scale of 1509-29, suchnumbers were useless without vessels to protect and transport them. Venicehad, by September, 100 galleys at sea and 1 galleon, a further 50 galleysunder construction and not enough transport. With every indication fromConstantinople suggesting Turkish preparation for a fresh sailing in thefollowing spring, naval allies were essential.

Nothing came of efforts to get the Sophi to attack Suleiman from Persia9

and on 1 February 1538 the Senate met to dot the i's of the alliance that, afterits signature on the 8th, was known as the Holy League. It was so calledbecause of the participation of the pope, though his contribution to itsexpenses was only one-sixth of the whole. Venice was to produce two-sixths;the Emperor three-sixths. The force whose expenses were to be divided inthis way was to comprise a combat force of 200 galleys (82 of them Venetian,

8 SS. reg. 58, 62V-63 (28 Sept. 1537).9 Dieci, Secreta, reg. 4, 81.

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leaving the republic's other galleys to patrol the Adriatic) and iootransports, 30,000 Italian and Spanish infantry, 20,000 Landsknechts, 4500cavalry and 'an adequate supply of artillery'. The dotting process was mainlyconcerned with unsuccessfully trying to demote Andrea Doria, the otherparties' candidate, from the captain-generalcy. Meanwhile, and hencefor-ward, with base reinforcements and amphibious actions in mind, recruit-ment continued: by the end of 1538 Venice had raised 21,225 'ex-traordinary' troops.10

Between the signing of the treaty in February and the battle of Prevesa inOctober, much was said in Venice about the allies' common purpose: todestroy the Turkish fleet on its arrival in central Mediterranean waters andto counter-raid on a scale that would discourage the Turks for years to comefrom meddling in Venetian, Italian or Spanish-African affairs. Yet thegovernment's preparations seldom envisaged a context wider than that ofself-protection. It was an attitude that had caused Venice to be accused ofbeing a traitor to the Christian cause since Pius IPs abortive crusade of1464. But it was not unnatural. The present pope, Paul III, was believed tobe sincere, but his contribution was the smallest of the allies' and he wasknown to be financially hard-pressed. The Emperor's land conflict withFrance was not settled until the Truce of Nice in June, and Spain's maritimeinterests were, in any case, limited to the area west of the Gulf of Tarantoand the Sicilian channel. Moreover, to a generation conditioned to believethat the present could learn from the past, one lesson was clear:contributions of men and ships specified in an offensive alliance had to bedocked by the numbers that signatories would in any case have mobilized forself-defence; thus when the Imperial fleet under Andrea Doria didrendezvous with the Venetian and papal units in September, it was shorn ofvessels and men left behind to guard the Spanish and African coasts. Amongall parties, the league's policies were remarkable less for confessions of faiththan for professions of poverty. And from the point of view of morale, thelittle for the common cause that was done was weakened in its possible effectby the repetition of excuses for not doing more.

Unlike its allies, Venice was under pressure through the whole breadth ofits possessions. Past experience suggested that the Habsburg-Valois trucewas no guarantee against new disturbances in Lombardy. Moreover, Venicecould not put out of mind the possibility of a move towards Friuli on the partof Turkish troops and their satellites in Slovenia and Croatia. The entireempire da Mar was on alert: the siege of Napoli di Romania continued; inlate May the investment of Malvasia and an attack on Suda showed that thethird zone11 was at risk until the allied fleet had built up to a size to risk battle

10 See below, 479.11 See below, 430.

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with a force estimated at between 250 and 300 fighting vessels. The expenseof guarding that enormous coastline was not just to be measured bygarrisons, but also by the steady stream of building supplies, artillery andmunitions, arquebuses and other weapons to practically every fortified placewest of Cyprus, though especially to Zara and Crete.

Yet logistic decisions, whether regarding ships or troops, revealed acertain uncommittedness that had not been apparent during the recoveryand subsequent protection of the Terraferma. This has some bearing onVenice's psychological veering from a predominantly maritime to anincreasingly mainland sense of identity, but there are mundane expla-nations. One was Venice's traditional reluctance to anticipate a threat beforeit could be measured. In this year the movements of both the Turkisharmies and fleet were particularly difficult to anticipate because the sultan,until late that summer, was committed on both the Balkan and Moldavianfronts at a time when a change of ministers in Constantinople left theVenetian bailo reliant on spies and gossip instead of the inside informationVenice had become accustomed to. Another was the government'sreluctance to impose a full wartime tax burden on subjects who were stillrecovering from a generation of war. Venice had recovered and maintainedher Terraferma possessions after 1509 with the reputation of being lessexploitative than its rivals; it was not a reputation to put at risk. Finally,though Venice could not match a full Turkish war fleet single-handed, co-operation with allies whose aims were not identical with the republic'sclearly had a blunting effect on Venetian morale and turned caution intoirresolution. On land, cash could still buy the manpower needed for defence;da Mar Venice was faced by the dilemma of being a sea power withinsufficient power at sea.

It was not until mid September 1538 that the papal andImperial-Genoese galleys joined the Venetian battle fleet waiting at Corfu.The joint armada then sailed into the inconclusive engagement of Prevesa.

That sea battle, fought on 27 September, was preceded by an amphibiousattack on the Turkish-held forts commanding the entrance to the Gulf ofPrevesa where the Turkish admiral Khair-ad-Din Barbarossa's fleet waslying. Galley fleets, with their ravenous need for provisions, were at a seriousdisadvantage when maintaining a blockade, and the opposing fleets were toonearly matched in numbers for the Christians to risk detaching a squadronfor supply duties. The plan of either making the entrance safe for the alliesto enter or of forcing Barbarossa to come out seemed to the Venetian andpapal commanders all the more urgent in that both suspected that Doria,like his master Charles V, was more anxious to come to terms with theenemy than to fight him. In any case, troops were landed and the attackmade. It failed. The forts were unexpectedly strong. Reinforcements

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poured ashore from the harboured Turkish galleys. The season was too lateto assure a fleet's being able to hover near a force it had landed and the rockycoast did not permit the usual solution to this problem, beaching the galleysand letting the crews run ashore. When Barbarossa did come out it was at amoment of his own choosing which found the allies reluctantly obeyingDoria's order to withdraw: by the 27th the fleet had been on station for overthree weeks. Widely strung out and hampered by calms which forced thegalleys to clot defensively about the troop carriers of the Imperialcontingent, the allies could not form a battle line. On the other hand thiswide and haphazard scatter of vessels robbed the Turks of a coherent targetand when dusk closed on a series of piecemeal engagements neither fleet wasmuch maimed. It was the storm the allies had feared that won the battle'saftermath. Swept north, the Turks lost an estimated 70 vessels against theshelterless Albanian coast while the allies lay safely at Corfu. And when theTurks withdrew, Doria led a successful attack on their outpost atCastelnovo. When it surrendered on 27 October, to Venice's acute chagrinhe installed a Spanish garrison and refused to consider the republic'scontention that as an outrider of Cattaro it should logically be left inVenetian hands.

The state of war continued until the Venetian-Turkish peace treaty of 2October 1540. The intervening two years were marked by a tensefeaturelessness. The sieges of Napoli and Malvasia lingered on in a mannersuggesting that to both sides they had become habits rather than issues.Venetian planning acquired a jerky, irrational quality from the unreality ofthe diplomatic scene. All parties to the league had made a pretence ateuphoria after the Turks' withdrawal from the Adriatic and the capture ofCastelnovo. Venice broadcast12 its intention of raising more troops for thefleet, but simply as a gesture towards the negotiations that produced on 3November 1538 an inflated version of the alliance.13 While not, perhaps,entirely cynical in intention, the revised league was little more than a writserved on the sultan to bid him avoid trespassing henceforward in Christianwaters. All parties were bent on peace, and the ground beneath the newtreaty was tunnelled with a secret diplomacy designed to bring this about.What delayed a settlement so long was the sophisticated spy network of theFrench, which, thanks to bribed members of the secretariat of the VenetianSenate and Council of Ten,14 was able to keep Constantinople informed ofthe concessions the republic was prepared to make, and the sultan's decision

12 Through its diplomatic envoys. E.g. SS. reg. 59, 92V (14 Oct.).13 In Predelli, vi, 234.14 BMV. ms. It. VII, 785 (= 7292), 110-17V; Cessi, Storia della repubblica di Venezia, ii, 102-5. MC.

Novus, 39V records distrust of the secretariat over the appointment of captains of horse and foot (7Jan. 1539).

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to increase the stakes by a show of force that retook Castelnovo after a siegelasting from 12 July to 7 August 1539. This sortie, the only new militaryevent of any importance after the allies' capture of the same fortress, wasdiplomatically all the more effective in that it occurred in the middle of atruce which Venice had quietly negotiated to run between 22 April and 20September. The breach of this agreement (which all representatives da Marhad been warned, however, to treat with caution) caused Venice to try toreanimate the league by announcing in July that it was preparing to fill itsquota of 10,000 men. Neither ally responded. Nor did they when Venicemade a similar declaration in December with the aim of encouraging thethreat of an allied fleet for the spring of 1540.

By then, however, military affairs were thoroughly subordinate to thediplomacy that produced the disappointing peace treaty with the sultan of 2October 1540.15 What galled the republic was not so much the cession ofNapoli and Malvasia and the Cycladean islands (except Tine), nor the newpinpoints in the Dalmatian limes where at Vrana and Nadino the Turksgained access to the sea, nor, indeed, was an annual tribute of 500 ducats forZante and 8000 for Cyprus anything to resent, for it had been paid in thepast; it was above all the size of the financial settlement, 300,000 ducats, thatstuck in Venetians' throats, a large sum with which to purchase a separatepeace after the expense of three years of a war conducted only partially onlines of their own choosing.

Yet the treaty defined terms of coexistence in the eastern Mediterraneanthat were to last, if precariously, for thirty years. The Turks, it is true, madeit humiliatingly clear that the Adriatic was 'their' water in the same sensethat Venice claimed it to be theirs. But Venice's right to continue sendingmerchant fleets to Alexandria, Beirut and Tripoli was acknowledged, as wasthe access, though under licence, to Constantinople, Galata, Pera andGallipoli, and to Modone, Prevesa and Lepanto. Ships of both nations wereto salute one another as friends at sea and pursue a common police actionagainst corsairs. And in retrospect the war's lessons could be seen as havingbeen learned cheaply enough in view of their importance: the essentialloneliness of the empire da Mar and the unlikeliness of getting support fromallies that would be effective east of the Sicilian channel - but, on the otherhand, the impossibility of meeting a full Turkish fleet without support fromother Christian powers; the vulnerability of Venetian Dalmatian territory toattacks from the interior which were supported from the sea - but, on theother hand again, the ability of well-fortified bases to sustain sieges and, asat Corfu, actually repulse them.

Given Venice's distrust of yet dependence on allies, the nagging15 Predelli, vi, 236-7.

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suspicions of diplomatic treachery and the lack of focus given to the war bythe Turks' own uncertainty as to what use to make of a striking power thatwas as yet - even after the conquest of Rhodes in 1522 - disassociated from apositive Mediterranean strategy, the republic's military-naval conduct inthese years is best seen in terms of an only partially deliberate stream oflogistic consciousness. The conflict of 1537-40 was basically a war of nerves.It began with an act of petulance. It was sustained by a half-hearted beliefthat to participate was to postpone the even more costly shape of things tocome. It was concluded not so much because the contestants were exhaustedbut because that vision of the future lacked conviction. It cost great sums ofmoney. It claimed many lives (largely from disease caused by exposure andinadequate rations). It was recognized by all contestants, almost from thestart, as a real crisis, but a sham war.

(iii) THE WAR OF CYPRUS 157O-15731 6

From the point of view of military preparation, the Turkish War of 1570-3started with the receipt of dispatches in late January 1570 from the bailo inConstantinople describing furious shipbuilding activity in the Bosphorus.Proveditors were elected and governors-general nominated for the keygarrisons overseas and stand-by contracts were made operational. Februarypassed without the course of events becoming clear - ' there is a threat ofwar', as a member of the College put it, 'but almost every year there is'17 -though preparations for defence continued, if not quite on the scaledescribed to the ambassadors in Rome for propaganda purposes by theSenate: 8000 fresh infantry sent da Mar, preparations for a fleet of over 150light galleys, 12 great galleys and 'a good number' of transports; all in all aneffort involving 'the greatest cost that we have ever incurred' because, theambassadors were to emphasize, the danger confronts not only us butChristendom as a whole.18 These preparations were sustained by news ofmobilizations of ships and men in Constantinople, of raids from Zara toBudua by troops massing in the Turkish hinterlands of Dalmatia andAlbania, of harassment of Venetian merchants that went beyond the normalgive and take of reprisal, and of the propagation by the Turks of a marenostrum concept of the eastern Mediterranean that prepared the governmentfor the formal demand for Cyprus that was made at the end of March. Thiswas turned down by a now thoroughly resolute Senate, which sent

16 See Romanin, s.a.; Paruta, Guerra di Cipro; G. A. Quarti, La guerra contro il Turco a Cipro e a Lepanto(Venice, 1935); P. Molmenti, 'Sebastiano Veniero dopo la battaglia di Lepanto', NAV., n.s. xxx, 1(1915) 5-146; Senate regs. and the invaluable Annali series which now begins.

17 Collegio, Notatorio, reg. 39, 140 (7 Feb.).18 Annali, s.a., 48.

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dispatches to all the authorities da Mar saying that now that 'the peace hasbeen broken by the Turks' and there was a state ' of open war', all must dotheir best to defend themselves and harm the enemy.19

Mobilization of the republic's fleet had begun in January. By 4 Aprilcontracts had been placed to supply it with a floating army of 11,800 menunder Sforza Pallavicino. By June the main body of the fleet underHieronimo Zane was at Corfu, still with no clear indication of the Turkisharmada's destination. Meanwhile, two amphibious expeditions were moun-ted, chiefly to keep the troops active and fit, one against the Turkishfortresses at Soporto, on the Albanian coast, which successfully captured it,the other against the more northerly fortified village of Margarita, whichfailed. On 14 July the fleet was reinforced by a detachment of galleys fromCrete which brought the news that 300 Turkish sail had been sighted offRhodes, apparently bound for Cyprus.

Ten days later Zane's fleet left for Cretan waters to rendezvous with thoseof the pope and Spain, the former's because Pius was determined to forge acrusading alliance, the latter's because Philip II had grudgingly come toagree that the Venetian limes was a valuable first line of defence for Spanishinterest in the western and central Mediterranean. No alliance had beenformally agreed (indeed, the pope was still hampering Venetian recruitmentin the States of the Church) but all parties had tentatively accepted the needfor common action under the overall command of Pius's nominee, the pro-Spanish Marc'Antonio Colonna. All the controlling governments wereshort of information. On 2 September, for instance, the Senate wrote toZane complaining that they had had no news for two months. That was aweek before the surrender of Nicosia on 9 September after a siege that hadlasted over a month.

Zane, meanwhile, reached Suda on 31 July, having sent ahead SebastianoVenier (who had been ordered to leave Corfu, where he was proveditor-general, to take up the same position in Cyprus) with two of his fastestgalleys to send back news of that island. As it happened, Zane received newsfrom a Cypriot galley on 9 August of unopposed Turkish landings, thoughnot that Nicosia was to be the first target. While his orders were to attack theTurkish fleet or divert it from Cyprus by a demonstration in force againstsome sensitive spot on the Turkish mainland, he could do neither, he wrote,until joined by Gian Andrea Doria, Philip's admiral, and Colonna; histroops were now down to 4000 and he was finding it impossible to getreplacements in Crete. He was doing all he could, but 'one cannot moveagainst the will of God '.20 Even after diverting Venier to join his second-in-command, Marco Querini, in raids for men among the islands of the

19 SM. reg. 39, 139.20 A n n a l i , s.a., 150V (14 A u g . ) .

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archipelago their yield - only 330 men - was overtaken by fresh casualties.Matters hardly improved when the arrival on 4 September of the 12 papal

and 49 Spanish galleys brought the combat fleet up to 126 light galleys, 12great galleys and 20 navi and galleons. They, too, were short of men throughsickness, and neither by exemptions from taxes and labour services,cancellations of debts and penal sentences nor threats and appeals to theirbetter natures could the Cretans, from peasants to feudatories, be persuadedto produce men; the fleets' recruiters marched through villages and intocastles emptied of their inhabitants. Try as they would, for reasons of pride,to conceal the unprepared state of their vessels from one another, each fleetcommander knew that any proposal for an attack on the Turkish fleet in acouncil of war was made to score a political point with little risk that it wouldbe acted upon. From Doria such urging was further discounted because, asColonna had told Zane, he was convinced that his lines of communicationwould be too extended in Cypriot waters to risk an engagement there. Thesame conviction made him reject Sforza's proposal to draw the Turks fromCyprus by forcing the Dardanelles and attacking Constantinople. As acompromise, the fleet made a confused sweep around Rhodes which failedto produce any Turkish reaction but revealed how wretchedly unpreparedthe allies were to face a major action. It was while off Rhodes that news wasreceived of the fall of Nicosia.

Morale fell lower than ever. Zane had hoped to conceal the news but itspread: the Turkish fleet could now board its soldiers and choose its owntime and place for combat. He referred bitterly to 'rebellious men whospoke of being led to the slaughter'. Doria was itching to get back to Otrantoand Malta. Colonna, though more attentive to Venice's concern for Cyprus,deferred in the end to Doria, conscious of the smallness of his owncontingent. Zane, who on 6 October put Venetian losses in oarsmen andtroops from dysentery and an infectious disease associated with some formof rash ('petechie') at over 20,000, including a number of patricianvolunteers, was, like other members of the Venetian command, shaken bythe speed with which Nicosia had fallen.

Throughout October opinion hardened that the fleets should withdraw.Doria went first, then Colonna, finally Zane, who reached Corfu on 19November, leaving behind Querini to guard Crete; Venier, who hadvolunteered to take supplies to Famagosta - known from the middle of themonth to be under siege; and Sforza, to see to the supplying of both unitswith troops. At Sforza's suggestion, all soldiers were disembarked before theVenetian fleet sailed so that he could call for volunteers, in the first place forFamagosta. All the captains refused, 'claiming that they had been engagedto serve in the fleet and not in Cyprus'.21 Each was then formally dismissed

21 Sforza Pallavicino's account in Archivio Proprio Pinelli, Ba. i, dated 27 Apr. 1571.

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and then asked again to volunteer. In this way some 1700 infantry wereobtained to accompany Venier and 800 to remain in Crete, either with theguard of galleys or in garrison. The rest were paid off and stranded, thoughmany, Sforza complained, managed to smuggle themselves on board thefleet and got back to Corfu. This done, Sforza left Suda for Corfu on 17November. It was not until 16 January that the relief force sailed - withoutVenier; he was bedridden with a complaint affecting his leg. Describing itsembarkation Filippo Bragadin, the Capitano of Candia, said that he hadnever before been so mortified as when reviewing the troops: cynical, purelyprofit-motivated captains and ill-equipped and inexperienced men. And hisopposite number in Famagosta, who during all this time had been writingincreasingly desperate appeals, could not disguise his disillusion when the'Venier' force arrived, unchallenged by the Turkish guardships, on 25January. The muster list stood at 1725 soldiers. In fact there were only 1319,and ' because the small number and the quality of captains and men are farfrom answering our needs we are left much deceived in our expectations'.22

It was against a sombre background - uncertainty as to the fate ofFamagosta, the post-mortem investigation into the failure to relieveNicosia, continued Turkish pressure along the whole Dalmatian coast, theconstant need to send further reinforcements there and to guard againstattacks on Friuli and the Lido itself - that at last a formal alliance wasnegotiated.

The anti-Turkish Holy League between Venice, Spain and the papacywas signed on 20 May 1571 and published five days later.23 Negotiations hadin fact begun as far back as July 1570, and their spasmodic and shiftingcourse had been chiefly delayed by Venice, distrustful as ever andcontinuously hopeful of a separate and not too disadvantageous peace. Thepurpose of the league was aggressive. But almost to the eve of its signing therepublic's military and naval preparations were concerned with the defenceof the empire da Mar (including the relief of Famagosta) and the build-up toa strength designed not for attack but for independent negotiation with thesultan.

Venice adhered to the league only just in time. In mid June a Turkishforce of 72 galleys began a series of attacks on the north coast of Crete. Thesewere unsuccessful or inconclusive; Retimo was briefly occupied and theterritory of Suda sacked, but the fortifications of Canea were strong enoughto hold off two assaults. The 38-40 galleys which had by then been readiedin Candia after frantic efforts (the recruiting parties had in some cases beenexpelled by force) for a further relief of Famagosta had perforce to stand off

22 Annali, s.a., 460.23 Predelli, vi, 321-3.

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and leave it to the authorities on land to deal with these incursions. TheTurks then moved westwards to Zante and Cefalonia, landing troops whoseincendiary and slaving forays effectively sterilized the islands' function offilling crews for Venetian galleys leaving Corfu for the open sea. Theseevents were read by Venier, who had replaced the disgraced Zane in thenaval command, as the prelude to a lunge deep into the Adriatic. His fleet of6 galliasses and 65 light galleys was then at Corfu. As the republic's mainobjective was to relieve Famagosta in conjunction with her allies, heanticipated his orders and took 56 galleys and the galliasses to the league'srendezvous, Messina, rather than be trapped in the Adriatic, and sent therest to join the contingent at Candia.

He left Corfu without having time to fill his troop quota, then reckoned at100 to 120 men per galley and 150 per galliass. With Turkish concentrationsin each of the Dalmatian bases' hinterlands, military governors were not inthe mood to release men to make good the fleet's formidable sick-list. Fourthousand fresh infantry had been assembled on the Lido to be transported tohim in Messina. After his leaving Corfu, however, the Turkish fleet movedinto the southern Adriatic and blocked their sailing. To the government'sembarrassment, its contribution to the first fleet of the century dedicated toan all-out attack on the Infidel was grievously undermanned as a fightingforce. Venier was told to aim at the reduced target of 100 men per vessel andto beg troops from the papal commander, Marc'Antonio Colonna, whoseforce arrived off Messina on 20 July, from Philip's lieutenant, and from theleague's commander, Don John of Austria, who did not reach Messina withhis fleet until mid August.

While the allies' joint force of 206 light galleys, 6 galliasses and 20 supplyvessels, built up at Messina, the Turkish fleet was free to test Venice'spreparations along the Dalmatian coast. The heavy reinforcements of thespring had produced a stalemate on land. The Turkish troops could not riskthinning out their front to mass for an assault on any of Venice's moreimportant bases without sea support on a scale the sultan was unwilling torisk so far from the Bosphorus; Venice could not afford to strip its garrisonsto inflict a serious damage on Turkish concentrations or bring in its fleetunsupported by the allies. There was considerable raiding and counter-raiding, especially in the area Cattaro-Castelnovo, where the Turks stroveto build forts to block the strait and the Venetians to destroy them. Here andelsewhere the stalemate was compounded by the unfitness of the Turks'majority of horse to attack infantry protected by fortifications, and by theperil which faced Venetian infantry when they ventured too far into acountryside dominated by cavalry. By 13 August the government had heardthat troops supported by detachments of the Turkish fleet had takenDulcigno, Antivari, Lesina and Budua, ravaged Curzola and retaken

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Soporto. Movement among the forces in the interior suggested theimminence of naval attacks on Cattaro and Zara, and possibly on Istria.Venier was told by the Senate to beg the allies to sail now that 'the enemy ispenetrating the very vitals of our state . . . to the detriment and scandal ofChristendom as a whole'.24 By the time his instructions reached Messina inmid September Venier and his allies were already at sea. News of the Turks'overrunning and sacking of the island of Corfu and their investment of thetown had determined the direction of the league's offensive, though theTurks had by then found the fortifications once more too strong and hadwithdrawn still further southwards to Lepanto, where the allies sightedthem at sunrise on 7 October.

The opposing fleets used similar tactics with vessels comparably designedand crewed; the only major discrepancy was the allies' possession of theVenetian galliasses, whose superior firepower helped to shake the otherwiseparade-ground regularity of the oncoming Turkish lines of battle. It was,indeed, the last great confrontation of floating armies, rowed methodicallyinto formation, firing artillery as the distance between them narrowed butrelying in most cases on closing to board infantry for the coup de grace;contemporary descriptions dwell on the flashing helmets and armour andbristling weapons of the troops and their officers and say little of the menwho worked them into action. Summing up the causes of the allies' victory,Paruta was to praise the strength and seaworthiness of their galleys, thedesign of the foredeck that allowed their guns a flatter trajectory than thoseof the Turks, the superiority of their artillery and the greater use made ofpavisades of wooden shuttering to protect the soldiers until the momentcame to board or repel boarders. But while relating the quality of the allies'troops to the performance of the galleys, he stressed their superiority as anarmy. More heavily armoured, they received fewer wounds. Theirarquebuses were better killing weapons than the bows still used in greatquantities by the Turks, nor did their performance fall off as the marksmentired. Even after adding the firepower of the galliasses to the balance ofadvantage between the fleets, he concluded that 'truly of greater weight thanany other factor was the quality and marked spirit of the soldiers' -including Spaniards, Italians and ' Greeks' alike in this judgement - thoughhe tempered it by attributing part of their resolution to the fact that, unlikethe Turks, they had no friendly shore to flee to.25 This was not the view ofFilippo Bragadin, Proveditor-General 'di Colfo', who wrote to the doge on18 November 1571 from Corfu urging that the galliasses should not bedecommissioned. It was thanks to their firepower 'that it was clear from the

24 SS. reg. 77, 131 (11 Aug.) and 132 (13 Aug.).25 Paruta, 162.

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start that the victory was to be ours'. What Venice needed in future wasmore gunners and fewer soldiers, and, indeed, a general lesson to be learnedfrom the battle was that ships' crews, armed and armoured, fought morebravely and terrified the enemy more than could soldiers 'of the sort we getnowadays'.26 Given the lack of agreement among the allies, thoughattributing the victory to the more or less even distribution of soldiersthroughout the joint fleet, Colonna took the longer view when he declared ita 'miracle' that it had held together long enough to come upon the enemy.27

Unknown to the combatants Famagosta, and with it the whole of Cyprus,had fallen on 5 August.

Lepanto was not seen in Venice as a battle that would end the war. Therewas rejoicing, but it was accepted that the league's responsibilities did notend with the bloodied seas of 7 October.

Though the galleys returned to base ahead of the winter storms, thediplomats started planning new capitulations - agreed in February 1572 -for another and larger fleet to assemble at Corfu with the express intentionof hunting the Turk in his own Levantine waters. In spite of this declarationof intent and Don John's expressed intention to follow up Lepanto at oncewith a drive to the east before he was recalled, suspicion of Philip IPsprimary concern with the western Mediterranean, especially with thecorsair base of Algiers, made Venice pursue a parallel diplomacy whose aim,as after Prevesa, was a peace settlement, not an intensification of the war.

The papal contingent did not arrive - at Corfu - until July. Before that,though reinforcements had yet again been sent to the garrisons in Dalmatiaand Crete, there had been only one military operation of any significance: anunsuccessful amphibious attack in May 1572 to clear the Turks fromNovegrad and the other forts from which they pinned down the garrison inCattaro and controlled the entrance to its gulf, a vital refuge and supply basefor Venetian shipping.

The dismal events of the late summer and autumn may be dealt withbriefly. Reports that the Turkish fleet was attacking Crete led Colonna andGiacomo Foscarini, the new commander of the Venetian combat fleet, to sailoff to the attack at the end of July before the Spanish galleys had arrived.After two confrontations at sea, which neither side wished to turn into abattle, the joint fleet returned to Corfu and then sailed again, this time incompany with Don John, in September. The Turks, now drasticallyoutnumbered, withdrew to Modon, landed their troops and entered thetown, whence an amphibious operation failed to dislodge them. By early

26 Annali, s.a., 267V-268. On firepower, see M. Morin, 'La battiglia di Lepanto: il determinante apportodelPartiglieria veneziana', Diana Armi (Jan. 1975) 54-61.

27 Capi di Guerra, Ba. 1, 5.

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October the allies were back at Corfu and split up for the winter afteragreeing on an earlier and more massive push in the following year. Asdefined in the agreement reached in February 1573, this meant that Venice'scontribution was to be raised from 113 to 130 galleys (with one great galleycounting as two light ones) and 22,800 infantry, the whole to be ready bymid April. Even with the possibility of regaining Cyprus in mind, it was aprospect to make the Senate blanch and the Council of Ten intensify itssearch for a tolerable peace settlement.

Yet none would be reached without a sword to draw attention to the olivebranch, so preparation for the campaign it was hoped would not take placebegan as soon as the fleets dispersed. On 10 February the Senate told theambassadors in Rome to point out that the republic had in being or undercontract 31,400 men 'without [counting] those in Dalmatia'.28 On paper,indeed, the figure was more like 26,000. But the immodesty of the claimmasked a determination to activate recent contracts only if it provedabsolutely necessary.

Indeed, the double policy of planning for war and negotiating for peacewent on with all the more determination because, instead of July, mid Aprilhad been agreed as the month of rendezvous for the allied fleets and, onceaboard and at sea, the wages due to troops and crews stretched into anotherincalculably long season of campaigning. The negotiations were kept secretnot only from Philip II and the pope but from Venice's higher command.Foscarini was told in January of the government's determination to put 100light galleys to sea; in February he was informed that the government wascomplying in full with the agreement reached that month with the allies.

It was on that same day that the peace terms, agreed in Constantinople on7 March and forwarded to the Heads of the Ten on the 13th by the bailo,were ratified in Venice. And on 3 April the Senate began the difficult task ofnotifying its allies that it was quitting the league. The ambassadors were toldto stress the financial exhaustion of Venice and its subjects. We have always'employed forces larger than those to which the clauses of the league obligedus', have' spent twice as much as the others because of the large garrisons wemaintained in so many bases in Dalmatia and the Levant'. And we have hadto see our subjects reduced to such extremity that 'like cattle, they ate thegrass'. What else could we do, knowing that the Turk is preparing a fleet of400 sail and a most powerful army aimed ' at the heart of our state throughthe gateway of Friuli, undefended by any fortress'? And this when we have' up to now spent on this war over twelve millions of gold - a fact that amazeseven us as to how and whence we have been able to extract it'. Theunfortunate ambassador who delivered this defence of the peace terms

28 Annali, s.a., 196.

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(chiefly, the Turks to retain Cyprus and any conquests on the Adriatic coast,while the Venetians were to return theirs) was hounded out of his audiencewith the pope under threat of excommunication. His colleague in Spain wastreated less drastically, if no less humiliatingly. Philip II 'kept his eyesmotionless upon me, and there was no alteration in his expression until heheard that the conditions of the peace had been accepted, when he made theslightest ironic movement of his mouth'.29

Tales of woe of this sort were trivial, however, compared to the savinginvolved in cutting down the army and the fleet. Unilateral withdrawal fromthe league was an offence in international law, but too much in accord withnational practice to bring retribution, especially as both Spain and the newpope, Gregory XIII, had come to regret their own investment in an area ofthe Mediterranean from which Venice would reap the major benefit. TheSenate demobilized troops awaiting shipment and cancelled all unfulfilledcontracts, but prudently brought the Terraferma garrisons from Verona tothe Milanese frontier up to 2130 men. It then began a more cautiousdemobilization da Mar where trade could at last recommence in theatmosphere of a peace dearly bought and still precarious.

(iv) THE WAR OF GRADISCA 1 6 1 5 - 1 6 1 7 3 0

The War of Gradisca of 1615 to 1617, undeclared, inconclusive, costly andsettled only a year after its official conclusion, has seldom been granted astatus higher than that of an impatient footnote. Yet, apart from Venice'sbrief intervention in the affair of the Mantuan succession in 1630, it was thelast war fought by the republic on land, and the scale of the mobilization andthe period over which operations had to be sustained make it the natural ifinglorious culmination of this account.

For two years the republic had covertly been subsidizing Duke CarloEmanuele of Savoy's campaign to control Monferrat, the region ofPiedmont which he had claimed on behalf of his daughter when herhusband, Duke Vicenzo Gonzaga of Mantua, died. Less covertly, CarloEmanuele was receiving sufficient unofficial military support from thestrongly anti-Spanish governor of Dauphine to have made the dowsing ofthis threat to the northern frontier of Spanish Milan unexpectedly difficultfor that region's governor. Anticipating the possibility of a diversionary

29 I b i d . , s.a., 233-5V, 239-41V, 252V.30 R o m a n i n , s.a.; F . Moisesso , Historia della ultima guerra del Friuli (Venice, 1623); P . Emil iani

[ p s e u d o ] , Guerre d'Italia tra la seren" republica di Venetia e gli archiducali di casa d'Austria ( ' I nPoistorP, n.d. but possibly 1618); S. Gigante, Venezia e gli uscocchi dal 1570 al 1620 (Fiume, 1904);Gunther E. Rothenberg, 'Venice and the Uskoks of Senj, 1537-1618', Journal of Modern History,xxxiii (1961) 148-56; but, again, mainly Senate regs. and Annali.

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thrust eastwards into the Terraferma, the Senate in February 1615 chargedthe College to raise 3000 'foreign' Italian infantry and 500 corazze. Thefigure 3000 was by now routine, it having been found that though raised as'extraordinary' troops a high proportion could be retained as replacementsfor deserters or the sick among the 'ordinary' garrison troops at home andabroad when the crisis of the moment faded. Also routine was a renewedinspection of the fortifications beyond the Mincio and along the frontierwith Austria. Austrian intervention, in case of a move from Milan, was bynow taken for granted; years of unsatisfactory bickering with the ArchdukeFerdinand, ruler from Graz of Inner Austria (Carinthia, Carniola, Styriaand Gorizia), over his protection of the Uscock pirates operating from Senjhad revealed the extent of his pro-Spanish feelings and of his independencefrom the more pacific diplomatic stance of the emperor Mathias.

Two regulations indicated the particular jumpiness of this year. To makesure that the governors of the most strategically important fortified towns(Bergamo, Brescia, Crema, Verona; Zara, Cattaro, Corfu, Candia, Caneaand Rettimo) did not have their loyalty to Venice contaminated by loyaltyto their own men, it had been resolved in 1590 that the companies they hadraised themselves should be distributed to other garrison captains. To thislist were now added Asola, Orzinovi, Peschiera, Legnago, Marano,Sibenico, the new fortress at Corfu, Asso, Cerigo, Tine, Grabusa, Suda andSpinalonga. It was also resolved that the governors' seconds-in-command inthese places, the sergeant-majors, should have a salary increase to makethem less susceptible to bribes and to encourage them to think of themselvesas 'directly dependent on this republic'.31 The places chosen reflectVenice's fear not so much of the Turk, though uncertainty about thepurpose of a Turkish fleet had led to the sending of reinforcements to Cretein the previous May, as of Austrian support for the Uscocks and of theSpanish fleet based on Naples.

By the beginning of August the danger from Spain seemed to have passedand the Senate wrote to the Proveditor-General in Terraferma of 'thegrowing prospect of peace'.32 But on this occasion the dying away of a senseof danger from the west and south did not lead to the routine dismantlingsand dismissals of the past. Emboldened by Spanish quietude, the mutteredsupport of France and England, and the overall promise of peace proclaimedby the Treaty of Asti of 25 June which purported to settle the problem ofMonferrat, Venice decided that this was the moment to challenge theUscocks - even if it meant forcing the archduke to break the cover frombehind which he had been supporting them (the Venetian charge) or, at

31 ST. reg. 85, 104-104.V (22 Aug.).32 S S . reg . 105, 152-152V (1 A u g . ) .

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least, failing to obtain the co-operation of his own frontier guards (theAustrian defence).

The decision was hardly an impulsive one. The Uscock question hadpreoccupied Venice now for three generations during which the growingpopulation of Senj had come, from parish priest to town councillor andmerchant, to rely for their livings on the outcome of piratical raids primarilyagainst coastal but also against long-haul shipping in the northern Adriatic.With a reputation that attracted outlaws and adventurers from far beyondits own racial orbit, Senj had become the Sherwood Forest of theMediterranean with Venice, the chief passer-by, its chosen victim. Therepublic had tried blockade, punitive raids, diplomatic protests to Graz tolittle purpose. Desperation had led to atrocities. In 1613 a successfulcounter-raid led to the display of 80 Uscock heads in the Piazza. In revenge aVenetian galley was captured, the head of its commander, CristoforoVenier, was cut off and, for good folkloric measure, the Senate was led tobelieve that his heart was eaten and his blood, 'on account of a certainsuperstition of theirs and as witness to their indissoluble bond ofbrotherhood', was sprinkled on their bread.33

On 11 August the Senate decided to attack them by sea from theirheadquarters at Senj (Segna) to Fiume and by land to cut the Istrian routesalong which they received help from the Austrian lands between Villaco andTrieste. The attack was to be co-ordinated between the Capitano 'in Colfo'and the Proveditor-General of Dalmatia and Albania; and the rectors ofRaspo and Capo d'Istria and the islands of the Quarnerolo, Veglia, Chersoand Arbe, were to apprehend any rats escaping from the trap. The orderswere passed only with a notable number of abstentions: 78:3:56.34 Giventhe uncompromising way in which the orders referred to the intolerabletergiversations of the Imperial court and referred to Senj and its supportroutes as 'archducal' this is not surprising. Ferdinand was believed to bemore intent than had been his predecessor Charles on adding Marano andCapo d'Istria to the bases he already held (Gradisca and Gorizia) as areminder that Venice's resumption a century ago of eastern Friuli was stillan affront to Imperial history, and its claim that the Gulf of Trieste was partof a 'Venetian' Adriatic mere provocation. All the same, once embarkedupon the policy of aggression the decisions that sustained it for the next twoyears were passed, with very few and always minor exceptions, byoverwhelming majorities.

By early September there had been a number of minor successes,particularly against the Uscock port of Novi, which the Venetian am-

33 Romanin, bk 15, 84.34 SS. reg. 105, 154-7. Votes cited in this form signify for: against: undecided.

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bassadors in Germany, Spain, Naples, Rome and Florence were told torepresent as undertaken merely' for the security, defence and comfort of oursubjects'.35

A month later affairs in the west seemed so tranquil that the offensive inthe east broadened. In November the 'extraordinary' infantry companieswere transferred to Friuli and Istria, and rectors were empowered to draftmilitiamen if they judged the ordinary garrison companies to provide aninsufficient guard. Troops waiting at Corfu for shipment to Crete were alsosent to what, in spite of Venice's persistent disclaimers, was openly atheatre of war. By the end of the year Trieste had been blockaded by seaand attacked from the land, Gradisca isolated by a push across the Austrianterritory up to the Isonzo which involved the capture of a number of villagesand the town of Cormons, and a few bridgeheads were established on theother side of the river. With Gradisca isolated, orders were given to cut itsnorthern supply route from Plez. Whether to advance still further to Goriziawas, after some hesitation, left to the discretion of the governor-general ofPalma and the Corsican veteran of the wars of Flanders, PompeoGiustinian, who was commanding the land forces. By now the Senate hadplaced orders for 9200 additional infantry and called up 2400 militiamenfrom the Terraferma to serve until they arrived. All these actions werejustified to foreign courts as being the consequence of Austrian raids intoFriulian and Istrian territory, to the archduke's open support of the Uscocksand to his refusal to negotiate a settlement of that problem.

Thus began a long-drawn-out war of attrition and atrocity in which nomajor battle was fought, no important centre of population taken. Centredthroughout on the area around the besieged, and frequently relieved,Gradisca, fighting flickered up into the mountains between Cadore andPontebba, and each side pressed now on Istria to release the pressure onFriuli and now vice versa. Large forces were employed and large plans laid,but the story (which with good reason has received no narrative treatmentsince Moisesso's contemporary account, printed in 1623) is one of quarrelsbetween commanders, exhaustion among proveditors, desertion and sick-ness among the troops, of skirmishes, small sieges and shows of strength thatwere not followed up, of individual acts of gallantry but no energeticprosecution of a major enterprise. It is not just heartlessness that finds thechief interest in the war to be administrative and logistic.

Venice's failure to sustain the impetus of the winter of 1615 was due notonly to weakness of purpose in the field but to pressure on other fronts.From March 1616, when secret information was received that Spain wasplanning surprise attacks on Brescia and Crema and other fortress towns,

35 Ibid., 170V-171 (4 Sept.).

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these, together with Pontevico, Orzinovi and Asola, and Verona and Anfo,were henceforward kept on full alert - again using militiamen untilprofessional troops arrived - and orders were given to complete the long-neglected defences of Peschiera. While the proveditors-general in Friuli andIstria were calling for more men and complaining that with so large acomponent of militiamen in the army they could not pursue an attackingstrategy, the Senate could only answer (in August) that reinforcementswould have to wait 'because of threats and alarms in Lombardy'.36

These had followed the breach of the Treaty of Asti initiated by CarloEmanuele and swiftly countered by a Spanish attack from Milan. FromJune 1616 Venice secretly supplied the duke with money (reckoned as amillion ducats by the following June) to keep the Spanish troops fullyoccupied, but the old fears of a diversionary strike across the Adda remainedeasily stirred.

In March of the following year, 1617, the threats were extended toanother front, with persistent reports that the Viceroy of Naples, the Dukeof Ossuna, was planning a naval attack on Dalmatia to stop the recruitingthere on which Venice was having increasingly to depend. By June it wasthought necessary to overhaul the fortifications of the Lido, from S. Andreato Chioggia, to arm the inhabitants and post troops and militiamen there.Calling for French and English aid in that month, the ambassadors were toldto explain that 'the republic is straining every nerve at sea, and our forces areprospering in Friuli in spite of Spanish help to the enemy. We continue tosend money to Savoy and we have to defend our Lombard frontier. We cando no more, and we cannot oppose the Spaniards single-handed'.37

Also in June, fervently encouraging the proveditor-general with the fleetto be active in recruiting more Turkish subjects now that the sultan (alsoalarmed by Spanish naval preparations and heavily engaged in bothHungary and Persia) allowed it, the Senate referred to another factor thatcontributed to the fumbling in Friuli. Our frontiers, it wrote, are sealed.While our enemies' armies grow, ours dwindles.38 Fear of Habsburgreprisals, in fact, kept the routes to the northern frontiers closed to thepassage of the Grison, Swiss and German troops for which Venice hadcontracts. To escape from this trap infantry were brought at great expensefrom Holland, and Venice exploited the military potential of its ownsubjects on the Terraferma and da Mar as it had never done before. Butwhile such measures just about kept the army in Friuli able to maintain abargaining position, they did not transform it, in command or morale, into avigorous fighting force.

36 S S . reg. 107, 59 (1 Aug. ) .37 Calendar of State Papers, Venetian, 1615-17 (London) 519.38 SS. reg. 109, 23iv (23 June).

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It was by observing this dilemma: the threats on other fronts coupledwith the sealed land frontiers, that the English ambassador in Venice, SirHenry Wotton, was moved to the following judgement. 'Touching thepresent affairs of these parts, the more I consider them, the more in truth Iwonder to see this sober country grown at last wild, if not mad, with passion,and a Republic that both by their form of government, by the lasciviousnessof their youth, by the wariness of their aged men, by their long custom ofease, and distaste of arms, and consequently by their ignorance in themanagement thereof, lastly by the impossibility, or at least great difficulty,of receiving help (the avenues being stopped) should, I say, by all thesereasons abhor war, is notwithstanding, I know not how, engaged, by allappearance, in an endless quarrel or shameful conclusion. Wherein if themerit of the cause (being against a nest of thieves) do not procure help fromheaven beyond the discourse of man, I know not what will become ofthem.'39

On 30 August the Ten passed to the Senate a report from a Frenchcaptain on Ossuna's plan, in connivance with Austria and the Spanishambassador in Venice, the Marquis of Bedmar, to land troops at Malamocco,transfer them to flat-bottomed boats and attack the Piazza and the Arsenal.This had been the stuff of spies' imaginings for a hundred years but thegovernment was in a mood to take it seriously.40 Far worse was a report fromthe man who was then commander-in-chief in Friuli, Cosimo I's bastardson, Giovanni de' Medici. It did not contradict Wotton's lugubriousestimate of events.

The troops are insubordinate and their insubordination goes un-punished, he wrote, 'and you know, Most Serene Prince, that rewards andpunishments are the means by which great designs are accomplished'. Forfield operations we lack pioneers. We are short of wine, clothing and, as forsupplies, we have picks and spades without handles. As for the cavalry, ' Iam frightened by their quantity, but appalled by their quality.' The Dutchare 'ill dissatisfied and disobedient'. As for the oltramontani they are, ofcourse, 'less resolute and more suspicious than we Italians; I do not knowwhat use I shall be able to make of them'. In general, 'taking into accountthe poor spirit and less courage of our troops, the paucity and lack ofexperience of their captains', he saw little hope, certainly none of preventingyet more troops getting in to relieve Gradisca. What the army does show, headded, is a determination to do the barest minimum that will preventdismissal and 'a universal desire to enrich itself; indeed, 'the abundance of

39 Life and Letters, ed. L . P . S m i t h ( L o n d o n , 2 vols. , 1907) ii, 121 (14 Ju ly 1617).40 B a c k g r o u n d in P . N e g r i , ' L a politica veneta con t ro gli Uscocchi in relazione alia congiura di 1618 ' ,

NAV., n.s. xvii, 1 (1909) 370-84.

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money and the profuse liberality with which it is disbursed do more damagethan the archducal troops'. And morale is worsened by the absence of thetwo proveditors-general and the paymaster (all were ill). I shall resign mypost, he concluded, if - and the conditions read modestly after thesedenunciations - you do not settle quickly the new terms of service for theDutch, and send iooo pioneers and between iooo and 2000 infantry, even ifthey have to be militiamen.41

With tocsins like this sounding from the field, with a resurgence ofUscock raids in the waters between Zara and Istria, and with informationthat a Spanish fleet was advancing towards Spalato, the news that acceptablepeace terms both between Savoy and Spain and between Venice and Austriahad been arranged through French and papal intervention in Paris in earlySeptember was received with deep relief. As confirmed in Madrid on the26th the treaty provided for the cessation of hostilities, the occupation ofSenj by a German temporary military government and the appointment oftwo commissioners each by the republic and by Ferdinand to supervise thedispersal of the Uscocks and the burning of their vessels. When this wasaccomplished to the satisfaction of both sides prisoners would be exchangedand occupied territories restored.

These negotiations took a year to complete. Backed though the treaty wasby Spain, Venice felt confident enough only to order a partial demobiliz-ation. Even when, in June 1618, the last corsair vessel had been destroyed,the last prisoner and village exchanged, the war, in a sense, won, the expenseof expunging a nest of thieves and discouraging their supporters wassobering, and the concept of armed neutrality, though recognized as morenecessary than ever, had acquired an embittered and depressing quality.The Adriatic was still arguably mare nostrum, and that was really what thewar had been about. But the contrast between an almost buoyantpreparedness for war and the actual functioning of the war machine whenaccelerated for combat rather than crisis made a perturbing contribution tothat phenomenon, located somewhere between morale and money, whichhas been dubbed 'the decline of Venice'.

41 V. Joppi (ed.), Lettere storiche sulla guerra del Friuli, 1616-1617 (Udine, 1882) 23-31.

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Government: policy, control andadministration

The acuteness of the danger facing the republic in the years followingAgnadello and the unprecedented series of campaigns that occupied theyears before 1530 led to a method of running military affairs that, whiledrawing much from the past, established a pattern reused with only minormodification later in the century.

In spite of the need to make urgent decisions doges were granted noemergency powers; they remained symbols of the accumulated experienceand current purpose of the state. As such, though of the multitude of lettersaddressed to them they were allowed to open none unless in the presence oftheir councillors, a letter, or a phrase in a letter from them, was a potentsource of encouragement. Writing from his direction of the siege of Maranoin 1514, Girolamo Savorgnan referred to one of his captains, Bernardino daParma, who had been wounded. 'And because he has borne himself worthilyin this campaign I beg Your Serenity to be gracious enough to include in aletter to me a word or two of praise for him so that he will see that I havespoken well of him. And I will show this sentence to his companions, whowill derive the greatest satisfaction from it.'1 It was as a symbol that DogeLeonardo Loredan was repeatedly urged, and on two occasions reluctantlyagreed, to send his sons to share the perils of towns threatened by siege onthe mainland, and that the proposal was made in 1527 that Doge AndreaGritti himself, rather than a proveditor-general, should join the main bodyof the army 'because the King of France and the Sultan of Turkey go inperson'.2

Within the ducal palace the doges' opinions were frequently and freelychallenged in the College and Senate, and in the latter, when to resolveconflicting views they occasionally moved proposals not previously dis-cussed in the College, the voting could be close. Gritti intervened in debatesor ruled to postpone their outcome more frequently than his predecessors,

G. Savorgnan, 'Lettere sulla guerra combattuta nel Friuli dal 1510 al 1528 scritte alia Signoria diVenezia', ed. V. Joppi, ASL, n.s. iii (1855) 22.Sanuto, xliv, 159.

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Government: policy, control and administration

partly because he was a stronger character, partly because a long series ofimportant military proveditorships gave his opinions greater weight. Buteven against his forcefulness and experience the conventions binding a dogeto the status of primus inter pares held.

Yet the importance attributed to individual doges in funeral orations, thetendency of chroniclers to periodize in dogeships as though they were thereigns of sovereigns, the bleakness exuding from the phrase 'vacanteducatu' used when measures were passed between the death of one doge andthe election of his successor: a sense of reality underlay all these conventions.Constantly watched and commented on, the temperature on the politicalfever chart was read by his colleagues in terms of the doge's deportment anddemeanour. What he wore, his absences from council meetings, the state ofhis health, whether he spoke firmly or with hesitation: Sanuto recordedthese details as part of the political life of Venice. News of a military setbackwas bad enough, but the impact was worsened when, during the discussionof its implications, a doge (Loredan) was so far shaken from the stoicdecorum expected by the patrician collectivity as to leave his seat in order tourinate. How the Venetians conducted their wars is a process that can beanalysed without more than a passing reference to a doge, but it cannot beunderstood without the assumption that their omnipresence, meeting bymeeting, decision by decision, in the various council rooms of the palace inwhich they lived night and day, guarded, cosseted, unremittingly observed,was a factor affecting the tone if not the direction of affairs.

Less qualification is necessary when describing the military role of theCouncil of Ten and its supplementary zonte.

Save in the sphere of wartime diplomacy and - more important still in theeyes of contemporaries - wartime finance, the Council's military role wasnormally an extension of its constitutional brief: political security. Itmonopolized control over artillery and ammunition and the gunnery scuolebecause in the early days of expansion on the Terraferma guns could havebeen turned against the state. For similar reasons, it had acquiredresponsibility for the maintenance of certain key fortifications, especiallythose on the perimeter of the lagoon itself. But in wartime the distinctionbetween police and military functions became blurred, for, in a sense, thewhole process of holding down reoccupied territory from 1509 was asecurity operation, and in the name of public safety the Council becameoccasionally involved in matters of recruitment, the distribution of garrisontroops and the granting of leave to commanding officers and proveditorswhile at the same time habitually controlling prisons and handlingnegotiations about the freeing or exchange of important prisoners of war,sorting out the information from spies and informers and chaffering(optimistically but usually fruitlessly) with applicant assassins and with

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RectorsProved itorsMilitary governorsSenior officersSome recruiting

agentsSpies

Security orders•<

Correspondence

Council Proveditors io f 1 Execution Arsenal

Artillery(until 1588) !

College Reports Formulationof policy

iCamerlenghi i

" I Report r~ !Accountingi

v̂ 1 r, . 1 I EngineersX Proveditors Orders _ y>•> ^ ( w J Commanders* I of . • j -in-chief

[ Rectors

Liaison

- Paymasters » Collaterals

Senior militaryofficers

Electionandorders

GreatCouncil

Militia

Capitani (rectors)ProveditorsCommissaries (supply)Castellans

Figure 1. Military decision and execution: the structure of government. Note: For theextension of the interest and authority of the Council of Ten during the course of the fifteenth

century, see pp. 163 seq.

offers to blow up strongholds occupied by the enemy.3The Ten was also led into a military function through an extension of its

other role: the preservation of secrets. The Senate was afforced by so manysupplementary bodies that it contained about 200 potential sources ofsecurity leaks. The precautionary tradition had grown up, therefore, thatwhile correspondence directed to the government had three postaladdresses: the doge, the Heads of the Council of Ten and (infrequent beforethe middle of the century) the savi of the College, in all cases the secretariatintercepting them laid them before the Heads of the Ten. The Council,however, seldom used this advantage to circumvent the normal course of3 The Heads of the Ten were ordered on 17 Oct. 1509 to investigate useful poisons and on 16 Feb. 1510a

cook in Treviso was paid to poison unnamed individuals (Dieci, Misti, reg. 32, 156, 19iv). The threemen who assassinated the traitorous Antonio Savorgnan in 1512 were granted 2000 ducats (reg. 35,89-90V). On the plot to blow up the castello at Brescia, see reg. 32, 125V-126.

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policy making based on the Senate. It might withhold the names of itsinformants rather than compromise their value, or suppress informationduring proceedings against suspected traitors; very rarely it delayedhanding on crucial diplomatic or military correspondence until it hadreplied to it in a way that committed the Senate to a new shade of policy.Proposals to withhold or censor information before passing it to the Collegeor Senate were more frequently defeated than passed — and this in spite ofpleas from proveditors-general that military plans 'should not, for God'ssake, be prattled about on the Piazza'.4

So though military crisis enhanced the power and increased thediplomatic and financial business of the Council of Ten, it seldom - in spiteof the suspicions of contemporaries on the fringe of the constitutional powercentres and the convictions of later historians - did much more thancomplicate the planning and control of military affairs through Senateorders by adding the security dimension. Almost invariably, members of theTen had been senators. Their military decisions were usually made whenafforced by the College as a whole or by the Senate-appointed savi. Theyattended Senate meetings themselves. The Council was not averse towagging a schoolmasterly cane at its more numerous and often unruly fellowcouncil. In November 1509, at a meeting in its most restricted form(seventeen members, including the doge and his six councillors), it passed aresolution calling upon the Senate to conduct its business with properdecorum; senators were to listen to dispatches 'without any muttering orwhispering among themselves' and when anyone was speaking to a motion'all the others are to sit still on their benches and in no circumstances standup or wander about'.5 Later in the century there was to be a rivalry whichled to a mulcting of some of the Ten's powers by the Senate (which took overthe responsibility for artillery, for instance), but this tension cannot, save atpiazza level, be read back into the predominantly complementary role thetwo bodies played between 1509 and 1530.

The highly confidential moves that had led to the recapture of Padua inJuly 1509 were planned by the Ten and the College, but Sanuto, for all hisprejudice against the pretensions of the Ten, acknowledged that this wasdone on the authority of the Senate. Again, after the wave of treacherouscapitulations that followed the defeat at Agnadello, the Ten handled some ofthe negotiations for the engagement of new captains; it issued some of thecrucial orders that led to the Po campaign in 1510; it ordered the Lieutenantof Friuli - that land of social tensions, baronial feuds and ties with Austria -to destroy strongpoints in 1511 lest they provide footholds in the case of newinvasion from the north. An example of negotiations which were on the

4 Andrea Gritti in appendix to Priuli, iv, 456. 5 Dieci, Misti, reg. 32, 160.

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borderland between security and military action and thus concerned bothoccurred in January 1512. The Ten had for some time been in touch withAlvise Avogadro of Brescia, a member of one of the republic's most reliablemilitary families. He had offered, with a group of supporters, to overcomethe guard of one of the gates of the city (then occupied by the French) when,by prearranged signal, a large force from the Venetian army would enter andtake the place by storm. Andrea Gritti, senior proveditor with the army,had, again in conditions of great secrecy, been kept informed. Now thedecision had to be made whether to set the plot in motion, to estimate therisk to the depleted army and the possible consequences of the coup were itsuccessful. After correspondence had been revealed to the Senate on theafternoon of the 10th, the Ten and its zonta entered. The names of allpresent were taken and individual oaths of secrecy recorded. The senatorsthen debated a proposal put forward by a majority of the savi and a morecautious one moved by the doge until four hours after sunset, when thedecision to go ahead was made that led to the retaking of Brescia on 5February.6

Usually, however, mobilization, the setting of targets for recruitment, theemployment of captains of companies and general officers, the urgingforward of individual campaigns and the planning of overall strategy werethe business of the Senate as, save in circumstances of exceptional urgencyor secrecy, were the setting of diplomatic goals and the passing or amendingof draft correspondence with ambassadors. On 2 March 1509, on news of thelikelihood of war in the south, the Senate gave orders for defending theVenetian ports in Apulia. Before the open declaration of war in Lombardythe Senate, on 4 April, ordered the army to behave as though on a warfooting. The crucial debate before Agnadello as to whether the army was toseek and destroy French units beyond the Adda or adopt a defensive stanceon the frontier, took place in the Senate, as did that concerning thedisposition of the troops awaiting papal attack in Romagna. Within hours ofreceiving the news of Agnadello, it was the Senate that, speaking in tones ofundoubted authority as the government's own voice, told the rectors ofBrescia to proclaim their gratitude to its subjects who had served well andwrote to Pitigliano affirming their continued confidence in him, toProveditor-General Andrea Gritti saying that hard as the news was, it wasthe will of Fortune and 'we are undismayed and are intent on doingeverything possible to protect our interests', to the Venetian cardinals inRome saying that Divine Providence had been pleased to decree the loss ofthe republic's artillery and the scattering of its infantry, but at least the

6 What is said above about the Ten is taken from the registers of its deliberations and (from 1524, whenthe series begins) from Capi, Dieci, Lettere, Provveditori in Terraferma.

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heavy cavalry seemed safe; and which, still in the same sitting, ordered theelection of two more proveditors-general to rally what was left of the army,cheer the morale of the Terraferma and serve in camp or garrison as eventssuggested. And, vain as they turned out to be, the orders continued in thefollowing days: get the remains of the army into Verona even if its citizensresist; keep the Adige open for supplies; put garrisons into Peschiera andValeggio. It was the Senate which then overrode the army commanders andproveditors-general and insisted on Mestre as the army's base, and which inthe following months insisted on the major strategic decision not to dividethe army even at the cost of alienating those cities that called for military aid;it was the Senate that increasingly left decisions to men on the spot and thusintroduced a new flexibility into military operations.7 Indeed, all theessential outlines of Venetian military policy and practice from 1509 to theApulian campaign of 1527-8 and to the wars that followed later in theCinquecento can be grasped from the Senate records alone. Those outlines,all the same, need the shading provided by an appreciation of the Ten'ssecurity-and-secrecy role, of the smallness (in comparison with the patriciateas a whole) of the group that rotated through the key councils and the extentto which they knew one another's careers and personalities and, finally, ofthe position occupied by the College and particularly the savi.

The College met daily and, when all its members were present, was 39strong. It had no power to legislate or to take any executive action that wasnot specifically delegated to it by the Ten or the Senate. Yet its role in theformation of policy and the management of military affairs was one of crucialimportance. The first aspect arose from its responsibility for drawing up theagenda of Senate meetings, formulating specific proposals for debate afterlistening to the day's crop of letters and to the Council of Ten's latestdecisions as reported by its Heads. Though when affairs of especial delicacywere concerned they might first be interviewed privately by the Heads of theTen, it was normally to the College that returning public representativesand military leaders made their preliminary reports. It was in the Collegethat drawings and models of new fortifications were discussed before beingrecommended to the Senate. With the great 1505 wall map of Italy toconsult in the antechamber; with models to facilitate the understanding ofdispatches describing siege operations; with the records of troop numbersand movements: when the College called in heads of departments like theproveditor of artillery and the patrons of the Arsenal to discuss plans witharmy commanders and former proveditors-general, Venice could be said topossess something like a modern War Council.

The executive aspect of the College's role arose at the conclusion of the7 SS. regs. 41 and 42, passim.

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Senate meetings it had programmed. When the Senate agreed, for instance,to raise a certain number of troops, it was left to the College to engagecaptains, negotiate with the agents of condottieri, fix pay and the numbers ineach company and see that the troops arrived at their destination. Theresponsibility deputed to them could be large: iooo light cavalry, 2000 men-at-arms and 7000 infantry on 18 May 1509,6000 infantry in June 1521,8000in October 1524, in each case without further reference to the Senate.8

Occasionally - as in May 1509 - a senator expressed impatience with theneed to depute the raising of reinforcements to the College when it wouldhave been quicker to do this through proveditors in the field, andresentment could be felt when the College answered letters before referringthem to the Senate or, very rarely, decided not to implement Senateinstructions before referring back to that body, but proposals relating tomilitary affairs formulated by the College were seldom challenged and werecommonly passed in the Senate by impressively large majorities.

It was the savi who comprised the working nucleus of the College, andsupported by secretaries with bulging files of precedents and recentcorrespondence they frequently prepared Senate business while sitting ontheir own. By tradition, those ai ordeni were younger than the others andwere primarily concerned with naval and overseas commercial matters. Butin wartime the emphasis on youth was dropped. Though they could still beasked to leave when the College was discussing matters of particular gravity,and it was they who were sent on mainly ceremonial or precautionaryerrands like escorting a new general officer to the army or accompanying anarmy pay-roll, with naval predominating over commercial affairs and withthe emphasis on amphibious operations among the Lombard river systemsat the beginning of the period and along the Apulian coast at its close, theposition of savio ai ordeni was too important to be seen as an observation postwhence youths of good family could learn about the machinery ofgovernment; it was filled, as was that of savio of the Council and of theTerraferma, by older men, and increasingly from members of the Senateitself.

The savi of the Terraferma, as responsible for all matters relating to waron land, were senators, most of whom had held positions of responsibility asambassadors, capitani of major cities, proveditors or Heads of the Ten. Likethe other savi they served for six months but, after the normal six-month'quarantine' period, they were more frequently re-elected; they might,moreover, be kept in the College after the end of their term of office, thoughwithout voting rights. As the engagers of troops on behalf of the College, oneof them (the senior for the time being) was often sent into the field to be

SS. reg. 41, 180; reg. 48, 194; Sanuto, xxxvii, 47.

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present when troops were mustered and paid and decisions made as to thecashiering of the delinquent or unfit, and to deal with civilian complaintsabout the depredations of troops. The savi of the Council, though chieflyconcerned with the drafting of diplomatic correspondence, commonlyassociated themselves with military proposals put up by the savi of theTerraferma and one or two of them could be sent out to mollify an offendedcommander or add additional weight to a council of war in the field. FromFebruary 1509, to help the College keep abreast of'matters of such numberand importance that occur in this time of emergency every day and hour',9 azonta of three additional savi of the Council was to be elected for threemonths, and the device was repeated at moments of special crisis until 1529.Similarly, while in peacetime the savi of the Terraferma balloted amongthemselves each three months to choose one who, as savio cassier, wouldhave the oversight of the income due to the state, it was first proposed inApril 1509 that' as the savi of the Terraferma do not have time, because it isnecessary that they attend the College assiduously to look after matters thatoccur hour by hour in our territories',10 a cassier should be elected from theSenate for three months for this purpose; and then, on the same day, thedecision was made to appoint in addition two proveditors of war finance(sopra i denari di la guerra) at six-month intervals to make sure that thebolting crop of new taxes was safely harvested and applied to warexpenditure.11

The failure of this system of moving the chief responsibility for militaryaccounting away from the College and into the office of the camerlenghi decommun was recognized on 26 May 1528 when the Senate acknowledged thatboth the accounts of cash due to the army and of payments earmarked formilitary expenditure from Venice itself and from local earnere had for manyyears been in such arrears and confusion that no balance could be struck.Noting that 'this responsibility expressly belongs to our savi of theTerraferma', it was decreed that in future records of all payments made totroops at home and abroad and of all accounts against which these weredebited were to be overseen in the first instance by a savio of the Terrafermawho was to be known as the savio alia scrittura. After he, helped by a book-keeper appointed to assist him, had entered them in a journal from which amonthly balance could be extracted, they were to be returned to theproveditors sopra le camere who were responsible for recording payments toand income from Venetian territories as a whole. The savio alia scrittura was

9 ST. reg. 16, 80.10 Ibid., 97. Andrea da Mosto, Archivio di Stato, says (i, 117) that this position had lapsed and was

restored only in 1526, but it is mentioned in 1523, 1524 and 1525: Sanuto, xxxiv, 95, 285; xxxvii, 341;xl, 16.

11 Sanuto, viii, 64-5; ST. reg. 17, 7 (4 Apr. 1510).

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to be chosen by ballot in the College, would serve for two months and duringthis period would be released from the normal rotating responsibility toprepare College business. Refusal to accept this office would lead toforfeiture of his place as savio.12 While neither the hoped-for orderliness ofaccounting, let alone the striking of accurate military balances evermaterialized, henceforward, and until the end of the War of Gradisca, warexpenditure was scrutinized and reported on by a savio alia scritturaP

The military role of the Great Council, which had a membership of about2500, can be dismissed summarily. The volume of business it conductedscarcely varied between years of war and peace. Always an electoral ratherthan a policy-making body, it had no hand in the selection of patricians forthe extra positions required in wartime, the proveditors and paymasterswith the army, who were chosen by the Senate, as were all the savi. Senatorstended to bend the electoral laws when appointing castellans and rectors inthe interest of speed and of obtaining the candidates they thought mosttrustworthy, and from time to time the Great Council effectively protestedagainst this oligarchical tendency,14 but erosions of function of this sort werepartly compensated for by the state's desperate need for ready money whichup to 1517 and again after 1521 opened places in the Senate and its zonta inreturn for cash to younger, less influential or less-experienced men thancould normally have hoped for this honour. This in turn led to a decrease inthe overall political 'weight' of the Senate at a time when the Ten was bothgrowing in size through its zonte and increasingly distrustful of the Senate'sability to keep state secrets. A parallel phenomenon was an enhancedconcentration of power in the hands of a restricted number of seniorpatricians. The appointment of older men as savi ai ordeni contributed tothis. So did the frequency with which the savi attended meetings of the Ten,the use of the Ten's zonta to provide a niche for a retiring member of theCouncil before he was re-eligible for election, the possibility of simul-taneously being of the zonta and in the College, the occasional appointmentof a zonta to the College. However, the changed relationship between Senateand Ten, and the difficulty 'new' men found in penetrating the circulatorysystem comprising Ten, Signoria (the doge, his six councillors and the threeheads of the Quarantia Criminal) and College are of more interest to thestudent of Venetian families and the constitution than to the historian ofwar. The planning and execution of campaigns were not held up by inter-body resentments. Old men may have been more cautious than their juniors,

12 ST. reg. 25, 34V-36V.13 The bulky records of this office are as yet (with unimportant exceptions) unarranged, and are not

available for consultation.14 For examples from 1510 and 1529, ST. reg. 17, 35V-36 and Sanuto, 1, 92.

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but both seniority and caution had long been characteristic of Venice'sconduct of affairs and were hardly inappropriate at a time when thebehaviour of armies, let alone the outcome of battles, was so difficult tocalculate.

No change occurred in the War of 1537-40 in the balance of decisionmaking between Ten and Senate, and only one procedural innovation wasmade with an eye to rationalizing procedures in the College. The specialresponsibility of each of the five savi ai ordeni was defined: one was to bechiefly responsible 'al'armar', that is for the equipment and crewing ofgalleys as they were prepared for service; one for Arsenal affairs; one for theAdriatic bases; one for those in the third and fourth zones; one for theprovisioning of the fleet, and especially for the supply of its staple diet,ship's biscuit.15 But if the running of the war proceeded on the familiar linesit was with a novel tetchiness. Renewed enjoyment of and profit from theTerraferma had produced a strong body of opinion that the empire da Marwas not worth defending through a costly war. Co-operation with the alliesof the Holy League was complicated by a fairly general distrust of them aswell as by the existence of widely shared pro-French inclinations. Theleaking of state secrets through secretaries of the Ten and Senate to thesultan via French agents, though not confirmed until inquisitorial investi-gations in 1542,16 led to a series of unexplained breakdowns in negotiationsthat in turn produced a mood of mutual suspicion between the two bodies.Finally, there were long pauses between bouts of military and naval activity,cold-war strains, as it were, that surfaced in a number of guises.

During the previous wars, and in 1537-8, the right of the savi ai ordinito introduce proposals relating to expenditure on the empire da Mar hadbeen established. In March 1539, at the start of a campaigning seasondirected entirely to that empire, the right was challenged before beingpassed by an unimpressive majority (110:54:0).I7 Later in the same monththe College was convicted by the Senate in an acclaimed vote of censure(119:9:3) of being irresponsible and careless in its choice of captains:henceforward they were to appoint only men who on reliable evidence hadcommanded at least 100 infantry in wartime or had acted as lieutenants tocolonels.18 In May the College confessed that it had not yet raised the 1000troops for Dalmatia-Albania which the Senate had ordered on 12 March.On 6 June, in a seldom-precedented move, the Council of Ten cancelled aSenate order of 31 May for the discharge from Dalmatia of three companies

15 Collegio, Notatorio, reg. 23, i n (11 Oct. 1537).16 See above, 231 n. 14.17 SM. reg. 25, 12V (11 Mar.).18 Ibid., 23V-24 (29 Mar.).

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of Italian light cavalry.19 It is indeed a tribute to the effectiveness of theprocedures and responsibilities worked out during the previous century thatthey were not challenged more radically in conducting a conflict sounpopular and so lacking in moments of pride and success.

The only new government agency set up to handle military affairs on landin the generation of peace that followed was the magistracy of the twoproveditors of fortifications, set up by the Senate in 1542.20 In 1545 a collegiosopra la militia da mar was established.21 This followed the decision to have afleet of 100 light galleys in a state of permanent readiness. It comprisedrepresentatives of all existing bodies concerned with the Arsenal -proveditors of the Arsenal, of artillery, of manning and equipping{provveditori aTarmar) and of provisioning (provveditori sopra i biscotti) - aswell as sixteen patricians who had commanded war galleys and four newproveditors each with special responsibility for the overall condition of 25galleys. But it contained no one responsible for the professional infantryshipped to reinforce the marines in time of war.

The College remained the organ of state responsible, under Senatecontrol, for hiring, firing and allocating troops to garrisons, to police dutiesand to the fleet. And within the College the savi of the Terraferma remainedthe effective managers of military affairs on the mainland, though they werenormally careful to associate their colleagues del consiglio with them whenpresenting the Senate with controversial or potentially costly issues. Amongthe savi of the Terraferma election determined an order of responsibility.The one who secured the most votes was co-ordinator of the republic'sfinances as a whole; next came the savio alia scrittura; after him came thesavio responsible for the militia, and it was usually he who was also deputedto attend general musters of cavalry.

While normally content to leave the day-to-day administration of militaryaffairs in the College's hands, the Senate did at times resent its constantpersonal contact with captains and condottieri and their agents. Such amoment came in 1552, when the College was negotiating for a successor tothe Duke of Urbino as governor-general, and negotiating, it was thought,too freely. We, the Senate declared, license negotiations and confirm them;the College was acting 'against the authority and dignity of this council,which is the directing body of the state {principal capo del governo delStato)\22 Another came in 1557, when the Senate reaffirmed the College's

19 Dieci, Comune , reg. 13, 25V (6 June) .20 J . R. Hale , ' T h e first fifty years of a Venetian magistracy: the Provveditori alle For tezze ' , in

Renaissance: Studies in Honor of Hans Baron, ed. A. Molho and J. A. Tedeschi (Florence, 1971)501-29.

21 SM. reg. 28, 61-2V.22 SS. reg. 68, 71V-72 (20 Oct.).

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powerlessness to make appointments without specific licence.23 Since anearlier refusal in 1536 of the Council of Ten to trust the Senate with plansfor the defences of the lagoon, relations between the two bodies hadimproved, the Council continuing to manage the works, but no longer insecret, and intervening in garrison affairs only when matters of security wereinvolved, and when feuds among the units guarding a city appeared toimperil it.24

The Council's role acquires a particular interest in the War of 1570-3when, if only in 1572 and in one theatre of the war, it directly managedprolonged military operations for the first and last time in the Cinquecento.

Up to then all troop contracts were as usual negotiated, with Senateassent, by the College, and military strategy remained firmly in senatorialhands. The Ten continued, in conjunction with the College, to concernitself with the defences of the lagoon, and with its familiar security role:investigating public representatives charged with cowardice, treachery orpeculation at the expense of troops or the fisc,25 investigating (at the Senate'ssuggestion) the causes of the loss of Cyprus,26 instructing galley com-manders after Lepanto to see that all important Turkish prisoners, armyofficers, naval captains, bosuns and master craftsmen were 'killed inwhatever secret and discreet manner you see fit to use'.27

Once again, the Ten conducted diplomatic negotiations it judged toodelicate to share with the Senate. This body was, however, informed aboutthem when ignorance might confuse its own day-to-day running of militaryaffairs. Thus, early in 1571, the Lieutenant of Friuli wrote urgently to begreinforcements because of rumours that Turkish troops were assembling foran invasion of the Patria. The Ten were then negotiating with the ArchdukeCharles of Austria to block the eastern passes with troops of his own butinformed the Senate, which was thus able to cite the negotiation in itsreply.28 The most important negotiations of all, however, were those which,in the teeth of Venice's protestations of loyalty to its allies, were pursuedwhile the fleets sailed and clashed inconclusively with the Turkish armada inthe autumn of 1572, dispersed to base in the winter and planned a third andeven larger mobilization for the coming spring,29 and which brought aboutthe separate peace of March 1573, ratified by a Senate which had been kept

23 S S . reg. 70, 64 and 66v.24 E.g. D i e d , C o m u n e , reg. 13, 126 (28 Feb . 1540 - ref. Brescia).25 E.g. ibid., reg. 29,190V-191 (11 Dec . 1570), Dieci , Criminal , reg. 1570,91 (15 Dec.) and S T . reg. 48,

126V-127 (9 Aug. 1571).26 S S . reg. 78 , 21 ; Dieci , Secreta, reg. 9, 196V (4 Dec . 1571).27 Quoted by P. Molmenti, 'Sebastiano Veniero', 33-4. For further evidence of Venice's awareness of

the Turks' resilience, Annali, 1571, 270 (22 Nov.).28 ST. reg. 48,74V (24 Jan.); SS. reg. 77,73V-74 (13 Mar.); Dieci, Secreta, reg. 9,132V-136 (7-12 Feb.).29 Commemoriali, 23, 193-4V.

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in ignorance of its terms and timing if not altogether of its drift.Though the Senate continued to direct the fleet and the prosecution of

the war in the third zone, activity in the second (chiefly the ousting of theTurks from the forts they had built in the territory of Cattaro, andsafeguarding its access to the sea) was taken over by the Ten. Each bodyused the College as its executive arm and the savi were not ordered to'reserve' information in this context when they moved across to take theirseats in the Senate, if they judged it necessary to reveal it there. Thesituation in Dalmatia came to justify the Ten's intervention: slackproveditors, dubiously trustworthy castellans, peccant captains, the need tofoster paramilitary activities, the organizing of fifth columns in Turkishgarrison towns, negotiations with volunteer captains of chameleon-likepolitical (and doctrinal) loyalties. Areas where military activity was closelyconnected with the status and affected by the loyalty of Venetian subjectstraditionally came within the Ten's competence. It was, all the same, whollyunusual - even with the blurring of security/military functions on theTerraferma after Agnadello in mind - for that council to take so dominant arole in the supervision of military operations as to separate what happened inone theatre, Dalmatia-Albania, from the concurrent flow of hostilities inanother, the Ionian and Cretan seas.

The Ten's supervision, moreover, included the planning, from De-cember 1571, of the largest military operation carried out in the followingyear, the amphibious attack on Castelnovo in May-June with 5000 infantrycommanded by Sciarra Martinengo and with transport and naval supportunder Sebastiano Venier: twelve great and ten light galleys. While anoperation of this size could not be kept secret once troops started assemblingat Chioggia and on the Lido and preparations were put under way in theArsenal, the strategy of the attack, the contracting for soldiers and thedispatches arranging co-operation with the authorities in Dalmatia and theofficers of the naval patrols in the Adriatic - all these were handled by theCollege. This was by then a thoroughly homogeneous body, the Senatehaving shortened in 1570 the period during which the savi of the Counciland the Terraferma were ineligible for re-election to three months ' so thatin this crucially important time of war the College can benefit as fully aspossible from men of experience in affairs of state'.30 The College workedwith the Ten through its Heads, and, necessarily, with the doge and hiscouncillors; not a small group, all told, but a more compact one than therepublic had used for an operation of this sort hitherto. When the Senate, atan advanced stage in its planning, was informed, there was no criticism, butthe attack's failure may help to explain why so much directing power wasnever sought by the Ten again.

30 ST. reg. 48, 58V (24 Nov.).

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After the war, policy-making and administrative links between thegovernment and its standing armed forces remained unchanged save in oneimportant respect. Reflecting widespread criticism of the power andcompetence of the Council of Ten, that body on n October 1588 handedover its responsibility for all matters relating to artillery to the Senate,' doubts having arisen as to whether the election of the provveditor sopra leartiglierie should be made by this council, as it had been up to the present';31

the voting was twelve to three in favour of the transfer. On 29 October theSenate spelled out the consequences.32 A motion to transfer the powers ofthe proveditor to the proveditors of fortresses was not passed. Instead theSenate resolved to elect one of its own members to serve for a year.Appointments of salaried gunners, which had been made by the proveditorand the Heads of the Ten who had immediately retired from that office, wereto be made by the proveditor and by the proveditors of the Arsenal (whowere also appointed by the Senate). Contracts for purchases of saltpetre andother supplies were to be dealt with by the proveditor in conjunction withthe College and subject to confirmation by the Senate. Appointments toposts in munition stores and armouries were to be made by the College, theproveditor, however, being present and entitled to vote. This legislation wasconfirmed by the Great Council on the following day.33 In November 1589,' having seen from experience how important and burdensome are the dutiesof the proveditor of artillery',34 the Senate decided that henceforward therewould be three and to this, too, the Great Council assented.35 From 1602they were helped by the expert advice and frequent inspections and reportsof Ferrante de' Rossi, appointed general of artillery in that year in successionto Leonardo Rossetti of Verona and reappointed in 1610.36 Control over thefortifications in the lagoon had already passed gradually to the Senate, andthe Ten was left only with the maintenance of its own armoury and thesupervision of the arquebus and other competitions which had, because ofthe crowds they drew, a public-security aspect. To bring responsibility forfortresses, the Arsenal and artillery together was clearly a useful rationaliz-ation. It also brought the Senate prestige, as the proveditorship was a highlyhonoured one, sought after, indeed, by procurators and ex-ambassadors.Every detail of running an army and conducting a war was now in the handsof the Senate.

On 11 August 1615 the Senate led the republic into a war designed tocheck Uscock piracy once and for all.37

Died, Comune, reg. 40, 19.2 ST. reg. 58, 142-142V.

Surianus, 28.ST. reg. 50, IOOV-IOIV (21 Nov.).Surianus, 2iv.

16 SS. reg. 95, i8v and 97V (20 June 1602 and 17 Feb. 1603); reg. 100, 133-133V (18 June 1610).See above, 241.

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The Council of Ten had become a shadow of its former self. Itcoordinated the information from spies engaged by proveditors andemployed spies and informers of its own. It checked the reliability ofcaptains and feudatories and kept proveditors informed as to any treasonthought to be hatching. But it no longer invoked security as a reason forsupervising self-defence preparations along the politically sensitive frontiersof the Terraferma: the arming of subjects on an unprecedentedly liberalscale was entrusted entirely to the Senate. It was the Ten, as formerly, thatdecided to lift sentences of banishment, thus inviting back men whoseviolence could be put to productive use in the army.38 But the applicationsfor safe-conduct were handled through the Senate, who appointed firstseven, then fourteen patricians39 to sift and decide on them. The Councilstill edited the information it passed to the College or, more frequently,imposed oaths of secrecy (with the assent of the doge) on its members if thematter were too sensitive or too alarming to be noised indiscriminatelyabroad.40 But information with a possible military bearing was neverwithheld for long. Thus on 30 August the Ten passed to the Senate a reportfrom a French captain on the Duke of Ossuna's plan, in connivance withAustria and the Spanish ambassador in Venice, the Marquis of Bedmar, toland troops at Malamocco, transfer them to flat-bottomed boats and attackthe Piazza and the Arsenal.41 Such unconfirmed and alarmist materialwould not, during the wars of the previous century, have been passed onbefore its validity had been confirmed or disproved. Nor, during the War ofGradisca, did the Ten conduct any 'secret' diplomacy of any significance.And with loss of its control over artillery and the less formal desuetude of itscontrol over the fortifications of the lagoon, the Council's role in the conductof strictly military affairs was insignificant.

The Senate repeatedly reminded proveditors that, as the men on the spot,'theirs' was the responsibility for deciding how the campaign was to befought. On the other hand the Senate controlled the liaison between fleetunits and the army, had a clearer view of the interaction between events inFriuli and Istria, raised and supplied the armies, balanced the needs of theTerraferma towns and frontiers against the demands for reinforcements onthe Gradisca front. A copious flood of information reached it through theCollege: dispatches from proveditors often enclosing the written opinionsproduced by capi di guerra and careful drawings of fortresses to be taken ornewly occupied,42 letters from minor public representatives and individual

Died, Secreta, reg. 15, 129V-130 (30 Nov. 1615).ST. reg. 85, 290-290V (20 Feb. 1616); reg. 86, 46V (24 Apr. 1616).

[0 On 11 Jan. 1617 (G. Cozzi, II doge Nicolo Contarini (Venice-Rome, 1958) 154).Calendar of State Papers, Venetian, 1615—ij, 590.E.g. in Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 52 (29 Apr. 1616).

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captains.43 The richness of this information, coupled with control of overallstrategy - helped by the non-voting presence of ex-proveditors44 - led to auniquely formidable volume of orders being transmitted by a body whichhad never before met so frequently nor transacted so much business. Thesupplying magistracies - fortresses, artillery, Arsenal, biave (grain supply) -were also more closely controlled than in previous wars, as were theexecutive actions of the College. Indeed, the most wasteful and militarilysluggish of Venice's wars was directed by an administration which had neverbeen so effectively centralized.

The most important points of contact between the government and itsarmies continued to be the men who, elected by the Senate, staffed a systemwhich provided a public representative for every place of strategic concernand a civilian shadow to every command: proveditors-general correspond-ing to captain- and governor-general, proveditors of stradiots and lightcavalry to their professional chiefs, the proveditor of artillery to the captainof artillery, capitani to the governatori of garrisons, patrician paymaster(pagador) to the collateral-general. It was roundly condemned by non-Venetians (Machiavelli being particularly astringent)45 as imposing acounter-productive interference with the freedom of action of professionalsoldiers. Yet an overwhelming reliance on mercenary troops did call for ameasure of constant political and financial control. Furthermore, though itwas modified and elaborated in the generation after Agnadello, the systemalready had the vitality of instinct, as a rapid glance at the events of 1509 willshow.46

In January, bearing in mind the running out of the precarious truce of theprevious summer with Maximilian, Alviano drew attention to the poorlydefended passes leading down from Germany towards Feltre, Cadore andCividale di Belluno and into Friuli. Two proveditors were elected to inspectthem and see to their fortification. In February a proveditor was sent toCremona to see to defence preparations on the western frontier, and inMarch, while the army was being built up from its winter nucleus, AndreaGritti and Zorzi Corner were elected proveditors-general in Lombardy toliaise with the commanders of infantry and men-at-arms, and GiustinianMorosini was appointed proveditor of light cavalry. Early in April ZuanDiedo was sent as proveditor with the army in Romagna, and a few dayslater a proveditor was dispatched to Pizzighettone, which was seen as an

43 E.g. the long series from Teodoro Trivulzio in Capi di Guerra, Ba . s-v.44 E.g. that of the former Proveditor-General in Dalmatia Lorenzo Venier (ST. reg. 85, 242; 14 Jan.

1616).45 Discorsi, bk 2, c. 33. H e also condemned the similar practice of Florence.46 W h a t follows is taken from S T . reg. 16; S S . reg. 4 1 ; Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1500-13; and

Sanu to , vii and viii.

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early objective in any thrust from France. His instructions give a fairexample of the duties of all proveditors appointed to individual towns. Hewas to take over from the rector (the podesta: there was no capitano atPizzighettone) in all matters relating to troops, munitions and militaryinformation. Supervision of the fortifications had already been deputed to alocal military expert, Alvise Avogadro, and henceforward he was to beresponsible to the proveditor. Any military news was to be sent in triplicateto Venice, the proveditors-general and the patrician team — rectors andproveditor - in Cremona. By 14 May further proveditors had been sent toBergamo, Crema, Valeggio and Peschiera, and to Rimini. News ofAgnadello led to the election of proveditors-general for Brescia, Verona,Vicenza and Padua. By this time, adding the names of men who hadremained en poste since the previous year, Venice had 37 proveditors spacedacross the Terraferma from Cremona to Fiume, and in Romagna from Russito Rimini. By the time the army had fallen back to Mestre in early June, 16of them were prisoners of the occupying forces.

For the rest of the year the system reflected every relaxation of enemypressure and every initiative taken by Venice. The immediate hinterlandwas secured by proveditors at Mestre, Grado and Motta. Venetian controlin Friuli was signalled by the election of a proveditor-general, proveditorsfor Cividale and Butistagno and a proveditor of stradiots in Istria, andproveditors were sent to Legnago, Monselice, Feltre and Vicenza as soon astheir reoccupation seemed reasonably secure. Padua, once retaken, wasgoverned by three proveditors-general, each on duty for successive eight-hour watches, and the Proveditor-General in Treviso was supplemented bya proveditor with special responsibility for arming and training peasantvolunteers from the Trevisano. During the licensed pillaging of thePolesine, four proveditors were based on Stra to control shipping on theBrenta and prevent damage to Venetian subjects and property, and thecaptain of the fleet in the Po had a proveditor-general to assist in amphibiousoperations against the Ferrarese. The emotional as well as the strategicsignificance of the move against Vicenza in November was symbolized bythe presence with the army of no fewer than five proveditors-general, threeto return to Padua and one to Treviso, and one to remain in Vicenza.

The term' proveditor' was not restricted to temporary appointments or astate of emergency. Proveditors, appointed one after another in peace andwar alike, were responsible for the city's grain supply and supervised themaking and allocation of artillery. The Arsenal was run by proveditors inassociation with 'patrons'. The men appointed to survey frontiers andreport on boundary disputes were called proveditors. Before the setting upof the proveditors of fortifications as a standing magistracy in 1542, newdefences were administered by ad hoc proveditors who were responsible for

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seeing that plans and models were followed accurately, for recruiting a workforce, obtaining wood, tools and other supplies from the Arsenal, keepingthe accounts and, as necessary, razing houses outside the walls that wouldinterfere with a clear field of fire. The functions of the military proveditorssent to single sites varied according to their place and size. In frontier fortslike Anfo, where the population was minute and the only Venetianrepresentative was a castellan, the proveditor's duty was to recruit spies andorganize an information service, to enlist a local militia and to stiffen themorale - a function common to all proveditors - of the garrison. In townslike Vicenza, where there were already a capitano, a podesta, a chamberlainand a castellan, his job was partly to relieve them of the extra administrativework caused by the billeting and feeding of troops and refugees from thecountryside and the strengthening of fortifications, partly to act as thegovernment's spokesman in any parley with an enemy force. He also tookover responsibility for internal security from the podesta and became theorganizer of the information service connecting his immediate territory withthe government and the army proveditors. While the other representativesreturned to Venice as their normal terms of office ran out, he remained untilmatters were judged stable enough for his recall. He was, in effect, the actinggovernor-general of the town and its hinterland and at times (though only inApulia) was given the title governatore, a word with almost exclusivelymilitary connotations. On occasion supernumerary proveditors wereelected, as when in 1510 four patricians, each with 50 infantry, were sent tohelp the proveditor of Legnago prepare to resist the siege its strategicposition invited. All five proveditors, the government piously hoped, wouldwork in complete harmony to administer and defend the town.47

Enhanced political authority, morale-raising, an information network:these objectives could not be achieved through the towns alone if the wholearea subject to Venetian control were to be placed on an effective warfooting. So between the static, single-site proveditors and those who movedabout with the armies, there were proveditors of zones, zones that wereeither actual theatres of war, like the Polesine in 1510,48 or were in need ofreorganization when armies had, after recent occupation, moved away fromthem, like the Bresciano in 1512 and 1524.49 In 1513 a Proveditor of theAdige was appointed to supervise the area across which the army was fallingback towards Padua and Treviso.50 In 1526 a Proveditor 'this side of the

47 Collegio, Commiss ion i Secrete , 1500-13 ,98V-99 . Both the T e n and the Senate emphasized to rectorstheir subord ina t ion in mili tary mat ters to provedi tors : e.g. Dieci , Mist i , reg. 32, 100 (12 May 1509)and S S . reg. 4 3 , 152 (11 N o v . 1510).

