Antonio Morosini (fl. 1418-1419)

by Andrew Brooke (see Chinese translation)

Antonio Morosini was born in about 1365 to a noble Venetian family. He must not have led a distinguished public life, but as a member of the Venetian Senate, would have been a well-placed observer of events. Little is known about his life, and the date of his death is uncertain. By the 1410’s his Chronicles came to the attention of the Censors, and some of the contents were reportedly burnt.

The surviving portion of the Chronicles starts from the year 1094 all the way up to 1433/34. The first (and briefer) part of his Chronicles are compared to dozens of other surviving Venetian histories and deemed by scholars to be rather unremarkable, unoriginal, and inaccurate in parts, interesting perhaps only from a linguistic viewpoint. The nature of the content from about the year 1400 begins to change, and as well the scholarly interest in their value. Constituting the greater bulk of his writing, the records from this date onwards increasingly take on the character of first-hand reportage: news, events, gossip, at times trivial, at others crucial. They are offered in immediacy, and therefore are either not found in the more official archives, or by subsequent events prove to be wanting and inaccurate. Covered are the diplomatic and political incidents of France, Germany, Italy, the Adriatic and Mediterranean basin, the Greek world, and the Levant. News of piracy, shipwrecks, and oftentimes detailed record of what was lost in them.

A Letter addressed by Morosini to the Venetian Consul in Alexandria (his nephew) is dated 1 February 1419. It relates to occurrences between November 1418 and January 1419. An article by Georg Christ compares the content with those of his Chronicles of the same date and finds much in common (as well as some omissions). The topics covered are: the embassy from Cremona to Venice, regarding their struggles with Milan; the Venetian war in Friuli; a Venetian embassy to Pope Martin V; the capture of Venetian ambassadors to Emperor Sigismund by a garrison in Finkenstein; report of cogs dispatched to Syria; Milanese skirmishes against Genoa; the Turkish threat to Hungary; minor domestic news; and so forth.