The Venetian army was the army of the city-state of Venice, and later of the Republic of Venice and its dominions. During the Republic's early centuries, it was a force comprising an urban militia.
During Venice's imperial age in the Late Middle Ages and the Venetian expansion into mainland Italy (Terraferma) in the 15th century, its conflicts with the Duchy of Milan, the Papacy, and even France and Hungary, required the Venetian government to raise armies of tens of thousands. Given Venice's small population and the Venetians' traditional preoccupation with naval affairs, these armies were mostly composed of mercenaries (such as the Balkan stradioti or the companies of the various condottieri). Venetian noblemen served as commanders in or accompanied these armies as representatives of the Republic, but for most of subsequent Venetian history, their captain-generals were usually distinguished mercenary captains. A further problem for Venice was the need to station permanent garrisons in their overseas colonies. During the Ottoman–Venetian Wars, primacy was usually held by the commanders of the Venetian navy, and the army forces served without distinction as shipborne infantry, in the field, or as garrisons of fortresses. During these conflicts, the Venetian forces also incorporated a number of allied forces from other Italian states.
In the 16th century, the local militias were organized into the cernida system and a small permanent peacetime force of professional soldiers was created, to be augmented with mercenaries in wartime. During the 17th century, the Republic hired foreign regiments—usually from Germany or Switzerland—for service by treaty with foreign princes. By the early 18th century, the regimental system had been firmly established, with the Venetian units separated into italiani (recruited in Italy), oltramontani (Swiss, Germans, and other from 'beyond the mountains'), and oltramarini (recruited from the Republic's overseas possessions in the Balkans). This system lasted, with some changes, until the Fall of the Republic of Venice to Napoleon in 1797.
Concina, Ennio (1972). Le Trionfanti et invittissime Armate Venete: Le Milizie della Serenissima dal XVI al XVIII secolo (in Italian). Venice: Filippi Editore.
Lenci, Angiolo (2014). "Marignano 1515. L'esercito veneziano del primo Cinquecento". In Haudenschild, Roland (ed.). Marignano 1515-2015. Von der Schlacht zur Neutralität (in Italian). Lenzburg. pp.191–202. ISBN978-3856481476.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
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Mugnai, Bruno (2018). The Cretan War, 1645–1671: The Venetian-Ottoman Struggle in the Mediterranean. Warwick: Helion & Company. ISBN978-1-911628-0-40.
Prelli, Alberto (2012). Sotto le bandiere di San Marco –Le armate della Serenissima nel '600 (in Italian). Bassano del Grappa: itinera progetti. ISBN978-88-88542-50-8.
Prelli, Alberto; Mugnai, Bruno (2016). L'ultima vittoria della Serenissima: 1716 – L'assedio di Corfù (in Italian). Bassano del Grappa: itinera progetti. ISBN978-88-88542-74-4.
The Battle of Fornovo took place 30 km southwest of the city of Parma on 6 July 1495. It was fought as King Charles VIII of France left Naples upon hearing the news of the grand coalition assembled against him. Despite the numerical advantage of their opponents, the French won the engagement and Charles was able to march his army out of Italy. It was nonetheless devoid of any strategic result as all of their conquests in the Italian Peninsula were abandoned. Fornovo was the first major pitched battle of the Italian Wars.
The Republic of Venice or Venetian Republic, traditionally known as La Serenissima, was a sovereign state and maritime republic in parts of the present-day Italian Republic that existed for 1,100 years from 697 until 1797. Centered on the lagoon communities of the prosperous city of Venice, it incorporated numerous overseas possessions in modern Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Greece, Albania and Cyprus. The republic grew into a trading power during the Middle Ages and strengthened this position during the Renaissance. Most citizens spoke the Venetian language, although publishing in Italian became the norm during the Renaissance, alongside Latin.
Bassano del Grappa is a city and comune, in the Vicenza province, in the region of Veneto, in northern Italy. It bounds the communes of Cassola, Marostica, Solagna, Pove del Grappa, Romano d'Ezzelino, Campolongo sul Brenta, Conco, Rosà, Cartigliano and Nove. Some neighbourhoods of these communes have become in practice a part of the urban area of Bassano, so that the population of the whole conurbation totals around 70,000 people.
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Veneto is one of the 20 regions of Italy. The music of Veneto.
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Mussolente is a town in the province of Vicenza, Veneto, northern Italy. It is north of SS248 state road.
The Seventh Ottoman–Venetian War was fought between the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire between 1714 and 1718. It was the last conflict between the two powers, and ended with an Ottoman victory and the loss of Venice's major possession in the Greek peninsula, the Peloponnese (Morea). Venice was saved from a greater defeat by the intervention of Austria in 1716. The Austrian victories led to the signing of the Treaty of Passarowitz in 1718, which ended the war.
The Lagunari Regiment "Serenissima" is the an active unit of Italian Army's infantry arm's amphibious Lagunari speciality. The name of the specialty comes from the Italian word for lagoon, while the regiment's name "Serenissima" commemorates the Most Serene Republic of Venice. The regiment is based in Venice and assigned to the Cavalry Brigade "Pozzuolo del Friuli". The "Pozzuolo del Friuli" brigade forms, together with the Italian Navy's Third Naval Division and San Marco Marine Brigade, the Italian Armed Forces' Sea Projection Force.
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The Bua were a medieval Albanian tribe. The name is first attested in 14th-century historical documents as one of the Albanian tribes living in the Despotate of Epirus. Later on, the Bua settled southwards in the Peloponnese, and a part of them found refuge in Italy in the Arbëreshë migrations that followed the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans. A branch of the tribe regiments was ennobled in the Holy Roman Empire after its service in the Stratioti, a Balkan mercenary unit. Mërkur Bua, its most prominent member, was Count of Aquino and Roccasecca.
The siege of Corfu took place on 8 July – 21 August 1716, when the Ottoman Empire besieged the city of Corfu, on the namesake island, then held by the Republic of Venice. The siege was part of the Seventh Ottoman–Venetian War, and, coming in the aftermath of the lightning conquest of the Morea by the Ottoman forces in the previous year, was a major success for Venice, representing its last major military success and allowing it to preserve its rule over the Ionian Islands.
Eugenio Bonivento was an Italian painter.
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AntonioGaidon (1738–1829), was an architect, urban planner and naturalist.
The Ottoman reconquest of the Morea took place in June–September 1715, during the Seventh Ottoman–Venetian War. The Ottoman army, under Grand Vizier Silahdar Damat Ali Pasha, aided by the fleet under Kapudan Pasha Canım Hoca Mehmed Pasha, conquered the Morea peninsula in southern Greece, which had been captured by the Republic of Venice in the 1680s, during the Sixth Ottoman–Venetian War. The Ottoman reconquest inaugurated the second period of Ottoman rule in the Morea, which ended with the outbreak of the Greek War of Independence in 1821.
Ruggero Cane Ranieri was an Italian military leader and a major political figure in the city of Perugia during the first half of the 15th century. He was a member of the noble lineage of the Counts Ranieri of Civitella Ranieri, near Umbertide.
The War of Padua was a conflict in 1404–1405 between the Republic of Venice and the Carrarese lordship of Padua. In the power vacuum produced by the death of the Duke of Milan, Gian Galeazzo Visconti, in 1402, Francesco II da Carrara endeavored to expand into the Veneto and capture cities held by Visconti troops. These designs alarmed Venice, which allied with Milan to counter the common threat posed by the Carrarese state, and for the first time adopted a policy of direct intervention in the affairs of its hinterland.
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