48 S S . reg. 4 3 , 29V-30.49 S S . reg. 45 , i2v ; reg. 50, 6 1 .50 Sa n u t o , xvi, 350.

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Mincio' was to prepare against the descent of the German army which, inthe following year, was to put Rome to the sack.51

Of the grades of proveditor deputed to accompany the republic's army,those attached to the Italian light cavalry and the stradiots played the moststraightforward military role. The light cavalry's role in raiding, cuttingcommunications and assisting local militia forces in the taking of isolatedenemy positions meant that they were on the move for months at a timewithout a specific headquarters. Their proveditors perforce spent their daysin the saddle and fought on more or less equal terms with the men in theircharge. Control of the light cavalry and stradiots was on occasion vested in asingle proveditor. But because the stradiots did not combine readily withother cavalry, it was more usual to have one proveditor for the Italians andanother for the stradiots. And because the professionals paid as captains ofall the stradiots found it difficult to exact obedience from captains ofindividual companies, the proveditor of stradiots was often in practice theeffective commander himself; in 1515 the company officers actuallypetitioned to serve under a proveditor rather than under the captain ofstradiots, the imperious veteran Mercurio Bua.52

The highest grade was that of Proveditor-General in Terraferma. Hispost - frequently with a colleague of equal status - was with the main bodyof the army, in daily contact with Venice's senior officers and an essentialvoice in any council of war. When the army was split, or a substantialportion of it was in action far from headquarters, a subordinate grade, that ofproveditor in the field, was invoked, so that both the proveditors-generaland the government could be kept in touch with the fortunes of the smallerbody. Elections were made to a third grade, that of executive proveditor, orunder-proveditor, when the proveditors-general found it necessary todepute part of their work locally.

The proposal to elect two ' provveditori executori nel exercito' in 1510said that it was put forward because the duties of the proveditors-generalwere 'so many and so laborious, keeping them in a continuous state ofmovement and agitation both in body and mind'.53 A glance at whatthese duties were will show that this was in no sense an exaggeration.Quite apart from their military role, indeed, they were expected to dis-charge functions that in Venice would have been divided among a widerange of councils and magistrates. They had to detect traitors amongVenetian subjects and have them sent to the Council of Ten for inter-rogation. They had to trace and execute deserters. When the army freed

SS. reg. 24, 126V.Sanuto, xx, 49-54.ST. reg. 17, 14V.

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previously occupied territory it was their job to see that the process ofresettlement (problems arising from expropriations, war damage, foodshortages and the like) was carried out in a way satisfying both to the localinhabitants and to the republic. Acting again for the Council of Ten, theywere to use secret agents in an attempt to bribe the commanders of townsoccupied by the enemy, as in the case of Verona in 1510 or of Brindisi in1528. On behalf of the Senate they could be seconded to allied armies tokeep them up to the mark. Thus hardly had Julius II successfully forcedthrough the winter siege of Mirandola in January 1511 than Proveditor-General Capello was sent to remind him (of all people) that 'in rebus bellicisit is imperatively necessary to use speed and not grant the enemy a breathingspace'.54 In later campaigns, when Venetian armies were co-operating as aminority with the French, this ambassadorial role was recognized in arevised title: proveditor-general and orator.55 And among the flood ofcorrespondence reaching the proveditors-general were copies of orders sentto their colleagues in other theatres of war, instructions to oratori with allies,translations of intercepted letters that might be relevant and, every now andthen, copies of the 'newsletter' dispatches sent to ambassadors containingsummaries of recent events — summaries which relied heavily on the reportsof the proveditors-general themselves. The number of letters arriving atheadquarters, marked, in ascending order of confidentiality, 'legatus solus','solus, solus' or 'solus, solus, solus', emphasized the political responsibilityof men whose expressions of opinions in war councils had to reflect Venice'srelationship with its subject territories, with its allies of the moment andwith any plans to promote a major shift on the diplomatic front.

As crucial as their political responsibilities, and more onerous, were theproveditor-generals' administrative duties. Their job of assuring that thearmy had enough to eat involved them in administrative procedures of greatcomplexity if the use of compulsory purchase powers, price fixing andtransport requisition orders were not to alienate populations which hadalready learned how to exchange one master for another. The job of assuringthat the troops got their pay was even more urgent, 'money' as a Senatepreamble banally put it in 1512, 'being the most important thing in time ofwar, because without that one is without troops'.56 Proveditors-generallearned the other side to their arguments as senators in favour of playing fortime before sending payments due to the army: the cost of endless bickering,desertion and, very occasionally, downright mutiny. In 1524 Piero da Ca'Pesaro refused to take up his appointment as proveditor-general unless he

54 SS. reg. 43, 174.55 E.g. Vitale, 'L'impresa di Puglia', 333-4.56 ST. reg. 18, 52V.

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could bring enough money to make him acceptable to the army.57 Theirenergies might also be absorbed by efforts to heal the quarrels between therepublic's captains. Squabbles arising from billeting or claims to prisonerscould lead to defiant non-co-operation at the highest levels of the command.' Do your utmost to keep all our captains in concord and amity, making everyattempt to urge them to work harmoniously together.'58 This plea to theproveditors-general in 1519 was to be repeated year after year.

Their duties were, indeed, wide and grave enough to make these postsamong the most honorific - and dreaded - of those available to seniorpatricians. The sort of previous experience expected of proveditors is shownin nomination lists. Among the eight nominees in 1512 for a proveditor-general in the field were three men who had already served in that capacityand, unusually, a former proveditor of the fleet; the others had been a Headof the Ten, a savio of the Terraferma, a savio of the Council (two). Out offifteen names put forward for the same position later in that year, five hadbeen proveditors-general and one a Proveditor in Feltre; another had heldthe important captaincy of Padua. It was thus unusual for seniorproveditorships to go to men younger than 60, and many were in their 70s, afew in their 80s.

The length of service was seldom spelled out. Two years was not anuncommon term, and repeated reappointment to the same or a similar postmeant that a man's family and business life could be interrupted for longperiods. Andrea Gritti's success in the field had led to seven years' almostconstant employment as proveditor and proveditor-general before hiscapture by the French at Brescia in 1512. Venetian patricians were oftenmocked for their awkwardness on horseback (unrealistically, given the sizeof their mainland estates) but, riding with his personal servants, hissecretary, a notary or book-keeper from the Chancery, his two couriers andhis personal guard of from twelve to twenty-five halberdiers under aninfantry captain, the proveditor-general was in no sense a comic figure, andthe armour in his baggage was meant to be worn.

There were many who refused office. The excuses offered included: Ihave gout and, in any case, I always bring bad fortune; my brother is alreadyserving in a similar capacity (Proveditor-General in Lombardy) and that isagainst the law; I have already been elected to an embassy in Rome; I have apain in my back, and it is not a post for which I am at all suited; I havechronic nosebleed and no experience in arms; I am a man of peace, not ofwar; I have no military competence and get headaches whenever I stay in thesun; the tongue is my weapon, not the sword; I am a member of the Ten; I

57 Sanuto, xxxv, 431.58 SS. reg. 42, 119 and 135V.

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am 75 years old. They were numerous enough to provoke another tighteningof the refusal regulations with the renewed darkening of the political scenein 1526. 'The exigencies of the present situation are such that those to beelected as proveditor or under any other title thought by the Senate to be forthe advantage and security of our army should go to serve the state at onceand without delay'; and there followed a resume of existing legislation.Election to military posts could not be refused on the grounds of the currentoccupation of any other office whatsoever; the rules forbidding more thanone member of a family to occupy similar posts were suspended; only oneday was allowed before making a decision; if it were to refuse, the penaltywas immediate dismissal from any office already held and exile 'de la delQuarner' for six months. Any appeal on grounds of age or infirmity had tobe supported by a five-sixths majority in the Senate.59

There were also charges of cowardice or dereliction of duty broughtagainst some who accepted office. On the whole, however, the positive sideof the evidence predominates. When a Vicentine spokesman congratulatedGritti on his election as doge he referred to the way in which, from totalignorance of military affairs, ' he had in a short time become more expertthan anyone else'. Remarks of this sort were not mere flattery. In 1510,when the captain-general was ill and his deputy, Lucio Malvezzi, was ofdubious popularity, Gritti was instructed to take the high command into hisown hands if he judged it appropriate.60 During the search for a newgovernor-general that followed, Gritti was twice proposed as more suitable(in part, it is true, for political reasons) than any professional candidate.61 InOctober 1521 he led the advance guard while the governor-general,Teodoro Trivulzio, brought up the rear.62 In 1513, attempting to rally themen around him, Proveditor-General Andrea Loredan seized a banner froma light cavalryman but almost at once received two wounds and was takenprisoner. After the battle, two Spaniards asked who he was. Given theanswer 'one of the Venetian proveditors', they replied, 'have at him, then'and struck him dead; it was remarked in Venice when the body, with itswounds upon it, was brought from Vicenza, that it did not stink and that hehad died 'as a true patrician'.63 Again, Alviano praised Proveditor-General Contarini for behaving more like a professional captain than agovernment agent at Marignano.64 In spite of the accusations levelled atCristoforo Moro, he was praised on his death at the age of 75 in 1518 as

59 Sanuto, xliv, 143-50.60 SS. reg. 42, 119.6J Sanuto, x, 170, 222, 336-7.62 Ibid., xxxii, 25.63 Ibid., xvii, 178, 181.64 Ibid., xxi, 102.

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having been 'accepted by soldiers as one of themselves'.65 And Proveditor-General Pesaro, who on one occasion killed insubordinate soldiers with hisown hand, was praised by the Duke of Urbino for the way in which he stoodthe army to arms on an alert during the duke's absence.66

Such examples, which could be multiplied, were characteristic of thepatriciate and its mentality as a class. It was a reaction against the knowledgethat the ideal of public service was constantly menaced by instances ofcowardice and self-protectiveness. Especially onerous and dangerous officewas the price to be paid from time to time for an enduring monopoly ofpolitical power and an increasing dependence on the profits it could bring.From 1509 to 1529 there was a succession of men whose actions showed thatin all but title they could be identified with the military leaders whosehardships and dangers they were instructed to share. But then there was, ofcourse, more than a touch of the politician and businessman about theleaders themselves.67

Other traditional patrician offices served to support the administration ofthe armed forces in wartime and to provide an experience which kept thegovernment continually informed of the state of military affairs in itsdomains.

By the end of June 1509, Sanuto calculated that the enemy was inoccupation of territories that had offered posts to 127 patricians as rectors,treasurers and castellans. Towns of any importance (of the size, say, ofVicenza) had two rectors, a podesta and a capitano; smaller ones like Rovigoor Feltre had one, combining the judicial and police functions of the podestawith the military and financial duties of the capitano, who was responsiblefor troops quartered in his city and its neighbourhood, professional ormilitia, and was much in the company of officers and their men. But it isartificial to make too much of a distinction between the military role of thecapitano and the civil one of the podesta. Both were in charge of the rector'sguard of infantry under its professional commander. Both commonlyattended musters and directed the building of new fortifications (inconjunction with a proveditor, if there was one). Correspondence relating totroop movements or orders received from army proveditors was frequentlysigned by the rectors jointly. The prestige attached to rectorships naturallydiffered greatly according to the size of the town; to be Podesta of Piove diSacco or Caravaggio was not an office greatly sought after, while among theseventeen nominations for Capitano of Padua in 1512 were six former Headsof the Ten and a former proveditor-general. But all involved some necessary

Ibid., xxv, 238. 66 Ibid., xliii, 443; xxxvi, 259-60.For further information about military proveditors in this period see Hale,' Renaissance armies andpolitical control', 11—31.

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contact with military affairs, and when a town was in a war theatre thiscontact could become intensive; in 1512 the Duke of Urbino virtuallyadopted Paolo Nani, Capitano of Bergamo, keeping him with the army in thefield and asking his advice until he was forced into behaving like aproveditor-general while still only receiving the stipend due to a rector.68

The usual spell of duty for rectors was sixteen months on the Terraferma,two or three years da Mar, depending on the distance of the post, so therewas a constant flow of ex-rectors with at least local military knowledge intothe pool of potential nominees to the key councils. Treasurers had directcontact with troops only on pay day but as the social equals of theircolleagues were no doubt privy to their consultations about military affairs.

Castellans were responsible for the munitions, artillery and garrisons ofthe chief fortified points in a town. Normally there was one, in the castle orkeep, but in Padua there were two, one in the castle, the other in the defencecomplex covering the main gate (La Saracinesca), and in Verona there werefour: in the citadel, the old castle, at San Felice and at San Piero. Many ofthese posts were sinecures, given in peacetime by the Great Council to poorpatricians (more rarely to retired professional soldiers) for long periods,sometimes - when the place was not considered of much importance(Marostica, for instance) - for the rest of their lives. From 1509, however,appointments to reconquered towns in the Terraferma or da Mar wereincreasingly made by the Senate and given to reasonably qualified men.With the coming of more peaceful days in 1520 the Quarantia Criminalevoted to pass elections back to the Great Council,69 but the Council of Tenvetoed the proposal. All the same, castellanships never escaped from their'welfare' connotations, partly because though the salaries were raised forpositions temporarily of great strategic importance (20 and 30 ducats forMonselice and La Scala at the end of 1509), many were so low - 5 ducats amonth was not uncommon — that only very young or very poor patricianswould accept them. In spite of their title, therefore, castellans had little tocontribute to the military expertise of the body of senior patricians.

It was far otherwise with men returning from other posts. All seaexperience, for instance, was relevant to supervising a war on land. Everygalley and round ship, even those bound on merchant voyages, wasequipped as a fighting vessel and no patrician merchant, apprentice nobile digalea or commander could return unfamiliar with artillery, arms, weaponsand (for each had its complement of marines) soldiers. Captains-general andproveditors of the fleet were expected to be able to report on the state of thefortifications and garrisons of the ports in which they victualled or

68 Sanuto, xxxi, 325.69 Ibid., xxix, 34.

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replenished their benches with oarsmen. Combat tactics at sea, lacking thepossibility of the broadside and therefore the notion of stand-off bombard-ment, bore a recognizable resemblance to tactics on land. It was rare,however, for a patrician who had held a high sea command to be given animportant military post on land. He was more likely to be reappointed to thesea or put in command of operations on the Po or on Lake Garda. All thesame, taking all these types of appointment into account, perhaps an actualmajority of the patricians who at any moment staffed the chief councils hadonce lived, even if only for a few months, in an atmosphere of cannon,arquebus and potential danger.

The administration of the Terraferma through short-term patricianappointments was paralleled in the empire da Mar. Thus, in addition toservice at sea, administrative experience fed into the patrician body anawareness of the strategic extent and military organization of the maritimeempire. In wartime this experience was drawn on directly: in 1511Sebastiano Giustinian was sent to provide for the defence of Istria because' he has an intimate knowledge of that province ',70 and at intervals from 1509to 1528 former Proveditors-General of Dalmatia were sent back onrecruiting drives for light cavalry.

The cadre's sense of political space and an eye for terrain that made forinformed strategic thinking were refreshed at intervals by the tours ofinspection carried out by pairs of patrician syndics on the Terraferma as awhole and through large segments of the empire da Mar, tours whichinvolved detailed reports on defences, garrisons and militias. And the effectof what amounted to a statistical and geographical training within Venice'sown dominions can be seen in the dispatches and reports of ambassadors toforeign countries, with their descriptions of communications, frontiers andneighbour states, fortified places and military organization. Such accountsvaried, of course, in quality: some ambassadors did little more than parrotthe descriptions of their predecessors.71 But at the worst they helped to keepdiscussions of international affairs, of allies and enemies and their resources'placed' on a roughly accurate mental map, reinforcing the map alreadypresent in the mind's eye of men whose success in international commercedepended on an awareness of time and space.

Patricians were also employed as army paymasters. Some were appointedfor a specific mission to pay contingents known to be particularlyrecalcitrant were they not paid with due ceremony and on time, notablySwiss and German pikemen. Most were sent to the field for long, though

70 S S . reg. 40 , 6 3 v .71 D . Quel le r , ' T h e deve lopmen t of ambassadoria l relazioni\ in Hale , Renaissance Venice. F o r a

particularly fine example of the Venetian 'strategic eye', see the report on Tuscany made by MarcoFoscarini in 1527 in Alberi, Relazioni degli ambasciatori veneti, ser. 2, i, 12 seq.

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seldom specified, periods, and were paid a monthly salary - that is, expensesplus incentive - which varied between 30 and 60 ducats a month, dependingon the size of the corps to which they were deputed. Their responsibility forseeing that the state's money was husbanded or disbursed according to theavailability of funds and the mood of the troops to whom they were duerequired tact and the ability to get on with the serving captains.

Taking into account, then, the constant feeding into the political machineof those returning from spells of duty involving at least some militarycontacts in normal times, plus the number of those with more specificmilitary duties in the war years and those who at all times were returningfrom serving at sea, the Venetian directing class cannot be imagined asunprepared to deal with either the immediate or the broader aspects of war.And from the opening stages of a campaign, the flow of those returning frommilitary proveditorships and rectorships in zones affected by the campaignssteadily increased, as did the flow of information derived from theirdispatches and reports.

Information about the enemy and, indeed, as a precautionary measure,about allied troops, was derived also from spies and informers.72

Proveditors-general were expected to organize their own contacts withinenemy-occupied territory and to hire spies, but the Council of Ten's ownservice was productive enough to lead to the appointment of two patriciansin July 1509 to do a preliminary sifting and co-ordination of their reports.73

As with long-service soldiers, the dependants of spies who were caught weregiven pensions or minor bureaucratic posts, and the system produced aloyalty that caused certain spies to risk their necks time after time onjourneys through enemy lines into France, Switzerland and Germany. In1526 a spy disguised as a Spaniard killed a Spanish courier in his sleep andsent the dispatches to Venice.74 Indeed, a courier's life was hardly lessimperilled than a spy's, but here again Venice secured loyal service, and it isnot unjust that one of them, Zuan Gobbo, repeatedly sent to the Romagna,to the army in Lombardy and to France and Germany between 1510 and1515, should have a name subsequently associated with Venice byShakespeare.75 On their return, Gobbo and his colleagues reported anymilitary information they had acquired to the College. A final element inshaping the ruling group's familiarity with military affairs were viva-vocereports from and discussions with captains passing through Venice orcalling there after a successful action to be congratulated by the doge.

72 Esploratori (though spia was also used) and persone degne di fede respectively. Names were rarelycommitted to writing, though cf. Dieci, Misti, reg. 33, 119V and 125V; reg. 34, 31 v and 74V; Sanuto,xxxvii, 604.

73 Sanuto, viii, 484.74 Ib id . , xlii, 53 .75 E .g . S T . reg. 17, 13V; S S . reg. 4 3 , 137; S a n u t o , xx, 393; xxi, 131.

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Among the directing castes of Europe the merchant patriciate of Venicewas thus probably uniquely well informed about the personalities,technicalities and wider issues confronting a government at war.

The system of military administration here outlined for the period1509-30 remained virtually unchanged for the rest of the century. In theTurkish wars, while a proveditor-general was appointed to supervise troopmovements and skeleton defence forces in the Terraferma, the majority ofappointments were naturally made to posts overseas. In 1570-3 there wereproveditors-general for Dalmatia as a whole as well as for Cattaro and Corfu,for Crete and for Cyprus (where, as one died and his successor, SebastianoVenier, could not reach the island, the defence of the island had to beconducted by the Lieutenant of Cyprus and the rectors of Nicosia andFamagosta). In Dalmatia there was also a proveditor-general of cavalry.Proveditors were based in such strategic ports as Zara and Canea tosupervise both local defence and the manning and supplying of fleets.

There was, occasionally, some advocacy of change. For instance, AlviseGritti in 1542 had suggested that in peacetime the organization sharedamong professionals, collaterals and rectors should be pulled together by a'provveditore di soldati\ elected each two years. But both in the Senate anden poste as rectors, patricians, in peace as in war, showed themselvesconsistently conservative: constantly reiterating the need not to evolve butto refurbish the military institutions that already existed. And even thedesire for reform in this conservative sense contained a note of hesitation.The Venetian posture in the Terraferma was one of command, yet inmanner it relied heavily on persuasion. For reasons of policy as well as ofcash, Venice came to the brink of war after war with its military structurestill virtually unreformed.

During years of peace civilian administration of the army was leftlargely in the hands of rectors. Relying on periodical surveys of theTerraferma and the empire da Mar by commanders-in-chief and syndics,proveditors-general were appointed only infrequently. In the winter of1600-1, when troop movements in the Milanese appeared to herald aSpanish attack, letters from rectors became suddenly doleful about the realstate of their troops and drew belated attention to defects in fortifications.This negligence, the Senate declared, was due to twelve years having passedwithout the appointment of a Proveditor-General in Terraferma, andLeonardo Donato was elected to stimulate reform and repair whileproveditors were rushed to the border cities of Brescia and Crema. Anotherproveditor-general, Benetto Moro, was appointed in 1606 to coordinate theelaborate defence programme which accompanied the 'Sarpi crisis' of thatand the following year, again with subordinate proveditors to assist him.

However, throughout the peace years a conscientious stream of inform-274


ation about garrisons and fortifications arrived in Venice from rectors.There were numerous complaints that they were extravagant or carelesswith public money or that they accepted honours in their own, rather thanthe republic's name, but there were none about the performance of theirduty to report on troops, attend their exercises and paydays and settlequarrels between them and civilians. There was a tolerable harmony, too, inthe sharing with local authorities of jurisdiction over the galiot and arquebusmilitias and the scolari of the gunnery scuole, all of whom came underrectorial control only when called up for training periods or active service; itis not improbable that the local loyalties contracted through the rectorialsystem did much to damp down resentment felt in the Terraferma at havingto support the burden of fortifications, a standing army and the militias.

The rectors had the advantage of having a buffer between them and thesource of the chief grievance among rural administrations, the expense andfrequent overbearingness of the cavalry: the continuing institution of thecollateral-general and his subordinates. These men were anomalies; notreally part of the army but not quite civil servants, at ease with the men(though not all vice-collaterals had been soldiers) but answerable to localcamere and, ultimately, to the Senate.

The most notable of Cinquecento collaterals-general was the Vicentinenoble and soldier Francesco da Porto. He was appointed in 1532 from astrong field of applicants including members of other traditionally militaryfamilies of the Terraferma, De la Torre, Colalto, Di Pii, Pompei,Brandolini. Other candidates (all professional soldiers) came from Brescia,Verona (two) and Padua (two), and two, Arborsani and Obizi, were non-patricians from Venice itself. One candidate was from the famous Cypriotmilitary family of Podacataro. Only one was not a Venetian subject, CarloMalatesta, and only one had already served as a vice-collateral.76 It musthave been in the Senate's mind that the Da Porto clan had not always beenconspicuous for loyalty, and were worth binding to the state; Sanutorecorded with satisfaction the arrival of Francesco with members of hisfamily and other Vicentines to thank the doge for the appointment 'andpledge his endeavours and his life to this most excellent state'.77 The postcarried a salary of 480 ducats a year in peace and 720 in war, with tasse for themaintenance of eight horses and a house in Verona, though Francesco dealtwith much of the position's routine business from his home at Thiene, northof Vicenza, an impressive combination of farm, castle and villa. Landowner,clan member, ex-soldier, indeed, cavaliere, Francesco da Porto (backed by asecretary who kept his books) proved a more than adequate expression of

76 Sanuto, lvi, 274-5 (24 May 1532).77 Ibid., lvi, 277 (25 May 1532).

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what Venice wanted: someone respected by the professional command andacceptable to his peers in the Terraferma, and who could be worked hardand confidently by the government. Though his chief responsibility was tokeep detailed records of the men-at-arms, deal with their complaints andpetitions, and put all new regulations concerning them into effect,78 he wasalso expected to attend general musters of the militia and, at his discretion,infantry garrison pay days. In 1550 his function was defined as including acomplete oversight of the republic's military preparedness, and thecollateral-generalship was ranked immediately after the governor-generalship.79 Forced by ill health to petition for an assistant in 1554,80 hedied in the same year.

To compare the administration of the War of Gradisca with that of thecampaigns that followed Agnadello is to see almost in the lineaments ofcaricature the persistence of old methods in the hands of old men. The onlysignificant change was the unprecedented use of patrician commissaries tooversee the provisioning and supply of an army concentrated, for the firsttime in Venetian experience, in one unfertile area for years at a time.

The decision to use Palma as a base camp and supply centre to supportany hostilities that might occur on the border towards the Isonzo coincided,in September 1615, with the death in office of its proveditor, Zuan Sagredo.His successor, Francesco Erizzo, was appointed as proveditor-general, withthe full legal (including capital punishment) powers of a proveditor-generalin campoy and authority (with the consent of the Lieutenant of Friuli) to levymilitiamen and summon any supplies and pioneers the fortress mightrequire.81 In November the proveditor appointed for Marano was asked topass on any evidence of hostile developments in Istria.82 In Decemberproveditors were appointed for Cadore and Monfalcone, and PietroBarbarigo was elected Proveditor-General in Terraferma with specialresponsibility for Friuli.83 Immediately under him in authority was to beAndrea Paruta, appointed commissioner of provisions and paymaster withthe army (commissario sopra i viveri della soldatesca et pagador in campo) inJanuary 1616. Paruta was empowered to call for transport and supplies fromthe Terraferma as a whole, and was to keep strict accounts of all goods andmonies received and disbursed and strike regular balances 'so that all

I am grateful to Conte Gian Giacomo di Thiene for letting me see the four volumes of records relatingto his collateral-generalship.ST. reg. 35, 182 (26 Jan.).Archivio Thiene, vol. 'A', writing 'in questa mia senile e ultima etta' on 12 Oct., 507-8.ST. reg. 85, 123V (18 Sept.), 128V (26 Sept.), 130V-131 (27 Sept.).SM. reg. 73, 128-128V (28 Nov.).SS. reg. 105, 233-4 (10 Dec), 242-3V (18 Dec).

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proceeds with suitable methodicalness \84 Also under Barbarigo wasCamillo Trevisan, proveditor of Albanian and Croat horse.85

As proveditor-general and the commissioner became progressivelyswamped with work while the army built up, the Senate rejected in May86 aproposal to appoint two proveditors in campo to assist Barbarigo. Instead, itwas decided, against all precedent, to elect a proveditor-general of the armedforces in the Terraferma and Istria (provveditore generate delle armi interraferma et Istria) assisted by one proveditor in campo?1 In Istria at thistime there were already both a proveditor (a roving commission) and aproveditor-general, Antonio Barbaro, who had just been elected to replaceMarco Loredan, fallen sick after holding the office since the previousDecember.88 So many switches of troops were being made between the twoprovinces that it was thought necessary to have two new men with acomplete oversight of operations from Cadore to Segna.

Giovan Battista Foscarini was elected proveditor in campo?9 For the newoffice of proveditor-general of the armed forces Antonio Priuli wasproposed. He had, until December of the previous year, been Proveditor-General in Terraferma in succession to Antonio Lando. He was old and inuncertain health. But for a position of such exceptional authority traditiondemanded a man so loaded with experience and authority that the chancesthat he would be both old and frail were very strong. Though he begged tobe excused, and produced medical certificates to show why he should be, hiscolleagues nevertheless elected him and he, like so many senior am-bassadors, naval commanders and proved it or s-general in the past, resignedhimself to an honour which had about it a strong whiff of the deathsentence.90 Later in that month, Barbarigo's request to resign on grounds ofhealth was refused,91 and so was Paruta's, though a patrician paymaster,Giulio Contarini, was appointed to share some of his burden.92

Later in the summer Paruta actually collapsed and was succeeded byMarc'Antonio Michiel, whose responsibility, however, was now restrictedto food supplies, the paymastership of the army being entirely trusted toContarini.93 Barbarigo also had to be replaced, but his successor, Francesco

84 ST. reg. 85, 217V-218 (29 Dec); SS. reg. 105, 260 (30 Dec), 274-5V (9 Jan. 1616).85 ST. reg. 85, 248V (20 Jan. 1616), 266 (3 Feb.).86 SS. reg. 106, 192V-193 (6 May).87 I b i d . , 193V (6 M a y ) .88 SM. reg. 74, 34V (6 May), 43 (17 May).89 S S . reg. 106, 213-16V (14 M a y ) .90 ST. reg. 86, 54V-55 (7 May).91 Ibid., 63 (17 May).92 Ibid., 74-74V (26 May), 93-93V (18 June).93 Ibid. (9 Aug.).

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Erizzo, was appointed only at the level of proveditor in campo.94 Priuli asearly as June had complained to the doge that ' I find the multiplicity of myresponsibilities here [at Mariano] in camp, and the daily correspondencewith all the rectors of Friuli and Istria and the Terraferma so overwhelmingthat I must have more secretarial help'.95 A few days later he had retired formedical attention and rest to Palma. Foscarini, on whom his responsibilitiesnow fell, wrote to say that he only hoped that he could manage 'with thegrace of the Divine Majesty' to continue serving his country.96

Priuli's health remained so bad that the two proveditors in campo\usefulness was cut down because they had to stay together to impress themilitary commanders in councils of war (there being no effective proveditor-general), but it was not until January 1617 that he was allowed to return toVenice.97 This was because another elder statesman who had recently beenProveditor-General in Terraferma, Antonio Lando, had been elected inNovember to take his place but had refused, citing 'thirty years in which Isupported the weight of the most important and expensive offices'.98 In thefollowing January, however, he was finally persuaded to go;99 meanwhileContarini, as the more senior of the proveditors in campo, was appointed hisdeputy and senior public representative with the army. But Lando's healthwas bad from the start. In June he wrote pathetically,' I am failing under theburden of the labours and worry of this post . . . I have spent nearly thewhole winter in bed, though by the especial grace of God I have been able toexert mind and body when emergencies called for i t . . . but I know that theend of my usefulness is near.'100 His health finally gave out in August and inSeptember he was succeeded by Pietro Barbarigo (who had already beenretired on health grounds from the proveditor-generalship) after his refusalhad been twice rejected. His predecessors had had their fate sweetened by adonation of 3000 ducats. It was proposed that Barbarigo should have 4000, aproposal turned down after no fewer than seven votes.101 Under theleadership of Doge Giovanni Bembo, who was 72 when elected in 1615, theold principles of gerontocracy allied to unmercenary public serviceremained intact.

Apart from the appointment of proveditors for Cividale and the frontierzone around Pontebba to assist the Lieutenant of Friuli in guarding thenorthern frontiers, and, in the higher reaches, replacements for the normal94 SS. reg. 107, 68-72V (9 Aug.).95 Capi, Died, Lettere, Rettori, Ba. 299, 20 June 1616.96 Ibid., 297 bis, 23 June 1616.97 SS. reg. 108, 26V and 32 (13 Nov. 1616).98 ST. reg. 86, 242 (16 Nov.).99 SS. reg. 108, 188-90 (21 Jan. 1617).

100 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 56, 28 June 1617.101 SS. reg. 109, 326 (7 Aug.); reg. n o , 7 seq. (5 Sept.); ST. reg. 87, 141 (11 Aug.), 146V (31 Aug.).

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reason (thus Nicolo Contarini replaced Foscarini, who was having difficultyin passing urine, as proveditor in campo)*02 the structure of civilian controlremained unchanged since the suppressing of the office of proveditor-general with special responsibility for Friuli: decisions lying with theproveditor-general of the armed forces and the two proveditors in campo.Nor were changes made at any time in Istria, though the succession to theproveditor-generaliship there has a familiar ring. When Antonio Barbaro,who had replaced the sick Marco Loredan, was relieved on grounds of hisown indisposition, he was succeeded by Matthio Michiel. He died inoffice.103 His successor, Giacomo Zane, was elected proveditor-general ofthe fleet before he left for Istria104 and in his place, in August 1617, theSenate reappointed Antonio Barbaro!105 The same emphasis on age andexperience at the expense of energy was shown in the appointment of ZuanGiacomo Zane as Proveditor-General in Dalmatia and Albania in succes-sion to Venier, who had retired owing to ill health in December 1615.106

Zane had already held that office before being transferred as Proveditor-General in Crete and his argument, less than a year later, when he wasgrudgingly allowed to be replaced in that post, had been that his health wassuffering from five years of unrelieved service abroad. His replacement,Giust'Antonio Belagno, was appointed direct from his current office asproveditor in the fleet.107

On the Terraferma outside Friuli, proveditors were appointed for LakeGarda, for the northern frontier of the Veronese, Vicentino and Bassanese,for Peschiera, Crema, Asola and Orzinovi, each with a company of 50 lighthorse to enhance his authority. Priuli's successor as Proveditor-General inTerraferma was Geronimo Corner, who had previously held the importantoffices of Podesta of Brescia and commissary-general (commissario generalsopra i viveri delta soldatesca). He was appointed not at general rank,however, though he had the powers over both soldiers and civilians of aproveditor-general, but (in March 1616) as proveditor beyond the Mincio,responsible for the preparedness of fortresses and troops and, later, for theorganization of the self-defence programme.108 He was permitted to resignin March 1617, on the production of a formidable list of the duties he had

02 ST. reg. 86, 184 (10 Sept. 1616); SS. reg. 108, 62V-63V (25 Nov. 1616), 116 (17 Dec), 135-6 (30Dec).

03 SM. reg. 75, 23V (28 Mar. 1617).04 SS. reg. 109, 165 (3 June 1617).05 Ib id . , 3 4 3 v - 3 4 7 v (21 Aug.) .06 S S . reg. 105, 217 (27 N o v . 1615), 310V (5 F e b . 1616).07 S M . reg . 74 , 134V (1 O c t . 1616).

S S . reg . 105, 88V-90 (14 A p r . 1605); reg . 106, 51V-52V (11 M a r . 1616), 52V (12 M a r . ) , 95V-97V(24 Mar.).

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conscientiously and exhaustingly carried out,109 but this permission wasalmost instantly rescinded. When his state of uncertainty was at lastresolved, in July, he was to find that instead of being retired, hisresponsibilities had been doubled; he was appointed Proveditor-General inTerraferma on both sides of the Mincio, with a dignity second only to that ofthe proveditor-general of the armed forces.110

The employment of professional troops who arrived without arms, plusthe lavish provision of equipment to the militia and self-defence forces,placed a heavy strain on the republic's resources. Armourers were sent toFriuli to keep a pool of usable weapons in being, and a repair service startedin the Arsenal, but repeated complaints suggest that the weapons of deadsoldiers were seldom recovered to be used again. It was to stop this wasteand control the issue of arms, that a commissioner of military supplies(commissario in campo sopra le munitioni di guerra) was elected for Friuli inAugust 1617.111

As commonly in the wars of this period, it was easier, however, to produceweapons than to get them to the men who needed them. The same was trueof the grain, rice, beans, oil, vinegar, salt fish and cheese112 that were neededin the increasingly denuded area of combat. As in the case of militaryweapons the export of essential foodstuffs was forbidden,113 but the problemof smuggling - indulged in by frontier territories who were neverthelessprepared to defend themselves against their illicit clients - was trivialcompared to that of transport. In theory the problem was simple. Inemergencies, all the territories of the Terraferma could be called upon toprovide carts, drivers and oxen or horses at their own expense.114 But almostnothing frustrated rectors so much as trying to get this traditional obligationhonoured. Exhort as they would the stubborn peasants that this wassomething their ancestors had done gladly, the results were dilatory andinadequate. All the same, it was not until March 1617 that the governmentrecognized the inevitable and hired private contractors.115

Central magistracies in Venice were responsible for receiving demandsfor supplies, obtaining consent for them via the College from the Senate,and administering their procurement from the relevant local authorities.Thus the proveditors of artillery were responsible for guns, powder and ball,those of biave for grain for bread, those of the Arsenal for building supplies,

09 ST. reg. 86, 6-7 (3 Mar. 1617).ST. reg. 87, 112 (1 July 1617).Ibid., 131-2 (3 Aug.).List in Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 239, 20 Jan. 1616.ST. reg. 85, 219 (29 Dec. 1615); SM. reg. 74, 44V (20 May 1616). Printed proclamation of PietroBarbarigo dated Udine, 5 Jan. 1616.E.g. ST. reg. 86, 53V-54V (6 May 1616); SS. reg. 107, 193V (8 Oct. 1616).SS. reg. 109, 1-2 (1 Mar.).

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entrenching tools and the like. By some quirk, the savio alia scrittura of themoment, as well as processing all military contracts, was also responsible forsupplying the army with palliasses and blankets. These offices were kept sobusy that from December 1615 the two 'executors of the decisions of theSenate' were put in charge of getting supplies, once raised, sent to the front.Within a month, however, 'because of the quantity and diversity offoodstuffs, military equipment, clothing and sums of money and otherthings that are sent by land and sea', three more executors were appointedtogether with additional secretarial and accounting staff and a frigate to helporganize the dispatch of supply vessels.116

All the supply services, though organized through the College and Senateand headed by patricians, relied - now, as in previous wars - on members ofthe bureaucracy to service them. Secretaries of the Ten, thanks to thelanguage qualifications demanded of them, were heavily engaged by theCollege in recruiting expeditions north of the Alps. But then the highersecretariat of both the Ten and Senate had always been so generously staffedas to permit secondment for recruiting and diplomatic errands (indeed, onoccasion, long-term diplomatic postings) without maiming the research,copying and filing services which enabled patricians (and later historians) tokeep abreast of precedent and current business. Where the bureaucracy wasweakest was in the recruitment of men who were numerate as well as literate.In peacetime, and - just - in times of crisis and mobilizations, the staffs ofsuch crucially important magistracies as those controlling the Arsenal andthe supply of grain could cope. In wartime they were overstretched, theirinventories, and especially their book-keeping, falling into progressivedisarray.

The civilian control of Venetian armies, though most readily told in termsof the governing patrician class, cannot omit this more anonymous element,and in no aspect of military organization was the shortage of trained menmore apparent than in the most important of all back-up services: financialaccounting and its processing of cash raised through taxation into thepouches of individual soldiers. Proveditors and commissaries could beproduced at the punch of an electoral button. The skills of book-keeping andaccounting could not.

While supplies of arms and food were slow to arrive and insufficient whenthey did, it was the irregular supply of a third commodity, money, thatcontributed more to the low morale and exceptionally high desertion ratethat characterized the War of Gradisca. Proveditors as well as captainscomplained. The Senate counter-claimed that enough was being sent butthat it was being wasted. The extent of fraud and peculation of course gave

116 ST. reg. 85, 213-213V (28 Dec. 1615), 227V-228V (2 Jan. 1616).

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colour to this. As was easy in such a mongrel army, every time-honouredabuse was used. Captains 'borrowed' men from others to make up theirnumbers in exchange for a small tip. Able-bodied shirkers hired substitutesto collect their pay for them. There were always, as a result of practices likethese, large discrepancies between the records of men paid and thoseactually present and capable of fighting. Typical was the Senate's referencein November 1616 to 'our armed forces, so many fewer when called to fightthan they are when they are paid'.117 The real blow fell when at the end of1616 Giovanni de' Medici found that of 'about 7797' (actually 7737)infantry paid in November, only about 2700 were present in the camp atMariano. 'This leaves us greatly astonished', the proveditor-general of thearmy was told; no figures can be entirely trustworthy, but how do youaccount for 'a discrepancy on this scale?'118 It was in the wake of thisdiscovery that Michiel Foscarini was sent as inquisitor in campo tocommence proceedings against 'nobles and other representatives of oursand against army officers' suspected of fraud.119 But in August 1617 thingswere no better. The orders flowed: men must not be allowed to answer theroll first in one company then another; names, surnames and physicaldescriptions must be checked, man by man; no captain might pretend that itwas the custom in his country to present merely a total and expect it to behonoured; every offender should be hanged and those who informed onthem rewarded. The solutions, the Senate told the proveditor of the armedforces in a mood of unreality born from desperation, were to pay only at ageneral muster of the whole army or to pay everyone at his post on the sameday.120

The first solution was impractical on strategic grounds (it would have leftmost of Friuli defenceless), the second because the paymaster's staff was notbig enough. Thus Giulio Contarini's summary of the men and their wages incamp at Mariano in October 1616 looks tidy enough, but in a covering letterhe pointed out that because of the shortage of trained book-keepers therewas no way 'to cut a path through the confusion which becomes continuallyworse; it would be wise to send a really experienced accountant like Colini. . . to organize the accounts in a manner that would deliver them from thedarkness into which they have fallen'.121

Francesco Colini was sent, but not until September 1617.122 Additionalevidence of the extent to which a contributing factor in making the war anexpensive stalemate was the shortage of men trained to keep the republic's

117 SS. reg. 108, 23 (11 Nov.).118 Ibid., 140 (4 Jan. 1617).119 Ibid., 209-1 iv (28 Jan. 1617).120 ST. reg. 87, i3 7v (7 Aug. 1617).121 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 55, 1 Nov. enclosing accounts of 30 Oct. 1616.122 ST. reg. 87, 169V-170 (11 Sept.).

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accounts in order was given by Foscarini. In March 1617 he described theillness and subsequent recovery of his accountant, Giacomo Caldoni, withthe concern normally reserved for a mistress, and then complained that theirwork was hampered by lack of a copy of the book-keeping guidelines laiddown in the Senate order of 26 May 1528! And by the time that arrives, headded bitterly, I shall have been here for months 'to the utter destruction ofmy health'. In May he begged for two more accountants, and it was not untilthe end of June that he announced the completion of a financial surveyhampered at every turn by the absence of official stationery, the rapidturnover of public representatives due to age or illness and the shortage ofprofessional assistants.123 Colini, rasonato ducale, was sorely needed inVenice to monitor a system now two centuries old which drew moneythrough the capillaries of village clusters to the venous system of towncamere and thence to the main arteries, the magistracies of the mint, thecamerey the communal chamberlains (camerlenghi di commuri), navalequipment {armamento) and many others, and thence, after an intricatejuggling with what was earmarked for other things, to what was at presentthe heart, the army. In spite of the crisp appearance of the general balancesof income and expenditure that were occasionally produced they were in anycase seldom more than roughly accurate in peacetime; in wartime they werepious guesses. As with troops, an army of figures travelled at the pace of itsslowest officials and accumulated their errors - along with a formidablebaggage of exemptions, special privileges and mutual trade-offs. All thesecomplications were reflected in Venice, where cassa borrowed from cassa,had its sources of income from direct taxation changed, got clogged bylitigation. While the military proveditors and paymasters begged for menwho could keep their accounts in order, the government could ill spare thefew men capable of sorting out its own. There was nothing naive aboutVenetian accounting methods. Allowance must be made for the ability ofcontemporaries to have the general feel of a fiscal situation which inretrospect appears hopelessly confused. But after centuries of doing withouta military budget there was a failure of imagination in the demand of theSenate - as late as June 1617 - for quarterly income and expenditureaccounts,124 and there was, cripplingly, a lack of manpower to service nervusbelli and make such a budget possible. As a result, it was not that moneywas not disbursed for the army (though there were occasions when theywere given food and wine instead of cash),125 but it flowed intermittently;now grudgingly, now in a rush that encouraged inadequate checking on thepart of the few men available to receive and distribute it.

123 p r o v v Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 243, esp. 12 Mar., 23 Apr., 13 May, 30 June 1617.124 ST. reg. 87, 106 (27 June 1617). And cf. ibid., 169-169V (11 Sept. 1617).125 E.g. ST. reg. 85, 282V (17 Feb. 1616).

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'We have a fine army, but it needs a leader'; a supreme commander 'is asnecessary to an army as a soul is to the body V These reflections of 1510 wereto be drastically reinterpreted as the century wore on.

At that date, however, tradition had also established that armies should bedirected, albeit under political supervision, by professional soldiers and thatthe supreme command should be divided between a captain-general,associated with the numerically superior infantry, and a governor-general,identified with the cavalry. The relationship between the two was not alwaysdefined in their contracts, though when it was it was made clear that thegovernor-general should accept orders from the captain-general. All thesame, problems raised by the definition of these commands led Venice tomaintain both a captain- and a governor-general very rarely: only in1509-10, 1513-15 and 1529-30.

The events of 1510 show some of the difficulties involved in giving thearmy a soul. Venice's captain-general, Pitigliano, as a member of a familythat was firmly anti-German and had provided Venice with captains for ahundred years (and was to do so for another) was made an honorarypatrician on 25 February 1509 by being elected to the Great Council - 'heand his sons and legitimate descendants'.2 But the outcome of Agnadellowas not such as to increase the government's confidence, nor was his by nowadvanced age, and four days after the battle the proveditors-general,referring to the indiscipline and confusion that reigned in the army, referredto him as 'worthless'.3 In May secret negotiations began with ProsperoColonna for an appointment which, whatever its title ('lieutenant-general ofmen-at-arms', 'lieutenant or captain of the Venetian army'), wouldeffectively whittle down Pitigliano's authority.4 Colonna was convinced thatVenice's fortunes were too low to permit a recovery and refused, but notbefore news of the approach had been picked up by Pitigliano's agents inVenice and leaked widely among his associates, who took it as a vote of no

1 SS. reg. 43, 77V.2 Sanuto, vii, 702.3 Ibid., viii, 294.4 SS. reg. 41, 189V; Priuli, iv, 86-7.

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confidence in themselves. Their reactions, added to the breakdown in Julyof another bout of negotiations, this time with Rostaino Cantelmi, Count ofPopolo, to fill Alviano's place as governor-general,5 led the government inAugust to extend Pitigliano's contract.6

His death in January 1510 was not, then, without its advantages. But itmeant that both supreme commands were vacant. Pitigliano's deputy,Dionysio di Naldo, captain of infantry, did not carry enough weight to bepromoted to either position. Another attempt to engage Cantelmi hadfoundered7 and there began two sets of parallel but tortuous negotiations.

The prime candidate for the captain-generalship had for months beenlanguishing (though not uncomfortably, apart from the bedbugs) in theCouncil of Ten's least obnoxious prison, the Toresella. As early as March1509 Venice had tried to woo Gian Francesco Gonzaga, Marquis of Mantua,from the alliance of Cambrai by offering him what was then the highestmilitary command available, 'lieutenant-general of our state'. In return,Venice would take his own state under its protection and 'save him from thevile and most certain servitude which is threatened at this moment to everyItalian ruler'.8 The marquis had refused, and fought against Venice until hewas captured in the Polesine in August. It was in April 1510, with Pitiglianodead and the campaigning season about to start again in earnest, thatnegotiations were reopened. Andrea Gritti wrote from the army that 'no onewill take orders from anybody else' and that the marquis would be an idealleader if his political loyalty could be assured by his handing over his wife,sons and fortresses in pledge to Venice.9

Oscillating between the College and Senate, debate threw up alternativenames and the proveditors-general were written to for their opinion.Meanwhile the marquis was visited in prison by deputations from theCollege and by the doge. His response was favourable. He could not answerfor his wife, who he thought was committedly pro-French, but for himselfhe would be happy to entrust his state to Venice, join the army and cut theFrench to pieces, make a Sicilian Vespers of them. Doubts having beenexpressed about all the other candidates, by a fairly close vote on 12 May(101:73:4) it was decided to appoint him.10 But it was only at this point thatthe choice of a head of state began to reveal its full complication. Themarquis was also gonfalonier of the Church. Through his wife he had close

5 SS. reg. 42, 21-2 and 28; Priuli, iv, 144.6 SS. reg. 42, 41.7 Ibid., 56-56V. He had insisted on a contract for life and the restoration of or compensation for any

lands of his lost in war.8 Dieci, Misti, reg. 32, 83 and 84V.9 Sanuto, x, 165.

10 Ibid., 304-5; SS. reg. 43, 30V.

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personal connections with Ferrara, against which Julius II, loudly callingfor Venetian help, declared war. While trying to judge the strength of hiscommitment, the government even made secret approaches, which wererejected, to the Duke of Termini11 as a possible alternative. The marquiswas not formally freed from prison until July; his contract as 'captain-general of all forces both horse and foot' was not drafted in its final formuntil the end of September.12 By October suspicion of his loyalty wasstronger than ever. 'We have noticed a pronounced irresolution in themarquis's behaviour', the Senate reported to their orators in Rome, and theproveditors were told to urge him into action.13 In November, when itbecame known that he had come to an understanding with the French forthe protection of his own domains, the government glumly allowed hiscontract to peter out.

Meanwhile - against a common background of intense military anddiplomatic activity sustained by the proveditors-general - a search for asuccessor as governor-general to Alviano (taken prisoner at Agnadello) hadbeen going on; we are assured from all sides, as the Senate wrote to theproveditors-general, 'that if the army had a leader who would foster itsinterests and honour this would undoubtedly bring victory and immortalhonour to you and the whole of our forces'.14 Throughout the spring andsummer of 1510 at meeting after meeting names were put forward, voted onirresolutely, withdrawn, discussed with a vigour, at times an acrimony, thatled to one adjournment after another - an avogador standing in the entranceto the Senate chamber to exact oaths of secrecy as the members filed out.15

Proceedings were given a sense of urgency by the belief that even were theMarquis of Mantua to be firmly contracted as captain-general he should notbe entrusted with the sole command, and a mood of bitterness because eachof the nominees had a backer among ex-proveditors who had known him inthe field. Matters were not improved by the College's holding backinformation, thus enabling its members to sneer at the wrong-headedness ofsenators, nor by the Senate's clapping a 500-ducat fine on any member ofthe College who was not prepared to name his own candidate. The nomineeswere Marc'Antonio Colonna, Janus di Campofregoso, Lucio Malvezzi,Jannes and Prospero Colonna, Zuan Paolo Baglione, Bernardino Fortebrac-cio and Renzo da Ceri of Anguillara, who had been appointed captain ofinfantry on 5 August on the death of Dionysio di Naldo.16

Sanuto, x, 621.SS. reg. 43, 130 seq.Ibid., 146V-147.SS. reg. 43, 42.Sanuto, x, 524.SS. reg. 43, 88.

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At the end of June the proveditors-general with the army in Padua wereasked to canvass the opinion of their senior officers. Fourteen voted, themajority for Malvezzi.17 As he had been previously voted down in theSenate, the proveditors were asked to try again, this time contacting captainswho were in the service away from the main body of the army. It was notuntil 23 July that the decision was reached (and then only on the fourth vote)to offer Malvezzi the restrictingly precise title of governor-general of men-at-arms.18 Even so, the decision was not a happy one. Though not anindependent ruler like Gonzaga, Malvezzi had property in Bologna and fiefsin the Kingdom of Naples which made him subject to pressure from thepapacy and Spain; only a week before, the Council of Ten, which had beenconducting security checks on the candidates, had written to theproveditors-general warning them 'to keep all their wits and senses aboutthem' while they kept an eye on Malvezzi's deportment 'so that we here cansleep in peace'.19

By the end of the year, then, Venice had lost a turncoat captain-generaland acquired a governor-general who was not only politically suspect butwas also visibly succumbing to syphilis. Secret negotiations to override hisauthority by appointing a governor-general with full powers over bothcavalry and infantry were helped in July 1511 by Malvezzi's decision not totake up his contract for a further year on account of his health. Accordingly,from that August Zuan Paolo Baglione was made governor-general20 and,apart from a period in 1512 when he was with difficulty prevented fromleaving the army in the field ('which would bring ruin to our forces, engagedas they are at present')21 to settle urgent family affairs in Perugia, his nativecity, matters went reasonably smoothly until his capture at the battle ofVicenza in October 1513.

By this time Venice had had once more, though only for five months, twocommanders-in-chief. As a by-product of the alliance with France signed atBlois on 23 March 1513, Alviano was released and recontracted in May, thistime as captain-general of foot and horse.22 The return to Venice of this bynow almost legendary warrior for the solemn bestowal of the baton andstandard of his office produced a surge of optimism. Referring to hisCaesarian birth he proclaimed, 'As I was never born, so I shall never die'and he reassured the College by saying that the business of a commander

17 Sanuto, x, 679-81.18 SS. reg. 43, 78. Contract of 2 Aug. in Commemoriali, 19, 148V-149.19 Dieci, Misti, reg. 33, 48V.20 SS. reg. 44, 42V. New contract, 25 Jan. 1513 (Predelli, vi, 123).21 Sanuto, xv, 329, 398-400.22 Predelli, vi, 131. Two years fermo, two rispetto; 325 men-at-arms and 200 mounted crossbowmen;

50,000 ducats per annum.

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was never to join battle unless forced to or with a great superiority offorces.23 Nor, after the doleful events that followed the defeat at Novara andthe withdrawal of the army to Padua and Treviso (under Baglione), wasthere any slackening of confidence in him. This was justified by hisrecapture of Friuli in the following spring. During the summer of 1515 hisletters to the doge from the field, alternating between furious complaints atdelays in sending pay and patient and detailed explanations of his strategicmoves, expressed a confidence and an independence that were to recur onlyonce more in the relationship between commander and government.24 AtMarignano in September Proveditor-General Contarini described him asfighting more bravely than Caesar. But a month later he died. In his funeraloration Andrea Navagero attributed his victories to a valour and single-mindedness that recalled the military devotion of the ancients, and hisdefeats to the corruption and pusillanimity of his men.25 The Venetian armybecame once more a mosaic of minor commands bound together by theauthority of the proveditors and the organizing assistance of the maestro dicampo, Corso di Piacenza.26

Alviano's loss was felt all the more because the officer who normally stoodthird in the chain of command, the captain of infantry, was still the much-valued but insubordinate Renzo da Ceri. In 1512 a secret clause had beeninserted in his contract absolving him from obedience to Baglione.27 Hissubsequent antagonism to Alviano became a notorious thorn in theproveditors' flesh. He was among those nominated for the governor-generalship in January 151428 in succession to Baglione (who had emergedfrom captivity only to transfer himself to papal service), and in Senatedebates about the succession to Alviano his candidacy received somesupport, but there was general relief when the decision was reached to leavethe captain-generalship in suspension and appoint Teodoro Trivulzio asgovernor-general.29 In spite of flickers of doubt lest the pro-French interestsof Trivulzio's family make him less than totally committed to the republic'sconcerns, the command remained stabilized on these lines until 1523.

The problems encountered by Venice since Agnadello reflect thedifficulty, at a time when Italian military clans were divided in theirallegiance or already engaged by allies, of engaging commanders-in-chief

23 Sanuto, xvi, 252, 240.24 Ibid., xx, July and Aug. passim.25 L. J. Libby, 'Venetian history and political thought after 1509', Studies in the Renaissance, xx (1973)

9-10.26 Capi di Guerra, Ba. s-v, 2 Feb. 1516 from G. G. Trivulzio.27 D i e d , Mis t i , reg. 35 , 72V.28 S S . reg. 46, 41 v; Predel l i , vi, 134.29 Sanu to , xxi, 4 1 3 - 1 5 , 422; Predell i , vi, 136.

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with sufficient military experience and political prestige to impress veterancaptains, many of whom were territorial magnates in their own right, andwith enough loyalty to Venice to put the republic's concerns before theirown. They also reinforce the importance and the burden of the office ofproveditor-general. Finally, they do much to explain Venice's repeated re-engagement, from 1523 until his death in 1538, of a commander-in-chiefwho became a symbol of sluggishness and hyper-caution, Francesco Mariadella Rovere, Duke of Urbino, pede plumbeo.30

The treaty of June 1523 among Venice, the Emperor and the Archduke ofAustria for the defence of the Milanese against the French forced therepublic to take fresh account of Teodoro Trivulzio's possessions in andaround Milan and his family's long association with France. His resignationwas procured by mutual agreement, and Venice's decision was shown to becorrect when he did not wait till the expiry of the six-month non-combatantperiod always specified in major contracts before appearing with the Frencharmy operating against his former employer.31 Approaches to the Duke ofUrbino had begun in June. His contract as governor-general (a status heaccepted under protest) was to serve against any ruler except the pope, ofwhose forces he was a former commander, and was dated 7 September; hewas promoted to captain-general on 22 June 1524.32

As a tribute to the leader of the papal army he had been made a hereditarymember of the patriciate in 1512 by an unusually large majority of the GreatCouncil: no5:i3:5.33 He had been considered as a possible successor toAlviano in 1515.34 Since then he had gained the reputation of a man with anunusually wide grasp of military affairs, strong loyalty and a shrinking fromrisk based on a determination to conserve his employer's manpower if itwere at all possible. As a head of state he was capable of dealing with thesocially weighty leaders of the allied armies with which Venice was nowenmeshed. His avoidance of combat unless absolutely unavoidable, 'be-cause the outcome of battle is always uncertain',35 suited Venice'sdetermination not to lose control of the territories it had regained. Cholericand given to savage outbursts of personal violence, there was no danger ofhis colleagues interpreting his caution as the result of timidity. With a statevulnerable to political pressure and exposed to military action in Romagna,it is not surprising that he was regarded at times with suspicion. Acceptingfrom the start his need to visit his own territories, the government had

Sanuto, xxxv, 127.SS. reg. 50, 29V; Sanuto, xxxiv, 361-2, 398, 446, 453-4.Commemoriali, 20, 181; SS. reg. 50, 78-9.Sanuto, xiv, 81-3.Ibid., xxi, 422. As was the Duke of Ferrara.Ibid., xliii, 677.

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presented him with an especially built fast cutter in which to ply at needbetween Venice and Pesaro. In 1527 he was allowed to detach his personalinfantry command of 2000 men to guard Urbino while the republic both asfavour and, still more, as precaution insisted that his wife and oldest sonshould come to Venice for 'protection'.36 A frisson of alarm was registeredwhen he overstayed his leave early in 1529, though he justified it by pointingout that' I have domains a good deal larger than the Count of Pitigliano orSignor Bartolomeo (Alviano) had'37 - the only two of his predecessors hedeigned to compare himself with.

Yet the steady renewal of his contract recognized his chief service to therepublic: protecting it from the full military consequences of its diplomaticalignments. Repeatedly he refused to commit the forces Venice had pledgedto an alliance in a joint action. The excuses varied: the time was not ripe, theenemy forces had been underestimated, it was necessary to wait for morecavalry or more heavy infantry. His foot-dragging as the Imperial armyscorched its way across Tuscany en route to sack Rome in 1527 was largelyresponsible for the obloquy levelled against him by contemporary his-torians, Florentines almost to a man. His own explanation was that 'we willdo all we can to protect the territories of the Florentines and the pope, butalways with the preservation of the Venetian state in mind, which dependson the intactness of our army'.38

No further change in the supreme command occurred until the darkeningof the politico-military scene after the sack. In September Janus Maria diCampofregoso was appointed governor in Lombardy only,39 a rankincreased, after his repeated urging, to the full governor-generalship inMarch 1529.40 The captaincy of infantry, which had lapsed since its tenureby Renzo da Ceri, was filled in May 1520 by Iacometo da Novello,41 in 1526by Malatesta Baglione42 and in 1528 by the Count of Caiazzo.43

In return for their services, commanders-in-chief gained the prestige ofserving in posts with an international reputation, the republic's promise ofprotection for their lands and dynasties, and the opportunity to extendpatronage to kinsmen and dependants. The cash rewards were notimpressive. Alviano's contract of June 1508 required him to provide 200men-at-arms and 100 horse crossbowmen or other light cavalry, a joint36 Ibid., xlv, 44. Died, Secreta, reg. 2, 17 (a reference I owe to Robert Finley).

Sanuto, xlix, 359.Ibid., xliv, 536.

39 SS. reg. 52 (9 Sept.).Commemoriali, 21, 79V seq.SS. reg. 48, 120V.SS. reg. 51, 40V.Sanuto, xlix, 274. There are incomplete lists of commanders-in-chief in BMV. mss. It. VII, 1213 ( =8656) 111 and Archivio Proprio Pinelli, Ba. 2, no. 24.

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annual wage bill of 24,000 ducats. His salary — in a contract for two yearsfermo and one di rispetto - was 30,000 ducats a year, 'que omnes pecuniaeintelligant tarn pro stipendio quam pro honoribus, preheminentiis etdignitatibus gubernatoris', leaving 6000 for the bonus fund, his ownentourage and, finally, any net profit. When re-engaged in 1513 with a muchlarger force he was left with only 5000 — if, as was probably never the case —he passed on the full 100 ducats due to a heavy and the 40 to a lightcavalryman.44 Lucio Malvezzi's contract as governor-general of August151 o named a salary of 23,000 ducats a year, which, after paying the wages of150 men-at-arms and 50 horse crossbowmen, would have left him with6000. The draft contract for the Marquis of Mantua in that Septembernamed 54,000 ducats; after paying 350 men-at-arms, 100 light cavalry and200 infantry, he would have been left with 10,200. Zuan Paolo Baglione,governor-general from July 1511, with 200 men-at-arms and 50 light cavalry,was given 3000 for his own use {pro eius plato); as with Alviano the contractwas for two years fermo and one di rispetto. In January 1512, havingnegotiated for 25 more men-at-arms and 50 more light cavalry, he asked forhis own provisione to be raised to 6000 ducats; the Senate thought this toomuch, and compromised at 4ooo45 At the end of the period,Campofregoso's contract would have left him, after paying a force of 200men-at-arms and 100 horse crossbowmen, also with 4000 ducats.

Another source of professional and personal satisfaction to commanders-in-chief was that the number and variety of forces named in their contractsas condottieri amounted to something very much like private armies. Withinthe conventions set by the government, it was they who settled questions ofbooty and ransom involving their own men, they who were judges of allcrimes, civil and criminal, committed by their men amongst themselves thatdid not come into the category of'outrageous', meaning political, crimessuch as treachery, forgery, arson and offences against (influential) civilians.The long-standing convention whereby commanders-in-chief actuallyhandled the cash due to the troops in their personal command was, it is true,modified when the Duke of Urbino's contract as captain-general of all horseand foot was drawn up in June 1524. His men were paid by him, but, thanksto his 'urbanita', they were to be entered on the collaterals' muster and paylists, a provision which inhibited his ability to short-change the governmentby keeping 'lances' under strength. In acknowledgement of this, he was lefta considerably larger sum for the bonus fund, his entourage and profit: noless than 19,000 ducats after paying 200 men-at-arms (now getting 80instead of 100 ducats) and 100 horse crossbowmen out of an overall annual

44 Commemoriali, 19, 119-20; Predelli, vi, 131.45 Predelli, vi, 123.

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salary of 35,000 ducats. The contract also envisaged his being told tomaintain at need 325 men-at-arms and 200 horse crossbowmen; at 50,000ducats he would, in this case, be left with 16,000 after paying their basewage.46

It would be a mistake to see the relationship between the Venetians andtheir captains simply in terms of merchants negotiating impersonalcontracts with aliens paid to risk their lives for them. Alongside the financialand political issues which caused a continual sense of involvement in theforces of war, there was a feeling of national pride in the conduct of'ourmen', 'our army'. Despite its cosmopolitan nature the army was looked onas a direct expression of Venetian government. Though enfeoffment47 andhonorary membership of the Great Council had become rare, manycommands were held by men so familiar from long service that the exploitsof their units were discussed in terms similar to those later employed innorthern Europe with reference to famous regiments in national armies. Butthe names and characters of new men, and the size of their commands: thesetoo came to be talked about with partisanship. Beside the cash bond, andcoexisting with much suspicion and recrimination, there was an emotionalbond between the republic and its fighting men.

New commanders-in-chief were greeted in Venice at the Rialto by thedoge and rowed down the Grand Canal to the Piazzetta. On routine visitsthey were entertained in the palaces of the patricians with whom theyworked. Commanders repaid hospitality from houses they rented or, onoccasion, were given in Venice. These were normally occupied by the agentsor secretaries whom all captains holding sizeable commands maintained inthe city to protect their financial interests and to intervene on their behalf inthe College - to scotch unfavourable rumours or explain unpopulardecisions. Usually lawyers, some were ex-soldiers and one, the Duke ofUrbino's Giangiacomo Leonardi, was a distinguished military theorist, theauthor of a widely cited treatise on fortification. The ceremony in thebasilica of handing over the silver baton and painted standard of St Mark,symbols of a captain- or governor-general's authority, was made asimpressive and public as possible. With respect to the final ceremonyassociated with commanders, Venice was less generous. The governmentpaid for state funerals (save for those who, like Malvezzi, died under a cloudof distrust) and contributed small sums to tombs for Pitigliano, Leonardo daPrato, ex-governor of light cavalry, and Dionysio di Naldo in SS. Giovanni e

46 S S . reg. 50, 78V-79.47 Alviano's investment with Pordenone in recognition of his 'virtues, loyalty, valour, extreme

faithfulness and outstanding deeds' protected Venice's interests in the military and labour services ofhis vassals. Commemoriali 19, 120V. So did later gifts to others.

2 9 2

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Paolo, stressing the roles they had played in the siege of Padua (thattouchstone of loyalty) and the 'fidelity' with which they had served.48 Thestate paid for Alviano's obsequies, and marked the day by closing all theshops as a sign of public mourning,49 but his monument in S. Stefano wasnot put up by the Senate until 1623.

Though contracts with condottieri and infantry captains were usuallymade through intermediaries - agents or Venetian public representatives -the College kept records of previous service, and had the opportunity tomeet them in person when they came to Venice to pick up troops, to bebriefed, to complain about being misrepresented by proveditors or to seekcongratulations and rewards from the doge. This familiarity, sharedthrough the Heads of the Ten with that council and through the savi withthe Senate, was regularly supplemented by dispatches from proveditors andletters from commanders-in-chief distributing praise or blame after aparticular action. Letters from minor captains addressed to the Ten areparticularly rich in protestations of loyalty, denunciations of the poorconduct of colleagues and accounts of inter-unit feuds and squabbles.50 Thedegree to which files and formal meetings could engender a strong sense ofcommitment to individuals was shown in 1513 when the returningProveditor-General Capello bitterly complained that 'there is not acondottiere in the army who does not have a protector in the College'.51

It would be ingenuous to suggest that there was a widespread return ofthis sense of commitment among the subordinate captains Venice engagedin wartime. Some were engaged for reasons most unlikely to engender asense of loyalty: to prevent them from joining the enemy, to foment discordin their native cities, to have ' a representative of the house of Sforza'52 as apurely political move, or 'a famous military leader'53 as a matter of merekudos. Yet the record of outright treachery or actual desertion is soremarkably thin as to explain (apart from his being a Venetian subject) thethunderous sense of outrage that greeted the Veronese Paolo Luzasco'scrossing to the enemy in 1528. His assassin or captor was to receive 2000gold ducats plus a pension of 500 ducats for life; in addition he could ask forthe pardon of any two outlaws, however horrific their crimes had been; were

Died, Misti, reg. 35, 70V. Also: Luigi da Porto, Lettere storiche, ed. B. Bressan (Florence, 1857), 169;Sanuto, ix, 496, 499, 502, xii, 114, xv, 90, xix, 331; SS. reg. 44, 7V and 21.Sanuto, xxi, 275-6.Capi, Dieci, Lettere di Genti d'Armi, 307 and 308. This correspondence reflects the very small roleplayed by the Ten in the conduct of strictly military affairs.Sanuto, xvi, 25. For another example, Sanuto, xxiv, m - 1 3 (24 Mar. 1517).SS. reg. 41, 175-175V (bastard sons of Galeazzo), 11 and 14 May, 1509.Ibid., 144 (Fracasso da Sanseverino), 17 Feb. 1509.

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he a soldier, he would be given a command of foot or horse, according to thenature of his own profession.54 And it explains the sense of freedom withwhich soldiers wrote to the government offering advice on military or evenpolitical55 matters, or justifying their conduct, as when Baldassare Scipionedefended himself in 1513 from rumours that he was a drunkard, a fop and ahomosexual.56

Mercenaries were, and not only in Italy, used to supervision by civilianrepresentatives of their employers and to their intervention in strategicdecisions in the field. With few exceptions, moreover, the background ofmilitary knowledge and the temperament of proveditors made theirpresence with the army, as we have seen, not only tolerable but welcome.With many military colleagues coming themselves from areas liable to bethreatened by shifts in the paths of campaigns and changes in alliances,commanders-in-chief had, in any case, to take political factors into account.

Thus the initiative in councils of war was normally accepted as lying withthe proveditors, and their authority was only very exceptionally in doubtsave when money for pay was not forthcoming and indiscipline threatenedto make a campaign unworkable. The government distrusted the soldier'sability to see a military situation in the round, that is, to include a vision ofdamage to Venetian life and property and the risk of alienating Venetiansubjects. It was the proveditors' ungrateful task constantly to blunt, blur orpostpone the logical use of violence.

The composition of councils of war was not specified, nor were rules ofprecedence established. The proveditors-general invited public representa-tives whose spheres of authority would be concerned; the captain- orgovernor-general invited the senior officers he most relied on or thought itwould be tactless to exclude. During the campaign against Marano in 1514,for instance, a council called to decide whether the moment had come to takethe port by storm comprised the directing officer, Girolamo Savorgnan, theproveditor-general, a representative from the Proveditor-General of Friuli'sstaff, the Captain of the Gulf and a number of patricians from the fleet and4all' the infantry captains.57 Before deciding to withdraw the army to Paduain June 1510, the proveditors-general asked for opinions in writing fromeleven condottieri and infantry captains58 whose opinions were all for-warded to Venice to justify the orders the proveditors had given. Later that

54 Sanuto, xlvii, 495-6.55 Ib id . , xiv, 589 (Alviano).56 Ib id . , xv, 485 .57 Savorgnan , iii, 26.58 Sanuto, x, 655-6.

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year, in September, the Senate left the decision whether to assault Verona tothe two proveditors-general and Renzo da Ceri and Malvezzi.59

The position to be taken up by the army in the days before Agnadello hadbeen the subject of heated debate among Pitigliano and Alviano and theproveditors. Alviano's wish to cross the Adda and strike at Lodi was somuch at variance with the captain-general's preference for remaining on theVenetian side of the river that opinions in writing were called for fromindividual captains.60 In their light, it was agreed on the 30th to cross. Thearmy accordingly moved from Ponte Vico. On 4 May it reached Mozzanica.By now Pitigliano's fear that the French army would slip past them into theinadequately defended Terraferma was shared by all except Alviano. At acouncil held that day in the captain-general's quarters, attended by theproveditors, the Terraferma condottiere Alvise Avogadro and 'a few'captains, Alviano, roundly out-voted, said on his return from storming outof the meeting, 'Magnificent proveditors, if you want to order me not tocross though having so fine an army, then put it in writing, otherwise cross Iwill.'61

In this case the quarrel was with his fellow commander-in-chief ratherthan with the proveditors, who next day put the blame entirely on hisshoulders.62 And shortly after his re-engagement in May 1513, he saidhandsomely to the proveditor-general, Domenico Contarini (whom he hadknown in 1509 when Capitano of Verona), 'I will do nothing without yourknowledge and I am glad to have you with me as proveditor.'63 Yet inOctober it was his command alone that sent the army into the disastrousrout outside Vicenza, and the proveditors' reports were loud in censure of' acommander who will listen to nobody', 'who consults no one'.64 Alvianolaid the blame on cowardly units who had not supported him. A year later,Contarini reported that when Alviano suggested flooding part of thePadovano to incommode the enemy and he had answered that so drastic anaction required consultation with the government, the captain-generaldeclared: ' I shall do it, then I shall let them know.'65

Normally relations were smooth, with commanders-in-chief writing toproveditors with the matter-of-fact expectation that they could bring updetached units, choose river crossings and build bridges as competently asfellow officers, and trusting men who commonly deferred to their own

59 SS. reg. 43, 118.60 Sanuto, viii, 153-4, 172-3.61 Ibid., 172-3.62 Ibid., 258.63 Ibid., xvi, 273.64 Ib id . , xvii, 153.65 Ib id . , xviii, 133.

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tactical knowledge. Do not worry, Andrea Gritti wrote to the doge inAugust, 1509, 'I shall put no plans in execution save with the care,consideration and manner that conduces to the security of your affairs, so Iwill in no way omit to communicate, consult and discuss with the captain[-general] and with condottieri and [infantry] captains.'66

If Alviano's awkwardness made him exceptional among commanders,Zuan Vitturi proved an exception to the rule that proveditors-general wereable to get on well with their professional opposite numbers. On 24 May1527, after attending a council of war, he wrote a letter to the Duke ofUrbino which openly gibed at his plan to hover near Rome in order to rescuethe pope. Venice, he wrote, was not prepared to risk an army on such anenterprise. When a copy of this letter was read in Venice 'everyone wasstupefied'. Letters were rushed off from the Senate to the effect that Vitturihad acted ultra vires and that the government did wish every effort - short ofpositively endangering the army - to be made to release the pope. Twoproposals on successive days were even made to replace Vitturi as 'ofunsound mind'.67 Vitturi, whose acknowledged energy and grasp ofsoldierly affairs made him almost a career military proveditor, had alreadycaused some degree of scandal during the siege of Marano by openly takingsides with Girolamo Savorgnan against Zuan Paolo Manfroni,68 and hisnext assignment, as Proveditor-General in Apulia in 1528-9, produced abitter quarrel with the commanding officer there, Camillo Orsini,69 thatcontributed to his being summoned to trial in 1530, and to his flight and itssequel: a highly prestigious and purely military career with Ferdinand I ofAustria.

Senior officers could not, in practice, be brought to book for failures in thefield; this was in part the reason why their selection was such an agitatingbusiness. Even senatorial reprimands were rare.70 And it was the provedi-tors who were expected to produce concord and efficiency in the field71 and,accordingly, it was they who were the scapegoats in case of defeat. FromZorzi Corner, whose career was blighted by his absence from Agnadello(though he was suffering agonies from the stone and had been unable tourinate for three days)72 and the remaining proveditors who were flailed afortnight later for letting the retreat continue,73 to the prosecution of AngeloTrevisan for losing much of the river fleet on the Po later in 1509, case after

66 Priuli, iv, 456.67 Sanuto, xlv, 201-2, 211, 213, 225.6 8 Daniele Barbaro, Storia veneziana, ed. T . Gar, AS I., ser. 1, vii, 2 (1843-4) I 0 4 ^ -19 Vitale, 'L'impresa di Puglia', 178; Sanuto, Hi, 48-56. Orsini was 'gubernator'.

For an example, SS. reg. 44, 85V, to Renzo da Ceri (13 Dec. 1511).Ibid., 86-86v, to Gritti, same day.

2 Sanuto, viii, 226.SS. reg. 41, 194V-195.

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case lent alacrity to the willingness with which the middle-aged or elderlydescendants of fishermen rode, almost to the manner born, across thebattlefields of the Italian mainland alongside their professional colleagues.

On 5 May 1532 the Duke of Urbino came to Venice to celebrate theconfirmation of the rispetto years of his contract as captain-general.74

Feasted at the Rialto, he was then conveyed in a bucintoro crammed with hisemployers in gold and crimson damask and black and purple velvet to hislodgings at S. Giorgio Maggiore. Five days later he treated the College to alengthy address on the current military situation,75 especially with respect tothe Turks, who were uppermost in everyone's mind.

Their preparations, he said, showed that they would be on the move thisyear, but it would be a strike against Austria to make good the wound theirhonour had received when rebuffed at Vienna in 1529. And it would notsucceed: the terrain was better suited to infantry, and the Turks reliedchiefly on their cavalry. Nor should the Turks be looked on as invincibledemigods; they had failed at Vienna, and though they had taken Rhodes in1522 the siege had taken far longer than with so great an army, led by thesultan himself, it should have done. And they had not yet been tested againsta Christian army in the open field. The duke claimed that he would fearnothing from them if he were in command of 10,000 Italians, 10,000Spaniards and a body of Landsknechts. And in answer to queries about themerits of the national contingents open to Venice to employ, he disposed ofany notion that military self-sufficiency might be possible: no more than10,000 decent infantry could be raised in Italy as a whole. The Spaniards,particularly adept at skirmishing, were comparable with the Italians, butboth needed support from Landsknechts: partly because of their greaterstature, partly because they gripped the pike nearer the head than did theItalians or Spaniards and thus struck home the harder. The Swiss werevalorous and fearless when the date of the battle they were engaged in couldbe known, but they degenerated when faced by delays.

Returning to the Turks, the duke then presented his audience with acareful analysis of Suleiman's defeat of the Mamelukes in 1517. In theunnatural clarity of the description of the battle, aided, it seems, by adiagram (. . . per lafigura scritta), and the comforting nature of the lesson tobe learned from it, there was an uncanny anticipation of the staff-collegelecture of the future. From Pompey's defeat by Caesar to Pescara's ofFrancis I, he concluded, two basic conclusions could be drawn. The firstwas that contingencies apart (which God alone could anticipate) victory

74 Sanuto, lv, 569. His contract was renewed from 2 July 1534 for three years fermo and two di rispetto at50,000 ducats p.a. with 300 men-at-arms and 200 light cavalry. Commemoriali, 21, 138-41.

75 Sanuto, lvi, 171-6. Printed (in revised form) in his posthumous Discorsi militari (Ferrara, 1583).

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would go to the commander and officers who had better information aboutthe enemy's numbers and methods than the enemy had of theirs, and whohad the better knowledge of the terrain over which they were to fight. Thesecond was that precipitancy in a commander was a fault (he cited Alviano atAgnadello); victory went to him who moved with a well-stocked mind and'with leaden feet' — and he instanced Prospero Colonna and his own father.

No discourse could have been better calculated to please a body ofcautious well-informed civilians whose presses were in the process ofacquiring a European leadership in the production of books on the art ofwar.76 Nor, with the need in mind to canalize the energies of the Terrafermaaristocracies, would they have been less pleased with another point made bythe duke. In spite of the ever growing importance of infantry and firearms(witness the defeat of the Mamelukes) the man-at-arms and the lightcavalryman still had an important role to play; to deny this would be tomaim an army, which, like a perfect human body, required the orders of thehead to be executed by all its limbs.

That summer revealed another facet of the transitional character ofVenice's commander-in-chief. If in May the duke was the classicallyminded analyst of the pitched battle, the keeping-abreast enthusiast forinfantry, firepower and the latest methods of fortification, the advocate ofthe studious pause before making a decision, in June he shone in an olderand equally congenial element. In that month he held a muster of his owncommand of men-at-arms and light cavalry stationed west of the Mincio atGhedi, in the plain south of Brescia. Routine as such an occasion was, evensordid, as its object was to check equipment and horses before handing overa quarter's pay, word had been spread and the occasion was one to appeal toFroissart rather than to Polybius or Machiavelli. As the 470 lances wentthrough their paces at the command of the duke's silver baton (he wassplendidly armed on a superb bay charger) they were watched by anaudience of over 400 horsemen. Many, including some patrician clerics, hadcome from Venice, more from the castles and estates of the Bresciano, yetothers - the Marchese del Guasto, Luigi Gonzaga and the dispossessedMalatesta signore of Rimini among them - were foreigners drawn to a sightthat telescoped nostalgia for the days before 1509 into the present rumble ofhoofs and flutter of standards.77 It may not have been what war was likeany more but, even if sponsored by a republic, the occasion represented whatwar could still stand for.

The duke was also consulted that year over the republic's fortification

76 J . R. Ha le , ' P r i n t i n g and the mil i tary cu l tu re of Renaissance Ven ice ' , Medievalia et Humanistica, viii(1977) 2 1 - 6 2 , and in Storia delta cultura veneta (Ner i Pozza, Vicenza) iii, pt 2, 245 -88 .

77 Sanuto, lvi, 476-82.

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plans, especially with regard to Vicenza, the S. Niccolo entrance through theLido, Verona and Legnago. When asked how urgent were the works underconsideration at the last two in May, his reply was less suited to the College'ssense of the possible.78 He accused them of dawdling, of planning from dayto day, bit by bit, a gate here, a bastion there, compromising any overallplan by the appointment of short-term proveditors each of whom altered thedirection of the work. The secret, he said, referring to the plans for his owncity of Pesaro, was to agree a plan as a whole and to carry it out as a whole. Itwas typical of the duke to be as resolute when dealing with bricks and mortaras he was tentative when dealing with an enemy in the field. But Venice washistorically conditioned as well as financially constrained to be tentativeabout both, and in this respect his advice glided by unnoticed, workcontinuing at a leaden pace.

The duke's fermo ran out in March 1537, on the eve of the Turkish War,and two years' rispetto was confirmed because of'an outstandingly valorouspractice of the discipline of war joined to the highest prudence and animmaculate loyalty to us {verso ilstato nostro)\79 By now the duke, at timesalmost daily with the College, had gained an ascendency in the patriciate'sstrategic planning that was unprecedented and would never be repeated. InJune he was asked to produce his own cavalry, and those of his sonGuidobaldo, as part of a general muster - a practice, as the Senaterecollected with a somewhat apologetic air, which had been neglected sincethe pageant at Ghedi in 1532. And it was to facilitate his access to the DucalPalace that 10,000 ducats were voted by the Senate on 15 September to buyhim a house at Sta Fosca ('near the Rio di Noale').80 When seriouspreparations began for raising 10,000 infantry, half by the duke and half byhis son Guidobaldo, for a war fleet in July, his offer to go himself incommand of this 'enterprise against the Infidel, without any care for theinterests of his own state' was accepted with acclamation.81 But his healthwas failing. Command in the fleet was entrusted to Valerio and on theDalmatian mainland to Camillo Orsini. While the duke continued to beconsulted, the war was effectively planned and conducted by the Senate andCollege. And so it was after his death in October 1538. The decision not toappoint a co-ordinating commander-in-chief but to work directly fromgovernment to local commanders via proveditors had a political reason:Venice's distrust of its allies of the Holy League and its intention to defuseand localize the war as much as possible. But it was also due to the difficulty

78 F. M. della Rovere, Discorsi militari (Ferrara, 1583) 3.79 SS. reg. 58, I-IV.80 Ibid., 57V-58; Predelli, vi, 230. Archivio Proprio Pinelli, Ba. 2, no. 24 (1 Dec. 1537), adds that it was

'quella di Giovanni Lippomani'.81 SM. reg. 24, 48 seq.; SS. reg. 58, 57V-58.

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of envisaging anyone who could take the duke's place. Though Guidobaldohad been recontracted in 1539 with an increased personal command, from50 men-at-arms and 50 light cavalry to 100 of each, plus 10 infantrycaptains,82 he was offered no higher rank and after the war there was evensome hesitation about renewing the contracts of the men who, under thedirection of the Senate, had played the most conspicuous part in it. ValerioOrsini's service in Dalmatia and the fleet was rewarded by an increase in hisstipend to 2400 ducats in peace or war, but he was warned that the eightinfantry captains the government paid him to retain in case he was called onto produce his quota of 2000 men were to be as subject to cuts as were thosehired directly by the Senate. Camillo Orsini was re-engaged at 4000 ducatswith 100 men-at-arms (including many of the now leaderless men of the lateduke), 100 light cavalry and 10 infantry captains, but after two hung votesthe contract went through by an unenthusiastic margin: 153:58:16.83 It istrue that his promotion to general rank was subsequently discussed, but inspite of his twenty years of service, he was a representative of clan ratherthan political loyalty. His cause was not advanced by a letter Valerio wrote tothe government in 1542: 'if the Signoria were to give the command to anyother condottiere than to Camillo, to whom as a member of my house andmy elder I willingly defer . . . at that moment I would consider myself freeto dispose of myself in whatever manner I please without incurring theremotest slur on my honour'.84

It was not until 1546 that the Senate, noting that the condition of thepermanent army had been steadily worsening in the absence of acommander-in-chief, appointed Giudobaldo not captain- but governor-general, and handed over his banner and baton of command after a gorgeousceremony in St Mark's.

The contract, for three years fermo and two di rispetto, followed thetraditional formula.85 His personal stipend was 5000 ducats, with 15,000 forthe payment of 100 men-at-arms and 100 light cavalry in peace and 25,000in war, when he was to engage another 200 light cavalry. He could hire anddismiss his own men, but had to report changes to the civil authorities; norwere his men exempt from the ordinary regulations governing musters andpay days. He was only to leave Venetian soil with the government's licence,and his men's leave was restricted to two periods of twenty days. His legalauthority over his troops was absolute except in the case of 'atrociouscrimes', which would be judged by rectors, as would cases arising between

82 SS. reg. 60, 4 (23 Mar.).83 SS. reg. 61, 39V and 77V-78 (23 Sept. 1540 and 11 June 1541).84 Capi, Died, Lettere di Condottieri, Ba. 307, 11 July.85 SS. reg. 65, 4-4V and 20V-22 (12 Mar. and 17 June 1546). Also in Capi di Guerra, Ba. 2 under Delia

Rovere.

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troops and civilians. He was not to employ, or in any way favour, rebels oroutlaws, and if any were taken in action they, like territorial lords or theirsons or nephews, were to be handed over to the government. When ordered,he was to attack anyone regardless of his status, except the pope, and on thetermination of his contract neither he nor his men were to fight againstVenice until six months had elapsed.

It was the familiar formula of the private army subjected to state control.The snag lay in the penultimate clause. Not only were Venice's relationswith the papacy bad, but if Paul Ill's nepotistic ambitions were to continue,they were likely to become worse, and Urbino was so situated as to bevulnerable to papal pressure. It was a factor - overruled by the usefulness ofUrbino as a source of men (the 'thousands and thousands of experiencedsoldiers' the duke's agents constantly harped on) - that had delayed hisappointment as governor, and which led the Senate in 1550 to turn down hisapplication to be promoted captain-general.86 When, under papal andImperial pressure, he resigned his commission in 1553 to become captain-general of the Church, Venice's impatience was mingled with relief.

The problem of replacing him was, all the same, a difficult one. An avidstudent of his father's unpublished military discourses, his ready identifi-cation with the government's military policy, especially with its emphasis onfortification, had made him popular and trusted as a balanced militaryadviser and administrator: qualities Venice had come to value more thancombat experience or flair. The key to all military planning, he wrote in amemorandum to the doge in 1551,87 is finance. And money must be spent inpeacetime: on fortifications, stocks of ammunition and food, contractswhich will yield the men you need in war. What is more, in peace you have toprotect your state 'from brigandage and unexpected disturbances'. But ifyou spend too much in peace there will not be enough left for war; a balancemust be struck. And what is peace? No prince can rely on it. You are not atwar, true, but are you secure? Its threat is so near that you cannot but feel itsheat. You are better prepared than most princes because you have not onlyyour own state, but mine. And though you need to secure some Swiss andGermans to stiffen your infantry, Italians are in the main best for you if wellled, 'because they will consider that they are fighting in their own cause'.Your 500 men-at-arms, with couched lance and mace, are sound supportersof infantry and, dismounted, useful in siege or defence. You need more ofthem in wartime, though it must be admitted that the shortage of finehorses, and Naples' refusal to export them, makes this difficult. Moreover,the pay is so poor that the men find it hard to support themselves far from

86 Archivio Proprio Pinelli, no. 27, n.p.87 Capi di Guerra, Ba. 4, from Verona, 12 Oct.

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their own homes. You also need more light cavalry, so useful in war to scoutand raid, as the use made of them by Julius Caesar proves, or to takearquebusiers riding pillion, and in peace 'they keep a state secure from any(internal) danger'. As both sorts of cavalry are hard to come by in wartimethey should be built up in peacetime, to numbers he would leave to thediscretion of the government. It was advice like this, moderate, lucid andlearned, that made him so acceptable to the government. And where could asuccessor be found whose territories guaranteed so rich a pool of recruits, orwho understood so well the police role of a peacetime army?

Valerio Orsini had now resigned. Camillo let it be known, through hisagent Scipio Porcellaga, that he would like the job, but his lands were smalland even more open to papal blackmail. While the government stalled therewere proposals to work through general officers of individual units -infantry, light cavalry, men-at-arms, artillery - without appointing acommander-in-chief, leaving the supreme command once more in thehands of the Senate. It was not until 1556 that negotiations began in earnestwith a man hitherto passed over because of his scant territorial standing.This was Sforza Pallavicino, Marquis of Cortemaggiore in Emilia, aprofessional soldier since the age of sixteen and a veteran of Imperialcampaigns in Piedmont, Germany and Hungary. The rank proposed wasonly that of captain-general of the infantry. Even that took two years tosettle, with Sforza's agent, Annibal Lioni, playing his master's uncertaintyabout Venice's policy, 'so very different in military matters from that ofother states ',88 against the Senate's increasing determination to employ him.It was a precise definition of his authority that Sforza was after, and it was anissue that Venice, when drawing up his draft contracts, had consistentlyavoided. It was not that he resented political control - that was inevitable;but in a republic, Lioni complained for him, it came from so manydirections: Council of Ten, Senate, College, rectors, proveditors, col-laterals. How far was he free to deal as he thought best with the infantry ofthe permanent garrison force? With the additional troops raised, crisis bycrisis? With new captains? With the militia, who seemed so firmly under thethumb of the savi of the Terraferma and the local authorities?89

Once employed, Sforza lost no time in agitating for the supremecommand, supported - a familiar phenomenon - by patricians who hadbecome enthralled by the prospect of fostering 'their' man: in this case itwas Girolamo Grimani and Andrea Badoer. And in the enhanced sense ofisolation that an international peace among contestants brings to professedneutrals, Sforza gained from the Peace of Cateau-Cambresis a contract as

88 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 8, 22 June 1558.89 SS. reg. 70, 128-^9 (24 Nov. 1557).

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governor-general on 14 December 1559, closely modelled on that ofGuidobaldo della Rovere,90 save that he was to reside in Venetian territoryin a house leased for him in Padua.

He accepted it, but, characteristically, it did not satisfy him. What exactlywas his authority over garrison governors who had been appointed by theSenate? Why could not he, rather than the rectors, determine the passwordsissued to city guards? The problems of definition became all the more acutewhen the Senate in 1562 appointed Giordano Orsini to the vacant post ofcaptain-general of infantry. After a year of cautious recrimination theSenate found itself forced to issue a code defining the command structure ofits forces. Unprecedented, it is worth paraphrasing at some length.91

Legislating for a time when there might again be both a captain- and agovernor-general, it firmly placed the latter under the former and bothabove the general officers (captains-general) of infantry, light cavalry andartillery. When both captain- and governor-general were together thelatter's authority was restricted to his particular charge, the men-at-arms,but when he was alone he acted as the captain-general's representative withauthority over all arms, though all his orders had to be reported to thecaptain-general for confirmation. Either could give orders to the men oftheir subordinate general officers, if the other were absent, copies of theseorders being, however, referred to them. Subordinate general officers couldhire and dismiss captains who were not engaged directly by the Senate.

