The Minor Council (Italian : Minor Consiglio) or Ducal Council was one of the main constitutional bodies of the Republic of Venice, and served both as advisors and partners to the Doge of Venice, sharing and limiting his authority.
The Minor Council (Italian : Minor Consiglio) or Ducal Council was one of the main constitutional bodies of the Republic of Venice, and served both as advisors and partners to the Doge of Venice, sharing and limiting his authority.
The Minor Council was established likely sometime between 1172 and 1178, [1] shortly after the Great Council. [2] Both councils had their antecedents in a 'council of wise men' (consilium sapientes) that the Venetian patriciate had placed next to the Doge to advise him and curtail his independent authority, and is attested at least since 1143. [3] [4] Indeed, the first known ducal councillors (consiglieri ducali) were elected along with Doge Pietro Barbolano in 1032, to prevent a recurrence of the monarchical tendencies of his predecessors. [5]
The members of the Minor Council were elected by the Great Council, and the chosen members were prohibited from refusing the election on heavy penalties. [1] The number of ducal councillors was raised to six, one for each district of the city. [1] [6] Their terms of office lasted for one year, followed by another year (later raised to 16 months) where they were prohibited from occupying the same office. [1] The ducal councillors were ex officio members of the Great Council. [6]
Very soon after its establishment, the heads of the Council of Forty (Capi dei Quaranta) became associated with the Minor Council, sometimes substituting for missing ducal councillors and holding the right to vote with them in certain matters. [1] [6] This association is documented as established fact by 1231. [1]
In 1437, three of the year's outgoing councillors were named as 'inferior' councillors, not formally part of the Minor Council, but tasked with representing it in the Criminal Forty. [1]
The main function of the Minor Council was to share in and limit the Doge's power. [1] Indeed, so close was the association of the two, that they are frequently almost conflated in the sources. [1] The Doge was dependent on the assent of at least four ducal councillors for his decisions to have force, and could not open dispatches except in their presence, while conversely the Minor Council did not require the Doge's presence to act. [7]
In the absence of a Doge, or during an interregnum, the Minor Council handled all government, and one of the ducal councillors—not always the eldest—became the Vice Doge. [1] [8] The Minor Council also initiated the election of a new Doge, and was empowered to introduce any changes to the process that they sought fit. [8] The Vice Doge was then responsible for crowning the newly elected Doge with the chief symbol of his office, the corno ducale . [8]
Together with the Capi dei Quaranta and the Doge, the Minor Council formed the Signoria of Venice, the formal Venetian government, [6] and along with the boards of the savi formed the de facto cabinet, the Full College. [9] [10]
The Minor Council co-presided with the Doge over all governing councils of the Republic, and had the right to initiate laws and proposals to be put before the Great Council. [1] The Minor Council was also notified in advance of any draft proposal initiated by other councils, and had the right to delay its presentation to the Great Council for three days. [1] Furthermore, even individual ducal councillors had the right to convene the Great Council. [1] Once the lower councils had reached a decision, however, the Minor Council was bound to obey it. [6] Indeed, the oath of office of the ducal councillors explicitly obliged them to enforce this on the Doge, and to oppose him should he try to override or ignore a decision of the lower councils. [8]
As part of the Signoria, the Minor Council shared in the supervision of the courts, [8] and adjudicated jurisdiction in disputes between junior magistracies. [1] The Doge's oath of office obliged him and his ducal councillors to visit the courts in person and hear any complaints brought to them there. [8] Until 1446, the Minor Council also had the responsibility of interpreting the law. [1]
In addition, the ducal councillors were responsible for supervising the administration of Venice itself, and the elections of its officials. [1] In financial matters, the Minor Council originally had the right to dispose of public funds of up to 10 pounds of gold, but this was abolished in 1441. [1]
The Doge of Venice was the highest role of authority within the Republic of Venice. The word Doge derives from the Latin Dux, meaning "leader," originally referring to any military leader, becoming in the Late Roman Empire the title for a leader of an expeditionary force formed by detachments from the frontier army, separate from, but subject to, the governor of a province, authorized to conduct operations beyond provincial boundaries.
