Venice

[Travellers | Cities | Routes | Trade Goods | Themes]

by Caroline Stone

Forced by its position to depend upon the sea, Venice (Venezia) lived almost from its beginnings by trade, particularly with the East and it also served as a link between Europe and Asia. In spite of its rivalry with Genoa and conflicts with the Ottomans, Venice remained one of the world’s most important centres of commerce until the beginning of the 18th century. Changing patterns of trade led to the city’s decline; it shrank into insignificance during the 19th century and only partially recovered in the 20th under the impact of tourism.

The islands on the northwest coast of the Adriatic that make up Venice were first settled – apart from a few fishermen - in the 5th century, by refugees from the cities on the mainland fleeing the invading Huns, Goths and later Lombards. 451 A.D. is the traditional date for the founding of Venice.

From the beginning, Venice was to have a close, although not always smooth, relationship with Byzantium. As when, in 828, the Venetians rejected their Byzantine patron saint and stole the body of St Mark from Alexandria to replace him. In the 9th century, Venice resisted the Carolingian Franks and became the point of contact between the Byzantine trade system of the southern Mediterranean and the Germano-Latin world of northern Europe. Grain, wood, furs, wool, honey, raw materials and slaves travelled south, while silks, wine, spices, sugar and luxury manufactured goods of all kinds headed north.

By the end of the century, Venice’s trade network was already in place. Her fleet was of prime importance, as was control of the Adriatic. Over the next hundred years, Venice was to suppress Slav pirates, and conquer the Dalmatian and Croatian coast. Like her later expansion into the Aegean, Venice’s main ambition was to protect her routes and trading posts, rather than territorial expansion per se.

The Crusades brought Venice new possessions and new opportunities. Defying the ban on selling weapons to the enemy, the Venetians became one of the major arms dealers around the Mediterranean. The sack of Constantinople in 1204 wrecked the chances of a united Christian East, but brought Venice a chain of ports stretching as far as the Black Sea, as well as 3/8 of Constantinople itself. Aleppo was their major centre inland and the departure point for the overland caravan trade.

Competition with Genoa and to a lesser extent Pisa was fierce and Venice began to explore the overland routes East in an attempt to lessen the middlemen standing between them and the trade in silk, cotton, porcelain and above all spices. Over the centuries a number of these merchants left accounts of their travels, the best known, of course, being the 13th century Marco Polo.

As wealth flowed in, Venice was adorned with churches and palaces and craftsmen of all kinds flourished, producing silks, glass, jewellery and luxury goods to satisfy local demand and for export. Over ten thousand workmen were employed in the Arsenal and the city developed a double dynamism: that of trade and that of its own industrial productivity. It was also probably the most international city in Europe, one traveller complaining that more foreigners than locals were to be seen in the streets.

In the 14th century, Venice and Genoa fought each other basically to a standstill, while the Black Death took its toll of them, as of the rest of the world. By 1400, Venice had asserted her dominance over her rivals and essentially had the monopoly of the spices bought at Constantinople and Alexandria for distribution to the rest of Europe. In order to secure her trade routes north through the Alpine passes, Venice began a series of campaigns against the cities of the Italian mainland.

For more than two centuries, the Venetians had maintained good relations with the Turks, importing large quantities of raw materials in exchange for manufactured goods. This was to change as the Ottomans began to expand into the Venetian sphere of influence, conquering territories that had long been subject to them. The Venetians, who had no wish for war, tried to safeguard their commercial interests by agreements – essentially involving the payment of large sums for the right to trade - but these were not respected and in a long series of battles, the Venetians lost one after another of their Aegean possessions.

In 1499 worse was to befall them. Vasco da Gama returned to Lisbon having proved the practicability of the sea route to India and Venice’s position as chief distributor of the spices, silks and other goods brought in by caravan across Asia was at an end. Europe, too, in the 16th century was determined to break the Venetian empire, both commercial and territorial. By 1718, the Austrians and the Turks had forced them to cede everything but the Dalmatian coast, a foothold in Albania and a few of the islands.

Embattled on all sides, Venice continued to fight for economic survival. As the Portuguese established themselves across the Indian Ocean, however, true power passed first into their hands and then to the Dutch and the British. Venice, which had generally judged armed neutrality to be most favourable for trade, gradually lost its naval capacity.

One last effort was made against the Barbary pirates, who were disrupting trade, but Venice increasingly became a city for entertainment and leisure, and by the end of the 18th century, both trade and manufacturing industries were in decline. The destruction wrought by the French under Napoleon further demoralized the city.

In spite of a limited revival of shipbuilding caused by the opening of the Suez Canal, Venice in the 19th c. was largely abandoned and one traveller commented that begging was the chief employment. Once wealthy families were forced to sell their treasures – this was at the beginning of the international market for antiques - and it is estimated that only some 5% of Venice’s works of art remain. By the end of the century, Venice was living largely off tourism and this led to a limited revival of some of her ancient crafts.