The Senate undertook to send copies of government decisions to therelevant heads of staff: about men-at-arms to the governor-general, aboutthe militia and infantry to the captain-general of infantry, about lightcavalry and artillery to their representative generals. Copies of all orderswere to go, besides, to the captain- and governor-general so that they had acomplete overview of governmental orders. On the other hand, no militaryofficer of whatever rank, nor any rector or other representative, was to makeany change in regulations without the Senate's assent.

The code left loopholes which Sforza and Orsini, by now acrimo-niously at odds with one another, were quick to point out in letters andduring interviews (separately) with the College. Orsini refuted Sforza'sclaim to discharge his own men, Sforza replying that he had the power to getrid of anyone unsuited to the government's service. Orsini complained thatat musters Sforza issued commands directly to the infantry instead of havingthem relayed through him. Neither was happy about his lack of control overappointments made by the Senate.92

9 0 S S . reg . 7 1 , 128V-129V.91 ST. reg. 44, 195-6 (28 Dec. 1563).92 E .g . Ma te r i e Mis t e Notabi l i , B a 7, 125 seq.

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The issue about engaging and discharging captains was treated warmlybecause it affected the system of military - which ran parallel to that ofpolitical - patronage. Who gave orders to whom was an issue which emergedmore clearly, in terms of prestige, on the parade ground than in battle. Ingeneral, the war years, during which proveditors acted as buffers betweenthe professionals and when pay and survival were more important thanmatters of precedence, raised fewer problems in the command structurethan did the years of peace when the army was left more to its own devices.But there was, besides, a deep temperamental difference between theambitious Orsini, who never sensed the pulse rate of a republic, and Sforza.He was too ambitious and prickly about his 'rights', but he also contained astrong dash of the genuine military reformer and wanted scope to make useof it.93

In Sforza, indeed, Venice had an alerter, less tradition-bound version ofFrancesco Maria della Rovere, and only his political insubstantialitystopped his promotion to captain-general. When his contract was renewedin 1566 it was still as governor-general.94 His stipend was increased to 7000ducats. New clauses were introduced promising him compensation for anylands or fiefs he lost in Venetian service, and undertaking to keep himinformed of all decisions relating to the army and of the implications for hisauthority of the arrival of proveditors-general and syndics. But another newclause read:' in the event that we should employ any person under any title totake over all or part of the aforesaid governor's authority over the land armyhe is free to cancel this contract, though bound not to come against us inarms for a further six months'. With no other candidate in sight, and by nowsecure of his standing in the patriciate's eyes, Sforza let this one gounchallenged.

Sforza's dominating role in peacetime, constantly on the move inspectinggarrisons, scuole and militias and advising on fortifications both on theTerraferma and da Mar, frequently called to Venice for discussions with thedoge and College, was notably different, as it turned out, from the part heplayed in the War of 1570-3.

Initially he was placed in command of the 11,800-strong floating armythat was packed into the fleet in the summer of 1570. He was accorded a fullheadquarters staff: 48 lanze spezzate, a camp marshal, two sergeant-majors,a paymaster, a provost-marshal with four subordinates, a commissarygeneral, a drum major, a farrier, two surgeons, two physicians and twoapothecaries.95 His was the largest single contingent: 3000 infantry; he had93 Many of his reports are in the collection Materie Miste Notabili (see their Indice); correspondence in

Capi, Dieci, Lettere di Condottieri, Ba. 308.94 S S . reg . 74 , 87V-89V (12 Oc t . ) .95 SS. reg. 76, 66v (21 Mar.). The medical staff was to be chosen by 'il prior del collegio delli fisici di

questa citta'.

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offered to secure the raising of 5000, but a sceptical College had cut thatfigure down and reserved the right to choose captains for it. Its trust in hisadministrative forethought, however, led on his advice to the calling up of1500 pioneers96 with a view to making field fortifications or siegeworks if thearmy were landed, together with 10,000 large baskets, including zerli, thelarge back panniers of the Veneto, so that crews could help with earth-shifting. His request for 200 masons, 50 bricklayers, 25 carpenters, 30sawyers and 12 smiths was also accepted.

In a fleet containing such an unprecedented number of troops it wasanticipated that problems of command might arise, problems, too, oftemperament and socio-cultural background due to the prolonged andenforced coexistence between the entirely Venetian leadership of the galleysand the non-Venetian leadership of the army. The importance of themilitary in the fleet had emerged very clearly from the discussions about thenaval captain-general Girolamo Zane's commission. The first draft simplysaid that before any major action was undertaken Zane should consultSforza, the two fleet proveditors and the commander of the great galleys or,in his absence, the Capitano 'in Colfo'. And this followed the normalprocedure for such commissions; they set out the command structurewithout spelling out the procedure to be adopted if there were a division ofopinion between the military and naval (that is, civilian) leadership. Thisfirst draft was amended twice to allow for differences of opinion, particularattention being paid to those that might arise between Zane and Sforza,symbols, as it were, of the princeling-condottiere and the patrician-navalstyles of life and thought upon whose co-operation Venice's fortunes nowdepended.97 The final draft provided that in case of a disagreement betweenthem the decision should go to whichever was supported by two out of theproveditors and the commander of the great galleys (or, in the absence ofone of these, the Capitano 'in Colfo').

The failure of an amphibious attack on the Turkish fortress atCastelnovo, urged in July by Sforza as a means of stimulating the army'smorale while waiting for orders at Corfu, led to some straining of therelations between him and his naval colleagues. In September, when theagonizing decision was taken not to endanger the fleet by attempting torelieve Nicosia even though its fall would thereby be inevitable, SebastianoVenier reminded Sforza that when early in the year the College had beenassured by members of the senior military command that Nicosia wasuntakable, he, Venier, had demurred. Addressed to the man whose

Divided: Friuli (216), Polesine (50), Padovano (200), Trevisano (21), Vicentino (183), Bellunese (25),Feltrino (33), Bassanese (12), Veronese (183), Colognese (25), Bresciano (336), Bergamasco (166),Cremasco (50) (ST. reg. 48, 5v; 13 Apr.).SS. reg. 76, 78-80(15 Apr.).

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sponsorship of Giulio Savorgnan's designs for Nicosia had persuaded thegovernment to adopt them, this was provocative and is a reminder that,under strain, in some members of the patriciate a distrust of the alienmilitary professional could still emerge.

The decision to withdraw for the winter until more troops could be raisedto replace the startling losses caused by disease98 and desertion (leaving onlyVenier behind in Crete to try and get a relief force to Famagosta) was,however, accepted by a council representing all the allied forces.

As reports filtered through to Venice that with Nicosia lost Famagostawas being left in isolation, a chorus of recrimination began. On 4 January1571, recording that 'from diverse sources we have come to realize the verygrave errors, defects and disorders that have occurred in the fleet, much tothe disadvantage of our state', the Senate set up a commission of threespecial Inquisitori sopra le cose delF Armata to conduct a post mortem andreport where the blame lay. They were to have full powers to investigate 'theevil practices, poor management, failings, mistakes and crimes committedby any military or naval authority of ours, sparing nobody'.99 This decisionwas confirmed by the Great Council, which voted 1229:37:68 in its favour.Because the commission had to wait for evidence from men (even corporalswere questioned) who were stationed overseas, its proceedings dragged onthroughout the year. These disgraced Zane, who had begged to be relievedof his command because of ill health and had been replaced on 10December100 by the distant and apparently heroic Venier. And theysmeared, if not enduringly damaged, the reputation of Sforza, who, afterdoing his best to organize Venier's makeshift relief force for Famagosta, hadreturned to Corfu in November.

In April 1571, ill in Zara, where he had been sent in January to advise onthe fortifications, though never formally charged with neglect of duty, hewas all too aware of the dossier of complaints against him swelling in theinquisitors' hands101 and discharged himself on 27 April of a copiousapologia.102 It had little effect. While no move was made to deprive him ofhis rank as governor-general, his function was, all the same, reduced to littlemore than that of a part-time consultant on fortifications. On 22 May thetitle of 'governor of all our infantry in the fleet' was given to the military

98 In August so many of Sforza's men had been invalided home that a temporary hospital sheltered bycanvas awnings had been set up near SS. Giovanni e Paolo (Collegio, Notatorio, reg. 38,207; 24 Aug.).

99 SM. reg. 39, 269-269V.100 His commission was not formulated until 3 Feb. 1571 (SS. reg. 77, 58V).101 E.g. Dieci, Secreta, reg. 9, 164 (30 June).102 I t w a s w r i t t e n o n h i s r e t u r n to V e n i c e . T h e ve r s ion in C a p i di G u e r r a , B a . ' p ' a p p e n d s a c o p y of a

letter from Querini to his brother-in-law which Sforza cites as representative of the slanderscirculating in the capital: it accuses him of being responsible for turning a 'gloriosa impresa' into a'vergognosa fuga'.

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governor of Corfu, Paolo Orsini. His commission clearly stated that he wassubordinate to Venier, who, with Zane disgraced, was now naval captain-general.103 Apart from six captains and fifteen lanze spezzate, Orsini hadnone of the elaborate staff that had been accorded to Sforza, and though hewas to be consulted by the command, he was to have no vote in councils ofwar;104 this year the floating army was put firmly under naval control. Andon land, in Dalmatia, routine troop management was left in the hands ofGiulio Savorgnan, and the only large-scale attack - another assault onCastelnovo in the summer of 1572 (also a failure) - was entrusted to the ex-outlaw Sciarra Martinengo, military governor of Cattaro. Once againVenice managed the major part of a war without an effective commander-in-chief.

A dogged decorum had marked the government's restriction of Sforza'sfunctions - given a warning timbre by their being defined by the Ten ratherthan the Senate105 - to the Dalmatian mainland until the end of the war. Bythe time the Council of Ten named him in March 1573 as a possiblecommander once more of the fleet's soldiery he had been officially cleared,and in April he put forward a contingency plan for the defence of Friuli andDalmatia from Turkish land attacks, commenting aggrievedly that while thedoge would be receiving advice from others' more intelligent than I ' ' no oneis better informed as to the actual state of affairs'.106 All the same, hisapplication for a renewal of contract in December 1573 as governor-generalwas passed only with 101 votes in favour as against 55 against and 20abstentions. The contract, moreover, confirmed the Senate's right toappoint someone over his head, leaving him free, if this occurred, toresign.107 And between 1575 and 1578 the College did consider such aperson, the new Duke of Urbino, Francesco Maria II della Rovere, thoughno agreement could be reached about terms.108 In 1581 Sforza's contractwas renewed for another seven years, with the same clause relating to thepossibility of the government's making a senior appointment. The votingwas, again, unenthusiastic: 132:43:35;109 but up to his death in February1585 there is no doubt that he retained the confidence of patricians directlyconcerned with military organization both on the Terraferma and da Mar.His more expensive suggestions (for instance that the standing army shouldbe increased to allow for a field force capable of harassing an invasion force

SM. reg. 40, 46 and 49 (22 and 26 May).SS. reg. 77, 90 (22 May).Died, Secreta, reg. 10, 45-45V (24 July 1572).SS. reg. 78, n6v (3 Jan.), 187-188V (28 Feb.); Capi, Died, Lettere di Condottieri, Ba. 308, n.p.;Died, Secreta, reg. 10, 104-104V (7 Mar.).SS. reg. 79, 79 (19 Dec. 1573), 90-iv (6 Feb. 1574). Terms are also in Commemoriali, 24, 65-7.Alberi, Relazioni, ser. 2, ii, 322, Matteo Zane; correspondence in Capi di Guerra, Ba. 2.SS. reg. 82, 146V-148.

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into withdrawal) were simply filed,110 but his reports on frequentinspections of Venice's whole forces at home and abroad kept thegovernment in reasonable touch with the state of its armed forces andtestified to his professional concern that Venice's troops should be no lessefficient than those of other states.

Among the candidates to replace him was Paolo Giordano Orsini. Thenaged 46, he had fought first with the French and then with the Spanish - atLepanto and with Don John of Austria at the siege of Tunis in 1573. InSpanish service, his agents pointed out, he had held a command of 17,000infantry with 'a personal guard of 300 arquebusiers, all gentlemen . . .dressed in velvet with silver and gold'. More recently, as governor-generalof the papal armies, he had inspected fortifications throughout the States ofthe Church. Personally he 'is of high spirit, sound judgement and bold in allmilitary affairs . . . extremely energetic, he remains in the saddle frommorning until evening while hunting, many times walks on foot for two orthree miles [sic], is very powerful in single combats, fighting at the barrierswith pike and sword in a manner equalled by few'. What is more, he couldraise 3000 infantry and 300 cavalry from his own estates and though on aretainer of 6000 ducats from Spain feels free to resign this if he were to serveVenice.111

Perhaps because of his claim to the highest of all ranks, captain-general,which Venice had now withheld for so long, he was passed over for hisalmost exact contemporary, Giovanbattista del Monte, a descendant of thecondottieri marquises of Monte S. Maria in Umbria. Like Orsini, he hadalso served in France and with Spain in North Africa. In 1565 he had takenpart in the siege of Malta and for sixteen years had fought as a free-lancewith the Spanish army in Flanders. In spite of this experience he camecheap, at 4000 ducats as his personal salary, and was prepared by December1586 to accept the title not of governor-general but simply of captain-general of infantry.112 As he, too, was formally in Spanish employ, he had tosend an agent to obtain Philip IPs consent, taking up duties early in 1587which he pursued, with a vigour equal to Sforza's, contract by contract untilhis death in 1614 — still with the title of captain-general of infantry.113

In 1537-40 and 1570-3 Venice had learned that wars could be fought, orat least not altogether unsuccessfully endured, without a supreme militarycommander. In 1615, entering a war of its own choosing, and one to befought on land (though with naval support), it resolved to exploit the lessons

110 Capi, Dieci, Lettere di Condottieri, Ba. 308, n.p., 1579, 'scrittura . . . difesa della terraferma'.111 Misc. Cod. 1, Storia Veneta, Ba. 142, no. 17.112 SS. reg. 85, 178V-179.113 His salary was advanced to 7000 ducats in 1603 (SS. reg. 95, 170-170V).

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of Senate and College direction and proveditor execution as never before.Military commanders there had to be: but no supremo.

For some years before his death Del Monte had been ill. As his possiblesuccessor, Duke Cosimo I of Tuscany's bastard son, Giovanni de'Medici,114 had been engaged without specific rank since 1610 on a retainerof 5000 ducats a year.115 But though required to live in Venetian territory hehad spent nearly all the intervening years in Tuscany, partly in the pursuitof a series of love affairs, partly as adviser on fortifications to the granddukes Ferdinand and Cosimo II; the chief occupation of his secretary inVenice, Cosimo Baroncelli, was to explain away these absences. These, andthe fact that for all his previous experience as a soldier in Hungary, Flandersand France he had no territories of his own whence he could extract troops,led the Senate to turn down in July 1615 the request he made, whenrenegotiating his contract at the expiry of the five years" fermo, to be madecaptain-general of infantry.116 In spite of interviews with the College, at theconclusion of one of which it was noted that' he left with expressions of greathumility, bowing so low that his right knee touched the floor',117 a newcontract was not negotiated until January 1616.118 It was for a further fiveyears plus two di rispettoy at 6000 ducats a year and with the responsibility ofraising 2000 'foreign' Italian infantry of which 1000 were called for almostat once. But again no rank was specified. It was only in the followingNovember that the Senate, at last convinced of the need for a more formalmilitary command structure, ordered him - still with no specific rank - totake command of the army in Friuli under the proveditor-general of thearmed forces and the proveditor in campo.119 This appointment was at oncegreeted with a request from Luigi d'Este, holder of one of the republic'smajor stand-by contracts, to withdraw from Venetian service.

In 1613 its terms (6000 ducats a year and a liability to produce 3000infantry ' from his own lands') had specified that he would not have to obeythe orders of other military leaders but only those of public representatives,that is, proveditors.120 Attempts to get him to withdraw his resignationbegan with references to Giovanni's age and experience and appeals toLuigi's noble sense of responsibility to the public good and ended, in July1617, with a donation of 3000 ducats and the title' governor-general of men-at-arms, cuirassiers and all other Italian cavalry' for the duration. In114 G. S. Picenardi, 'Don Giovanni de' Medici, governatore dell'esercito veneto nel Friuli

(1565-1612)', NAV., ser. i, xiii (1907) pt 1, 104-42, pt 2, 94-136.115 SS. reg. 100, 107 (24 Sept.).116 SS. reg. 105, I39-I39V (14 July).117 Esposizioni Principi, reg. 27, 39V-40 (18 July 1615).118 SS. reg. 105, 275V-276 (9 Jan.).119 SS. reg. 108, 22V (11 Nov.).120 SS. reg. 102, 180-180V (22 Feb.).

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councils of war he was to rank immediately after Giovanni de' Medici.121

This promotion was not accompanied by any redefinition of the rank ofFrancesco Martinengo, whose appointment in April 1616 as captain-generalof light cavalry had also specified that he would accept orders only frompublic representatives,122 and it merely confirmed Ferdinando Scotto aslieutenant of light cavalry without defining his immediate commander.

The early stages of the campaign had been directed from November 1615by the Genoese Pompeo Giustinian. A cultivated veteran of the War of1570-3 and of Flanders,123 where he had lost a forearm whose artificialreplacement gave him the nickname 'iron arm' (braccio di ferro), seniorrepresentative of a family who had raised Ligurian and Corsican troops forVenice throughout the century and employed by the republic as governor-general in Crete from April 1614,124 he was named 'superintendent-generalof all infantry and cavalry'.125 The title implied no more than the overalldirection of a strategy determined by public representatives, at that time bythe Lieutenant of Friuli and the Proveditor-General of Palma, and as thearmy filled up with captains and colonels bringing men loyal primarily tothemselves, Giustinian's executive authority was progressively diluted. InMarch 1616, for instance, the decision to call off the siege of Gradisca for thetime being was based on advice from him and seven other officers.126 Andwhile individual infantry captains and condottieri were expected by theSenate to obey his command, it was made clear that this was because ' he isthe executor of our orders'.127 In May, in order to placate his growingresentment, the Senate offered him the rank of maestro di camp0 generate. If,he replied, this rank actually carried the authority it does among otherprinces, I would accept it. But as you intend it as a device 'to remove suchauthority and rank as I possessed at the beginning of this campaign' I mustrespectfully beg leave to return to my home.128 Shortly afterwards he waskilled in action.129

The command structure was, indeed, coming to look increasingly like amosaic and less like a hierarchy. Horatio Baglione was given the command(though only as superintendent) of infantry who did not arrive undercommands of their own.130 Antonio Savorgnan commanded the militia units

121 SS. reg. 109, 278V (17 July).122 SS. reg. 106, 171-171V (24 Apr.).123 Pompeo Giustinian, De/Ie guerre di Fiandra libri VI (Antwerp, 1609).124 SS. reg. 104, 13-13V (12 Apr.).125 ST. reg. 85, 171 (28 Nov. 1615).126 p r o v v Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 52, 28 Mar. 1616.127 SS. reg. 105, 243-4V (18 Dec. 1615).128 Capi di Guerra, Ba. 3 (5 May 1616).129 Romanin, vii, bk 15, 109.130 SS. reg. 105, 290-1 (22 Jan. 1616).

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from Friuli.131 The gunners - even when used as musketeers - were underthe command of the general of artillery, Ferrante de' Rossi, who took ordersonly from public representatives.132 It was to rationalize this structure thatGiovanni de' Medici had been promoted, but such authority as was inpractice accorded him was at once reduced on the arrival with his Dutchreinforcements of John Ernest of Nassau, who refused to accept it. Here wehave a large body of well-trained and fit men, the Senate complained inApril 1617, who have come thousands of miles at great risk and vast cost andnow stand idle 'solely on account of trivial points of honour'.133 Bickeringcontinued until July, when John Ernest threatened to resign, ostensiblybecause his troops were getting insufficient medical attention.134 Thereafterthe two men coexisted largely by keeping out of one another's way. Themajor complaints of those who wanted a more vigorous prosecution of thewar, especially a massed encirclement of and assault on Gradisca - thattroops were kept in scattered garrisons over too long a front, and that toomuch time was spent in idleness135 - arose at least in part from rivalries anduncertainties within the military command.

No such uncertainty attended the structure of civilian command. Fromthe appointment of a proveditor-general of the armed forces it was he whowas the unchallenged 'capo superiore et principale' over all theatres of warwith' the command', as Priuli's commission had it,' in the hands of your solejurisdiction'. War councils were to comprise him, the two proveditors incampo and the proveditor of Croat and Albanian horse, together with (inMay 1616) the following senior officers: Luigi d'Este, Giustinian, Mar-tinengo and De' Rossi and others Priuli might choose to invite. Thedecisions arising from them, however, were to be made by Priuli and theproveditors in campo only, with at least one of the latter supporting Priuli'sviewpoint.136

It was not until Don Giovanni was appointed commander-in-chief that amilitary leader was granted precedence in councils of war over even simpleproveditors. In January 1617 the order of rank was spelled out as:proveditor-general of the armed forces (Lando), Don Giovanni, the twoproveditors in campo, the proveditor of horse, the commissary andpaymaster (according to their ages), such captains as Lando wished toattend. The final decision, however, still lay with Lando and his two seniorassociates and, as formerly, the Senate repeated to Lando what it had said to

ST. reg. 85, 231 (7 Jan. 1616).SS. reg. 106, 171V-172 (26 Apr. 1616).SS. reg. 109, 97-97V (20 Apr.).Ibid., 305-305V (28 July).E.g. Cozzi, Contarini, 163-4.

6 SS. reg. 106, 193-5V (6 May 1616), 213-16V (14 May).

Part II: 150Q-1617

Priuli: 'the command in the field is in your sole jurisdiction'.137 Themilitary, in fact, advised and executed but it did not decide. It was not a rolethat came easily to commanders who had not abided by it previously, not toJohn Ernest, nor to Giovanni de' Medici. By August relations betweencivilians and senior officers were almost as bad as those between the latter.You must, Lando was told, prevent decisions being taken in the council ofwar itself. That is solely for you and your colleagues. But afterwards youmust make much of the qualities and experience Don Giovanni brings tobear on their execution, being careful to remain as far as you can in hispresence when he is passing his orders to other senior officers lest yourintention become altered. The exercise of your authority requires muchtact. But if you do not exert i t ' and the present instability, irresolution andweakness of purpose continues, we can see the increase of difficulties anddangers that will lead to the complete break-up of the army'.138

For while the lack of a military leader of unchallenged loyalty, skill andpersonal following (such as Venice had never had since Francesco Mariadella Rovere) led to the civilian field command being given an un-precedented power, that power, being unprecedented (though modelled onnaval practice), was sapped by a similarly unprecedented degree ofsenatorial supervision. From the early Cinquecento, the conduct of war hadbeen progressively pulled back into the ruling group within the patriciate asa whole. And if, like previous wars, that of Gradisca petered out rather thanending in a formal victory, at least it realized the aim that group had setitself.

137 SS. reg. 108, 188-90 (21 Jan.).138 SS. reg. 109, 136-136V (3 Aug.).

3 1 2

1 2

Manpower

(i) FOREIGNERS

Among the many myths of Venice was that of a commercial governing classactive at sea but passive, to the point of craven pacificity, on land. TheTerraferma had been won by the hired help of mercenaries whose success,as Machiavelli put it, constituted a miracle; the Venetians' subsequent defeatat Agnadello was the result, he claimed, of 'their miserable baseness ofspirit, caused by a wretched military system'.1 The allies of Cambrai put itabout in 1509 that 'the Venetians would have to return to their original jobsas fishermen, for they were not worthy to rule a state and an empire',2 a gibeechoed in the contemptuous tirade Henry VIII addressed to the Venetianambassador in 1516: 'Vos estis piscatores.'3 The view was fostered by theVenetians themselves. The bitterness of defeat led Girolamo Priuli to reflectthat the Venetians had become better at thinking than acting; emasculatedby peace and prosperity they had left the defence of the fatherland toforeigners who had no concern beyond their pay.4 In the flush of victory,with the Terraferma regained in 1517, a party of patricians bragged to theTurks' ambassador (who had compared their military system unfavourablywith his own) that 'in the recent cruel war, in which all the monarchs of theworld were ranged against us, not one man in this city was killed; all wasdone with money and at the cost of foreign soldiers' lives'.5 This connivancein projecting a pacific image was later confirmed by the most influential of allcontributions to the mature Myth of Venice, Gasparo Contarini's Demagistratibus et re public a Venetorum.6 Had Venetian patricians wished toqualify for army commands (as opposed to naval ones), he pointed out, theirprolonged absence from the capital would have led to a division ofexperience and interest that could have led to faction, even civil war.Dependence on foreign mercenaries was thus the carefully calculated price

1 His opinions are discussed in Cervelli, Machiavelli, esp. 68-80, 334-5.2 Priuli, iv, 424.3 Sanuto, xxii, 163.4 Priuli, iv, 24.5 Sanuto, xxv, 72-3.6 Written 1523-31; published (Venice) in 1543.

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of political stability. And this view, in support of their stance as peacefulneutrals, was repeated by other Venetians throughout the Cinquecento; thepatrician was not militaristic: responsive to his Christian duty to repel theTurk at sea he was nonetheless basically a statesman, a merchant and apatron of Church and learning. When Venice's self-generated image cameto be reflected in the work of foreign commentators, they too stressed thepacific nature of the patriciate and their fastidious reliance on mercenaries.This was the view of the Frenchman Bodin7 and the Piedmontese Botero,8and was expressed by Contarini's English translator Lewes Lewkenor in hisquestion 'what is there that can carrie a greater disproportion with commonrules of experience, than that unweaponed men in gownes should with suchhappiness of successe give direction and law to many mightie and warlikearmies? '9

The view has, like other aspects of the Myth, a core of truth. We have seenthat as military proveditors in the field, patricians were (in the main)personally brave, and had a remarkable knack of co-operating harmoniouslywith professional soldiers. As a class, the knowledge they brought to thedirection of campaigns was not inferior to that shown by other governments.All the same, in spite of its precocious establishment of a standing army inthe fifteenth century10 and of a 20,000-strong militia from the earlysixteenth, Venice did depend on mercenaries to constitute by far the greaterpart of its forces in time of crisis or actual war. But who, how many, and howreliable were they? What part did their availability play not only in war, butin the planning of foreign policy and - through Venice's attitude to themilitary potential of its own subjects - in the relationship between capitaland empire?

The defeat at Agnadello and the subsequent flight of some 15,000 of therepublic's troops led to an initial challenging of the whole military system ofthe republic. The permanent core of the army, the patrician diaristGirolamo Priuli sourly noted in June, comprised men who had beendrawing their pay and doing very little to earn it for twenty, forty, eveneighty years, 'flattered, honoured and rewarded - only to scatter likechildren or women when put to the test'. As for the rest, 'it should be bornein mind that strangers and foreigners are not so loyal and determined indefending the cities and territories of others as are those who have their ownchildren, wives, country and careers at stake'.11 But this reaction was purelytemporary. The successful recovery of the Terraferma by 1517 was a clear

7 Six Books of the Commonwealth, tr. M. J. Tooley (Oxford, 1955) 171.8 Relatione della republica venetiana (Venice, 1605) 48V, 85-6V, 93-93v.9 Sig. A3.

10 Mallett, 'Venice and its condottieri', and above, 28 seq.11 Priuli, iv, 54, 42.

3H

Manpower

argument against change, and in the intervening years only one debate in theCollege raised a note of doubt. This was in June 1515, when the wisdom wasquestioned of trusting ' an army composed of so many nations' against theFrench, 'who all speak a common tongue'.12

Two predominantly peaceful generations in a land fertile and notoverpopulated meant that Venice could not reckon on a poor and restlesspopulation eager to take long-term risks for pay - apart, that is, from thefrontier valleys in the north and in Friuli. When mobilizing in January 1509,the Senate had recorded that' suitable and experienced foot soldiers' wouldhave to be raised by 'foreign' Italian captains from their own lands 'as wehave come to know very clearly that we cannot find men fit for our needs inour own towns and territories in Lombardy \13 Such a captain was Dionysiodi Naldo, 'a man of great valour', wrote Luigi da Porto, 'though of humblebirth, and favoured by the Venetians because of the large number of infantryhe and his brother Cardino could bring from Romagna'.14 The argumentbecame all the stronger with much of the Terraferma under foreignoccupation. Moreover, the multi-generational military families of theVeneto, Avogadro, Collalto, Martinengo and the like, were cavalrymen. Forthe infantry, especially for companies of any size, recruiting power andmilitary experience had to be sought elsewhere.

Among 'foreign' Italians with professional experience and the ability tobring at least a nucleus of tenants and other fellow countrymen with them,Venetian service attracted captains of infantry from Piedmont to Calabria,from Alessandria and Pavia through Bologna, Siena and Perugia to Naples,from Genoa through Parma across to Faenza and Pesaro. Some wereTuscans, from Prato, Pisa, Pistoia and Cortona, but the greatest numbercame from the traditional recruiting grounds used by all the Italian majorpowers, the Marche, Romagna and Umbria. Venice also drew captains andmen increasingly as the wars wore on from Corsica, building up among these'gallant men', as Venice's commander-in-chief the Duke of Urbinodescribed them in 1525,15 father-to-son loyalties as in Dalmatia andAlbania.

With regard to the Swiss, the most famous of European foot soldiers,Venice was in competition with, and at times blocked by, the cantons' treatyobligations, particularly to France and the papacy. It was not until 1512 thatthe republic was able to engage more than the odd free-lance company ofsome 300 men. In that year agents from the twelve confederate cantons andthe 'leagues' loosely associated with them brought shopping lists to Venice,

12 Sanuto, xx, 241.13 SS. reg. 41, 131V.14 Letterc storiche, 41-2; see also 177.15 Sanuto, xl, 109.

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varying from Bern's capacity to deliver 20,000 men to the 1000 availablefrom Zug and Basel. It is not clear how many were bought, though the bill,66,899 ducats, was heavy.16 The next bulk hiring came in 1526 and 1527,when Venice was responsible for paying half of the League of Cognac's13,000 Swiss. Left to its own initiative, the republic employed fewerthereafter: 700 in 1528, 1930 in 1529.17 The hiring arrangements, thanks toVenetian chancery secretaries in Switzerland and the cantonal agents inVenice, were straightforward. Tactical command was eased by theinterpreters who accompanied the troops (paid by Venice at the stiff rate of20 ducats per pay). Bravery and discipline in action were not questioned. Itwas the insistence on payment before results, impatience with the Italianmethod of varying the number of days in each 'month' and insistence on anexaggerated number of dead pays18 that tempered Venetian enthusiasm andmade the republic prefer Cisalpine troops.

All the same, a connection was established from 1521 with Graubiinden(Grisons) that was to remain a Venetian special relationship north of the Alpsfor the next hundred years. Graubiinden was not part of the SwissConfederation and its troops could be hired even when the Confederationwas bound by treaty. In 1527 there were 1700 with the Venetian army.19 It istrue that they were no less insistent on the notion that a month's pay shouldbe handed over every thirty days than the other Swiss, and were the cause onone occasion, in 1528, of a bloody affray between Grison officers and theDuke of Urbino's staff when pay was not forthcoming,20 but the Grisonconnection was to rival the Corsican in providing Venice with a steady andconveniently situated source of manpower outside its own dominations.

German Landsknechts were also employed at intervals from 1509, alwayson a non-political basis and somewhat casually, as when an individualcaptain offered his services, or when, as in 1526, a band of 1000 turned up inLombardy having sold their equipment, even to their famous pikes, andwere delighted to be re-armed and engaged by Venice.21 Their numbersseldom rose above 1000. On a similar basis, regardless of the political stanceof the moment, Venice employed wandering companies of French andSpanish troops who had been turned off or had deserted from their ownarmies or had simply come in search of an occupation. Their quantity couldvary from a few individuals to really sizeable contingents: some 600016 Ibid., xiv, 46, 528-9; xv, 444.17 Ibid., xlvii, 333; 1, 522-3.18 Ibid., xlii, 523,423. Wages calculated for but not allocated to actual soldiers were known as dead pays;

the intention was to create a bonus fund to allocate to outstanding men. Too often it was simplypocketed by the contractor or captain.

19 Ibid., xlv, 240-4.20 Ibid., xlix, 36-42.21 Ibid., xlii, 285.

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French 'adventurers' (venturieri) and 1849 Spaniards in 1517; oddcolleagues, but hired as much to keep them out of other armies or fromliving off the Terraferma as to make up numbers.22

Nor does the Noah's Ark quality (a phrase applied by Sanuto to theenemy army besieging Padua in 1509) stop here. Apart from restlessindividuals who turned up from as far afield as Flanders, Venice recruitedlight cavalry captains and men from the buffer areas between its ownterritories and those directly controlled by the Turks in Dalmatia,employing the Vaivod Cosul Starbach and Count Giovanni of Corbavia,from the hinterlands of Sibenico and Zara,23 and Bot Andreas and the son ofCount Bernardino de Frangipani whose chaotic dominions stretched eastand north of Segna.24 More important were contracts with successiveSanjaks of Bosnia for supplies of the Croatian light horsemen (Crovati) whowere used regularly to supplement the companies of stradiots.25 Theattempt to attract 1000 horsemen from Hungary in 1509 seems to havefailed, though individuals turned up as volunteers, but detachments fromBohemia arrived - to be praised, in contrast to Italians, as 'valiant men whoare content with black bread' - in sufficient numbers for Venice to becharged by the papacy with employing heretics.26

A graver charge was the employment of actual Infidels. Recruitment inBosnia and Croatia involved traffic with a doctrinal no man's land, a zonewhere conformity to the faiths either of Christianity or of Mohammedanismwas often shallow or uncertain. When captains, however scimitared andturbaned, arrived with the assurance that they and their men wereChristians, or converts to Christianity, they were given the benefit of thedoubt. It was a different matter when Venice decided to negotiate directlywith the sultan. Faced in 1509 by the full implications of the enormouslosses to her army caused by capture, desertion and the occupation of theTerraferma, Venice was desperate enough 'to try poison as the last remedy',as Priuli put it, and there were inconclusive discussions in the College andSenate on sounding out the sultan's advisers as to the possibility of hiringTurkish cavalry - a force of 15-20,000 was being mentioned in July.27

As usual, secrecy was imposed, but by August the possibility of a militaryalliance with the Turks was being discussed publicly, and favourably - evenmore so when in October, with Venice once more filled with refugees from

Ibid., xxiii, 463-4; SS. reg. 44, 31 (16 June 1511).Commemoriali, 20,24 Aug. 1512,2O3v-2i4and 24 Feb. 1513; SS. reg. 48,7 and 1 i2v; reg. 50 (19 Jan.1524)-SS. reg. 41, 139 (30 Jan. 1509).Ibid., 182 (18 May 1509); ST. reg. 18, 56V (22 Jan. 1513).SS. reg. 41, 145 (22 Feb. 1509).Sanuto, viii, 284, 509, 512, 548, 555; Priuli, iv, 187-8.

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the mainland and the city itself feeling isolated from the possibility of relief,debate was intensified, and Priuli summarized the issues underlying it. TheTurks were the only source of aid on the scale needed. But once introduced,how were they to be got rid of? Then there was the question of conscience: ifthe Turks got out of control, as they very well could with their enormousresources, how, with Rome taken and Christianity overwhelmed, would theVenetian face God after death? With the break-up of the Cambrai Leaguestill at least a possibility, would not the calling in of the Turk, and thecomplete destruction of Venice's image as the main defender of Chris-tianity, be as though a man were to cut off his penis to spite his wife?28

In spite of this sobering reflection, it was decided to press negotiationswith Constantinople. They continued into the following year,29 becominglittle more than a reverberation of the shocking vision of isolation thatfollowed Agnadello. What did happen was that Venice employed smallbands of the sultan's Balkan subjects who came as volunteers30 or wereenlisted by agents of men like the Count of Corbavia, and whose receptionshowed what might have happened had Venice imported large numbersthrough a formal agreement with Constantinople. They were ostracized bytheir colleagues in camp, accused of every crime from theft to homosexualassault and the conversion of small boys prior to smuggling them out ofVenice.31 Prisoners believed to be 'Turks' (though the word was used ofresidents in lands vaguely known to be under Turkish rule as well as foradherents of the Moslem faith) were killed without being allowed recourseto ransom. Not surprisingly, the ioo-odd 'Turks' serving in 1510 graduallymelted away.

Such were the expedients whereby Venice supplemented the number ofits permanent infantry force on the mainland (about 2000) together with thelong-term contracts whereby they could be inflated on a reliable basis (byabout a further 6000) with other non-Venetian Italian troops. Between 1509and the peace settlement at Bologna in 1529 there were only three years(1518-20) in which the republic's commitment to raise troops either for therecovery of its Terraferma or to fulfil treaty obligations to its allies did notmean obtaining a force in excess of 8000. Quite apart from the cost, theadministrative effort involved in raising the balance, and the waste,confusion and command problems endemic to Noah's Ark armies helped tosteady Venice on the course the republic was to adopt for the rest of itsindependent existence: the sacrifice of the aspiration to control ports southof the Po and in Apulia; the adoption of a neutralist posture; a more

28 Priuli, iv, 397-8.29 Sanuto, x, 355.30 E .g . D iec i , M i s t i , reg. 35 , 64V (28 Ju ly 1512).31 Da Porto, 297; Sanuto, xi, 561. The subject is discussed in P. Preto, Venezia e i Turchi.

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pertinacious diplomacy which could seed the storm clouds of war beforethey burst over Venetian territory.

The Turkish War of 1537-40 threw little new light on the problems ofrecruitment. Deeply suspicious of its allies and reluctant to impose a fullwartime tax burden on subjects still recovering from demands that hadended less than ten years before, Venice rilled the military quotas it owed tothe Holy League grudgingly and incompletely. Altogether some 24,225 newItalian troops, nearly all infantry, were contracted for.32 Though thenumbers who actually turned up were, as always, below contractualstrength, the pool of recruits was adequate. The only major problemencountered concerned a force of 5000 Landsknechts. They were called forby the league. Moreover, when Venice negotiated for them in April 1538with Duke Ludwig of Bavaria, they were needed to counter a Turkish threatto Friuli. The contract required their presence in the Terraferma early inMay. By the end of that month, when they were still at their recruitmentcentre, Augsburg, the threat to Friuli seemed to have faded. Venice nowwanted to switch them to the fleet. They refused to serve at sea and tooktheir time to consider whether they would even consent to be transported,with arms folded, in order to serve in Dalmatia. Early in June, as Venicedetermined to dismiss them, the Landsknechts marched towards Friuli,resolved to serve where they had been hired to serve, whether there was anenemy there or not, unless they were given three pays. The Senate hastilycalled up cavalry units from Padua and Castelfranco and an infantry forcethat had been raised to serve with the Landsknechts - to stop them atChiusa. And there, after some chaffering, they settled for one and a half paysand went home.33

Recruiting in Italy had been favoured by three factors, all of which wereweakened during the generation that followed the Peace of 1540. TheSpanish alliance had meant that troops could be sought not, it is true, inMilan and Naples, where Spain's own recruiters operated, but in the areaswithin Spanish influence, Tuscany and Liguria. This facility becameuncertain with the peace. So did the possibility of recruiting in the States ofthe Church, especially as papal-Venetian relations worsened. Finally, aslong as Francesco Maria della Rovere was Venice's captain-general, one ofthe richest sources of troops of all, the lands of Urbino, had been at therepublic's disposal. On his death in 1538, however, this situation — thoughprolonged by his successor Guidobaldo II until the end of the war -changed. Though Guidobaldo's secretary, as we have seen, emphas-ized his ability to provide 'thousands of experienced soldiers',34 Venice

32 SS. and SM. regs. passim; and Bernardo Navagero (above, 227 n. 7).33 SS. reg. 59, 25 seq.; Collegio, Notatorio, reg. 23, 131; Predelli, vi, 233.34 A b o v e , 3 0 1 .

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feared his vulnerability to Pope Paul Ill's territorial ambitions and post-poned until 1546 his promotion to command rank. In 1553 he resigned inorder to protect himself by entering papal service and he accepted a Spanishpension. With this record, Venice rejected his renewed advances in 1564.35

The arguments for his engagement he put forward were not, however, adistortion of Venice's position.

Both he and his subjects, he explained, would prefer Venetian toSpanish-Austrian service.36 Indeed, at this very minute, prayers were beingoffered up in all the churches of his duchy that his approaches would bewelcomed by the Signoria. That duchy could produce 10,000 infantry, 'thebest, most disciplined and obedient that exist in Italy today'. And theycould be moved quickly to Venice by sea. Look around, he told MarinCavalli, who interviewed him in Venice, and where else will you recruit somany troops of this quality? In case of war with the house of Austria itssubjects would be forbidden to serve you, including those who asindividuals do so now. The pope's subjects obey him, and he does what he istold to by Spain. You have good principal officers but they are men of littleimportance and a trivial following. What men Sforza Pallavicino could raisewould be blocked by their overlord the Duke of Parma, who is in theSpanish camp. Giordano Orsini could only smuggle a few men from hisestates in the Marche, if they were prepared to defy the pope. Beyond theAlps? The Swiss mutiny if they are not paid every thirty days and 'it iscommon knowledge, based on experience, that they sell their employers andtheir fortresses for cash'. Besides, they are only effective in an open battlethat happens to suit their methods. The Grisons - you know howuntrustworthy they are. So be advised (he went on), do not force Urbino toclose the ring: Mantua, Ferrara, Parma, Florence, Milan and the wholeAustrian length of your northern frontier. Keep open the way south!

Two years previously, in a eulogy of the Venetians, an eloquent Bresciandeclared that' no princes or cavalierly however distinguished, scorn to servethem; indeed, they often compete with one another for positions underthem'.37 But like the content of most eulogies, this generalized from thepast. Though no mobilization to meet a crisis had fully tested its militaryresources, the patriciate was aware that the general Italian peace settlementof Cateau-Cambresis of 1559 and the shadow of the raised wing of Spanishpower over the peninsula as a whole had created a mood of wary control overthe market in troops.

35 Venice did offer a junior command to his son; this was rejected on the grounds of the divided loyaltiesthat might ensue. Collegio, Esposizioni Principi, reg. i, 101-2.

36 Ibid., 97-8.37 Discorso del magnifico signore Ugoni gentilhuomo Bresciano della dignitd et eccelenza della gran citta di

Venetia (Venice, 1562) 13.

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In 1567, reporting on his term of office as Podesta in Brescia, FrancescoTagliapietra pointed out that 'in the city there are many valorous youngmen and honourable cavalierly many of whom have served in wars underother princes. They are all most eager to serve Your Serenity and might bemore appropriate to this state than foreigners, because in serving their ownprince they protect their own goods, liberty, their dear children and theirlives. I believe that this would be of the greatest advantage'.38

Venice's condottieri were, in fact, still predominantly subjects of theTerraferma. Of the cavalry captains employed in this period thirteen wereVenetian subjects (Avogadro, Brandolini, Capodilista, Capra, Collalto,Martinengo, Pompeo, Porcellaga, Porcia, Da Porto, Sanbonifacio, Savor-gnan, Soardi) and seven were from other parts of central and northern Italy(Baglione, Malatesta, Manfroni, Orsini, Pallavicino, Pepoli, Scotto). Tojudge from names that include place names, their men were divided in aboutthe same proportion. On the other hand, fewer captains of light cavalry andvery few infantry captains with contracts of any significance were Venetiansubjects. There were two main reasons for this. The more important was theemployment in peacetime of captains who could raise additional numbers,possibly very large numbers, at a time of crisis or war. This did not apply tothe men-at-arms, where numbers did not vary between peace and war. Itapplied slightly more to the light cavalry. It applied overwhelmingly to theinfantry; the Veneto was not a good source of supply for troops; it was on thewhole settled and prosperous enough to make soldiering unattractive. Thegovernment, moreover, required a large reserve of manpower for militia,naval and pioneer service. The second reason was that the infantry inpeacetime were there as much to guard artillery and munitions and helppreserve law and order as to dissuade a formally composed army frominvading, and Venice believed that the best policemen were men free fromdomestic ties. (There was, however, no rule against natives serving in thepermanent infantry and many did, though they formed only a smallproportion of the whole.) A third may be added. Venice could not afford tobe flexible in its contracts because of the tradition whereby loyalty wasencouraged by allowing sons and nephews to succeed to the commands ofcaptains, of whatever origins, who had given good service. Though inSeptember 1559 the Senate had to forbid the granting of expectancies tocommands unless passed by a majority of the whole College and of three-quarters of the Senate,39 along with the granting of pensions to agedservicemen or their families this was part of a calculated but unreviewed

C. Pasero (ed.), Relazioni di rettori veneti a Brescia durante il secolo XVI (Toscolano, 1939) 102.1 ST. reg. 47, 42-42V.

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policy to keep the lines of communication open to recruiting centres outsidethe Terraferma.

By the end of the fifties, however, doubts were felt about the recruitingcapacity of the standing force's colonels and captains, and early in 1560negotiations began to ensure the service, when an emergency justified it, of aregiment of Grisons and another of Swiss from other cantons. By Junecontracts had been exchanged with Colonel Hercule de Salis (or Salice)40 forthe former and with Cavalier Melchior Lusi of Unterwalden for the latter.These were the contracts scorned by the Duke of Urbino. Lusi's grantedhim 1200 ducats a year and it was his responsibility to ensure that twelveSwiss captains were always ready to raise troops when Venice called forthem: 3600 in twelve companies (insegne) of 300.41 These were stand-bycontracts, fairly long-term, four years fermo plus two di rispetto, and cheap atthe price - which included the scepticism of others besides the Duke ofUrbino. Returning from a tour of inspection as Proveditor-General inTerraferma in 1568, Alvise Mocenigo warned the government of theimportance of cherishing and training the militia, 'because of the very greatdifficulty, almost the impossibility of raising infantry in Italy - and,perhaps, out of Italy'.42

The only significant contingents enlisted outside Italy for garrison dutywere, in fact, the by now familiar Corsicans. The non-Venetian Italianrankers were those who at any time drifted across frontiers in search ofsomething securer or more interesting than their homes could provide.Their slovenliness and indiscipline were a matter of steady complaint. Butthese were blinked at. None of the warning signs that in a time of crisisinfantry would be hard to find was heeded. No attempt was made to enlistVenetian rural subjects. The republic's posture in the Terraferma was oneof command, yet in manner it relied heavily on persuasion. The pool ofmilitary talent in the cities was large and potentially valuable. But whileVenice wanted men who would be tigers in war it wanted subjects whowould be law-abiding lambs in peace.

The next wartime test of recruiting came with the Turkish War of1570-3. Within a month of the government's declaration in March 1570 thata state of war (rather than yet another threat of it) existed, 46 offers to raisebetween 1000 and 5000 men and 65 to produce between 300 and 500 hadbeen received. Together with individuals volunteering to serve and bringsmaller groups, these offers promised (on paper) an army of around 109,000

40 Predel l i , vi, 297.41 S S . reg. 72, 8 v - g (27 Apr . ) , 58 (17 June ) . Sources relating to Grisons and Swiss negotiat ions are

calendared in V. Ceresole, La Republique de Venise et les Suisses (Venice, 1864).42 Misc. Cod., ser. 1, Storia Veneta, 123, i n .

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men, nearly all infantry. All those seeking contracts were Italians, a minorityfrom the Terraferma, the great majority men who already held, or had heldor whose families had held Venetian contracts.43 But after a preliminarysorting out by the College only offers amounting to 11,800 men werethought reliable enough to confirm in order to hurry an armed force into thefleet in April.44 Indeed, though other bids were made and sought during thewar the total of new troops raised was only some 62,000 men.45 Apart fromVenice's borrowing 2-3,000 Spaniards from Don John of Austria to makeup numbers in the fleet that sailed to Lepanto, Corsicans and Savoyardscomposed the only significant non-Italian element. All Italian contractswere for men 'from outside our own domains', though the government alsowelcomed individual volunteers from among its own subjects, andstimulated them by offering tax exemptions, the suspension of legalproceedings in which they might be involved, and the suspension (with theprobability, if not the promise, of pardon) of sentences of banishment evenfor grave crimes.

Once more, as in 1537-40, thanks to alliance with Spain and the papacy ina war recognized by the Italian states as one to be supported on ideological ifnot self-interested grounds, recruiters could cast their nets widely. Troopswere raised in Liguria and Tuscany, the Mantovano and Ferrarese,Romagna and the Marche and (with grudging Spanish consent) in theKingdom of Naples and Sicily.

The problem was not so much one of numbers but of quality, thoughthese were connected: new troops had constantly to be raised to replaceabsentees, deserters and those whose inexperience contributed to appallinglosses at sea or in the hard conditions of garrison life in Dalmatia. Therewere ceaseless complaints of companies arriving under strength andconsisting of 'abject and useless' men led by captains 'who cannot betrusted to undertake any enterprise'.46 Service in the fleet and overseas wasknown to involve high casualties, even if these were chiefly from disease.The Turk was still a foe especially fearful: not so much in battle but for aprisoner. Venice raised its rates of pay with this in mind. But the chiefcontract-holders, however professional, gallant and trustworthy, wereforced to employ company captains who were interested only in making aprofit and avoiding risk. It is enough to recall the infantry captains in thefleet in the winter of 1570-1 who were asked to volunteer to help break the

43 S T . reg. 48 passim; Collegio, Nota tor io , reg. 38 passim; Annali , s.a., 61-4 ; BCV. , ms . Gradenigo 187,93-93V-

44 S M . reg. 39, 149V (4 Apr . ) .45 Senate regs. passim.46 E.g. S M . reg. 40, 6 iv and SS . reg. 77, 8 iv .

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Turkish siege of Famagosta and who all refused 'claiming that they hadbeen engaged to serve in the fleet and not in Cyprus'.47 As for the men, thewidely experienced commander Giulio Savorgnan summed up in 1572 hisimpression of them by asking why Italians enlisted. 'To escape' - heanswered himself - ' from being craftsmen, working in a shop; to avoid acriminal sentence; to see new things; to pursue honour (but these last arevery few). The rest join in the hope of having enough to live on and a bit overfor shoes and some other trifle to make life supportable.'48 He might haveadded that the eloquence of the recruiters' drums in the previous two yearshad been aided by the desperation caused by disastrous harvests; some 80%of those who joined up in 1571 had to be completely equipped by thegovernment.

If the political lesson of the war was that allies were not to be trusted,logistically it was that even when most of Italy was open to the recruiter thetroops garnered were expensive, inexperienced and unreliable. Of coursethere were exceptions; individuals of experience and courage, whole unitswhich, at least at sea (on galleys whence there was no retreat), showeddiscipline and daring. But 'foreign' Italy, despite the large numbers of menpromised and the smaller, though not unimpressive, number actuallyrecruited, was not a dependable source. Neither was the real foreigner.

As Melchior Lusi had been on a stand-by contract since 1560 which wasrenewed in 1565 and 1571 it may seem strange that the government had notturned to him before and did not ask now for a larger number of troops. Thecontract of 1571 obliged Lusi to provide up to 6500 men, but on unusuallyprecise conditions.49 Once mustered they were guaranteed three pays, evenif dismissed almost at once. Also, 'if they are engaged in battle and, withdivine aid, obtain a victory' they were to have an extra pay. If forced toentrench themselves they were to be paid more after two days' digging. Inthe field, they were always to be provided with cavalry cover and a protectiveartillery train. They could be required to go to garrisons overseas but couldnot be ordered to fight at sea, nor to take part in the conduct of sieges. Theseconditions made them more or less useless in a naval and amphibious war.When Lusi wrote to congratulate the doge on the victory of Lepanto andoffer his services the Senate replied with a polite refusal.50 The engagementof some of his troops in February 1573 merely reflects the government'sdesperate shortage of oarsmen. After exhausting all other sources, theSenate approached Lusi for 1200 but he would only agree on condition that

47 A b o v e , 235 .48 E . Salaris (ed.) , Relazione di Giulio Savorgnan a" Osoppo capitano delle milizie venete sulla difesa di Zara

(Venice, 1909).49 S S . reg. 77, 101-3 (7 J u n e 1571).50 S S . reg. 78, 58V-59.

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he supplied as many troops. Forced to accept, the Senate resignedlyallocated them to garrisons in the Terraferma, where they were all the idlerbecause, not speaking Italian, they could not be put on sentinel duty.51

The War of 1570-3, then, reinforced Venice's determination to remainneutral on the basis of a renewed programme of refortification, a largerpermanent army (by land and sea) of, in intention, at least, 9-10,000 troopsbacked by a further 10,000 on stand-by contracts, and a native militia takenmore seriously than ever as a breach-filler until the contract troops could bebrought in. Never before was foreign policy so closely to reflect the logisticalimperative.

Though Venice was not involved in another war until 1615, theintervening years were distracted by crises. In 1583 the doge noted that thepope would not allow recruiting in his states. Neither would the GrandDuke of Tuscany. The Duke of Urbino (Guidobaldo II) had been forced toaccept a Spanish stipend. 'Thus if an emergency presented itself, we couldnot be certain of raising a significant number of troops.' And he concludedthat on these grounds alone 'it would be wise to stay on terms of amity withall the princes of Christendom . . . and to let this be known to the Turks, sothat respecting the Spaniards they will also respect us, and ars deluditurarte\52 In that year, of some 7000 permanent infantry the great majority,4500, were in garrison overseas to man fortifications and absorb the firstshock of any new attack from the Turks.53 This imbalance made thepracticality of the contracts designed to raise 10,000 'extraordinary'infantry for the defence of the Terraferma all the more important. And thesebecame less and less trustworthy. Asking for one in 1573 Count Camillo diCorreggio had enclosed a testimonial saying that 'the count can be looked onas an absolute ruler, that is, as one having no obligation to recognize theauthority of any prince . . . As cavaliere and count he can raise speedily andwithout reference to any prince, from one to two thousand troops, withsupporting cavalary, from among his own people.'54 Twenty years later evenDel Monte, when asked about the availability of a force of 3000 infantry, wasextremely cautious: ' I will write to various friends of mine who on otheroccasions have aided me . . . and, if the vigorous prohibitions that obtain,especially in the States of the Church, can be circumvented, one can hopefor a measure of success.'55 Yet another scare, in 1599, led to the republic'smost bizarre and extravagant attempt to secure an extraordinary force: a

51 Ibid., 175V-177, 185-185V, 189V-190; Died, Secreta, reg. 10, ioov; ST. reg. 49, 120 seq.52 'Ricordi del doge Nicolo da Ponte per il buon governo della patria in pace ed in guerra', ed. N.

Barozzi, Raccolta veneta . . . , i (Venice, 1866) 13-15.53 Besta, Bilanci, 326-32.54 Capi di Guerra, Ba. A-D, 20 June.55 Ibid., Ba. M, 8 July 1592.

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contract with the Count of Vaudemont, son of Duke Charles IV of Lorraine,to have the title 'general of transalpine troops' and to be prepared todispatch, six weeks after receiving an advance for their pay, no fewer than26,000 men: 10,000 French, 4-6000 Swiss, 4-6000 German, and 4000cavalary (of unspecified origin).56 Together with existing contracts for 6000Grisons and Lusi's 6500 Swiss, and a further 600 French (through acontract with Francesco Martinengo), Venice was for a few months entitledto call on 30,000 oltramontani. This dramatic attempt to compensate for theshortage of Italians was short-lived: so heavy a commitment did not sit wellwith Charles' Italian policy and though Vaudemont received his patentes asgeneral, the contract lapsed.

It was, however, in 1606, when Venice anticipated that its challenge topapal authority - expressed by the republic's spokesman on religious affairsPaolo Sarpi - would lead to invasion by the Spanish satellites thatsurrounded the Terraferma, that the most drastic reappraisal of therepublic's recruiting pool took place.

The notion that 10,000 Italian foreign infantry could be raised throughstand-by contracts was treated sceptically. Only 4000 were called for, andthey arrived in companies that were under strength and padded with make-weights. In one company the Proveditor-General in Terraferma found 57Veronese and 12 other Venetian subjects as well as 17 oltramontani 'whodon't understand the Italian language'. In another, though its captain,lieutenant, sergeant, two corporals and 24 men were from Modena, otherswere the usual mixed bag of vagrant labour: men from Graubiinden,France, Germany and the Tyrol, from Milan, Tuscany, the Papal States andNaples, Ferrara, Mantua and Bologna. In addition, 50 out of the strength of148 came from the Terraferma.57 The moral was clear: the proveditor wassent the unprecedented instruction to investigate the means of raising 6000native infantry, under captains who were also Venetian subjects, as long asthey were not already enrolled in the Terraferma reserves as militiamen,galley crew or gunners.58 That was in September. In November a warcouncil attended by military chiefs of staff came (on balance) to the sameconclusion: that the notional stand-by force of'foreign' Italians would haveto include men raised from Venice's own domains. Even this measure wouldleave Venice reliant on oltramontani. The old, dubiously reliable sources ofmen were repeatedly cited. Grisons and other Swiss; Germans who were notdirect subjects of the Habsburgs; French volunteers; subjects of the Duke ofLorraine. In addition, it was suggested for the first time that the crew of the56 SS. reg. 92, 171-171V (28 Oct.), 183V-185V (20 Nov.).57 P row. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 45 (Benetto Moro), 2 June; ASP., Milizie busta 26 (1) - a reference I

owe to Peter January.58 P row. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 45, 27 July, 1 Aug., 29 Sept. And cf. SS. reg. 97, 91V-92, 98.

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military Noah's Ark should include troops from England and Holland.59

The suggestion gained force from a disillusioned dispatch sent to the dogeby the proveditor-general, Benetto Moro, in the following spring. Com-menting on a new offer by Martinengo to raise 4000 infantry in France, henoted that 'though this idea of bringing Frenchmen to these borders carriesthe important consequence that their presence will accelerate the Spanishmobilization, nonetheless the greed of the Grisons, the sluggishness andirresolution of those of Lorraine, and the absence of anything but words asto the enlistment of the Swiss . . . all show me that so as not to be left onlywith these miserable Italians, it is essential to stiffen them with steadier andmore warlike men if we can, no matter from what ultramontane country theycome'.60

The crisis of 1606-7 was resolved by diplomacy, without recourse toarms. The republic's painful, wasteful and inadequate mobilization mightseem to have underlined, this time finally, not only the wisdom but thenecessity of remaining neutral. All the same, there was to be a last rebuttal ofthe logic of manpower, the War of Gradisca.61

The seriousness of the difficulty emerged at once. Under the 1589 treatyfor a supply of up to 6000 troops when called for from the Grisons League,such troops could not be asked to fight at sea, nor' be ordered to assault wallsor fortresses', nor to attack Austrian territory.62 Ignoring the treaty,therefore, Venice tried to recruit individual captains on a free-lance basis.Not only was the yield small - only some 750 men managed to trickle through- but they were so mutinous in camp and at the same time so reluctant tofight in the field that attempts to obtain more were suspended in April1616.63 As for the Swiss, the problem of getting through the sealed borderwas such that one captain said that the only practicable route was via Savoyto Nice, by sea to Ostia, overland to Ancona and thence by sea to Venice.64

Recruiting efforts (handled, as among the Grisons, by secretaries of theCouncil of Ten) nevertheless continued; by the end of the war in 1617 some2500 Grisons and Swiss had been obtained at the expense, apart from theirpay, of some 100,000 ducats in subventions, advances for conduct moneyand equipment, bribes (including gold medals) and the entertainment oftheir agents.65

59 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 45, 6 Nov. Copy in BCV., Ms. Gradenigo 187, 304-19.60 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 46, 27 Mar. 1607.61 See Wotton's remarks above, 246.62 For terms, SS. reg. 87, 67V and 69 (9 June 1589), 123V (26 Oct.); reg. 95, 168V-169 (23 Sept. 1603).63 SS. reg. 106, 217-18; cf. ibid., 177V-178; reg. 107, 203 (15 Oct. 1616). A few more companies were,

however, engaged in 1617.64 Esposizioni Principi, reg. 27, 92-92V (12 Apr. 1616).65 Ibid., 140 seq. (13 Oct. 1616 seq.); ST. reg. 86, 268 (13 Dec. 1616); SS. reg. 107, 209V-210 (19 Oct.

1616).

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The problem of the sealed frontier operated still more strongly against theengagement of German troops, though approaches either direct or via theambassador at The Hague led to the acceptance of contracts for 4100 menand a prolonged but inconclusive negotiation with Duke Francis Julius ofSaxony for a further 1800. There is no evidence that any of these men turnedup. The government also did its best to hire French troops, signingcontracts for 8550 (only 600 of whom turned up) and negotiating for afurther 3000.66

It was a bizarre situation. Between 1615 and 1617, Venice contracted for17,100 oltramontane troops. The minimum subvention per man payable tocaptains on signature was 3 ducats; a total of 51,300. To take account ofdouceurs, conduct money (8 ducats a head in the case of French infantry) andother expenses, this sum should be at least tripled. Venice is unlikely to havepaid much less than a quarter of a million ducats for contracts which yieldedthe unsatisfactory service of about 3000 men.

Almost as soon as the difficulty in getting in oltramontani by land wasappreciated, the College began to negotiate for troops from Holland. Thecost was high (12 ducats a head for the sea passage) but at least they arrived:by May 1617 - a year from the commencement of negotiations - 3000 werein camp in Friuli, only 950 short of the number contracted for.67 This force,commanded by Count John Ernest of Nassau, included 600 English troopsunder his second-in-command, Sir John Vere. Attempts by the Venetianambassador in London to hire more had failed, partly because of KingJames' uncertain relish for Venice's anti-Habsburg war, partly because thedemands of potential entrepreneurs were so high; Richard Preston, LordDingwall (in fact a Scot), arrived in Venice in June 1616, for instance,announcing that he would serve only were he given a contract for 6000men.68 Even before the arrival of the Dutch and English troops problems ofcommand were complicated by the mongrel nature of the army. A typicaldraft sent to Friuli in November 1616 comprised 251 Corsicans, 54Germans, 168 Grisons, 290 Swiss and 31 unspecified oltramontani. Another,sent in January 1617, comprised 300 Grisons, 140 Swiss, 300 'Greeks'(probably Turkish subjects), 600 French and 150 'foreign' Italians.69

Faced by the sealed frontier problem (both before and after its partialcircumvention by the bringing in of the Dutch by sea) Venice exploited itsown subjects to an unprecedented degree. The older devices were reused:66 Details (9 Feb.-6 Sept. 1616) in SS. reg. 105, 319V-321; reg. 106, 106, 119-20V, 191 v, 196-7V and

234-234.V; ST. reg. 86, 24, 140V, 146-146V, 158V and 165V.67 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 56, 30 May. For negotiations: ST. filza 28 May 1616; Capi di Guerra,

Ba. s-v (Seghers); SM. reg. 75, 540-55.68 Calendar of State Papers, Venetian, 1615-1617, 193, 197, 260. He was compensated for Venice's

refusal with a gold chain worth 2000 ducats.69 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 55; SS. reg. 108, 148V.

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the free issuing of arms to local communities who requested them, thesuspension of sentences passed on outlaws, the call-up of militiamen forgarrison service, the enlistment in the Balkans of Venetian and (now withthe active agreement of the sultan) Turkish subjects. The exploratoryproject of 1606 for a Terraferma 'extraordinary' force of 6000 infantry wasnow ordered to be implemented. Militiamen and members of the volunteergunnery scuole in Terraferma cities were conscripted on a larger scale foractual combat than ever before: there were, indeed, moments whenmembers of these bodies constituted no less than a third of the total fieldforce. All the same — leaving aside a small minority who had had militaryexperience outside Italy and served as volunteers — the Venetian subject wasbetter suited by temperament and training for defence or support than forattack. And this was an offensive war. So the republic had, perforce, to putfaith again in its contract reserve of' foreign' Italians, even if long years ofpeace in the peninsula meant that their calibre would be as poor as theireconomic and social backgrounds.

The contract numbers between the preparation for hostilities inSeptember 1615 and their petering out in stalemate (pending a finaldiplomatic settlement) in September 1617 is known: 13,300. Something isknown of the origins of the entrepreneurs (for the day of the contractor whoserved with his own men was passing) who raised them: about half wereVenetian subjects, the rest came from Piedmont, from Crema and Modena,Genoa, Ferrara, the Marches, Bologna and Siena.70 And much is impliedabout their quality by the waiving of the requirement that serving captainsshould be men of attested experience and competence while raising of theirfee per head for recruits contracted;71 and about their quantity by thewithholding of pay unless companies turned up with at least half theircontracted strength72 - and by the falling-ofF of contracts accepted after thespring of 1616 - the very moment when the supply of oltramontani wasrecognized as being insufficient. This was not due (outside Spanish Milanand Naples) to the effect of prohibitions against recruiting but to the factthat both for entrepreneurs and recruits war had become an unfamiliar andan unattractive way of alleviating poverty. The records do not show howmany 'foreign' Italians actually served, but the largest figure quoted asbeing in camp (in April 1616) was 4348,73 well under half the numbercontracted for by then.

Venice's success in obtaining Austria's agreement to treat the raiders ofSenj as outlaws rather than unacknowledged allies was due less to the

70 SS. and ST. regs. passim.71 ST. reg. 85, 181 (4 Dec. 1615), 236V (9 Jan. 1616), 267V (5 Feb.).72 S T . reg. 87, 9-9V (3 M a r . 1617), 31V-32 (21 Mar . ) , 145V-146 (19 Aug.) .73 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 52 (Pietro Barbarigo).

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achievements of the republic's army than to the reluctance of other powers tobecome involved. The unsuccessful involvement in the war of the Mantuansuccession in 1629—30 was only undertaken in conjunction with the promiseof support from Venice's ally, France, and cannot be seen as yet anotherdefiance of a lesson that had taken so long to learn: that along with otherfactors the republic's foreign policy had to take account of its limited accessto recruits.

(ii) VENETIANS

As a class, it was the patricians who organized wars and raised armies:should they not therefore fight in them? In the bitterness of defeat bothSanuto and Priuli harped on the cowardice of their class.74 But GasparoContarini's assumption that there were actual laws prohibiting patriciansfrom accepting military commands of any importance75 was based if not onfact at least on common sense; a group which never mustered more than2500 adult males was too small to add military to its naval, mercantile andpolitical and administrative responsibilities. All the same, if patricianswished to stiffen the morale of their subjects should they not be seen to risktheir lives with them, and not just as proveditors? The question naggedbecause it tapped a vein of conscious political magic which in othercountries, compressed into the person of a king, could cure diseases. TheByzantine dignity (in theory) of Venetian electoral procedures, the symbolicconnotations of styles and fabrics of costume, of appearing shaven or (intimes of personal or national crisis) bearded, the elaborate protocol thatstage-managed processions and the reception of embassies: all these hadinfected a whole class with the belief that at least its elder members sharedsomething of this aura.

If the absence of senior patricians from Agnadello, it was held, hadcontributed to defeat, the presence of the doge's sons at the defence of Paduain September 1509 had been a factor leading to a repulse of the Imperialsiege force.76

There was, in addition, some abortive talk in 1509 that henceforward acertain proportion of the younger patriciate should be trained as soldiers.77

When Alviano came to Venice in 1513 a number offered to serve with him asmen-at-arms. He accepted only three, and then with the condition that hewould let them serve in the field only when he had come to judge theirsuitability.78 Two years later, Piero Tron put to the College the following

74 E.g. Priuli, iv, 24.75 De magistratibus et Republica Venetorum, 179—82.76 Sanuto, ix, 165; Priuli, iv, 469-70.77 Priuli, iv, 298.78 Sanuto, xvi, 275.

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proposition: that ioo patricians between the ages of twenty and forty shouldbe elected as men-at-arms to serve under the captain-general's authorityand receive 10 ducats per pay. It received no support, but was subsequentlydiscussed on a number of occasions with Alviano, who, while polite, wasguarded; he thought that the age limits should be lowered and the proposednumber reduced, and that the College should think only in terms ofcavalrymen 'alia Borgognona', one fully armed man with an attendantriding a spare horse.79 Taking these points into account, Tron put hismotion formally to the Senate on 7 May 1515.80 Its preamble stressed theneed to be as militarily efficient by land as by sea. The expense of armies wasgreat, yet 'the soldiers are mercenaries and foreigners, a great part of whomserve in a manner well known to everyone'. Let us then follow the exampleshown 'by innumerable records concerning ancient republics and othergreat states' who have cultivated the military virtues. He proposed theelection of 50 patricians between the ages of eighteen and thirty to be lightcavalrymen with two horses each. So that they would be content topersevere in their new careers when hostilities came to an end, they wouldbe given 10 ducats per pay in peace as well as war and would not be expectedto take any government office nor attend meetings of the Great Council.This proposal to create a professional military cadre within the patriciatefound no support among the other savi, one of whom protested that 'ourancestors never wanted us to play a military role or to make gentlemen intomen-at-arms', and it was resolved to postpone a decision.

Tron, this time supported by three others, put his motion again on 27September, a fortnight after the defeat of the Swiss by the French atMarignano. The military art, he said, is both natural to the nobly born andan example to others. The nobility of other countries have always broughtup their sons to arms and the outcome of the recent battle shows that weshould follow their example. To begin with, then, let us create a body of only25 - on the conditions set out in the previous motion. Again, by 131 votes to75 with no abstentions, it was resolved that the decision should bepostponed; sine die, as it turned out,81 though the idea was resurrectedinformally by Alvise Gritti in 1542.82 Indeed, the episode is chieflyinteresting for the light it throws on an element within the younger andpoorer patriciate that yearned for an income that would be associated withthe military cachet enjoyed by other aristocracies.

At least 23 patricians did, in fact, take up arms as a profession on theirown initiative. While some were cavalrymen, most served on foot, usuallywith small commands, though three of them, Marco Gradenigo, Piero

79 Ib id . , xx, 116, 146, 149, 151.80 Ibid., 185-8.81 Ibid., xxi, 147-9.82 Disc or so di Alvigi Gritti sopra la sicurezza . . . di Vinetia, ed. S. Ricci (Venice, 1842) 26 seq.

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Sagredo and Hieronimo Diedo, led companies of 150 each,83 and one,Fantino Zen, became a captain of militia in Friuli.84 They were awardedpensions or promotions for brave or faithful service on the same terms andwith the same commendatory phrases as were other professional soldiers.When Alessandro Marcello, captain of an infantry company of 300, was shotwhile scaling the walls of Cremona in 1526, his brothers were awarded 80ducats a year for the support of themselves and the rest of his family. ZuanTiepolo was compensated for the loss of an eye with a contract for 300'foreign' infantry 'to encourage him and others to continue to serve ushonestly and trustily \85 The evidence of pensions suggests that poverty wasa prime motive in adopting a military career. Zen was a bastard as, perhaps,were others. Distinguished as were many of their names, none came fromthe politically weighty branches of their families, and none re-entered themainstream of their caste's functions in the city. Yet no disapproval of theireccentric choice of a career was expressed. Their letters from the field weregiven weight in the College. They resumed their voting rights in the GreatCouncil when on leave.

For a few patricians - also from impoverished families - it was election tomilitary office that led to an enduring taste for military life. Alvise Bembostayed on with the army when his term as proveditor in campo ran out, andhis subsequent first-hand experience led to his being appointed proveditorof light cavalry. Andrea Ciuran took up his duties as proveditor of stradiotswith such zest that though retaining the title and function from 1510 to hisdeath in Apulia in 1529, his behaviour was indistinguishable from that ofany other serving officer, apart, perhaps, from his positive relish for dangerwhether on horseback, on foot or on the scaling ladder.86 His role wasrecognized by the unusual title 'proveditor and captain of stradiots'. Acomparable career, spanning the defence of Padua in 1509 and the Apuliancampaign of 1528-9, was that of Giovanni di Marcantonio Contarini, whosecombination of expertise and daring both in land operations and the navalservice in which he was more constantly engaged earned him the nickname'Cazzadiavoli'.87

Between the voluntary military career and the refusal to institutionalize iton the lines suggested by Tron came the employment of patricians on aparamilitary, short-term basis to bolster morale at the key sites in threatened

Sanuto, xxviii, 590 and xxiv, 39 (Gradenigo); xlvii, 261 (Sagredo and Diedo).P. M. Giraldi, 'The Zen family (1500-1550): patrician office holders in Renaissance Venice' (unpub.Ph.D. thesis, University of London, 1975) 123.Sanuto, xliii, 176-6; ibid., 471 and 1, 535-6.His letters compare favourably with the ardour of Luigi da Porto's. E.g. Sanuto, x, 68-9; xiii, 13,248-50; xliv, 257-8 (describing 'belle scaramuze').M. Brunetti, 'II capitano "Cazzadiavoli"', AV., ser. 5, lvi-lvii (1955) 12-54.

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cities, at the gates and in the central squares where the rectors' palaces weresituated. The idea was first mooted in June 1509, when the Council of Tenresolved that a patrician should be elected to guard each gate at Treviso.They would have 10 ducats a month for themselves and their servants, andeach was to command a corporal and 25 soldiers.88 The recapture of Padualed to moves to extend the idea to that city.89 Indeed, within days of aspirited appeal by the doge in the Great Council on 4 September, 186patricians had arrived in Padua,90 some with horses, some without, mostbringing with them from one to five soldiers, a few with ten to twenty, onewith thirty - over 700 men in all. And the numbers grew until, well beforethe time Maximilian's siege was lifted on 3 October, the number ofpatrician volunteers in Padua was estimated at around 300.

The experiment was attended by minor setbacks. Many families had soldor lost their weapons and armour generations ago. Priuli ruefully admittedthat his own household of 25 could muster only four swords and ten rustylances, and there were petulant scenes when some of the volunteers refusedthe rough-and-ready equipment from the Arsenal as unsuited to gentlemenof blood, and forced a reluctant Council of Ten to release some of theprecious and historic arms and armour conserved in the Council's privatearmoury. Some of the wilder young volunteers treated the journey up theBrenta as a looting expedition and subsequently disobeyed orders in a waythat, had the proveditors not intervened on behalf of their own class, wouldhave led the captain-general to execute them.91 But on the whole the schemewas voted successful. If the 300 had not proved themselves as soldiers, theyhad an invigorating effect on the defenders' morale in their role of voluntaryhostages. A sluggish response to the call for volunteers in 1510, however,showed that the appeal of patriotism was not in itself a sufficient incentive.The names of the 1509 defenders of Padua were entered on an honour rollby the Chancery: all subsequent names, it was promised, would similarly beenrolled and read out at the next meeting of the Great Council. Moreover,the fact that a patrician had served at Padua or Treviso was to be inserted onthe lists of nominees for offices in the expectation that this would give himthe edge over less public-spirited men. Finally, it was resolved in July 1510that volunteers should have their debts to the fisc suspended for six monthsso that they could qualify for election to all offices.92 The government would88 Died, Misti, reg. 32, n6v (18 June).89 What follows until the end of the section on patrician gate-guard is almost all taken from Sanuto,

passim, and Priuli, iv (including the appendix of dispatches from Andrea Gritti). I cite only the mostimportant references.

90 Names in Sanuto, ix, 145-8, 204-11. They should perhaps be treated with some caution, given theadvantage to families to have members of their clans associated with this service.

91 Priuli, iv, 158; Sanuto, ix, 378.92 M C , Deda, 52V-53.

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pay the wages of any troops taken. It soon became clear, however, thatcertainty of obtaining office was for some more important than the paymentof expenses. So in August 1511 volunteers who chose to pay for themselvesand for five soldiers for two months were promised office first in theQuarantia Civil and then in the Quarantia Criminale93 (both terms of officewere for eight months, and the fee was \ ducat per sitting), though only oneman was allowed to qualify for these terms from any one branch of a family.

These incentives proving insufficient, the College had recourse tonomination, a challenge set the individual to prove his willingness to servethe state. Gate-guard thus became an office, which like others could berefused: among the excuses given being ill health, poverty, a captive brotherwhose ransom negotiations required the nominee's presence in the city.Nomination did not involve compulsion; it was merely a fairly effective formof blackmail within a government where everything was written down, acaste within which nothing was forgotten.

In September and October 1513, the true nadir of Venetian fortunes inthese wars, the moral pressure on the patriciate, particularly on its seniormembers, was stepped up through appeal after appeal by the doge.94 Thosewho could not, because of their age, health or office, themselves serve, werenow urged to send brothers, sons or nephews as substitutes, or to make acash contribution towards the wages of troops. All offers of substitute as wellas personal service were to be entered on the honour roll and read out at thenext meetings of both the Great Council and the Senate, and service ineither form was to be entered against the names of those competing inelections.

The doge's sons were among the first to set the example, Alvise going toPadua with 30 men, Bernardo to Treviso with 34. On 6 November acompleted list of those who had offered to serve, or had been asked to serve,was read out in the Great Council.95 It contained the responses from 374patricians. Of these, 146 were serving in person or through substitutemembers of their families, 157 had contributed money, 71 had failed torespond with either men or money. Among them the 146 had taken well over1000 troops, some of them professionals, the others, probably the majority,tenants and servants or volunteers from the city's crafts and scuole.

The reading out and recording of names to give encouragement or causeembarrassment (the same was done with patricians who were in arrears with

93 Ibid., 70. Voting was far from unanimous: 956:356:3. Names in Sanuto, xii, 415-19 (Treviso), 438-40(Padua), 570-1 (both).

94 Sanuto himself was moved by such an appeal and returned on 2 Dec. 1513 after serving at Padua for 35days with five men and a horse at his own expense. He lost no time in reporting this to the College(Sanuto, xvii, 245-6, 352).

95 Ibid., xvii, 283; the list itself: 284-302. For the distribution of patricians among the strategicstrongpoints of Padua, ibid., xvii, 276-81 (1 Nov.), 399-402 (15 Dec).

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their taxes) became a standard practice. In 1514 it was decided that anyonewho gave 15 ducats (one month's pay for five men) should have the factendorsed against his name on election lists,96 and those returning fromservice obtained letters certifying their presence in Padua or Treviso fromthe rectors, and handed these in to the College as additional evidence ofpublic-spirited behaviour.

When patrician gate-guards were revived in the crisis of 1527-8, andextended to Verona, Brescia, Crema and Ravenna, even though expenseswere covered and pay tripled to 30 ducats a month, there were no offers. Alltraces of voluntarism were dropped. The 68 men who served were allnominated subject to heavy fines for refusal.97

The steep falling-off in readiness to serve after the initial shock of theCambrai war should not be seen in terms of a failure of individual courage.This continued to be shown in the normal course of their duties by militaryproveditors, rectors in the war zone and naval commanders. However, withthe recovery of the Terraferma (and patrician possessions there) and arevived faith in the mercenary system and in the loyalty of subjects, the needfor personal service faded into the urgent fascination of everyday politicallife.

Nor did the mood of readiness recur until 1570-1. On the outbreak of theWar of 1537-40 there was one voice, that of the savio ai ordini GiovanniDona, which proposed that Doge Andrea Gritti should command the fleetand the army it contained in person 'out of the greatness of his soul and hiscompassion for his country'.98 Gate-guard duty was revived. Ten patricianswere elected for Zara, five for Sebenico and two for Cattaro, but the fine forrefusal had been placed as high as 500 ducats.99 It remained as high in 1570when the Council of Ten, noting that 'it being of great importance that inwartime the command of the gates of our fortresses be in the hands ofpersons we can trust with a quiet mind as entirely loyal', called for theelection of six patricians for Zara and four each for Sebenico, Trau, Spalatoand Cattaro.100 But only in the response to the call for patrician volunteers toserve as soldiers in the fleet101 was there perhaps an echo of the mood of

96 Ibid., xviii, 239 (1 June).97 SS. reg. 53, 14-14V.98 SS. reg. 58, 113-15. Navagero's narrative ('Istoria delle tre guerre', 123-58) shows the Duke of

Urbino's influence on the negotiations.99 SM. reg. 24, 116V-117. They were recalled on 26 Sept. 1538 (ibid., 145).

100 Dieci, Comune, reg. 29, 157V (24 July).101 The casualty figures for Venice's soldati (1,333 dead, 1,087 wounded) given in Archivio Proprio

Pinelli, Ba. 1-2, 13V do not distinguish between other troops and patrician volunteers. The captain-general of the sea reported on their indiscipline on 11 June 1570 (Annali, 1569-70, 144); casualtiesamong them from disease were referred to on 14 Aug. and 6 Oct. (ibid., 150V, 279). But only the lastrefers clearly to patricians of standing. The ambassador to Spain claimed on 17 Apr. 1573 that 400patricians had served in the fleets in 1570-2 (ibid., 1572-3, 251). Enlistment was encouraged by thesuspension of any lawsuits pending against them (Collegio, Notatorio, reg. 38, 200V, 223-224).

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1509, and their response, if not their performance, was all the moreimpressive because of the unprecedented number of patricians alreadyserving as naval commanders.

No patricians were called for military service other than as proveditors inthe War of Gradisca. And it was also in contrast to these later wars that thegovernment in 1509-29 placed a heavy reliance on the service of othersections of the Venetian community.

In spite of temporary blockages of trade routes, shortages of commoditiesand ever rising taxation, there is little indication that hard times forcedcitizens to adopt soldiering as a career. The 'cittadin veneto' who was killedwhile storming Cremona in 1527 was, to judge from the compensationoffered his father, a professional soldier on whose earnings his familyrelied.102 But army lists cite few Venetians and none in command of cavalryunits or of any infantry companies more than 25 strong. In July 1509 gateand guard duty, however, was begun for citizens as well as patricians, and onsimilar terms. Two 'most faithful citizens' were sent to guard the castles ofCorfu, with 10 ducats a month and each taking 25 soldiers — themselvesnatives of Venice — at 3 ducats a month. As soon as Padua was recovered sixcitizens were elected by the College to guard the gates and the Saracinescaoutworks with 30 soldiers each; like patrician volunteers, they were licensedto borrow weapons from the Council of Ten's armoury.103 The subsequentappeals for patrician volunteers for Padua and Treviso included citizens onequal terms. They were to get the same pay and take the same number ofsoldiers; they too were to have their debts suspended for six months and, byhaving their service officially recorded, gain precedence when competing forposts in the bureaucracy.104 Nor did enrolment on the honour list remain adistinction only for 'citizens' in the technical sense of commerciallyprivileged long-term residents. In October 1513a recruitment proclamationread out in the Piazza of S. Marco and on the steps of the Rial to declared thatvolunteers for Padua and Treviso, 'citadini e populi', would have theirnames and service recorded for glorious memory in future generations.105

Every distinction had in any case been broken down in the proclamations ofNovember 1509 and August 1510 calling on all Venetians to join the fleet inthe Po to put the territories of the Duke of Ferrara to the sack and to keepwhatever loot they could obtain.106 And subsequent proclamations, drawnup either by the College or by individual patricians who were trying to fill

102 ST. reg. 34, 213-213V.103 Dieci, Misti, reg. 32, 112-112V (7 June); SS. reg. 16, 117V (19 July); Dieci, Misti, reg. 32, 124 (10

July), 141 (4 Sept.)104 M C , Deda, 52V (16 July 1510); Sanuto, xvi, 493 (13 July 1513).105 Sanuto, xvii, 117.106 Ibid., ix, 331; xi, 177-8.

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their quotas, suggest that the 1509 emphasis on 'fidelity' was withdrawn asquantity became the chief criterion; on muster lists the heading 'cittadini'changed to 'populani' and an increasing number of names suggest recent ormerely temporary residence in Venice.107 It cropped up again, however,when individual citizens were entrusted with posts of some importance, aswhen Lodovico Malombra, 'our most faithful citizen', was put in commandof the militia of the Trevisano in 1528.108

At intervals between 1509 and 1513 the guilds and scuole were drawn on,but sparingly; they were the source of the precious reserve of manpower forthe river and sea fleets. On occasion the whole crews of merchant galleys thathad just arrived, or were ready to leave, were impressed for service in Paduaand Treviso: 1200 men from the Beirut and Alexandria galleys were rushedto Padua in August 1509, for example.109 But this only worked when thecrews were already boarded and under the control of their officers. Thedevice of making service in Padua a precondition for enlistment onmerchant galleys (normally popular because of the freight- and customs-free merchandise space allowed each crew member) was tried in 1513 butbroke down because so few men came forward at the rate offered: 1 ducat fortwelve days' service - calculated from the infantrymen's 3 ducats for a'month' of 36 days.110 The two classes of men to whom the governmentturned most readily, because their jobs anchored them firmly to the city'sfortunes, were seamen (marinari), A.B.S and mates, that is, and the skippersof the small craft that plied around the city and on the lagoon; and thecraftsmen — carpenters, caulkers and oar-wrights for the most part — whowere full-time workers in the Arsenal.

Seamen were not only encouraged to volunteer as individuals but weregiven commands, usually of ten, but sometimes of twenty and more, men,and were deputed to duty at the gates of Padua and Treviso. A few took nosalary and paid the expenses of their men, craftsmen or fellow seamen, butnot after 1511; repeated summonses had, as for patricians, rubbed theenchantment from conspicuous patriotism, and because ' they are men wholive on their wages' unit leaders were paid 5 ducats a month.111 In March ofthat year the College proposed a new experiment, passed by both the Senateand the Great Council. Seamen who provided their own arms and wereprepared to serve gratis for six months would be put at the top of theapplication lists for the rent-free housing maintained for charitablepurposes by procuracies, scuole and hospitals. Those who served alone

07 E.g. ibid., xvii, 293 (Cristoforo Zenoese, Zuan Bachi di Candia, Zorzi fradello de Laura griega).08 Ib id . , xlvii, 539.09 Priuli, iv, 214-15.

Sanuto, xvi, 580-1.SS. reg. 44, 45V (4 Aug.).

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would qualify for a single-storey house, those who took (and paid for) acompanion, for double-storeyed ones. And if they were killed in action, theright, though for ten years instead of for life, would pass to their next ofkin.112 Whether there were any takers for this scheme is unrecorded.Probably not; the sense of acute danger faded from this year, and so doreferences to the military employment of seamen. References to the use ofArsenal workers on the other hand continue until 1525 and 1526, when 200and 100 respectively were sent to Padua to meet the threat from the Spanishtroops marauding through the Polesine.113 They had played an importantpart in the surprise recapture of Padua in July 1509, and 200 were sent tothat city's gates in September. One hundred went to Padua in 1510, 45 in1513,300 m 1514; 100 were at least proposed for Treviso in 1515; 100 wentto the gates of Padua in 1516. Their pay was a ducat for ten days' service,though in 1516 it was specified that they should get what they normallyreceived in the Arsenal.114

Citizens and seamen enrolled on a purely voluntary basis. Arsenalottialso volunteered, though it was the responsibility of the patrons of theArsenal to see that government quotas were met. Something nearer formalconscription was attempted in July 1509, in response to urgent calls from theproveditors in Padua and Treviso. Lists were made, sestriere by sestriere bytwo elected patricians and' populani' for each, of able-bodied men who werethen ordered to collect arms and prepare themselves for call-up. A selected2000 were mustered in the Piazza on the 29th. They were given a ducat eachand dismissed for the time being to their homes.115 In August some 1800were ordered to Padua for ten days. In June of the following year 600 weresent, again for ten days at a ducat each. In neither case is it clear how manyactually left, let alone arrived. In 1509 Priuli stressed their lack of militaryexperience, their fearfulness, above all their reluctance to leave theirhabitual livelihoods even for so short a period. In September 1511 the listswere revised and the heads (deputati) of sestrieri told to select 1200 fromwhom men would be chosen for Padua. There is no record of their goingthere. In 1513, when there was a last mobilization, they were again held inreadiness but not sent.116 Apart from the reasons given by Priuli, thegovernment's irresolute implementation of this scheme is understandable.112 Sanuto, xviii, I O - I I .113 Ibid., xxxviii, 231-2; xliii, 221.114 Ibid., xxii, 342. Though the great majority of the Brescian contingent, both N.C.O.S and men, were

raised in the western Terraferma, there was a group of 22 Spaniards, a few recruits from Germanyand the Tyrol, a Frenchman, a Greek (from Napoli di Romania) and a few from Mantua, Tuscany,Romagna and Naples (Brescia, Archivio Storico del Comune, Ba. 227, a reference I owe to PeterJanuary).

115 Priuli, iv, 170, 443; Sanuto, viii, 567-8.lie Priuli's opinions: iv, 214, 219; mobilizations: Sanuto, x, 650, xii, 492, xiii, 19, xvii, 174 and 179.

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Thanks to the selective control of immigration, craft unemployment inVenice and the lagoon islands was usually low, and fishing, marketgardening and small-boat building kept the coastal communities fromhaving to send their young men off to be soldiers. Venice's local, andperennial, problem was not a restless and roaming proletariat but a shortageof manpower for its fleets. It was, moreover, the very confidence of havingestablished over centuries a uniquely harmonious relationship with the massof the city's population that made the patriciate hesitate, even with the knifeat its throat, to emphasize the discordant note of compulsion.