The Republic of Venice, officially the Most Serene Republic of Venice and traditionally known as La Serenìssima, was a sovereign state and maritime republic with its capital in Venice. Founded, according to tradition, in 697 by Paolo Lucio Anafesto, over the course of its 1,100 years of history it established itself as one of the major European commercial and naval powers. Initially extended in the Dogado area, during its history it annexed a large part of Northeast Italy, Istria, Dalmatia, the coasts of present-day Montenegro and Albania as well as numerous islands in the Adriatic and eastern Ionian seas. At the height of its expansion, between the 13th and 16th centuries, it also governed the Peloponnese, Crete and Cyprus, most of the Greek islands, as well as several cities and ports in the eastern Mediterranean.
The Council of Ten, or simply the Ten, was from 1310 to 1797 one of the major governing bodies of the Republic of Venice. Elections took place annually and the Council of Ten had the power to impose punishments upon patricians. The Council of Ten had a broad jurisdictional mandate over matters of state security. The Council of Ten and the Full College constituted the inner circle of oligarchical patricians who effectively ruled the Republic of Venice.
The office of Procurator of Saint Mark was one of the few lifetime appointments in the government of the Venetian Republic and was considered second only to that of the doge in prestige. It was routinely occupied by nobles belonging to the most influential families and typically represented the climax of a distinguished political career, although it was often an intermediate position prior to election as doge.
The Senate, formally the Consiglio dei Pregadi or Rogati, was the main deliberative and legislative body of the Republic of Venice.
The Great Council or Major Council was a political organ of the Republic of Venice between 1172 and 1797. It was the chief political assembly, responsible for electing many of the other political offices and the senior councils that ran the Republic, passing laws, and exercising judicial oversight. Following the lockout of 1297, its membership was established on hereditary right, exclusive to the patrician families enrolled in the Golden Book of the Venetian nobility.
The Council of Forty, also known as the Quarantia, was one of the highest constitutional bodies of the Republic of Venice, with both legal and political functions as the supreme court.
The Avogadori de Comùn, literally "public prosecutors", were an institution of the Republic of Venice. The Avogadori were responsible for taking care of and defend the interests of the Commune Veneciarum, meaning the union of noble families in the Government of Venice, in a manner similar to that of a modern State Attorney.
The Ionian Islands were an overseas possession of the Republic of Venice from the mid-14th century until the late 18th century. The conquest of the islands took place gradually. The first to be acquired was Cythera and the neighboring islet of Anticythera, indirectly in 1238 and directly after 1363. In 1386 the Council of Corfu, which was the governing body of the island, voted to make Corfu a vassal of Venice. During the Venetian period the Council remained the most powerful institution on the island. A century later, Venice captured Zante in 1485, Cephalonia in 1500 and Ithaca in 1503. These three islands modelled their administration on Corfu's model and formed their own councils. The conquest was completed in 1718 with the capture of Lefkada. Each of the islands remained part of the Venetian Stato da Màr until Napoleon Bonaparte dissolved the Republic of Venice in 1797. The Ionian Islands are situated in the Ionian Sea, off the west coast of Greece. Cythera, the southernmost, is just off the southern tip of the Peloponnese and Corfu, the northernmost, is located at the entrance of the Adriatic Sea. It is believed that the Venetian period on the Ionian Islands was generally prosperous, especially compared with the coinciding Tourkokratia — Turkish rule over the remainder of present-day Greece.
The Order of Saint Mark was the sole order of chivalry of the Republic of Venice. It was named in honour of Venice's patron saint, Mark the Evangelist.
The Venetian navy was the navy of the Venetian Republic which played an important role in the history of the republic and the Mediterranean world. It was the premier navy in the Mediterranean Sea for many centuries between the medieval and early modern periods, providing Venice with control and influence over trade and politics far in excess of the republic's size and population. It was one of the first navies to mount gunpowder weapons aboard ships, and through an organised system of naval dockyards, armouries and chandlers was able to continually keep ships at sea and rapidly replace losses. The Venetian Arsenal was one of the greatest concentrations of industrial capacity prior to the Industrial Revolution and responsible for the bulk of the republic's naval power.
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The Savii or Savi di Terraferma was a board of five senior magistrates of the Republic of Venice, initially charged with the defence of the Republic's possessions in the Italian mainland. Gradually they assumed specific roles pertaining to the supervision of public finances, the military administration, state ceremonies, and urgent ad hoc matters.
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The magistrato alle pompe was a government department of the Republic of Venice responsible for upholding the Republic's sumptuary laws.
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The grand chancellor was one of the most senior offices in the Republic of Venice. Alone among the senior magistracies, which were reserved for the Venetian patriciate, it was held by common citizens.
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