In contrast, war by war, Venice came with decreasing caution to rely onthe military service of its mainland subjects. From 1509 to 1529 it fought toregain control of a Terraferma which was still to some extent an unknownquantity. It was not so much that more than a few, in all probability, sharedPriuli's opinion that the whole enterprise ashore had been an ill-judgedperversion of Venice's true destiny to keep the seaways, trade diligently,govern equably and get richer and richer, or that the costs of fortificationsand companies of men-at-arms were greater than the profits from theterritories they guarded.117 It was, in spite of generations of public servantswho had surveyed its frontiers, governed its cities, scooped up its taxes andbought slices of its farmland, rather the fact that neither the loyalty of itsinhabitants nor the number of men it would contribute to the war effortcould be more than guessed at. Historically, the Terraferma was apatchwork of conquests and bargains, held together across plains, aroundlakes and among mountain ranges by the stitchwork of the Venetianadministrative system. In 1509 all this was ripped. In retrospect, however,the Cambrai crisis and its aftermath can be seen as a prerequisite for theanomalously independent survival of the Venetian state until the lateeighteenth century. Old resentments and animosities could flare and hadtime to die back to enduringly containable levels. A grudging sense ofcommon advantage emerged which bleached the territorial patchwork to adrabber but more consistent colour.

The government's initial reaction was, perforce, to slacken the reins. On25 May 1509 the Senate offered peasants in the Veronese exemption inperpetuity from the mill tax {dazio della macina) to encourage them torelease food stocks to the army. Coming quickly to terms with the reality ofdefeat, Venice let it be known in June that her subject territories were free toacknowledge what authority they chose. From July followed promises torural communities of additional exemptions from taxation for five years andthe cancellation of state debts,118 and free medical care for those who were

117 Priuli, iv, 52-3.118 Cervelli, Machiavelli, 378.

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wounded while fighting for the republic.119 Tax concessions to foodproducers were renewed in 1512. In the towns on occasion a bullying notewas struck, as when the Lieutenant of Friuli threatened the first man tospeak of surrender at Udine with death.120 But on the whole the governmentrelied on fair words. The citizens of Vicenza and Verona, both in Imperialhands, were told that it was fully understood that their temporary alienationfrom Venice was caused more by fear than disloyalty and that all would beforgiven if they would change sides again. In April 1510, however, whenhorsemen with the Venetian army rode up close against the walls of Veronacalling on the citizens to surrender, they were answered: 'And then behanged, like those of Padua?' The Council of Ten wrote plaintively to theproveditors-general: 'You must point out that when we hanged fourPaduans it was for the enormity of their rebellion.' It was a quite exceptionalcase. Let the Veronese know that all past offences will be forgotten whenthey return to 'their ancient devotion to our state'.121

It was, indeed, difficult to know where the loyalties of the Terrafermatowns did lie. The citizens of Serravalle, while parleying with Venetian forcesat one gate, let in Imperial forces at another. When their spokesmen turnedup in Venice, however, they claimed that' San Marco had never been absentfrom their hearts'; and 'the doge welcomed and spoke kindly to them'.122

But it was also unclear to the Terraferma what support it would get fromVenice. Debate after debate in the Senate stressed the importance ofkeeping the army intact and able in the last resort to guard Venice itself,rather than detaching parts of it as garrisons for cities asking for protection.Well before the pitiless sack of Brescia by the French in 1512, the progress ofFrench and German armies had been associated with lurid tales of atrocities.Fear of suffering the fate of Peschiera after its capture by the French in May1509 had influenced Verona's fall from grace. From that year onwards,Venice strove to convince its ex-subjects that the republic's armies could beguaranteed to liberate and not to terrorize. The proveditors with the armyseeking to regain Vicenza in November 1509 were warned that there must beno looting or sacking,' for the outcome of this enterprise will be the modeland example for others \123 In 1522 Gritti was told to refuse French requeststo billet troops in Venetian towns. On the whole the republic's forcesbehaved reasonably well during the process of reoccupation. On the otherhand, reoccupation could impose its own penalties, such as the modernizingof fortifications; the orders given during Alviano's pre-Cambrai tour of

19 ST. reg. 17, 65.20 Sanuto, viii, 446-7.21 Died, Misti, reg. 33, 16.22 Sanuto, viii, 503.23 SS. reg. 42, 78v.

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inspection on the Terraferma had led to cries of rage at the cost anddestructiveness of his plans for strengthening defences, and they had noteven been implemented. Reoccupied Padua provided a dire example of thetearing down of suburbs outside the walls to provide a clear field of fire, andof secular and Church property inside them to provide speedy communi-cation from one threatened point to another. And there was the bill (thoughusually shared in thirds with Venice and the surrounding communities) topay.124 Reconquest had to await the piecemeal outcome of debate withincities as to where their true advantage lay, and reoccupation was handledgingerly. Pressure on citizens to form home guards to help defend their citygates and walls once they had returned to Venetian control was applied withhesitance at first. But by the autumn of 1526, when German troops weremassing for their descent into Lombardy, citizens from Cremona to Trevisoand Padua were armed freely and confidently - 1800 in Vicenza alone.125

The artillery companies established in 1506 in Padua and Brescia and earlyin 1509 in Udine had been at first invited to get started again afterreoccupation with some tentativeness, and only from 1518 were they keptfirmly on their toes by the rectors.

Similarly, Terraferma subjects who volunteered for professional servicein the ranks were engaged initially without enthusiasm. They tended to taketheir first pay and then desert, wrote Gritti in August 1509, having justhanged three Vicentines for this offence; it would be better to look for anequivalent number of troops to Bologna and other places in the Romagna.But again, there came to be a change of heart. Gritti himself, proveditor-general once more in 1521, wrote this time that it was well worth engagingVenetian subjects, and he deplored the general belief that the Signoriapreferred to hire 'foreigners'. Volunteer captains of infahtry or condottieriof cavalry were, on the other hand, engaged readily from the start. ThePaduan Alexandro Bagolin was given a command in August 1509 of a smallarmy, 300 horse and 500 foot, because he wanted to recapture property andland he owned around Citadella and because he thought he could get 4000 ofthe peasantry there to support him. In the same month Hieronimo Pompeoof Verona was given a larger contract because he had served' without respecteither for his own fortunes or for those of his brothers living in Verona'. Inthe next year the Brescian Pietro da Longhena was given a cavalrycommand, as was - among others - the Vicentine Bernardin da Sesso, 'whohas left Vicenza together with his nephews and other relations'.126 Theregaining of the Terraferma, and the end of the fear of reprisals against

124 Da Porto, Lettere, 33-4, no ; Priuli, iv, 277-8; Sanuto, ix, 236.125 Died, Misti, reg. 32,118 (21 June 1509); Pieri, II Rinascimento, 473; Sanuto, xliii, 160 (4 Nov. 1526).126 Sanuto, ix, 6; SS. reg. 42, 38V; reg. 43, 149V-150 and 55.

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Venetian subjects, led to offers of service in even greater numbers. Therewere also those who took service with the enemy. But it was perhaps nodisadvantage in the long run that the wars gave an outlet for many who hadchafed under Venice's comparatively orderly rule and were ill at ease simplyreading chivalrous literature and plotting duels in the comfort of the proto-villas and less fortress-like palaces that reflected two generations of peace.127

Bands of'young gentlemen'128 had ridden out from the west Lombardcities - 60 from Brescia - to join the army before Agnadello, and the mood inwhich they and others who served when Venice had regained theirhomelands can be glimpsed from the correspondence of the youngVicentine aristocrat Luigi da Porto. His family was typical of those whichhad at first welcomed Imperial occupation as a jab to Venetian arrogance.Disillusion with their new masters soon set in, however, and from November1509 Luigi, with a command of 50 light horse (doubled in the followingyear), served first in the Veronese, then in Friuli. At first he complainedabout his transfer, 'because it means leaving the splendid sort of warfare wehave in the Veronese, where I can play my part in actions of real importance,and going instead to a theatre where there are few troops, most of them ingarrison and thus, I fear, given up to greed, idleness and self-indulgence, themortal enemies of the martial spirit'.129 But he was soon relishing the'marvellous skirmishes' that were a chief feature of guerilla warfare in Friuliand subscribing heartily to the dictum, echoed by Castiglione, that thesmall-scale voluntary action allowed a gentleman's real gallantry to berecognized, whereas it was liable to be overlooked when righting underorders in a large mass. This was the spirit that was commemorated when thedoge knighted a Cremonese cavalry captain for his part in a combat betweeneleven Spaniards a'nd eleven Italians which he had organized during a lull inthe formal fighting in Lombardy.130 And an appreciation of this spirit, aswell as evidence of the extent to which its exponents put it at the disposal ofothers, is reflected in a proclamation of 1528: no Venetian subject was toserve princes other than those who formed the Holy League, and those whodid, as well as those already so serving, and who did not return within tendays, were to forfeit all they owned and, if caught, be hanged. Publishedthroughout the Terraferma, the decree also proclaimed the fact that the daysof wheedling and suing for support were passing.131

In addition to ardent volunteers like Da Porto, Venice could reckon on

127 Ventura, Nobilita e popolo, 340-1, 339-40.128 Dieci, Misti, reg. 32, 96, with reference to Crema.129 Da Porto, 176.130 Sanuto, xvii, 22.131 Ibid., xlvi, 629. It was to be published in Padua, Vicenza, Verona, Brescia, Bergamo, Crema,

Treviso, Feltre, Belluno, Udine, Rovigo and Salo (ST. reg. 25, 22).

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the continued service of the families which had staffed the republic'sstanding army over generations. Some, like the Vicentine Giovan PaoloManfroni, were now given commands of real importance: he was governorof the whole force of men-at-arms in 1514. Others, like the condottiereMarc'Antonio Martinengo of Brescia, were and remained on easy andfamiliar terms with the patriciate; in 1521 he was made a member of theliterary society of the Ortolani and sponsored the performance of a new playby Ruzante in Ca' Pesaro.132

The most prominent, and most controversial, of these families was that ofthe Savorgnan of Friuli who controlled estates so vast, so riddled with feudalexemptions from direct governmental control and so matted with inter-clanrelationships and rivalries as to make of much of the 'Patria' of Friuli a semi-independent buffer state against Austrian and Turk rather than a trueextension of the Terraferma. His control over an extensive peasantry ledVenice to entrust Antonio Savorgnan with their military organization andleadership on the outbreak of war in 1509. By July rumours spread againsthis loyalty by rival clans, notably the Delia Torre, led to anxious exchangesof letters between the Lieutenant of Friuli and the Council of Ten. TheCouncil's opinion was that he was too useful to dismiss on mere suspicion,especially at a time when few professional troops could be spared fromLombardy. And, indeed, in October he was granted Castelnuovo in fief afterretaking it from the Germans 'with no aid save from his local peasants'.133

Thereafter, however, his putting his local above his Venetian interestsbecame so flagrant that in 1511 he joined the German side; his property wasconfiscated and a price was put on his head and in 1512 it was duly paid tothe men who assassinated him as he was leaving a service in Villachcathedral.

Antonio's career had been further complicated by quarrels with his ownrelatives, notably with Girolamo Savorgnan. Girolamo never forfeitedVenice's trust, though when in addition to his honorary status as a Venetianpatrician his military service in the early Friulian campaigns led to his beingelected to the Senate, and to his actual attendance during debates onconfidential crises, there was an outcry against this breach of precedent andhe was hurriedly appointed collateral-general as a respectable pretext to gethim out of the city.134 Tired of what was primarily an administrativeappointment, he relinquished it and returned to Friuli after a few months.

Concern for his own tenants and property was, as always with the' feudal'commanders, a distraction from the military job in hand. When conducting132 Martinengo: Sanuto, xxix, 536; ST. reg. 24, 103V.133 F. Savini,' Antonio Savorgnan', Memorie storiche forogiuliesi (1931) 274. For fief: Dieci, Misti, reg.

332, i55v.134 Ventura, 172.

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the siege of Marano in 1514, his letters to the doge harp increasingly onGerman depredations to his crops and his peasants. Yet his enthusiasm forthe progress of the siege remained paramount and he broke out intocomplaint about a delay in sending him supplies with a half-humorousreference to Venice's preference for foreign commanders: 'it is true that Iwas not born in the Kingdom of Naples or the lands of Rome, but Inonetheless hope that though simply a humble Friulian I can do honourableservice to Your Serenity'. And the enthusiasm that made the less intrigantmembers of his family so useful to Venice stamps his reception of thedecision to raise the siege. 'So we are to draw vilely off from this actionwithout assaulting the enemy? All our labours, all this expense to be thrownto the wind? Oh, the shame for myself- if not fop others! It devours me tothink of it.'135

An incentive for territorial magnates to serve Venice was the enlargementby legal title of their domains and the ability to enlarge their clientage bygranting favours. Thus Girolamo, in addition to getting Castelnuovo andPalazzuolo after Antonio's disgrace, received the castle of Belgrado (and thetitle and jurisdiction of count in perpetuity) and the shifting of a toll pointfor German goods en route to Venice from Gemona to Osoppo - a right hesubsequently commuted for 400 ducats a year from the camera of Udine. Healso obtained the confirmation of the life pensions and minor castellanshipshe had on his own authority granted to relations and followers. Thesefavours and others (the gastaldia of Fragagna in fief for his associateTeodoro da Borgo, for instance) were asked for in a high tone. 'I amGirolamo Savorgnan. My family has always been of service to YourSerenity, and as friends rather than nobles, as nobles rather than assubjects.' And at times with a hint of blackmail: 'the Patria [of Friuli] mostardently desires the promotion of the House of Savorgnan, and would farrather see its fortunes fostered by your Serenity than by the Germans'. Inone of his last letters before his death in 1529 he was asking for cannon fromthe Arsenal 'because it is as though they are due to me'.136

The balance of feudal self-interest in the Terraferma was expected (as, onthe whole it did) to work to Venice's advantage. A similar calculation led to aremarkably steady confidence in the armed co-operation of theTerraferma's peasantry as a whole. As opposed to urban communities, theycould expect nothing from new masters save the pillage and depression ofstatus normally associated with conquest. It was they who suffered mostfrom the atrocities perpetrated by the invading armies, they whose handswere cut off and eyes gouged out, whose daughters were forced to join the

135 Savorgnan, 'Lettere', iii, 16, 27.136 Ibid., iii, 26-7; iv, 42.

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army's train of prostitutes, who were slaughtered simply out of blood lust(for no ransom was to be expected), as were the thousand-odd suffocated bybonfires lit at the entrances to the grottos in Monte Berico, outside Vicenza,where they had crept for refuge.137 In November 1509 Machiavelli was inVerona, headquarters of the Imperial army, as Florence's observer of themilitary situation. He reported that the savage behaviour of the French andGerman troops was forcing the peasants into a defiant loyalty to, apreparedness to die for, the republic: 'these monarchs cannot possibly holddown those territories as long as the peasantry remains there'.138 There was,indeed, much evidence of their goodwill; reports on troop movements,information as to the whereabouts of caches of old cannon balls that couldmake all the difference to the success of a siege. In August 1509 informationfrom four peasants led to the capture of the Marquis of Mantua in his fieldbillet, unguarded and in his shirt, an action rewarded generously and withthe maximum publicity: 100 ducats a year and a 100-ducat dowry for a sisterto the one who played the leading role, 48 ducats a year for the others,freedom from every ' angaria reale et personale' for all of them and theirfamilies and heirs in perpetuity, and permission to carry defensive armseven in Venice itself.139

On the other hand, reoccupation by Venice meant no lightening ofburdens. Horses, oxen and carts were subject to requisition according to thearmy's need for transport. The government tried to cut this to a minimum,restricting it to the service of the artillery. Individual soldiers were orderedto carry only what they needed for active service ' in the laudable and soundmanner of old' rather than turn subjects into rebels by stealing theirproperty and carting it away.140 And in spite of regulations concerning thereimbursement of the cost of billeting troops, that tried to protect ' thepeasants who have shown such devotion and steady fidelity to our state 'I41 asa measure of 1517 put it, the family into whose yard clattered a detachmentof men-at-arms were not in a position to present a bill; it could be monthsbefore the claim could creep from local podestaria or vicariato to the regionalcamera, back for confirmation and thence, all too frequently, to Venice forappeal.142

The potential loyalty of the peasantry to Venice was not a sentimentalone. As with the territorial magnates it depended on the outcome of a

Da Porto, 203.Cervelli, 346-7.SS. reg. 42, 39 (14 Aug.).ST. reg. 18, 29V (5 Aug. 1512). On requisitioning: ibid., reg. 16, 98V-99 (16 Apr. 1509); Sanuto, xx,559 (23 Aug. 1515).ST. reg. 20, 22. Printed in Besta, Bilanci, 194-6.For a list of labour services (or commutations) due from a rural community as enforced contributionsto military activity, see Ferrari, 'Com'era amministrato un comune del Veronese', 276.

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balance of interests: degrees of protection versus degrees of exploitation.For reasons that will probably in part remain always inscrutable, it turnedout that there was a bond of common interest between the Venetianpatriciate and the rural patriarchate - those hamlet elders, massari andsindici, who persuaded their neighbours to pay, work and fight. And it wasthe support of the rural masses, organized, as we shall see, into a militiasupporting the professional army, that was the greatest contribution madeby the Terraferma to Venice's rebirth as a major power in Italy.

Thereafter, the republic had no cause to doubt the support it wouldreceive in wartime from Terraferma communities or individuals, though aresidual notion that Venice was but primus inter pares persisted — had,indeed, been intensified by the re-wooing ceremonies of the post-1509period. The relationship between ruler and ruled can be summed up interms of the response to the Turkish challenge of 1570. It was not until 25March that the Senate acknowledged a state of 'open war',143 but theinevitability of conflict had infected the Terraferma with a mild case of warfever by the middle of the month. On 18 March the municipal governmentof Padua promised to arm three galleys and to send 100 'gentlemen' and asmany common soldiers to the army at their own and the city's expense. Onthe same day Verona, which in January had made itself unpopular bypleading exemption from one of the taxes imposed on the Terraferma withthe need for mobilization in mind, offered to pay for 500 infantry for sixmonths a year for as long as hostilities continued. Other offers followed: payfor 1000 Terraferma infantry for six months from Brescia, 400 for sixmonths from Treviso, unspecified amounts of' horse or foot or money' fromVicenza. On 30 March came an offer of 10,000 ducats from Bergamo which,though pleading poverty (and 1509 had, indeed, been a year of dearth),declared its determination to help the Signoria 'in this most unjust warprovoked on land and sea by the great Ottoman Emperor of the Turks, thecruellest enemy and persecutor of our Christian religion'.144 There werealso offers of aid from groups, such as the caste Hani of Friuli and the Collegeof Notaries in Treviso. Altogether offers from communities totalled over100,000 ducats plus the pay for 2200 infantry.

It is true that Bergamo asked for and received permission to raise localtaxes in order to recoup itself, but then the Christian religion really signified,save to a few enthusiasts, the empire da Mar, whose administrative anddefence systems were already subsidized by the Terraferma. Verona's offerof men was not realized until May - when its contingent marched under the

143 SM. reg. 39, 139.144 ST. reg. 48, 9v.

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banner not of St Mark but of'Verona fidelis'.145 Padua's men turned up inJune. The government accepted all offers from volunteers who would payfor themselves (from families like the Brescian Gambara and Porcellaga) aslong as the numbers they offered to bring with them were small. Somescepticism was felt when more than 30 were offered; larger offers were seenas possible poaching on the strengths of the militia or as bids to pre-empt theCollege's choice of mercenary captains and were turned down withexpressions of gratitude.146 In this way 54 offers of personal service wereaccepted for a total of 30 cavalry and 830 infantry.

Purely individual volunteers were not only welcomed but stimulated bythe offer of tax exemptions and the suspension of legal proceedings in whichthey might be involved. Still more successful was the suspension (as fromI5°9)/47 °f sentences of banishment even for grave crimes. SciarraMartinengo, who had been fighting for years in Flanders and France, wastempted back by such an offer148 and his subsequent appointment asGovernor-General of Albania broadcast the republic's good faith to its notinconsiderable band of militant exiles. But with the Terraferma garrisonsreduced in numbers and stripped of their more experienced captains, andwith most of the men-at-arms posted to Friuli, the government was toocautious to go beyond the encouragement of individuals and add the goad ofcompulsory military service to the ever weightier yoke of taxation it wasforced to impose.

Similar support followed the outbreak of the War of Gradisca. In January1616 alone Bergamo offered to raise and pay 50 cuirassiers for the duration;Brescia, 1000 infantry with a preliminary list of four gentlemen who wouldserve in commands; Vicenza, 400 infantry; Verona, 500; Este, 50; Padua,100 cuirassiers; Montagnana, 60 infantry; Cividale di Belluno, 2000 ducats ayear while 'the present disturbances' lasted; Castelfranco, 30 arquebusiers;and Treviso, 1000 ducats a year.

Among the volunteers there were conspicuous examples of gallantry,such as that of Daniel Antonini of Udine, disciple of Galileo and author ofLettere scientifiche, who fought so bravely as a cavalry captain that when hewas killed in action his family was given 300 ducats for a monument to

145 A. Avena, 'Memorie veronesi della guerra di Cipro e della battaglia di Lepanto', NAV., n.s. xxiv, i(1912) 99.

146 These offers are recorded in ST. reg. 48 and Collegio, Notatorio, reg. 38.147 Priuli, iv, 452; Sanuto, xxxi, 308-9. Banishment: SS. reg. 41, I6IV (19 Apr.). Also SM. reg. 20,

I 6 - I 6 V (7 June 1522).148 Dieci, Comune, reg. 29, 224-224V (21 Feb. 1571). He was not allowed to re-enter Brescia, where his

crime had been committed. The suspension of sentences to banishment had also been applied in the1537-40 War; e.g. ibid., reg. 13, 3 (4 Mar. 1539).

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commemorate him.149 But such careers were exceptional. Those whovolunteered to form or join infantry or cavalry companies numbered2-3000150 and there is no indication that most of them behaved eitherbetter or worse than men from other states. Once more the offer to suspendsentences of banishment brought home some enduringly valuable and loyalservants, such men as Francesco Tensini of Crema; banished for life forraping (or at least sleeping with) a nun, he weathered the war and becamethe republic's leading military engineer.151 But out of the perhaps 1000 whoreturned there is far more evidence of recidivism than of value to a state atwar; 582 had already deserted from Friuli by July 1616.152 More soberinterest attaches in any case to the remarkable extent to which thegovernment, as we shall see, was able to count on local communities beingwilling to accept inconvenience and danger in the interest of self-defence,their preparedness to make sacrifices to preserve the political status quo.153

Venice's trust in its subjects did not extend to the peacetime permanentinfantry army in garrison or quarters. How far the permanent infantry forcein the Terraferma came to comprise Venetian subjects is difficult todetermine. Local men were, of course, used as substitutes, but theimpression is that the great majority both of captains and men originallyenrolled were still Italians from outside the Veneto. In 1585 the c. 200 menwho had deserted within eighteen months from the garrison of Brescia weresaid by its capitano to be 'mainly foreign' - i.e. non-Venetian.154 In 1593 thegarrison of Bergamo (like Brescia a key frontier city) was described as'chiefly foreign and of the worst the world could supply, incapable andcriminal'.155 In an exceptional move to improve the garrison of the castelloof Brescia in 1600 the Senate ordered that both captains and men should beVenetian subjects; but in 1602 Nicolo Contarini, repeating the usualcomplaints about foreign garrison troops, recommended their replacementnot by subjects of the Terraferma but by men imported from Dalmatia andAlbania.156 Indeed, the policy of not setting dog to watch dog which wasobserved in the switching of garrison troops as well as captains from oneplace to another (and thus led to endless complications in the case ofTerraferma subjects) encouraged the employment of non-Venetian Italiansjust as it determined the use of men from the empire overseas to act as policeon the mainland. There was also the problem (acknowledged by the Senate

V. Joppi (ed.), Lettere storiche sulla guerra del Friuli, 1616-1617 (Udine, 1882) 9-13.ST. regs. 85 and 86 passim.SS. reg. 105, 248 and 249 (21 Dec), 223V-224 (2 Dec), 251-251V (26 Dec).Ibid., 213V (26 Nov.).See below, 364 seq.Pasero, Relazioni, 183.Romanin, Storia document at a, vi, 473.ST. reg. 70, 118 (7 Nov.); Cozzi, Contarini, 84.

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in 1599) of what to do with troops when they retired or when they weredischarged; much better that they should take their indigence and theirviolence to be solved by another government. Nor among the captains doesthere appear to be a change of emphasis. They remained a mixed bag,mainly Italian, though including some Corsicans and Swiss; the records arevery incomplete, but towards the end of the Cinquecento perhaps anestimate of 20% of Venetian subjects among captains and 15% amonginfantrymen, corporals and sergeants would not be misleading; in 1610 theCollege was authorized to engage up to four more 'native subjects of ours'for garrison commands.157 For the men, the wage structure and lack ofprospects in the infantry bred discontent, and this was the last infectionVenice wanted in its own subjects. Nor was the demand to enlist strong; inother occupations real wages appear to have kept up with inflation, and thefaltering industrial output in the face of foreign competition in the latesixteenth and early seventeenth centuries was compensated for by migrationor the doubling-up of occupations. The army, as elsewhere in Europe,remained an occupation of the last resort, and the non-Venetian origins ofthe names on Venice's muster lists reflected worse cases of economic malaisethan its own.

With the numbers of men-at-arms static, infantry commands hard tocome by and, in any case, lacking in peacetime the prestige attached tocavalry service, the republic was faced with the problem of what to do withthe more restlessly ambitious males of its Terraferma, men doubtless usefulin war, but a challenge to law and order in normal times. Frequently theproblem solved itself. Typical was the case of the young Count PompilloCollalto. After fighting in Dalmatia under Camillo Orsini in 1538-9, heserved in Germany, Flanders and France c and other provinces, to considerand learn the things that could improve him as a soldier and a captain andalthough he was constantly offered the most honourable posts by variousprinces he did not accept them, waiting always to be employed by his ownsignori\15S This is the sort of career referred to by Tagliapietra. Similarly,while Giulio Savorgnan remained in Venetian service from the late 1520s -fighting through the wars of 1537-40 and 1570-3 and designing fortifi-cations in peacetime - until his death in 1595, his younger brothers Marioand Ascanio made their names in French and German service.159

Two attempts, however, were made to direct the surplus energies of thosewho stayed at home. One was the setting up in 1593 of a volunteer dragoon

157 SS. reg. 100, 133 (29 June).158 Girolamo Ruscelli, Le imprese illustri . . . (Venice, 1580) 313.159 E. Salaris, Unafamiglia di militari italiani deisecoli XVIe XVII: i Savorgnani (Rome, 1913) passim.

See SS. reg. 64, 93 (13 Feb. 1546) for praise of Giulio's bravery and loyalty in aparte renewing hiscontract. For Tagliapietra, above, 321.

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militia open to recruits of sufficient means to provide their own mounts andnot to require pay.160 By the following year 1300 had been enrolled,including members from such notable families as the Martinengo. But thevolunteers made so poor a showing at musters that the Senate, accepting thefact that the organization had been exploited by signori who used it as a coverfor maintaining mounted bravi and as an excuse for carrying an arquebus atall times, decided in 1596 to disband them all and declare the experimentclosed.161 Instead, it sponsored academies in Padua, Verona, Treviso andUdine where horsemanship and its companion cult, fencing, could becanalized and where, together with a little of the mathematics useful forbrigading troops and planning fortifications and siegeworks, young bloodscould let off steam while at the same time preparing themselves for armyservice when it was required of them.162

(iii) THE MILITIA

Both the age and the armament of the men to be enrolled in the militia of1508 had been left to the discretion of local authorities, though theorganization within companies was defined: a contestabile for every 100, 1corporal for every 25 men; no pay save a tassa for a horse for the contestabilewas offered in peacetime. The only incentive to join was exemption from thelabour services that could dislocate the peasant's life, pioneer and cartingwork on canals, river courses and fortifications. And pay in wartime servicewas to be considerably lower than that of professional troops encounteringsimilar risks.163 It is a remarkable tribute to Lactantio da Bergamo, Citolo daPerugia and the other captains chosen by the College that on being called upin April 1509 to join the army massing at Pontevico, 9000 militiamen arrivedthere from the following regions:

Bergamasco 1500Veronese 1200Bresciano 1200Trevisano 1200Vicentino 900Padovano 1500Friuli 1500

160 Capi di Guerra, Ba. A-D, 28 June. Only officers received a salary; men were remitted the expense ofattending musters.

161 SS. reg. 90, 151 (11 Jan.). Cf. Capi di Guerra, Ba. 4 (6 Jan. 1596), adverse report from Capitano ofPadua Zaccaria Contarini.

162 J. R. Hale, 'Military academies on the Venetian Terraferma in the early seventeenth century', Studiveneziani, xv (1973) 273-95.

163 ST. reg. 15, 161 v. Four ducats for the contestabile, 3 for the corporal, 2 for the men.

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Manpower

And the enthusiastic support of the militia by the captain-general, Alviano,must account for reports that they sported his red and white colours.164

By early May, however, the number of deserters was causing alarm; allrectors were told to warn the subordinate local authorities to send them back'without an hour's delay' on pain of having their ears and noses cut off andtheir possessions confiscated.165 Accounts of militiamen's conduct atAgnadello on 14 May differ widely: some fled, others ranged so far in the vanthat they were killed by their own artillery; Lactantio, pioneer of theVeronese nucleus of 1507, was warm in his praise.166 All the same, in theconfusion that followed the army's retreat and during the snakes-and-ladders campaigns of the next months, references to the trained militiabecame few; much of it was in enemy or occupied territory and stayed thereto guard its members' own interests, the rest can only dimly be glimpsedbeneath population shifts and amid local call-ups based on the pre-existingright of the Venetian authorities to impose military service.

Thus early in August 1509 the Proveditor of Treviso claimed that10-12,000 peasants had been raised from the surrounding countryside.167

Later in the month 6000 peasants were reported among the defenders ofPadua, welcomed as supplementing the work force for the fortifications andissued with arms confiscated by the rectors from the less trustworthycitizens. Andrea Gritti, indeed, repeatedly urged the government to sendhim bows and arrows ('their natural weapon') in large quantities for defencepurposes and also for peasants operating as guerillas; after all, he pointedout, the German infantry wore no armour on their backs. DuringSeptember peasants who had fled to Venice were rounded up by thesestriere authorities, issued with arms and with breastplates hastilyhammered out in the Arsenal, and posted in the Mestrino.168 Thereafter, bylegal hook or crook, or in response to requests for arms for self-defence, thecivil and military authorities used peasants as essential supplements to theregular forces. In spite of much pious talk of'their goodwill towards theVenetian state', their being 'true men of S. Marco', it was realized that fullcontrol over them was impossible, that they would desert if their cropsneeded attention or to prevent reprisals if the enemy occupied theirterritory, that they were friendly brigands rather than a reliable reserve, letalone a potential shock force. But they were useful as baggage guards, scoutsand moppers-up of stragglers or as temporary reinforcements of depleted

164 Numbers from Sanuto, viii, 152-2. Colours in Cervelli, Machiavelli, 149-50.165 ST. reg. 16, 108-108V.166 £ ) a p o r t O 5 Lettere storiche, 5 5 - 6 ; Cervell i , 343; Pieri, Rinascimento e la crisi militare, 4 6 6 , 602 .167 Sanuto, ix, 11 (2 Aug.); Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1500-1513, 92.168 priii j

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garrisons. And they were trusted to see where, in the long run, their trueadvantage lay. The government had from the start of the war condemned illtreatment of the rural population by its armies. The point was even seizedby the command, harassed as they were by troops frustrated by the latearrival of their pay; newly appointed as captain-general in 1513, Alvianopromised the doge and College in 1513 that 'I will see that the army doesnot ruin your subjects and the miserable peasants.'169

Bands of rural guerillas, or reinforcements to garrisons or armies, wereraised on an ad hoc basis; little attempt was made to keep them in being oncean emergency had passed. Nonetheless, this piecemeal experience made theeventual return to the notion of a large trained militia in 1528 inevitable.Meanwhile, there were gestures in this direction: an attempt in 1510 to raisea 'militia of S. Marco' {ordinanza marchesca) in Friuli,170 which probablyfoundered because it was in competition with the semi-feudal one (said tonumber about 6000 in that year)171 organized by the Savorgnan clan and itsdependants, and the raising of a force by Alviano in 1514 from the Padovanoand Trevisano which, still in being in the following year, was declared by theproveditor-general with the army to be ' a fine sight, all dressed in the redand white livery of the captain-general'.172

After the recovery of the Terraferma the first general militia reorgani-zation, however, gave priority to the fleet. News of Turkish preparations in1520 led the Senate to order an enlistment throughout the Terraferma of10,000 men capable of bearing arms as a reserve for the galleys. Passed byonly four votes, the measure lapsed.173 Two years later a unanimous voteordered the creation of a 6000-strong sea militia (ordinanza da mar).174 Theinducements to serve, given the unpopularity of galley service, were nowstronger: exemption for life from personal taxation as well as labour services,permission to carry arms in peacetime, freedom during service and for sixmonths afterwards from prosecution for debt, the normal monthly wage (12lire for the first four months, 9 thereafter) and rations of a galiot when at sea.Each man on joining was to be given a schioppo and trained in its use, which,the Senate observed, 'will be of great benefit to us in time of need both at seaand on land'.

The administrative reaction to the order was slack, and such response asthere was was poor in the first year and then dried up altogether. Thegovernment explained this as being due to the unfortunate experience of the

Sanuto, xvi, 248-9.ST. reg. 17, 4-5 (12 Mar.). No numbers specified.Da Porto, 188.Sanuto, xviii, 219-22, 276; xx, 305.Ibid., xxviii, 559.SM. reg. 20, 7-8V (18 Mar.).

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Manpower

first men sent to sea. They had been mixed at the benches 'with Dalmatianswho had treated them badly'; wintering abroad,' many died and the rest hadundergone much suffering', and word of these conditions had discouragedothers from coming forward.175 But more important causes were thereluctance of men to leave homes menaced by one war scare after another,and the preference of Venetian representatives for reconstructing theTerraferma militia. In 1525 an ex-proveditor of the army recommended afresh enrolment of 12,000 men, 4000 to be trained to use pikes; 4000,'arquebuses, not large but like those used by the Spaniards'; and 4000,schioppetti.176 In 1526 the rector of Capo d'Istria reported that men wererefusing to serve because the labour exemptions promised in 1508 hadlapsed. The Senate authorized him to offer these and, when acceding to aproposal in 1527 from the Lieutenant of Friuli to enrol 3000 men, agreedthat they should be released from labour services and allowed to carry armsin peacetime and would be trained by captains appointed by the College.177

In February 1528 the government at last took the initiative, decreeing theelection of a proveditor-general to look into the whole question of militiaorganization in Venice's border territories,178 and in April, after some hungvotes, the Senate ordered that an arquebus militia of 20,000 should be raisedthroughout the Terraferma. In addition to the 3000 recently enrolled inFriuli and a body of about 1000 in the Bresciano which also acted as a spur togovernment action, the allotments were to be: Padua, 3000; Treviso, 3000;Vicenza, 3000; Verona, 3000; Bergamo, 2000; Crema, Feltre and Belluno,500 each; Rovigo and the Polesine, 600.179

Taking into account some supplementary legislation of the followingyear,180 the reactivated permanent militia (le ordinanze de li archibusieri) wasorganized on the following lines. It did not involve formal conscription.Local authorities were to reach targets passed on to them by the rectors ofthe regional capital, not taking heads of households, men living on their ownor men already enrolled in the sea militia. Selection and enrolment were tobe supervised by panels comprising a professional militia captain, a vice-collateral and a representative of the local authority, and the men's names

J. R. Hale, 'Men and weapons: the fighting potential of sixteenth century Venetian galleys', in Warand Society, ed. B. Bond and I. Roy (London, 1975) 9 seq.; SM. reg. 23, 39V-40 (29 Sept. 1534)explaining failure of the 1522 scheme.A. Angelucci, // tiro a segno in Italia dal XII al XVI secolo (Turin, 1863) li-lii (15 Oct.).SM. reg. 21, 19V (20 July); ST. reg. 24, 190-190V (28 June).Sanuto, xlvi, 608 (19 Feb.).Hung votes: ST. reg. 25, 13 (30 Mar.). Order to College to work out scheme: ibid., 20 (18 Apr.).Orders to rectors: ibid., 23-23V (28 Apr.). The number 20,000 is mentioned only by Sanuto, xlvii,307 (28 Apr.) and it is from this that, lacking other evidence, I put the Bresciano figure at c. 1000,bringing the total to 20,100.ST. reg. 25, 181V-182.

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and personal characteristics were to be noted in a book, from which theycould subsequently be removed only with the consent of the rectors of theregional capital. No age limit was prescribed (it was probably the 18-40years of the galley militia). Recruits could wear arms throughout Venetianterritory, were exempt from labour services (faction personal) only, and werepromised that they would be called on 'only for the defence of our cities andterritories and not for service at sea'. Each 500—800 men were to becommanded by an experienced resident captain who on the first Sunday ofeach month was to check their competence with the arquebus and train themin the use of the pike. There were four compulsory target practices a yearwith prizes amounting to 10 ducats for each. That the revived militia shouldcontinue to be trained to use guns reflected wartime experience: theyencouraged recruits who might have been put off by the connotations of coldsteel, and they were the weapon best suited to amateurs, whether engaged inguerilla warfare in countryside well known to them or manning the walls offortified places under professional supervision. And though (if we includethe galley militia) one in fifteen rural households was to contain a firearm, intheory they were harmless without the ammunition carefully guarded inVenice and the armouries of the regional capitals. Even here, given theavailability of gunpowder for hunting, and the evidence of its use in crimesof violence, the government was calculatedly accepting a risk to public order.

The enthusiasm of rectors led them to overshoot the target: by 1537 therewere 24,000 men enrolled. To Venice's commander-in-chief, the Duke ofUrbino, faced with a sea war against the Turks, this was a misuse ofmanpower. He saw the arquebus militiamen as unfitted for combat; theirrole was to supplement the garrison and field forces of the standing armyuntil hired professionals arrived and 'to punish the insolence of subjects andcertain neighbouring signorotti who sometimes take advantage of troubledtimes to plot against the dignity of the state'. In any case, they were toopoorly trained to be sent overseas.181 Accordingly, the militia was to bereduced to 15,000. From the 9000 men discharged and the 6000 alreadyenrolled in the galley militia, 12,000 of the fittest were to compose anenlarged galley militia, sufficient, it was hoped (vainly, as it turned out), forthe manning of 66 vessels.182

In spite of the arquebus militia's passive role in the war of 1537-40, thegovernment's faith in it remained high. Moreover, since the reduction innumbers of 1537, the population of the Terraferma had notably in-creased.183 This was due, suggested the land reclamation enthusiast Alvise181 Discorsi, quoted by Celli, 'Le ordinanze militari', 498-9.182 SM. reg. 24, 53-4; SS. reg. 29, 187-187V (18 Sept.).183 A 1561 estimate put it at 1,900,000-plus: BMV., ms. It. VII, 1187 (= 8971) n.p., quoting ex-sindico

Alessandro Mocenigo.

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Manpower

Corner, to a reduction in the number of plague epidemics and to 'the newway of making war' which involved less bloodshed than the old.184 Drawingattention to the increase in 1560, the Senate ordered that from August themilitia was to be increased to 20,000 men enrolled as shown in theaccompanying table.185

Territory

FriuliBellunoFeltreTrevisoBassanoPolesinePaduaVicenzaColognaVeronaBresciaBergamoCrema

Total

No. ofcaptains

51

1

41

1

441

4531

35

Old nos.

1875312312

187s187376

18751875376

187525001250

312

15,000

New nos.

2500500500

2400500600

24002400

500240030001800

500

20,000

In the following year the galley militia was increased from 8000 (acompromise between the 12,000 called for in 1537 and the 6000 actuallyfound to be enrolled in 1545) to io,ooo.186 At a time, therefore, when thenumber of adult males fit for active service on the Terraferma was reckonedat around 200,000, one in every seven belonged to an organization whichallowed him to carry arms. This was the chief inducement to serve, evenstronger, the Senate had implied in 1552, than exemption from otherpersonal services; rectors were punishing militia members for carryingweapons, but they must not put notions about local law and order above thegovernment's need to have willing men 'to put into cities for their safety anddefence'.187 The privilege was, however, carefully circumscribed. Armscould not be worn to church or on feast days, nor within towns; pikes andarquebuses could only be carried when actually on duty - when assemblingfor musters and training, for example. Men were trusted to keep theirweapons (but not the body armour issued to selected members of a

184 Quoted by Brian Pullan, Rich and Poor in Renaissance Venice (Oxford, 1971) 290.185 ST. reg. 42, 151V (20 June).186 SM. reg. 35, 69-69V.187 ST. reg. 38, 74V-75 (26 Feb.).

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company) at home and not in central armouries; gunpowder, however, wasstill issued only at training periods and was carefully rationed. Thegovernment's interest was seconded by its higher command. At therecently engaged Sforza Pallavicino's urging, piecemeal regulations wereconsolidated in a militia code in 1558;188 this was revised in 1564 on theadvice of the captain-general of infantry, Giordano Orsini.189 Under thesecodes the age of enrolment was lowered to 17-24 and the period of service toeight years. Exemption was granted to heads of families, men living andearning alone, servants living with a family, non-Venetians by birth andmen already enrolled in the galley militia. Each sub-company of 100 was tobe trained on five Sundays a year by its capo di cento and capi di squadra (theold contestabile and corporals), and formed part of a full company of 5-600under a captain, each with a full-time sergeant and drummer. These in turnwere answerable to five colonels (governors of garrisons, for whom this wasan extra duty) in charge of the districts of Friuli, Feltre, Padua, Verona andBrescia; twice a year they had to exercise the full force within theirjurisdiction. In supreme military command was the captain-general ofinfantry, under the political guidance and check of the savio of theTerraferma deputed to this charge for his term of duty; both men had toattend annual general musters and manoeuvres of all the companies fromVerona westwards (at Monte Chiari, near Brescia) and Vicenza eastwards(at Barcon, near Treviso). In each zone they were assisted by a sergeant-major from the captain-general's staff, whose function was to goad into somesort of order men despondently described by Orsini as being ' for the mostpart ignorant and thick-headed'.190

The reasons for his disappointment are fairly simple to identify. Thoughstill referred to as the arquebus militia, and though all its members wereencouraged to enter for regional marksmanship competitions now heldtwice a year, the ratio of arquebus to pole-arms for each 100 men had beencut (to 30:70 in 1548),191 and the pike was neither a handy weaponto carry around for everyday protection and prestige nor easy to learnto use in the tight formations prescribed for its practitioners. Anyonecould load and blaze off an arquebus after a fashion, but the pike was not asuitable weapon for the 'thick-headed'. Again, the army militia had still notbeen granted the exemption from personal taxation offered to their navalequivalent. Another snag concerned incentives. In some areas, as in theBresciano, peasants and local craftsmen carried weapons so habitually anduniversally that local authorities had had to blink at this illegality, and it did

188 ST. reg. 41, 142-8V (10 Dec).189 ST. reg. 45, 24V-26V (24 May).190 ASI., ser. i, app. 21-2, vol. vi (1848) 199-218.191 ST. reg. 35, 179 bis (26 July); cf. Materie Miste Notabili, 8 (15 May).

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Manpower

not appear as a privilege. Again, there were areas in which, by custom, finesand commutations for labour services had been paid on behalf of individualsfrom the profits derived from communal lands: this removed anotherincentive to join the militia.192

More generally there was the problem of the system's administrativecomplexity. The authorities of the rural communes (degani, consoli, massari)were not always men of proven literacy, yet their responsibility was toproduce lists of militiamen in their areas, annotated with ages (and not everypeasant knew his age), surnames (still rare in the country) and physicaldescriptions. These were used by vice-collaterals as the basis for their ownregional register, copies of which had to be forwarded to the captain-generalof infantry and the collateral-general. Militia regions which had no vice-collateral attached to them - Bassano, Feltre-Belluno, Cologna - weremeant to be covered by those nearest to them, respectively Vicenza, Trevisoand Verona. Taking into account deaths, sickness and emigration as well asilliteracy and negligence, it is not surprising that militia records were in astate of such permanent disarray that training periods were largely devotedto checking them.

A final reason for the contrast between the neatness of the codes and theconfusion of the product was financial. Responsibility was divided betweencentral and rural government. The former paid the salaries of colonels andcaptains and paid for the gunpowder used in training. The latter paid for theleather gorget and steel helmet every man needed, the half-armours worn byfile-leaders of pikemen (10% in 1548, 15% in 1559, 20% from 1564)193 andweapons. They paid - this was the real bone of contention - a cost-of-livingallowance for every day a man spent attending a training period outside hisown district; it was this issue that had persuaded the Senate in 1549 to cutthese occasions from ten to five a year -194 at considerable cost to themilitia's efficiency. They also had to provide a house for each captain thatwas large enough for the storage of his company's half-armours (and to payhim extra for having them kept in good condition) as well as findingaccommodation for sergeants and drummers. All this required additionalbook-keeping and was grudged and avoided all the more because the salariesof the militia's permanent establishment though paid 'by the government'came from the camere of the regional headquarters - to which both ruralcommunes and citizens contributed through taxes and tolls. Finally, therewere constant complaints about the quality of the militia captains. At anaverage of 80 ducats a year they received something like one-half the income

192 E.g. BMV., ms. It. VII, 1187 (= 8971) n.p. (1562: citing ex-Capitano of Brescia Sebastian Venier).193 ST. reg. 35, 179 bis (26 July); Materie Miste Notabili, 8 (15 May); ST. reg. 45, 24V (24 May).194 ST. reg. 36, 164-5 (13 Nov.).

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of an 'ordinary' captain in the garrison force. Orsini pointed out that theirduties involved considerable travel and the training of companies far largerthan those of professional infantry, so that they ought to be paid at least asmuch to compensate for their 'expenses and fatigue'. He estimated thatanother 5000 ducats a year would provide the militia with officers of thecalibre it required, but the Senate, in this respect, was not prepared to act onhis advice.

The result was that the militia was good in parts and not good in the samepart for long at a time, depending on the energy and quality of the localofficials and captains. Describing a general muster in the Bresciano,Bergamasco and Cremasco in 1546 the Podesta of Brescia said: 'it is agrievous financial burden to the territories without any utility, for the menturn up so uninstructed that there is just a few hours of general uproar . . .it's essential that the captains prepare them first man by man, file by file, andcompany by company . . . but they visit their men only on the rarestoccasions'. Twenty years later, however, in 1566, the militia of theBresciano was reported on enthusiastically: ' Fine men and well trained bytheir present chief, Hieronimo Martinengo, who shows the greatestdiligence and musters them frequently'. But the rector also noted that thesemusters involved, 'an unwelcome burden to the men and expense to thecommunes'.195 The moral of these and comparable reports was clear: goodofficers and energetic local authorities196 could mitigate the ill effects ofhoping to have a useful militia on the cheap. But the numbers called up scareby scare into garrison (or to help police such festivities as the annual fair atCrema)197 were small, and the long years of peace were more productive ofregulations than of enlightened expenditure and improved preparedness.

As in 1537-40, the government during the greater overseas war of1570-3 did not include the militia in its combat calculations. In 1570 therewas a call for 900 men, in 1571 for 2500, but it was made clear that these weredirected only at volunteers and that their repatriation from garrison duty inDalmatia would be effected as soon as sufficient professional soldiersarrived.198 In sharp contrast to the full call-up of the galley militia, this mostcautious of uses made of the arquebus militia in years during which Veniceraised 27,800 and 13,800 new troops respectively calls for explanation.Though nothing had been said in regulations since 1528 about militiamen195 Pasero, 63, 95. Cf. Relazioni dei rettori veneti in terraferma, iii, Treviso (Milan, 1975) 17-18 and 53

(from good to bad).196 I.e. unlike the Capitano of Padua who said in his relazione that he was unable to report on militia

numbers 'because to make them come to the city would inconvenience and cost them too much, as itwould me to go through the territorio' (Relazioni dei rettori, iv, Padua (Milan, 1975) 15-16 (1547)).

197 ST. reg. 43, 3V (12 Sept. 1560).198 S T . reg. 47, 155V (28 Jan. 1570); S M . reg. 39, 252V (2 Dec. 1570), 302 (19 Feb. 1571); SS. reg. 77, 67

(11 Feb.); ibid., 132 (13 Aug.).

358

Manpower

being excused overseas service there was a general assumption that thisprovision, rooted in medieval practice, still obtained. A further reason,however, was the ever declining standard of a militia whose officers, beingreadily available, had to be sent overseas in the early stages of mobilization.The galley militiaman's task, though arduous, was simple; he wasdisciplined instantly by the oar and his bench. The scarcely trained, oruntrained, arquebus militiaman was liable to be simply a nuisance. And inthe third place, Venice was never so sure of its neighbour states that it couldafford to strip the Terraferma of every means of self-defence.

But in spite of its near uselessness during the war, given one of that war'schief lessons, the increasing difficulty of raising professional troops tosupplement the standing army, the militia came to be valued more than everas the vital make-weight between the permanent army and its short-contractmercenary reinforcements. 'You do not wish, I believe', Sforza Pallavicinotold the doge in 1579, 'to rely any more in time of need on Spanish andFrench infantry. But, as we know, the forbidding of enlistment of theprinces of Italy makes the supply from the peninsula very uncertain. So yoursole resource rests with your own subjects, the men of the militia.'199

Ambassadors and other envoys were expected to report on other countries'militias in case there was anything to learn from them.200 It was with doubtsabout the number and quality of'foreign' troops available in an emergencyin mind that the military proveditor-general Alvise Grimani in 1589suggested doubling the militia enrolment.201 This, thanks to the continuingefforts of patrician representatives and the military command, then stood atsome 23-24,000, at least on paper.202 Such an increase, he suggested, wasamply justified by a continuing increase in population.

Though the government made no move to increase the official enrolmentfigure from 20,000, rectors had become so concerned by the discrepancybetween paper and actual numbers that recruitment had been put on anincreasingly ad hoc basis. As early as 1556 the ex-Capitano of Vicenza hadrecommended the creation of a reserve of 1000 men in the Vicentino. Theywould attend only company musters, so that local communities would nothave to pay their expenses at regional musters; nor would they be exemptfrom local taxation. From 1565 names of possible reservists were enrolled inthe Bergamasco, but it was only from the early 1570s that the practice ofenlisting a militia 'di rispetto' alongside those raised 'per ordinari' began tospread more widely. Other rectors referred to the men of the reserve as

199 Dieci, Lettere di Condottieri, Ba. 308 (27 Nov.).200 E .g . A n d r e a G u s s o n i on the T u s c a n milit ia in Alber i , Relazioni degli ambasciatori, ser. 2, ii, 364.201 p r Ow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 43, n.p.202 Ibid. For 1589 a total of 21,320 excluding Istria. The Istrian enrolment was put at 2400 in 1580

(BMV., ms. It. VII, 1187 (= 8971) n.p.

359

Part II: I$OQ—I6IJ

'soldati novi' as opposed to the 'soldati vecchi' of the body of 20,000.203

Grimani himself saw to the enrolment of 436 militiamen 'di rispetto' in theCremasco and as many as 3725 in the Bergamasco, thus more than doublingthe numbers in this zone, and after judging the drills they undertook with'ordinary' members of the militia a success, he advised the doge to grantthem similar privileges.204 The reserve militia does not seem to have beenformally constituted by government order. The men provided their ownarms, but the numbers enrolled, and the privileges extended, were left to theinitiative of rectors and proveditors. 'I enrolled 1700', the ex-Capitano ofPadua reported in that same year, and his successor claimed to have broughtthe number up to 3600.205 Taking the ordinarii and the di rispetto together(again on paper), Grimani achieved a total of 37,3oo;206 his proposal todouble the militia enrolment was, then, an attempt to clarify the regulationsthat would henceforward apply both to the official trained militia and itsreserve.

In the militia regulations207 first printed in 1593, a stout compilation of 31pages, produced at the prompting of the captain-general of infantry, Giovan-battista del Monte, no distinction was made between militiamen andreservists. What is more, the whole question of numbers was kept vague, asan issue best determined by rectors and the military staff on a regional basis.These regulations were in any case not designed to make changes, but tocorrect abuses, above all to prevent the employment of unqualified captainsand untrainable, or potentially vagabond, recruits. The command andcompany structure in essentials remained unchanged. Certain practices,which had been introduced locally, were now officially confirmed. Recruitshad to be between 18 and 34 years old, and their period of service was to befourteen years. All changes of residence were to be notified; this was to keepthe muster lists accurate and enable other authorities to be warned of thearrival of a likely recruit. Most important was the long-postponedratification of the custom whereby recruiting had been encouraged byexempting militiamen not only from labour services but from the personaltax, or estimo, that was due from every adult male inhabitant of theTerraferma unless he was specifically exempted.

By now the phrase'arquebus militia' had been dropped and ordinanze, or

203 Relazioni dei rettori, vii, Vicenza ( M i l a n , 1976) 40; xii, Bergamo (Mi lan , 1978) 77; xi, Brescia (Mi lan ,1978) 140 (references I owe to Pe te r J a n u a r y ) ; ii, Belluno, Feltre (Mi lan , 1974) 27; iii, Treviso, 112; i,Udine (Mi lan , 1973) 103.

204 p r O v v . G e n . in T e r r a f e r m a , B a . 4 3 , 2 Sep t . 1589 seq. F igures in B M V . , m s . I t . v n , 1187 ( = 8971)suggest that by 1590 he may have enrolled as many as 13,330 men 'di rispetto' in the Terraferma.

205 Relazioni dei rettori, iv, Padua, 9 3 , 95 .206 BMV., ms. It. vn, 1187 (= 8971), n.p.207 Ordinationi et regole . . . in materia di ordinanza (Venice) .

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Manpower

militia companies, used by itself. And this corresponded with thecontinuing decline in the use of that weapon. All militiamen had to haveswords; none was to possess the outlawed pistol or dagger, 'which are notsoldiers' weapons'. On Del Monte's advice each ioo men were to comprise50 arquebusiers, 40 pikemen and 10 musketeers, the two last groups to weararmour as well as helmets, the first to have at least a jerkin of reinforcedleather. In 1594 the proportion was changed to 40 arquebusiers, 40 pikemenand 20 musketeers.208 This was in keeping with European practice butunpopular, because the expense of weapons and armour, and the higherallowance paid to musketeers and pikemen on muster days, fell on thecommunities.

For the chief reason why numbers were not specified in the 1593regulations was the government's desire to keep the central costs of themilitia as low as in the past. The only nod of recognition to the militia'sinflation through the di rispetto convention had been the addition to thecommand paid by Venice of two colonels;209 no new captaincies were nowmentioned, and the annual cost to government of the militia officers' salarieswas 11-12,000 ducats. It was a bargain price to pay for a police and militaryforce on such a scale.

The cost to local communities, on the other hand, taking account of thetravel expenses payable to militiamen going to musters outside their owndistricts, and amortizing the capital expenditure on arms and armour overtheir effective life period, was something like 36,000 ducats a year.210 Spreadthroughout the whole Terraferma this is not, perhaps, an impressive sum.But the villages and hamlets which paid were composed of rural craftsmenand peasants. They lost, moreover, the personal tax from which militiamenwere exempt and which was designed, at least in part, to meet the expensesof local government. In 1581 a Senate order that the Riviera di Salo shouldproduce 600 instead of 250 men met with a storm of indignation; the regioncould not, it claimed, bear the extra expense. And in the following year theSenate reduced the number to 400. In 1601, after similar representations, itcancelled an order that Cividale in Friuli should increase its quota from 140to 200.211 The number of exemptions from attendance at musters duringyears of dearth, or following militia reinforcement of garrisons during thefrequent political scares of this period, point in the same direction. Themilitia was not only as large as local communities would bear but neither its

208 ST. reg. 63, 192 (16 Feb.).209 ST. reg. 52, 224-6, giving names (28 Nov. 1579).210 Based on the figures given in F. Rossi,' Le armature da munizione e l'organizzazione delle cernide nel

bresciano', ASL., ser. 9, viii (1979) 169-86.211 ST. reg. 53, 183 (2 Dec. 1581); reg. 54, 27V (5 June 1582); reg. 71, 68 (17 Aug. 1601).

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equipment nor the level of training could be expected to be up to thestandard envisaged by regulations.

At the end of a year 2I2 all men should have been taught to handle theirweapons smartly, the arquebusiers to have fired, running and crouching, attargets set at 40 paces, the musketeers at twice that range. Pikemen shouldhave practised skirmishing together, arquebusiers advancing and retiringwhile exchanging places in order to reload. All should have become familiarwith the words of command and drum signals for changing formation fromfront to rear, left to right and vice versa, and to have practised running for150 paces without breaking ranks. All this in their full equipment, though,revealingly, the 1593 regulations still had to repeat the prohibition abouttheir turning up helmetless and wearing the peasant's straw hat.

Accounts of these training periods vary, as indeed the skill andpersuasiveness of captains varied and the ability and willingness of the mento learn. In a report of 1609, f°r instance, Del Monte expressed thefrustration of a true reformer whose ideas were always blocked by pleas offinancial stringency. In particular he focused on the militia sergeants. Theregulations of 1593 had allowed them, after five years' service, and afterpassing the examination, to qualify as captains. Not one had applied. Thepay did not, as had been hoped, attract the ambitious, the would-beprofessional, but only the hangers-on of the powerful, their bravi.213 Over along period the evidence relating to such a numerous body of men mustcontain many divergent judgements on the militia's efficiency. If manycaptains were corrupt and lazy, others were reported on by rectors in tonesof high praise214 even if only one, the scholar-soldier Valerio Chieregato ofVicenza, acquired some fame as a zealous if pedantic reformer who used hisknowledge of classical military formations to turn ' a mere inventory of menand weapons' into a model army of 6600 men (the militias of Friuli, theTrevisano and the Feltrino); and this, he claimed, 'without all the shouts,curses, threats and blows and other untoward excesses that are customarilyused today'.215 A later account, however, claimed that even 'another Mars'could not bring order to the grudging ragamuffins of Friuli;216 and this wasbefore the added burden of cash contributions and labour services for Palmahad led to peasant emigration that left villages empty and land un-cultivated.217 A report on the Trevisano complained of the politically useful212 This account draws on orders of 1583 that remained in force though were not detailed in the 1593

regulations (ST. filza 5 Nov.).213 Capi di Guerra, Ba. M, 21 July.214 E.g. Senato, Dispacci Rettori, Padova, 11 Oct. 1609.215 O n Chierega to , J . R. Hale , 'Andrea Palladio, Polybius and Caesa r ' , Journal of the Warburg and

Courtauld Institutes, xl (1977), 2 4 5 - 6 .216 Relazioni dei rettori, v, Cividale del Friuli, Marano (Mi lan , 1976), 103 (1585).217 Ibid., 122 (1601).

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but militarily infuriating pacificity of its inhabitants, and one on the Feltrinodwelt on the problems of enforcing service on peasants so litigious that theywould spend 12 ducats in contesting a doctor's bill of 6 soldi.21* All the same,though indifference, recalcitrance and local misery all took their toll, none ofthe general reports on the militia by the higher command described it asunworkable or failed to praise certain units.

Militiamen were used freely to buttress garrisons during the Sarpi crisis of1606-7, but it was only during the War of Gradisca of 1615-17, whenVenice had unprecedented difficulty in obtaining troops from elsewhere inItaly, let alone - save from Holland - from across the Alps, that the militia,for the first time since Agnadello, was tested in offensive action.

Early in 1615 it had been decided, on the advice of Antonio Lando, thenProveditor-General in Terraferma, to select 12,000 of the best militiamenand re-enrol them in four divisions, each under a 'colonel major', two oneither side of the Mincio, thus dividing the militia into a first- and second-line reserve.219 In November 2400 of the men selected by Lando as'stoutest, most competent and freest from domestic responsibilities' weresent to Friuli and Istria. In theory they were to be armed with muskets,pikes and arquebuses in thirds. They were to be given a half pay from localcamere to enable them to get to Venice for transfer to the field, when theywould come on the government's pay-roll; local communities werereassured that this half pay exempted them from any demand from the menfor food and lodging as they passed on their way.220 Officers' and N.c.O.s'pay was to be brought up to active service rates. Brigading was, to start with,in groups of 1200, that is four companies of 300 each with a captain, ensignand sergeant, heads of hundreds and corporals,221 but this tidiness brokedown as detachments became scattered among the entrenched lines andcorps headquarters in Friuli and Istria. The militias of Friuli and Istria wereheld for local defence, and the drain on the Terraferma was kept reasonablylight because of the vulnerability of its frontiers and the need to have goodmen ready to reinforce garrisons. In this latter capacity they were usedincreasingly as professional troops were called to Friuli. In all, to keep activenumbers steady at about 2000 some 5600 'select' militiamen were calledfrom the width of the Terraferma from the Bresciano to the Padovano.222

These numbers were kept up only with increasing difficulty anddecreasing practical effect. In May 1616 the Capitano of Padua reported thatthe first batch of 1200 men from the Padovano had been sent off to Friuli and

218 I b id . , iii, Treviso, 1 2 1 - 2 (1607) and ii, Belluno, Feltre, 259 (1578).219 S S . reg. 104, 217V (13 F e b . ) .220 ST. reg. 85, 172-172V (30 Nov.).221 I b id . , 170 (27 N o v . ) , 173 (30 N o v . ) , 184.V (7 D e c ) , 260V (26 J a n . 1616).222 ST. regs. passim.

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Istria without much trouble. But the recent dispatch of a second 1200 hadbeen plagued by the men's reluctance to serve, 'partly because they wereless free than the first from domestic ties and interests, partly because theysaw many returning sick and [knew] that the war, through disease and inother ways, had consumed a large proportion of them; indeed, I can assureYour Serenity that from the lists of those who came back from camp I sawthat more than a third were missing'.223 Later in the year the ex-Capitano ofVerona made similar points. The news of 500 deaths did not encourageservice, and the character of countrymen was such that to leave behind'wives, children and the little comforts that their own hearths provide'sapped their morale, 'being like farmyard dogs, fearless of death in the yard,fleeing at the least alarm outside it'.224 It would be best, he concluded, tostrip more professionals from the Terraferma garrisons and use militiamento take their places. With such reports in mind (and the need for peasantplots to be tilled and harvested to supply the food on which the army inravaged Friuli relied) the government at last accepted that the best policywas to replace them with fresh drafts every two or three months.225 On oneoccasion the rectors of Treviso had been told to assure a draft of 1000 menthat they would be away 'only for the space of a very few days',226 but thisand similar declarations, because of the administrative strain of getting menaway and back for short periods, were recognized as subterfuge; units fromthe Veronese, indeed, served for fifteen months in Istria at a stretch,227 andthe repeated command that no militiamen should leave his post until hisrelief had arrived was countered, with mounting frequency, by desertion.

The militia system cannot, however, be judged simply by its performancein the field. It represented a military force, a poor one; but, more important,it represented, and over a century had nourished, a state of mind: a beliefthat the government could trust its subjects-in-arms.

In December 1615 rectors in the archducal border areas - Salo, Verona,Vicenza, Cividale di Belluno, Feltre, Bassano - were told to encourage allmales who were not already enrolled in the militia or the galley reserve toorganize themselves, under capi of their own choosing, into local defenceunits; these men were to be loaned muskets, arquebuses and helmets.228 InMarch 1616 the Capitano of Vicenza was congratulated for having enrolled4600 men in this way, complete with heads of hundreds and with drillssupervised by militia sergeants.229 The size of this enrolment was perhaps

223 Relazioni dei rettori, iv, Padua, 165.224 Ibid., ix, Verona (Milan, 1977) 225-6.225 S T . reg. 86 , 309V (18 J a n . 1617).226 S S . reg. 107, 105V (23 Aug . 1616).227 ST. reg. 87, H3V-I44 (18 Aug. 1617).228 S T . reg. 85, 196V-197 (18 D e c ) .229 S T . reg. 86, 17 (16 Mar . ) .

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unusual, but throughout 1616 there was a steady stream of requests fromsub-Alpine and Friulian communities, some of them very small, forweapons and ammunition with which to defend themselves at home or asthey worked in the fields, and for all the possibility of local violence whichthis might be thought to encourage, these requests were invariably gratified.

August 1616 was a month of real fear for the Terraferma, mulcted as itwas of professional troops and 'select' militiamen, and with Spanishintervention feared from the Milanese, especially after their capture of CarloEmanuele's strategic capital, Vercelli, in July. On that frontier, too, theproveditor beyond the Mincio was now told to organize a self-defence force'among those whose properties are towards the frontier'. He was to checkcarefully the trustworthiness of the captains and governors who had beenleft in charge of garrisons; were there any doubt about their loyalty he was toask for volunteers to replace them 'from the gentlemen of the cities ofBrescia, Bergamo and Crema'. He was to review and, as far as he could,weed out the dead wood from the militia and gunnery corps. But he was alsoto 'enrol in all those towns and territories [i.e. west of the Mincio] mensuited to bear arms with an eye to emergencies that might arise, dividingthem under capi\ Moreover he was, in co-operation with rectors and on thelines of the mobilization of 1605-6, to produce the names of 5-6000 menwho could be induced to join up as professional, if short-term, infantrymen,as long as none of them was already enrolled as a militiaman, oarsman orgunner. And he was to prepare for this 'without arousing confusion oralarm' but to show his confidence that subjects would co-operate inresponding to 'the paternal care and consideration in which we hold them'.To whoever seemed willing he was to give arms, and to this effect he wassent 100,000 ducats.230

This determination to raise a reserve over and above the 'select' militiaand its reserve (which included the militia di rispetto), capable of holdingfrontiers, enlarging garrisons and serving in the field, was extended, thoughpossibly less vigorously, to the area east of the Mincio. In September some1900 men from Treviso itself and its territory, enrolled as 'capable ofbearing arms', were sent to Friuli. The proveditor-general there was,however, warned that they represented 'the scrapings' and that he shouldretain them for the minimum possible period.231 All the same, the pressureon the authorities in Treviso and elsewhere from Verona to Udine to enroleveryone between the ages of 18 and 50 who was not sick or totallyresponsible for his family was kept up, and with the fleet and army as well asself-defence in mind.232 In July 1617, with peace talks already in progress

230 SS. reg. 107, 61-2V (3 Aug.), 74 ( I 0 Aug.); ST. reg. 86, 148V-149 (3 Aug.).231 S S . reg. 107, 172V (28 Sept . ) .232 S T . reg. 86, 234-234.V (9 Nov . ) ; S S . reg. 109, 240 (24 J u n e 1517).

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but abundantly distrusted, recruiting parties were ordered to beat the drumin every town of the Terraferma, proclaiming the government's search forstill more volunteers.233 In Venice itself the heads of sestrieri were to selectmen to serve as soldiers with the fleet, and given authority to compel service(after a short preliminary training) where adequate excuses could not begiven.234 And the government's determination to depend in the last resourceon its own subjects was deepened by the consideration ' of the advantage tobe gained by their forming a counter-weight to the foreign elements in ourarmy'; the problem of controlling that mongrel army was, indeed, gravelycomplicated by its increasing unfamiliarity with the Italian tongue.

All these Terraferma reserves, conscript or voluntary, were, as it turnedout, used only in bits and pieces, but they constituted the most impressivevote of confidence Venice had ever accorded to or received from the loyaltyof its subjects as a whole.

233 S S . reg. 109, 256V-257 and 276 (17 Ju ly) .234 S u c h as be ing the head of a household or having an occupat ion that would suffer from an absence of

four months (the term proposed) (ST. reg. 87, 114-15; 5 July 1617).

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13

Cavalry, infantry, artillery

The prestige arm throughout the century, and the most resistant to change,remained the heavy cavalry, the uomini d'arme. And this was in spite of thedecline in their numbers, especially after the campaigns of 1509-17, andalso in spite of the realization that between 1530 and 1573 the chieflikelihood of combat was amphibious warfare against the Turks, in whichthey could play no useful part, and that thereafter, when land war againstthe Spaniards or Austrians seemed more likelyy heavy cavalry wasuniversally recognized to have long outlived its usefulness.

Until 1519 they were organized in' lances' each comprising three fightingmen, the man-at-arms proper, riding in full plate armour ('in arme bianche'or' in biancho' or' in albo') on a barded horse, the others more lightly armedwith lance or crossbow and riding unbarded horses. In each 'lance' therewas a fourth horse, of inferior quality, ridden by the man-at-arms' servantand carrying baggage.1 A company of 50 men-at-arms thus contained 150righting men and 200 horses, the combatants and their horses being the onlyones counted for pay purposes. In practice, 'lances' were seldom up tostrength and in 1519 the number was cut; henceforward they were tocomprise the man-at-arms riding his war charger (capo di lanza or cavalgrosso), one squire or saccomano armed as a light cavalryman but on a horse{primo piatto or corsier) capable of acting as the man-at-arms' reserve, and aservant on a ronzin, terzo or bagaglione; two fighting men, that is, and threehorses, 'as was the custom before the war'.2

Even then only the wealthier men-at-arms could afford the full unit. Itwas not until the 1590s, however, that it was officially acknowledged thatthey would provide only two mounts and that the primo piatto would beridden by an attendant who was not necessarily a professional fighting man.3While the man-at-arms had to support his servant from his pay (80 ducats ayear from 1514,4 rising to 120 in the 1560s), the saccomano was paid his 40

1 SS. reg. 41, 158 (13 Apr. 1509).2 Sanuto, xxvii, 432-5 (Senate, 30 June).3 [Printed] Regolatione et privilegi delle gente d'arme per deliberatione dell'Eccellentissimo Senato. 1592. A

di 8 Apr He. [Venice.]4 Sanuto, xxvii, 14-16 (Senate, 1 Mar.).

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ducats direct, an arrangement reflecting the tactical separateness of the lightcavalry. Organizationally, however, tradition and the satisfaction to theman-at-arms of being responsible for a miniature unit of his own led to thepreservation of the old administrative framework. Thus though a man-at-arms was paid quarterly, twice a year he had to present his 'lance' as a wholefor inspection. This conservatism, this sense of living in a different militaryworld from other righting men, was also fostered by the continuity withwhich companies were kept together. During the campaigns of 1509—29there were years when the number of men-at-arms (lances) rose above 1000;more generally numbers ranged from about 900 down to 600 and it was atthis latter level that they remained more or less steady throughout the rest ofthe century, grouped in small companies under sixteen to seventeencondottieri.5 Though these were always engaged on short-term (one to threeyears) but renewable contracts, it was understood by government and menthat the connection would last during infirmity or even until death, and thatif there were not then a son or brother to take it over, a company would bekept together under a new commander.

More expressive still of Venetian conservatism was their mere existenceas a separate and - in comparison with others - cosseted arm.

In the largely like-to-like tactics of the 1509—29 campaigns, the man-at-arms rarely encountered massed pikes, could ride with some imperturb-ability through light cavalry. He was vulnerable in charges against his equalsand to the cannon balls that might prelude a major engagement or pound areserved position, but, though armour was not as yet regularly proofed, thebullets that claimed the vast majority of casualties in battle or siege (to judgefrom citation references and pension awards) seldom pierced his carapace,though they could bring down his horse. Yet to be invincible was notnecessarily to be useful, and from 1509 contracts for new condottierihabitually required that they should raise half or an equal number of lightcavalry (in addition to the saccomani of the 'lance').

They played no role in the war of 1537-40 (though senior condottieriwere detached to serve as military governors and captains of light cavalry,even of infantry, as others were to do in 1570-3), and thereafter, from apurely tactical point of view, the arm was an anachronism. No mobilizationinvolved raising any extra numbers. 'I know that there are many in thisrepublic', wrote Aventin Fracastoro, himself an experienced captain ofhorses, in a pleading letter to a senator, 'who would replace the heavy withlight cavalry.' This is because 'this state is now pursuing a defensive policy. . . and is relying for its protection upon fortifications'. But men-at-arms

5 Lists in BMV., mss. It. VII, 1213 (= 8656); ST. reg. 41, 148-148V; reg. 46, 169-71; Archivio ProprioPinelli, Ba. 1-2, no. 5.

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are the noblest part of an army, and their condottieri 'are commonly men ofsober and mature judgement and, as such, give their counsel in matters ofwar to the commanding officer'. The present peace cannot, after all, bereckoned on; we shall need that counsel, that solid presence on thebattlefield and - but his arguments soon ran out with the reflection thathorses could always be eaten during a tight blockade. More persuasive washis pointing out that were Venice to disband its men-at-arms it would losemany who scorned the idea of being transferred to light cavalry commands,and the government would, moreover, miss the opportunity 'to givesatisfaction to many of its nobles, vassals and subject citizens'.6

The government had, in fact, already accepted the fact that the retentionof heavy cavalry was primarily an exercise in maintaining good relationswith powerful Terraferma families and a diversion of their chivalrouspretensions into a form of public service.

The success of other forms of heavy cavalry in Europe, Reiters orcuirassiers, had raised the question - that is, patricians returning fromdiplomatic service abroad raised it - whether the men-at-arms and theirlances were useful enough to be retained. They were required by aregulation of 1573 to learn the use of the heavy cavalry pistol - used in thenorth from the 1540s — and to have two of them (as part of the equipmentcarried by the primo piatto, however, and not holstered on their ownmounts).7 Little notice appears to have been taken of this hint that changemight be desirable. In a memorandum of 1577 Scipio Costanzo wrote thatthe corps attracts men of rank who would not find sufficient dignity attachedto serving in light cavalry units. We have come to rely heavily onfortifications, but to stop the armies coming to besiege them and gain timefor the defenders we need 'this mass of steel, this fortress of armour'.Besides, he concluded ' innovations have always been pernicious, or at leasthazardous, and have therefore been instinctively abhorred by this state'.8 Inthe following year a proposal (poorly sponsored) to abolish the corps wasturned down by the Senate.

The decision to set up in 1593 a volunteer dragoon militia9 stemmed inpart from dissatisfaction with the tactical irrelevance of the men-at-arms. In1598, two years after this scheme had been judged a failure and wound up,the College faced the problem more directly. The savio alia scrittura wascharged to put four questions to the captains-general of light cavalry andinfantry, the newly appointed Francesco Martinengo and Del Monte:

6 He was given a command of 51 light cavalry in 1551. ST. reg. 38, 3V.7 ST. reg. 49, 170 (19 Oct.).8 Delia necessitd di conservare la cavalieria di grave armatura nello esercito veneziano: ricordo di Scipio

Costanzo alia Signoria di Venezia (Venice, 1868) 11, 19.9 See above, 349-50.

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should the men-at-arms be left as they are, or should they give up the lanceand adopt the overall arquebus-proof armour (the heavy cuirass) used inFrance and Savoy? If so, should all or only part of them do this? Shouldhorses have bullet-proof head armour? More generally, if the men-at-armsare to be seriously reformed, what changes would you suggest in their mainand subsidiary weapon?10

Martinengo was for change (not surprisingly, considering the arm herepresented). The combination of lance and armour part of which has to bearquebus-proof means, he wrote, that the weight of the man-at-arms and hishorse is such that the lance thrust has little impetus: nor is there a horse thatwill not flinch or rear aside when arquebuses fire at them just before they arewithin lance range. As for weapons, it is frequently necessary to changerapidly from one to another and it is easier to fire and drop a pistol and todraw a sword than disengage a lance and then search for one. No, give up thelance. Most terrain is against its use in any case. This applies both to heavyand light cavalry. Pistol and sword are the weapons to employ, but do not tryto lighten armour: all the pieces that face the enemy should be arquebus-proof. The old instinct for weight is right. The heavily armoured sword-wearing pistoleer is the breaker of lines and the steadier of armies, whetherhe fights on horseback or dismounted. The heavy cavalry, moreover,attracts 'more men of good background and thus of nobler spirit' than doesthe infantry. As for the other points: a few lightly armed lancers may becombined with the rest; horse armour should be light, to keep the animalnimble; as to other weapons, let individuals choose whether to supplementthe pistol with sword or dagger.

Del Monte was more for compromise. Let only half the men-at-arms bechanged to heavy-armoured pistoleers. The man-at-arms is not a thing ofthe past; the Spaniards in Milan retain him in spite of the example ofFrance. The lance is still the better weapon for offence. So make the changebut keep both types of soldier within the existing organization and under thesame condottieri. Few horses are killed by being shot in the head, so theydon't need proofed head guards. Beside lance and pistol, let men choosebetween sword and dagger for themselves.

When the College passed on these opinions, the Senate called for acanvass of opinion among the condottieri themselves.11 Representative oftheir opinion is a joint memorandum submitted to the Capitano of Paduaexplaining 'why men-at-arms should not be transformed into cuirassiers, ascertain senators who have been in France have proposed'12 - a hit10 Replies in SS. filza 10 Mar.11 SS. reg. 92, 13 (7 May).12 A. de Pellegrini, Gente a" arme del la repubblica di Venezia . . . i condottieri Portia e Brugner

(Udine, 1915) doc. 26.

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particularly at Pietro Duodo, the ex-ambassador whose praise of the Frenchcuirassiers that year13 had probably done much to start the College'sinvestigation. Its upshot was that matters should remain as they were,though individuals might seriously consider actually obeying the regulationabout pistols being available on the primo piatto. In another memorandumsubmitted independently by Di Porcia recurs the argument that 'thecompanies are commanded by men from the noblest, most outstanding andloyal families' who would not be content to serve in other than the dignifiedand traditional way.14 But if no changes were made, neither was muchcare shown to keep up numbers. At the start of the War of Gradisca therewere 481 of them, divided into 15 companies.15 Three of the condottieri wholed them were not Venetian subjects, Cesare Pepoli of Bologna andFerdinando and Alberto Scotto of Piacenza. The rest came from Friuli(Fulvio di Porcia), Verona (Girolamo Pompeo, Giorgio Allegri), Padua (PioCapodilista, Lodovico San Bonifacio), Vicenza (Gabriele Porto, ManfrediPorto, Pompeo Capra), Brescia (Sanson Porcellaga, Federigo Martinengo)and Valdemarino (Paolo Brandolini). Ninety per cent of the men werenatives of the Terraferma.16 Another round of discussions about theirusefulness had been called for in January 1615 and, as in the past, theconservatives won and their armament remained unchanged.17 Bands beganto be drafted to Friuli in November 1615 with orders to fill up the places ofprimi piatti with men actually capable of fighting; when this was done in away satisfactory to the collaterals, the man-at-arms was to receive an extra 6ducats a month. The operation took time because, as the Senate ac-knowledged, the men-at-arms ' were anxious that their horses should not beridden by men who were strangers to them', but by early in the new year theforce had been doubled in this way.18

Their losses were heavy. The collateral-general, Antonio di Collalto,reported on 1 August 1616 that out of more than 1000 horses (somebelonging to grooms) only 478 were left alive and among the men-at-armsthemselves numbers had thinned for the following causes: dead, 190; ill orwounded, 48; absent without leave - a tellingly large figure - 82.' It is all tootrue', he commented, 'that thanks to the rigours of the past spring and theircontinually being engaged in standing guard, clearing roads, patrolling,turning out with the other cavalry for night alarms and being ready to fight13 Alberi, Relazioni degli ambasciatori, Appendice, 104 seq.14 De Pellegrini, doc. 27.15 Ibid., 216 seq.16 To judge from such lists of names as in ST. reg. 57, 150-1 (13 July 1587). Moro described the 454 in

being in 1606 as * un terzo Gentilomini et cittadini, un terzo habitanti di terre et castelli, et l'altro terzopersone di manco conditione' (Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 47, 26 Oct.).

17 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 50.18 ST. reg. 85, 178V (30 Nov. 1615), 285V-286 (17 Feb. 1616), 298V (27 Feb. 1616).

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by day when ordered, this sort of cavalry, whose role in an army is normallyto take part in battles and stiffen the light cavalry . . . is, damply andcrampedly lodged as it is, falling prey to sickness.' And he urgentlyrecommended that they should be given a month's leave.19 This, after longdelays, was granted, and the condottieri bidden to fill up their vacancies butno longer to bring a combatant as a primo piatto; their service had not beeneffective, and it was better for the second horse to be ridden by aservant-groom who devoted himself to the welfare of his master and thehorses.20 To encourage the men-at-arms themselves to serve in a warbewilderingly lacking in 'battles', their pay was increased to 20 ducats amonth.21 The Senate recognized the anachronistic nature of their equip-ment, but cautiously, ordering as early as January 1616 that some of themshould fight as cuirassiers, 'leaving the others with the traditional lance,both to preserve the reputation of this arm, which is so much valued andrespected by us, and because it is our intention that when these presenttroubles are over, all of them shall resume their old custom of bearing thelance'.22

The peacetime duties of men-at-arms were far from onerous. The wholeforce was on leave for four months in the year, from June to September,partly to save their horses the extra exertion of exercising in the hot summermonths, partly because the family, and, indeed, in some cases politicalinterests of the condottieri were such that their presence was required forlong periods in their own estates. For four months, April and May andOctober and November, most of them were quartered together in Verona inthe spring and Padua in the autumn. This was their training period, eachcompany being required to muster for this purpose twice a week, at one ofwhich occasions the rectors had to be present. Sforza Pallavicino'sdirections show at least what he considered should happen on theseoccasions. The men-at-arms should become practised in mounting andhabituated to the feel of their equipment while performing all the evolutionsnecessary in war. They should practise with the lance both in mock charges,designed to accustom both them and their mounts to close combat, and inrunning at the ring, and should learn to throw away the lance and draw theirswords without losing control of their horses. There should also be drill bysquads to make movements in close order precise and automatic.23 Inaddition, the whole force was expected to train together twice a year, inApril and October, the April manoeuvres being of special importance

19 De Pellegrini, 156-9 and doc. 51.20 ST. reg. 86, 227-227V (25 Oct. 1616).21 SS. reg. 109, 8v (4 Mar. 1617); ST. reg. 87, 27V (18 Mar. 1617).22 SS. reg. 105, 27 (9 Jan. 1616).23 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 8, nv.

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because in addition to their own exercises, detachments of cavalry -including light cavalry - had to train together with the militia at sites in thePadovano, Veronese or Bresciano to accustom the militia to co-operatingwith horse. For the remaining few months of the year men-at-arms were oncall, though not on full duty, and could return to their homes as long as theydid not leave the Terraferma and were available at short notice.

This was the system in the 1560s.24 Formerly, each company had spentsix months in the country, six in one of the garrison towns.25 But from 1541it was decided that owing to the high cost of living in the towns, whichforced men-at-arms, although they lived rent-free in quarters, to sell theirhorses and weapons and even to discharge themselves, only one-quarter ofthe force should be in towns at any one time.26

In addition to their pay, topped up for lieutenants and ensigns andespecially deserving men from their condottiere's caposoldo, or bonus fund,men-at-arms were entitled when on duty to billets and a cost-of-livingallowance of 4 lire and 10 piccioli a month, a figure based on the cost offodder for their horses and bread and wine for themselves.27 Thesesubventions, or taxe di cavalli, were raised by a levy on rural communities,and, especially after the reduction in size of the lance, left spare taxe (ortasse) to use as rewards for gallant service and pensions for old or disabledmen.28 Though out of consideration to communities the rate remainedpegged throughout the period, food prices rose, and the men-at-arms cameto be seen far more as an exploitative force - with their illegal demands formeat, cheese, fish and fresh linen - than a protective one.

Pay could, in any case, never keep up with the self-imposed standards of aforce more and more determined to assert its superiority as its usefulnesswas increasingly questioned. The Quattrocento tradition of conspicuousdisplay - the surcoat of cloth of gold, trappings of cut velvet, fine Brescian orMilanese armour, imported chargers - continued throughout the Cin-quecento; indeed, increased together with the corps' claim to socialexclusiveness.

All accounts late in the sixteenth century of the parades which precededthe donning of utilitarian armour for military exercises comment on the silksand damasks, the pearl and gold embroideries worn by the captain,lieutenant and ensign and such men-at-arms of the company as could afford

24 ST. reg. 43, 110-11 (25 Sept. 1561); reg. 44, 28V-33 (25 June 1562); reg. 46, nov (23 Nov. 1566).25 ST. reg. 30, 106V-107 (28 June).26 ST. reg. 31, 122V-123 (10 June).27 Sanuto, xix, 409-10. And see Ferrari, 'Com'era amministrato un comune del Veronese', esp. 232,

235-7. From the early seventeenth century citizens who owned land in rural jurisdictions were alsosubject to this charge.

28 Sanuto, xxviii, 336-7.

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them. They note the brave liveries of the men riding the primi piatti,displaying their masters' helmets, and the pages riding on the third horsesstill maintained by the richer cavalrymen. It is not surprising that whenFulvio di Porcia in 1598 offered the vacant lieutenancy of his company to hisensign, he warned him to think seriously about whether he could afford tomaintain the expenses of such a position. Fulvio himself recorded in 1603that on top of the annual caposoldo of 520 lire he was allowed by thegovernment he paid 1474 out of his own pocket to keep up the appearance ofhis company.29

It was generally acknowledged that a man-at-arms could not manage onhis base pay. For by convention men-at-arms were expected to haveindependent means of at least 200 ducats a year and not to have practised, orto have fathers who practised, a mechanical trade. The collateral-generaland his vice-collaterals were instructed to make such inquiries as couldensure that 'the way was not open to men of any sort of background to enterthis corps'. And if any 'peasant or other unworthy person' was found tohave become enrolled, he was to be dismissed and, according to regulationsof 1610, his horse and equipment were to be sold on the spot.30

This regulation was not intended to produce a Libro d'Oro for anexclusive military caste. It was an attack on the abuse of privileges. Onlymen-at-arms had more-or-less assured pensions - after 30 years' service orat age 60 (somewhat overripe for the effective management of a war stallion).Among other perquisites were exemption from paying gate-charges whenentering a town with their baggage and from imprisonment for debt, and aspecially speedy process of law if they were involved in a criminal case; themost highly cherished was the permission to carry arms. This included 'thearquebus, either wheel-lock or firelock, of the regulation size', i.e. not thepistol-like 'small' arquebus, which was forbidden to all as an assassin'sweapon. During a time when law and order was becoming increasinglyimperilled and licences to carry weapons more grudgingly granted by theCouncil of Ten — especially in the light of remarks like the ex-Podesta ofBrescia's in 1607, 'nearly all murders are carried out with arquebuses'31 —the right to walk attended by an armed servant or by a group of them (eachman-at-arms was entitled to three licences) was deeply cherished as a markof distinction. The right extended to men who were not in essere but dicondotta, that is, on stand-by duty, and to the men chosen by men-at-armsto be saccomani. Not surprisingly the privilege was abused. The savio of theTerraferma who attended the spring muster in 1584 warned the Senate that29 De Pellegrini, 140-1; also 46, 49 seq., 238.30 [ P r i n t e d ] Terminationi dell'Illustrissimo Signor Almoro Nani, savio sopra la regolatione della gente

d'arme, confirmate nell'eccellentiss. Senato a di 16 Decembre 1610.31 Senato, Relazioni Brescia, Ba. 37 (Leonardo Mocenigo).

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men were getting themselves enrolled simply to get the licence and with nointention of serving the state, and that this was winked at by certaincondottieri.32 In 1608 the Capitano of Padua warned that the corps wasbeing infiltrated by personal dependants and bravi.33

Here lay the chief danger to the state. The corps' numbers were low, itscost high (67,800 ducats in 1609),34 its utility scant. Apart from the sheerineptitude of some, it practised abuses such as attempts to pass off substitutemen or borrowed horses at musters, the bullying of peasants, with a cynicalpersistence that produced a volume of legislation larger than was foundnecessary for any other arm - it was gathered together under 52 heads,printed and distributed to rectors in 1592.35 If the corps was tolerated, wartsand all, it was because its abolition would offend families on whose good willas magnates in peace and on whose recruiting ability in war Venicedepended. Yet the increasing cost of fodder, horses and arms was forcingmen-at-arms into dependence on their condottiere's private bounty at atime when his own wish to play the independent grandee led him to salt theirranks with creatures of his own. The slaughter of Gradisca gave the republicat least a breathing space before it confronted the full challenge to law andorder of bravoism and petty tyranny nourished by this so inappropriatelycherished corps d* elite.

The importance of light cavalry not only in battle but in scouting,skirmishing, raiding and blocking roads and bridges was recognized in aSenate order of January 1509. 'The light cavalry, as everyone with militaryexperience knows, is nowadays greatly valued and praised.' There is ashortage of them in Italy, the preamble continued, and lest we be forced toaccept inferior men, 'as in the recent German war', let us recruit 530 ofthem while there is still time. The men were to be horse crossbowmenexcept for 20 per 100 who were to be armed with arquebuses.36 Indeed,though nomenclature was not consistent, horse crossbowmen (so called, butincreasingly armed with arquebuses, especially after 1518, when the latterweapon replaced the former at sea) became the most numerous type of lightcavalry raised in Italy up to 1529, and the horse became more a form of fasttransport or — probably very rarely — a firing platform than the impetusbehind a blow. The annual pay of a missile horseman was in war 40, and inpeace 32, ducats a year, captains of companies up to 100 strong and up to 50strong receiving 300 and 240 ducats respectively. For larger companies theprovisione and caposoldo system was used, according to the fame of the

32 ST. reg. 55, 15V (24 Mar.).33 Piero Duodo: Senato, Dispacci Rettori, Padova, 30 May.34 De Pellegrini, 53 with refs.35 [Printed] Regolatione . . . 1592.36 S S . reg. 4 1 , 132V-133.

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commander and the number of subordinate officers he employed, and — aswith a condottiere of men-at-arms - on the persuasiveness of his agent inVenice.

The equipment of companies of light horse, especially those involved inthe guerrilla warfare of Friuli, depended to some extent on the taste ofindividual captains. In 1510, for instance, Luigi da Porto armed his lancerswith supplementary small handguns 'looking more like maces than schioppVwhich were slung in front of the saddle in anticipation of the horse-pistolswhich were to be so widely used later in the century.37 Stradiots wereprobably always lightly armed lancers and swordsmen. In that same year,1510, their proveditor, Andrea Ciuran, complained that they would notapproach infantry armed with arquebuses.38 It was rare to judge the qualityof stradiots so objectively. Of outlandish appearance, strange speech,dubious religion and, until 1519, riskily underpaid, even Venetian cosmopo-litanism found it difficult to take these outlanders in its stride. Anti-Christian, perfidious, born thieves and potential traitors: more pernicious toour own side than to the enemy, was Priuli's summing up in August 1509,39

and it reflected the depressed reports of Andrea Gritti that ' they are sodisobedient that they can do us no good'.40 They deserted (the burden ofcomplaints ran on) either to become full-time brigands or to join thestradiots who had filtered up through the Balkans to join German armies(Maximilian was said to have 400 at the beginning of 1509);41 they cheatedby getting relatives in Greece and Albania to collect pay in their names aswell as the pay they received in Italy; they defied the orders of savi of theTerraferma at musters.

Their fierce incalculability (their ranks included a fair proportion ofpardoned murderers) led Venice to treat them with something akin to kidgloves. The executive proveditor charged with sending the worst offendersagainst discipline home in 1512 was charged 'to use soft and persuasivewords' and to give them a pay and promise them a free passage.42 Yet theirindiscipline was in part caused by a rivalry between Greeks and Albanianswhich made them welcome the command of a proveditor, and, taking theperiod as a whole, blame was outbalanced by praise for their bravery, dashand endurance, documented in a long succession of promotions, pay rises,pensions for widows and dependants, gifts of cloth-of-gold surcoats, andknighthoods. They may have been especially praised for raiding deep intoenemy-occupied country where opportunities for loot were freest, but

37 Lettere storiche, 193.Sanuto, x, 558.Priuli, iv, 247.Ibid., 444.SS. reg. 41, 132.Collegio, Commissioni Secrete, 1500-12, 113 (21 Jan.).

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citation after citation for wounds gallantly received in combat, and thewillingness of the College to recommend that sons should take over theirfathers' commands, suggest that when the Senate proposed in 1511 (whencriticism of them was at its height) that more should be raised 'because thepresent wars have shown how useful and fruitful it is to have stradiots in ourarmies', this reflected the balance of informed opinion.43 Indeed, were it notfor their importance overseas in helping maintain law and order andguarding coasts and hinterlands from Turkish raids, it is likely that morewould have been engaged in Italy; instead, on at least three occasions, in1511, 1523 and 1524, stradiots were detached from the army and sent backto Dalmatia.

After 1529, because it was easier, and certainly cheaper, to hire light thanheavy cavalry at short notice, their numbers fluctuated: some 300 inpeacetime,44 500 at moments of crisis on the mainland.45 In 1537-40 Venicerelied on the stradiots and Croat horse (Crovati) already stationed overseas.In 1570-3 525 Italian light cavalry were newly raised, less for active service(though some were transported with the fleet for raiding and the forciblerecruiting of oarsmen) than for the defence of a Terraferma more or lessstripped of professional infantry. The permanent force was divided into twocategories. The light cavalry literally so called, the cavalier ia leggier a, raisedin 'lances' of two horses (though the second was simply a replacement plusbaggage mount), wore spurred top boots, closed helmet 'alia Burgognona',gorget, cuirass, arm guards and gauntlets. They fought with the lance andcarried a mace or cutlass as a secondary weapon. They were, in fact,medium, rather than light cavalry.46 Other light cavalry, the cappeletti, wereraised, separately from the 300-500 cavalli leggieri. From 1549 100, andfrom 1551 200, were used in the Terraferma, but in peacetime exclusivelyfor police work against 'outlaws and men of ill life, and in similarcircumstances'. Foreigners (lest they become corrupted by local ties), andraised from Croats and Greeks, the cappelletti supplemented the cheaperbut over-tolerant locally recruited horsed constabulary, the homini dicampagna, and were sent by the Senate to whichever rector neededadditional help in dealing with crime - mainly brigandage - in his territory.In 1589 their number was ordered to be raised from 500 to 1000 47 Armed43 S S . reg. 4 4 , 1 0 (21 Apr . ) . F o r another es t imate , by an ex-provedi tor of light cavalry, Sanu to , xxiii, 513

(22 J an . 1517).44 To ta l s for 1558 (330), 1561 (265) and 1568 (310) in S T . reg. 4 1 , 148-148V; reg. 43 , m v - 1 1 2 ; Misc .

Cod. , 1, Storia Veneta , B a . 123, 120V.45 As in 1557. S S . reg. 70, 66v.46 Ora t i o Toscane l l a , Gioie historiche . . . (Venice, 1567) 33 .47 S T . reg. 38, 23-23V and 3 1 . In 1554, asking for the rep lacement of the local force by ' fo res t ie r i ' , the

ex-Capitano and Podesta of Rovigo remarked that 'they more readily supported criminals and banditithan otherwise' (Relazioni dei ret tori, vi, Rovigo (Milan, 1976) 61). The number of cappelletti was cutin 1586 on account of their expense, and more homini di campagna enrolled, but this policy wasreversed in 1589 (ST. reg. 57, 25 (13 Nov.); SM. reg. 50, 25-25V (6 May)).

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with wheel-lock carbines, they wore the cavalryman's cuirass, arquebus-proof on the chest, pistol-proof on the back.48 From the early seventeenthcentury Corsicans too were employed, bands of them being deputed to scourwhole areas for bandit gangs, especially in the otherwise sparsely patrolledPolesine and Friuli.49

In 1559 or 1560 Sforza Pallavicino had written about the republic'scavalry to the doge in unenthusiastic terms. Of the some 500 light cavalry'many are well mounted, but few have had any experience of war'. Of the600-odd men-at-arms, 'most are well-mounted but many are quiteinexperienced'; and noting how their poverty was at odds with theirexpenses he recommended dropping the obligation to keep a third horse andraising their pay. The government chose the compromise described above.He also suggested, as a way of increasing the numbers of such a useful butexpensive arm, that Venice ' should raise a cavalry militia as is done in manyother places, that is, oblige everyone who has a certain amount of income tomaintain a horse and weapons suited, according to his means, to a lightcavalryman or a man-at-arms'.50 This was the idea taken up in the abortivescheme of the 1590s.51

Later in the century the very phrase 'cavalli leggieri' became vague, andMartinengo's title from his engagement in 1597 as their captain-general waslittle more than an excuse to retain his services as a leading militaryconsultant.52 It was, however, he who advised on armour and weapons forthe 650 light cavalry offered by the Terraferma towns in the crisis of 1606—7.Their cuirass was to be arquebus-proof on the chest, pistol-proof at theback. The helmet (celata) was to be pistol-proof, and the protection forshoulders, thighs and knees and lower back and the gauntlets were to be oflight unproofed plate. To keep the horse as free as possible there was to beno armoured saddle. The arms were to be two pistols apiece 'longhe almenocinque quarti di canno' holstered on the saddle bow and either a sword ordagger. In addition, half the men were to carry lances, the other halfarquebuses; these, too, should have a form of holster so that the cavalrymenwhen changing weapons would not have to discard them. All firearmsshould be wheel-locks.53

How far this blue-print for a nimble, multi-purpose light cavalry and therevival, after three-quarters of a century, of the mounted arquebusier was

ST. reg. 74, 149V-150V (19 Feb. 1605).E.g. SS.reg. 99, io9v-no(i3 Dec. 1608), reg. 100, 63V (31 Oct. 1609) and ST. reg. 81, i46v(22Nov.1611).Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 7, 77V-78.See above, 349-50.SS. reg. 94, 153 (23 Oct.), 161 (20 Dec).Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 45, enclosure with Moro's letter of 5 Aug. 1606.

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realized is not shown. Given the expense and short supply of wheel-lockweapons and the more absolute shortage of suitable mounts,54 its implemen-tation, at least on these lines, is doubtful. What is not in doubt is theunpopularity of the foreign cuirassiers who were raised and the nativeversion alike. The billeting regulations were clear, and were distributed inprinted form.55 Nonetheless, the usual misbehaviour of the military wascompounded by the abuses whereby their reluctant hosts tried to get theirown back, chiefly by misrepresenting the tolls charged on the transport andsale of hay, fuel, bread and wine, and inventing 'shortages' that justifiedexcessive prices being charged for the foodstuffs the troopers were expectedto pay for themselves. It was for prudential reasons, as well as the result of acalculation of the usefulness of leggieri in peacetime, that the governmentran down its cavalry force save for the unbudgeable men-at-arms and theunavoidable cappelletti.

As a result, the need for lighter cavalry in wartime led, among themobilization measures taken in November 1615, to a call to the feudatories,castellans, prelates and communities, first in Friuli and then elsewhere inthe Terraferma who enjoyed fiscal and jurisdictional privileges in return formilitary service, to send horsemen to Palma.56 They were also asked to senda list of other horses and men available; Fulvio di Porcia, for instance,reported 301 men and 55 horses on his estates around the castle of Porcia,and 273 men and 64 horses on his properties in and about Brugnera.57 Noloans were to be made for equipping the men ' because they are bound toserve the Signoria when called upon and to provide themselves with horses',but in service they would be paid the normal light cavalry rates.58 Rectorsand collaterals throughout the Terraferma were charged with compilinglists of horses available for feudatories and for volunteers who had none oftheir own. A list surviving for Rovigo and its territory is impressivelythorough, each animal being described in terms of age, sex, colour, defectsand current use: for riding, hire, draught and so on. And against each wasmarked its suitability for use by a man-at-arms, a cuirassier or a lightcavalryman or as a pack animal.59

The summons itself, however, was widely protested against or ignored.In May 1616 the Senate threatened those 'feudatories enjoying jurisdictionor whose title of investiture clearly speaks of personal military service' whohad left Venice's dominions or (worse) were serving Venice's enemies to

54 Yet the average value of a military mount was only 10-20 ducats. Ibid., Ba. 46, 28 Oct. 1607.55 E.g. in Brescia, dated 1 Aug. 1607.56 ST. reg. 85, 1 6QV (27 Nov.).57 De Pellegrini, 147-8.58 SS. reg. 105, 225-30V (7 Dec).59 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 66, 27 Aug. 1616.

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return on pain of expulsion from their fiefs.60 In July those whose titles ofinvestiture made no reference to military service were required to make a'voluntary' contribution to the state's military expenses.61 A few, notablyCornelio Frangipani, one of the most 'Austrian' of Friulian nobles, obeyedbut most did not, and in September two more proveditors were added to the'magistrate di provveditori sopra i feudi' in order to prepare prosecutionsand confiscations.62 At the same time, comparably unsuccessful attemptswere being made to extract the horsemen due from the nobles and otherfeudatories of Crete.63 The device of feudal service had long outlived itsusefulness, and contributed far more to skirmishes in the law courts than inthe field.

During the war years ten contracts were placed for 750 'foreign' Italiancavalry.64 All but 200 of these were for corazze. The rest were horsearquebusiers, also armed with pistols, protected as to breast and back and'obliged to serve on foot when occasion demands', as were an additionalcompany of 100 mounted wheel-lock musketeers.65 How many actuallyturned up is unclear. A remark of Giovanni de' Medici, Venice'scommander-in-chief in Friuli, perhaps throws light on the paucity ofreferences to them in the records of the war: ' I am frightened by theirquantity but appalled by their quality.'66

The infantry garrisons on the Terraferma were held fairly steady atbetween 1500 and 2000 men throughout the century - figures reflectingthose of the only years of true demobilization, 1517-20, during the period1509-29.67 Yet because their numbers were so frequently augmented intimes of political crisis and because they were liable to be drafted into theenormously inflated numbers of hired infantry in wartime, it is perhapsworth prefacing an account of the peacetime garrisons with some generalcomments on the infantry employed by Venice in 1509-29, commentswhich, with due allowance for their different circumstances, apply to thewars of the rest of the period.

The brigading of infantry remained haphazard. Attempts were made tounify large bodies into colonelcies (colonelli)6S of as many as 3000 men, toround up companies under individual captains to even numbers of 100 or

60 ST. reg. 86, 78V-79. Cf. SS. reg. 108, i6v and 17V (9 Nov. 1616).61 ST. reg. 86, I I 7 - I 8 V (5 July).62 Ibid., 190V-191 (17 Sept. 1616).63 SS. reg. 108, 72-72V (29 Nov. 1616).64 ST. reg. 85,183-183V (5 Dec. 1615), 290V (20 Feb. 1616); SS. reg. 105,231-2V (7 Dec. 1615); ST. reg.

86, 25-25V (26 Mar. 1616), 172 (1 Sept. 1616); reg. 87, 5 (1 Mar. 1617), 124 (20 July).65 ST. reg. 86, 138 (21 July 1616).6 6 J o p p i , Lettere storiche sulla guerra del Friuli, 1616-1617, 2 3 - 3 1 .67 ST. reg. 19, 138; Sanuto, xxiii, 512-13, 526-7.68 The expression was used at least from 1510: SS. reg. 42, 117V (24 Jan.).

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200 in 151169 and 4-600 in 1527,70 and to obtain a rational proportion ofsubordinate ranks: ensigns and corporals. Notionally, companies weredivided into squads of 25 under corporals. On his reappointment in 1513,Alviano, fired to demonstrate both his zeal and his learning, proposed thatcompanies should henceforward be standardized at 256 men envisaged as afour-square parade formation sixteen ranks by sixteen files. Each file ordecuria should be headed by a decurione and its rear steadied by anexperienced tergiductor. One decurion in every four files should be thecorporal in charge of 64 men and answerable for them to the captain. Thereshould in addition be an ensign whose flag would be guarded by fourhalbardiers.71 That this scheme, rightly described by Andrea Gritti as 'moreantiquo'72 and anonymously as 'divine rather than human',73 was takenseriously on at least one occasion is shown by a pay list for 2460 infantrydivided under headings for captains, corporals, decurioni, tergiductori andordinary soldiers.74 But though the need for a rationalization on these lineswas recognized on the grounds of discipline, tactical flexibility and financialcontrol, it was never achieved. Numbers were never constant thanks to thesystem of individual contracts based on the number of men a constablecould raise and to the fluctuations within these companies caused by illness,wounds, capture or desertion, or by the temporary adherence of wanderingfree-lances (lanze spezzate) who in spite of their name were as often footsoldiers as former men-at-arms turned light cavalrymen. Unbalancedcompany numbers, too many captains and too few men of intermediateranks: these factors, which encouraged simplistic and undisciplined tactics,were not even to approach a cure in the Cinquecento.

The same is true of equipment. Later in the century the proportions ofarquebuses, muskets, pikes and halberds were frequently spelled out incontracts, even if they were not insisted upon, but in these campaigns therewas no rationalization of weapons. Men were rounded up with the arms theyhappened to have become familiar with. It was, besides, a real period oftransition, when pikes and a miscellany of other pole-arms, schioppi andarquebuses, crossbows and long bows (including those which, underEastern influence, were drawn back against an induced curve)75 might all beused together in battle and regularly were in sieges.' Una ex principalissimisrebus quae necessariae sunt in bello est salnitrium', proclaimed the Council

SS. reg. 44, 8 (12 Apr.).Sanuto, xlvi, 116.Ibid., xvi, 639-41.Ibid., 660.Ibid., 641.Ibid., xvii, 429-30.This type is shown in Carpaccio's Heron Hunt.

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of Ten in August 1509 -within days of licensing the dispatch of 20,000 arrowsfrom its armoury.76 In May 1514, Girolamo Savorgnan announced that hehad accumulated sufficient men to attack Marano: 200 schioppettieri, 300archers, 100 crossbowmen and more than 2000 men armed with pole-arms(aste), 'of which I have readied 600 in my own way'77 — probably with pikesin the manner of German Landsknechts.

Hand firearms changed rapidly from the schioppo, in which the matchhead had to be applied to the touch-hole by hand, to the arquebus in which itwas moved down by a trigger: 5020 arquebusiers were ordered to be raised inApril 1528. It was not until 1570 that the Council of Ten formally acceptedthe musket (archibusone da posta) as' the best weapon for offence and defencethat can be used in fortresses, armies and fleets', established competitions inVenice and the Terraferma to encourage its practice, and ordered theArsenal to keep a stock of 2000, to be topped up as soon as weapons had beenissued.78 For military (as opposed to sporting) use the matchlock was longunchallenged by any form of wheel-lock, a mechanism first mentioned in aVenetian context in 1532.79 Though firearms were on occasion ordered fromGermany most were forged in the iron-bearing regions in the northernBresciano: Val Camonica, Gardone in Valtrompia and the Riviera di Salo,and finished and mounted in Brescia itself. It was from Brescia, too, thatbulk purchases of swords, sallets (the commonest form of helmet andcapable of stopping a bullet),80 and back and chest pieces of armour weremade. Indeed, the Venetian government rigidly controlled the export bothof iron and of manufactured arms and armour,81 and the recovery of Bresciain 1517 came at a time when the stocks of the Council of Ten and in theArsenal were gravely low.

Because the cutting down of numbers in winter or, more drastically, intimes of truce or actual demobilization, affected the infantry more sharplythan the cavalry, fewer infantry commanders were engaged as stipendiati,that is, with contracts lasting at least a year, renewable at the government'sdiscretion and involving payment in peace as well as in war. The rest - overthe protests of their agents, if they were established enough to have one -were engaged 'a beneplacito', that is on a pay-to-pay basis which gave them

76 'Saltpetre is one of those principal things which are necessary in time of war.' Dieci, Misti, reg. 32,137V and 135.

77 Savorgnan, 'Lettere', iii, 33.78 Dieci , C o m u n e , reg. 29, 37-37V and 46 (21 July and 19 Aug.) . O the r orders in S S . regs. 75 and 76 and

S M . regs. 38 and 39.79 Sa n u t o , xlvii, 182; M a r c o M o r i n , 'Or ig in of the wheellock: the G e r m a n hypothes i s ' , in Art, Arms and

Armour: An International Anthology, ed. R. Held (Chiasso, 1979-80), i.80 Sanu to , xlii, 426.81 E.g. S T . reg. 24, iv—2 (9 Mar . 1525). O n gun product ion , see M . Mor in and R. Held , Beretta: la

dinastia industrial piii antica al mondo (Chiasso, 1980) 20 seq.

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no sense of commitment to their own units, let alone to their co-operationwith others.

The common foot soldier received 3 ducats every 36 days (40 for the tenthpay) in war and every 45 days in peace; squad leaders and ensigns (in theory)9 per pay. In April 1528 it was recognized, very late in the day, that muchdesertion and indiscipline was caused by the inadequacy of wages, and theSenate decided that while the number of pays should remain the same, theducat of 6 lire and 4 soldi should be replaced by the scudo of 6 lire and 14 soldi.At the same time a captain's caposoldo, which for the infantry took the formof dead pays {paghe morte), that is, so many extra salaries to use as the bonusfund, was fixed at 15 for every 100 men, to be distributed 'to men ofoutstanding merit, free-lances, arquebusiers and those known by captains todeserve something over and above their three ducats a pay, it beingemphasized that captains may divert no part of this money to their ownuse'.82 This more than doubled the previous average caposoldo, whichamounted to approximately 210 ducats per 100 men, or seven dead pays.Only one pay sheet of the following year suggests that this system wasactually applied; an infantry captain of 150 troops in Apulia was creditedwith 22^ dead pays. But this company was also suspiciously neat incontaining a squad leader for every 25 men, and an ensign.83 Three ducatsremained the norm throughout the century, and, even though bonuses wereintroduced for musketeers and pikemen, its inadequacy meant that whilemen could be expected to expose themselves to discomfort and, lessregularly, danger for it, they could not be expected to improve theirefficiency by frequent drills and inspections.

The thin and unanalytically conceived accounts of battles give littleindication either of the tactics involved in the few large-scale engagementswhich Venetian-raised armies fought on their own rather than as com-ponents of an allied force, or of the degree of co-operation achieved betweeninfantry and the various types of cavalry. On the eve of Agnadello the armywas divided into the traditional European components (of almost equal size)advance guard, battle (battaglia) and rear guard, each containing men-at-arms and infantry, while the light cavalry scouted for information.84 On themarch in July 1512 it was divided into two large groups, advance and rearguards, the first headed by light horse followed by men-at-arms andinfantry, the second led by men-at-arms followed by infantry and lighthorse; the artillery and baggage proceeded in the middle.85 Anothermarching order, in August 1515, was: advance guard (light horse, men-at-

82 SS. reg. 53, 13-13V. The change to scudi was not implemented.83 Sanuto, lii, 155-60.84 Da Porto, Letter e stork he, 54.85 Sanuto, xiv, 521-2.

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arms); artillery; battle (men-at-arms, infantry); rear guard (men-at-arms,infantry); stradiots scouting ahead and on the flank nearer the enemy.86

Other accounts of march or battle formations and their outcome are lessclear, though most give the impression that for the foot what counted was, inspite of the presence of the captain of infantry,87 the reaction tocircumstances of the bands immediately surrounding the captains who hadraised them, and those captains' nearness to, and personal relations with, thecommanders of the large units of which their men formed part. With this inmind, plus the absence of an adequate stiffening of non-commissionedofficers, it is not surprising that neither tactical agreement in a war council,nor the wearing of surcoats or sashes bearing a common symbol orcombination of colours, nor shared war-cries and banners could do muchmore than fill a motley assemblage of men with a vague sense of what wasexpected of them. When senators spoke of Fortune as the determining factorof battles it was because while spies and scouts could report an enemy's sizeand probable deployment, and comparative strengths in men and topogra-phical advantage could be calculated, neither the degree of co-operation northe morale of individual units could be anticipated with any confidence.

Something of why this should be so can be inferred from the military codeissued by Alviano in 1514.88 Captains were to swear to be faithful to Venice.They were not to cheat the paymaster by passing off non-combatants(servants or others) as soldiers or getting men to present themselves again atthe pay desk under the name of another who was absent without cause, dead,or was merely a phantom name smuggled on to the pay-roll. They were notto maintain notorious swindlers, gamblers, ill-livers or idlers in theircompanies. They were not to possess valuable horses (i.e. fast ones) and inaction were to fight on foot among their men; nor were they to allow theirmen to possess these temptations to flight. They were not to grant leave ofabsence nor take it themselves without the permission of the captain-general. They were not to retain any of the pay due to a soldier, nor more ofhis booty than the customs of war allowed. They were to see that their menwere armed and equipped, drill them and see that they could handle theirweapons. They were to give an honest account of all booty to the pro vedi tor-general or paymaster; use the bonus fund only to reward extra responsibilityor good service; at each pay day they were to take an oath from their men toserve Venice faithfully, obey orders and never abandon their flag, and' to dierather than fail in their duty in battle, siege, skirmish, or foray against the

86 Ibid., xx, 484-6.87 'Experience, which is the teacher in all affairs, has shown how necessary it is in an army to have a

captain of infantry to control and draw them up' (SS. reg. 41, 179.V, preamble to the decision on 13May to appoint Dionysio di Naldo).

88 Sanuto, xviii, 219-22.

384


enemy'. The troops were also to swear to abstain from brawling; drawing aweapon would be punished with the cutting off of the right hand; woundinga colleague, with death. In addition, they were to swear not to keep whores,to restrain their oaths this side of blasphemy, not to provoke quarrels, to robneither their colleagues nor others, to respect the persons and property ofpeasants on whom they might be billeted. When captains were ordered to filldepleted ranks they were not to employ troops from any country notspecified by the captain-general, nor peasants, artisans or any others un-suited to war or who had already been cashiered. Captains violating any ofthese ordinances, the code concludes, would be publicly disgraced anddismissed; soldiers would be executed.

Like all codes, then and later, Alviano's is concerned with abuses, buteach could be documented with a painful multiplicity of instances and nonewas cured by oath or gallows. Venice gave commanders-in-chief fulljurisdiction over their troops save over such political offences as treason, theuttering of false coin and disputes with civilians. But a state whose law-enforcement agencies were so inadequate that it had to resort to thepardoning of murderers if they murdered other murderers, was not in aposition to expect or even demand much of a military society into whichdrifted the restless and potentially violent — and whose numbers had to bekept up. The republic, through Senate directions to military proveditors,concentrated on what were not, essentially, matters of military discipline:frauds to the fisc and behaviour that harmed not so much the enemy asVenetian subjects.

The code's early provisions had in mind captains like Piero Corso,cashiered by Andrea Gritti in 1511 for putting up straw men to answer theroll call on pay day.89 And as late as 1528 the Senate ordered paymasters notto show captain's clerks their own pay books, which noted a soldier'scomplexion and other distinguishing marks, nor to allow them withinhearing while troops were questioned about their parentage (necessarywhen so many were known only by a Christian or nick-name and a place oforigin).90 Fraud was too common in all armies, however, to be checked inone. As was vice. Just as an army was accompanied by itinerant food andwine vendors and dealers ready to change booty into cash, so it was by ahorde of prostitutes and their male bawds (rufiani).91

On hearsay evidence their numbers varied between one and two thousand,and it was considered worthy of news when Alviano, tireless in hisdetermination to revive 'the Roman discipline in its original and most

89 Ibid., xiii, 259.90 SS. reg. 53, 13-13V.91 Sanuto, viii, 414 (18 June 1509).

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blessed form', threw out the army's whores in 1514 and slit the noses ofthose who defied the order and were found in camp.92 They were notedagain as a normal part of the army in the order of march of the followingyear.93 Their inadequacy as an instrument of social hygiene was shown bythe case of a soldier who, in that same year, organized the group rape of apeasant girl of fourteen.94 It would be too representative of men who werefrequently accused of behaving 'worse than Turks' to be referred to if it didnot have an additional point of interest: whereas the captain-general wishedto hang the culprit as an example, a prominent captain pleaded that heshould be pardoned if he married the girl and paid a heavy fine towards thefortification of Padua. The captain was Teodoro Trivulzio, who next yearwas to be appointed governor-general of Venice's armed forces.

That in war as in peace the combination of venal captains andinadequately paid men led to abuses that maimed military effectiveness is afact so amply documented on a European scale that only one later source ofevidence need be cited here. The winter of 1570-1 saw a rapid build-up inthe garrisons of Dalmatia. The usage then was to give one pay to theinfantryman on recruitment, a second on mustering for embarkation and athird on arrival. The soldier's natural instinct was to spend the first two atonce. The third was retained by the captain as a delayed down payment onthe arquebus, morion and palliasse or cloak the man had been issued with,leaving him nothing to live on until the fourth. Part of this went on astoppage to make up part of the balance of the cost of equipment; anotherpart, in all probability, to recompense the captain for advancing him a loan.Even if he had worked off these obligations by the fifth or sixth, his pay wasstill inadequate.95

In January 1571 the Governor-General in Dalmatia, Giulio Savorgnan,explained the predicament the infantryman found himself in.96 He and theproveditor-general had gone round the market with a pair of scales pricingthe bread, wine, soup, cheese and sardines a soldier's basic diet was basedon; meat they ignored as too expensive, as was the wood to cook it with.Savorgnan found that 'the cost of keeping body and soul together' to be 12̂soldi a day, whereas a soldier's local pay averaged 11 soldi and 8 bagattini(local coins of the smallest denomination) and was thus 10 bagattini short ofhis requirements. 'What soldier', he asked the doge, 'would leave Italy forDalmatia knowing that he would not be able to feed himself, let alone buyshoes and other necessaries, nor match, powder and lead for his arquebus?'

92 Ibid., xviii, 379 (21 July 1514).93 Ibid., xx, 486.94 Ibid., 92-3.95 S. Ljubic , Commissiones et relationes venetae (Zagreb, 3 vols. , 1876-80) iii, 253. For hygiene on galleys,

see S M . reg. 40 , 7V and 2 o v - 2 i v .96 E . Salaris, Relazione di Giulio Savorgnan. Cf. be low, 496 .

386


And what is more, the captains,' knowing that the infantrymen cannot staythe course', stop so much of their pay in order to be reimbursed for the armsthey have loaned them that the men are left with nearer 7 soldi than 11, andhow long can they remain in service on that? He proposed two remedies to'the evil reputation of Dalmatia'; still higher pay and better captains: 'realsoldiers or at least men of honour, unlike the base, contemptible thieves ofwhom too many have been sent here'.

Let us follow this forward for a moment. On 15 March the Senate tookup, though feebly, both these points. Henceforward all overseas service wasto be paid each calendar month in ducats worth 7 lire each (the scudo d'oro)instead of 6 lire and 4 soldi, and a 10% bonus was to be distributed amongthe 20 men in each 100 who as file leaders wore corselets; this bonus was notto be in the captains' discretion but paid directly to men qualified to receiveit. The Senate then referred to the commonest of captains' frauds: theypresented a full company at the embarkation point and then, by connivance,let part of the men go home in return for a proportion of their pay, so that'not only are we cheated of our money but of the proper numbers of men wehave planned for the defence of our fortresses'. This was made a capitaloffence. The penalty was to be proclaimed throughout Venice's dominionsand repeated on each pay day, as was the penalty - five years in chains at theoar — for employing or conniving at the employment of substitutes.97

Late in June the Senate confessed themselves aghast to hear thatcompanies were still arriving shrunken in numbers and comprising 'abjectand useless' men, led by captains 'who cannot be trusted to undertake anyenterprise'. Yet the senators had been made well aware of the number ofdeserters ' among the soldiers' - as an order to round them up in April ran -'destined by us for the garrisons of our towns and fortresses in theLevant'.98

Given the scale of the mobilization for war, by the end of 1570 about halfof the new contracts for infantrymen went to men Venice had not employedbefore. But the real trouble lay less with them than with the subordinatecaptains they chose for each company of 250 or 300, some 42 in all, for thesewere chosen at the contractor's discretion, subject only to confirmation bythe College, which, given the pressure of time, was usually automatic.Military patronage as practised by the state certainly included appointmentsmade from political motives; not all sons were as competent as their fathers,for instance; but the deputing of patronage led to the creation of captainciesfor men over whom the government had no check until the results of theirincompetence or corruptness had been demonstrated all too clearly. And bythen rectors and proveditors were faced with weighing - as the Senate

97 SM. reg. 40, 8-8v and gv—10 (15 and 17 Mar.).98 Ibid., reg. 40, 6iv (26 June); SS. reg. 77, 8iv.

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ordered them to do in these cases - which evil would prove the lesser: a badcaptain or a reprimanded and thus resentful and mutinous one. For thedifficulty of finding replacements meant that degrees of reprimand were farmore frequently employed than dismissal and that abuses had to betolerated.

Meanwhile, in the wave of relief that followed the political settlement of1529, garrison forces were reduced to 1100" and held at this level for someyears. Initially this was because the wage bill was inflated by captains whosecontracts had not run out;100 it was maintained as the novel sense of securitycontinued. What is the use, asked the returning Capitano of Legnago in1537, of strengthening the walls of that fortress town if its garrison is toosmall and badly paid to be able to wish to defend it?101

But the government never made any fresh calculations about the suitablesize of garrisons during the modernizing of fortifications. Garrisons werenot then regiments on leave from field duties. They formed scarcely morethan a skeleton crew of watchdogs and key-keepers; they were securityguards rather than bodies competent to man walls and bastions againstformal investment. Against that eventuality there was, it was assumed,always time to contract for additional men.

Certainly each fortified town required a garrison sufficiently large toperform (according to regulations seldom observed in toto) the followingfunctions: gate guard, wall walk, piazza guard, street patrol, sentinel andpatrol duties on the glacis, the guarding of food and ammunition stores. Inaddition a reserve remained at all times in the castello, if there was one. Therectors' personal guard watched their palaces. In practice the numbersinvolved on any particular night varied with the degree of vigilance thesituation called for, and in some cities, such as Brescia, wall-walk duty wasperformed by an indigenous force, the guardaroli.102

In their relazioni returning rectors regularly pleaded for larger garrisons.Thus in 1551 Marc'Antonio Morosini pointed out that 60 infantry were notenough to guard Treviso, a city so strategically important and (he shrewdlyadded) where so many patricians had 'houses, possessions and incomes'.Because the men 'as is customary' worked one week on and one week off, theeffective force was 30 and at times, 'when they go to eat or are sick', fewer.He asked for 40 more, and was given 20, but by 1564 the garrison was downto 50.103 For the logic of what was needed in terms of men at each guardpoint was constantly contradicted thanks to the frequent partial mobiliz-

99 Sanuto, Hi, 517-21.100 ST. reg. 27, 13V-14.101 Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni, Ba. 42.102 Pasero, 'Aspetti dell'ordinamento militare', 15.103 Relazioni dei ret tori, iii, Treviso, 23-6, 43-4.

388


ations of the 'scare' years and to the need to draft troops from theTerraferma to the garrisons da Mar.

From the demobilizations that followed 1573, as in 1529 and the Warof 1537-40, the garrison force gradually came to be stabilized at about2000, based as shown in the accompanying table.

MonfalconeMaranoChiusa di VenzonCadoreTrevisoPaduaLegnagoVeronaChiusa di VeronaPeschieraAnfoAsolaPontevicoOrzinoviBresciaSermioneBergamoCrema

Total

1541'

10——

172 0

3075

23012

—

—

25

401 2 0—

2580

684

1551*

——

2 0

80170160510

8166286012

1 0 0

2 1 0—

50245

1819

1556'

401 0 0

12

2 0

902 0 0

160500

16150258832

1 2 0

2 0 0—

—

225

1978

1607*'

6—

16——

25232256161

—16

1 2 0

32260

3452 0

5502 0 0

2239

ST. reg. 31, 159-159V.ST. reg. 67, 134-5 (an order for these to be built up to a total of 3733 in the face of troopsreported to be moving into the Milanese).ST. reg. 40, I I O V - I I I .Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 46, 14 Aug. and 8 Oct. No Polesine or Friuli figuresavailable.

Indeed, on 30 March 1560, the Senate determined that the standing forceof infantry in the Terraferma garrisons should be 2000 men under fourcolonel-majors, eight colonels, twelve governors and forty captains.104 Thistop-heaviness (64 senior officers for 2000 men)105 was due to the number ofsmall garrisons,106 the division of larger garrisons into small units for guard

104 SS. reg. 72, 4-4V.105 In 1568, 70 captains for 2235 men (Misc. Cod. 1 (Storia Veneta), Ba. 123, i2ov).106 E.g. in 1566 in the rocca at Sermione there were one captain, one corporal and five men; at La Crovara

one captain and four men; at Malcesine, one captain, one corporal and four men, Relazioni dei rettori,ix, Verona, 52.

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duty, the need to have enough officers in garrison even when some weredrafted overseas and, most important, the need to have a commandstructure ready to absorb additional troops raised in emergencies. This wasto be the full extent of the 'ordinary' or permanent officer establishment,and the College was not to add to it without getting the assent of the Senate.A final reason for the top-heaviness was to avoid having to bring militiaofficers to accompany detachments of their men when they were summonedto reinforce garrisons. In this respect, too, the regulations of March 1560clarified procedures. Rectors, with the advice of colonels or governors, couldcall up militia units on their own responsibility for periods of eight days inthe case of Verona and the sites east of it, fifteen in the case of sites west ofVerona. The College could authorize an extension of these periods up to amonth, but applications for still longer periods had to be referred to theSenate. Lest it be thought, however, that regulations alone give a truepicture, it should be noted that five months later the Senate decided to cutthe infantry force which was 'about 2350' to 'about 1500', in order to saveexpense.107

The constant laying off, bringing men back or recruiting new ones - aprocess almost constant, in order to compensate for the stream of deserters -left captains' pay books in a state of such confusion that the governmentnever knew precisely how many men it did employ, nor whether they wereactually the men they purported to be. Expertise in the art of taking pay andgetting someone else to do the work had passed from the Church to thearmy. Regulations laid down that every soldier should be checked each payday against a roll on which was entered his own and his father's names, hisplace of origin and a physical description, warts and all. Apart fromblemishes, and their whereabouts, this description should note the colour ofeyes, hair and skin, height (tall, medium or small) as well as outstandinglyrecognizable features such as a large nose, a receding forehead or unusuallyshaped ears.108 In practice substitution, though punishable by rectors bythree years in chains in galleys or the amputation of nose or ears,109 was anineradicable abuse. Again, in spite of regulations specifying that noVenetian subject could serve in the region in which he or his wife was anative,110 and that no one could serve more than five years at a time in oneplace, there was a steady stream of complaints from rectors that both nativeand 'foreign' troops had gone native and were supporting broods of

107 ST. reg. 42, 158 (3 Aug.).108 C . P a s e r o , La partecipazione bressiana alia guerra di Cipro e alia battaglia di Lepanto, 1570—73

(Brescia, 1954) 89.109 ST. reg. 44, 28V (25 June 1562).110 ST. reg. 33, 3 (7 Sept. 1543). Amended in ibid., 23V (3 Nov.) to allow men from a city or its territory

to serve as long as their place of duty was not their birthplace.

390


relatives, plying trades in the town or becoming 'indistinguishable frompeasants' in the surrounding countryside.111

While the garrison force was not a body that could respond to thereformist military literature that was streaming from the printing houses ofthe capital, advantage was taken of the demobilization in 1573 to decide atleast which captains to retain and which to dismiss. The savi alia scritturaand of the militia were to check records of service against contracts, takeaccount of reports by proveditors and senior officers, and put individualnames to the vote in the College, which would then submit them forconfirmation to the Senate. The result was an approved list of 42 names, 12of them Venetian subjects (2 from Cyprus). These men formed the new'ordinary' or permanent establishment, at company commander level, ofthe garrisons and militia. Theoretically, applicants had to wait until one ofthem vacated his post.112

The system broke down at once. Not all wanted to remain. Some of thoseexcluded protested that they should be retained. There were 21 places onthe Terraferma where garrisons were maintained (not necessarily all thetime, however) apart from the Lido forts, Chioggia and the sometimesmanned lagoon posts at San Pietro in Volta, Malamocco and Brondolo.Each needed one captain, several needed more - eight at Brescia andVerona; six at Bergamo, for instance - and in addition there was the whole ofthe militia to care for. Nine garrison towns, moreover, were of sufficientstrategic weight to have, in addition, military governors: Bergamo, Brescia,Crema, Asola, Orzinovi, Peschiera, Verona, Legnago and Marano. Some ofthese governorships were important enough to be offered to colonels (ofwhom it was discovered in 1578 that there were twenty instead of the legaleight);113 others were held by captains. Forty-two were clearly not enough togo round, and the College began considering new applicants almost at once.

Garrison duty could not attract ambitious or efficient men. The dutieswere routine; the numbers of troops in a command were seldom as high as 40and often as low as 12 or 15. Salaries were accordingly low and the chances ofpromotion slight, as the custom still obtained whereby contractors for 500troops or more, at times of alarm or war, hired their own captains ofcompanies, or accepted suggestions from the College's list of captains likelyto be able to speed matters by bringing men of their own. Thus in 1591,when 2000 infantry were to be raised for Crete, the College turned to fivemen whose claims, on grounds of tradition, parentage or personal following,were considered greater than those of garrison captains: the Bolognese111 ST. reg. 36, 104.V (14 June 1549) and reg. 37, 162-162V (25 July 1551); supporting detail in e.g.

Pasero, 'Aspetti dell'ordinamento militare', 18-19 and Relazioni dei rettori, ii, Belluno, Feltre, 232-3.112 ST. reg. 49, 133-4V (30 June); SS. reg. 92, IIO-IIOV (28 Mar. 1597).113 ST. reg. 52, 47 (3 Mar.).

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Count Francesco Pepoli, whose brother Cesare had been employed byVenice in the past; the Tuscan Ottone del Monte Maria, a direct descendant'of that Pietro del Monte who fought for us at the Ghiarra d'Adda[Agnadello]'; Count Ottaviano Vimercato, of the famous Cremasco militaryfamily; and the Paduans Paolo Conti and Giacomo Tacco, both of whomwere ' persons of a large family and eager to demonstrate their loyalty anddevotion to our Signoria'.114 The College was also tempted to bend the rulesabout checking for vacancies before making new appointments when theywere petitioned by well-supported ex-employees, by for instance theFlorentine Giovanni Altoni. He had served in Zara and Sibenico in 1568—9and was taken prisoner to Constantinople. After more than three years hewas freed, thanks to the bailo and the ambassador Andrea Badoer, but at acost of 600 zeechini. Since then he had served in France and Hungary. Hehad already sent the doge 'a book of mine about military affairs' andenclosed a stoutish manuscript describing the Hungarian wars of 1594-7.And he cited an impressive list of referees including Del Monte, Ferrantede' Rossi and the military engineer Lorini.115

With transfers still constantly going on among stations within theTerraferma, Dalmatia and the third zone, not to mention desertion,dismissals, and retirements and deaths, it is not surprising that in years freefrom crisis the savio alia scrittura of the moment did not always check hisbooks. The result was that there soon came to be too many garrison captainson the Terraferma, a situation damaging to their own career prospects andbad for the government's finances. In 1586 the Senate ruled that preferenceshould be given them when vacancies appeared da Mar.

In 1591 Alvise Grimani, reporting as former Proveditor-General inTerraferma, presented an alarming report on the garrisons' corrupt andvulnerable state,116 and the Senate elected Francesco Duodo, Marc'AntonioBarbaro and Zorzi Contarini 'to look into the reform of the armed forces astre eletti supra la regolatione della militia\ After consultations with DelMonte, Giulio Savorgnan and the collateral-general they made their firstsuggestion in 1592: that peacetime pay (still at 3 ducats for the commonsoldier) should be given ten instead of eight times a year. How couldcaptains ensure discipline and keep honest books when their men wereforced to take other jobs? As usual, when reform meant spending money, theproposal was turned down.117 More successful was the proposal in thefollowing year to reduce the number of captains from 58 to 38, 24 on the

114 SM. reg. 52, 35-35V.115 Capi di Guerra, Ba. A-D, 6 Nov. 1604.116 Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni, Ba. 52, 36-85.117 SS. reg. 89, 20-20V (6 June, referring to elections of 9 Sept. 1591). Cf. report of 28 Nov. 1591 in

Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 21.

392


Terraferma and 14 da Mar - figures that did not include governors. Coupledwith this was the condition that no new garrison captains should be engagedunless they had already held captain's rank and had served as ensigns orsergeants for five years or spent three in a theatre of war. Apart frompresenting testimonials to this effect, candidates had to pass a viva voceexamination devised with the most searching rigour by Del Monte.118 Ifthey had known enough to get the answers right, Venice should have had, inthe field and in siegework, the most competent permanent officer corps inEurope.

Nothing was done about this. Nothing emerged from the next wave ofsenatorial reforming zeal, which also resulted from a gloomy report by aproveditor-general (Pietro Duodo in 1603) and led to the appointment ofthree patricians 'on the manner of proceeding in the reform of the standinginfantry (sopra il modo et ordine di regolare la militia pagata)\119 Theirproposals were presented in 1605.120 Further proposals, this time fromsenior officers, were put forward in 1606.121 Indeed, the inspectorate systemwhereby proveditors-general and chiefs of staff supplied the College withfairly regular accounts of what was going on, together with advice on how toimprove matters, was as admirable as ever. That no action was taken wasdue to three main factors: the reluctance to spend, the belief that the militiacould save the situation in the short term, and the conviction thatfortifications and the activation of long-term contracts with militaryentrepreneurs, tided over if need be with local recruiting, would provide asolution, as long as spies and diplomats kept on their toes and uttered theirwarnings in time. Perhaps it could be added that familiarity bred if notcontempt at least resignation. That soldiers would neglect their duties oremploy substitutes in spite of threats to their ears and noses, would look likebeggars and act like bandits, that captains would fail to post their guards andteach men how to use their weapons, that armoury doors were not alwaysbolted, that men in armour turned out to be shopkeepers while shopkeepersand carpenters turned out to be soldiers: these were oddities to bear, as theywere known to be borne elsewhere. It was clear what should be done. Theextremely detailed orders for the ideal system of patrols, guards andsentinels for a garrison city printed in 1603 is excellent example.122 But itwas still better known that it would not be done. To bring armament abreast

118 SS. reg. 89,112-13 (29 J u n e ) - The examination is printed in Ricotti, Storia delle compagnie di venturain Italia, ii, 470-82.

119 ST. reg. 74, n 7 v (3 Dec. 1604).120 SS. reg. 96, 152V-157 (12 Feb.).121 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 25.122 [ p r i n t e d ] Ordini deliberati dalFEccell1710. Senato. 1603. A di 11 Marzo. In materia delli presidij delle

cittd e fortezze da Terra, e da mar.

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of current practice it was ordered in 1607123 t n a t there were to be equalnumbers of arquebusiers, musketeers and pikemen. But as the last two,because of the weight of weapon and armour, had to be paid more, the orderwas ignored. Impaired by crises as it was, 'peace' retained its soporificflavour.

Salaries remained unchanged at an average of 20 ducats per pay for agarrison captain and 240 per annum for a governor.124 Pay was normallygiven to captains eight times a year, though in periods of food shortages andhigh prices or partial mobilization or in moments when a specially highsecurity value was set on particular towns,125 it could be given ten or twelvetimes. This flexibility, which was yet another cause of confusion in the savioalia scrittura\ accounts, also applied to the pay of the men. Their base wagethroughout the period was 3 ducats (or 18 lire, 12 soldi) a pay, making 24ducats a year, or 8 soldi a day. Notionally, bonuses were available for menactually in possession of arms and armour at the rate of (per pay) 21 lire foran arquebusier, 23 for a pikeman, 25 for a musketeer. Pay could beincreased, as we have seen, by calculating it in terms of the scudo of 7 lireinstead of the ducat of 6 lire and 4 soldi. Normally this was done only fortroops drafted in to supplement the standing force, out of consideration fortheir short term of service, but on occasion companies of 'extraordinary'infantry (especially Corsicans) were retained over long periods, presenting acontrast in wages that was a source of resentment among the 'ordinary'garrison troops, few of whom qualified for bonuses because they hadcommonly pawned their weapons and armour.126 The government did notattempt to reduce the basic 3 ducats a pay, but, in an attempt to pare downthe costs of each company still further, in 1587 refused the bonus paymentswhich had enabled ensigns, sergeants and even corporals to maintain a'ragazzo' or batman,127 and in 1611 offered only a flat 8 ducats per pay (6.7in peacetime) to all under-officers instead of wages that had come to rangeup to 16 ducats a pay for ensigns.128 It is uncertain, however, how far thelatter reform was implemented.

Save for the most prestigious governorships, those of Bergamo, Bresciaand Verona, service in the standing infantry force for those of less thangeneral officer rank thus offered little money and less glamour. This was

123 SS. reg. 98, 13 (19 Mar.).124 ST. reg. 54, 184 (10 Dec).125 E.g. at Legnago and Orzinovi in 1589 (ST. reg. 58,198V) and at the Brescia castello in 1589 (ST. reg.

59, 40V-41) and 1601 (reg. 71; 22 Mar. and 7 Apr.), when the troops there and at Verona andPontevico were paid by the calendar month.

126 On pay: Pasero, 'Aspetti', 16; SS. reg. 92, I IO-IIOV (25 May 1599); Senato, Dispacci Rettori,Verona, 20 June 1610; ST. reg. 81, 49V (29 Apr. 1611). And see Appendix below.

127 S M . reg. 48 , 83V (12 Sep t . 1587).128 S T . reg. 8 1 , 49V.

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reserved for the landed families on stand-by contracts (from 700 to 4000ducats a year for doing nothing but abstain from serving other states) such asthe Orsini, at least eight of whom served between 1509 and 1617,129 or theMalatesta, who, when their pay was in arrears, could remind thegovernment, as Giacomo did in 1577, how he' had raised 3000 infantry in 29days in spite of the prohibitions of princes'.130 Nor could they musteranything like the influence of local magnates like the Savorgnan orMartinengo or the Terraferma condottieri of men-at-arms, all of whomwere capable, or at least thought capable, of producing extra men inwartime. Again, commands of soldiers in the fleet when it was put on a fullalert also went to officers who could bring troops of their own, as GiacomoMalatesta did when he was made 'governor of all the infantry in the fleet' in1595.131 Thus while the garrison force offered a career, it was not calculatedto attract men of talent or ambition, let alone to act as a school forprofessionals who could help discipline and bring up to date the increasinglyinept recruits Venice was forced to employ in its crises and wars.

The only aspect of the armed forces which was both efficient and whichkept abreast of developments elsewhere in Europe was the artillery service.'There can be no doubt whatsoever that one of the chief factors in theprotection of lands and of armies is the artillery.'132 This opinion, from aCouncil of Ten preamble, typifies the importance attached by the republicto this arm. Military proveditors were reminded, time and again, to be ascareful about putting the artillery at risk as they were about needlesslyendangering the army.133 The Council of Ten ran the manufacture andsupply of guns in terms of a strict monopoly, checking that galleys returnedwith the guns they had set out with, keeping inventories of artillery issued tofortresses and garrison towns up to date, and sparingly loaning guns toindividuals who proposed, as Girolamo Savorgnan did in 1511 in Friuli, touse them to improve the defensive capacity of their castles.134 The patricianproveditor of artillery had as his opposite number in the field a captain ofartillery. The combination of sound manufacture in Venice and effectivemanagement by the captain of artillery and the corps of full-time paidmaster gunners and volunteer part-time trainee (scolari) gunners135 made129 Capi di Guerra, Ba. O-P, Orsini file. For Paolo Orsini's 4000-ducat contract, see Commemoriali, 24,

67V-68 (2 Jan. 1577).30 Capi di Guerra, Ba. 3, 30 Oct. 1577.31 SM. reg. 55, 55 (2 Aug.).32 Dieci, Misti, reg. 44, 103 (30 Dec. 1521).33 E .g . S S . reg . 4 3 , 125V (25 S e p t . 1510).34 Dieci, Misti, reg. 34, 82.35 Gunners are discussed below, 403-8. On 23 Mar. 1509 Baldisera dalle Stagnade of Verona was

appointed to an unspecified supervisory post (at 64 ducats p.a.) in which 'habia el cargo de sollicitartutte le cose spectante a tute le artellerie, si per campo come de questa nostra citade', but there are nolater references to such a position. ST. reg. 16, 93V.

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the reputation of the Venetian artillery service a high one. When the armywas waiting at Lodi near that of its allies in September 1515, the proveditor-general reported that 'many of these French lords came over to inspect ourcamp and praised it highly, especially the artillery':136 no mean complimentfrom members of the nation which had supposedly opened the eyes ofItalians to the potentiality of modern guns. It is also a surprising one, for thesignificance of Venice's land artillery is to be understood far less in terms ofthe tactics of the battlefield, even of siege, than of the strategy of defence.

On the march, a clear distinction was made between the field artillery,which accompanied the advance guard, and the siege train which ac-companied the baggage, usually between the 'battle' and the rear guard.References to the former are few, but they all put the numbers low: seven' pieces' with the advance guard at Agnadello; two sackers and two falconetsin 1510; two cannon often (i.e. firing ten-pound balls) and four falconets in1511; two falconets in 1512;137 in 1523 an army of 11,000 men had twelvesackers, and the same number, though of cannons and semi-culverins, weresupplied by Venice to the vice-regal army in 1524.138 No battle accountsuggests that this light artillery (from three - the falconet - to ten calibres)played more than an irritant or galling role in combat, and that briefly.

The size of siege trains is nowhere expressed in a way which makesspeculation profitable. Descriptions of sieges pay more attention tocountermines and details associated with the assaulting of walls with menthan to guns. By 1509 siegecraft had become more or less internationalized.The only innovation attributed to Venice was the use of parapeted zig-zagapproach trenches for bringing guns and assault parties up near the wallsunder cover. Using Girolamo Savorgnan's own letters describing his use ofthis technique in 1514 against Marano, his contemporary Daniele Barbarodescribed it as 'the way used in antiquity by the most excellent captains ofthe Romans'.139 But though on occasion an active bombardment was keptup, at least intermittently, for months at a time, as at Brescia during thewinter of 1515—16, Venice was less anxious to damage the walls of her ownsubject cities than to starve, bluff or threaten them into surrender, and apartfrom the arming of war and merchant galleys, the government's chiefconcern was to provide artillery for the static defence of the Terraferma.

With interchangeability between ship and shore in mind, Veniceprogressively stepped up the production of rust-free bronze artillery at theexpense of iron guns, which were, in any case, more difficult to cast with thesame degree of accuracy.' If ever there was a time when we should produce

136 Sanuto, xxi, 76.137 Da Porto, Lettere storiche, 54; Sanuto, xi, 567; xiii, 190; xiv, 521.138 Sanuto, xxxv, 127, 328.139 Storia veneziana, 1046, and see Savorgnan, iii, 10 seq.

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more bronze artillery for the defence and security of our state and keep itunder strict control, it is now'140 ran a Council of Ten preamble to a law of1511 which defined the strict licensing system under which guns could beloaned to loyal Venetian subjects.

The extraction of metals on the Terraferma, though carried out byprivate companies, was subject to export licences, which were granted onlyafter the needs of the Arsenal had been satisfied. Copper was mined in themountains north of Belluno, notably around Agordo, with Zoldo Alto asecondary centre,141 but the local supply had to be supplemented withimports from Austria and through the Lyons market. The early price of 40ducats the miara doubled by 1600. Venice was entirely dependent onimported tin (again, obtained through Lyons, even in wartime), but lead wasmined near Cadore and in a number of places in the northern Vicentino.The 24 small companies, many of them German-owned, which ran thesemines were also bound to satisfy Arsenal demands before selling else-where.142 The Arsenal purchased iron less for guns than for the mountingsand wheel tracks of gun carriages and for ball. Some were imported fromVillach, but the deposits of ore scattered in the valleys north of Brescia,especially in Valtrompia, made Venice reasonably self-sufficient. As we haveseen, government control both there and in Brescia, which was therepublic's chief arms manufacturing centre, was especially close, not onlyimposing sales licences but at times prohibiting the emigration of craftsmen,miners and smelters. After the recovery of the Bresciano one of the chiefproblems of its rectors was to reconcile the government's appetite for armsand ore with the local population's pressure for a free sale and labourmarket.143

Early in the period, inventories of 1509 and 1510144 show the followingtypes of bronze gun sent to Padua and the Vicentino from the Arsenal:

Cannon of 16, 30, 40, 50 and 100Curtalds of 45Basilisk of 100Passavolants of 12 and 25Sackers of 12Falcons of 6Falconets of 3

A supply of balls (stone and iron, in proportions difficult to determine) in tendifferent calibres was included.

40 Died, Misti, reg. 34, 50.41 A. Alberti and R. Cessi , La politica miner aria delta repubblica veneta (Rome, 1927) 54.42 Ibid., 29, 62 seq. The miara appears to be c. 1050 lb.43 E .g . Sena to , Relazioni , B a . 32, Brescia, 22 M a r . 1527, 30V.

Died, Misti, filze 29 Dec. 1509 and 18 Apr. 1510.

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As the years went by the manufacture of the older types, curtalds, basilisksand passavolants, was dropped and the most unwieldy were melted down, aswas the great bombard called 'No more words!',145 the metal being used forthe sackers and falcons which were made in increasing numbers, formedium cannon and for the somewhat lighter and longer-barrelledculverins which were to become the standard long-range guns, with calibresranging from 20 to 40, though a few were made of 80 and 100. In 1625 anexperimental bronze gun was made capable of firing a stone ball of 250pounds,146 but the dominant tendency was to develop lighter weapons. In1512, on Alviano's advice, twenty guns of a new type, weighing only 400pounds unmounted, were ordered. These asps (aspidi) passed their proofand range tests on the Lido with enough success to justify a celebratorydinner attended by the College and the proveditor of artillery,147 and thetype was to be used both afloat and ashore for the rest of the century.

While some iron artillery was cast in Brescia and in private foundries inVenice itself for sale (subject always to licence) to individuals, boat ownersor foreign arms dealers, bronze artillery was made in the Arsenal or thenearby Tana, and from July 1526 all government work in bronze had to beconcentrated within the Arsenal itself in the interest of security and the closesupervision of materials — though the law accepted that in exceptionalcircumstances weapons could be made in the Tana.148 It mentioned in thisconnection four mortars currently on order to be made in the foundry ofSigismondo Alberghetti. That Alberghetti should be given governmentwork in his own foundry is not surprising. As with its military families,Venice had the knack of retaining the service of men from the same familyfor long periods. From 1487 to 1793 26 generations of Alberghetti cast gunsfor Venice,149 eclipsing in service if not in fame the Di Conti, the otherfamily who in this period was chiefly responsible for work ordered by theCouncil of Ten. These men were not highly paid as far as salary wasconcerned, getting the normal pay scale — 80 ducats a year for CamilloAlberghetti in 1517, 64 for Marco di Conti in 1525150 - of an experiencedmaster gunner. On top of that, however, they could keep whatever profitthey made after working at prices for materials fixed by the Council. Withpermission, they could also accept non-government work.

As with military contracts, they were engaged for short terms offermo and

Sanuto, xxv, 129.Ibid., xli, 60.Ibid., xx, 149, 262.Dieci, Comune (21 July 1526) 45V, 46.R. Romano, 'Aspetti economici degli armamenti navali veneziani nel secolo xvi', RSI., lxvi (1954)41. Tr. in Brian Pullan (ed.), Crisis and Change in the Venetian Economy in the Sixteenth andSeventeenth Centuries (London, 1968).

150 ST. reg. 20, 3v; reg. 24, 23.

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de rispetto. It was the same with the casters of iron cannon balls (lead ballswere only used for proving pieces of artillery from twelve calibres down,and handgunners used their own moulds). Thus Francesco Orlando ofValtrompia was engaged in 1511 for five years fermo and five de rispetto tosupply the Council with a minimum of 50 miara of cannon balls a year,making what profit he could on the fixed price of 9 ducats the miara. He waspermitted to cut wood for timber (necessary because of restrictions in favourof the shipbuilding industry) for carbon, and because ball could be madefrom the inferior ore found here and there in surface veins, he was allowed toprospect for and exploit these. As the Vicentino where he proposed tooperate was 'full of rebels and the friends of rebels' he was promised fullredress against anyone who threatened himself or his labourers.151 TheCouncil also bought ball from foundries in the Bresciano. In 1529, however,when alterations in the foundry area of the Arsenal had made it possible tomake all the iron parts of composite guns (like the moschetto da zuogo, whichhad an iron breech welded to a bronze barrel) and of gun carriages there(instead of buying large quantities from smiths in Padua) it was decided thathenceforward all ball should be made there too. The man chosen to headthis operation, Marian Bonfadin of the Riviera di Salo, was given a salary of5 ducats a month to make ball at 5 ducats the miara from iron already paidfor by the Council. He paid his own assistants and paid for tax-free carbon.The terms were favourable enough for him to be recorded five years later asstill occupying a house in Venice for which he was paying 15 ducats a year inrent.152

Saltpetre, essential for making gunpowder, occurred naturally in the soilin a number of Terraferma areas from the Vicentino and Trevisano to Friuliand Istria, where, after being dug up and mixed with lime and boiled withashes, the saltpetre masters were able to produce a product refined tomilitary standards. But mainland Venice was not self-sufficient, importinglocally refined saltpetre direct from Apulia and (towards the end of theperiod) Crete, or through the many merchants, Genoese and others, whospeculated in a commodity that was in general demand. Prices through thecentury rose from 32 to 95 ducats the miara, variations depending moreon demand than place of origin. Surveying, extraction and refining on theTerraferma were carried out by private individuals or small firms undercontracts fixed by the Council of Ten. These had the following points incommon: an advance could be given for the purchase of equipment, boilingvats and the like; saltpetre masters and their assistants could carry arms andenforce local labour; they could dig in any man's fields or in the floors of his

151 Dieci, Misti, reg. 33, 126V.152 Dieci, Comune (30 Aug. 1529) 82-82V; ibid. (28 July 1531) 68.

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house, animal sheds and outbuildings; the price was fixed at the refinery,transport to Venice being paid by the republic.153 Sulphur, at around 4ducats the miara, was all imported from Romagna and Apulia and fromSicily, where the substance was most widely available in an easily refinableform. This was used not only in gunpowder but in compounding, togetherwith camphor, materials used for the incendiary missiles used in sieges, and(on uncertain evidence) for a form of Greek fire that stuck to armour andbodies and could not be extinguished by water.154 It was, yet again, in theArsenal that the masters of artificial fire worked (at 80 ducats a year, fromwhich they paid an assistant).155 In spite of the great fire of 1509 and anothermajor explosion in 1522, gunpowder continued to be made and stored in theArsenal, so that apart from the Council of Ten's armoury in the ducalpalace, Venice had the whole of the equipment needed for war by land andsea, and the means of replacing it, if not under one roof, at least within oneset of walls.

Only two changes took place in the administration of the artillery service.One was the transfer of responsibility for it from the Ten to the Senate in1588.156 The second came in 1604. A number of rectors of Brescia hadrecommended including the gun foundry there within the Arsenal'smonopoly for the production of bronze artillery, and in that year the Senateauthorized it157 to undertake the repair or recasting of all defective guns westof the Mincio to save the expense of transporting them to Venice.Marc'Antonio di Conti was sent to supervise the work. But the bulk of newwork and, above all, of new design, continued to be carried out in theArsenal, where the standards were such that most of the Turkish gunscaptured at Lepanto were not only melted down as technically deficient buthad new metal added in the furnace 'because the material is of such poorquality'.158

Working so closely with the proveditors of artillery, whose office was inthe Arsenal and one of whom had to sleep there, the gun founders were awareof the general need for economy and the special requirements of the navy. Itwas because he knew of 'the eternal and intolerable cost' of keepingfortifications suitably armed159 that Sigismondo Alberghetti asked for a new

53 Copious references throughout Dieci, Misti regs.54 Da Porto, 122-3; °f- Sanuto, ix, 178.55 E.g. Sanuto, xxxvi, 482.56 See above, 261.57 ST. reg. 74, 55v-56v (3 July).58 Dieci, Comune (28 Nov. 1572).59 Proveditor-General Alvise Grimani reported on 26 Aug. 1589 that out of 339 pieces of artillery in

Peschiera, Brescia, Bergamo, Asola, Orzinovi and Crema 92 were too light for their function and 48in bad condition (Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 43). On 7 May 1586 the ex-Proveditor of Legnagocomplained that with 43 pieces of 3-50 calibres, the fortress was seriously undergunned (Collegio,Secreta, Relazioni, Ba. 42).

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and cheap type of weapon to be given secret tests in 1599.160 It was becauseof the exposure to fire of naval gunners running in their weapons in order toreload them by the muzzle that trials of breech-loaders were ordered atintervals through the 1580s and 90s.161 Normally such trials, from whichmere onlookers were carefully excluded, were conducted on the Lido in thepresence of the proveditors of artillery, fortresses and the Arsenal, and ofsenior officers like Giulio Savorgnan, Del Monte and De' Rossi. But on atleast one occasion in 1590' all nobles who have held naval commands and arenow present in the city' were also asked for their opinion.162 And on occasionproveditors-general in the field conducted trials of new weapons. Thus in1606 Benetto Moro reported (unenthusiastically) on the gate-splittingcapacity of petards made by an unnamed English 'petardiero' attracted bythe mobilization of that year.163

The founders' ingenuity was spurred by their awareness of the increasingprice of metals and, above all, of gunpowder. The shortage of wood thataffected the shipbuilding industry so seriously was felt in the gunpowderindustry as well, with its need for fine carbon. The greatest challenge,however, was the cost of saltpetre. The government contracted withsalnitrari to supply some 340 miara a year from Venetian territory, theTerraferma, Istria and Dalmatia. In 1584 they were producing only 180 andsupplies, at higher cost, were having to be bought from foreign mer-chants.164 From 1572 to 1578 the average cost per miara had crept up from 43to 65 ducats.165 In 1587 imported saltpetre was offered at 95 ducats themiara.166 That was in a year of acute shortage, it is true, but the Senate foundit increasingly difficult to hold its local monopolists to the 60 ducats it set in1593,167 especially as the government itself charged 82 ducats to those whowanted to use the manufactory on the Lido which was licensed to makegunpowder and its materials for export.168 In 1609 36,000 ducats a year wasearmarked for the purchase of saltpetre,169 a sum that may be comparedwith the total annual cost, 47,000 ducats, of the militia.170 It is not surprisingthat in 1603, m Yiew of the burden placed by the obtaining of supplies of thisone commodity on the proveditors of artillery, the Senate discussed, but did

6 0 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 22, 76-7.61 E.g. ibid., 56 (12 Sept. 1596).62 Savio alia Scrittura, Ba. 193 (9 Dec).6 3 Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 45 (29 Sept.).64 S S . reg . 84 , 159-159V (17 N o v . ) .65 Died, Comune, regs. passim.6 6 Ibid. (26 Jan.).67 Savio alia Scrittura, Ba. 193 (11 Dec).6 8 [ P r i n t e d ] Pane presa neireccellentiss. Conseglio di Pregadi, 1593, a di 11 Decembre. In materia di

Salnitri. Copy in Savio alia Scri t tura, B a . 193.6 9 Savio alia Scr i t tura , B a . 193.7 0 Adding government pay to senior officers to the sums paid by communit ies mentioned on p. 361.

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not pass, a proposal to elect annually a proveditor sopra i salnitri*71 nor thatthe legislation of 1557 forbidding the firing of salutes at sea was yet againrepeated in that same year,172 nor that the militia training periods werehampered by a shortage of powder, nor that trials of new pieces of artilleryhad to be conducted with both fine and coarse powder in order to determinethe cheapest effective charge.173

In 1589 it was reckoned that the relation of the cost of powder to ball ineach shot from a piece of artillery was three to one;174 thus to enable the 65pieces then in position at Brescia to fire 26,000 shots among them GiulioSavorgnan calculated that 43,000 ducats would have to be spent, 32,000 onpowder, 11,000 on ball.175 The cost of ball too was mounting, though moreslowly.176 In 1583 tests with stone balls were conducted and theireffectiveness, especially against wood, was thought impressive enough forquantities of them to be ordered to be cut in Istria.177 This return to the pastwas probably an isolated experiment. However, it helps to explain why themain effort in artillery design was centred on guns of medium or low calibrethat would achieve a good range and impact with the smallest possiblecharge.

Inventors of new and ingenious small arms continued, as before 1588, toapproach the Council of Ten. In 1592, for instance, Giorgio Bergaminooffered the secret of a foolproof weapon, a wheel-lock arquebus that firedfour shots at a time. The Heads of the Ten passed it to the proveditors ofartillery for testing, but it was the Ten who negotiated the contract after itsbeing found workable: Bergamino was given 6 ducats a month for life andpermission to release two banditi (by now a not uncommon sign of the timesin contracts), on condition that he made the weapons in the Arsenal and didnot reveal the secret 'on pain of losing his life'.178 The connection of the Tenwith secret or otherwise valuable weapons was maintained because of thecontinuing reputation of its armoury, which by now occupied six rooms inthe Ducal Palace.179 And it was here that Bergamino's trial weapon wasplaced.

Until the recuperation of the Terraferma in 1517 and the establishment in

ST. reg. 73, 19 (18 Mar.).V. Lamansky, Secrets d'etat de Venise, ii, 587.SM. reg. 48, 154 (24 Feb. 1588).Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 22 (6 Apr.).Ibid (22 May 1590).For costs inr. 1593, ibid., Ba. 18, 59. See also the ball-maker's contract of 8 July 1601 inSM. reg. 61,40-40v.

177 SS. reg. 84, 64-64V (22 Oct.). For a list of types of artillery with point-blank ranges, see A.Capobianco, Corona e palma militare de artiglieria . . . (Venice, 1598).

178 Dieci, Comune, filza 28 Sept. 1606 contains material transferred from 1592. See M. Morin,'L'archibugio a quattro col pi di Giorgio Bergamin', Diana Armi (1970) 85-9.

179 Dieci, Misc. Cod., 91, 28 Sept. 1606.

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its major cities ofscuole de bombardieri, training organizations for gunners,Venice relied on foreign, chiefly German, artillerists: in a list of 37 serving atthe siege of Brescia in 1512 only 5 were from Venice. Thereafter, therepublic fostered a gunnery militia which, based on towns, and coming bythe century's end to number some 4700, was a significant companionorganization to the rural arquebus militia, and additional evidence of theextent to which the republic relied on the voluntary co-operation of itssubjects.

It was with the marine in mind that the original bombardiers' scuola of S.Barbara (the patron saint of those handling explosives) had been set up inVenice in 1500. In 1505 its headquarters were moved from the neighbour-hood of S. Marcuola to a ground floor near the main bridge in Campo S.Maria Formosa. It was allocated the chapel still named after it in the church,and henceforward, with its charitable fund for members' families who hadfallen on hard times, its weekly mass, its annual procession on 4 Decemberand its members' presence in the processions organized for major feast days,ducal elections and the like, it played a readily discernible part in the city'slife. Under close government supervision, and at government expense, itsmembers received a weekly theoretical training session in the casting andfiring of artillery and the making of gunpowder and artificial fire, andpractical lessons were held on the Council of Ten's practice ground for lightartillery at S. Alvise and on its proving range for heavier guns on the Lido.Its members were predominantly seamen, arsenalotti, carpenters, smithsand stonemasons, and places for seagoing bombardiers were reserved tothose who belonged to the scuola}™

The ability to use a hand-held missile weapon was normally a condition ofemployment on both war and merchant galleys, except for oarsmen.Shooting practice had been encouraged since the fourteenth century.Decreeing the refurbishing of five butts in 1506, in the Tana, in the parishesof SS. Giovanni and Paolo, S. Margarita and S. Eufemia (on the Giudecca)and in Canarregio, the Council of Ten had stressed the importance oflearning to use bow and crossbow 'to nobles, citizens and populace alike'.181

Indeed, the prizes at the annual competitions for each weapon on the Lidowere won with some regularity by patricians. These competitions wereorganized with deliberate formality. Supervised by two Heads of theCouncil of Ten, matches, which took place before and after lunch forlengths of velvet and satin for first and a more workmanlike cloth for second

See Scuole Piccole, Ba. 257, Capitolare. On S. Alvise, see M. Morin, 'Per la mia Venezia', DianaArmi (1974) 59. And see above, 85-6.Died, Misti, reg. 31, 23V (19 May).

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prize, concluded with an al fresco dinner and the winners went next day tothe College to be congratulated.182

In 1514 there was some talk of dropping the crossbow 'as its bolts are noteffective',183 but the change of weapons was not formalized until 1518.Then, and thereafter, because 'nothing is more useful in war, both by landand sea, than the schiopetto" there were to be three annual competitions onthe Lido: with the crossbow just after Christmas, with the longbow on StBartholomew's day, and with the schioppetto or arquebus at Pentecost.Moreover, arquebuses were henceforward to be used at sea instead ofcrossbows, and annual competitions were also to be held with themthroughout the Terraferma - from 1526 monthly184 - as a stimulus torecruitment in the regional scuole.

After the war of 1537-40, during which all gunners were Venetian orVenetian subjects, the Council of Ten reaffirmed its right to control theirtraining, to choose scolari from the gunnery scuole to put on the permanentpay-roll, to promote them to head gunner and to select such head gunners asthey thought trustworthy enough to be in charge of garrison munitionstores.185 Given the cash value of the weapons they served, potential salaried(provisionati) gunners were not only required to have had two years ofexperience at sea or in the army (a requirement dropped as the years of peacerolled by) but were given firing tests for accuracy on light pieces and a vivavoce examination of their knowledge of the manufacture, types, charge andball of other artillery, and of the making of gunpowder and artificial fire.186

This selection procedure was not uncontaminated. The Council generallyratified promotions made by military or naval proveditors for valour orreliability rather than for expertise, and the sons of head gunners weregiven precedence over other candidates. On the whole, however, thestandard was reasonably well protected and it seems likely, thoughinformation is lacking, that with such enrolments as 400 in Padua in 1557and 521 in Verona in 1556 the corps kept up with the increased number ofguns that was part of the refortification programme.187 All the existing scuolewere maintained and two new ones started at Orzinovi (mooted in 1555 butnot founded until 1569)188 and at Chioggia (1565).189

182 Among many references in Sanuto: ix, 419-20, xviii, 247, xx, 233-4, xxxiii, 291. Prize details: Dieci,Misti, reg. 45, 39V (30 May 1522).

83 Sanuto, xviii, 245 (5 June).84 Dieci, Misti, reg. 42, 143-143V; ibid., Comune (7 Feb. 1526).85 Diec i , C o m u n e , reg. 13, 132V-133 (20 M a r . , ci t ing pane of 29 Ju ly 1538 and of 19 Apr . 1539).86 Ib id . , reg. 13, 13V (19 Apr . 1539). F o r examples of the examina t ion , see Archivio P rop r io G .

Con ta r i n i , B a . 25 , n . p . , sub 1544 and (?) 1560 ( inc luding model answers) .87 Relazioni dei retturi, iv, Padua, 47; ix, Verona, 51 .88 D iec i , C o m u n e , reg. 29 (20 Sep t . 1569); cf. ibid. (23 J a n . 1555).89 SM. filza 31 Dec. 1590 (giving earlier reference). But cf. Dieci, Comune (27 May 1587) ordering its

foundation.

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Initially, membership was restricted to men from trades which would begenerally useful in siegecraft or the repair of fortifications: carpenters,blacksmiths, bricklayers, stonecutters and masons. As the century drew on,however, though rectors were urged to ensure that enrolments contained anucleus of these occupations, others had to be accepted: porters and millers,even the occasional bonnet-maker, barber, bookseller and organist.

In Venice weekly practices at the shooting ground at S. Alvise werereintroduced after 1540, during which scolari could learn the use ofhandguns (schioppetto and arquebus), rest-assisted weapons (scopetone daposto, archibusone or archibuso da posto, moschettone) and the lightest piece oftrue artillery, the carriage- or sled-mounted falconet. In addition, monthlycompetitions on the Lido range near S. Niccolo were held for all thesecategories. These remained open to scolari from the Terraferma (who couldbring food and wine duty free). The 1541 regulations for the schioppettocontests give something of the flavour of those occasions. An entrance fee of1 soldo was charged to cover the cost of the paper targets and the fees of theman who put tags in the bullet holes and the scorekeeper; only one shot wasallowed per man; every man had to wait quietly until his name was called; noone was to use insulting words or threatening gestures.190 A later regulation(1547) forbad cheating by steadying the lighter handguns on a rest.191 Adrawing of a target used in a moschetto competition in Brescia in 1543 wassent to the heads of the Ten with the winning shots marked on it, plus a listof the 93 contestants, each annotated with the position of his shot: ' in thered' (the centre), 'in the outer white', and so forth.192 And the competitionscame to be taken all the more seriously as the opportunities for experienceon active service faded.

After the War of 1570-3, with the resumption of the fortificationprogramme and its call for increased numbers of new pieces of artillery, thescuoley which had provided gunners for the fleet, the army and the fortressesda Mar, were the object of a renewed fostering. In 1608 a printed list ofregulations for the scuola of S. Barbara of Venice, updating that of 1571 andproduced by the proveditors of artillery,193 reaffirmed that the magistracy'smost important task was to produce 'gunners, because artillery is worthlessand the money spent on saltpetre, powder, balls and other equipment isthrown away unless there are trained and competent men to make use ofthem'. Three years previously a report from De' Rossi's second incommand, Giacomo Pagnini, had listed the following places as possessing

190 Died, Capi, Notatorio, 1540-2, 83V-84 (13 Aug.).191 Scuole Piccole, Ba. 257, Capitolare, 6 June.192 Capi, Dieci, Lettere Rettori, Ba. 20, 1 Sept. 1543. I owe this reference to Marco Morin.193 [Printed] In Materia de Bombardieri, delli illustrissimi Signori Provveditori alle Artellarie, 19 Jan.

1607 [Modo Veneto]. Copy in Savio alia Scrittura, Ba. 193, where there is also a copy of the [printed]Pane presa nell'eccel*0 Conseglio di Died, 1571 a di 18 luglio in materia dei Bombardieri di Venetia.

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scuole of gunners: Bergamo, Brescia, Crema, Asola, Orzinovi, Pontevico,Peschiera, Verona, Legnago, Vicenza, Bassano, Rovigo, Padua, Treviso,Marano, Udine and Palma.194 Omitted is Monfalcone, where a scuola wasordered to be started in 1571, but may not have been,195 Venice itself andChioggia as not part of the Terraferma, and Feltre. Here it was not until1608 that the returning capitano pointed out the anomaly whereby Feltrealone among the populous towns of the Terraferma had no scuola, yet was ona route threatened alike by 'powerful foreign princes' and militant exiles. Asuccessor added in 1611 that the training given were a scuola to beestablished would add some ginger to a population 'unwarlike andpusillanimous'.196 One was ordered in 1612 and had 150 members in 1614.197

The total number of men inscribed was some 4300 in 1590; 4755 in 1606,plus (in 1605) 104 provisional.198 The former, the scolari, served as did themilitia not for pay (save when on active service) but for privilege: relief frompersonal taxation (in Venice this meant from the first 2 ducats due in tanseand the first 2 due in decime),199 exemption from tolls on certain quantitiesof flour, wine and wood,200 permission to carry arms. The latter pro-vided the small permanent staff of the Terraferma organization, chiefand assistant chief gunners. There was considerable variation in theway in which the scuole were run. Padua, the largest with 700 members in1610, followed militia procedure and had a sergeant, a lieutenant, heads ofhundreds and corporals.201 Venice, with 300, had twelve heads ofsquadrons. Venice trained its gunners to shoot not only at fixed marks onland but also on sea targets bobbing 400 paces off the Lido.202 Payment ofsubordinate ranks, the extent of tax exemption and allowance varied fromplace to place. All scuole had in common, however, supervision by rectorsunder the remote control of the captain-general of artillery and theproveditors of artillery; compulsory training sessions, usually once a month;recruitment mainly from craftsmen in the towns; liability to call-up forgarrison duty in the Terraferma or da Mar or in the fleet at standard wagespaid by the government. The basic pay was, in peace or war, 60 ducats a yearfor chief gunners, 48 for assistant chief gunners, 36 in war or when194 Capi di Guerra, Ba. O-P, 19 Jan. 1605.195 Dieci, Comune, reg. 30, 24.V-25 (29 May). It was not mentioned in the list of scuole given in ST. reg.

49, 81 (13 Dec. 1572).196 Relazioni dei rettori, ii, Belluno, Feltre, 3 0 3 , 314.197 ST. reg. 82, 141 (15 Dec. 1612); Relazioni dei rettori, ii, Belluno, Feltre, 323.198 BMV.,ms. It. vii, 1187 (= 8971); Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 45 (30 July 1606); Capi di Guerra,

Ba. o-p, Jacopo Pagnini (19 Jan. 1605).199 Thus the regulations of 1608, glossing a provision of 18 June 1594.200 E.g. ST. reg. 77, 44 (2 June 1607) to bring the Paduan into line with other scvole. Cf. ST. reg. 64,

138V (5 Nov. 1594) referring to Brescia.201 Senato, Dispacci Rettori, Padova, 28 Jan. 1610.202 Regulations of 1608.

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mobilized for scolari?03 but the rates varied much in relation to demand.This demand was not only affected by mobilization and wars but by theprogress of the fortification programme. Marco Antonio Memmo reportedin 1599 that when he first went as proveditor-general to Palma, there wereonly four trained gunners. He had 'persuaded' 50 men from among thestorekeepers in Palma and from the neighbouring villages to become scolariand had his gunners train them in the use of a falconet on the first Sunday ofeach month. He ruefully admitted that as very ignorant men they were goodfor little else than lugging artillery from one place to another. Yet theeighteen flanks, nine curtains and eighteen cavaliers of Palma 'all need onetrained gunner, quite apart from the scolari\204

In 1613 the Council of Ten decided to allow members of the scuola ofVenice to take part in the 'open' shooting competitions on the Lido forfalconet and musket, 'because the scuola is dying of inertia'.205 As with themilitia, the condition of the scuole differed widely from place to place andtime to time. In 1603, for instance, the ex-Capitano of Padua reported thatof the scuola\ membership of 900 only 200 turned up when he musteredthem: the rest were dead, sick, uninterested or never contacted by corporals(also volunteers, one for each 25 men) who took their small fee from the cityand did nothing in return for it. Three years later the scuola was representedas having 780 active members, 'excellent men, ready for any sort ofservice'.206 There were also widespread complaints that the weapons usedfor training (falconet and musket and both the heavy wall arquebus and thehand-held variety) were antiquated or in short supply, or that the townsmenwere insufficiently attracted by the chief perquisite of the scolaro,permission to bear arms, to bother to enrol. 'The young men of this city livefor the most part in great idleness', reported the ex-Capitano of Belluno in1592,' so I humbly suggest that a gunnery scuola be set up as in all your othertowns of the Terraferma'; in the same year a scuola was urged forCividale in Friuli, this time to help the local authorities 'extirpate criminalsand outlaws'.207 For, again as with the militia, the gunnery organization waslooked on not only as a military necessity but as a morale-supporting andpolicing body. And it was the government's determination to obtain all theseadvantages at the lowest possible cost that caused such small but continuouscontroversies as whether it was better to let individuals keep their weaponsat home or to store them within easy reach in their corporals' houses, or, to

203 Unchanged since 1570 (SM. reg. 39, 160; 20 Apr.).2 0 4 Relazione della fortezza di Palma del provveditore generate Marco Antonio Memmo . . . , ed . G .

Collotta (Venice, 1863) 71.205 Savio alia Scr i t tura , B a . 193 (29 Apr . ) .206 Relazioni dei rettori, iv, Padua, 96, 101.2 0 7 I b id . , ii, Belluno, Feltre, 30; v, Cividale del Friuli, Marano, 26 .

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guard against loss or illegitimate sale, keep them in the town armoury.208

In this, as in so many respects, the further one moves from governmentfiat to local action the more blurred the picture becomes. With the gunners,militiamen and the troops of the standing army alike it was fortunate forVenice that each time the test of war came, its technology and procedureswere still simple enough for unskilled men to be jarred towards competenceby deference to authority, an instinct for self-preservation and, moreconjecturally, a calculation of possible profit.

208 E.g., ibid., iii, Treviso, 102 (1597).

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Fortifications in the Terraferma

The extensive programme of fortifying, or of modernizing older fortifi-cations, that was carried out by the Venetian government from Agnadello tothe beginning of the War of Gradisca has left its mark, in the most literalway, on the townscape of northern Italy from Bergamo to Palmanova. Itspurpose was of the highest importance: to protect the major centres ofpopulation, to provide storm-shelters for the republic's armies, to dis-courage invasion. Fortifications and their garrisons provided the essentialbase from which to carry out Venice's on-the-whole successful policy ofarmed neutrality. This importance was attested by the creation of a specialmagistracy, that of the Provveditori alle Fortezze, in 1542 and itsenlargement in 1580; by the appointment in 1587 of a 'superintendent' of allfortresses; by the prominence given to fortifications in the dispatches ofcommanders-in-chief, proveditors-general and the rectors of cities through-out the period; and by an expenditure of some 15,000 ducats a year up to1540 and about 23,000 thereafter.1 It is true that fortifications da Marreceived a proportion of these sums, but on the other hand centralgovernment funds contributed only one-third to the total cost of fortifi-cations, the rest being borne by the cities concerned and by theirsurrounding territories.

In 1460 all rectors in the Terraferma had been ordered to have mapsmade of their jurisdictions.2 This paper knowledge, backed up by thepractical understanding of distances and terrains acquired by those whoowned land or had held office on the mainland, and through diplomaticwrangling over border disputes, meant that those discussing defence in theCollege or Senate had a reasonably clear mental image of the area to bedefended. Thus Marano was frequently referred to as the 'key' to southern,Osoppo as the 'heart' of northern Friuli.

In the months before Agnadello, a good deal of ad hoc strengthening of

This chapter was in large part printed in Florence and Venice: Comparisons and Relations, i: Cinquecento(La Nuova Italia, 1980), the proceedings of a conference organized by Professor Craig Smythe, directorof Villa I Tatti.1 See below, 468 seq.2 C. R. Crone, Maps and their Makers (London, 1953) 103.

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city walls and fortresses had been carried out on the periphery of theTerraferma; on castles guarding the passes to Feltre, Belluno, Cadore andinto Friuli, at Cremona and Crema, and in the Ghiaradadda, wherePitigliano himself directed the work. In the south Alviano ordered thelowering of towers and the strengthening of gate defences at Legnago anddiscussed plans for cutting the river Tartaro to put a barrier of marshbetween Mantua and Verona. The only central site where new work wasbegun was at Vicenza;3 little had been done there, however, before theevents following Agnadello showed the policy of fortifying frontier regionsto have been mistaken. Writing in June of Verona, Vicenza and Padua,Priuli explained that their defences had not been brought up to date becausethey were ' in centro civitatis Venetiarum . . . and the Venetian Elders hadonly been concerned to fortify the Lombard cities bordering the state ofMilan'.4 Referring again to their strategic error in October, he pointed outthat however strong a frontier town, like Cremona, might be, it would fallunless there was a secure base nearby which could reinforce both troops andfood stores and, even more important, the morale of the defenders; it was thefeeling of isolation, not a shortage of supplies, that had led the Cremonese tosurrender.

The situation was different in Friuli, where the events of the winter of1509-10 showed that the throats of access from the northern mountainscould be stopped by fortresses such as Osoppo in the north and walledtowns, notably Gradisca, in the east. But in the Terraferma the emphasis ina defence system that did not ignore passes (Anfo, Feltre), nor townspatrolling the rivers that sliced the Terraferma into sections in all Venetianstrategic thinking (as Orzinovi, Pontevico and Asola patrolled the Oglio, forexample), concentrated henceforward on the main centres of population. Itis true that at intervals between 1510 and 1517 the safety of the army as wellas the defence of Venice itself focused attention on the quadrilateral Soave-S. Bonifacio-Lonigo-Montebello and the banks of the Adige that guardedit from the west, but this involved the building of earthworks that werealways looked on as temporary expedients. In 1517 Andrea Gritti,delivering what was probably the most important and respectedproveditor's report of the period,5 said that 'the army should be based intowns, not in the field' and he named those whose fortifications should beimproved. He included places of largely strategic importance, Asola,Peschiera, Legnago, but followed Priuli's insight by naming Brescia andCrema, together with Verona, Padua and Treviso - omitting Vicenza only

Sanuto, viii, 14, 15, 22.Priuli, iv, 55.Sanuto, xxiv, 68-80.

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because, as he said, he had not had time to inspect it, and, for the samereason, Bergamo. The concept was repeated as an orthodoxy by DonatoGiannotti:' as our fellow Venetians had seen that a single defeat could put ourwhole state in Lombardy in jeopardy they thought of fortifying the towns insuch a way that, were an army lost, the enemy would not be left witheverything else. So from 1509 to the present day we have to this effectfortified Padua, Treviso, Verona, Brescia, Bergamo and Crema.'6

At first, competition with the financial demands of troops and the navymeant that only a fraction of the plans proposed by rectors, castellans, seniorofficer and proveditors were accepted. The main work carried out was onPadua from 1509 to 1520, on Treviso in the years following 1510, onLegnago at intervals from 1510. A new spate of proposals came with thereduction of expenditure on the army in 1517, but it was not until 1525, andlargely on the pleading of the Duke of Urbino, commander-in-chief from1523, that new large-scale works were undertaken, at Crema and Bergamofrom 1525, at Brescia and Legnago (which, though not a centre ofpopulation, 'commands the Vicentino, the Veronese and the Polesine')7

from 1527, at Verona from 1528. In that year the duke promised to remodelthe fortifications of Vicenza in a few weeks, a feat which, as Luigi da Portocommented, would have defeated the combined talents of Euclid and LeonBattista Alberti8 - a tribute to the extent to which fortification had come tobe seen in terms of geometry and rational planning. Work was begun in 1528but little had been achieved by 1530, partly because of differences of opinionabout the inclusion of Monte Berico but also because of the wails of protestfrom the inhabitants.

For the policy of planning the defence of the Terraferma in terms ofrefortified, mutually supporting cities involved a political risk. Large forces,let alone whole armies, were no more welcome as temporary residents in the1520s than they had been during the enforced retreat to Mestre in 1509.Even substantial garrisons were resented as a burden on local taxes, a threatto law and order and a problem as far as billets were concerned.Nonetheless, when work was resumed after the Turkish War of 1537 to1540, it was taken as axiomatic that fortified cities were the key to defensivestrategy. They could deter invasion. They could gain time for mobilizationin the case of an unexpected attack. They could shelter Venetian forces untilthey chose to give battle and reduce the status of invading army to that ofaimless prowlers. And the building programme that occupied the periodfrom the War of 1537-40 to that of 1570-3 was sustained by other factors: an

Libra delta repubblica de viniziani (Florence, 1850) ii, 171-2.Sanuto, xl, 715.Ibid., xlvii, 223.

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enthusiasm, common to the peninsula as a whole, for fortifying 'aliamoderna', the (erroneous) belief that the better the defences the smaller thegarrison need be, the argument that fortifications had a police and securityas well as a military function and, finally, perhaps a satisfaction in spendingpart of the defence budget not on wages and consumables but on property.The arguments for building were based on need, but it is worthremembering a comment made by Paolo Paruta when he looked back overthis period. 'Certainly if one were to consider with a calm judgement thegreat size, the magnificent appearance and the regal expense of the manyfortresses built by the republic at this time, and allow for the differencebetween these and the most famous buildings of antiquity with which theymay be compared, then with respect to their cost and the splendour of theirexecution, the Venetians have earned no less admiration than is accorded tothe ancient Romans.'9

The building programme would not have gone forward as it did had theseyears been really peaceful; politico-military scares were, as we have seen,frequent, and the Terraferma was topographically vulnerable. As one of therepublic's commanders-in-chief was to remind the doge, 'your state beinglong and narrow can truthfully be described as nothing but frontier, andthus is more likely to be cut into and divided by whoever wants to attack itthan had it been of any other shape'.10

In 1543 it was decided to defend Chioggia by, in the first instance, anelaborate series of ditches and earthen outworks that would protect it fromattack from the land. As for the Lido, a previous decision to begin with 'thesite of the castle on the S. Andrea side known as Castello Novo' wasreaffirmed.11 It was to be built on lines that had been suggested by MicheleSanmicheli and Antonio da Castello, and then work was to begin onremodelling its opposite number, at S. Niccolo, in accordance with a modelthat had been left with the College by the Duke of Urbino. Work began at S.Andrea at once under the supervision 'day and night'12 of Sanmicheli, andwhen it was broken off in the autumn of 1549 the fort was defensible, thoughincomplete.

It was also in 1543 that the question of fortifying Friuli was taken up forthe first time since a survey by the duke in 1532.13 Together with the duke'sson Guidobaldo, Sanmicheli and Antonio da Castello, once more working intandem, endorsed Francesco Maria's emphasis on regaining Marano by fairmeans or foul. It would complete the defensive line running south from

9 Historia vinetiana, 176.10 Capi, Died, Condottieri, Ba. 308, 19 June 1579.11 Died, Secreta, reg. 1539-46,104-104V; P. Marchesi, 11 forte diSant1 Andrea a Venezia (Venice, 1978).12 Prow. Fort., Ba. 20, iov.13 Died, Secreta, reg. 4, 128V-131.

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Osoppo through Udine; and this could be supported by a strengthenedSacile, which was in any case important to the defence of the Livenza,the last natural barrier holding an enemy from access to Treviso and thelagoon. They played down the importance of the line Cividale-Gradisca-Monfalcone and wrote off the blocking of the northern passeswith fortresses as impracticable; even if heavy artillery could be deniedaccess, troops could filter round any obstacles placed in their way.14

Their report was simply filed, and it was not until the 1560s that renewedinterest was shown. The advice given in 1561 by Sforza Pallavicino (thencommander-in-chief) was to set the tone. Instead of allowing an enemy toreach the line of Udine, he wrote,15 he should be stopped as near the easternfrontier as possible. There, in those barren regions, supplies would fail themand their cavalry, encumbered by the hilly terrain, would be vulnerable tothe local militia arquebusiers. Once into the plain, however, an enemy wellsupplied with food from the rich countryside could settle down at leisure tothe siege of its towns. 'For this reason one sees that princes who haveunderstood the defence of their kingdoms well, have a care to fortify theirfrontiers above all.' He reckoned that 350,000 ducats could make theexisting frontier castles and forts adequately strong and that they shouldhave precedence over Udine; if, as the regional capital, it ought, for non-strategic reasons, to be fortified, this could be done reasonably cheaply withentrenchments.

It was precisely the fact that Udine was a capital city, and a highly vocal, ifnot particularly populous one, that checked the Senate from following plansthat would leave it exposed. By 1565 Sforza had conceded the point; itwould be too costly to bring so large a city wholly up to date, but the wallsshould be strengthened and a citadel added. He was sent next year to Friuliwith the Proveditor-General of the Terraferma, but before they hadcompleted their survey the government received a report from GiulioSavorgnan which was to turn out to be of far more importance.16

He discounted the possibility of making Udine the hub of a Friuliandefence system. 'The surrounding ground could not be worse, being a smallgravel, the size of nuts, beans and grapes and with hardly a trace of livingrock. There is almost no clay. To find fresh water you have to go down 35feet. Lime costs a fortune and it means carting it along eighteen miles ofpoor hilly roads. Then there is no wood to refine it or make bricks with: thereis hardly enough to serve Udine for its everyday needs.' No, it was far wiserto concentrate on stopping an enemy near the frontier, 'and there is no14 V. Joppi, Discorso circa il fortificar Udine e altri luoghi (Udine, 1859).15 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 7, 81-90. This and Ba. 8 are rich in Sforza's opinions on fortifications in

the Terraferma.16 Ibid., Ba. 11, 51-2V.

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doubt that the great gateway into Italy, for the Turks or the Germans, is thegap between Gorizia and Gradisca.' Both Bruzzano or Medenza, hecontinued, had been suggested as possible sites for fortresses. Of these theformer was preferable. It guarded the Isonzo; it could be readily reinforcedfrom the sea via Strassoldo and St. Elia. What was more, if a suitably largefortified area were established there, as soon as it had been built and filledwith houses, you could tax it so hard that it would pay for its own garrison -unlike Udine, most of whose local taxes get consumed on the spot. Hisreport was the seed from which Palma was to grow in the 1590s.

He concluded by pointing out that this was no decision for stay-at-homes.' You must have a large and accurate plan made of the whole of Friuli . . .and a model of Udine big enough to show the houses on the site of thecitadel, and in accurate relief.'

Strategic considerations did, after all, depend to some extent on personalas well as political involvement. Savorgnan was right to call for map andmodel because few patricians visited, owned land in, built villas in or hadconnections in Friuli compared with the large and ever growing money-and-family complicity between Venice and the Terraferma proper, west-ward, that is, of the Piave. And even in that zone the sense of direct personalinterest can be sensed to fade: acute up to the Adige, weaker up to theMincio (the administrative halfway mark), increasingly merely intellectualup to and beyond the Oglio, even though Bergamo and Crema wereeconomic and strategic prizes of a high order.

It was, then, in both a strategic and personal sense natural that the firstpiece of unfinished business beyond the lagoon resumed by the Senate after1540 was work at the two main centres of communications on the Adige,Verona and Legnago. Padua and Treviso were now considered strongenough; even if their mainly round bastions were falling out of fashion,subsequent building there was only of a supplementary nature. Vicenzaremained, as it had been, a special and awkward case.

Work at Verona began again in 1541 and continued into the early 1560s.Even then it was not finished. As was usual, conflicts between expertsproduced delays. Noting that work had stopped in 1546, the Senaterecorded that this was due to ' difficulties arising from the opinions of theengineers',17 though it charged the proveditors of fortresses to send moreexperts and produce yet another report on what should be done. There wereconflicts, too, about the apportionment of labour services among thesurrounding territories, and these exacerbated another perennial source ofdelay and waste: the conflict between masons and bricklayers on the onehand, reasonably well paid and prompt to execute their contracts, and on the

17 ST. reg. 34, i66v (12 Nov.).

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other the reluctant peasant earth shifters, paid a subsistence dole and piningfor their neglected farm lands. This led to curtain walls and bastion casingscollapsing because left too long without their earthen backings or infills, andthe continuation of such collapses makes it doubtful if much heed were paidto a Senate order of 1562 that wall building and terrepleining were toproceed, foot by foot, together.18

Sanmicheli paid handsome tribute when he reported that' the bastions atLegnago which have been built with the fullness of knowledge that was HisExcellency Francesco Maria Duke of Urbino's are held by everyone to be thefinest and strongest that have yet been constructed',19 but work wasrecommenced there in 1542 and continued, according to the designs ofSanmicheli himself and his nephew, Zuan Brugnolo, among others, into the1560s. The main cause of delay was the incalculable action of the Adige as itcurved through the 'port' on one bank and the town on the other, causingone section of the waterside fortifications after another to collapse. But thisincalculably was due in part to a conflict of interest between the publicinterest in defence and private interest in riparian property rights upstream.In 1565, after more damage, the proveditors of fortresses were sent to inspectthe course of the river and of its tributaries and to report any constructionsthat hindered the flow of water: mills, weirs, fish-traps and the like. So manywere discovered that the Senate decided to elect a panel of twelve of itsmembers to regulate this abuse, restricting eligibility to those who did notpossess property, nor were related to anyone who had, in the area 'betweenthe Po and the Bacchiglione or in the Veronese, Vicentino or Colognese'. Itproved, however, that 'because the number of interested parties hasturned out to be so great the election could not be made',20 and the termswere modified to exclude only those who owned land themselves or whostood most directly in line to inherit them: sons and nephews. If east of thePiave there was insufficient interest to get public works decisions pushedthrough determinedly, west of it there could be too much to get themeffectively carried out.

It was in the next zone, west of the Adige, that the first new project of thepost-war period was begun, at Peschiera, where the Mincio flowed fromLake Garda past a small and dilapidated castle. Three reports in the summerof 1549, from Sanmicheli, Giulio Savorgnan and Duke Guidobaldo ofUrbino, emphasized its strategic importance: dissuasive of a Germanattempt to by-pass Verona; a guard against Mantua; a source of support tothe defence system Asola-Pontevico-Orzinovi-Brescia if that were broken

18 ST. reg. 43, 154 (17 Feb.).19 Prow. Fort., Ba. 65 (i) n.p.20 ST. reg. 45, 2i8v.

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into from the west; a barrier to the Terraferma being cut in half. And thedecision in this case was made swiftly, work being set in hand, initially inearth, on plans produced by the duke. The English traveller Sir ThomasHoby noted in 1555 that Peschiera was being 'marvellouslie fortified by theVenetians'.21 Two years later the works were high enough to invite criticismof the form they were taking and the College was faced with contradictoryopinions from Michele and Zuan Hieronimo Sanmicheli.22 Thereafter thework slowed, the masons and earth shifters got out of phase and wallcollapses occurred in 1562 and 1565.

Work on a lesser scale had meanwhile proceeded, though fadingly as thefinancial drain of Verona, Legnago and Peschiera made itself felt, at theother points in the defence system between the Mincio and the Oglio, atOrzinovi and Brescia, both of which acquired a new bastion, and at Brescia'snorthern outrider Anfo. Pontevico's old earth fortifications were deemedadequate and probably were for a place considered primarily as a fieldencampment for an army concentration, and Asola, the perennial Cinderellaof the Terraferma, remained unimproved in spite of reports like one of 1546which complained that although it was crucial to stopping an advance fromMantua to Brescia 'it has a poor and unflanked wall, unfinished ditches anda miserable glacis'.23 It was with a sense that the building programme wasrunning down after twenty years of peace that Sforza Pallavicino remindedthe doge, on 1 June 1561, that' the world's affairs never stay long in one state. . . It is true that gold is the sinew of war, but if it is not spent usefully and intime it is nothing but profitless metal. Just suppose (which God forbid) thatan enemy invaded your lands now and imagine, unprepared as they are atpresent, the resulting losses in men, territory, income and population.'24

The advice was taken and he was sent to the Terraferma's westernmostzone, beyond the Oglio where, apart from some ditch clearing at Crema,nothing had as yet been done. In July 1561 Sforza inspected Bergamo with ateam of experts, engineers and senior army officers.25 Their arrival causedan outcry; the citizens of Bergamo protested about the destruction toproperty and the additional tax burden that followed any updating ofoutmoded fortifications, and the territorio complained about the equallyinevitable call on labour services. In spite of this, Bergamo was markeddown for improvement and by 1563 52,000 ducats had been earmarked forexpenditure there. This contrasts sharply with the continuing effectivenessof similar protests from Vicenza, whose territory contained some of the

21 Travels and Life (London, Camden Society, 1902) 121.22 ST. reg. 41, 68-68v (30 Dec. 1557).23 Pasero, Relazioni di rettori veneti, 63.24 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 7, 89V.25 SS. reg. 72, 65.

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richest of patrician landholdings and whose aristocracy had powerfulprotectors in the Senate. In 1536 the Duke of Urbino had pleaded for theutilization of the models he had prepared for the fortification of Vicenza.The plea was taken up in 1544 by his son. In the next year a report from thecondottiere Luigi Gonzaga pointed out the anomalous position of a virtuallyundefended city 'among so many linked fortified places, each of which cansupport the others'.26 In 1548 Michele Sanmichele recommended that thecity should at least be surrounded by a new bastioned enceinte in turfedearth rather than remain a standing invitation to invasion from Germany. Itwas not enough, he wrote, to rely on support from Verona and Padua.27 Yetnothing was done. Vicenza, for reasons that would be worth fullerinvestigation, remained a special case, psychologically 'off limits' to theotherwise logical process of the government's strategic planning.

In 1572 Domenico Priuli, returning from his duty as Capitano of Brescia,ruefully supposed that its defence would remain unimproved 'as I knowthat at this time Your Serenity is fully concerned with fortifying the mostimportant places da Mar'.28 Moreover, in the financial exhaustion of theyears that followed the War of Cyprus there was little work carried outanywhere on the Terraferma until three major operations were undertaken;at Bergamo from 1585, at Brescia from 1587 and, most dramatically, inFriuli, where the decision to create the new fortified city of Palma was takenin 1593. Otherwise work was restricted to maintenance and repairs,knocking off' dead works' such as battlements, excavating covered ways andclearing ditches. Even these minor works were restricted in the main toOrzinovi, Peschiera, Legnago and Padua.

Concern for the vulnerability of Friuli, intensified by the loss to Austriaof Gradisca and the entrenchments along the Isonzo in 1511, had led, as wehave seen, to a number of inconclusive projects to build a fortress or groupof fortified villages there. But it was not until 1583 that a commission,including Marc'Antonio Barbaro and Giulio Savorgnan, was sent toexamine the region and hold talks with representatives of the Archduke ofAustria. Savorgnan's advice29 was that Venice should make every attempt,by purchase or exchange, to regain the lost stretch of river (opening up theold entrenchments) and Gradisca; this would obviate the need to found newfortresses and would deny an enemy, whether Austrian or Turkish, themore or less free run he had at present to the lagoon itself. However, it wasthe need to fortify an area 'which was threatened by two enemies, the

26 Capi di Guerra, Ba. 3, unfoliated.27 Ibid., Ba. 8, unfoliated.28 Pasero, Relazioni, 118.29 'Lettera di Giulio Savorgnano alia serenissima signoria di Venezia sui confini del Friuli 1583', ASI.,

n.s. xiv, 1 (1861) 32-8, and BMV., ms. cl. vi, 1217 (= 9448) 132-42.

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Germans and the Turks',30 as one expert put it, that was taken for grantedthroughout the planning stages which started in earnest in 1592.31 Work onthe large scale which was contemplated had, however, to be justified to theother powers, especially to the Imperial authorities within a mile of whoseterritory the planners recommended building. Tactfully, throughout thediplomatic correspondence only one enemy was mentioned: the Turk, andthe benefit Venice's project would bring to Christianity as a whole.

In the light of a report from three proveditors-general and a party ofexperts including Giulio Savorgnan and the engineer Bonaiuto Lorini, theSenate decided on 29 January 1593 ' to make, in the name of the Holy Spirit,afortezza re ale in the Patria of Friuli as a benefit not only to ourselves but tothe whole Christian republic'.32 There then came a pause for morediplomatic activity (supported by the pope) aimed at ensuring that thearchduke would not interfere, and for further reports on the best site. InOctober another commission of five proveditors-general (withMarc'Antonio Barbaro again among them) decided unanimously torecommend the building of the new fortress between the three villages ofRonchio, San Lorenzo and Palmada. Their unanimity, given the nature ofexperts, was, according to Barbaro, 'the work of God, and of His evidentintervention in favour of the republic and the well-being of Christianity'.33

The Senate accepted this recommendation and appointed Barbaro asPalmanova's first proveditor-general, Martinengo as governor of the troopsprotecting the pioneers and as general overseer of the construction,Savorgnan as chief design consultant and Genese Bressano as site engineer.On 4 January 1594, 7480 pioneers were called up from the whole of theTerraferma as far as the Bresciano; only 910, indeed, were drawn fromFriuli.34

The nine-bastioned symmetry of this vast essay in military engineeringand town planning (an aspect which had led Udine to contest the project outof commercial jealousy) was nobly harmonious. But the unanimity at whichBarbaro had marvelled broke down at once when it came to fixing the detailsof the design. All the experts who submitted plans in 1594 agreed that thisshould be governed by the nature of the virgin site and by the need torespond to the most up-to-date methods of siegework. All supported thesuggestion - probably but not certainly Savorgnan's (who had been too old

30 Archivio Proprio Pinelli, Ba. 2,27 Mar. 1594. For other assumptions that the chief threat was from theTurk, see Esposizioni Principi, reg. 2, 38V-41 (12 Feb. 1569) and Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 43,30 Jan. 1590.

31 Relazioni dei rettori, v, Cividale del Friuli, Marano, 26; SS. reg. 89, 22V.32 SS. reg. 89, 82V.33 C. Yriarte, La vie d'un patricien de Venise au seizieme siecle (Paris, 1874) 386.34 ST. reg. 63, 158V-159.

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and ill to join the commission of October 1593) - that the plan should beregular and nine-sided. But when it came to details, the slope of scarp andcounterscarp, the breadth of ditch and covered way, the placing of batteriesand cavaliers and the insertion of drainage channels, Barbaro's weakness (healso was very advanced in years), Martinengo's intransigence andSavorgnan's refusal to visit the site, 'where I would inevitably be involved infresh quarrels',35 produced much bitterness and confusion. The Senate didits best to mitigate this; it insisted in March 1594 that a model based on oneby Savorgnan but containing modifications taken from one by Martinengoshould be used as the basis of all work done on the site. This was to be kept inthe office of the proveditors of fortresses and a duplicate was to be used onthe spot. This was superseded in December by another model,36 reflectingfurther brushes between the two men, and this remained ihe template forfuture work, though there was hardly an engineer — including Lorini — whodid not introduce modifications as it proceeded. Given the new impetus tothe study of fortification and siegecraft provided by the wars of theNetherlands and by the dominating place of Venetian presses in thepublication of books dealing with fortification methods, this is perhapshardly surprising.

These technical conflicts went on against a background of real woe. Friulihad suffered gravely in the plague of 1576. Reporting on the years 1596-9which he spent at Palma as proveditor-general, Marco Antonio Memmopointed out that the population of Friuli had sunk from 196,000 to 97,000 inthe past 30 years, and every village presented the spectacle of empty andruined houses. In addition, much of Friuli was poor farming country andthe peasants were unusually heavily burdened with labour services. It wasfor this reason that the Senate had called for comparatively few pioneersfrom the province in 1594. In Memmo's time, however, the unwelcomenessof this service to men from the more prosperous and distant parts of theTerraferma led him to recruit as much local labour as he could, paying bypiecework so that men could make (he claimed) up to 40 or 50 and childrenup to 16 or 18 soldi a day. In spite of this many fled as soon as they saw theworking conditions or after taking their travel money, 'terrified out of theirwits and holding the name of Palma in hatred because of the many lives ithad claimed', lives lost in working overhard pushing wheelbarrows of wetearth up steep slippery slopes in the rain which dogged the enterprise's earlystages. Nor, so lonely and unhealthy was the site, was it easy to maintain thegarrison of 500 troops. He himself, he added, had been so cast down and illthat he had lost two teeth and been in danger of his life.37

35 Mar ia Grazia Sandr i , ' L a progettazione di Pa lmanova ' , Castcllum, 1973, cccxc.36 S S . reg. 90, 6V-7 and 51-51V (12 Mar . and 17 D e c ) .37 G . Col lo t ta (ed . ) , Relazione della fortezza di Palma . . . (Venice , 1863) 27.

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Though he was, all the same, able to report considerable progress on theenceinte and ditch, the dream of Palma as a populous town, the envy ofUdine, the payer of the bills for its own construction, remained a dream. Asmall inner fort was built, cantonments for the garrison, huts for thepioneers. But no one wanted to live there. In spite of tax exemption, projectsfor toll-free fairs and for two markets a week (normally fewer were grantedfrom a distrust of large throngs), Palma's function as a huge fortified spaceserving as a base camp during the War of Gradisca was unhampered by rowsof houses or by wealthy citizens who would have had to bolt their store-rooms and lock up their daughters.

To turn from chronology to a theme of more general interest, thoughnothing was said explicitly on this topic Vicenza may have been left a moreor less open city because of lingering fears of the pro-German leanings thecity had shown so dramatically after Agnadello. An open city was easier toretake if it revolted. On so sensitive an issue the records are covert, but theloyalty of the subjects of the Terraferma was undoubtedly taken intoaccount when taking decisions about fortifications. Accepting in 1542 thatthe acquisition of new territory was out of the question, Alvise Gritti warnedthat' the republic must secure what little it has with more care than ever,anticipating the fact that all of its subjects are not so loyal and obedient thatdanger from them can be discounted'.38 And in June 1549 the formerProveditor-General in Terraferma Stefano Tiepolo, reviving a topic firstmooted in 1517, suggested that until a citadel was built in Padua, all itsartillery and ammunition should be withdrawn to Venice. It could bereturned were an enemy to threaten, but meanwhile 'the city would be morecautious'.39

The need for strong defences against an enemy and weak ones in case oflocal treachery had been put with symbolic clarity by the Duke of Urbino in1536. Referring to the project to replace the castles at the Lido entrance hesaid that they should be massive on the sides that faced the channel but toothin to hold out against artillery on the landward sides; 'you would thenhave works of the requisite strength for war and of the weakness suited to arepublic in time of peace'.40 To deal with places already strong, such asPadua and Verona, the solution taken by princes was to build a citadel - asAlessandro de' Medici had built the Fortezza da Basso in Florence. But thecitadel was so bound up with the notion of tyrannous oppression that it wasdangerous to introduce in the Terraferma save in the guise of an additionalprotection for, not against, the citizens. Citadels, moreover, involved the

Alvigi Gritti, Discorso . . . sopra la sicurezza . . . di Vinetia, ed. S. Ricci (Venice, 1842) 20.Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni, Ba. 52, 19 June.Dieci, Secreta, reg. 4., 131V-135.

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destruction of inner-city property on a scale which itself could trigger revolt.Tiepolo's suggestion followed the breakdown of plans to build a citadel at

Padua. Sanmicheli had proposed merely strengthening the old castle; 'thiswould suffice to keep the munitions secure, provide a place of refuge andhold the people in check (tenir infreno ilpopolo), and this is all that is needed,since Venice is near enough to send help in a moment'.41 Giulio Savorgnan'sadvice was similar. After a discussion (at which Alvise Gritti was present) herecommended no more than strengthening a site which 'being near to thePiazza could the better protect the rectors and control the citizens andpopulace'.42 Asked to consider the siting of a citadel in Verona in 1548,Sanmicheli wrote that ideally there should be two, one on each side of theriver. If there could only be one, then it should be able to command bothsides, for if it covered only one 'then those who revolted could sieze thebridges and cut themselves off'.43 He indicated a site on the river by the oldTorre della Paglia. With a stone (i.e. indestructible) bridge it would be abase from which to move against any forces of revolt (ogni pane chetumultuasse) and it could be readily reinforced from Vicenza or Legnago. Heended his memorandum (which he begged should be treated in the strictestconfidence) by saying that he did not believe in building formal citadels infortified cities, especially when there were existing points that could bemade more secure less obtrusively. He added that he had already made thispoint with reference both to Padua and to Brescia.

The notion of holding down subject populations is perhaps so alien to thegenerally received impression of Venice's relationship to the Terrafermathat it is worth some elaboration. Sanmicheli was not the first to suggest acitadel for Verona. In 1546 the garrison commander Manfrone, reporting atthe request of the proveditors of fortifications, wrote that it is important 'totransform the castle of S. Felice into a fortress against both internal andexternal threats. I believe that with this fortress the city would be muchmore secure not only against the force of open enemies but also from that ofsecret ones, though how far these have to be taken account of I leave to yourwisdom. I do not say this because I am unaware that the justice and charityof this most excellent government towards its subjects is such that theyshould in all reason remain faithful. . . but because of the ill-will that manymen nourish, although they should not.'44 All the same, his advice, both oncreating a citadel and increasing the garrison, was based on the assumptionthat Verona was looked on as 'a suspect city'.

41 Prow. Fort. Ba. 65, no. 1, unfoliated, undated; text starts 'havendo io Michiel da S. Michiel per unamia scrittura altra volta discorso longamente tutti i luoghi dove si potria fare un castello in Padoa'.

42 Ma te r i e Mis t e Notab i l i , B a . 11 , 4.V-6.43 Cap i di G u e r r a , B a . 8, unfol iated, 1 Aug .44 Prow. Fort. Ba. 37, no. 4, 39V-40.

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This assumption underlay the similar advice given in the following yearby Duke Guidobaldo. The arguments that had led to consideration beinggiven to building a citadel in Padua, he wrote, applied with even greaterforce to Verona, a strategic centre which was normally under-garrisonedwith respect to a dense population 'who, were they for any cause to take uparms, would in effect have the city at their mercy . . . whereas were there afortress this would not only frustrate their evil intentions but dissuade themfrom having any'.45 There was other work that needed to be carried out tomake Verona properly defensible against external enemies, but urgentpriority should be given to a citadel. And he, too, suggested strengtheningfor this purpose the existing castle of S. Felice 'because it commands boththe countryside and the interior of the city, much of which is commanded byits guns'. And when, after Sanmicheli's report of 1548, the duke was againasked for his opinion in 1551, he repeated that priority should be given toturning S. Felice into an impregnable fortress even if, for reasons ofeconomy, the work had first to be done in earth. External danger made thisimperative: ' I will not raise the issue of the city's population in thisconnection', he finished by saying, 'as I know that you are prudentlybearing this in mind.' And though the issue, I believe, was not brought intothe open during the next two decades, it was expressed again in 1547 byBaldassare Rangoni, the city's military commander, who, though on the onehand he could praise the citizens' loyalty, on the other recommendedenlarging S. Felice so that it would hold enough soldiers 'to keep enemies infear and the populace in check (infreno)\46

That the issue should have been borne in mind at all owed something tooutside factors, to the systematic building of citadels in Savoy, France andthe Low Countries, and to Venice's building programme da Mar: in 1567,for instance, Sforza Pallavicino recommended that the new enceinte ofNicosia should include a citadel 'which could command the whole of thecity and provide a place of refuge for the nobility of the island'.47 But as ourconcern is with the Terraferma, one more reference to mainland policy mustsuffice. It concerns Crema, a place of renewed strategic importance since the1560s. In 1589, after taking the advice of an engineer and four senior armyofficers, the Proveditor-General in Terraferma, Alvise Grimani, wrote thatif a citadel could have been constructed on rising land so that, as at Brescia, it

45 Ib id . , 46-9V.46 Ib id . , 67-70V. An instance of t reacherous intent ions was the letter smuggled via Mi lan by a g roup of

(anonymous) Paduan nobles to Phi l ip I I early in 1570. T h i s urged the king to take the city unde r hisprotect ion as Venet ian rule was illegitimate and a usurpat ion of the r ights of a free republ ic ( M .Berengo, Pad ova e Venezia alia vigi/ia di Lepanto (Padua, 1974)). T h e r e is no evidence that any noticewas taken in Spain .

4 7 A n n a l i , s.a., 7V.

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could command both the countryside and the city itself, he would haverecommended building one. As it was, both expense and reducedeffectiveness argued against it. Moreover, 'these people are most loyal andobedient to you, as they have demonstrated in the past, so that [a citadel]would be a great slur on their fidelity because it would imply that you haveno trust in them'.48

The whole issue, as a commentary on Venice's attitude to the loyalty of itssubject populations, would repay more attention. It is true that the expertswho advised that citadels should be built were for the most part foreigners,men attuned to princely rather than republican ways of thought, or to idealrather than contingent solutions. Yet they were asked to write about them,and when they reported it was with the confidence that at least the doge, theCouncil of Ten and the proveditors of fortifications would see the point ofwhat they wrote. All the same, they were unlikely to be aware of the fullrange of reasons why the issue was such a particularly sensitive one.

As we have seen with respect to Bergamo, and more effectively still in thecase of Vicenza, government decisions to strengthen the defences of a citymet with expressions of dismay on the part of citizens and the inhabitants ofthe surrounding territory. And this was always the case. This was primarilybecause each had to foot one-third of the total cost according to the thesisthat a new enceinte was not only a protection to the inhabitants and a placeof refuge for country-dwellers, but an element in the overall policy ofdissuading would-be aggressors; it was therefore of potential benefit toeverybody. But additional taxation was an all too familiar burden and tosome extent could be mitigated in the short term by borrowing or by themortgaging of toll or customs income. More sharply resented, because theindividual was immediately affected, was the destruction of townsmen'sproperty and land, and the conscription of peasants into labour services.

New fortifications required a roughly symmetrical ground plan, an innermilitary road and a sloping external glacis free from all obstructions in theinterest of maintaining a clear field of fire. As a consequence whole suburbs,monasteries and churches, villas, orchards, vineyards and woods werethreatened, and one of the most frequently repeated of Venetian laws wasthat forbidding rebuilding or replanting on cleared ground. The loss ofproperty or rent and the unlikelihood of getting more than a meagrecompensation (and then after long delays) led citizens to defy the law timeafter time. Damage to citizens' property in Brescia was calculated at 200,000ducats by 1562, 'which has sadly alienated them, and many have left'.49 Asearly as 1512 the rectors of Padua had been ordered to pull down buildings

48 P r o w . G e n . in Ter ra fe rma, B a . 43 , unfoliated, 14 Aug.49 B M V . , ms. I t . VI I , 1187 ( = 8971) unfoliated.

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put up on the glacis since 1510 and to remind the inhabitants of the 200-ducat fine plus a year's imprisonment that would be visited on subsequentoffenders - though the officially defined glacis had, under pressure, beenreduced to half a mile.50 In 1517 the Senate passed a measure providing forthe election by the Great Council of five proveditors responsible for glacis(proveditor sopra le spienade) to reside in Padua, Treviso, Verona, Bresciaand Crema. But because this trenched on the authority of the capitano themeasure, though passed, was thought too controversial to send down to theGreat Council.51 Wrangling over the exact width of the glacis (measuringoutwards from the tip of the counterscarp or covered way) and what cropscould be grown on it went on for the rest of the period, all the more stronglyfor the government's apparent exaggeration of the danger of invasion.

Legislation had to be repeated in stronger terms in 1543 and again in1551, 1578 and 1588. Even so, the engineer Francesco Malacreda reportedafter a survey of the walls of Verona in 1598 a long catalogue ofcontraventions: houses and sheds, orchards of fruit trees, mulberryplantations, walled vegetable plots, drainage ditches and bird-snaringgroves which would inhibit the effective use of defensive artillery in theevent of a siege.52 Indeed, to the inhabitants of towns fortifications were anoose about their freedom of action, and the constant reiteration of the lawshows how chary the rectors had to be in carrying it out. The issue came to ahead with the distribution of a printed version in 1607. Resistance wasparticularly strong in Padua, where sections of old wall still remained as thebacking to houses, and where shops and houses had been built between itand the ditch. The capitano, Piero Duodo, met blank hostility from themunicipal council and wrote in the following year to warn the doge that thecitizens were sending a deputation protesting that many of these buildingshad licences 'a century old', that others had been built with the Senate'spermission more recently and that he would be asked to consider 'theserious hurt to so many of your citizens, merchants and poor workmen'.53

Argument about this issue continued to the very eve of the War of Gradisca.How far there was any compensating pride taken by citizens in having a

new set of up-to-date walls is difficult to estimate. Overseas, in order topersuade wealthy individuals to contribute to their costs, bastions werenamed after them. On the Terraferma, however, though the early rule thatthey should be named only after saints or adjacent gates came to be relaxed,this was only in favour of the rectors or proveditors who had been mostclosely concerned. And no insignia were permitted to be displayed apart

50 ST. reg. 18, 24 (25 June).51 ST. reg. 20, 91-2V.52 Prow. Fort., Ba. 37, iv, 173-7.53 Senato, Dispacci Rettori, Padua, 10 Dec. 1608. A copy of the proclamation is enclosed.

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from the lion of St Mark. As bastions and curtain walls had to be strictlyfunctional, moreover, the only concession to display was in the design ofgates, often, as at Brescia or Treviso or Verona, of great beauty. But eventhis was grudged: of the marvellous Porta del Palio at Verona a rector sourlyremarked that the 50,000 ducats it cost would have been better spent on thecounterscarp of the ditch. It is likely that expenditure on display was thoughtof, at least in the first place, as redounding merely to the greater glory ofVenice. It was only at the Fortezza di S. Andrea in the lagoon itself thatdisplay was permitted not only in the water-gate facade but in the lion-guarded gun ports of its flanks.

Although by 1519, when new works were proposed for Brescia,54 thedivision of costs into equal thirds had become the rule throughout theTerraferma, one exception had been created in 1517 when an imposition' demandato domini' was imposed on the whole of the Terraferma east of theMincio to pay for the construction and subsequent maintenance of newfortifications at Legnago.55 It was justified as being in the strategic interestof the entire Terraferma, and in the true spirit of Venetian fiscalconservatism it became a standing, and a much-resented, tax, any surplus(when contributions were unnecessary, or when a bad winter made workimpossible) being diverted to other fortifications or even to the generalpurposes of the Arsenal. Heartrending pleas to be exempted from thispayment, especially from poor centres like Badia or the Polesine, burdenedthe general current of petitions to the government and were very seldomgranted, and then only for one year. As late as 1603 a petition from theVicentino to be let off the 3600 ducats a year it had been paying for Legnago(on which work had long ceased) since 1527 was turned down.56

As the programme for refortifying the Terraferma gathered way, the postof proveditor in charge of the works in a particular city became increasinglyunpopular because of the resentment expressed and its attendant paper-work. The programme's very success increased the resentment, for as theneed for mobilization after mobilization on Venice's frontiers evaporated,the feeling spread that all this parade of stony resistance was unnecessary.The patriciate's belief that the diplomacy of neutralism should be backed byevidence of strength was not shared by those who paid and worked toprovide it.

Resentment was particularly widespread in the territories subject tonewly fortified cities. As well as contributing one-third of the cost in taxesthey had to provide labour, and carts and waggoners for building materials:

54 ST. reg. 21, 42V (21 July); Sanuto, xxvii, 507.55 Bes ta , Bilanci generali, clxxvii .56 Prow. Fort., Ba. 36, no. 2, 49V.

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stone, wood and lime. As soon as the scope of a new work had been decidedupon, the engineer in charge worked out the number of men required, andallocations were made among the administrative areas composing theterritory, according to their populations. The men - labourers andspazzamonti - brought their own tools and reported to contractors whooversaw the work done, paid them and fed them, all to often at a corruptprofit to themselves. Labour was at least paid, though the sums werenugatory. And sometimes, but only in the worst of seasons, the workattracted volunteers whose own land was not yielding enough to live off. Butusually men were extremely reluctant to work on ditching and embankingfortifications; the work was painfully hard and it meant neglecting their ownholdings. Conditions were seldom as bad as at Palma, but the provision oflabour and carts - which were never surplus to peasants' own agriculturaland market needs - created one of the most difficult problems facing ruraladministrations.

Resentment spread beyond the territory immediately concerned, thanksto the doctrine that the Terraferma was a unity, so that what touched onetouched all. Thus half the labour employed at Treviso in 1513 was recruitedin Friuli. At Verona in 1543 men were conscripted not only from theVeronese and Colognese but from the territories of Vicenza, Bergamo andBrescia. Of the 2000 labourers employed at Peschiera in 1549, only 724 camefrom the neighbouring Bresciano and Veronese and from Salo; the rest werebrought in from the territories of Bergamo, Crema, Cologna, Vicenza andFriuli. The system remained unchanged throughout the Cinquecento, butnot unchallenged. When in the autumn of 1575, for instance, labourers werecalled from the Bresciano to clear rock and earth that was blocking firebetween the flanks of bastions at Bergamo, the local syndics petitioned thedoge to be let off because they had already contributed men not only toBergamo's own fortifications but to military works in Friuli in 1538, atVerona in 1521, 1543 and 1559, at Crema in 1504, 1512, 1523 and 1549, atPeschiera in 1549, at Porto Cortellazzo in 1565 - not to mention the 'manytimes' they had worked on Brescia's own fortifications.57 And they added tothis list labour in connection with the excavation of the Brenta in 1548.Their petition was, nonetheless, turned down.

Mention of the Brenta is a reminder that labour services rendered tofortifications were only one aspect of the obligations that lay with thatmajority of Venetian subjects who lived outside the towns. A petition fromthe contadinanza of Friuli in 1610 makes this point clear.58 During the lastthree years they had paid in cash - no mention is made of personal service

57 Ib id . , B a . 36 , n o . i , 8 N o v . 1575.58 ST., filza 195. Commented on by the lieutenant in letter of 6 Jan. 1611.

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and its inconvenience, hardship and poor renumeration - 34,000 ducats,leaving them with a debt of 15,770. This money, which came 'from thepockets of poor peasants according to the estimo of their land, animals andperson', had been made up by contributions to the following causes: thecappelletti, who at this period were not even carrying out their function ofpolicing the countryside but formed part of the garrison of Palma; thepurchase and maintenance of arquebuses and muskets for the militia, andpayments towards the salaries of its officers; the tasse that went to thesupport of the republic's force of men-at-arms; the salaries of the garrison ofRaspo; the firewood and straw that were part of the allowances of the cavalrycompany based on Marano, and contributions towards maintaining thatfortress's fabric; the cutting, shaping and transport of timber for the Arsenaland the transport used by the Lieutenant of the Patria and other patricianofficials; the wages of the local officials and book-keepers who kept track ofall these outgoings. The petitioners also pointed out that because 36 villagesaround Palma had been relieved from other services in return for providingcarts whenever these were called for by the proveditor-general in charge ofthe site, the burden on all the others was proportionately higher. Yet all theyasked was to be relieved from paying for the cappelletti and permission to payoff their debt in instalments.

This moderation is typical. So is the covering letter from the lieutenant;he vouched for the accuracy of their statement and even added that whenthey had to provide transport it was ' at a very low charge and often withoutany compensation at all'. And any review of the services and payments thatVenice could demand has to be seen against the financial drain on territoriesand the personal hardship involved in two other spheres: militia and galleyservice. Yet in spite of this background, which might seem to make thegranting of petitions a necessary safety valve, they almost never were.Financial considerations, not fears of peasant revolts, were uppermost in theSenate's mind. Turning down an urgently worded request from theVeronese to be let off carriage service in connection with fortifications atBrescia, the Senate gave the reason that were this to be granted it wouldgreatly add to the proportion of the cost borne by the government. As far asthe building of fortifications was concerned, the concealed cost of enforcingco-operation with the Signoria on cities and countryside was not disorder ortreason but inefficiency, delay and the towering files of protest's paperwork.

To sum up, this survey suggests that strategic policy helped the patriciateto see the Terraferma as a whole; that the inheritance of services due to thecentral governments which Venice took over piecemeal as it conquered theTerraferma were usefully exploited for static defence purposes throughoutthe second century of occupation; and that fortifications which in the eyes ofthe former Proveditor of Fortresses Paolo Paruta challenged comparison in

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cost and scale with those of the Ancients could be imposed - albeit withoutcitadels - without arousing an explosive bitterness. And in 1630 Vicenza wasat last absorbed within the strategic programme that had begun over acentury before, with a new and complete circuit of bastioned walls.59

59 J. R. Hale, 'Francesco Tensini and the fortifications of Vicenza', Studi veneziani, x (1968) 231-89.

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The defence of the maritime empire

The Venetian empire da Mar comprised a series of clusters of islands andports ending in two widely spaced and weighty pendants, Crete and Cyprus.Acquired partly by conquest, partly by inheritance, purchase and gift, itreflected, in its long-drawn-out inconsequentiality, a dialogue between shipand shore that had been going on for centuries as Venetian merchant andwar fleets sailed out and back between the lagoon and the Levant. Thelogical result of this exchange - on the one hand Venice's need for manyports of call (given the galley's scant space for provisions), a few strategicbases, and recruiting areas whence to 'intraterzare', or top up, crews; on theother the coastal population's desire for, or willingness to put up with,protection - could have been a continuous rim of Venetian service stationsall the way to Famagosta, the break-off point for voyages to Beirut andAlexandria. As it was, by 1509 there were large gaps: at the Imperial Gulf ofTrieste; along the coast of the Gulf of Quarnero between Istria and VenetianDalmatia (which began at Novegradi), caused by the insurgency of thepopulation crammed into western Croatia by incessant warfare in theBosnian-Slovenian-Hungarian interior; between Curzola (Korcula) andCattaro (Kotor), where the redoubtable energy of independent Ragusarepresented a challenge rather than a threat; between Dulcigno (Ulcinj) andButintro a longer stretch of insecure anchorages; between Crete andCyprus, Venice's latest acquisition (1489), where the major stepping stone,Rhodes, was in the Christian, if not co-operative, hands of the Knights of StJohn (but only up to its conquest by the Turks in 1522). What is more, theline of Venetian possessions had been infiltrated at a number of points by theTurks: Castelnovo at the mouth of the bay of Cattaro, Valona in the Strait ofOtranto, Santa Maura (Levkas) to the north of and Lepanto within the Gulfof Patras.1 From Zante (Zakinthos) to Cerigo (Kithira) the coast was all inTurkish hands. After the unsuccessful war with the Turks in 1499-1503Venice retained only Malvasia (Monemvasia) and Napoli di Romania1 Fernand Braudel wondered whether these enclaves served as safety valves for Turkish pressure

towards the Adriatic. 'Can it be true that the gaps in the Venetian limes, by decreasing its effectivenessas a barrier, enabled it to survive longer?' The Mediterranean and the Mediterranean World in the Age ofPhilip II, tr. Sian Reynolds (London, 2 vols., 1972-3) ii, 847.

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(Nafplion) - and then only until 1540 - in the western Peloponnese, andTine (Tinos) among the Cyclades.

From the strategic point of view the empire da Mar from 1509 to the lossof Cyprus in 1571 came to be seen in terms of four zones.

The first zone embraced the head of the Gulf of Venice from the defenceson the Lidi to Pola, including Marano, Monfalcone, Muggia and Capod'Istria in the Gulf of Trieste and Raspo and Montana in central Istria. Thesecond began with Venice's most northerly group of islands, Veglia, Cherso,Ossero, Arbe (Rab) and Pago, and included the only area in Dalmatia whereVenetian rule extended into a significant hinterland, behind the ports ofNovegradi, Zara (Zadar), Vrana, Sibenico (Sibenik), Trau (Trogir),Spalato (Split) and Almissa; a second group of islands, Brazza, Lesina(Hvar) (with the fortress ports of Staregrado and Visichio), Curzola andLissa (Vis); and a second coastal strip from Cattaro and Budua to Antivariand Dulcigno. Apart from Butintro, Malvasia and Napoli, the third zonewas made up of islands: Corfu, Cefalonia (Kefallinia), Zante (Zakinthos),Cerigo, Tine and Crete. Far to the east, in the fourth zone, lay Cyprus, ahefty postscript to the long story of Venetian colonialism and one whoseerasure, on the grounds of the expenditure needed for its defence, was stillbeing considered as late as 1517.2

Between 1509 and the opening in 1537 of the first war Venice had foughtagainst the Turks since that of 1499-1503, little was promised and lessachieved by way of improving the fortifications of the empire da Mar. Heavyinvolvement on the Terraferma from 1509 to 1529, in spite of apersistence of Turkish pressure, had caused the sea empire to slip from theforefront of the patriciate's consciousness: a process aided by the election ofits best talents to offices with the armies and in the fortified places on themainland, the increasing responsibility of the maritime savi ai ordini forterritorial military affairs, and the lack of interest in imperial strategyevinced by Venice's commanders-in-chief, even after the peace of 1529.There was also the formidable problem of modernization. Fortifications daMar had remained practically untouched by the gunpowder revolution. Thecost of converting 'alia moderna' plant that squatted in massive butantiquated heaps all the way from Istria to Cyprus was dismaying.

There was a comforting argument against doing anything at all - that itwould provoke the Turk. The Duke of Urbino, easily Venice's most trustedcommander-in-chief of the sixteenth century, blandly confessed hisignorance of maritime affairs and contented himself with warning thegovernment of the danger of thinning the garrison forces overseas bydividing them among too many bases. He was concerned that Friuli be

2 Sanuto, xxiv, 237, 263.

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defended against overland attack. But to check the Turks by sea he trustedfirst the fleet, then transports which could rush reinforcements to any pointthey invested, and, finally, strengthened defences of last resort on the Lidi atthe main Lido entrance.3

Given the uncertainty of the economic yield of Istria, Dalmatia andAlbania, the ups and downs of their crops and fisheries and salt-pans, werethey good for anything but a thin supply of stradiots and reluctant oarsmen?Staging posts there must be en route to Crete and Cyprus, bases there mustbe to check the counter-flow of Turkish fleets and pirate squadrons en routeto Venice: but that trailing mosaic of conquests and submissions, of islandsand hilltops, anchorages and river mouths - did all of it really call forconservation and protection?

The local loyalties contracted by castellans and rectors said yes; fewpatricians failed to respond to the unaccustomed vision of real misery andfear, and the longer term of office served da Mar (two to two and a half years)gave ample time for local impressions to sink deep. But when it came tospecific proposals, there were puzzling disagreements. Sea captains, navalproveditors and the syndics on their whirlwind tours of inspection sawfortifications and garrisons primarily in terms of harbour protection anddefence against attack from the sea; army captains, rectors on the spot andthe majority of military engineers saw them more in terms of defence fromland attack and, moreover, stressed the need for strategically protectedhinterlands.

In the event, the government came to concentrate almost exclusively onthe major anchorages: Zara (and to a lesser extent, Sibenico), Cattaro,Corfu, Canea, Cerines, Famagosta, and - but only from 1567 - Nicosia.

As far as fortifications were concerned, the first to force itself on thegovernment's attention was Corfu, when a deputation from the islandersasked ^1517 for protection against corsairs. The suggestion was a reminderthat work had long hung fire on Castel Nuovo, which was 'the key to theisland', but by a grudging majority (104:76:4) it was decided to recommencework on the whole enceinte of the city itself and a year later, again after along debate, to send a proveditor to supervise it. In November 1518, theCollege interviewed Janus di Campofregoso, who had returned from thethird zone after inspecting the defences of Corfu, Crete and Napoli diRomania. His opinion was that given the willingness of the inhabitants toco-operate in self-defence and the availability of a strong relief fleet, thefortifications could be made adequate without too much expense - hesuggested 5000 ducats. The Senate discussion that followed demonstratedthe either-or-but-not-both attitude that was to taint peacetime defensive

3 Died, Secreta, reg. 4, 129, 131V-135; Delia Rovere, Discorsi militari, 4.

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thinking throughout the century. No new money was to be voted, but thecash allocated to building programmes at Padua, Verona and Brescia wasfor December, January and February (a total of 1650 ducats) to be creditedto Corfu. Against those who deplored robbing the land to pay the sea it wasargued that the truce with the Empire reduced the need to complete theTerraferma projects on time.4

This system was dropped in 1522, when toll income of 2400 ducats a yearwas diverted to Corfu from Treviso, Padua and Vicenza. After another visitand report from Campofregoso this was increased in 1525 to 3600 ducats.Peace on the mainland brought another intensification of effort. Proveditorswere replaced by proveditors-general 'because of our concern for thisimportant site'.5 New reports were called for from naval as well as the shoreauthorities; one naval proveditor made simulated attacks which revealedsome of the port's deficiencies: inadequate flanking fire at one point, caves atanother that could be used as starting points for miners.6 In 1535 MicheleSanmicheli was sent to check the progress made by the resident engineer,Augustin da Castello. Models made by both men were to be discussed by theCollege and the Duke of Urbino and then referred to the Senate.7 On the eveof the Turkish war the citizens were complaining loudly that the defenceprogramme had already led to the destruction of 2000 houses and wasthreatening more.8

Work on the second zone also began in response to petitions from localinhabitants reacting to Turkish raids, which in 1522 led to the capture ofSardana and in 1527 to the fall of Obrovazzo; small but pinching gains atVenice's expense. To this threat nearer home, the reaction was quicker andmore generous than it had been in the case of Corfu. In 1522 10,000 ducatswas allocated for refortifying Zara and Sibenico, in 1523 the outlawedengineer Marchio Buconovich was pardoned so that he could work there,and in 1524 a further 5000 ducats was voted.9 Between August andNovember of that year Malatesta Baglione, the most trusted of Venice'sinfantry commanders, carried out a survey during which he sent back asteady flow of models, drawings and reports. His conclusion was that noneof the Dalmatian coastal fortresses, Zara, Sibenico, Trau, Spalato, Almissa- not to mention their outlying castles - could hold out against a Turkishattack for more than a week.10

4 Sanuto, xxiv, 398-9, xxv, 383-4, xxvi, 200, 227-8; ST. reg. 21, 70V-71, 177.5 SM. reg. 22, 98V-99.6 Sanuto, lvi, 122.7 SM. reg. 23, 96V-97.8 Ibid., 140-140V, 20 June 1536.9 SM. reg. 20, 49V; SS. reg. 50, 16; Sanuto, xxxvi, 383, 602.

10 Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni, Ba. 61 n.d.; printed in S. Ljubic, Commissiones et relationes venetae(Zagreb, 3 vols., 1876-80) i, 184-91.

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Dependent on Zara were Novegrad, Nadino, Tin, Nona and Vrana, andas he rode between them with the Capitano of Zara, Baglione drew a grimcontrast between the pleasantness of the countryside and its deserted state.Constant raids on animals and crops, kidnappings and abductions had led tothe evacuation of whole areas and only the establishment of effectivedefences could tempt the population back and make the land profitableagain to Venice. As for Zara itself, there was no way of modernizing the oldcastle without destroying a third of the town; it would be better to build anew wall, based on the principle of flanking fire, which would also provideshelter for the population and a large garrison. Baglione did not recommendindiscriminate rebuilding. At the southern extremity of his tour, forinstance, he suggested reconstructing Starigrado and Almissa, but disman-tling Visichio. All the same, with a new French invasion threatening, and aDalmatian economy so run down that but modest local contributions couldbe expected, the Senate paid attention only to his suggestions about Zara,and postponed making a decision about them. In spite of repeated warningsfrom returning castellans and capitani the fortifications of the second zonewere essentially unmodernized when war broke out in 1537.11

If more was done in Crete and Cyprus this was because the inhabitantswere better able to bear the whole, or a large part, of the costs.Campofregoso's report on the city of Candia of 1518, which accompanied amodel devised by him, the rectors and the naval proveditor SebastianoMoro, led to the order in 1520 that 60,000 ducats should be spent onremodelling its fortifications over the next five years. Of this sum one-halfwas to be provided by the nobles and feudatories of the island and one-quarter by clerics and the Jewish community; the remaining quarter was tocome from the local camera. Ten years later the work was far from complete,however. After loud complaints, the camera had taken over part of thecontribution from the clergy and the Jews. But as the returning duca,Niccolo Nani, explained in 1532, the camera had been unable to muster itsown contribution and only 24,000 ducats had been as yet wrung out of thenobles and feudatories.12 The work was still unfinished by 1537; neither hadprojects drawn up for Suda and Canea been put in hand.

A report on Cyprus of 1529 described the walls of Nicosia as 'antiquatedand weak', those of Limisso and Baffo (Papho) in ruins. Cerines, wheregetting on for 34,000 ducats had been spent since 1504, was in need of littlemore than finishing touches. Famagosta was nearing completion after theexpenditure, in cash and materials since 1491, of a figure put in 1531 at190,000 ducats.13 Yet by 1537, thanks to different opinions held by

11 E.g. Ljubic, i, 178-9, 196.12 SM. reg. 19, 226; Lamansky, Secrets d'etat de Venise, ii, 604-5. For cost context, below, 469.13 Sanuto, li, 444-6; Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni, Ba. 61, 8 Nov. 1531.

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successive rectors and military governors, and the desire to introducemodifications based on the Terraferma building programme, even thesetowns were not represented as being really defensible.

Of the fortifications put to the test in the War of 1537-40,14 Corfuwithstood bombardment from the sea and investment by land; Napoli diRomania held out for a year and Malvasia until it was surrendered by thepoliticians as part of the treaty that ended the war in October 1540. Takentogether with the failure of the Holy League's amphibious attack inSeptember 1538 on the fortresses guarding the Gulf of Prevesa - alsounmodernized - the siege experience of the war suggested that men, moraleand munitions were more important than the character of the plant theywere defending.

We touch here on a technological debate that could not be readily settled.In a land war, one type of armament could be adjudged more effective thananother; at sea one type of vessel could demonstrate its superiority; butfortifications old and new could not be so manoeuvred together as todemonstrate in a direct encounter which was the better, and the longer timespan that distinguished a siege from a battle allowed factors that had nothingto do with design to claim equal weight in a post mortem. And thoughprofessional military engineers obtained an acknowledgement in peacetimethat newest is probably best, in war, because of the time required to rebuildand to cope with the litigation that was involved,15 the emphasis was onmake-do and mend. And spread as it was throughout the sea empire the costeven this involved was redoubtable; the Duke of Urbino reckoned that thebill for putting Corfu alone back into its original state of preparedness infoodstocks, soldiers, pioneers and material (iron and wood) would be over70,000 ducats.16

Apart from a brief attack on Suda, Cyprus and Crete were left alone bythe Turks. The defensive strategic lessons of the war were these. Theimportance of Corfu was recognized more clearly than ever; after the siegethe Senate described it as 'the heart and soul of this state (stato da mar),where there should always be a reserve sufficient for all the needs of ourterritories south of the Gulf [i.e. the Strait of Otranto]. They can bemobilized far more quickly from there than from Venice to bring aid to anyplace that needs it.'17 Further north, a successful allied amphibious assaulton the Turkish enclave at Castelnovo - and its subsequent recapture -focused attention on its Venetian neighbour, Cattaro. And further northagain heavy Turkish land pressure on Zara in 1538 pulled from the Senate's

14 See above, 423 seq.15 See above, 227 seq.16 Delia Rovere, 7.17 SM. reg. 25, 31V (13 May).

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collective memory the cliche that it was ' the key and chief sinew of ourmaritime empire' whose loss 'would weaken the resolve of Dalmatia as awhole'.18 In the following year, the order was given 'in the name of God' tocommence works that would make it an impregnable place of refuge.19

That little was done in wartime was due not only to grudged expenditurebut to the numberless particles that induced a' friction' that slowed buildingprojects as surely as they impeded the efficacy of armies. To give but oneexample: please pay no attention to the last scheme forwarded to you by themilitary governor (Babon di Naldo) here, the Bailo of Corfu begged thegovernment in October 1538; it is 'criticized by everyone' and I have had todismiss the engineer Zanin 'who, though he seems stupid when he speaks,being from the Bergamasco, is in mind and deed full of excellent ideas and ofsense and experience — but he does have the defect of being unable tocommunicate his ideas to anyone else . . . Could we not have MaestroMichel [Michele Sanmicheli]. . . who was so much praised by the late DukeofUrbino?'20

Soon after the war was over, however, and when these priorities had beenestablished, Antonio da Mula, conte of Zara, still generalized bitterly: 'welose good opportunities to fortify in peacetime, then throw money away intimes of crisis when work can never be done well'.21 Like most analyses ofVenetian spending habits, this was also a prophecy: the reluctance to spendmoney on precautionary measures persisted. All the same, in 1541 theSenate named the following sites as of capital importance: Zara, Sibenico,Cattaro, Corfu and Canea (to reinforce the defensive capacity of westernCrete, given that Candia had been given favoured treatment in the past), andruled that 5% of all new taxation raised by the Senate should be set aside forthem.22 By 1548 the irksome fact that Famagosta was still not abreast ofcontemporary defensive standards was acknowledged, and expenditurethere too recommenced.

That opinions like Da Mula's were accepted as just was shown by twomajor laws passed in 1542. By that of 24 September the importance ofkeeping fortresses in prime defensive condition was affirmed, and the delaysand inefficiencies (including peculation) of the past acknowledged. In spiteof its success in repulsing the Turks in 1537, Corfu was named as the chiefexemplar of these deficiencies, which were in large part put down to theoverburdening of the College's savi with military business. So the new

18 SS. reg. 59, 59 (12 June).19 SM. reg. 25, 61, 77V-78V (11 Sept. and 15 Nov.).20 Capi, Died, Lettere, Rettori, Ba. 291,31 Oct. The idea that Sanmicheli had benefited from the advice

of the duke was voiced by the Senate in a letter to the authorities in Crete: SM. reg. 25, 73 (3 Oct.).21 Ljubic, ii, 171.22 SM. reg. 26, 55 (3 May).

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magistracy was created, that of the proveditors of fortresses23 (at first two;from 1580 three). Henceforward their office was to monitor and aid everyfortification project by land and sea from its inception to its completion;regular attendance in the College and the power to propose legislation in theSenate was to key their function into policy making as a whole.

This magistracy was to last as long as the republic itself. Far briefer wasthe career of an organ set up on 3 November. This was a collegio orcommittee of 25 patricians to consider the various projects for strengtheningZara, make recommendations and ensure that the work was done speedilyand without waste. Majority decisions, when the committee was afforced bythe savi, the Heads of the Quarantia and the proveditors of fortresses, wereto be as binding as those of the Senate itself. The difficulty of obtaining aquorum led to the enlargement of the committee's numbers to 30 in 1544.But it was the overriding by the Senate of a committee decision in 1546 onthe grounds that it was out of touch with events in Zara itself that probablyexplains why nothing is heard of it after that date. The experiment of givingspecial powers to ad hoc bodies of this size was never tried again.24 Not thatZara was the better for relapsing into the more streamlined procedures ofthe proveditors of fortresses; after the expenditure of 40,000 ducats (aquarter of which went on wages) by 1557 the defences were reported to be'in a deplorable state'.25 This was partly because in spite of a theoreticalapportionment between the expenses of Terraferma and Mar fortificationsthe either-or mentality persisted, with a more vocal lobby of landownerstilting the balance towards the former, a tilt emphasized by the charging ofthe Lido fortifications to the cassa dellefortezze da mar. But it was also due tothe stronger strategic (and, after 1537, emotional) claims of Corfu.

In 1541 2000 ducats had been sent there, as opposed to 1000 to Zara, andanother 5000 followed in 1542. Thereafter, up to the early 1560s, a fairlyregular flow of 2-4000 ducats a year was sent to Corfu, sometimes at theexpense of the cassa delle fortezze da terra, more frequently at that of othercompetitors for the resources of the cassa da mar, the sum rising and fallingwith the rhythm of rumours about the purpose of activity in the shipyards ofthe Bosphorus. Corfu alone was allowed the privilege of building in stonerather than brick - and masons were sent from the Bresciano and Veroneseto instruct the natives. Only for Corfu was the locally unpopular measurerisked whereby, with the aim of speeding their work, pioneers were paid bypiece-work rather than by the day. Only a patrician returning from Corfuwould have had the confidence to say, as the former bailo and proveditor-

23 Hale, 'The first fifty years of a Venetian magistracy'.24 Refs. in ibid.25 Ljubic, iii, 99.

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general did in 1533, that 'there is an imperative need to protect this city andthe island, sparing no possible effort or payment, for since it came under thegovernment of this illustrious state in 1386 our ancestors, conscious of itsimportance, spent such sums on fortifying and supplying it that to look atthe accounts is to be amazed. And as the methods of making wars andattacking cities are now undergoing a change, some 100,000 ducats havebeen and are being spent on one bastion; and since the completion of thiswould leave it like a man with an arm missing, the other must be made.'26

This to a Senate which five years earlier had decided that the buildingprogramme was so far advanced that the engineer-in-charge, ZuanHieronimo di Sanmicheli, could be seconded to Cyprus. And moneycontinued to flow to Corfu where from 1559 the construction of S. Sidro hadthe powerful support of Sforza Pallavicino, on whose designs it was based,while in spite of their having been named in 1541 as places of specialimportance, little was done for Sibenico after the completion in 1557 ofZuan Hieronimo's waterfront fort of S. Niccolo, and very little beyondrepair work at Cattaro.27

Work on the Adriatic fortifications had been stimulated by distrust ofSpanish Naples and ever increasing corsair activity. The Peace of 1540 withthe Turks was, in the main, trusted, but it led to a species of strategicdecorum whereby Venetian fleets fell back on, or even well past, Corfu whenTurkish armadas issued from Constantinople, leaving Crete and Cyprusvulnerable to any change of heart on the part of the sultan.28 Thus theweight given to the third zone rather than to the first and second wasincreased by the need to protect the northern coast of Crete, especially nowthat Canea was coming to be looked upon as a second Corfu and worked onby the same engineers. It is true that, as with Candia, the bulk of the expensewas intended to be borne by the local camera, but for three chief reasons thecassa da mar was forced at frequent intervals to bail it out. Costings of thework recommenced in the 1540s assumed a low charge for labour because11,000 of the rural inhabitants were legally obliged to work for thegovernment if called on, some for two, others for three, weeks in the year,and received only 8 soldini( = 3 Venetian soldi) a day for their food.29 But astime went on more and more of them claimed exemption from this serviceeither on grounds of hardship or of privileges granted earlier which wereexpensive and time-consuming to check. Many commuted their service for

26 Lamansky, ii, 610-11.27 For a detailed report on Corfu in 1566 by Col. Moreto Calavrese, see Capi di Guerra, Ba. A-D and

Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba. 43. A report on Dalmatian fortifications in 1560 is in Materie MisteNotabili, Ba. 8.

28 A. Tenent i , Cristoforo da Canal: la marine venitienne avant Lepante (Par is , 1962) 122.29 G . Gero la , / monumenti veneti nell'isola di Creta (Venice, 5 vols. , 1906-32) i, pt 1, 4 2 1 .

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cash, but by 1566 it was ruefully admitted that little of this money had foundits way to the fortification budget.30 From 1549 the government of Crete hadsubstituted labour at Canea for galley service as a punishment for crime, andCristoforo da Canal, alarmed at this drain on the recruitment to his fleet ofcondannati galleys, suggested that the vessels should winter in Crete, whenthe prisoner-oarsmen could work on the fortifications. 'This would lead', hereported in Venice, 'to a notable saving for the island and be a real benefit tothe men, who would prefer working at that season on land to being shut up,exposed to the cold, in the galleys. What is more, 300 of them would do morework in three months than 300 local inhabitants in a year.'31 Thoughprisoner-oarsmen were so used from time to time (not only at Canea) thescheme was never put on a regular basis.

The second cause why constant demands had to be made to Venice forextra cash was the changing of plans that so often followed a tour ofinspection by a senior engineer. Thus in 1550, after one of ZuanHieronimo's visits from Corfu, the rectors of Canea wrote in alarm to saythat he had condemned some of the works in progress and suggested others.In this case, even before they had seen the new plans, the Senate authorizedthe rectors to finish 'works so large and expensive' in their original form,32

and in general Venetian policy came to forbid all alterations that had notbeen formally approved from models sent to Venice and kept thereafter forrecord purposes by the proveditors of fortresses. The third was the old habitof raising money by imposing new duties - in Crete particularly on theexport of wine, oil and cheese - or allocating proportions of existing tolls orlegal fines to the fortifications account. However fiercely the law bared itsteeth, however careful were the regulations that actual cash, not merely arecord in ducats of account, should be placed by three carefully chosen andsworn-in key-holders in a specific strongbox, the system never produced theamount it was supposed to. The ups and downs of production and the flowof commodities, the intervention of tax farmers, the greasing of palms, thearrears of additional book-keeping adding confusion to a chronic shortage ofactual coin - all these factors made a bad assumption worse: that a fuller lifecan be led without a real increase in income. New tolls, moreover, were badfor trade, good for smugglers, and of uncertain advantage to the camera - letalone to the fortifications strongbox, for all income had to fight its way to anearmarked account through a gauntlet of competing claims.

All the same, something of the order of 82,000 ducats had been spent atCanea by the resumption of hostilities in 1570 and some 42,000 at Suda,

Lamansky, ii, 604.Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni, Ba. 61, 26 Apr. 1549.SM. reg. 31, 73V.

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while to bring Candia into line with revised standards of up-to-dateness(estimated in 1553 as requiring 15,000 ducats a year), the government in1561 voted 3000 a year for five years. A plan prepared just before this periodexpired, however, showed all too clearly how much remained to do and thevote was renewed for a further five.33 The insufficiency of even this sum waspointed out in a report on the whole island by Venice's captain of artillery,Cluson. How is it, he chided, that Crete is not yet in a position to defend itself- the chief barrier to Turkish threats to Corfu and the Adriatic, the naturalsupport of Cyprus and set as it is ' in the middle of the world especially ofthose waters that are your own'? But the government had by now learned todeal with its experts' questions; it imperturbably filed them away.34

With the war of Cyprus that opened in 1570 in mind it is perhaps to thefourth zone that most interest attaches. In 1542 the Council of Ten, lessswamped with business than the Senate and better able to think ofprobabilities as well as emergencies, took (unusually) the initiative inordering the strengthening, on up-to-date lines, of the fortifications ofCerines. Little was done, probably because administratively Cerines wassubordinated to Famagosta, where the military authorities had their ownaxes to grind. Nor did the visit to both ports by Zuan Hieronimo in 1548lead to more than the irksome impression he usually left behind: that whathad been done ought to be redone. In this case he deplored the torrioni atFamagosta both because the angle, rather than the round, bastion had bynow been accepted as superior, and because they did not project sufficientlyto give a flexible covering fire from flank to flank.35

Matters lingered until 1557. By that time the Council of Ten's insight hadbecome a dogma: the Turks, instead of looking on Cyprus as an irritant totheir trade but irrelevant to their anti-western strategy, when occasionserved would try to capture it. The new Capitano of Famagosta, PieroNavager, was fully briefed as to what this threat entailed, and in thefollowing year Zuan Hieronimo was sent out to rethink his previoussuggestions and another engineer, Alvise Brugnolo, was dispatched tosupervise their execution. As had never happened in the case of Crete, thedefences of the island were considered as a whole. The chief effort was to beexpended on Famagosta and Cerines, but inland from the latter S. Ilarioneand Buffavento were to be strengthened, and other sites were to beinvestigated which could be made into places of refuge, preferably on thecoast, where they could be relieved or evacuated from the sea.36

33 Lamansky, ii, 605; SM. filza ix (19 Aug. 1553); Died, Zecca, reg. 3,9V; plan in BMV., mss. it. vi, 180(= 10031) no. 20; SM. reg. 38, 9.

34 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 3, ult. Jan. 1563.35 Died, Comune, reg. 14, H5v-n6r; SM. reg. 29, 157V; reg. 33, I I8 - I I8V.36 SM. reg. 34, iov; SS. reg. 71, 40V-41.

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The costings landed in Venice like so many blows: 150,000 ducats forCerines, 300,000 for Famagosta. Work was begun on both sites, though tothe moderate tune of 12,000 ducats a year,37 expenditure difficult to traceafter 1564 but likely to have been sustained after the Turks' recoil fromMalta and the subsequent rapprochement between them and Maximilian ofHabsburg in 1567. It was in 1567, on 1 June, that the replacement at last ofthe old walls of Nicosia by a new enceinte was commenced ' in the name ofthe Holy Spirit' and to the designs and under the supervision of GiulioSavorgnan. The city itself offered 60,000 ducats together with 5000 tocompensate those whose shops and houses had to be destroyed. A furthersum in the region of 40,000 ducats was promised by wealthy individuals -helped by Savorgnan's undertaking to name bastions after them. To savetime and expense the works were carried out in earth and turf. At the end ofFebruary 1568 he wrote to say that 70,000 had already been spent out of hisestimate of 90,000 ducats and that the enceinte was nearing completion.Sending a further 25,000 ducats, the Senate approved the next stage heproposed: the cladding with stone of one bastion to act as a model for theother ten were he to be transferred.38 Among the tributes paid to him whenwork ceased on his recall in early May was a panegyric delivered byGiovanni Podacattaro (to whose family one of the bastions had beendedicated). 'You were the sole inventor, the sole engineer, yours alone theskill and mastery with which at great expense and in so little time you havecreated and raised up these eleven bastions, these eleven legitimate childrenof yours: such strong and formidable champions, such stalwart and securedefenders of this country.'39

Though the order of priority in the war scare of 1567-8 was first Cyprus,then Crete, work was also done on two unfinished bastions at Corfu, while10,000 ducats was sent to Zara in September with orders to rush through thefilling of gaps in the enceinte with earth and turf. A further 10,000 followedin January 1568, and because the local labour force was small 400 pioneerswere ordered to Zara from Istria, divided among the local communities inthe proportions used for the recruitment of oarsmen for galleys.40 InFebruary - with news from Constantinople indicating a spring sailing of theTurkish armada - masons and bricklayers were sent from the Bresciano to

37 Ma te r i e M i s t e Notab i l i , B a . i (C ip ro , Ercole Mar t inengo) ; B a . 7 (Sforza Pallavicino, G i ro l amoM a r t i n e n g o , As tor re Bagl ione, Giu l io Savorgnan) ; B a . 11 , 35V; Sir George Hi l l , A History of Cyprus(Cambr idge , 4 vols., 1940-52) iii, 861 ; S M . reg. 35, 119.

38 S S . reg. 75 , 57V-58 (4 Feb . ) .39 Annal i (for correspondence) , 27 M a y 1567-16 F e b . 1568; Hill , 846n; Mater ie Mis te Notabi l i , B a . 11,

194V.40 P inguen to , 50; Buie , 36; Portole , 36; Doi Castelli , 24; Piera Pelosa, 47; P iemonte , 47; terri torio di

C a p o d ' Is t r ia , 165 ( S M . reg. 38, 65; 10 Jan . 1568). F u r t h e r broken down, after local protests , in ibid.,83-5V (30 Mar . ) .

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commence the cladding of the new fortifications and the insertion in them ofbatteries and countermine galleries. But by April the news discounted thepossibility of a Turkish sailing and work on the fortification was cut backthere41 and throughout the empire da Mar.

New rumours early in the next year led to renewed expenditure: 50,000ducats for Cyprus, 30,000 to Zara. But that walls, however reformed aliamoderna, were no substitute for men and munitions was forcibly broughthome by a dispatch sent from Zara in January by Giulio Savorgnan. Hepointed out that in case of war Zara would need a garrison of 3000 troops,Sibenico, Trau and Spalato 1000 each. He would need grain for bread andrice and beans for soup, and vinegar, wine, oil, cheese, salt meat andsardines; 62 pieces of artillery with a spare wheel and powder ladle as well asa gunner for each plus 350 balls each and 400 miara of powder; 3000 pikes,2000 other pole arms, fine powder, lead and match for 4000 arquebusiers;also 2000 fire grenades and 1000 artificial fire projectors (trombe dafoco);planks and nails for building quarters; wood for fuel; iron, carbon, 1000spades, 6000 baskets for carrying earth, 25,000 bricks for casemate vaults,furnaces and new powder magazines; two master masons and two mastercarpenters, four well-diggers with their assistants, four miners ('from themountains') to direct the digging of countermines; boards and palliasses forevery man to sleep on because of the health danger of sleeping directly onthe ground; two physicians - not, significantly, so much to minister to healthas to analyse the causes of death, i.e. to discover how to deal with anepidemic - and two medical orderlies (hospedaglieri), a provost-marshal witha staff of eighteen together with a quantity of hangman's rope.42

And, as usual, each fresh scrutiny even of the most recently revisedfortifications revealed errors in their design. Girolamo Maggi, whosepioneering and influential Delia fortificatione delle cittd had been publishedin Venice in 1564, volunteered to go to Famagosta and submitted amanuscript of comments and suggestions.43 It is an extraordinary produc-tion or, rather, it is extraordinary that so many of its ideas should have beenaccepted as practicable. It starts with an analysis of Famagosta's weak-nesses: insufficient flanking fire, no cavaliers to reach the enemy at adistance, ditches so narrow that they could be easily filled up; and his answerto these disadvantages, and to the certainty of the defenders' beingoutnumbered, is to use machines. Some supplement the lack of flanking fireby enabling guns to be pushed out from curtains and then swung throughninety degrees by ropes. Others enable cannon to be lifted high above the

41 SS. reg. 75, 57 seq.; SM. reg. 39, 9 seq.42 M a t e r i e M i s t e N o t a b i l i , B a . 11 , 156V-158V.43 Died, Cod. Misc., Ba. 109.

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ramparts by counterweights to make good the lack of cavaliers. A series ofpits in the ditches, connected by tunnels to the inside of the fortress, were toenable the defenders to remove earth as quickly as the Turks pushed it in.Along the glacis devices were to be hidden which, at the pull on a buriedrope, could explode a mine or cause huge multi-barrelled fire projectors torear up and spray the attackers. All these projects were based on models ofFamagosta kept by the proveditors of fortresses. All, as drawn anddescribed, reveal the faults of one Renaissance 'inventor' after another; toomuch faith in ropes and pulleys, indifference to the effects of recoil,obsession with the over-complex. From the 436 ducats worth of poisons(arsenic, corrosive sublimate and decoctions of poisonous plants) handedhim in a double-locked chest,44 Maggi proposed to bait fodder for horsesand anoint caltrops, and also to envenom wells with devices which, byreleasing poison a little at a time, would render them noxious for longperiods. Hardly had his advice been received than he was made Cavaliere diSan Marco and shipped to Cyprus.

It was there, with the investment of Nicosia by the Turks in July 1570,that the republic's next war began. As in the course of that of 1537-40, littlesave repair work was carried out on defences. And, again, as after the War of1537-40, wartime lessons as to the effectiveness of static defences wereinconclusive. The surrender of Cerines, early in the Cyprus campaign, wasput down not to the inadequacy of its defences but to the cowardice of itscapitano, Zuanmaria Mudazzo, and of its military governor. Nicosia's fallafter seven weeks was attributed to the feebleness of the command (the newmilitary governor-general had not arrived; the proveditor-general had diedin May and not been replaced; the Lieutenant of Cyprus was by allcontemporary accounts a disastrous mixture of vacillation and bombast);45

to the small number of professional soldiers among the defenders (caused bysickness among the last reinforcements to arrive);46 and to the vastdisproportion between the garrison and able-bodied citizens and the size ofthe besiegers' army. Famagosta, which held out for ten months with asmaller garrison against an even larger force, was the subject of elaborateand recriminatory inquest.47 But little was said about the good or badpoints of the fortifications (or about the devices of Maggi, who survived tobe taken off to the slave market in Constantinople). The investigationfocused on the failure to send an adequate force to succour the garrison, andthe excuses were logistic and political: the danger of leaving home and Cretan

44 Dieci, Secreta, filza 23 Feb.45 O n the siege: Paru ta , Delia historia vinetiana, 52 seq.; Hil l , iii, 950 seq.; U . Fogliet ta, The Sieges of

Nicosia and Famagosta in Cyprus, tr . C. C. C o b h a m (London , 1903).46 Annal i , s.a., 152, 20 and 24 May .47 SS. reg. 78, 21 (17 Oct. 1571); Dieci, Secreta, reg. 9, 196V (4 Dec. 1571); Annali, 1571-2 passim.

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waters unguarded; the need to keep strong garrisons in the Adriatic bases toward off Turkish armies which had the free run of the Balkan hinterland; thereluctance of allies to draw off the Turks by attacking Constantinople —indeed, the essential loneliness of Venice's concerns in Mediterraneanwaters east of the papal Marche and Spanish Apulia.

Given allies who wanted to check Turkish naval power rather thanprotect Venice's empire, and given, too, the difficulty of finding, let alonepaying, enough mercenary troops to fill both galleys and garrisons, the lossof the whole of Cyprus was accepted with more equanimity than the fall ofFamagosta. For though the island was one of the few possessions fromwhich Venice made a profit, the strategic lay-out of the empire da Mar, andthe Turk's command of its internal land routes, allowed no concentration ofmilitary effort on its defence. So Venice sought its separate peace (again asin the previous war) from the end of 1571 without any thought of its terms"including the island's restitution.

To have lost two lengthy, formal sieges did not, however, destroy therepublic's faith in fortifications. The Venetians themselves, in 1570, hadfailed to take the Turkish Albanian base of Margarita, or, in 1572,Castelnovo. The Turks, before Lepanto, overran the island of Corfu butwere again frustrated by the walls of the town. From Cattaro to Zara attackshad shown that fortification could at least produce a stalemate: TurkishBalkan forces, predominantly cavalry, could make little impression againstinfantry protected by brick and stone; Venetian infantry were at risk whenventuring into countryside dominated by cavalry. So, after the war, work onfortifications resumed - naturally following the mode, for the republiccontinued to recruit engineers who represented the theoretical avant-garde,even though the effectiveness of the mode could not be demonstrated.

Among the justifications put forward to its allies by Venice for itswithdrawal from the Holy League in 1573 had been the fear of losing moreChristian territory to the Turks.48 What if Crete were to fall - 'the chiefoutpost of our empire and of Christianity as a whole' - or Corfu - 'the mostprincipal frontier of our empire as well as of all Christendom'? To continuea war that could incur such risks was, surely, irresponsible. Both the trucewith the Turks and the programme of fortification that followed it wererepresented as in the common interest of Venice and its ex-allies both thenand whenever relations between the republic and Spain, the Empire and thepapacy became strained thereafter.

The concept quickly became a cliche. When the engineer BonaiutoLorini reported to the doge on the defences of Corfu in 1582 he referred to

48 On this theme see Alberto Tenenti,' The sense of space and time in the Venetian world of the fifteenthand sixteenth centuries', in Hale (ed.), Renaissance Venice, 28.

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its' outstanding importance not only for the convenience and repute it bringsYour Serenity but for the public benefit it brings to every Christian prince,for this fortress constitutes the line of defence that protects all Italy from sopowerful and tyrannous an enemy as is the Turk'.49 And at least as far asCorfu was concerned, there was an interest resembling the internationalconcern for the defences erected after the siege of 1565 in Malta, that otheranti-Turkish outpost. From 1575 the chief adviser on Corfu was theengineer Ferrante Vitelli, loaned for the occasion by the Duke of Savoy,whose superintendent-general of fortification he was and who was allowedto see copies of his plans.50 When the Senate appointed two proveditors-general to go to Corfu in 1582 with the engineers Lorini, Bonhomo andGenese, the decision was taken 'because for many years now it has beenknown to all rulers and in all places that various objections have been raised tothe new fortifications in Corfu': to have these differences of opinion resolvedwould therefore be 'for the benefit of Christendom and ourselves'.51

While there was diplomatic kudos to be gained by publicizing the scaleand expense of anti-Turkish fortifications, they were constructed solelywith Venice's own interests in mind. Apart from small sums spent elsewhereon repairs the whole emphasis on new works was restricted to three areas:the fleet bases of Corfu and Zara and the island of Crete, that is, to twostrategic foci and to the most prosperous of Venice's possessions overseas,and involved central government contributions to their fabric of some214,500, 21,500 and 261,000 ducats respectively.52 And this buildingprogramme was related not simply to passive defence but to an alleviation ofthe still more expensive process of keeping large fleets at sea.

Naval defence was rationalized in 158753 on the basis of 29 galleys, each tokeep station for five years at a time before returning to Venice for a refit and achange of crew. The area to be defended was divided into five zones. Basedon Venice itself or Chioggia, the captain contra Uscocchi with two galleys andthree fuste was responsible for anti-corsair patrol in the Gulf of Venice andthe waters of Istria. Patrol from Istria to Zara and on the opposite coastdown to Ancona was in the hands of the captain dei condannati with fourgalleys rowed by prisoners. From Zara to the island of Saseno, at thenarrowest point of the Strait of Otranto, and from Ancona to Brindisi, wasthe responsibility of the captain 'in Colfo' with seven galleys. The

49 Capi di G u e r r a , B a . 3 .50 F . Sassi, ' L a politica navale veneziana dopo L e p a n t o ' , AV., ser. 5, xxxviii-xli (1945-7) 167-8; S S .

reg. 80, 123V (27 Sept . 1576).51 S S . reg. 83 , 58-58V (16 Feb . ) .52 Senate regs. passim. These figures suffer from my subjective allowance for the element of garrison

wages in some payments; nor are they necessarily complete.53 S M . reg. 47 , 259V-260V (24 Feb . ) .

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proveditor of the fleet with twelve galleys based on Corfu guarded the straitand the Ionian Sea from Saseno to Zante and in the west from Brindisi toCape S. Maria di Leuca. Finally, the captain della guardia di Candia tookover from the southern Ionian to the Cassos Strait to the east of Crete withfour galleys. Behind this peacetime force lay, in theory, a reserve of ioo lightand 12 great galleys, but in 1604 the Arsenal was still far from possessingenough artillery for them and no one seriously believed that the whole forcecould be properly manned.54

A high priority was therefore given to the purchase of the most preciouscommodity in a crisis, time; to building fortified harbours in which navalunits could shelter and fill their crews, local galley reserves be fitted out, andmerchantmen be converted, and which would, moreover, be defensibleagainst land as well as sea attack.

Work in Crete took up the suggestions made by Sforza Pallavicino andGiulio Savorgnan in 1571: to improve Candia, Retimo and Canea and tobuild forts to defend the harbours of Suda and Spinalonga.55 In the first leanyears of peace Venice relied on local earnere to produce the necessary money,and in this way 51,454 ducats was spent on Rettimo between 1574 and1587s6 and 42,150 on Suda by 1577.57 From 1578, however, Venice sentsupplementary cash up to 1589 when this support came to an end. Suda wasfar enough advanced to receive a garrison and a proveditor-castellan in1574,58 Spinalonga by 1581,59 Grabusa by 1584.60 By 1590 the entire northcoast, along which Turkish fleets could be expected to pass en route for theAdriatic, was supplied with bolt-holes and assembly points at fairly regularintervals and thereafter, in spite of alarmist reports by engineers dedicatedto keeping abreast of the latest refinements to their art, no major alterationswere undertaken.

This programme did not advance unchallenged. In 1579 the returningproveditor-general, Giacomo Foscarini, complained that modern fortifi-cations, for all their new-fangled features,61 required more men to defendthem than those they were replacing. Let us concentrate, he suggested, lesson artificial than on natural defences, on fending off an enemy from landingplace to landing place until he is exhausted and pulls away. This would notonly save the large garrisons (the experts think in terms of 12,000, even if

54 SM. reg. 44, 153 (20 Feb. 1580); reg. 64, 87 (19 Aug. 1004).55 SS. reg. 78, 19 (11 Oct.).56 Gerola, i, pt 1, 494.57 Lamansky, Secrets d'etat, ii, 605.58 SM. reg. 41, 258V-259 (6 Feb.).59 Ibid, 236 (13 Jan.).60 SS. reg. 84, 119V-121 (14 Aug.).61 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 3, 25 Sept.: 'orecchie, beloguardi, fianchi, orecchioni, spalle, cortine,

fosse, cunete, terrapieni, parapetti, cavallieri, mine et contra mine'.

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they do not say so) that eat the local inhabitants into starvation, butstimulate morale by calling for constant vigilance. In 1589 SforzaPallavicino expressed, though more moderately, a preference for leaving the'artificial' defences as they were and, if further works were required,concentrating on the site at Paleocastro which would support the fortress atSuda; this had been chosen by the ancients because of its natural features,and could be strengthened by men rather than by elaborate fortifications.62

It was after this report had been read in the College and presented to theSenate63 that government payments to Cretan fortifications ceased. And inthe following year Foscarini, who had been reappointed as proveditor-general in Crete, shifted his argument. Indeed leave the fortifications alone,he advised, but rely on 40-50 'good tight galleys whose speed would enablethem to harry the enemy navy in the rear and flanks just as last year [sic] only60 English "barche o galioncini" through their speed and agility chased offthe very large Spanish fleet that entered the English Channel'. Thosenimble vessels, by forbidding the embarkation of the Duke of Parma's army,had been the salvation of the people who did not wait in fortifications to beattacked but kept their enemy from landing, and we should follow theirexample for our island.64 Work was not, in fact, halted in Crete, and Venicecontinued to send out engineers to report and advise,65 but henceforwardrepairs and modifications were left to the pockets of the Cretans.

Though the new works in Corfu were on a far narrower scale, the islandwas hardly more than self-supporting, and to provide a place of refuge forthe northern part of the population at S. Angelo, to complete the new citadelof S. Marco in Corfu itself and to enclose the suburbs and to protect thedockyard, the Mandracchio, Venice between 1577 (when Vitelli's projectswere approved) and 1604 n ad to send getting on for a quarter of a millionducats. The only other new work in this zone (apart from hospitals, barracksand munition stores) was a new fortress at Asso on the northern peninsula ofCefalonia, which was begun in 1577 with every precaution 'to keep ourplans from the ears of the Turk'.66 In Dalmatia, despite recommendationsfrom Lorini in the 1580s that improvements should be made at Arbe,Almissa and Novegrad, the only expenditure of any significance incurredby Venice was for Zara, for clearing ditches, strengthening curtains andconstructing two cavaliers to Lorini's design between 1573 and 1592.67

62 Ibid., 6 Aug. For the commission charging him to inspect the defences of Crete, see SS. reg. 86,169-70 (6 Aug. 1588).

63 Ibid., Ba. 1, 'Scrittura del S. Gio Batta. dal Monte', with dates of submission to College (9 Aug.) andSenate (10 Aug.). M Ibid., Ba. 3, 13 Apr. 1590.

65 E.g. Lorini in 1598 (Prow. Fort., Ba. 36, no. 1, 14 Dec. 1598); SM. reg. 69, 138 (23 Nov.) forSpilemberg.

66 Ma te r i e Mis t e Notab i l i , B a . 1 (Asso), 17 M a y 1577.67 Prow. Fort., Ba. 2, 1573 and 1587 seq. passim.

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As usual, new fortifications involved the destruction of property. Whenwork began at Corfu in 1577 the proveditor in charge was told to point outthe difference between short-term hardships and long-term security and toremind the citizens that 'these occur in all the other fortresses that are madein every part of the world'.68 With arguments as weak as that, the localauthorities had to be careful not to arouse additional resentment by callingfor the full labour services owed by the dependants of citizens andlandowners. So in Corfu oarsmen were used as pioneers while galleys werelaid up during the winter, and labourers were called from Zante andCefalonia. The pay was just enough to attract men from the poorer regionsof the Turkish hinterland, though at least on one occasion complaints fromthe sanjakbey that Venice was encouraging permanent emigration led totheir dismissal.69 Here, as elsewhere da Mar, the use of an unskilled, oftengrudging and always insufficient labour force led to simplifications of theoriginal designs, to skimped work that collapsed and had to be done again,and to delays that gave each visiting engineer time to suggest furthermodifications.

Except for the wars of 1537-40 and 1570-3, when the bases da Mar wereheavily reinforced, the investment in troops paralleled that in fortifications:derisory in 1509-29, greater in 1541-69, heavier again from 1573, whenafter the post-Lepanto revelation of the speed with which the Turks couldrearm, the maritime empire was on repeated alert.

Freely imported hitherto for service on the mainland, from 1530 thenormal peacetime establishment of stradiots, 'from 400 upwards', wasrestored in Dalmatia. They were based on Zara, where the largest, andSibenico, where the second largest, force was maintained, and on Trau,Spalato, Cattaro, Budua, Dulcigno and Antivari. This number wasmaintained with fair continuity. In 1559 there were 413; in 1567, 418.70

These towns were their pay centres and winter quarters. For most of theyear they were deployed in the out-stations most subject to raiding, in thecase of Zara at Novegradi, Nadin and Vrano (until these places were, in1540, ceded to the Turk). Another force of about 100 was based on Corfu,and included detachments serving on Cefalonia and Zante.

For men who were responsible for providing their own arms (lance,scimitar and shield),71 harness and horse, and whose food allowances wereconstantly contested by communities often in want themselves, their pay of32 ducats a year was accepted even by the Senate as being 'somewhat

68 SS. reg. 81, 22-3 (30 May).69 Ibid., 10 (2 Apr. 1577).70 S a n u t o , Hi, 533; L j u b i c , Commissiones, iii, 194.71 ST. reg. 38, 3iv.

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inadequate'.72 Yet not only was no move made to increase it, but it wasfrequently in arrears. Unable to face the brokers to whom they had pawnedhorses and equipment, many deserted. In 1547 a law had to be passedforbidding stradiot captains to leave their posts in order to bring theirgrievances to Venice.73 Meanwhile the cost of living grew; there should be apay increase of 16 ducats a year, reported Andrea Querini, ex-Capitano ofZara in 1561, the stradiots cannot live, and the better ones wont live, onwhat they get now.74

It is difficult to sum up the republic's attitude towards the stradiots. Itreflected an imperialistic glamour: pride that Venice's past could producefor its service a cavalry force so fiercely exotic in its arms and oaths. It wasfed on two conflicting diets of information. One was based on the notion thatthe stradiots were hard-done-by protectors of the local population. Theother represented them as feckless exploiters of that population; an ex-Capitano of Zara had, in 1524, accused them of concealing, under their beds,the olive harvest, to which they were not entitled, under a covering of hay, towhich they were.75 The resulting uncertainty enabled the government totolerate a process whereby something approaching an elite force slippedtowards becoming a body of quasi-brigands, and a race apart became dilutedwith men raised locally. In 1530 it had been decided that the strathia, orcavalry force in Dalmatia, should be entirely composed of Levantini fromthe third and fourth zones; from 1548 the salaries of local men, or Crovati,hitherto paid separately, were charged against the stradiots' limitation'because these two forces are almost identical'; in 1567 the strathiacomprised 312 Greeks and 106 Croatians.76

This was a significant compromise with the principle that the stradiots inDalmatia should be fully professional non-native troops, with no otheroccupation to interfere with their soldiering, and no family or other local tiesto prevent their policing, as well as defending, the population among whomthey were stationed, or to hinder their being transferred at need to Italy or toother zones da Mar. Elsewhere da Mar 'stradiot' came to mean anythingfrom the true non-native serving full time to a retired professional on halfpay and stand-by duty or a local militiaman with a vague responsibility tothrow his leg across a borrowed horse from time to time. Reporting on thedefence of Cefalonia in 1560, Alvise Balvi complained that while there were

72 SM. reg. 28, 5.73 Ibid., 5-5V, 171, 176-7; reg. 30, 8-8v; reg. 32, 68-68v.74 Ljubic, iii, 155.75 Ibid. , 175.76 K . N . Sathas, Documents inedits relatifs a I'histoire de la Grece au moyen age (Paris, 9 vols., 1880-90) vii,

143; SM. reg. 30, 8-8v; Ljubic, iii, 194.

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a few stradiots getting 32 ducats a year, more had only 16 and most werereceiving only grain, wine and oil to the value of 8.77 Similar third-zonedisparities existed on the islands of Zante and Corfu and in Crete. Thelessons were clear: the less a man was paid the more he perforce blended intothe occupations, family structure and values of the community; mobility,prior loyalty to the central government, military efficiency based on thepossession of adequate horses and arms — these qualities could not beguaranteed at 32 ducats a year; they could not even be expected at less. Yetthey went unheeded. Moved to enthusiasm by actual contact, patriciansreturning to Venice almost always urged reforms,78 but their zeal was soondigested into the collective complacency.

When Venice had acquired Cyprus, 600 Greek stradiots were importedon the principle, there too, that only foreigners, kept regularly on the move,could adequately perform their policing and military functions. By 1519 anumber of native Cypriots had been enrolled. Detected in that year, whenthe College reviewed muster lists da Mar, they were discharged andreplaced by Greeks. A large number, however, were found to be the sons ofthe original force of Greek stradiots: born in but not natives of the island,they were to be given the option of continuing to serve in return forprovender only - the equivalent of half pay.79 This was the thin end of thewedge. More and more were invited to serve in return for inalienable gifts ofuncultivated land; in 1529, out of 437 'stradioti', 150 served on these termsand their proportion grew80 until in 1559 Antonio Zane, returning from aninspection of the forces in Cyprus, protested to the Senate that 'yourstradiots have become farmers . . . from March to October their mainconcern is their crops'. And in parallel with the progressive feudalization ofthe stradiots went the continued use of the pre-existing feudal cavalry units:the Turcopoli of the countryside and the horsemen due from noble citizensand from the greater landowners.81

The chief function of the stradiots themselves was to patrol the coasts.Zane picked out one, Hettor Renes, as a model, so swift and tireless with hissmall squadron 'that no corsair or captain can put in for so much as a cup ofwater without his consent because he is now at one end of the island, now atthe other so swiftly . . . that they look on him as a spirit rather than a man'.82

Far more frequent, however, was the complaint that thanks to the islanders'77 Lamansky, ii, 614.78 E.g. Sathas, vi, 272.79 S M . reg. 19, 109-109V.80 F o r an example , S M . reg. 28 , 31-31V (1 J u l y 1545).81 S a n u t o , li, 440 (for 1529); L a m a n s k y , ii, 617 (for 1559); Salar is , Una famiglia di militari, 144 (for

1563). I n 1529 the re were 252 Turcopoli, 85 m e n d u e from cit izens and 140 from landowners ; in 1563the equivalent numbers were 205, 91, 90.

82 L a m a n s k y , ii, 617 (1559).

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addiction to mules and the chronic shortage of horses in the easternMediterranean (the Turks forbad their export) all grades of the cavalry weredeplorably mounted.83

After the dislocation of the war of 1570-3 the cavalry of the second zonewas restored to the peacetime footing of 1530. There were to be 300 stradiotsin companies of fifteen under twenty captains, 100 to be distributed betweenSibenico, Trau and Spalato, the rest to be based on Zara, and 90 Croats incompanies of ten under nine captains.84 But both in numbers andnomenclature, in fact, the situation was fluid. While stradiots were re-established as, for the most part, Greeks, Crovati, who were nominallynatives of Dalmatia and paid less because they could live at home instead ofin barracks, were often Albanian immigrants or, indeed, Hungarians, andconsequently resentful of their smaller wage. And while company effectiveswere reduced by the normal abuse of including non-serving substitutes theywere also inflated by the presence of lanze spezzate, not, as on theTerraferma, from companies that had been dispersed, but from individualswho had been rewarded for good service in the Turkish war with higher payor had arrived as part of the prestige guard of a proveditor-general andchosen to stay on. By regulations, they should slowly have been absorbedinto existing companies as positions of lieutenant or ensign became vacant.Some were, but others continued to be appointed; proveditors came to relyon them as escorts or trouble-shooters. Together with the drafting of cavalryfor police service on the Terraferma as cappelletti and transfers every fiveyears (a regulation not uniformly observed) among the bases of the secondzone, the symmetry envisioned by the post-war legislation was rapidlyblurred.

Organizationally separate from the strathia of the second zone were thecavalry forces of Corfu, Cefalonia and Zante, where in 1576 there were 102,58 and 25 stradiots respectively on full pay. In Cefalonia there were 260additional horsemen, loosely referred to as stradiots, but men living in theirown homes and either owing military service in return for land grants orseeking it in return for tax exemptions. Few of them had horses fit for use inthe field as opposed to the fields and at best they were little more than aragged supplement to the island's arquebus militia.

In Crete the government's policy remained ambivalent throughout theperiod. The aim was to secure an effective force of 400 cavalry. Theequivocation arose from determining how it was to be paid for. On the onehand feudal obligations could, if enforced, have supplied the force eitherthrough personal service (and some feudatories were still subject to the full

83 Ibid., 616 (1550).84 SM. reg. 41, 180V-181 (10 Aug. 1573) amending the regulations of 29 June 1563 in reg. 36, 61V-63.

450


man-at-arms obligation to supply a 'lance' of two fighting men and abaggage horse) or its commutation;85 and in 1578, 1582 and 1600proveditors 'della cavallaria de nobeli et feudati del regno di Candia' wereappointed to enforce them.86 On the other hand, this obligation arouseddeep resentment87 among the class Venice relied on to back up the centraladministration and repress the tendency to revolt (which had flared up in1571) among the peasantry. In an unsatisfactory compromise, reflectingsuch comments on the feudal contingents as that they 'were more like amasquerade than a cavalry force',88 the obligations were kept alive butdecreasingly called upon, and a professional force of imported 'stradiots'was built up whose payment was a constant source of conflict betweencommuting feudatories and local camere. Nor did even this force evernumber 400 except on paper because of the shortage of horses in the islandand the expense of importing them.

Valuable as they remained for escort and scouting duties and for coastaland border patrol, the stradiots were of little use in the hillier or moredensely wooded part of Dalmatia, Albania and Crete. They were, moreover,vulnerable to the firearms increasingly used by the Turks, both foot andhorse; so though some companies still used lances, and were issued with thelancer's cuirass which incorporated a rest for couching the weapon and avisored helmet that gave protection on contact,89 most became pistoleersand mounted arquebusiers.

The most striking change, however, occurred in their cost to governmentand local camere. During the war of 1570-3 stradiot annual pay rose to 48ducats (40 for Crovati). Those serving in Corfu, where a large garrison andthe provisioning of galleys led to exceptionally high prices, received 56, anemergency measure that became permanent there90 and then the normdemanded, and grudgingly granted, elsewhere. Of all military commoditiesit was the horse whose price increased most sharply. Pay continued to rise totake account of this, and was driven still higher by the difficulty ofattracting men into what was essentially a voluntary exile from their homesto take the place of those keen enough to volunteer for service with thecappelletti. By 1613 the trooper's annual peacetime pay was 96 ducats (84 forCrovati)?1 double what it had been in the war.

Investment in cavalry rose only in cash terms: numbers remained static

85 SS. reg. 80. 30-1 v (25 July 1575); SM. reg. 44, n v (14 May 1578).86 S S . reg . 8 1 , 134-134V (21 A u g . 1578); reg . 8 3 , 86 (18 A u g . 1582); reg. 9 3 , 41-2V (17 J u n e 1600).87 E .g . S M . reg . 46 , 211 (24 M a y 1584); reg. 64, 20V-24V (20 A p r . 1604).88 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 3, 21 June 1586 (Latino Orsini).89 E .g . S S . r eg . 80, 30V (25 J u l y 1575).90 Cf. SM. reg. 41, 18 (17 Apr. 1572) and BMV. ms. It. vn, 1217 (= 9448) no. 18, 214 seq.91 SM. reg. 71, 95V-96 (18 Apr. 1613).

451

5405801000

4302100

i6oo

11004430

Part II: isog-1617

throughout the sixteenth century. With the infantry garrisons it was theother way about: numbers increased while their pay hardly changed.Allowing for cut-backs whenever times seemed secure and hurriedreinforcements when Turkish fleets or armies appeared poised for attack,average inter-war garrison totals were of the order of those shown in thetable.

Before 1537 1540-69 1574-1613

Zone 2Zone 3Zone 4

Total 2120^ 4130^ 553Or

a Sanuto, xlii, 65-70 and 527-8, conflated, and li, 444.h Mar regs., esp. 27, 41-41V; SS. reg. 75, 88; Capi di Guerra Ba. A-D, Baglione,

28 Aug. 1569; BMV. ms. It. 1213, 29 seq.c SM. reg. 43, 40V-41; reg. 45, 83; reg. 71, 73v~74; SS. reg. 80, 7; reg. 81, 5 and

26V-27; reg. 83, 9V-10, 83 and 88v; reg. 90 (26 May 1595); reg. 102, 44V-46V; BMV. ms.It. vii, 1217 ( = 9448) no. 18, 199V seq.

Before the loss of Cyprus, the three bases where the largest garrisons weremaintained were Corfu, Candia and Famagosta; this corresponded not onlywith the size of the fortifications to be manned but the need to supply galleyswhich arrived short of their proper complement of soldiers.92 And becausethey were not envisaged as forming the nucleus of a land army, but to scout,serve on shipboard or defend walls, from the 1530s an attempt was made toensure that at least two-thirds of them were arquebusiers.93 Some nativevolunteers were employed. They were not allowed to serve in their ownhomelands or islands. However, the great majority were recruited in Italyand even they were (in theory, at least) moved from base to base every fiveyears lest they strike debilitating roots in their adopted soil. In especiallysensitive posts, like Corfu, certain companies were to be switched monthly,without prior notification, from the old citadel to the new or to one of theoutlying forts, 'as nothing is more pernicious in fortifications than apermanent garrison'.94 The officers responsible for defences as a whole,military governors of towns and their territories, and the governors-generalof Dalmatia and the large islands of Corfu, Crete and Cyprus were alwaysmen who had held infantry commands in Italy.

92 Hale, 'Men and weapons'.93 SM. reg. 23, 7-7V and 2ov.94 SS. reg. 97, 69 (13 Sept. 1606); see also reg. 82, 99 (16 Apr. 1580).

452


The system of using chiefly troops who were not natives of the empire daMar began to break down in the late 1570s. The discussion of the problemreflected the stages in Venetian experience when looking for extra infantryto supplement garrison forces during scares on the Terraferma: first, theshortage of troops procurable from other Italian states; second, theincreasing difficulty of obtaining non-Italians; third, the need to useVenice's own subjects.

The problem was highlighted in the case of Crete. With Cyprus digested,this became the prime object for Turkish appetite. In 1575 the Senate setthe infantry establishment at 4000.95 It was seldom, in terms of effectivesrather than numbers on paper, attained. But more disturbing was thediscrepancy between this peacetime establishment and the number requiredin time of war, variously estimated by successive military advisers asbetween 16,000 and 20,000. In 1590 Giulio Savorgnan, still clinging to theidea that locals should not be employed, envisaged the reinforcement of12,000 as comprising 1000 Germans, 1000 Swiss, 2000 Corsicans, 4000Italians from the Papal States and 4000 subjects from the Terraferma: 2000from towns and 2000 from the militia, 'though these should be chosen fromthose living nearest to cities, towns and important estates {castelli), for theseare more civilized and, above all, are commanded by good captains'.96 Withdefensive needs at home in mind, this suggestion was unacceptable to thegovernment.97 Instead, it increasingly exhorted its successive representat-ives in Crete to win and organize the potential military support of what wastraditionally the most resentful of its subject peoples, and Cretan garrisonsbecame, albeit cautiously, diluted with domestic infantrymen.

Though the possibility of all-out Turkish attack west of Crete ceased tobe taken seriously after 1573, the manpower problem led there to similarcompromises and Venice came to engage larger numbers of subjects da Maras foot soldiers. An anonymous report on Dalmatia of 1577 described theinhabitants as fit to be 'the very sinew of the Signoria's forces', suited asarquebusiers either for galley or garrison service, though ' as they have hottemperaments and a lively spirit they need much nourishment, especiallywine \98 This was endorsed by Pietro Lando, returning from a tour as syndicthree years later, though he pointed out that though Venetian subjects inDalmatia numbered 60,778, only 15,390 were males fit for militaryemployment.99 Further emphasis was added in 1599 by the ex-captain

95 SS. reg. 80, 7 (20 May).96 Opinions are collected in Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 3, 25V-98. Savorgnan at 51 v. See also Ba. 2, esp.

Apr. 1590.97 As were comparable ones for Corfu, e.g. SS. reg. 103, 236V (29 Jan. 1614).98 Lamansky, Secrets d'etat, ii, 551-2.99 Ibid., 552.

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against the Uscocks Niccolo Donato, who declared that because theeconomy was so static the career of arms was the Dalmatian's only means ofself-advancement,100 and to encourage local recruitment the Proveditor-General of Dalmatia and Albania was ordered in 1607 to contradict 'evilnotions' about Venice being a bad employer; he was to let it be known that'soldiers who come to serve us are well treated by their captains and aregiven their pay even when they are sick' - a not unrevealing phrase.101

The need for recruits was all the greater because of the difficulty ofrecruiting marines and soldiers for the fleet from Italy. The 29 galleysspecified as the peace-keeping fleet in 1587 were each to carry 52 marines(the number hitherto had been 44), a total of 1508.102 In times of crisis anadditional complement of 50 soldiers was shipped in each vessel. Thegalleons and great galleys, which were only fitted out at such times, carriedno marines but up to 120103 or 130 soldiers.104 In addition the fuste and otherbarche armate that were used against smugglers and pirate long-boatsneeded men who could both row and fight, and merchant vessels frequentlytook on companies of 20 to 25 soldiers when warned of the likely presence ofcorsairs.105

From at least 1573 onwards, syndics and other authorities hadrecommended the use of men from the militias of the poorer areas da Mar,such as Cefalonia, as marines, men likely to be grateful even for the poorwage of 23 lire and 18 soldi a 'month' of 33 days plus a free allowance ofbiscuit. And as during the years of alternating peace and crisis the need wasfor soldiers to serve at sea for limited periods, it was cheaper and quicker toenlist them from the areas where galleys were in any case on station. Thenew galleon of 1607 had 80 musketeers (at 5 ducats each 33 days) under a'captain of Italian infantry' and 40 arquebusiers (at 4 ducats) under a'captain of Croat, Albanian and Greek infantry'. But this was a prestigecraft. It had already become rare to raise 'extraordinary' Italian infantry foruse in the fleet, and the full reliance on troops from the maritime empire hadbeen further encouraged by the experience of friction on shipboard betweenthem and Italian units. The search for recruits had by then extended wellinto the Turkish hinterlands. By 1614, indeed, as a symptom both of thedifficulty Venice was having in recruitment in Italy and the sultan'ssympathy with the republic's worsening relations with both Spain and

00 Ibid.01 SS. reg. 98, 17V-18 (24 Mar.).02 SM. reg. 48, 10-11 (12 Mar.).

SM. reg. 67, 94V-95V.Complete crew list in Hale, 'Men and weapons', 1-3.E.g. SM. reg. 66, 91V (27 Oct. 1606).

454


Austria, Albanian Turkish subjects began to be raised for foot service in thegarrisons of the Terraferma.106

The peacetime infantry strength da Mar also took account of thatbattered anachronism, feudal service. Indeed, in some of the out-stations,like the island of Tine, the defence system was based on it. When NicoloBarbarigo was briefed before his departure in 1565 as a syndic andproveditor in the Levant, he was told what to expect on Tine. The peasantswere subject to the service of'nictovigili', night-time coast watches, and tolabour on fortifications, while the feudatari of the town were responsible forguarding the castle that overlooked it. Barbarigo was told that he couldrelieve the peasants from service between October and March as they hadcomplained that there were no shelters to protect them from the bitterwinter weather and that they could not afford warm clothing. As for the'mudo di notte', or castle guard, 'which can be called the very eyes of thecastle', this had become maimed by exemptions given in return for bribesand gifts. Exemptions must be cancelled and all those liable, some 50 men,must present themselves every evening so that 15 could be chosen for eachnight's watch. In addition the liability of the burgesia to guard the castle'sgate during the day must be revived, each man being enrolled for one day'sduty a week. Then the system whereby signal fires on the coast warned thecastle how many raiding sail were approaching was to be checked. The dutyof the male inhabitants of farms and villages to come to defend the castlewhen the alarm was sounded could be suspended; they could not beexpected to leave their families unprotected. However, 'as these feudatarimust give some service in return for the property given them by the doge',they must provide themselves with an arquebus, be trained every threemonths, and keep this weapon and a half lira of gunpowder always ready intheir houses.107

Another device to avoid paying a full complement of professionals was theuse of a class of full-time but poorly paid infantrymen for castle-guard.Called paghe da guazzo, they were either raised locally or were (in a fewcases) Italians who, when discharged, preferred to remain overseas with thesecurity of what amounted to a small pension in exchange for minimalduties. Most were married or at least had families. The job commonlypassed from father to son (the five-year rule did not apply, nor did anyobligation to serve elsewhere). As time went on, the number of effectiveveterans in their ranks decreased and the paghe da guazzo became a body ofold men, youths who had never seen action and substitutes who looked on

106 SS. reg. 104, I I8 - I I8V (27 Sept.).107 SM. reg. 37, 94.V-100V. The instructions, though entered here, are dated 28 Aug. 1561.

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the position as a preferred form of poor relief. Recommendations werefrequently made to get rid of them, but were coupled with the warning thatat least a few professionals would have to be hired in their place, and it wasnot until 1560 that the Senate ordered the dismissal of all paghe da guazzofrom the first and second zones, from Capo d'Istria to Antivari, except thoseholding patents of life service. The money saved was to be sent to Venice forthe College to spend on 'good soldiers' instead.108

Given the reluctance to place more professional troops on the pay-rollthan was absolutely necessary, it is, perhaps, surprising that little attentionwas paid da Mar to the organization of militias on the Terraferma modeluntil the period between the two Turkish wars. Militia forces wereorganized in Corfu and Zante in the 1540s and in Cerigo in 1552, but it wasnot until 1565-7 that a determined attempt was made to improve the localmilitias of Zara, Sibenico, and Spalato and the islands from Cherso toCurzola and to link their organization to a plan for the second zone as awhole. The delay can be attributed to a number of factors: the risk of issuingfirearms to families by no means as stable or — in this zone of land and waterfringes — as 'Venetian' as those of the mainland; the shortage ofprofessionals capable of training and disciplining men whose contact withauthority was, in any case, often frail and sporadic; the thinness ofpopulations already liable to coast- and castle-guard. Nonetheless, theDalmatian proveditor-generalship of Marco Michiel left from 1565 a'voluntary' enrolment of 10,000 men. Faced with a not altogether welcomefait accompli, brought about by a patrician impressive and popular enoughto be elected captain-general da Mar in the following year, the College sentColonel Giunio di Pompei to supervise their training programme andstepped up the provision of arms Michiel had highhandedly commenced bystripping galleys on the way back to Venice. It was not done ungrudgingly.On 7 March 1566 the Arsenal was ordered to send 1500 arquebuses andschioppi, 3600 pole-arms and 1600 archi di Nasso (Turkish return-tensionbows) for which payment was to be secured from the camere of Dalmatia.Confirming the consignment, the Senate commented sourly that' they shallbe taken from the arms set aside as out of date'.109

As for Crete, Gabriel Martinengo had been sent as early as 1520 toorganize a pike and firearms militia of some 3500 men especially for thedefence of the port of Candia. Little was done thereafter until, again, 1565,when the Senate sent Captain Giovan Maria Pallazzo da Fano withinstructions to raise a militia force of 10,000 men throughout the island as a

108 SM. reg. 35, 10-iov and 51V-55.109 SM. reg. 38, 29 and 84; reg. 37, 133-133V.

456


whole. The project had some very cold water poured on it by GiulioSavorgnan, the island's governor-general.110

He pointed out that a clear distinction must be made between a militiaraised in the countryside and one raised in towns. The men of the formerwere widely scattered. To arm from 30% to 50% of the adult male citizensof a town was, however, to create a serious political problem, for a force ofthat size could be indifferent alike to the orders of their captains and therectors 'and this I take to be one of the reasons why the Illustrious Signoriadoes not raise a citizen militia in Padua or Brescia or Verona'. Look at whathappened, he went on, in Cyprus when a militia was set up there five or sixyears previously. The 1000 men enrolled in Nicosia became good soldiers,'too good, indeed, for when one of them committed a murder and wasarrested by officers of the law, his companions, seeing him led along callingfor help, leaped out of their houses and shops and caused a riot'. Matterscame to such a point that in order to disarm them, the rectors had to call intheir weapons on the pretence of intending to reissue better ones. And theresult was the same as it had been in Cerines, where the arming and trainingof a large body of ill-intentioned townsmen led to an outburst of murdersand atrocities and uprisings. And here in Crete the men are even more proneto violence, especially during their Lenten fasts 'when they are governed bywine'. Remember, too, that Crete is poorer than Cyprus, yet you plan toraise 10,000 men instead of Cyprus's 3000; the difference in cost will have tobe made up from Venice. Don't imperil the valuable labour service onfortifications (from which militiamen were exempt). The Senate, heconcluded, should think again: leave out the towns; don't touch themountain areas, where the men are too much like outlaws already;concentrate on the coastal plains, where the inhabitants have, in any case, todefend themselves against corsairs. And when, his advice unheeded, hereported on a muster under six native colonels of the militia of Candia, hewarned the doge that such a militia was only safe' when counter-balanced bya sufficient number of soldiers of the guard' - and better ones than thosenow in garrison, who were openly laughed at in the Piazza. Nevertheless, themilitia plans for Crete were driven forward by mounting fears of aTurkish expedition.

The Cypriot militia to which Savorgnan referred had been established in1558. Previous to that, though shooting competitions had been held everythree months at Cerines, Nicosia and Famagosta from the 1520s, thegovernment was more concerned to secure trained marksmen for galleyservice than to rationalize the legal duty of the islanders to defend

110 Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. n , 45-45V (27 June 1565), 46V (5 Aug. 1565).

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Part II:

themselves against Turkish raids. The regulations of 1558 provided for 3000men under five Italian captains to be based on Cerines, Nicosia, Famagosta,Baffo and Limisso. Next year the enrolment was ordered to be extendedfrom 3000 to 5000 and, because the men were too scattered to be broughttogether for training in companies of 600, these were to be reduced to 300(save for Nicosia, where there were to be two companies of 500 each). It wasin the following year that as a consequence of the disturbances mentioned bySavorgnan, the civic militia of Nicosia was disbanded and an equivalentnumber of peasants from the countryside enrolled instead.111

After the War of Cyprus accurate numbers are available only for theextreme north and south; for Istria, where the militia was increased from2400 to 2900 in 1581;112 for Zante (1000), Corfu (500) and Cefalonia (700);113

and for Crete, where Valerio Chieregato was sent in 1574 to organize anddrill 10,000 men enrolled by the proveditor-general Iacopo Foscarini.114

This followed Latino Orsini's advice early in that year that Crete should bemade as militarily self-sufficient as possible. Give the Cretans the chance, heurged, to show the world, and especially the Turks, that their island is'inhabited by men, and not by rabbits and sheep'.115 There were, in addi-tion, citizen defence forces. In 1583 3490 were enrolled: 2190 in Candia, 600in Retimo, 560 in Canea and 140 in Sitthia.116 However, when the systemwas applied to the inhabitants of Istrian towns they successfully appealedagainst it in 1598, the Senate ruling that 'they are exempt from this service,as are the citizens of the other chief towns in our domains'.117 Theconsequences of this decision for Crete are unclear, but it is unlikely to havebeen applied in a zone at risk from invasion in a period when the bias daMar, as in the Terraferma, was in favour of trusting subjects, howeverstained their loyalty had been in the past. Foscarini had been aware that'there are some who hold it unwise to drill and entrust arms to the hands ofthe Greeks, remembering the bygone revolts in that realm'.118 Nonetheless,the threat of war and a progressive shrinkage in the mercenary market forcedupon Venice in the last generation of the Cinquecento a new, post-colonialmood of co-operation with its maritime subjects.

Venice was constantly sending out new brooms as rectors or militarygovernors da Mar and not allowing them to sweep clean. It would be easy to

SS. reg. 71, 76V-77.SM. reg. 45, 72 (25 Nov.).BMV.,ms. It.VII, I2i7(= 9448)00. 18 for Zante and Corfu in 1576; SM. reg. 59,101 v for Cefaloniain 1599.SM. reg. 42, 57 (24 Aug. 1574).Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 3 (31 Jan. 1574).Prow. Fort., Ba. 49, no. 1.SM. reg. 58, 54-54V (24 July).Materie Miste Notabili, Ba. 3 (25 Sept. 1579).

458


compile an anthology of abuses: the garrison who deserted from Buduabecause they were being paid entirely in salt; the misery of the troops inSibenico who were given kersey valued at 12 ducats a piece while they couldonly sell it for 9; a captain of the garrison in Zante who was 94 years old; agrotesque corps of bombardiers at Cefalonia, two of them gouty, one whocould only hobble with a stick, the fourth subject to incapacitating fits ofapoplexy; the militia issued by mistake with wall-arquebuses, so heavy thatthey were knocked backwards with injured faces when they first fired them;munition stores of stringless bows, featherless arrows and ancient shields'not even good for firewood'; the use of inept substitutes; absences with-out leave; refusals to serve overseas (very few, and punished only withdismissal); the more general phenomenon of men going native, marryingand bringing up families, working on the parents-in-law's land, trading alittle. The distrust of infantry captains was shown in regulations of 1581which cut their pay of 28 ducats a month by 3 ducats for every 20 menshort of the standard 150 per company.119

The degree to which uniformity of practice or efficiency was neverobtained in garrisons da Mar was made clear in report after report. Somedetails may be taken from that produced - it occupies 168 sides - by AndreaGiustinian on his return from serving a tour of duty as syndic and inquisitorfrom Zante to Veglia in 1576.120 In the castle of Zante he found 40 Greekpaghe da guazzo, the rank that had been abolished in 1560. At Cattaro,Albanians were employed, in spite of the regulation that they should not beused so close to their own country 'with whose Turkish inhabitants they arefriendlier that I would like', and stradiots were receiving pay for the non-combatant servant-grooms who should all have been dismissed in 1563; onLesina there was no sign of the militia ordered to be set up in 1565, thoughits commander had been steadily drawing his pay for doing nothing. AtSpalato there was a company of Uscocks, 'fine men and fit for any action,but born and practising thieves' - on the other hand, Giustinian added, ifdismissed they would return to Segna and become pirates so it is better toput up with the lesser of two evils. At Zara, where cavalry were needed on aneveryday basis to protect peasants working in the fields between the townand the nearby Turkish frontier, there was a sorry tale of stradiots who hadbeen forced to pawn their horses and equipment.

These were the sorts of abuse that could be matched in any peacetimearmy, and at home as well as abroad. The tolerance of them throws littlelight (and neither does the absence of any governmental discussion aboutthe expense of fortifications in relation to that of the men needed to protect

120

19 SM. reg. 45, 83 (30 Dec).BMV. ms. It. VII, 1217 (=9448) no. 18.

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them) on the cost effectiveness of maintaining an empire da Mar. Thatempire was assumed to be needed to preserve Venice's still active function asan entrepot between east and west, and to give credibility to its claim thatthe Adriatic was mare nostrum which alien vessels should only enter weretheir cargoes destined for Venice, with its harbour dues and customscharges. But the balance between defence costs and commercial profit wasnot worked out. Patricians no longer, as in the past, settled overseas andrallied their relations to press the imperial cause in the Senate. Tradition,routine, falteringly held assumptions momentarily strengthened by thereality or threat of war: these determined the criteria on which the defencepolicy of this aged and equivocally useful overseas empire was based.121

121 As yet there is no study of the overall profitability of the empire da Mar.

460

i6

The costs of defence and war

Rising defence costs at home and overseas - a larger permanent army ingarrison and the modernization of fortifications - and the costs ofprecautionary mobilizations or of war itself were the only significantchallenges to a central government expenditure normally restricted tohousekeeping. An apparently steadily rising revenue could deal withgradual increases in the peacetime expense of army, defences and fleet, but itcould contribute little if anything to the 'extraordinary' costs of war - apoint to bear in mind when considering the relationship between armywages, revenue and 'total' expenditure hazarded in Figure 6. And as in thecapital, so in the regional centres; toll and tax income was perceived on a tick-over basis, give or take a modest surplus due to central government. Thus anyescalation in costs relating to defence or war produced a psychologicalunease and a methodological (accounting, administration) shock.

Even the steady succession of campaigns up to 1530 did not lead to anorderly way of raising or accounting for the year's expenditure oranticipating the next. It was not until 1584, as we shall see, that Veniceestablished a war-chest. A specific threat to counter, a specific treatyobligation to honour; these were met, in anger and distress, throughexpedience financing. Perhaps there is a reflection here of private financialdealings, based on the short-term contract, the temporary partnership,minimum insurance against contingencies. Yet while patrician firms paidagents to ensure against waste due to inefficiency in the course of acommercial operation and against mystification when it was accounted foron its conclusion, the same patricians permitted both forms of abuse whensupervising military operations. A reasonably stalwart course in politics wasconducted in an atmosphere of economic pacifism.

The 'costs' of the wars of 1509-1617 are all the more difficult to estimatebecause they were never, save in moods of subjective propagandist^outbursts, seen as such. No war was budgeted for, nor accounted for on itsconclusion. We have seen that no ministry existed to provide an overviewof military and naval wages, equipment, armament, provisioning, freightand transport charges, and subsidies to allies. Though its all-too-personalimpact was registered, no written calculation was made of the 'cost' of

461

Part II: I5og-i6iy

productive income forfeited by the interruption of commerce or the cuttingoff of raw material from industry, or of shortage-produced price rises whichforced the subsidizing of essential commodities. Such costing, which takesaccount both of actual expenditure and income forgone is difficult enough toestimate today; it is mentioned here only to prepare the reader for therestricted nature of what can be derived from records of expenditure whichare, in any case, neither complete nor fully accessible.1

THE STANDING ARMY

The wages of the standing army constituted 'ordinary' expenditure, andwere the major item among the costs of defence (more than double that ofthe peacetime navy in 1582).2 The rate of increase is indicated by numbersfor each of the three periods of peace:

Terraferma Mar Total

c. 1536 c. 2000 c. 2400 4400c. 1555 c. 2650 c. 4100 6750

1582 3229 6050 9279s

The whole costs of the permanent army were met through standing,though periodically revised, charges on local camere, topped up at need, aswhen 'extraordinary' troops were hired in times of crisis, with cash raised inthe capital by loans or increased taxation.

Thus in 1543 the annual 'limitation' of 24,397 ducats for infantry troopsin the Terraferma was divided among the camere of Padua (3,176 ducats),Verona (5,016), Brescia (7,281), Bergamo (1,360), Crema (3,384), Treviso(1,500), Rovigo (1,360), Vicenza (1,000) and Udine (320).4 These sums wereto be sent in monthly instalments to a separate account in Venice,established in that year, whence they would be disbursed in garrisons underthe supervision of the savio alia scrittura. The account was modelled on thelong-standing one used for monies due in Venice for the quarterly payments{quartirori) to men-at-arms. In 1548 the sums for the men-at-arms'limitation' were revised as follows: Padua 1710 ducats a year, Vicenza4000,Verona 3460, Bergamo 9000, Crema 1500, Treviso 500, Brescia 38,000 andfrom the office of the earnerlenghi di commune in Venice 1200; a total of

The chief gap is the largely unordered archive of the savi alia scrittura.209,492 ducats. Besta, Bilanci generali, 326.Figures for c. 1536 derived from ST. and SM. regs. The others are discussed below.These sums derived from Timprestidi restituiti alle communita nostre et il terzo spettante alia signorianostra dalla restitution dell'imprestido del clero [of 1529]' (ST. reg. 32, 165V-166V; 9 June).

462


59,370 ducats.5 When either account needed topping up (as they frequentlydid) the Senate named the sum and deputed the proveditors 'sopre lecamere' in Venice to find it, sometimes specifying the source,6 morefrequently leaving it to their discretion. The same system applied to the'limitation' for stradiots, an annual 9920 ducats secured in 1559 on Vicenza(7920 ducats) and Verona (2000).7 In this case it was part of an everextending process whereby part of the costs of the standing cavalry andinfantry forces da Mar were met by charges levied on camere in theTerraferma. By the time it was stabilized in 1587, the ducal camera ofVerona, which, in addition to its 2000 contribution to stradiot pay, had up to1538 been supporting the infantry garrison in Napoli di Romania,8 waspaying the whole of what income remained after contributing to the men-at-arms, the Terraferma garrisons, and the Arsenal and its local militia andgunnery corps to the central 'deposito per la militia di Candia e Corfu'handled by the proveditors 'sopra le camere': a total sum of 117,809 ducats.9

This reliance on local camere to provide sources of income for governmentexpenditure was in line with general policy. Thus in 1544 the Arsenal was inreceipt of contributions to its outgoings of 37,779 ducats from Padua(17,100), Vicenza (3939), Bergamo (2984), Verona (6923), Brescia (5066),Treviso (870), Crema (140), Udine (140), Cologna (290), Veglia (260),Conegliano (7) - and the salt office in Venice (60).I0 Some cameral budgetfigures will show how largely military expenditure featured in them. In 1526Zara's income was 39,176 lire; of the total expenditure of 38,955 lire themilitary component accounted for 26,O34.n I*1 I53° the central camera inCyprus paid 56,547 in military salaries and the upkeep of fortifications(12,700) out of a total local expenditure of 86,000 ducats, 8000 of which wasthe tribute payable annually to the Turk.12 Cefalonia's income in 1545 was4460 ducats; military salaries accounted for 2195 of a total expenditure of3111 ducats.13 On the Terraferma, in 1538 out of Brescia's expenditure of84,847 ducats, 57,807 went (apart from 2760 for defence works at Orzinovi)in military salaries and wages.14 As Brescia's prosperity increased, so did its

5 ST. reg. 36,10-11 v (24 Sept.). The infantry' limitation' was topped up seven times in 1552 (ST. regs.36 and 37 passim).

6 E.g. from the tax on imported wines (ST. reg. 38, 83; 29 Mar. 1552) or 'dalli pro francati et che sifrancherano del monte novissimo et sussidio [of 11 June 1551]' (reg. 37, 138; 23 June 1551).

7 Archivio Proprio Pinelli, Ba. 1-2, 1559.8 ST. reg. 28, 115-115V (19 Mar. 1535).9 Besta, Bilanci, 348-9.

10 Archivio Proprio Contarini, Ba. 25, n.p. (n.d. but apparently 1544).11 Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni Rettori, Ba. 61, 72V-73 (10 Sept.).12 Ibid. (1 Feb.).13 Ibid. (3 Mar.).14 This includes 2769 ducats for the salaries of patrician castellans and proveditors in the city and its

territory (Pasero, Relazioni di rettori, 45-53).

463

Part II: 150Q-1617

liability to military contributions; in 1587 this amounted (together with itsdependency, Salo) to 104,436 ducats.15

Whatever the motivation of the Venetian practice of ear-marking localaccounts (and it had much to do with distrust of the collecting agents,including rectors and patrician treasurers), it led to complications insolubleby central government. In theory, as the Senate draughtsman put in apreamble of 1565,16 all was straightforward. Monthly accounts came in fromcamere in the Terraferma and da Mar, specifying expenditure and income(whether local or derived in cash or kind from Venetian magistraciesconcerned with military supplies: food stocks, munitions, arms andartillery). These, vetted by the book-keepers of the relevant magistracies,were entered in three ledgers recording income and expenditure on theTerraferma, da Mar and in Venice itself. From these, the savio alia scrittura,advised by his accountant (cassier), would inform the Senate of the currentstate of affairs anywhere in Venetian territory. For all this, the preamblecontinued (with, as it were, gritted teeth) there was provision in law. But infact either local accounts were badly kept or not sent in regularly or, onarrival, their information was not transferred to the books of magistracies,let alone incorporated into the three ledgers.17

These inefficiencies continued, but no attempt at any major reform wasmade until an attempt to review the state's financial position after the War of1570-3 revealed a confusion and uncertainty that could no longer betolerated. From 1575 a succession of specially elected patricians examinedall central accounts and, as 'revisori e regolatori alia scrittura', maderecommendations: among them the setting up of an office to co-ordinate allfinancial records respecting the empire da Mar in 1581 and a parallel one forthe Terraferma in 1587. With their combination in 1593 the state could atlast (in theory) have a regular and complete oversight of its financial affairs.18

However, no machinery for obtaining specifically military balances wasasked for or suggested. No magistracy was set up to be responsible fortroops on the lines of those responsible for the Arsenal, artillery orfortresses. Instead, a clearer distinction than before was made amongpayment zones: Terraferma, Dalmatia-Albania, Corfu-Zante-Cefalonia-Crete; and in 1587 certain rationalizations of sources of revenue wereintroduced and their income assigned to the following deposit accounts(in ducats):19

15 Besta, Bilanci, 354.16 ST. reg. 45, 141V-142V (30 June 1565).17 Cf. BMV., ms. It. VII, 1217 (= 9448) 215V, relazione of zx-sindaco Andrea Giustinian (1576)

discussing cameral accounts of Corfu. For an earlier Senate complaint about inadequate monthlybalances, ST. reg. 38 (19 Dec. 1552).

18 The legislation is summarized in a typescript, 'revisori e regolatore', prepared by the staff of ASV.And see Revisori . . . alia Scrittura, Capitolare.

19 Besta, Bilanci, 341 seq.

464


1587 1594 1602 1609

Men-at-arms 63,779 62,000 59*845 67,836Troops in Crete and Corfu H7,8o920 132,318 187,695 183,208

These accounts were administered by the zecca. Under the officio sopra lecamere came accounts relating to other expenditure on troops. In the onlysurviving record of them,21 dating conjecturally from 1587, they are set outas:

Senior officers 22,648 ducatsInfantry, Terraferma 44>7J6 ducatsInfantry, Dalmatia/Albania 28,748 ducatsCavalry, Dalmatia/Albania 22,228 ducatsGunners No figureCastellans No figureTransport etc. No figure

Totals for allocations to these accounts were:

1587 1594 1602 1609

142,35! 152,156 360,592 438,393

In 1582 a complete list of sums due to officers and troops in theTerraferma and da Mar was drawn up (see Table i).22 Based not on theactual numbers of men in being and paid but on contract numbers, itrepresents a maximum budget for the standing army as a whole. To this cashtotal should be added the salaries of general officers and the retainers due tothose on stand-by contracts, which in 1587 were reckoned at 29,776. Thisgives a total of 449,037 ducats. If we add the zecca deposit figures for men-at-arms and for troops in Corfu and Crete to the officio sopra le camereaccounts outlined above23 they compare with the 1582 contract figures asfollows:

1582

449,037

1587

323,939

1594

346,474

1602

608,132

1609

689,437

Plus revenue from Zante and Cefalonia sent direct to Corfu (ibid., 348-9).Ibid., 368. 22 Ibid., 326-32.In 1587 the discrepancy between the total, 142,351, and the figure quoted for troops - i.e. theunspecified amounts for gunners, castellans and transport, etc. - amounts to only 24,000. Somethingover this should be allowed for the other years.

465

Part II: 1509-ibij

Table 1

Category

CondottieriMen-at-arms (lances)Militia captains and colonels

(Terraferma and Mar)Infantry officers, governors

and captains, TerrafermaInfantry troops, TerrafermaInfantry officers, DalmatiaInfantry troops, DalmatiaInfantry officers,

Corfu and Crete(including Zante, Cefalonia,Cerigo)

Infantry troops, Corfu and Crete etc.Light cavalry in Friuli

and da Mar: officersDitto troops (50 in Friuli),

omitting cappellettiTotal

Numbers

1 2 \760)1 2 0

772270

301000

3430 J40 ^

1480 j

9279

Pay p.a. (ducats)

oo,5t>o36,520

80,483

53^30

129,677

38,885

4I9,26l

Though the total number of men given in the 1582 list corresponds fairlyclosely with the overall 9500 which seems to have been kept in mind as thedesirable strength of the standing army, until the archives of the savio aliascrittura and the revisori are available, the difference between paper strengthand real strength must remain obscure.24 Nor are there sufficient records tocheck the significance of the ducat totals given for the other four years.Contract prices are misleadingly high not only because they conceal menwho had not been raised, or had deserted, but because they assumed bonussystems based on ideal proportions of arms (the extra pay for pikemen andmusketeers, for example) which were never attained. They also conceal paywhich, though due, was never in fact delivered. Given current wage rates(see Appendix) the probable cost of 9500 men was more like the sums givenfor 1587 and 1594. Those for 1602 and 1609 reflect partial mobilizations andthe employment of'extraordinary' troops and are untypical. Thus, but only

See above, 389, 452. Cf. 'The Signoria maintains about 7000 infantry in time of peace in theTerraferma, Dalmatia and the Levant' (SM. reg. 43, 40V (8 Nov. 1576)).

466


Table 2

Category imbers

HI600 /

90

450 '60 |

1500 I701

3S°o 1,8)

450 )

Pay p.a. (ducats)

59,730

15400

19,800

55>5oo

128,000

18,720

CondottieriMen-at-armsMilitia officers

(Terraferma and Mar)Light cavalry, Terraferma officersLight cavalry, Terraferma troopsTerraferma infantry: officersTerraferma infantry: troopsMar infantry: officersMar infantry: troopsMar cavalry: officersMar cavalry: troops

Total 6758 297,150

with great caution, the average cost of the standing armies on theTerraferma and overseas of'ordinary' troops of all arms between the warsof Cyprus and Gradisca can be put at about 335,000 ducats annually.

This may be compared with figures for the standing forces in the middleof the period of'peace': 1540-69. No full estimate of numbers or projectedcosts appears to be available, and allowance must be made for errors inextracting a pattern from a mass of fragments. In c. 1555, however, mattersstood more or less as in Table 2. As in the later period of peace, a sum forgeneral officers and retainers must be added, in this case some 21,000 ducats,giving an average cost for the 'ordinary' standing forces of 318,150 ducats ayear.

The financial reformers of the 1570s and 80s did not solve the problems ofobtaining regular accounts from local earnere or of enabling regular balancesto be struck either for numbers or payments, but one important featurestill remains to be mentioned. On 15 June 1584 the Senate recorded thatenhanced taxation had at last not only extinguished the war debt of 1570—3but left a credit balance of 500,000 ducats. This it was resolved to retain,establishing with it a deposito grande or war reserve 'which cannot beinvaded for any reason whatsoever save that of open war, with a penalty of1000 ducats to whosoever should propose otherwise'.25 Though this was infact invaded at least once, in July 1601, to top up the zecca deposits and

25 Besta, Bilanci, 340.

467

Part II: i$og-i6ij

'bring order to our accounts which are in great confusion',26 thegovernment arrived at the War of Gradisca with a reserve so capacious thatits existence must have been one of the chief reasons for Venice then tobecome so uncharacteristically the aggressor.27

FORTIFICATIONS

Fortifications were a second item of recurrent 'ordinary' expenditure ondefence. Before the setting up in 1542 of the new magistracy of theproveditors of fortifications, payments were authorized by the Senate (savein the case of the defences of the lagoon itself, which were the concern of theCouncil of Ten) and charged to existing sources of income on an ad hocbasis. Thus in 1518, when 1650 ducats were needed for Corfu, afterrejecting proposals to charge the sum to the camera of Treviso, it wasresolved to allocate 600 to the camera of Padua, which then had accountsearmarked for that city's defences of 7800 ducats a year, 600 to the camera ofVerona and 450 to that of Brescia, an arrangement repeated in the twofollowing years.28 The next payments to Corfu, in 1523, 1524 and 1525,were charged in equal thirds to the tax incomes of Padua, Vicenza andTreviso.29 The specific allocation of these sums was sometimes left to thelocal authorities but more usually specified: thus 3000 ducats for Zara in1524 was to be paid from the income from confiscated estates in theVicentino, and an annual 6000 ducats for Verona, starting in 1531, was tocome from 'le daie [dazii] di le lanze' payable to the city's camera?®

This was the first significant sum to be allocated to fortifications on theTerraferma after the war generation 1509-29, and when in 1534 the Councilof Ten referred to 'the infinite expense we have incurred and continue toincur on the fortification of our town and forts on land and overseas'31 it waswith the latter predominantly in mind: 12,000 ducats a year for five yearshad been resolved on for Candia in 1520, and the 6000 a year for Famagostaof 1515 had been doubled in 1519.32 In 1529 the returning Lieutenant ofCyprus claimed that 178,092 ducats had been spent on Famagosta since1491 and 33,868 on Cerines between 1504 and 1528.33 In 1531 his successor,

26 SS. reg. 94, 92 (11 July).27 Besta, Bilanci, ccxix. The editor puts it without reference as 'oltre nove milioni di ducati' in 1609.28 Sanuto, xxxvi, 227-8; ST. reg. 21, 70V-71 (28 Nov. 1519), 177 (27 Nov. 1520, not mentioning

Brescia). Cf. above, 432.29 SM. reg. 20, 59 (10 Mar. 1523), 102 (9 May 1524), 152 (28 Apr. 1525).30 Sanuto, xxxvi, 602 (17 Sept.); liv, 211 (5 Jan.).31 Dieci, Secreta, reg. 4, 42 (16 Dec).32 SM. reg. 19, 226V (11 Sept. 1521, citing a protest from the city's clergy); Hill, History of Cyprus, iii,

854.33 Sanuto, li, 446 (1 Sept.).

468


as we have seen, put the sum spent on Famagosta at 190,000 ducats34 — a lessformidible sum when averaged at an annual 4750 ducats.

The phrase 'infinite expense' was emotional: the Council was preparingto incur expenditure in its own zone of competence, on the Lido. It must betaken with a further grain of salt, for not all the sums voted for fortificationscan be considered governmental expenditure, even in the form of incomeforgone. The 60,000 ducats voted over 5 years for Candia, for instance, wasto be divided into quarters, two to be paid by the 'nobeli et Pheudati' of thecity and its territory, one by the clergy and Jews, and only one by the camera,though on appeal the quarter charged to the clergy and Jews was dividedequally between them and the cameral fund provided by fines imposed inthe courts.35 And that the sums voted, whatever their legal source, cannot beassumed to equal sums spent is made clear by the explanation given as late as1532 as to why the fortifications of Candia were still unfinished. Of the 30,000ducats owed by the 'nobeli et Pheudati' only 24,000 had been extracted,and, as many of them were poor or indebted, attainment of the balance wasmost unlikely; the camera was also behind with its payments and unable,with its scant income, to make them good. The only solution was for Veniceto make a direct contribution - and not just to make up the balance, for theoriginal estimate had been proved inadequate.36 The ad hoc solution,moreover, meant that, as the implementation of decisions dwindled everfurther into the minutiae of local administration, no one in the Ducal Palacecould keep the whole picture of what was happening in his head. AnotherCretan example may be cited. Work on modernizing the fortifications ofCanea began in 1538.37 The pace and cost of the work depended on a labourforce of some 11,000 peasants. But these, according to the region where theylived, had different obligations: some for six days' work, some for twelve,others for eighteen. Convention determined that they should be paid a foodallowance by the camera. This dwindled from 8 soldini a day to 6 and then to4 - at which point the number of deserters (and the cost of tracking themdown) led to a proposal to settle for jj soldini - payable two-thirds by thecamera and one-third by the inhabitants of Canea.38

The new complications that then arose are not worth pursuing. It was theneed to have a body whose sole responsibility it was to have these issues inmind - especially when after the 1537-40 War the improvement offortifications da Mar seemed a priority - that led to the creation of the

34 Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni Rettori, Ba. 61, 123 (8 Nov.).35 S M . reg . 19, 226V (11 Sep t . 1521).36 L a m a n s k y , Secrets d'etat de Venise, ii, 6 0 4 - 5 , Relazione of the e x - D u c a Nicolo N a n i .37 Ibid., 605, Relazione of Giacomo Foscarini pointing out that since then c. 82,000 ducats had been

spent by 1577.38 Ge ro la , Monumenti veneti nell'isola di Creta, ii, p t 1, 4 2 0 - 1 wi th refs. to S M . regs.

469

Part II: isog-i6iy

fortezza magistracy.39 And after a flirtation in the previous year with theidea of funding all new works da Mar from a blanket 5% of all taxationimposed by the Senate40 the sum allocated to it, about 15,500 ducats,represents what inadequate documentation suggests was the actual annualaverage expenditure on fortifications in the previous two decades.

A third of this was intended to cover munitions and food stores,41 for thecharge given to two proveditors and their small staff was not only to getdefence works built and maintained and accounted for but' to ensure that allour fortified places that seem of importance to them are furnished with thethings necessary to their conservation for at least a year'. Accordingly thesums earmarked were to be put by the proveditors in three accounts, oneeach for building works on the Terraferma (the cassa da terra) and overseas(the cassa da mar) and one named the cassa delle vittuarie dellefortezze. Suchneatness was impractical. The last was not mentioned in connection with thefortress office after 155542 and from 1544 the other two were constantlyhaving to reimburse one another as the demands now of the Terraferma,now of the empire da Mar grew ahead, though the distinction was notdropped until as late as 1584.43

As a Senate managerial agency, the fortress office operated within thecash limits set for it, and advised the College when the Senate authorizedprojects that would need additional funding. After the initial allotment of c.15,500 ducats the amounts credited to the office were as follows.

1559 18,577- comprising 15,577 from the toll and tax revenues of Padua, Treviso,Vicenza, Verona, Brescia, Bergamo, Rovigo and Udine and 3000 from the'dazio della mesettaria' paid in Venice.44 This last sum had been added tothe fortress allocation in 1550, earmarked for payments to Peschiera.45

1579 29,000- cut in the same year to 22,900 ducats, all payable from one source, the'datio del transito' as a result of a general simplification of accountingprocedures.46

1587 22,326- after reapportionment of the office's source of income.47

39 S S . rcg. 62, 59-59V (24 Sept . 1542).40 S M . reg. 26, 54V-55 (19 Sept . 1541).41 S M . reg. 33 , 34 (16 Sept . 1555).42 Ibid., I I - I I V (6 Apr. 1555).43 The last mention I have found of a separate cassa is SM. reg. 46, 136 (7 Apr. 1584). Thereafter the

re fe rences c i te t h e cassa delle fortezze o r denaro del loro officio.44 Besta , Bilanci, 2 2 2 - 5 .45 Dieci , Zecca, reg. 1, 107 (24 Sept . ) .46 Ib id . , reg. 4 , 22V-23 (28 Mar . ) .47 Besta , Bilanci, 341 seq.

470


1594 22,150^1602 54,978

— reflecting additional sources of income temporarily earmarked forPalma.49

1609 29,101s0

These figures, which simply represent the moments at which balances wereattempted between the republic's income and expenditure, give (omittingthe exceptional figure for 1602) a rough average annual expenditure of22,800 ducats from the 1540s to the early seventeenth century. And thisapproximates to the annual average of the individual sums voted by theSenate throughout the period.51

The sum of 101,050 ducats was spent on Peschiera, but this was spreadover the years 1549-70, and the 252,000 authorized for Corfu wasdistributed, at fairly regular intervals, over the long period 1541-1604.There were, however, years in which expenditure soared above the norm.Between 1561 and 1567 the 125,480 ducats voted for Bergamo involvedborrowing 45,000 ducats from the Monte Vecchio, to be paid back from salttaxes,52 pre-empting part of the new decima tax;53 and raiding the cassa dellevittuarie (now an account independent of the proveditors of fortresses).54

The next burst of expenditure on Bergamo (coinciding with major works atBrescia) involved raising 120,000 ducats over the five years 1588-92, some10,000 ducats over the fortress office's total income during years when49,500 ducats was being allocated to Crete, Corfu and Zara. Again therewere borrowings, mainly this time from the deposito delle occorenze.55 Mostof the sums borrowed, either from specific tax income accounts in localcamere or from central tax magistracies in Venice, were chargeable, atinterest varying between 2% and 5%, to the fortress office. Before 1570 theups and downs of expenditure made this possible. And though one of thecosts of withdrawal from the War of 1570-3 was an enhanced spending inshort bursts on fortifications - against both the ex-ally, the Habsburg circleof rulers and their deputies, and the ex-enemy, the Turk - the authorizedexpenditure between 1573 and 1601 in the Terraferma and overseas, whichtotalled at least 662,000 ducats, was, at an annual average of 23,643 ducats,just within the fortress office's budget. And though, as far as they can be

8 Ibid., 368 seq.Ibid., 369 seq. It is not clear whether this included income from the 'uno soldo per lira posto l'anno1596 dal Senato sopra li datij'. This source was accounted for separately in 1609 (ibid., 421).Ibid., 421 seq.ST. and SM. regs., passim.Dieci, Zecca, reg. 2, 102 (5 Dec. 1561), 109 (8 Apr. 1502).

53 Ibid., 134 (11 Mar. 1563).54 ST. reg. 45, 11 iv (31 Mar. 1565); reg. 47, 67 (27 Nov. 1568).55 Prow. Fort., Ba. 2, 64 (16 July 1588), 76 (25 Feb. 1589), 81 (20 July 1589).

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Part II: isog-1617

disentangled, the figures quoted are for materials, salaries and wagesdevoted to building works and omit the sums charged to the fortress officefor ammunition and guns (as much as 2000 ducats at a time for artillery)56

and freight,57 the building lull after 1601 not only enabled the office to catchup on its arrears of interest due to the zecca for repayment to the sources ofthe loans but also to sustain the progress of work on Palma.

While something like 23,000 ducats may be taken as the annual direct costof fortifications to the state, new works of any significance on the Terrafermainvolved equal contributions from the city concerned and from its territory.These necessitated the raising of gifts, loans and new taxes and theimposition of yet more tolls; how far these affected the state's income byreducing the individual's power to purchase commodities taxable by itmust, however, be left to the local historian. Overseas the government'sshare in the costs of fortifications varied. It was seldom as low as in the caseof Canea, and from Capo d'Istria to Zante all income due to Venice wasretained when defence works were in progress.58 Here, too, there were lossesto the fisc additional to the income formally diverted to the office of theproveditors of fortresses.

THE WAR OF 1509-1530

The major military expense was wages, and figures 2 and 3 suggest themaximum potential number of men under arms at any one point in a yearbetween 1509 and 1530, and the overall cost of wages - taking account ofvariations in the numbers employed — throughout the same year, whethertroops were raised direct by Venice or by allies, with the republic footing thebill. Senate orders, College contracts and the reports and muster lists ofproveditors in the field provide the base of these figures, which have nopretension to exactness.59 Orders and contracts represent the numbers thatought to, but might not, have been raised. They have been checked whenpossible against actual pay records, but even these conceal the silent losses ofmanpower due to the chicanery of captains and the corruptibility orinaccuracy of pay clerks. Nor does any sequence survive covering the wholeof any one year; it is thus impossible to follow the effect of desertions,dismissals and partial demobilizations.

The costs of wages, as in Figures 3, 5 and 6, are based on the average sum

56 E.g. for Canea: SM. reg. 38, 11 (Apr. 1567). Costing each type of weapon, this is an importantinventory.

57 Hale, 'The first fifty years of a Venetian magistracy', 517 n. 62 on the heavy incidence of freightcharges.

58 As at Zara, Cattaro and Corfu in 1582-3 (Besta, Bilanci, 337-8).59 They are based chiefly on Senate regs. and Sanuto.

472

p ip ] Missile cavalry

Light cavalry (information notalways available)

Infantry

| ) Figures uncertainaNumber of light cavalry uncertain^January only.

% ^ ^1509 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

Figure 2. Size and composition of the armies 1509-1530. The numbers for 1530 refer to February—December after demobilization.

473

Part II:

680640600560520480440400360320280240200160120804001 509 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30

Years

Figure j . Army wage bills 1509-1530. The costs are in ducats of 6 lire 4 soldi.

due to statistical units of ioo men, arm by arm, units which contain anallowance for captains' salaries and bonus fund; where appropriate, they areadjusted from wartime to peacetime rates. An annual 12,000 ducats has beenadded to represent payments to senior officers which do not show up on paysheets, as have 10,000 ducats for the largely undocumented artillery service(in war years only) and 8000 for administrative services. In Figure 2, whichis a list of potential combatants, % man-at-arms 'lance' is counted as two menup to the end of June 1519; after the reduction in the size of the lance in thatmonth, as one man. The light cavalry 'lance' is counted as one throughout.Pioneers are not included; too little is known about either numbers or pay.Neither are militiamen, for the same reason. The only year for which theiromission makes a significant difference is 1509. According to Sanuto,60

10,000 militiamen were with the army in May. Taking cautious account ofthem, and of other Venetian subjects (about 5600) paid for short periods ofemergency enrolment, the total cost for 1509, given in Figure 3 as coveringprofessional troops only, should be nearer 720,000 ducats.

The wars started at a time when the government's budget may haveshown a surplus of c. 500,000 ducats available for extraordinary expenses.61

Until early in 1517, however, the revenue from the Terraferma was available60 Sanuto, viii, 217-21.61 Lane, Venice, 237, gives the surely too high figure of 620,000.

474


either not at all or only in part; the extent of this loss is suggested by a figureof 553,454 ducats in 1518 as the revenue derived from Padua, Vicenza,Verona, Brescia and Bergamo.62 The financial position was worsenedbecause during the majority of the war years trade with the Levant wasseriously interrupted by the steady persistence there of Turkish power. Thefigures in Figure 3 must, moreover, be imagined alongside other, less readilyanalysable expenditures: on munitions, warships and transports, war loanrepayments. The army wage bill was a heavy component of total warexpenditure, and the variations in its chronological incidence are anindication of changes in the scale of expenditure overall; but it was not justthe wages of troops that forced the government to have recourse to massiveloans from its own and other bankers,63 to forced 'gifts', the repeatedimpositions of personal taxation, lotteries and, most controversial of all, thevirtual sale of government offices, often for pathetically small sums.

Prestanze, loans to a military contractor to get his men out of their homesand into their billets, and which varied from a ducat for an infantryman to 30ducats for a four-man heavy cavalry 'lance', were theoretically repayable,but pay sheets raise considerable doubts as to whether they actually were.The same is true for the issue of arms and armour. Nor do wage calculationsinclude the cost of billets, foodstuffs bought in times of dearth (the harvestof 1527 was particularly disastrous) and subsidized at prices the ordinarysoldier could afford, or the cost of fodder for the cavalry - the cost, that is,over and above the contributions from the Terraferma communities whichwere geared to a peacetime military establishment.64 There were formalsubsidies to allies (Venice had paid 66,900 ducats by July 1512 for the pope'sSwiss infantry)65 or direct payments to their men when their real employerscould or would not get money to the camp. And there were indemnities: itcost Venice 10,000 ducats to regain Verona, another 100,000 to benefit fromthe Franco-Imperial truce of July 1518.66 Nor must the expense of naval co-operation be forgotten, though this probably rose significantly abovepeacetime levels only during the campaign in the Polesine in late 1509 andduring the amphibious phases of the war of 1528-9 in Apulia. So while (forall the caveats that have to surround them) the annual wage bills are the mostsatisfactory indication of comparative annual costs available, the notions ofcontemporaries on overall costs are not necessarily to be treated as wildguesses. Though the wage bill for the Cambrai wars, 1509-16, was some 3.562 R. Finlay, Politics in Renaissance Venice (London, 1980), 165.63 Felix Gilbert, The Pope, his Banker, and Venice (Cambridge, Mass., 1980).64 Cf. the 621,000 ducats received by Proveditor-General Pesaro (Sanuto, xliii, 442; 14 Dec. 1526) with

the 490,000 ducats due to be disbursed in wages according to the calculations described in theAppendix.

65 Dieci, Misti, reg. 35, iov (5 Apr. 1512); Sanuto, xiv, 528-9 (31 July 1512).66 Predelli, vi, 139 and 141, 149.

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million ducats, an anonymous compiler put the total expense at 5 millions.67

In mid September 1529 the Senate put the cost of the hostilities that hadbeen put in train with the Treaty of Madrid in January 1526 at 4 millionducats 'between the land armies and the navy',68 though the army wage billamounted only to just under 2 million ducats. Even taking into account thenaval element in 1528-9 and a deliberate exaggeration for propagandapurposes - the sum was mentioned as a reproach to Francis I for breakingthe contract of Cognac - the difference seems excessive. But in thebackground were high food prices and the mounting costs of anti-piracypatrols in the empire da Mar. The figure is a useful reminder that militaryestimates could be emotive as well as inefficient.

Missing from Figures 2 and 3 is any separate estimate for the standingarmy. On the mainland its absorption into the chaos of territorial loss andrecovery after Agnadello was both instant and lasting: the stable statepostulated for the period from February 1517 to the end of 1520 of 3600 menis, given the probability of renewed military involvement, no true indicatorof what was thought of as a normal defence force. The sources for the troopsmaintained overseas, alternating between drafts to reinforce the Terrafermaand movements in reverse resulting from the threat of Turkish raids,present no satisfactory overall picture: 1700 is perhaps a representativefigure.69

THE WAR OF 1537-1540

Turning now to the numbers of troops and the costs involved in the wars of1537—40,1570—3 and 1615—17, Figure 5 is based on wage rates, bonus fundsand officers' salaries. The standing army, less wastage, is included in Figure4. For lack of source material Figure 5 omits charges for artillery andadministrative services. On the other hand, it includes an allowance forconduct money, for which the evidence at last emerges with some clarity.The cost totals given, while thus not strictly comparable with those for1509-30, are not in grave disaccord. All these later wars were conductedoverwhelmingly by infantry; no attempt, therefore, has been made, as in1509-30, to distinguish the different arms, though wage differentials among

BCV., ms. Gradenigo 187, 232.Quoted by V. Vitale,' L'impresa di Puglia', 177, from SS. reg. 53,201. If the reference - which coversthe imprisonment of Francis' sons to their release under the terms of the Paix des Dames of 3 August -means their actual imprisonment rather than the decision that they should act as hostages on Francis'release, the period would run not from January but from April 1526 and the wage bill be reduced by52,500 ducats.The upper figure is a conflation of Sanuto, xl, 65-70 and xlii, 526-8.

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%!%% Newly raised troops

F^gpl Previously raised troops\MM (wastage rate 33% plus dismissals)

j ^ ^ l Standing army (wastage rate 20% p.a.)aWastage rate during winter of 1570-1 at 50%.

1537 38 39 40 1570 71 72 73Years

1615 16 17

Figure 4. Comparative size of armies in wartime 1537-1617 (infantry only).

477

CJUU

850

800

750

700

650

600

550

500O

go 450o2i

W 400

350

300

250

200

150

100

50

0

-

-

-

-

-

-

—

—

1509 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26.27 28 29 30 1537 38 39 40 1570 71 72 73 1615 16 17Years

Figure 5. Comparative wartime army wage bills 1509-1617 ('extraordinary' troops). The column for 1509 includes c. 6500 of the rapidlydismembered standing army. The costs are in ducats of 6 lire 4 soldi.

478

The costs of defence and mar

infantry and heavy and light cavalry have been taken into account.Calculations are based on contract numbers rather than muster lists (if onlySanuto had been immortal!) and contain too much guesswork as to thelength of time over which troops raised remained on the payroll.70 Conductmoney at i ducat a head is included.71 Taking changes in bonus rates andallowances for under-officers (ensigns and squad leaders) into account, theannual wage bill (ten pays) for an infantry unit of ioo men, which had been3370 ducats in 1509-29, was now 3430 ducats. The only non-Italian troopscontracted for were the troublesome 5000 Landsknechts of whom therepublic dis-embarrassed itself in June 1538 for a settlement of one and ahalf pays. Fortunately, a copy of the pay list used by the secretary,Constantin Cavezza, who was sent to settle with them survives.72 Paymentwas at the rate of 4 raynes (1=4 lire 10 soldi) per man per pay for 5152 'live'pays and 1277 'dead' pays and an extra reyne a head each for 619arquebusiers. From the dead pays (normally 106 per company of 500)supplements were paid to captains, under-officers, drummers and fifers andto such officials as the chaplain, barber-surgeon and interpreter who servedwith each company. Characteristically there is a divergence between thesum given by Cavazza as the total due for one pay, 19,110 ducats, and theSenate's figure73 of 19,882, which I take.

New troops raised were:

15371538

15391540

784513,3807500500

Allowing for the paying off of the Landsknechts in June 1538 and thedemobilization of 3800 men in August 1539 and allowing a wastage rate ofone-third each winter, the rounded sums due annually in 'extraordinary'wages were in the neighbourhood of:

1537 115,000 ducats1538 427,000 ducats1539 462,000 ducats1540 271,500 ducats

The desultory nature of the campaigning and the predominantly

70 They are taken chiefly from ST., SS. and SM. regs., as are allocations to fortifications. Note that manytroops served for only a few months.

71 E.g. SM. reg. 24, Q6V (13 Feb. 1538).72 Archivio Proprio Pinelli, Ba. 1-2, 9. Cf. SS. reg. 54, 58V-59 (12 June) to 66v (23 June).73 SS. reg. 59, 59 (12 June).

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defensive nature of Venice's strategy led to expenditure on fortifications,defensive nature ofchiefly in Dalmatia:

1537 600 ducats1538 15,900 ducats1539 44,600 ducats1540 4000 ducats

Even taken together, the amount spent on troops and fortifications in themost expensive year, 1539, when the total was over half a million ducats,represents only a proportion of the cost of the war. With 100 light galleys atsea (and crews retained during the winter) the cost of naval salaries andwages would have been at least 800,000 ducats in that year.74 And to thesesums must be added the building of new galleys and the expense of newartillery and munitions, of arms and armour lost or not fully paid for out ofwage stoppages, of food supplies and of heavy freight charges involved ingetting men and materials into the bases da Mar, plus the economicconsequences of the interruption of merchant shipping. Marco Foscari'sestimate early in 1538 of 200,000 ducats a month,75 though deliberatelyalarmist - he was arguing for a speedy settlement of the war - was not so ill-judged an estimate as to have carried no conviction.

THE WAR OF 157O-1573

With his unrivalled knowledge of the source material, Roberto Cessi askedthe question: how much did the War of Cyprus cost? and at once admittedthat owing to the absence of uniform and overall methods of accounting anattempt to provide a general picture of the financial situation was'practically hopeless'.76 What follows, though once more a restrictedinvestigation dealing only with the cost of troops, is itself as fraught as everwith uncertainties. An attempt has been made to check the numbers oftroops actually raised against the global figures recommended from time totime by the Senate and against individual contracts and movement orders.But with the College's records so inadequate and the savio alia scrittura'sunavailable, the picture must remain unfocused, especially given theunprecedented annual fall-out rate from disease and desertion, calculatedhere as one-half during the winter of 1570-1, and adjusted for the loss ofCyprus, battle casualties and demobilizations thereafter.74 A. Tenenti, Crist oforo da Canal: la marine venitienne avant Lepante (Paris, 1962) 100, estimates

7500-8000 for a light galley of free rowers in peacetime. No condannati galleys were employed as yet.75 L j u b i c , Commissiones et relationes venetae, ii, 132.76 Ibid., 141. The calculations which follow should be compared with those for Spain given in Geoffrey

Parker's admirable 'Lepanto (1571): the costs of victory', in Spain and the Netherlands(London, 1979).

480

The costs of defence and mar

Cavalry played so small a part in the campaigns (only 525 were newlyraised in 1570-1) that they have been ignored. The 3.43 ducats per pay foran infantryman has been used again, as it still fits with the average sumsallocated for base pay, bonuses and under-officers in each company.However, in this war pay in the fleet was given eleven times a year from thestart and in early December it was raised to twelve times, as it was for allinfantry serving overseas; hitherto, troops in Crete and Cyprus had beenpaid ten times, as had those in Dalmatia-Albania (though they were voted aninterim raise of one pay in November 1570). It has been assumed that thisincrease did not take effect until January 1571. Conduct money variedbetween\ ducat and 2 ducats; repatriation money for those serving overseas(as all new troops did) was 1 ducat, but given the reduced numbers who wereable to return and the scant evidence that it was paid, I have simply added 1ducat for each newly raised man in 1570-1 and 2 in 1572-3. Salaries ofcaptains have been reckoned, as in 1537-40, according to the average 300ducats p.a. for commands of 200 men; those of serving captain-entrepreneurs (in receipt of contracts for raising troops) at 1 ducat per head,the most usually quoted figure, though there were exceptions here, as for'ordinary' captains, that took account of long service or individualdistinction. Inadequate as they are,77 the numbers of new troops likely tohave been paid were:

1570157115721573

27,80013,80010,00010,000

The rounded sums due in pay to the force in being extra to peacetimerequirements were, taking account of months of service and wastage, in theneighbourhood of:

1570157115721573

Government

1570157115721573

658,000 ducats874,000 ducats719,000 ducats442,000 ducats

contributions to fortifications da Mar were:

70,000 ducats31,500 ducats15,000 ducatsNil

Again, the chief source is Senate regs. The Annali provide, at last, some of the sort of supplementarystatistical evidence provided by Sanuto. For cavalry, above, 451.

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Part II: i$og-i6i7

In troops' wages and fortifications the additional cost of the war years wasthus conceivably 2,809,500 ducats. Given the uncertainty underlying thebasis from which these calculations were made we can use the round sum of3 millions.

In justifying the separate peace it had made with the sultan in March1573, the Senate stressed the unendurable expenditure the republic hadbeen involved in. The ambassador in Rome was told to explain to the popethat 'we have spent on this war up to now considerably more than 12millions in gold [ducats]; how and whence we have managed to raise it is amatter of amazement to ourselves'.78 Later, in 1576, explaining to HenryIII of France why the republic could not advance him money, the Senateclaimed that the war had cost it 'some sixteen millions in gold'.79 In thatyear the debt left over from the war stood at 5,714,439 ducats,80 representingthe state, after partial amortization, of a sum that cannot have been in excessof 7 millions at the war's end.

This sum could well account for the 'extraordinary' costs of the four waryears: the 3 millions for troops and fortifications, and 4 millions as a by nomeans ungenerous estimate for the fleet81 and for the wages of pioneers,gunners, additional public representatives, Arsenal construction costs andsupplies of every description and their freight. If we add 'ordinary' militaryexpenditure of 0.75 millions for troops and 2 millions for the peacetimenavy, we get an estimate of total strictly military expenditure of 9.75millions. Taking into account loss of revenue from overseas, the admittedlypropagandistic estimate of 12 millions as what the republic had 'spent' byMarch 1573 is not without some credibility.

THE WAR OF GRADISCA 1 6 1 5 - 1 6 1 7

The uncertainties respecting men and costs in this war have beendescribed.82 The numbers of new troops of all nations which actuallyarrived were of the order of:

161516161617

11,6008150

9450

78 A n n a l i , 3 A p r . 1573 , 234V.79 SS. reg. 80, 115V (11 July).80 A. Stella, 'La regolazione delle pubbliche entrate e la crisi politica veneziana del 1582', Miscellanea in

onore di Roberto Cessi (Rome, 3 vols., 1958) ii, 162.81 See n. 74 above, and the contributions owed by Venice to the allied fleet cited above, 236 seq. (plus

defence patrols). Though Tenenti's figure of 8000 ducats p.a. for a light galley does not take account ofundermanning or the retention of skeleton crews in winter, the galliasses and transports with the fleetshave to be taken into account.

82 Above, 280-3, 327~9- But at least a fuller series of proveditorial relazioni now supplement theevidence in Senate regs. and Annali.

482


2 M

1 M

Standing army wages (fortifications omitted as negligible on this scale)RevenueWartime wages (average pa. for 'ordinary' and 'extraordinary' troops)

Conjectural 'total' war expenditure: troops' pay, fleet and supply(average p.a.)

1530

1609'1602

1537-40 1615-17

Figure 6. Costs of defence and war 1530-1617 in relation to revenues and conjectured totalcosts. Note: Revenue figures are based on Lane, Venice: A Maritime Republic, 426 and R.Romano, 'Economic aspects of the construction of warships in Venice in the sixteenthcentury', in Pullan, Crisis and Change in the Venetian Economy, 79. Both, but with differinginterpretations, are based on Besta, Bilanci. The figures are flawed by being in several caseswhat was expected, not received. Lane omits, as Romano does not, the Bilanci figures for1582 (3,317,906) and 1583 (3,875,848), presumably because they are at odds with the rest ofthe series. I follow Lane. Revenue in 1620 was expected to be 3,944,000. The figure given for1530 is that for 1500 and is a guess at the revenue on the resumption of normal conditions.

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Pay had been raised since the previous war; the per capita figure forinfantry that allows for bonuses and under-officers within a company forItalian, Corsican, Slav, French and Dutch troops had gone up from 3.43ducats per pay to 4.7 scudi (1 scudo = j lire). The comparable figure forGrisons and Swiss troops was now a theoretical 6.8 scudi, though penaltiesfor inadequate armament probably reduced it in practice to 6. Light cavalrywere now also paid in scudi, though additional increases are unclear.Conduct money varied from 3 to 8 ducats, depending on place of origin, andhas been allowed for. Men-at-arms, who once more played a part in thefield, received an additional 6 ducats a month when serving with an effectiveprimo piatto. There had probably never been a Venetian war in which moremoney had been handed out to captains for so few men actually fit to serve,or so much spent but unaccounted for: in May 1617 the inquisitor in campocomplained that such was the inadequacy of accounting that he could nottrace where 'more than 600,000 ducats' had gone.83 And it has been notedabove84 that out of 7737 infantry paid in Friuli in November 1616 only 2700could be found in camp in December. Though there are precise figures formen paid in camp in Friuli in other months in that year (before the arrival ofthe Dutch), figures are lacking for numbers in the base at Palma, in Istriaand in the fleet, and for the expense of paying militiamen and volunteers.The sums that follow (which include the initial expense of troops contractedfor but who did not arrive) are thus to be treated with perhaps even greatercaution than those suggested for previous wars:

1615 304,000 ducats1616 818,000 ducats1617 572,000 ducats

No appreciable amounts were spent on fortification. To this sum of1,694,000 ducats, plus 950,000 due to the standing force at wartime rates,might be added 1,125,000 for the fleet (about a quarter of the number ofvessels used in 1570-3) and at least 1 million85 for supplies, to give a possibleexpenditure of 4.75 million ducats from August 1615 to the partialdemobilization that began in September 1617.

83 SS. reg. 109, 123 (12 May).84 P. 282.85 The expenditure figures for the army of Friuli in November 1616 in Prow. Gen. in Terraferma, Ba.

55 put the expense of supernumerary personnel alone at one-fifth of the total. This does not includeunreclaimable sums for arms, armour or munitions.

484

Conclusion: the European context1525-16171

The composition of Venice's armed forces was already traditional by 1530: apermanent nucleus, supplemented in crisis or war by mercenaries andnative volunteers, and supported by a more or less trained militia. This basicformula did not change, but neither did it grow out of date. It was theformula employed by all the settled, centralized western states of com-parable or greater size.

All had a standing army of royal guards and troops in frontier garrisonsvarying in numbers from England's average of 2000 to the 12,000 of pre-Civil War France and the 23,500 maintained at the century's end by Spainin Italy, North Africa, the Azores and Canaries and Portugal as well as inSpain itself. These numbers, thanks to varying leave systems (the Frenchmen-at-arms, for instance, were, like those of Venice, on leave for half theyear in peacetime) and faulty book-keeping, are uncertain. As with Venice, a'standing army' could not be assumed to be well trained, up to effectivestrength, of uniform national origin or characterized by a high morale basedon regular pay and promotion prospects. The term represents little morethan the size of a force on which expenditure was accepted as 'ordinary'.Something more like the skill and sentiment associated with the laterconnotations of the phrase only occurred when forces were kept in beingduring particularly prolonged campaigns, as on the Hungarian-Croatianborder where the forces of Ferdinand I and Maximilian II fought the Turksyear after year or, most spectacularly in terms of the numbers employed,during Spain's wars in the Netherlands.

I mention only a few, but essential, works dealing with sixteenth-century military practice: C. G.Cruickshank, Elizabeth's Army (2nd ed., Oxford, 1966); I. Feretti,' L'organizzazione militare duranteil governo di Alessandro e Cosimo I', in Rivista Storica degli Archivi Toscani, i (1929) and ii (1930);H. A. Lloyd, The Rouen Campaign 15QO-15Q2 (Oxford, 1973); F. Lot, Recherches sur les effectifs desarmies francaises des Guerres d'ltalie aux Guerres de Religion I4g4~i$62 (Paris, 1962); H.-M. Moller,Das Regiment der Landsknechte (Wiesbaden, 1976); B. Nickle, The Military Reforms of Prince Mauriceof Orange (University Microfilms, Ann Arbor, 1975); Geoffrey Parker, The Army of Flanders and theSpanish Road 1567-165Q (Cambridge, 1972) - the book to whose stimulus I owe most of all - andSpain and the Netherlands I55g-i6$g: Ten Studies (London, 1979); F. Redlich, The German MilitaryEnterpriser and his Work Force (Wiesbaden, 2 vols., 1964-5); I. A. A. Thompson, War and Governmentin Habsburg Spain 1560-1620 (London, 1976).

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No other country could bear anything like the burden of Spain'srecurrent 'extraordinary' expenditure (which, indeed, caused a series ofstate bankruptcies), and though reformers everywhere recommended anincrease in the size of standing armies and less reliance on mercenariesbecause of the incalculable nature of their availability and quality, Venice'sreliance in wartime on hired foreign troops remained the norm. Maurice ofNassau resisted Spain with English, Scots, French and German troopswhich far outnumbered his own Frisians and Walloons. Kings of Franceclung to the Swiss special relationship and employed Italians and Germansas well as English auxiliaries (as in the Rouen campaign of 1590-2). HenryVIII's armies were among the most polyglot of the century, combiningScots, Spaniards, Germans, Burgundians, Flemings, Portuguese and evenAlbanians. Venice's composite army of 1615-17 fought an equally mongrel-ized one, Ferdinand's troops containing Croats and Dalmatians in additionto Germans, French, Spanish; only the republic's Swiss and Greeks foundno echo on the other side. Spain's foreign troops in the Netherlands, thoughspeaking a diversity of tongues (French, Italian, German), were, it is true, inthe main Habsburg subjects, but the only true exception to the Noah's Arkrule was Elizabethan England, where, denuded of Reformation spoils, thecrown's restricted income forced a revived reliance on subjects with theability to recruit locally for volunteers willing to serve abroad on a short-term basis. This increased reliance on subjects was, as we have seen, also afeature of Venetian recruiting, though in the republic's case it was caused bya shortage of available mercenaries rather than of cash. But for acombination of these reasons, against the common background of anenhanced confidence in the efficacy of central administration, there was alsoa renewed reliance on native magnates and their tenants or clients in Spainand — during the intermissions between the civil wars — in France.

Militias, as an essential back-up to defence programmes and, moremodestly, as components within combat forces, were used throughoutwestern Europe, though, as in the case of native volunteer soldiers, theincidence of their effectiveness and use varied according to local circum-stances. Spain never succeeded in persuading local communities to acceptresponsibility on an effective national scale. In France, the supersession ofthe Francs-archers in 1534 by the 42,000-strong Legions was, on paper, themost impressive European example of a national military reserve. Butthough confirmed in 1558 the Legions - even before the Huguenot challengeto central authority of 1562 - were more impressive as a concept than as areality. In England restricted income, political reluctance to increase taxesand the lack of credibility on international money markets that led to asharply reduced reliance on mercenaries produced in 1573 legislation for'trained bands' within the traditional militia as a supplement to the neo-

486

Conclusion: the European context 1525-161 y

feudal levies which the crown came to rely on. Though employed in action,their performance was not such as to challenge Venice's claim (especiallywhen the utility of its civic gunnery' schools', which had no equally effectiveparallel elsewhere, is taken into account) to have produced the longest-livedand the most reliable of Europe's organized militia systems.

Finally, if the composition of Venice's armed forces resembled that ofstates beyond the Alps, it is not surprising to find them mirrored in the othernotable independent Italian state, Tuscany, where Cosimo I maintained asmall permanent ducal guard and garrison force, a roster of native magnatesand foreigners (German, Swiss, Romagnol, Lombard, Neapolitan andCorsican) on stand-by contract to supply mercenaries in case of war, and amilitia estimated at some 30,000 men.

The escalation in army numbers which resulted from more cannon-prooffortifications (and thus more emphasis on blockade) and the outmoding ofexpensive heavy cavalry by comparatively cheap foot soldiers armed withpike, arquebus or musket took the French total from the 28,000 men at Paviathrough the 38,000 arrayed against Metz in 1552 to the 68,000 Henry IVreckoned as his contribution to the anti-Habsburg alliances of 161 o, andHabsburg numbers from the 26,000 at Pavia to Charles V's 55,000 at Metzand the 86,000 in Spanish pay in the Netherlands in 1574. In 1544 HenryVIII raised, between English and mercenary troops, an army of 48,000, butthereafter the largest force raised in any one year was the 12,620 garneredfor service in Ireland in 1601, where it formed a total force of17-18,000. That Venice could maintain averages of 33,400 troops in 1570-3and of 23,500 in 1615-17 suggests the republic's position in the Europeanmilitary league (especially when compared with the 8000 raised by Cosimo Iagainst Siena in 1554) even though all totals mask both statisticaluncertainties and the different circumstances and aims that conditionedrecruitment. We have seen that because of the shortage of availablemercenaries Venice's forces in the War of Gradisca were well below whatthe government felt it could afford and control.

Because of the universal criss-cross use of mercenaries, the aviddiscussion of military affairs in seldom-censored and increasingly well-illustrated books, and the pertinacious inquiries of diplomatic agents, therewere no military 'secrets' of the slightest importance in the sixteenthcentury. Novel means of attack and defence were offered to governments byinventors and were (perhaps with unique thoroughness in the case ofVenice) experimented with, but none passed into the everyday technicalrepertory of war. As a result Venice was now abreast of, now lagged behind,the armies of other powers in such matters as the proportion of cavalry toinfantry, armour, weapons and the proportions of those bearing them (pike,halberd, arquebus, musket per 100 men); seldom notably retrograde if never

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a pioneer. And it was the same with military architecture and the techniquesof siegecraft.

Company organization and the brigading of men into larger units forpurposes of muster and pay were similarly in line with common practice.Nothing can usefully be said of tactics. Innovation was, in any case, largelyrestricted to the later-sixteenth-century campaigns in the Netherlands,though even in this 'School of War', as the region was frequently called,there was little correlation between what the training manuals called for andwhat actually occurred in the field. Venice's employment of senior officersand individual captains who had seen service in active theatres of war,notably in France, the Austrian-Turkish borderlands and the Netherlands,certainly meant that there was nothing isolated about the militaryknowledge available to the republic. Given the untypical, amphibiousnature of the campaigns of 1537-40 and 1570-3 and the desultory, attrition-motivated conduct of the War of Gradisca, however, the merits of a militarysystem which - unlike those of transalpine Europe - placed command in thehands of men who were professional soldiers but were not native subjectscannot be assessed on a comparative basis.

In any case, no Venetian army used the full potential of the paper strengthit contained. The preceding chapters have recorded a sorry toll ofcomplaints about the slackness of garrison troops, the falsification ofwartime numbers by captains, and the bedraggled, under-equipped andunenthusiastic nature of too many of their men. But any detailed study of asixteenth-century army must make the same points. Even the longest-surviving tercios in the School of War itself were racked by mutinies inprotest against the defalcations of captains and the tardiness of pay. Fromthe initial fudging of muster lists and the choice of men too poor or pitiful tobribe their way out of enlistment to the failure of governments to delivercash on time to paymasters, the story, country by country, is the same: theyeast of enthusiasm in some individuals, the self-imposed morale of somelong-service units, the weight of those who at best allowed themselves to beherded into the adrenalin pool of action - these were the factors makingbattles occasionally take place and sieges succeed against the odds set bycorruption, inefficiency and wastage from disease and desertion. ThatVenice's armies, which, being in the main mongrel and devoid of religious orpolitical enthusiasm, held together and conducted such actions as they did isa tribute to the rapport between government and senior officers and theefficiency of the civilian overseers who kept the military task force at its job.

For while financial corruption and such offences as the pawning of armsfor drink were probably as rife among 'good' as among bad captains andsoldiers, Venice shared a problem common to all states: the obtaining ofrecruits sufficiently motivated to be determined soldiers.

488

Conclusion: the European context 1525-1617

The need for larger armies coincided with a reluctance to serve in them.In spite of the growth in Europe's population, the vast majority of familiesremained - with an average 2.3-4.0 children - too small readily to give upthe labour of adult males. The 'steady' peasant or artisan saw no advantagein soldiering. If real poverty encroached, then there were better alternatives:militia service, with its tax exemptions, or, when it was available, a second,moonlighting occupation. Bourgeois values, however much they aspiredtowards those of the aristocracy, stopped short of a military service that hadno guaranteed or reputed career structure, in an age when, because ofgovernmental prior claims, the opportunities of making a quick fortunethrough ransom or loot were rare. Though men of aristocratic or - and theshadings are numerous - near-aristocratic birth looked increasingly to non-military forms of court employment to supplement their income from landor the iconic capital of their coats of arms, many were still prepared to fight;but they were in a minority that had no impact on the construction ofarmies. The sixteenth century gives little support to those who claim thatwars are inevitable because men want to fight in them. A high rate ofpersonal violence, indeed of organized brigandage and piracy, coexistedwith a reluctance to blend into the slow, disease-ridden marches and the farmore frequent and almost as desperate leisures of military service. Andwhen it was over? Shakespeare's Boult, in Pericles, spoke from common, notmerely English knowledge: 'what would you have me do? go to the wars,would you? where a man may serve seven years for the loss of a leg, and havenot money enough in the end to buy him a wooden one?' The response tothe recruiters' drums was so disappointing in quantity and dubious inquality that it was by no means only Venice that lifted the sentences of menbanished for crimes of violence in return for their enlistment.

Indifferent armies were the result of unattractive wages. In the appendixon wages that follows it is suggested that for rankers military service wasconceived as no better than a subsistence occupation. For many, thanks toillegal stoppages made by captains, or the high level of food prices in times ofshortage, it was not even that, as is shown by the high incidence ofdesertions. And the Venetian wage pattern holds good for most of westernEurope. Thanks to the engagement by governments of troops of manydifferent national origins, and the employment of men from the same nationby rival governments, the military tariff was an international one. Therewere some local distinctions. Up to the 1540s Landsknechts and Swiss couldobtain a slightly higher wage than other infantry; thereafter, their armamentand tactics were insufficiently distinctive to give them this advantage. Andthere were moments, as in the War of Gradisca, when a particularly graveshortage led to higher offers to foreign contingents. Such offers, however,lest they should lead to increased wage demands throughout an army, were

489

Part II:

fed in through the use of dead-pay and bonus systems and affected thepockets of captains rather than those of their men.

Standard wage levels for rankers, those on base rate and those paid asupplement for carrying body armour or the heavy musket were, up to themid century, on a par with those of unskilled or semi-skilled labourers andcraftsmen, N.C.O. rates were about those of skilled craftsmen. During thesecond half of the century, however, army wages dropped behind theequivalent earnings, and though changes in the value of money probablymeant that the soldier's pay still represented a true subsistence wage in spiteof price rises, in comparison to civilians he knew himself to be worse off.This disparity was perhaps less marked among Spanish and Dutch troops inthe Netherlands wars. There, exceptionally, the men from the Habsburgdomains were employed over a period long enough for collective bargainingto become a reality, and the Dutch government, righting for political andconfessional survival, was similarly constrained to give a soldier's occup-ation a financial edge over a civilian one.

Two fundamental differences, however, remained to make the transitionfrom civilian to military life unattractive save to the restless, the misfit, thethug or the romantic. One, obviously, was that death was more likely to bepart of the soldier's than the labourer's or craftsman's wage packet. Theother was the proportion of pay that was withheld as the amortization of aloan. The concept - applicable to the weaver's loom or a carpenter's tools -was familiar. But in no other occupation was the proportion held back sohigh. It was reckoned that out of an English soldier's annual pay (8d. a dayfrom c. 1552) of £12. 35.4^., after stoppages for arms, clothing, government-provided victuals and contributions for medical, spiritual and administrat-ive services, only £1. 25. 2d. was given in cash. Cash residues varied, ofcourse, country by country and campaign by campaign, especially inrelation to the extent to which troops were fed by contractors or chaffereddirectly with vendors, but the English 5. id. a week seems a not unreasonableEuropean average; too easily spent on a supplement to rations, a gamblingdebt (no wonder these gave rise to so many violent altercations!) or one ofthe women camp-followers, the sum supports the view of military service asa subsistence occupation and, at that, an insecure one.

Behind reluctant recruitment into a poorly paid occupation lay theproblem of governmental financing of war.

With the occasional exception of Spain, with its metallic revenuewindfalls from the New World, war meant debt. Though France as early as1532, and England and Venice as late as the 1580s, attempted to retain cashfrom normal income against the cost of a future war, these war-chests onlydelayed the inevitable moment when government had to turn to local orinternational financiers for loans. To loans because though additional

490

Conclusion: the European context 1525-1617

taxation, demands for emergency 'gifts' and debasement of the currencycould be resorted to, there were social and political limits of forbearancewhich could not be passed in safety, and, in any case, apart from 'gifts',these sources of relief took more time to operate than the bills for wages,equipment, provisions and transport, not to mention subsidies to allies,could wait for. And the only security states could offer for loans - or for theinterest payable on war debt bonds - was the anticipation of its own incomefrom direct and indirect taxation. The financing of war was, then, madepossible by mortgaging future revenue and, unless a state declared itselfbankrupt, thus cancelling all obligations, as the Spanish crown risked doing,limited in scope by the extra difficulty of raising compensatory income fromduties and taxes in peacetime. State revenues rose, it is true, fairlyconsistently in the long term from the mid century, but so did the desirablesize of armies. The only way to prevent war becoming economic suicide wasto keep wages, the largest element of expenditure, as low as possible, andthus untempting to men of potentially the best calibre. And similarly,permanent armies in peacetime which in theory, as contemporary reformerspointed out, should have been capable of disseminating high standards ofdiscipline and morale amidst the ad hoc hordes of wartime recruitment, werepaid so little as to remain - and the complaint was not restricted to Venetianofficials - scarcely more disciplined than the civilian population they wereexpected to protect and at times police.

For all the allowances that must be made for local circumstances, in theorganization and the performance of its armed forces Venice operatedwithin the major constraints experienced by the other independent westernpowers. And there are other areas in which the detail accorded here to onestate can illumine by analogy the practice of others.

Venice's programme of refortifying alia moderna places of strategicimportance was echoed by Tuscany, England, France, Holland, some of thelarger German states and, most nearly a parallel because of the Imperialcommitment, Spain. But the republic's investment in static defence was,perhaps, uniquely pondered and unintermittent because Venice alone sawfortifications as a deterrent integral with a deliberate policy of neutrality.

The republic's reliance on non-Venetian senior officers was paralleledonly in Tuscany; other states did employ foreigners (as Spain came toemploy the Genoese Ambrosio Spinola as commander-in-chief in theNetherlands) but not as a deliberate policy. Was this a better policy than theemployment of native grandees who, however great their natural authority,frequently had to learn as they went along? In effect, the question has abearing only in peacetime, when Venice's commanders were able to devotemore time than could their counterparts elsewhere to tours of inspection ofgarrisons, militia and gunner units and fortifications. In war all important

491

Part II: i$og-i6i7

tactical decisions were taken in consultation with professional subordinatecommanders and within strategic options set by government, whetherthrough representatives in the field, restrictive commissions of appointmentor dispatches from home: usually all three. Venice's general officers werelooked on and, with few exceptions, behaved as though they were honoraryVenetians; and they did not have other, conflicting axes of interest, politicalor economic, to grind within their employer's domains. But a discussion ofthe rival command systems rapidly breaks down into a consideration ofindividuals at the few moments before or during an action when personalinitiative really counted, and such scrutiny reveals the scant usefulness ofpitting one system against the other.

Venice's system of shadowing military commanders with civilianproveditors has been described in some detail in this book. But nogovernment was prepared to let its most massive investments manoeuvreunsupervised. Besides, in an age of permanent diplomacy but ad hoc combatarmies, military forces were seen very clearly as extensions of foreign policyand could not be allowed to take on a life of their own. So much is clear,though the nature of political control has not yet been studied closely forother countries. It can be claimed that the relationship between governmentand armed forces was particularly close and acceptable to both sides in therepublic, but it is a claim that awaits contradiction.

Finally, what about 'modernity' - the thesis that war in the sixteenthcentury played a predominant role in proto-national cohesion, the develop-ment of state bureaucracies and the sophistication of public finance: theindicators that government was moving into at least a post-medieval phase?Does the Venetian experience confirm this suggestion, so frequentlyrephrased since its formation by Max Weber?

Certainly in the post-Cambrai period of reconstruction on the Terra-ferma the need for greater co-operation in militia and gunnery service andin the building of fortifications led to increased contacts between govern-ment and governed; more orders were sent, via public representatives, fromthe lagoon; more complaints and supplications were received there. Anincreased proportion of the income due to regional treasuries came to beearmarked for a military expenditure determined by Venice. Generalmusters of the militia and their switching from place to place at times ofmobilization, and the wide geographical area from which labour wassummoned for the most ambitious defence programmes, did something,perhaps, to break down the persistent regionalism - backed as it was by acarefully maintained tradition of local self-government - of Venice'spossessions. Votes of confidence, as it were, in the loyalty of its subjectsbecame more notable, from the temporary permission given in 1570 to allthe male citizens of Udine to bear arms or the wide reliance on native

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Conclusion: the European context 1525-161J

volunteers during the Sarpi crisis and the Gradisca War. But if there wassome modest increase in the cohesion between the Terraferma regions andthe capital it was caused more by gratitude for peace and fear of Lombardand Alpine neighbours than by the machinery of military preparedness.And it must be seen in relation to other factors: patterns of landholding,inter-regional commerce, and the Venetianization of the senior clergy, andthe shared preoccupation with the mounting problem of law and order.

Nor was there any significant change in the bureaucratic machinery thatraised, equipped, transported, paid and sometimes fed the armed forces. Inthe process of acquiring and governing an empire by land and sea, andadministering a navy and the state-organized merchant fleets, Venice hadlong acquired a bureaucracy which could accept additional responsibilitieswithout the need for an inflation of numbers or the creation of newpermanent posts. In a sense the Venetian patriciate, while also directingpolicy, making laws and commanding warships, actually was itself abureaucracy, its members being prepared to perform supervisory, executiveand accounting functions elsewhere deputed to men outside the traditionalruling caste; internally there was a distinction between patrician offices andthose under the jurisdiction of the 'citizen' chancery, but it was not adistinction that made much sense outside the republic. Though unique inthis way, Venice's failure in the sphere of military administration was aninternational one: the lack of middle-echelon civil servants sufficientlynumerous, numerate and well paid, steadily and uncorruptibly to patrol thepassage of money from government fiat to army in the field or fleet.

Similarly, the costs of territorial expansion within the confines of a zoneof exceptional financial maturity meant that the challenge of raising anddiscounting credit for military emergencies had been coped with in waysthat required no fundamental rethinking in the sixteenth century.

There are, then, in this account of Venetian military organization, manyparallels with and some divergencies from the practice of other countries. Itcan thus add to a more general understanding of the significance of'war' inthe period it covers. All the same, it must remain primarily a contribution tounderstanding the special nature of the government, the people and theproblems of the republic.

493

Appendix: Infantry wages in the sixteenthcentury

Among military facts, the most important before the introduction ofsophisticated industrialized technology was the wage of the rankerinfantryman. It determined, more than any other figure, the overall cost ofdefence and war; it was crucial to the quantity and quality of recruitment.Mulcted of legitimate stoppages and illegal withholdings, it conditioned thelife experience of the soldier. Given the nature of the sources1 it is easier toassess the official wage than the sum that actually went into an individual'spocket on pay day.

The basic unit in the annual wage was the paga or' pay'. In peacetime thiswas given out every 45 days, or eight times a year, up to 1589, when ten paysbecame the norm on the Terraferma.2 Overseas, where the cost of living washigher, ten pays had been given as a temporary measure to attract new draftsin 1568 and early 1570.3 From November 1573 ten pays became the norm daMar;4 this was temporarily increased to twelve in periods of dearth and in1592 monthly pay was made permanent in Dalmatia.5 In 1601 this rate wasextended to Corfu and Crete.6 On the Terraferma twelve pays becamestandard, garrison by garrison, in 1600-17 though this was not confirmed asthe new norm until 1615.8

From 1509 the standard wartime rate, both for the permanent garrisonforce and for new recruits, was ten pays a year at home and overseas. Withhostilities between 1509 and 1529 restricted to the mainland, troops da Marwere paid only eight times a year. For the Turkish War of 1537-40 thewartime scale was introduced in October 1537 for new recruits,9 andgrudgingly applied to troops already serving overseas early in 1538.10 It was

Chiefly Senate Deliberazioni regs.ST. reg. 58, 198V (29 Feb.); reg. 59, 40V-41 (6 May). Confirmed SS. reg. 89, 20-20V (6 June 1542).SM. reg. 38, 72V (14 Feb); reg. 39, 98 (8 Feb.), 99V-100 (16 Feb.).SM. reg. 41, 219 (14 Nov.).SS. reg. 89, 45V (27 July).SS. reg. 94, 17V-18 (24 Mar.).ST. reg. 70, 104V (12 Oct. 1600) seq.; reg. 71 (22 Mar. and 7 Apr.).SS. reg. 104, 230-230V (27 Feb.).SM. reg. 60 (20 Oct.).A decision of 29 Nov. 1537 to introduce the wartime rate for troops already in garrison as well as thosenewly raised for service overseas was deferred (SM. reg. 24, 75V).

494

Infantry wages in the sixteenth century

dropped within a few weeks of the peace treaty with the sultan of 2 Oct.1548.11

For the War of 1570-3 the wartime base rate was at last changed. Thearmy hired in March 1570 to sail with the fleet was promised eleven pays12

and from November the rate for service in garrison or in the field was raisedto the twelve pays a year, which lasted for the duration of the war,13 andwhich from December 1572 was also applied to service at sea.14

Henceforward payment by the true calendar month (instead of the'month' of 38 or 45 days) became habitual when raising additional troops intime of crisis. Thus twelve pays were offered the Corsicans, French andGrison troops contracted for in 1599-1601,15 and the reinforcements calledfor during the Sarpi crisis of 1606 were to be paid monthly.16 When freshtroops' services were retained after demobilization, moreover, their pay wasnot cut as formerly by reducing the number of pays, but by setting a pay unitof a lower value.17 Monthly payments were the norm throughout the War ofGradisca both for professional troops and militiamen.

The value of one 'pay' for the infantryman remained unchanged from1509 to the end of the century at 3 ducats. This ducat was not the coin of thesame name but a money of account, valued at 6 lire and 4 soldi or, as the liracontained 20 soldi, at 124 soldi. On pay days men were issued with smallchange {piccoli, quatrini, bagatini, sesini etc.) which was reckoned at the timeto amount to the cash value of 3 ducats of account - a transaction which gavescope for considerable peculation.18 Occasionally during the Turkish wars,as a special incentive to men to enlist at a moment of great urgency or forunpopular, risky duties (like the relief of Famagosta),19 the 'pay' was raisedfrom 3 to 4 ducats. More commonly, a rise was expressed by substituting for3 ducats 3 scudi, the gold coins quoted in 1570 as having a value of 7 lire (arise of 2 lire and 8 soldi per pay) or - though rarely - 3 zecchini, the gold coinrated at 8 lire and 12 soldi.20 From 1599, given the increasing difficulty ofrecruiting 'extraordinary' infantry, the base pay was at last expressed11 E.g. SS. reg. 61, 4 3v (23 Oct. 1540).12 SS. reg. 76, 66 (21 Mar.). Confirmed SM. reg. 39, 149V (4 Apr.).13 SS. reg. 77, 31 (23 Nov.). Confirmed in a parte of 7 Dec. (ibid., 33 and SM. reg. 39, 256) which

stressed that this was because of the high cost of living da Mar.14 SS. reg. 78, 154 (13 Dec), meeting complaints that Venetians were paid at a lower rate than Spanish

troops.15 SS. reg. 92, I IO- I IOV (28 Mar. 1599); ST. reg. 69, 89V (9 Sept. 1599) and SS. reg. 92, 183V-184 (20

Nov. 1599); SS. reg. 94, 17V (24 Mar. 1601).16 E.g. SS. reg. 97, 98 (7 Dec).17 E.g. ST. reg. 81, 49V (29 Apr. 1611); from 4 ducats to 3 ducats, 2 lire and 8 soldi.18 E.g. ST. reg. 47, 146V-147 (21 Dec. 1569).19 Dieci, Secreta, reg. 9, 115V (29 Dec).20 For a payment in zecchini, SM. reg. 39,99-100 (16 Feb. 1570). The value of the scudo was set at 6 lire

and 14 soldi in 1528, when there was a resolution - not implemented - to pay in terms oiscudi ratherthan ducats (SS. reg. 53, 13; 16 Apr.).

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Appendix

habitually in scudi: 3 for the permanent force, 4 for additional troops onshort-term contracts.21 In 1606 there was a further increase bringing allinfantry up to 4 ducats, though as the 'ducat' for this purpose was rated at 6lire the increase above 3 scudi was only 60 soldi?2 From early in 1616 untilthe end of the War of Gradisca the base pay was 4 scudi of 7 lire each.23

In terms of soldi of account, then, the daily wage of the common soldiercan be expressed through the period as follows:

1509-881589-981599-16051606-15

1509-691570-981599-16051606-151616—17

Peacetime rate8.15

10.1913.815-78

Wartime or mobilization rate10.1912.2313-8I5-7818.41

Given the uncertainty as to the purchasing power of the coins reckoned atany time to be the equivalent of the soldo, it is perhaps preferable to comparethese wages with those of other occupations rather than with the actual costof necessities. In the mid sixteenth century unskilled labourers in theArsenal received 8 to 10 soldi a day. Between 1522 and 1601 the daily wage ofthe 'free' galley oarsmen rose from 5.42 soldi24 to 6.02;25 but in addition theywere given basic rations: biscuit or bread and one meal of vegetable soup.Between 1545 and 1615 the average daily wage of building labourers rosefrom 18 soldi to 41.63.26 In terms of wages, soldiers came well towards thebottom of the social ladder.

The wages quoted above apply to the lowest-paid, least-skilled infantry-man. To take account of the extra fatigue, skill or danger which the handling

21 E.g. SS. reg. 92, I IO-I IOV (28 Mar. 1599).22 Four ducats was regularly quoted as equivalent to 24 lire (e.g. SM. reg. 73, 142-142V; 21 Dec. 1615).

Garrison rates may have been reduced in some towns during the comparatively peaceful period1607-14, though 4 ducats was being paid in 1610 (Senato, Dispacci Rettori, Verona (23 June),enclosing muster list of 20 June).

23 E.g. SS. reg. 105, 319V-321 (9 Feb. 1606); reg. 106, 119V (7 Apr. 1616); ST. reg. 87, 7V-9 (3 Mar.1617). To enable payments to be made when scudi were in short supply and captains had to be givenzecchini instead, it was pointed out that the zecchino was now valued at 10 lire and 12 soldi (SS. reg.106, 116-117V; 5 Apr. 1616).

24 SM. reg. 20, 7-8V (18 Mar.).25 S M . reg. 6 1 , 44-6V.26 Brian Pul lan , 'Wage -ea rne r s and the Venet ian economy, 1550-1630 ' , in Pullan (ed.) , Crisis and

Change in the Venetian Economy in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (London, 1968) 174. Thiswas for casual, day-paid labour.

496


of certain weapons involved, captains were expected to use a proportion ofthe caposoldo, or bonus fund (commonly, throughout the period, reckonedat 10% of the wages due to a company),27 to reward their users. At first littleconcern was paid by government to the proportion of arms - pikes and otherpole-arms to firearms — in a company though it gave an indication in 1528that arquebusiers should be paid extra.28 It was not until the late 1540s thatgovernmental orders, rather than a commander's idiosyncrasies or thehiring of specialist troops en bloc, reflected the need to rationalize the armingof companies. This was shown first in regulations concerning the force overwhich immediate professional control could be exerted, the militia. In 1548the proportion to be aimed at was ordered to be 10% partisan men orhalberdiers, 30% arquebusiers and 60% pikemen, of whom 10% should becorsaletti, heavily armoured front-rank men.29 Ten years later it wasacknowledged that corsaletti should be given, on training days, 18 soldiinstead of the normal 12.30 A further regulation called for the proportion ofcorsaletti to reach 20% by 1589.3I But it was not until the war of 1570-3 thatprofessional companies were expected to have 20% corsaletti and tocompensate them from the caposoldo with an extra 4 lire and 10 soldi?2

The final erosion of a mercenary captain's privilege of allocating thecaposoldo at his own whim only occurred in 1592 when Venice, already latein accepting the role of the front-line pikeman, at last recognized theimportance of the musket in professional hands: while the former were to bepaid not 4^ but 5 soldi from the caposoldo per pay, the latter were to receive 7.This was, in fact, the death knell of the discretionary caposoldo system. From1599 payments to all ranks and arms were spelled out in contracts.

Again the new policy was first applied within the militia. In 1593 paymenton exercise days was set out at: arquebusiers, 12 soldi a day; pikemen (as allnow were armoured the distinction between corsaletti and picche secche33 wasdropped), 18; musketeers, 24«34 A late reference to the caposoldo (nowshrunk to 6%) as the source of bonus payments to pikemen and musketeersoccurred in March 1599.35 In September came the first of a long series of

27 Venice had to bow to the higher proportion of'paghe morte' or 'dead pays' insisted on by Swiss andGerman military entrepreneurs (Sanuto, xlii, 423 on a Swiss demand for 2790 dead or extra pays for aforce of 5789 - Archivio Proprio Pinelli, Ba. 1-2, 9, for 106 soprapaghc for a company of 500Landsknechts).SS. reg. 53, 13V (16 Apr.).ST. reg. 35, 179 bis - 182 (26 July).ST. reg. 41, 144V.ST. reg. 45, 24V-26V (24 May 1564).SM. reg. 40, 9V-10 (17 Mar. 1571).For this term, see Rossi, 'Le armature da munizione e l'organizzazione delle cernide nel bresciano',table c.Ibid., 176 n. 45.SS. reg. 92, IIO-IIOV (28 Mar.).

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Appendix

contracts which set wage differentials for professional private soldiers:against the standard 4 scudi a month for the short-service 'soldato privato',i.e. the private neither wearing heavy armour (the corsaletto) nor carrying aheavy firearm (the musket and its rest), and 5 scudi for the armouredpikeman and the musketeer.36 When, in 1606, the increase for all infantry to4 ducats was established, the differential was expressed as: arquebusiers, 4;pikemen, 4 ;̂ musketeers, 5.37 The 1616 rise (replacing ducats by scudi)maintained the differential but brought pikemen level with musketeers at 5scudi per pay, as against the arquebusier's 4 scudi.3S Realistically, in view ofthe difficulty of raising any troops at all, the proportion of arms was seldomspelled out; the theoretical ideal was, however, expressed in an order of 1615that a militia draft for Friuli should contain musketeers, pikemen andarquebusiers in equal thirds and the same proportion was specified forprofessional companies during that winter.39 By the end of the war thecaposoldo had shrunk to a mere 40 ducats per pay per company to beawarded not for any particular form of service but solely on the basis ofpersonal merit.40

It is unprofitable to tabulate differentials until they were determined bygovernment. So no chronological table is attempted here. It probablysuffices to point out that the maximum daily wage that the ordinaryinfantryman in a specialized arm could achieve was 23 soldi a day. That wasin 1616, when the building labourer got 41.63 - but not on holidays.

A company of 100-plus infantry would in theory have one sergeant (or, ifit were the captain's own company, an ensign, or alfiero), & corporal(caporale or capo disquadra) and a drummer (tamburro). Government recordshave little to say of them, presumably because their wage above the base ratefor the ordinary infantryman came, at the captain's discretion, from thecaposoldo. Financially it was in the captain's interest to keep the number ofN.C.O.S low, so that he could pocket the wage supplements, and it isdoubtful whether they were ever up to strength. A further disincentive toappointing them was the custom whereby the supplement paid to N.C.O.Swas large enough for them to maintain a ragazzo, or servant.

Occasionally governmental guide-lines break the silence. In 1571, forinstance, N.C.O. wages were defined as: corporal, 6 ducats per pay;sergeant, 10; ensign, 14.41 It was not until 1599, however, that contractsregularly stipulated the wages, inclusive of base pay, that were allowed forN.C.O.S. Corporals were to receive twice the base pay; sergeants, three

ST. reg. 69, 120 (14 Oct.).SS. reg. 97, 98 (7 Dec).E.g. ST. reg. 87, 145V-146 (19 Aug. 1617).ST. reg. 85, 172 (30 Nov.), 2i5v-2i6 (29 Dec. 1615), 235 (7 Jan. 1616).ST. reg. 87, 7V-9V (3 Mar. 1617).Annali, 281-2 (14 Dec).

498


times; and ensigns, four times. It was partly on the assumption that thesepayments would be made, and checked, that the bonus fund was loweredfrom 10% to 6% - i.e. from ten to six dead pays per ioo men.42 Whendrummers were mentioned, their wage was specified as i scudo above basepay. These differentials held good until the end of the War of Gradisca.

Assuming that all N.c.o. positions were actually filled in companies of150, 6% of soldiers below the rank of lieutenant could expect to earn - totake 1616 again - in soldi per day:

Ensign 73-64Sergeant 47.34Corporal 36.82Drummer 23

Thus only 1.33% of men who enlisted as N.C.O.s or private soldiers couldexpect to earn more than a building labourer.

The sums given so far, however, represent maxima which were seldom ifever attained.

There were times, especially during the campaigns of 1509-29, when ashortage of coin led to troops being paid in kind: wine, grain or - mostcommonly — cloth.43 As the resale value of what the individual did not needhimself of these commodities was always less than the value set on them bygovernment or captains, the result was a net loss to the soldier.

A more constant source of discrepancy between wages due and actuallypaid was the system of stoppages. The base wage was calculated on theassumption that the ranker or N.C.O. arrived ready to serve. He seldom did.He had to be issued with all or any of: shoes and hose, shirt, tunic, armour(depending on his weapon and, in the case of pikemen, his wish to earn thebonus paid to front-rank troops) and arms. Anything issued — including theblankets and palliasses that could make the difference between health andsickness, often fatal, on shipboard or during winter duty in Dalmatia - hadto be paid for in instalments stopped from each pay.

Typical prices of armour and arms in the 1560s and 70s were, in soldi:

Helmet (depending on type)BreastplateCorsaletSwordHalberdPikeArquebus (simple)

41-99248620

6262

100144

42 S S . reg. 92 , 1 0 0 - i o v (29 M a r . 1599), 183V-184 (20 Nov . ) ; reg. 97, 98 (7 D e c . 1606). A variation was:base pay, 4 scudi (as in all cont rac ts of this date) ; corporal , 7; sergeant , 9; ensign, 16 ( S T . reg. 69; 9Sep t . 1599).

43 E .g . Diec i , Mis t i , reg. 35,1V (4 M a r . 1512); S a n u t o , xx, 304 (17 J u n e 1515), 572 (26 Aug.) ; xxi, 426 (30Dec); SS. reg. 100, 212 (2 Jan. 1611).

499

Appendix

A man without equipment of his own, enlisting as an arquebusier, wouldneed a simple helmet, sword and an arquebus; it would be wise for him alsoto have a breastplate. Together, these items would cost him 495 soldi (if hiscaptain issued them at cost: by no means certain). Repayment conditionsvaried, but were never spread over more than a year. For equipment,therefore, his daily wage of 8.15 soldi in peacetime and 12.23 m wartimewould be docked by 1.35 soldi. But conditions were seldom so favourable.Because short-term contracts in time of crisis or war were the rule,governments sought to get back the sums they advanced to captains forraising, transporting and equipping troops as quickly as possible, andcaptains were still more anxious to recoup their loans before men fell sick ordeserted. So the stoppage over the first three or four pays might be imposedat a rate as high as 25%. This led men to pawn equipment almost as soon asthey had received it (though pawnbrokers were forbidden to accept armsand armour) and then desert because they could no longer qualify to receivea wage. It was with this in mind that in the early seventeenth centurygovernment tried to insist that the stoppage should be spread over eightmonths and offered to buy in equipment that had not yet been boughtoutright, at its second-hand value.44

Neither private soldier nor N.C.O. received any perquisites apart frombarrack accommodation or free quarters in civilian houses.45 Captains weregiven conduct money at so much a head to raise and transport troops, butthis was so calculated and distributed as to avoid any profit to the individualsoldier. Similarly, turn-off pay to enable a man to return home ondemobilization included no element of bonus: indeed, its inadequacy was afrequent source of contention. Each man had to find his own clothing andfood and drink during service, including service or transport at sea (apartfrom ship's biscuit); in 1570 the stoppage for extra food at sea was 33.3% ofthe daily wage 46 It was very seldom that pay was increased to take account oftemporary price rises due to local food shortages.47

No personal accounts survive for a private soldier. This is not surprising,as the vast majority were illiterate. But we are at the mercy of statisticalevidence that points to soldiering (not only in Venetian service: the republicon the whole kept abreast of other wage rates) as a subsistence occupation.And not always that; drawing on his experience on the Terraferma and in

44 E.g. SS. reg. 97, 98 (7 Dec. 1606).45 Barracks were built on an increasing scale in garrison towns on the Terraferma and overseas, largely

because householders protested at the threat soldiers posed to 'wives, daughters , sisters and similaryoung persons ' (Collegio, Secreta, Relazioni, B a . 61 , 9 1 ; 1550). I t seems that the principle of freebillets was not fully accepted overseas by 1549 (SS. reg. 7 1 , 75V; 28 Jan.) .

46 S S . reg. 76, 66 (21 Mar ) .47 SM. reg. 41, 219 (14 Nov. 1573), increase for troops in Marano and Corfu.

500


Dalmatia, Giulio Savorgnan in 1570 estimated a wastage rate of 30%-plusdue to the troops' inability to live on their wages.48

For a peasant proprietor in a cultivable area, perhaps the most covetableobject was a draught ox. In 1566 the price of an ox, cash down, was reckonedat 2976 soldi or, more realistically, 4464 soldi if bought on credit;49 a privatesoldier on base pay would, after equipping himself, have to serve for 656days in peace, or 486 in war, to earn this sum; and then only if he abstainedtotally from spending it on food, drink and the replacement of worn-outclothing.

48 Mater ie Miste Notabil i , B a . n , 139-140 (12 Sept.) .49 Capi di Guer ra , Le t te re , B a . s -v (Giacomo Valvasone).

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509

Index

Abano, 34accountants, 282-3Adda, river, 7, 35, 36, 39, 41, 61, 63, 93, 94,

96, 176, 184, 207, 252Adige, river, 53, 88, 89, 96, 98, 120 n. 83, 207,

253, 265, 410, 414, 415Adria, 90Adriatic Sea, 8, 9, 12, 15, 19, 33, 57, 97, 237,

243, 260, 443, 460Agnadello, battle of, 1, 4, 5, 57, 87, 121 n. 86,

175, 199, 210, 221, 248, 252, 295, 313-14,330, 342, 35i, 476

Agordo, 397Albania, 9 n. 7, 73, 233, 243, 260, 279, 315,

348, 431, 465Alberghetti, Camillo, 398Alberghetti, Maestro Sigismondo, 83-4, 398Alberghetti, Sigismondo the Younger, 400Alberghetti, Maestro Zanino, 86Aleardi, Francesco, 95 n. 167Alessandria, 59, 315Alexander VI, pope, 167Algiers, 239Allegri, Giorgio, 371Allegri, Girolamo Novello, 47, 49, 148Almissa, 432-3, 446Altoni, Giovanni, 392Alviano, Bartolomeo d', 60-1, 63, 64, 81, 85,

86, 91, 92, 188, 190, 191, 210, 223, 263,269, 286-7, 293, 295, 298, 330-1, 340,351-2, 381, 384-5, 398, 410

Alvise da Venezia, 84-5Anastasio da S. Angelo, 49 n. 122Andrea da Borgo Sansepolero, 77Andreas, Bot, 317Anfo, 90, 166, 245, 265, 389, 410, 416Angelino da Feltre, Maestro, 86Angelo da Roma, 196Anguillara, Deifebo dall', 47, 49, 192Anguillara, Giovanbattista dall', 194 n. 72Anguillara, Giuliano dall', 194 n. 72Antivari, 237, 447

Antonello da Corneto, see Corna, Antonellodella

Antonello da Siena, 38 n. 93, 105Antonello da Trani, Maestro, 84Antoniazzo da Doccia, 194 n. 72Antonini, Daniel, 347Antonio da Brabante, 84Antonio da Fiume, 82Antonio da Martinasco, 192Apulia, 172, 226, 253, 332, 399-400Aquila, battle of, 32Aquileia, Patriarch of, 11, 16, 176Aragona, Alfonso d', Duke of Calabria, 52Arbe, 446Arcelli, Filippo, 30-1, 103 n. 10, 155, 170

n. 66, 177, 191, 206Argenta, battle of, 53, 73Argos, 15, 45, 46armour, 2, 70, 138army administration, 3, 4-5, 23, 28, 42-3,

52-3, 101-51, 186, 248-83army regulations (ordines a banco), 17-18,

113-15, 123-4billets and billeting, 35, 120, 129, 131-6,

151, ll%, 197, 345, 373, 5°°booty, 40, 143, 144-5camp followers, 386condotte, 17-18, 22, 23, 24-5, 29, 31, 32, 40,

101, 114-16, 133, 136, 138, 259, 300, 304demobilization, 21, 24-5, 31, 38, 43-4, 53,

76-7, 105, 114, 145-6, 227, 241, 390deserters, 18-19, 122-3, 293, 348, 371, 390discipline, 25, 41, 120-3, *37, 181-6, 384-5horse taxes (tasse dei cavalli), 125, 137, 373inspections (mostre), 63, 68, 81, 105-6, 108,

109-10, 117-23, 124, 138, 142, 148, 150,254-5, 299

medical services, 141-2, 304, 441military training, 80, 142-3, 148-9, 202-3pay, 17-18, 115-16, 119, 120-1, 123-7,

128-31, 151, 169, 178, 267, 281-3, 372-4,383, 387, 394, 45i, 472-84, 489-91, 494-501

510

Index

pioneers, 75, 80, 93, 95police role {see also cavalry: cappelletti), 321,

348, 448, 450prestanze, 17, 125, 475prisoners, 35, 38, 143-4, 259, 2°8provisioning and supply, 113, 136-7, 140-1,

151, 164, 169, 178, 276, 279, 280-1, 345recruiting, 12, 26, 31, 117, 254, 281, 313-66,

454, 489rewards 13, 15, 186-97, 321size, 213, 282, 318, 462, 465-7, 472-84, 487Venetian role in, 23-4, 101-4, 174, 248-83war finance, 3, 12, 24, 30, 108, 112, 128-31,

152, 255,461-83see also collaterals; executores; governors;

paymasters; proveditorsartificial fire, 400artillery, 3, 81-7, 395-408

experiments with, 84-5, 398, 400-1field, 83, 85, 396gunfounding, 81-2, 84-5, 395, 398proveditors of, 86, 174-5, 395, 40 1

responsibility for, 86, 167, 249, 261schools (scuole), 85-6, 214, 275, 329, 341,

403-8, 487siege, 82, 85, 396storage, 86, 141, 150supplies, 82, 87,. 141; see also gunners;

gunpowder; saltpetreAsola, 90, 137 n. 163, 245, 389, 391, 406, 410,

416Asolo, 199, 279Assereto, Biagio da, 99Asso, 446Asti, Treaty of, 242Astolfo da Trieste, 18 n. 37Attendolo, Lorenzo, 33, 38Attendolo, Michele, 40-1, 76, 82, 99, 106, 124,

126, 133 nn. 141 & 142, 156, 172, 179, 182,187, 190, 205, 206

Aureliano, Andrea d', 107, no , i n n. 48Aureliano, Gianfilippo d'Andrea, 107, i n , 147Austrians, 15, 16, 29, 47, 53-4, 56, 242-7Aviano, 188Avogadro family, 315, 321

Luigi (Alvise), 56, 96, 199, 295Azzoni, Rizzolino degli, 18 n. 37

Babon di Naldo, 435Badia Polesine, 94Badoer, Ambrogio, 204Badoer, Andreas, 302Badoer, Jacopo, 68, 206Badoer, Marco, 8Baffo, 433, 458Baglione family, 321

Horatio, 310Malatesta, 432-3Zuan Paolo, 286-8

Bagnolo, Peace of, 52, 53, 84, i n , 146, 166,178

Bagolin, Alexandro, 341Balbi, Alvise, 448Baldaccio d'Anghiari, 181banditi, 219, 329, 348Banoli, Dalmazio de', 10Barbarigo, Jacopo, 207Barbarigo, Nicolo, 455Barbarigo, Pietro, 276, 278Barbaro, Antonio, 277, 279Barbaro, Daniele, 396Barbaro, Francesco, 39, 107, 171, 204Barbaro, Giosafat, 48 n. 116Barbaro, Marc'Antonio, 392, 417-19Barbaro, Zaccaria, 165Barbarossa, Khair-ad-Din, 227, 230Barbo, Pietro, see Paul IIBariata, 187Bartolomeo da Cremona, 83, 84 n. 99, 85Bartolomeo di Benedetto da Piceno, 90 n. 134Barzizza, Gasparino, 171Baseggio, Niccolo, 102 n. 4Bassano, 11, 170 n. 64, 364, 406Bassano, Maestro, 94Battaglia, Ludovico, 72Bavaria, Duchess of, 42Bedmar, Marquis of, 246, 262Belegno, Antonio, 103Belegno, Giust'Antonio, 279Belluno, 11, 16, 17, 31, 147 n. 202, 222, 353,

397, 407Beltramino, Giovanni di, 197Bembo, Alvise, 332Bembo, Bernardo, 190, 204Bembo, Francesco, 17, 98, 170, 206Bembo, Doge Giovanni, 278Benedetti, Alessandro, 142Benzoni, Guido, 46Benzoni, Soncino, 72Berardi, Francesco, 196Bergamino, Giorgio, 402Bergamo, 35, 41, 52, 79, 108, no , 130 n. 132,

132, 152, 189, 221, 223, 264, 346-8, 353,365, 389, 39i, 394, 406, 411, 416-17,462-3, 470-1

Bernardino da Parma, 248Bernardino da Rota, 86 n. 116Bernardo, Andrea, 162 n. 33Bernardo da Crema, 127 n. 114Bernardo d'Arezzo, 196Bettino da Calcinate, 46Bibbiena, 60

Index

Biondo, Flavio, 33 n. 64, 171 n. 69Blanco, Giovanni, 196Blois, Treaty of (1499), 61; (1513) 222, 224Boldrino da Gazo, 185Bologna, 11, 315, 329

Peace of, 214, 226Bon, Andrea, 93Bon, Bartolomeo, 94Bonaconte, Domenico, 103, 104Bonfadin, Marian, 399Bonhomo, Giovan Battista, 444Borella, Giovanni, 91-2Borgia, Cesare, 4, 63, 81, 84Borgia, Juan, Duke of Gandia, 58Borgo, Franco dal, 72Bosnia, 317Bottanuco, 187Boucicault, Marshal, 25Braccio da Montone, see Fortebraccio, AndreaBragadin, Filippo, 236, 238Brancaleone, Rocca di, 91Brandolini family, 321

Brandolino, 105, 121 n. 87, 187Cecco di Tiberto, 12Paolo, 371Tiberto (13th-century mercenary captain), 9

n. 7Tiberto di Brandolino (15th-century

Venetian captain), 41, 181, 196bravi, 350, 362, 375Brenta, river, 97, 264Brentelle, 14Brescia, 221-3, 244

artillery school, 405-6Carmagnola in, 34, 189castle, 34defences, 90, 91 n. 140, 416-17, 423, 471finances, 152, 462-3funeral of Taddeo d'Este in, 193garrison, 44, 49, 106 n. 24, 389governors (military), 394gunfounding industry, 84, 85, 141, 397-9,

400headquarters of Venetian army, 34, 36, 148,

150, 199Malatesta lordship, 25, 29, 30Milanese desire to recover, 52recruits from, 342, 346-7, 365SS. Faustina e Giovita, 95 n. 167sack of (1512), 340siege of (1426), 34, 75, 82, 94, 192; (1438),

39, 98, 107, 171, 172, 186Venetian officials in, 108, no , i n , 119, 199,

264, 274Bressano, Genese, 418Brindisi, 267

Brugnolo, Alvise, 439Brugnolo, Zuan, 415Brunoro, Pietro, 44Bua, Mercurio, 266Buconovich, Marchio, 432Budua, 233, 237, 447, 459Buonconforto, 14Burgundy, Duchy of, 3, 84Bussone, Francesco, see CarmagnolaButi, 60, 84, 143 n. 186Butistagno, 264Buzzacarini, Ludovico, 28, 101Byzantine Empire, 8, 9

Cadore, 244, 263, 276, 389Calabria, 315Caldoni, Giacomo, 283Caldora, Jacopo, 103 n. 9Calliano, battle of, 53, 54 n. 136, 122 n. 92,

158Cambrai, League of, 4, 63, 64, 159, 200, 221-4

Peace of, 226Campofregoso, Janus di, 286, 431, 432-3Campomorto, battle of, 52, 158Camuccia, Francesco di Piero, i nCamuccia, Piero, n oCanal, Cristoforo da, 438Canal, Niccolo da, 162 nn. 33 & 34, 183 n. 9Canal, Paolo da, 84, 85-6Canal, Vito da, 162 n. 33Candia, 13, 433, 439, 445, 452, 456-8, 468-9Canea, 236, 274, 431, 435, 437-8, 445, 458, 469Canedoli, Gaspare de', 144 n. 187Cantelmi, Rostaini, 285Capiccio, Battista, 38 n. 93Capodilista family, 321

Pio, 371Capo dTstria, 9, 31, 47, 243, 353Capodivacca, Antonio, 112Capra family, 321

Pompeo, 371captains- and governors-general, 153-9, 168-9,

284-312appointment, 11, 22, 54, 154-9, I^7~8,

284-3I2

authority, 105, 113, 115, 121-2, 155-6, 157,291

pay and emoluments, 118, 133, 136, 156,290-2

proveditors and, 36, 175-80, 294-6rewards to, 187, 189-91Venice and, 29, 32-3, 37, 39, 135-6, 153-9,

175-80, 292-3Caracciolo, Dorotea, 81Caracciolo, Gianbattista, 81Caravaggio, 90

512

Index

battle of, 41, 76, 82, 99, 125, 128 n. 118,139, 156, 172, 179, 182, 186

Carlo Emanuele, Duke of Savoy, 241Carmagnola, Francesco Bussone, Count of

appointment as captain-general, 33, 153, 156arrest and execution, 36-7, 39, 114, 145, 155,

164, 171, 180, 181-2arrival in Venice, 32-3, 76condone, 155 n. 13military career, 34-6, 82, 94, 98, 105, 141,

176, 179proveditors and, 170 n. 67, 171, 173, 176,

178, 179, 204, 206rewards to, 187, 189, 190, 191views on military organization, 70 n. 19, 118,

124, 139 n. 167, 178Carrara family, 11, 16, 19, 20, 101, 154

Francesco il Vecchio da, 12, 13, 14, 16Francesco Novello da, 20Marsilio da, 26Giovanni Michele Alberto da, 141

Casalmaggiore, 34battle of, 40, 76, 113, 144, 172, 173, 186

Cascina, 60Castel Bolognese, battle of, 38Castelcarro, 94Castelfranco, 41, 182, 187, 199, 205, 347castellans, 114, 271Castello, Antonio, 412Castello, Augustin, 432Castelnovo, 231-2, 237, 260, 305, 307, 434Castel S. Giovanni, 106 n. 24Castel Tedaldo, 10Castiglione, Franchino, 157 n. 16Catalano, Jacopo, 195Cateau-Cambresis, 215, 320Cattaro, 231, 237-9, 274, 334, 43*, 434~5, 437,

447, 459Cavalcabo, Cavalcabo de', 187Cavalieri di S. Marco, 196-7, 376, 442Cavalli, Corrado de', 21 n. 9Cavalli, Giacomo de', 15, 190cavalry, 5, 65-74, 367-80, 447~5i

cappelletti {see also army; police), 377, 427corazza (elmetto), 70-1Crovati, 377, 448, 449~5idragoons, 349-50, 369, 380heavy, 2, 65, 69, 367-75lance formation, 17, 65, 69-71, 119, 126, 375lanze spezzate, 65-9, 70, 71 n. 21, 109, 116,

117, 119 n. 75, 122, 124-5, 127 n. 114,145, 146, 194, 196, 206

light, 71-4, 175, 375-8militia, 349-50mounted crossbowmen, 71, 72mounted handgunmen, 71

pay, 17-18, 119, 126-7, 367-8, 373-5, 45irecruiting of, 73, 117, 369, 371, 375-8, 380stradiots, 47, 50, 53, 58, 72, 73-4, 174-5,

199, 376-7, 447-51, 463Turkish, 317-18see also army administration; horse taxes;

horsesCavazza, Constantin, 479Cavenago, 83Cavriana, 40Cefalonia, 62, 85, 237, 446-8, 450, 454, 459,

463, 466Ceneda, 20Ceri, Renzo da, 288Cerigo, 456, 466Cerines, 431, 433, 439-40, 457-8, 468Cermisone, Antonio, 141Cerreto, 183, 185Cervia, 63, 127, 221, 226Cesena, 165, 184Charles, Archduke of Austria, 259Charles V, emperor, 224, 226Charles V, King of France, 1Charles VII, King of France, 1-2Charles VIII, King of France, 1, 4, 54, 55, 56, 87Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, 2, 3Chiari, 119, 187Chieregato, Valerio, 362, 458Chiericati, Belpetro di Ludovico, 111 & n. 51Chiericati, Chierighino, 106-7, 109, n o n. 38,

113, 123, 126 n. 104, 135, 154 n. 2Chiericati, Ludovico, 107, n oChiericati, Valerio, 107, 109Chioggia, 245, 260, 404, 406, 412

War of, 14-15, 19, 81, 170, 207Chiusa di Venzon, 389Chiusa di Verona, 389Cimarosta, 67Citolo da Perugia, 79Cittadella, 53, 158, 183, 188Ciuran, Andrea, 332, 376Cividale, 31, 264, 361Clement VII, pope, 225Cognac, League of, 316Cognac, Treaty of (1526), 225Colini, Francesco, 282Collalto family, 315, 321

Antonio di, 371Count Pompillo, 349

collaterals, 102-13, 115, 119, 120, 152, 163collateral-general, 105, 108, no , 111-12,

115, 263, 275-6election, 111-12, 275pay, 103, 104 & n. 11, 106, no , 275responsibilities, 102-3, JO5-6, 108, no , 112,

113-14, 116, 119, 133, 135-6, 145, 276

513

Index

collaterals (cont.)staff, 103, no , i nVenetian nobles as, 103, 107-9vice-collaterals, 106-7, 108-9, I I 0 , I X I , H 1

Colle di Val d'Elsa, 51Colleoneschi, 68-9, 120, 148-9Colleoni, Bartolomeo

ambitions, 55appointment and career as captain-general,

44, 46, 107, i n , 130 n. 129, 153-4, 157,159, 209

condotte, 136 n. 157, 164death, 50, 51, 68, 109, 157, 158, 193-4heirs, 158, 204infidelities, 67, 106, 146, 182-3military career up to 1455, 38, 41-2, 82and military development, 76, 82, 85rewards to, 187, 189, 190, 191, 195, 199troops, 76, 185War of 1467, 48, 85

Colleoni, Caterina, 204Colleoni, Ursina, 194Cologna, 463Colonna, Fabrizio, 4Colonna, Jannes, 286Colonna, Marc'Antonio, 234-5, 237, 239, 286Colonna, Prospero, 4, 284, 286, 298Company of the Rose, 21conduct money, 481, 500Conegliano, n , 12, 148, 175 n. 92, 463Constantinople, 9, 227, 233, 235, 318, 443Contarini, Antonio, 154 n. 6Contarini, Bernardo, 58Contarini, Domenico, 295Contarini, Federico, 162 n. 33, 171-2Contarini, Gasparo, 200, 313, 330Contarini, Giovanni, 104Contarini, Giovanni di Marcantonio, 332Contarini, Giulio, 277, 282Contarini, Marino, 207Contarini, Nicolo, 279, 348Contarini, Stefano, 99Contarini, Zorzi, 392Conti della Frattina, Cittadino de', 91Conti family, 398

Giovanni de', 41, 44, 70 n. 19, 124n. 100, 188, 195, 196

Marc'Antonio, 400Marco, 398Paolo, 392

Contrari, Uguccione de', 26Contrin, Giacomo, 90 & n. 139, 91-2, 95Corbavia, Count Giovanni of, 317—18Cordignano, 188Corfu, 15, 96, 228, 230, 237-40, 274, 336,

431-2, 434-7, 443-4, 446-7, 450, 452,456, 458, 465-6, 468, 471

Corinth, 46, 93Cormons, 244Corna, Antonello della (or da Corneto), 67,

109, 183, 189, 195, 209Corner (Cornaro), Alvise, 355Corner (Cornaro), Caterina, 199Corner (Cornaro), Geronimo, 279Corner (Cornaro), Giorgio (proveditor with

Carmagnola), 37, 171, 179, 206Corner (Cornaro), Giorgio (proveditor at

Agnadello), 175, 199Corner (Cornaro), Marco, 191Corner (Cornaro), Zorzi, 263, 296Coron, 9, 73Correggio, Count Camillo di, 325Correggio, Giberto da, 14Corsica, 315, 322-3, 328, 349, 378Corso, Vincenzo, 196Cortina, 64Cortona, 51, 315Costanza, Tuzio, 199Costanzo, Scipio, 369couriers, 273Crema, 77, 90, 132, 136, 152, 221, 223, 244,

264, 274, 279, 329, 335, 353, 365, 389,391, 406, 410-n, 422, 462-3

Cremona, 40, 61, 90, 91 n. 140, 98, 107, 132,166, 221-5, 263-4, 332, 4Jo

Crete, 9, 21, 48, 204, 230, 234-9, 274, 380,399, 443-4

defence of, 9, 18, 433, 437^9, 445, 45°-i,453, 456-8

revolt of 1342, 12revolt of 1363, 12-13

Cristoforo da Montecchio, 144 n. 189Cristoforo da Tolentino, see Mauruzzi,

CristoforoCroatia, 317 (see also cavalry; Crovati)Crusade, Fourth, 8, 9Curzola, 237Cyprus, 48, 232, 259, 274, 431, 433, 437,

439-41, 443, 449, 457, 463War of, 233-41

dadia delle lanze, 128, 186Dalmatia, 9, 12, 21, 26, 73, 97, 232-3, 236-7,

239, 243, 245, 260, 272, 274, 279, 307,3i5, 323, 348, 386, 392, 43i, 435, 446-8,453, 465-6, 480

Dal Verme, Alvise, 38, 164, 182, 190, 198,205

Dal Verme, Bartolomeo, 18 n. 37Dal Verme, Jacopo, 16, 21, 22, 190Dal Verme, Lucchino, 13, 169 n. 60Dal Verme, Taddeo, 25, 27, 28Dandolo, Andrea (chronicler), 21 n. n

514

Index

Dandolo, Andrea (proveditor in Morea), 46,172, 176

Dandolo, Bernardo, 206Dandolo, Doge Francesco, 11Dandolo, Gherardo, 171Del Giudice, Boffilo, 158 n. 21Delia Rovere, Francesco Maria, Duke of

Urbino, 224-5, 258, 270-1, 289, 297-9,354, 411, 415, 420, 430, 432, 434

Delia Rovere, Francesco Maria II, Duke ofUrbino, 307

Delia Rovere, Guidobaldo, Duke of Urbino,299-300, 319-20, 325, 415, 423

Delia Scala family, 11Brunoro, 26Mastino, 11

Diedo, Andrea, 119 n. 75Diedo, Giovanni (captain of crossbowmen in

1404), 207Diedo, Giovanni (condottiere in late 15th

century), 184, 206Diedo, Hieronimo, 332Diedo, Zuan, 263Dingwall, Richard Preston, Lord, 328Dionisio da Viterbo, 90 n. 139, 94, 95Doimo da Veglia, Count, 10Dolfin, Doge Giovanni, 12Dolfin, Giovanni, 102 n. 4Dolfin, Jacopo, 16Domenico (de' Benintendi) da Firenze, 82, 8c.

94,95Donatello, 193Donato, Maestro, 84Donato, Andrea, 192, 204-5Donato, Leonardo, 274Donato, Niccolo, 454Doria, Andrea, 229-31Doria, Gian Andrea, 234-5Dulcigno, 237, 447Duodo, Francesco, 392Duodo, Pietro, 371, 393Durazzo, 15, 18

elmetto, see cavalry: corazzaEmanuele, Carlo, 365Emiliani, Angelo, 90 n. 139Emo, Gabriele, 22, 23, 170Emo, Giorgio, 175Emo, Leonardo, 21Emo, Pietro, 170 n. 62empire da Mar, 5, 9, 12-13, 15-16, 18, 45-7,

62, 429-60, 462-83England, 2, 84, 446Erba, Piero d', 72Erizzo, Francesco, 276-8Esquerdes, Marshal d', 158 n. 21

Este, 222, 347Este family, 8, 26, 28

Alberto d', 16Alfonso d', Duke of Ferrara, 4, 221Azzo d', 10Bertoldo di Taddeo d', 41, 44, 45-6, 47, 70,

135, 192, 209Borso d', Duke of Ferrara, 165Ercole d', Duke of Ferrara, 52, 61, 184, 209Ferrante d', 58Francesco d'Azzo d', 10Fresco d'Azzo d', 10Giovanni d', 93Luigi d', 309, 311Niccolo d' (at siege of Trieste, 1368), 13Niccolo d' (lieutenant-general, 1426), 33, 34Taddeo d', 30, 31, 39, 46, 171 n. 73, 189,

190, 192, 209executor es, 102

Facino, Antonio, 103Faenza, 131 n. 138, 221, 315Fagnano, 89Falier, Doge Marino, 12Famagosta, 235-6, 239, 274, 306, 324, 431, 433,

435, 439-42, 452, 457-8, 468-9Farnese, Ranuccio, 56, 196Fazio, Bartolomeo, 34Feltre, 11, 16, 17, 31, 90, 95 n. 167, 263-4,

353, 356, 364, 406, 410Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, 242Ferdinand, King of Aragon, 2-} 221Ferlino, Maestro, 82-3Ferrando da Spagna, 196Ferrara, 10, 11, 22, 26, 51, 90, 97, 165, 201,

221-2, 264, 286, 323, 329, 336War of (1308-9), 10War of (1482-4), 43, 52-3, 54, 56, 67, 72,

73, 84, 94, 95, 99, no , 130, 140 n. 173,165-6, 168, 175, 183, 198, 201, 205, 209

Peace of (1428), 35, 38Peace of (1433), 37-8

feudal service, 379, 450-1Figarolo, 52, 84, 95 n. 166, 208firearms, 3, 76, 79, 141 n. 175, 203, 354, 382

(see also infantry; militia)Fiume, 64, 85Florence

abandons alliance with Venice, 56ally of Venice, 11, 21, 32, 33, 35, 39, 50, 124comparisons between Venice and, 181,

201-2, 209, 210enemy of Venice, 52, 54, 55, 57, 59, 61, 67,

182and Pisan War, 57, 59, 61, 63

Foglianica, 91, 134, 150515

Index

Foix, Gaston de, 222Fontana, Pietro della, 14Fontanella, 187Fornovo, battle of, 4, 54, 56, 57, 58, 72, 73,

130, 137, 142, 158, 175, 179, 196, 199Fortebraccio, Andrea (known as Braccio da

Montone), 29, 32, 44Fortebraccio, Bernardino di Carlo, 51,56, 58,

60, 69, 117, 122 n. 91, 194, 196, 204, 286Fortebraccio, Carlo di Braccio, 44, 49, 50, 51,

148-50, 151, 206fortifications, 3, 50, 87-96, 213-14, 242, 298-9,

409-28, 430-47, 49icastles, 89, 91citadels, 88-9, 134, 420-3city walls, 89-90damage caused by, 423-4, 440, 447engineers, 13, 87-96expense, 425, 432-3, 435~4i, 444, 468-72,

480-1, 484field, 74, 91, 92-5innovation in, 87, 90, 409, 412, 434labour force, 89, 93, 95, 305, 426-7, 440, 447Livenza line, 26-7, 30, 75, 92-3, 96, 97, 101

n- 1, 134, 4i3opposition to, 340-1, 423-7proveditors of, 409, 436responsibility for, 89, 164-5, 166-7

Foscari family, 191Doge Francesco, 31 n. 53, 159-60, 161 n. 31,

172, 200-1Jacopo, 209Marco, 480

Foscarini, Giacomo, 239-40, 445-6, 458Foscarini, Giovan Battista, 277-9, 2$3Foscarini, Ludovico, 204Fracassa, see Sanseverino. Gaspare daFracastoro, Aventin, 368France, 1, 4, 10, 61, 87, 201, 221-6Francesco, Maestro, 83Francesco da Fino, 184-5Francesco da Lodi, n oFrancesco da Teano, 47, 77Francis I, King of France, 223, 225, 227-8,

476Francis Julius, Duke of Saxony, 328Frangipani, Count Bernardino de, 317Frangipani, Cornelio, 380Frignano da Sesso, 101 n. 1Friuli, 223, 229, 236, 240, 262, 263-4, 276,

279, 288fortifications in, 88, 91, 96, 240, 410, 412-14,

417-20Hungarians in, 15, 36, 176Lieutenant of, 119, 146, 251militia in, 356

river fleets in, 97Turkish threat to, 49, 50, 61-2, 71, 73, 78,

109, 157, 319Venetian concern for, 11, 13, 16, 307Venetian expansion in, 30, 64, 85, 177Venetian troops in, 51, 72, 73, 75, 78, 132,

134, 148, 149-52, 243-7Furlano, Taliano, 195

Galeotto, Jacopo, 158 n. 21Gallipoli, battle of, 171Gambacorti, Piero, 72Gambara family, 347

Gianfrancesco, 56, 199Gandia, Duke of, see Borgia, JuanGarda, Lake, 39, 97, 98, 272, 279Gardone, 382Garigliano, battle of the, 63Garzoni bank, 129 n. 123gate guard, 333-7Gattamelata, (Erasmo da Narni)

captain-general, 40, 156-7, 209heirs, 44, i nhired by Venice, 38, 105military career, 38-40, 94, 98, 141, 144

n. 157, 172, 186retirement and death, 41, 67, 193rewards to, 187, 190, 192statue of, 193troops, 121 n. 87

Gattamelata, Gianantonio di, 67, 190, 193Gatteschi, 41, 44, 50, 67Genese Bressano, 444Genoa, 8, 12, 14, 179, 315, 329Gentile da Leonessa, 41-2, 67, 156-7, 185,

188, 193, 206George of Trebizond, 173 n. 80German War (1487), 53-4, 118, 130, 175Germany, 2, 21, 64, 139Ghedi, 120 n. 83, 159, 188Giannotti, Donato, 411Giocondo, Fra, 96Giorgio, Niccolo, 161 n. 31, 170Giovanni da Argentina, 86 n. 113Giovanni dell'Atella, 46Giovanni Antonio da Feltre, 142Giovanni Antonio da Galesio, n oGiovanni Francesco da Massa, Maestro, 91Giovanni Ludovico da Imola, 95Giovanni Marco da Arzignano, no , i n &

n. 51, 125 n. 101Giovanni Maria da Treviso, 84Giovanni Grande della Massa, 46Gislardi, Antonio, i n n. 51Giuliano, Andrea, 171, 179, 204

516

Index

Giustinian, Andrea, 459Giustinian, Bernardo, 204Giustinian, Marco, 12Giustinian, Pompeo, 244, 310-11Giustinian, Sebastiano, 272Gobbo, Zuan, 273Gonzaga family, 25, 28, 139

Carlo, 44, 48 n. 115, 126, 146Ettore di Ridolfo, 137Francesco, Lord of Mantua, 21, 22Francesco, Marquis of Mantua, 54, 55-8, 60,

118, 142, 158, 167-8, 196, 199Galeazzo, Count of Grumello, 23, 24, 191Gianfrancesco II, Marquis of Mantua, 222,

37-9, 66 n. 2, 76, 146, 155-6, 176-7, 182,190, 191, 204

Gianfrescesco II, Marquis of Mantua, 222,285-6, 345

Luigi, 417Ridolfo, 158, 196Vincenzo, Duke of Mantua, 241

Gorizia, 64, 85, 91, 92, 168, 223-4, 244Gorlino da Ravenna, 96Governolo, 17governors (garrison commanders), 389-94governors {gubernatores) of the army, 21, 102Grabuse, 445Gradenigo, Gianpaolo, 112Gradenigo, Giovanni, 206Gradenigo, Marco, 331Gradisca, 62, 91-2, 111, 132, 134, 150, 205,

223-4, 3ii , 4io, 417War of, 241-7, 262, 327, 420, 482-4, 493

Grado, 264Granada, 2, 3Grassi, Francesco, 58Grasso da Venezia, 29Greco, Giovanni, da S. Vitale, 72Gregory XIII, pope, 241Griffoni, Matteo, da S. Angelo, 44, 76-7, 80-1,

136Grimani, Alvise, 359, 392, 422Grimani, Girolamo, 302Grimani, Marco, 97Grisons, 316, 320, 322, 326-8Gritti, Alvise, 274, 331, 420Gritti, Doge Andrea, 175, 248, 252, 263, 268-9,

285, 296, 335, 340-1, 351, 376, 381, 410Gritti, Benedetto, 206Gritti, Michele, 206Gritti, Stasio, 107Grosso da Mandello, Battista, 189Grumello, Count of, see Gonzaga, GaleazzoGuarini, Battista, 173 n. 80Guarini, Guarino, 105Guaschi, Ranieri de', 14

Guiano, Guido, 72gunners, 82-7, 143 n. 186

pay, 82-5recruiting of, 83-4training, 85-6, 142see also artillery: schools of

gunpowder, 3, 84, 141, 399-402

Henry VIII, King of England, 313Herman of Nuremburg, 139Hexamilion, 46, 93Hoby, Sir Thomas, 416Holland, 328Holy League (1495), 55, 57, 59; (1538), 228,

257, 299, 319; (157O, 236, 443horses, 70, 137-40, 151

cost, 137-8foddering, 136-7rearing, 139replacement, 17-18, 125, 138-9supply, 73, 87, 139-40

horse taxes, see under army administrationHundred Years' War, 1Hungarians

adversaries of Venice in 14th century, 4, 10,12, 14, 15

First Hungarian War (1411-13), 25, 26-8,75, 92-3, 103, 154-5, l 6 x n- 30, 170, 176,185, 207

Second Hungarian War (1418-20), 30-1, 75,103, 201

mercenaries of Venice, 13, 317threats to Venice, 36, 78, 88, 128

infantry, 2, 4, 74-81, 348, 367-95, 452~6, 485,494-501

archers, 80, 142, 351arquebusiers, 353, 356, 382, 497-8, 500command of, 29-30, 75-8, 80-1constables of, 44, 74, 75-8, 116-17, 196in fleets, 212, 217, 304-5, 307, 454footlances, 74, 76francs archers, 2garrison troops, 9, 17, 48, 74-5, 146-7, 150handgunmen, 3, 76, 79, 80, 142pay, 126, 383, 387, 394, 494-501pike, 79, 80, 143, 353, 356, 497-̂ 9provisionati, 74, 75, 78, 124-5, H 1

recruiting of, 79-80, 313-50, 452-5shield bearers, 74sword and buckler, 76see also militia

Inquisitori . . . dell'Armata, 306Isabella, Queen of Castile, 2Isola della Scala, 106, 146Isonzo, river, 7, 62, 91-2, 244, 276, 417

517

Index

Istria, 9, 15, 18, 28, 31, 49, 85, 238, 244-5,262, 264, 272, 276-7, 402, 431, 458

Italian League, 44Italian Wars, 3-4, 55-64, 212, 221-7

Jacobino da Pavia, 93Jacomaccio da Venezia, 78, 81John of Ulm, Master, 82John Ernest of Nassau, 311-12, 328John of Austria, Don, 237, 239John of Moravia, 16Julius II, pope, 63, 221-2

Lactantio da Bergamo, 79, 351Ladislas, King of Naples, 26, 154Lagoscuro, 95, n oLa Motta, battle of, 223Lando, Alvise, 207-8Lando, Antonio, 277-8, 311-12, 363Lando, Pietro, 453Landsknechts, 297, 316, 319, 479Lannoy, Charles de, 225La Scala, 271Laufer, Enrico, 91-2, 95Lautrec (Odet de Foix), 224Lazzarino da Rimini, 117 n. 66Legnago, 98, 264, 299, 389, 391, 406, 410-11,

4i4, 425Leo, Maestro, 98 n. 185Leonardi, Niccolo, 104Leonardo da Vinci, 92Leopold, Duke of Austria, 13Lepanto, 15, 62

battle of, 238-9Lesina, 237, 459Liguria, 319, 323Limisso, 433, 458Lippomanno, Marco, 162 n. 33Lippomanno bank, 130 n. 133Livenza, river, 15, 26, 27, 62, 92-3, 97, 413

fortifications on, see fortifications: Livenzaline

Lizzana, 171 n. 73Lodi, 61, 225

Peace of, 42-4, 50, 54, 66, 77, 107, 157, 164Lodrone, Parisio da, 189Lombardy

campaign in (1483-4), 52French retreat to (1495), 56markets, 8, 10Venetian ambitions in, 51Venetian troops in, 34, 36, 41, 59, 61, 105,

130wars in (1426-54), 35, 39, 42, 66, 74, 82, 92,

129, 138, 172, 210Longhera, Pietro da, 341

Lonigo, 120 n. 83Loredan, Alvise (leader of war party in 1405),

24, 25, 200, 334Loredan, Alvise (captain-general of 1463 fleet),

45-6Loredan, Andrea, 86, 269Loredan, Antonio, 175, 184Loredan, Bernardino, 334Loredan, Doge, Leonardo, 248-9, 334Loredan, Lorenzo, 68, no , 119, 138 n. 166,

147-52, 153Loredan, Marco, 277, 279Loredan, Marino, 205Loredan, Paolo, 13Loredan, Pietro, 33 n. 64, 97, 99, 142, 171,

173, 176, 206Lorini, Bonaiuto, 392, 418-9, 443-4, 446Lorraine, Duke of, 51, 80, 158Louis XI, King of France, 2Louis XII, King of France, 59, 63, 221-2Lova, 14Lucca, n , 35Ludovico da Crema, 90 n. 137, 95Ludwig, Duke of Bavaria, 319Lupi, Dietisalvi, 41 n. 95, 76, 80, 189, 197Lupi, Niccolo, 90 n. 134Lusi, Melchior, 322, 324Luzasco, Paolo, 293

Machiavelli, Niccolo, 1, 181 & n. 1, 200, 313,345

Maclodio, battle of, 35, 170 n. 67, 171 n. 68,186, 190, 191

Maggi, Girolamo, 441-2Malacreda, Francesco, 424Malamocco, 246, 262Malaspina, Matteo, 18 n. 37Malatesta family, 321

Carlo, 16, 27, 29, 103, 121, 128, 154, 155n. 13, 170, 176-7; Carlo (1532), 275

Dorotea, 81Giacomo, 395Malatesta, 21-3, 155 n. 13Pandolfo (Lord of Brescia), 18, 23 n. 15,

25-6, 27-30, 32, 101 n. 1, 128, 155, 177,190, 191

Pandolfo di Roberto (Lord of Rimini), 138Roberto, 51, 52, 157-8Sigismondo, 41-2, 46-7, 77, 117 n. 67, 156,

172, 176Malavolta, Giovanni, 144 n. 190Malgariti, Alvise de', 85Malipiero, Domenico, 163Malipiero, Doge Pasquale, 118 n. 69, 160,

172-3, 175, 209Malipiero, Tommaso, 204

518

Index

Malipiero, Vettore, 68, 206Malombra, Lodovico, 337Malpaga, 44, 158-9Malta, 444Malvasia, 229, 231-2, 434Malvezzi, Lucio, 58, 269, 286-7, 292-> 295Malvezzi, Ludovico, 44, 195, 209Manelmi, Belpetro, 104-7, IQ8, no-11,

113-14, 117 n. 67, 136 n. 159, 147, 152Manelmi Evangelista, 107, 109Manerbio, 42Manfredi, Astorre, 48Manfredi, Guidantonio, 33, 38, 155 n. 11Manfroni family, 321

Gianpaolo, 58, 62, 64, 96, 296, 343Mantegna, 193Mantelino, Giovanni, 89Mantua, 17, 22, 25, 26, 31, 99, 221, 241, 323Manutius, Aldus, 208Manzini, Giovan Niccolo, 107, 109, no , 148Marano, 243, 248, 276, 296, 344, 389, 391, 406,

409Marcamo, 10Marcello, Alessandro, 332Marcello, Hieronimo, 175Marcello, Jacopo Antonio, 172-3, 175, 179, 204Marcello, Piero, 175Marche, 315, 323, 329Margarita, 234Mariano, 282Marignano, 288, 331Marino, Rosso, 200Marostica, 271Marsciano, Count Antonio da, 44, 47, 50, 67,

68, 151Marsciano, Bernardina di Berto da, 195Marsciano, Guerriero da, 195marshals, 138, 151Martinengo family, 68, 315, 321

Cesare da, 44, 144 n. 188, 187Federigo, 371Francesco, 310-n, 326-7, 369-70Gabriel, 456Gherardo da, 194Giorgio da, 137 n. 163, 183Hieronimo, 358Ludovico da, 199Marc'Antonio, 343Marc'Antonio (the younger), 418Marco da, 56, 58, 199Sciarra, 260, 307, 347

Martino 'ab Ancoris', Maestro, 82Martino da Faenza, 29Massa, Giorgio della, 152Matteo da Capua, 44Matteo da Forli, Fra, 190 n. 47

Matteo da S. Angelo, see GriffoniMauruzzi, Cristoforo, 41, 44, 116 n. 65, 122

n. 91, 135, 188, 195Mauruzzi, Niccolo, 192Maximilian I, emperor, 2, 63-4, 224, 263Medici family, 60

Giovanni de', 4, 246, 282, 309-12, 380Lorenzo de', 178

Melo da Cortona, 77Memmo, Marc Antonio, 407, 419mercenaries (see also army administration:

recruiting; Landsknechts), 10-15, 18, 21,47, 202, 294, 486

Messina, 237-8Mestre, 15, 17, 20, 129, 132, 149, 253, 264Michelotti, Ludovico de', 33Michiel, Domenico, 13, 14Michiel, Fantino, 24-5, 170Michiel, Francesco, 201Michiel, Marc'Antonio, 277Michiel, Marco, 456Michiel, Matthio, 279Michiel, Tommaso, 162 n. 33, 170-1Milan, 225

aggressive intentions, 30, 49, 55, 201ally of Florence, 50, 54army, 2, 26, 125, 210attitudes to Pisan revolt, 58-9Carmagnola's flight from, 32gunfounding in, 82-3, 87French threat, 59Venetian invasion (1499), 61-3, 175at war with Venice, 33, 35, 36, 39, 40, 42,

52, 88, 93, 98, 182'Military Revolution', the, 4militia, 75, 275, 346, 350-66, 456-59, 486

arming, 79, 167di rispetto, 359-61provisionati di S. Marco, 78-9, 150-1recruiting, 78sea, 352, 355select, 78-9, 117, 122 n. 92, 150-1training, 50, 62, 167, 402

Mincio, river, 88, 89, 96, 99, 149, 266, 279,365, 4!5

Mirandola, 267Mistra, 47Mocenigo, Alvise, 322Mocenigo, Doge Tommaso, 32, 129 n. 121,

181, 201, 209Modena, 329Modon, 9, 62, 90, 239Molin, Francesco da, 21 n. 9Molinella, battle of, 48, 85Monfalcone, 276, 389, 406Monferrat, 241

519

Index

Monforte, Cola di, Count of Campobasso,49-50, 71, 83 n. 91, 148

Monselice, 11, 132, 222, 264, 271, 347Montagnana, 119, 132Monte, Giovanbattista del, 308, 325, 360-2,

369-70Monte, Hieronimo da, i n , 112Monte, Mariotto da, mMonte, Piero del, 80Montefeltro, Antonio da, Count of Urbino, 32Montefeltro, Federigo da, Duke of Urbino, 52,

95Montefeltro, Guidobaldo da, Duke of Urbino,

58, 60Monte Maria, Ottone del, 392-3Montpensier, Duke of, 58Morat, battle of, 3Morea, 9, 45-7, 70, 77, 93, 96, 112, 130, 172,

175 n. 91Moro, Benetto, 274, 327, 401Moro, Doge Cristoforo, 46, 160, 269Moro, Sebastiano, 433Moron, Vetturino, 91 n. 140Morosini, Andrea, 204Morosini, Barbone, 154 n. 6Morosini, Bernardo, 45Morosini, Domenico, 208Morosini, Giustiniano, 175, 263Morosini, Marcantonio, 175Morosini, Marc'Antonio, 388Morosini, Paolo d'Andrea, 119 n. 75, 162

n. 34, 204Morosini, Pietro, 13Moses of Mestre, 129 n. 123Motella, Taddeo della, 56Motta, 11, 27, 62, 90, 93, 171, 264Mula, Antonio da, 435

Nadino, 232, 433Nafplion {see also Napoli di Romania), 15, 46Naldi, Dionigi (Naldo, Dionysio di), 197, 285,

292Nani, Niccolo, 433Naples, 31, 52, 54-5, 57-8, 76, 139, 182, 226,

315, 3i9Napoli di Romania {see also Nafplion), 228-32,

43i, 434Navagero, Andrea, 288Navagero, Bernardo, 215Navagero, Piero, 439Navarino, Pietro, 38 n. 93, 185Negroponte, 9, 45, 48Niccolo da Nona, 196Niccolo da Pisa, 106 n. 24Niccolo da Rota, Maestro, 86Niccolo da Tolentino, see Mauruzzi, Niccolo

Nice, Truce of, 229Nicosia, 235, 274, 305-6, 422, 431, 433, 440,

442, 457-8Noale, 149Nobili, Almerico de', 84Nogarolo, 89Nona, 433Normandy, 2Novara, 57, 94, 288

battle of, 222Novegrad, 239, 433, 446Noyen, Treaty of, 223

Oderzo, 185Oglio, river, 56, 61, 96, 410, 414onoranza di S. Marco, 125Orlando, Francesco, 399Orsini family, 321

Camillo, 296, 299-300, 302Carlo, 61-2, 205Francesco, 27Giordano, 303, 320, 356, 358Latino, 458Niccolo, Count of Pitigliano, 54, 57, 59,

60-3, 81, 158-9, 168, 175 n. 93, 188, 199,206, 252, 284-5, 292i 295, 410

Orso, 44, 195, 209Paolo, 20, 21; Paolo (1571), 307Paolo Giordano, 308Piero Gianpaolo, 33, 38, 155 n. 11, 187Valerio, 299-300, 302

Ortiga, Giovanni, 46Orzinovi, 35, 90, 245, 279, 389, 391, 404, 406,

410, 416, 463Orzivecchi, 187Osoppo, 344, 409-10Ossuna, Duke of, 245-6, 262Otranto, 51, 221Ottoman Empire, 5

Padua, 221-3artillery school, 86, 346, 404, 406citadel proposed, 421-2collateral in, 103Colleoni and, 195defence (1509), 208, 330, 333-8, 351finances, 128, 130 n. 132, 462fortifications, 410-11, 423-4garrison, 25, 29-30, 44, 75, 134, 150, 207,

271, 289Gattemelata's funeral and statue in, 193men-at-arms in, 372militia raised, 79Palazzo del Capitano, 134recapture, 351S. Antonio, 206

520

Index

serraglio, 89 n. 131siege of (1404-5), 21-4, 95, 97, 170, 186,

192, 197, 207; (1509), 222, 330, 333, 336-7Taddeo d'Este's palace, 189Venetian officials in, 108, no , 139, 264Venice and, in 14th century, 8, n , 12,

13-14, 15, 16, 19, 20paghe da guazzo, 455-6Paleocastro, 446Pallavicino family, 321

Sforza, 218, 234-6, 302-7, 320, 356, 359,372, 378, 413, 416, 422, 437, 445-6

Palma, 217, 276, 406-7, 414, 417-20, 471Panego, 98Paolo di Leone, 20, 30, 101Parma, 26, 59, 171, 315Paruta, Andrea, 276Paruta, Paolo, 412, 427Patras, 15Paul II, pope, 106-7Paul III, pope, 229, 301Pavia, 98, 315

battle of, 4paymasters, 102, 104, 112, 123, 169, 263,

272-3, 276-7Pazzi War, 48, 50-1, 80, 157Pepoli family, 321

Cesare, 371Count Francesco, 392

Pergola, Angelo della, 34Persia, 48 n. 116, 228Perugia, 49, 315Pesaro, 315Pesaro, Niccolo di Ca, 77 n. 56, 152 n. 227Pesaro, Piero di Ca, 267, 270Pescara, Marquis of, 4Peschiera, 90, 186, 245, 264, 279, 340, 389,

391, 406, 410, 415-16, 470-1Petrarch, 202, 209Philip II, 234, 239, 241Piacenza, 171 n. 73Piacenza, Corso di, 288Piave, river, 64Piccinino, Jacopo, 41-4, 45, 118, 124, 156, 181,

183Piccinino, Niccolo, 38, 39, 40, 98, 192Pico della Mirandola, Galeotto, 183-5, l9%Piedmont, 228, 315, 329Pieri, Domenico, 191Piero da Cartagena, 192Piero da Piemonte, 84Pierpaolo da Fossombrone, 84Pieve di Cadore, battle of, 64, 80, 191, 210Pio, Marco, 127Pio, Taliano, 117 n. 66Piove di Sacco, 23, 207

Pisa, 57-61, 63, 72-3, 112, 175, 315Count of, 183

Pisani family, 205Bartolomeo, 182, 205Luca, 77 n. 56, 175Vettore, 15

Pisani bank, 130 n. 133, 205Pistoia, 315Pitigliano, see Orisini, NiccoloPius II, pope, 45, 47Pizzighettone, 263-4Plez, 244Po, river, 7, 10, 34, 36, 38, 39, 52, 94, 96-9,

117 n. 67, 201, 272Polesella, 222Polesine, 22, 23, 52, 97, 223, 265, 285, 338, 353police, 218-20Pompeo family, 321

Girolamo, 371Giunio, 456Hieronimo, 341

Pontevico, 90, 150, 245, 350, 389, 406, 410, 416Porcellaga family, 321, 347

Sanson, 371Porcia family, 321

Fulvio di, 371, 379Pordenone, 64, 85, 188Porto, 98Porto, da, family, 312

Francesco, 275-6Luigi, 315, 342, 376,411

Porto, Gabriele, 371Porto, Manfredi, 371Prata, 27, 31, 97Prato, 315Prato, Leonardo da, 292Prevesa, 229-30, 434Priuli, Andrea, 128Priuli, Antonio (15th a), 119 n. 75, 162 n. 34Priuli, Antonio (proveditor-general, 1616),

277-8, 311-12Priuli, Domenico, 417Priuli, Girolamo, 313-14, 333, 338, 376proveditors, 18, 102, 104, 112, 163, 165, 167,

169, 182, 205, 262-83, 492of artillery, 175, 280in campo, no , 168-76, 277-9election, 168, 268-general, 112, 147-52, 174, 264, 266-70, 272,

276-83, 287, 294, 296, 353instructions to, 56, 179-80pay, 173-4of stradiots and light cavalry, 73, 174-5, 2 O3,

266see also fortifications, proveditors of

provisionati di S. Marco, see under militia

521

Index

Quarantia, 334Quarantotto da Ripamortorio, 29-30, 75, 76Quercia, Jacopo della, 192Querini, Alvise, 134 n. 144Querini, Andrea, 448Querini, Francesco, 205Querini, Lauro, 193 n. 67Querini, Marco, 234Querini, Niccolo, 10

Ragogna, 188Rangoni, Baldassare, 422Rangoni, Guido, 188, 195Ravenna, 63, 80 n. 74, 91, 109, i n , 132, 135,

172, 221, 335battle of, 222, 226

rectors (capitano and podesta), 264-5, 270-1,274, 390

Renes, Hettor, 449Retimo, 236, 445revisori, 464Rhodes, 233Riario, Girolamo, 52, 190Rimini, 47, 131 n. 138, 135, 221, 264river fleets, 16-17, 23, 36, 82, 96-100, 170

n. 64, 171, 206, 222, 296Riversi, Carlo, 141Roberti, Antonio de', 29Roberto (Paganelli) da Montalboddo, 41 n. 95,

67Roberto da Recanati, 15Roccafranca, 187Rodrigo Spagnuolo, 196Romagna, 14, 38, 48, 51, 63, 117 n. 67, 132,

149, 165, 167, 201, 221, 226, 263, 315,323,400

Romano, Ezzelino da, 8Rome, 63, 106, 168, 226Rossetti, Leonardo, 261Rossi, Beltramo de', 194Rossi, Ferrante de', 261, 311, 392Rossi, Filippo de', 58Rossi, Filippo Maria de', 194Rossi, Guido de', 53-4, 194, 206Rossi, Piermaria de', 11Rossi, Rolando de', 11Rovereto, 29, 53, 64, 90, 166Rovigo, 134 n. 144, 186, 221, 353, 379, 406,

462, 470Ruggiero da Perugia, 29

Sacile, 28, 31, 93, 119, 132Sagredo, Piero, 331-2Sagredo, Zuan, 276Salo, 361, 364, 382saltpetre, 399, 401-2

San Bonifacio, 120 n. 83Sanbonifacio family, 321

Lodovico, 371Sanguinetto, 187 n. 35, 188Sanmicheli, Michele, 92, 96, 412, 415-17, 421,

432, 435Sanmicheli, Zuan Hieronimo, 416, 437-9Sanseverino, Anton Maria da, 121, 183, 186Sanseverino, Gaspare da, 120-1, 199Sanseverino, Giovanfrancesco da, 56Sanseverino, Luigi da, 33, 38, 155 n. 11, 187Sanseverino, Roberto da, 51-4, 69, 95, 118, 144

n. 189, 158, 166, 178, 183-4, J88, 190-1,195, 199, 205, 209

Santino da Rota, 86 n. 116Sanuto, Marino, 12, 40, 251Sarpi, Fra Paolo, 218-19, 274, 326, 493Sassetti, Rinieri della, 72Savelli, Evangelista, 183, 185Savelli, Luca, 183Savelli, Paolo, 22, 23, 192Savelli, Sperandio, 85Savorgnan family, 16, 321, 343, 352

Antonio, 310, 343Ascanio, 349Girolamo, 248, 294, 296, 343, 382, 395-6Giulio, 306-7, 324, 349, 386, 392, 402, 413,

415, 417-18, 421, 440-1, 445, 453, 457Mario, 349

Savoy, 228, 245, 323Dukes of, 82, 241

Scaramuccia da Forli, 189Scipione, Baldassare, 294Scola, Basilio della, 85, 87Scotto family, 321

Alberto, 371Ferdinando, 310, 371

Scutari, 15, 18, 48, 91, 175 n. 91, 208Segna, see SenjSeniga, 187Senj (Segna), 242-3, 329, 459Sermione, 389Serravalle, 27, 340Sesso, Bernardin da, 341Sforza, Alessandro, 48, 122 n. 90, 185Sforza, Francesco, 225, 227Sforza, Francesco, Duke of Milan

Andrea Donato and, 204-5arbiter of political affairs, 40, 178condotte, 124Duke of Milan, 42, 83, 164and military administration, 118, 121 n. 88,

122 n. 90, 185military service with Milan, 34, 41military service with Venice, 39-40, 98, 144

n. 188, 156, 209

522

Index

proveditors and, 171 n. 68, 173, 178rewards to, 186, 191, 192Venetian plots against, 164

Sforza, Galeazzo Maria, Duke of Milan, 2Sforza, Giovanni, 58Sforza, Ludovico, Duke of Milan, 51, 57, 59,

63, 166Sforza, Massimiliano, 222-3Sibenico, 335, 431-2, 435, 437, 447, 450, 456,

459Sicily, 400Siena, 45, 60, 315, 329Sigismund, King of Hungary and Holy Roman

Emperor, 26, 37, 155Simone da Canossa, 29Sithia, 458Sixtus IV, pope 51-2, 107Soardi family, 321Soave, 89Societa di S. Marco, 67, i nSocieta Nuova di S. Marco, 69Soderini, Paolantonio, 54 n. 136Soldo, Cristoforo da, 41Sommariva, Giorgio, 93-4, i nSoncino, 179, 196Soporto, 234, 238Soranzo bank, 129 n. 123, 205Sorbolo, Niccolo, 98Soriano, Jacopo, 27, 170Spain, 3, 4, 63, 212, 216, 218, 224, 229, 234,

236, 241-2, 244, 247Spalato, 26, 335, 432, 447, 450, 456Spano, Pippo, 26, 28Speroni, Giovanni, da Caravaggio, 86 n. 116spies, 273Spinalonga, 445Stagnade da Verona, Baldissare delle, 87Starbach, the Vaivod, Cosul, 317Starigrado, 433Steno, Doge Michele, 19, 200, 209stradiots, see cavalryStrozzi, Carlo, 196Suda, 229, 236, 438, 445-6Sulieman II, sultan, 227sulphur, 400Swiss, the, 1, 2, 3, 50, 73, 80, 223, 297,

315-16, 320, 322, 326-8, 349, 475syndics, 272

Tacco, Giacomo, 392tactics, 4, 92, 383-4Tagliapietra, Francesco, 321Taranto, 57Taro, river, 56Tartaro, river, 88, 95Tensini, Francesco, 348

Termini, Duke of, 286Terraferma

administration, 75, 119-20defence, 1, 26-7, 28, 31-2, 42, 62, 88, 146-7,

189,389expansion, 4, 7, n , 31finances, 30, 128-31, 195, 461-83fortifications, 409-28role, 213, 326, 329, 365-6savi delta, see Venice: savi dell a TerrafermaVenice and, 7-19, 20-1, 108, 128 & n. 117,

161-2, 197-8, 200-1, 274, 298, 322,339-40

Terzi, Ottobuono, 22, 26Ticino, river, 98Tiepolo, Stefano, 420Tiepolo, Zuan, 332Tine, 232, 455Torbolo, 99Torcello, 207Trani, 221Trau, 335, 432, 447, 450Trento, 53, 63Trevisan, Angelo, 296Trevisan, Camillo, 277Trevisan, Jacopo, 154 n. 6Trevisan, Melchior, 175 n. 93Trevisan, Niccolo, 98, 204Treviso, 7, n-12, 15-17, 19, 20-2, 25, 32, 108,

no , 132, 195, 205, 221-3, 264, 333-8,346-7i 35°, 352, 365, 388-9, 406, 410-11,462-3, 470

Trieste, 244independence, 15occupation by Venice (1280), 9; (1508), 64,

85,92revolt of (1368), 12-13siege of (1463), 45, 47, 50, 77, 83, 109, 172,

186, 207Trivulzio, Gianjacopo, 4, 60, 63, 158, 168, 184Trivulzio, Teodoro, 269, 288-9, 386Tron, Piero, 330Turin, Treaty of, 15Turks

prisoners of, 144 n. 91threat of, 4, 5, 7, 15, 55, 78, 88, 92, 96, 147,

157, 297, 323-4, 432war with (1463-79), 43-50, 73, 77, 78, 91,

109, 130, 148-51, 208; (1499-1503), 61,85; (1537-40), 227-33, 319, 476-80;(1570-3), 233-41, 480-2

Tuscany, 319, 323

Udine, 31, 86, 96, 151, 340, 350, 406, 413-14,462-3, 470

Ulm, 82

523

Index

Umbria, 315Urbino, 301, 319Uscocks, 242-7, 261, 459

Valaresso, Alvise, 206Val Camonica, 382Val di Lamone, 60Valeggio, 264Valier, Hieronimo, 131 n. 134Valier, Vincenzo, 147, 175Vallata, 58Valle Lagra, 29Valmareno, 187Valona, 228Valtelline, 37, 171 n. 70Valtrompia, 397, 399Varano, Giulio Cesare da, 53, 209Varano, Jacopo da, 105Vaudemont, Count of, 326Veglia, 463Venice

Arsenal, 81-3, 84-5, 141, 246, 253, 258, 260,262-3, 264, 280, 333, 337-8, 351,397-400, 402, 463

College, 160, 161, 253-60, 262-3, 281, 299Council of Ten, 36-7, 86, 94, 105, 141,

163-8, 181-4, 185, 204-5, 231, 240, 249-53,256-62, 267, 273, 281, 285, 287, 374, 400

diplomacy, 9, 16, 48, 61, 213-16, 231-2, 249,251-2

doge, 159-60, 248-9Ducal Palace, 37, 118, 144economy, 8factions, 19, 20, 200-1finances, 12, 108, 128-31, 240, 461-83Frari, 192Great Council, 16, 159, 166-7, J8 2 , I 0A

256, 261, 271, 284, 289, 292Lido, 83, 236, 245, 260, 391, 398, 401, 403,

405, 407, 412, 420, 425, 469military thinking, 1, 4-5, 9, 14, 16, 33, 43,

54-5, 57, 200-2, 208, 210, 212-20, 253,273, 292-3, 297-8

military training, 202-3Piazzetta, 37S. Andrea, fortress, 245, 412S. Biagio (Giudecca), 84S. Marco, Basilica di, 125savi ai ordeni, 161, 255-7savi alia scrittura, 255-6, 258, 281, 391-2,

464savi cassier, 255savi del Consiglio, 161, 255, 258, 260savi della Terraferma, 90, 135, 160-3, I7°>

255, 258, 260, 374-5Scuola dei Bombardieri, 85-6, 403, 405-7

Senate, 19, 21, 28, 113-15, 159, 160, 168,203, 231, 250-69, 271, 280-3, 299

Signoria, 256tournaments in, 46, 142, 208-10Venetians as soldiers, 9-19, 97, 100, 154-5,

169, 200, 202-3, 205-8, 330-50war councils, 19

Venier, Cristoforo, 243Venier, Delfino, 103 n. 10Venier, Francesco, 201Venier, Paolo, 105Venier, Santo, 154, 170, 206Venier, Sebastiano, 234-8, 260, 274, 279,

305-6Vere, Sir John, 328Verona, 88-90, 221-4, 264, 267, 271, 346,

362-3, 475artillery school, 86, 404citadel, 58, 79 n. 66, 86, 88-9, 101 n. 1,

134, 196, 421collaterals in, 103-4, 106finances, 128 & n. 118, 130 n. 132fortifications, 88-90, 410, 414garrisons, 25, 29, 75, 207, 389governors (military), 394headquarters of Venetian army, 113, 171Machiavelli in, 1, 345man-at-arms in, 372Piccinino and, 39population of, 134Porta de' Calzolai, 104river fleets in, 98serraglio, 89, 93-4, i nsiege of (1404-5), 20, 22-4, 134, 154, 170Venetian officials in, 104, 108war with Della Scala in, 11

Vicenza, 11, 75, 84, 91, 104, 107, 128, 130n. 132, 189, 221-3, 264-5, 287, 299, 340,345-7, 353, 364, 406, 410-11, 416-17,420, 462-3, 470

Vico Pisano, 60Villach, 397Villani, Giovanni, 195Vimercato, Gianjacopo, i n n. 51Vimercato, Count Ottaviano, 392Vinciguerra, Maestro, 141Visconti family, 16, 32, 40, 182

Filippo Maria, Duke of Milan, 34-6, 83, 157n. 16, 164

Giangaleazzo, Duke of Milan, 17, 19, 20-1Visichio, 433Vitelli, Ferrante, 444, 446Vitelli, Paolo, 60-1, 84, 143 n. 186Vitelli, Vitello, 72Vitturi, Zuan, 296Vrana, 232, 433

524

Index

William of Nottingham, 80 n. 72 Zen (Zane), Antonio, 449Wotton, Sir Henry, 246 Zen (Zane), Carlo, 15, 24, 170

Zen (Zane), Fantino, 332Zamboni, Bartolino de', 27, 30, 93 Zen (Zane), Hieronimo, 234-5, 237, 305-6Zancani, Andrea, 62, 175 n. 93 Zen (Zane), Paolo, 200Zante, 232, 237, 447, 450, 456, 458-9, 466 Zen (Zane), Doge Raniero, 208Zara, 9, 10, 12, 26, 45, 48 n. 115, 230, 233, Zen (Zane), Zuan Giacomo, 279

238, 274, 335, 431 -6, 440-1, 444, 446-7, Zoldo Alto, 397450, 456, 459, 463, 468, 471 Zurlo, Collantonio, 49 n. 122

Zen (Zane), Andrea, 21

525