Doge of Venice - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The Doge
Doge
Doge is a dialectal Italian word that descends from the Latin dux , meaning "leader", especially in a military context. The wife of a Doge is styled a Dogaressa....

of Venice (icon; Venetian

Venetian language

Venetian or Venetan is a Romance language spoken as a native language by over two million people, mostly in the Veneto region of Italy, where of five million inhabitants almost all can understand it. It is sometimes spoken and often well understood outside Veneto, in Trentino, Friuli, Venezia...

: Doxe; ; both derived from Latin dux, "military leader"), often mistranslated Duke (the Italian word for duke is "Duca") was the chief magistrate

Chief Magistrate

Chief Magistrate is a generic designation for a public official whose office—individual or collegial—is the highest in his or her class, in either of the fundamental meanings of Magistrate : as a major political and administrative office , and/or as a judge Chief Magistrate is a generic designation...

and leader of the Most Serene Republic of Venice

Republic of Venice

The Republic of Venice or Venetian Republic was a state originating from the city of Venice in Northeastern Italy. It existed for over a millennium, from the late 7th century until 1797. It was formally known as the Most Serene Republic of Venice and is often referred to as La Serenissima, in...

for over a thousand years. Doges of Venice were elected for life by the city-state's aristocracy. Commonly the person selected as Doge was the shrewdest elder in the city. Contrary to popular belief the doge was not a duke

Duke

A duke or duchess is a member of the nobility, historically of highest rank below the monarch, and historically controlling a duchy...

in the modern sense, nor was a doge the equivalent of a hereditary

Nobility

Nobility is a social class which possesses more acknowledged privileges or eminence than members of most other classes in a society, membership therein typically being hereditary. The privileges associated with nobility may constitute substantial advantages over or relative to non-nobles, or may be...

duke. The "doge" was the senior-most elected official of Venice and Genoa; both cities were republics and elected doges. A doge was referred to variously by the titles "My Lord the Doge" (Monsignor el Doxe), "Most Serene Prince" (Serenissimo Principe), and "His Serenity" (Sua Serenità).

Origins

According to the chronicler John the Deacon

John, deacon of Venice

John the Deacon was a Venetian deacon, secretary to the doge of Venice and a chronicler.-The Venetian chronicle:According to the New Advent encyclopedia:...

, author of the Chronicon Venetum ("Chronicle of Venice"), written about AD 1000, the office of the Doge was first instituted in Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

about 700, replacing tribune

Tribune

Tribune was a title shared by elected officials in the Roman Republic. Tribunes had the power to convene the Plebeian Council and to act as its president, which also gave them the right to propose legislation before it. They were sacrosanct, in the sense that any assault on their person was...

s that had led the cluster of early settlements in the lagoon. Whether or not the first doges were technically local representatives of the Emperor of Constantinople, the doge, like the emperor, held office for life and was similarly regarded as the ecclesiastical, the civil and the military leader, in a power structure termed caesaropapism

Caesaropapism

Caesaropapism is the idea of combining the power of secular government with, or making it superior to, the spiritual authority of the Church; especially concerning the connection of the Church with government. The term caesaropapism was coined by Max Weber, who defined it as follows: “a secular,...

Selection of the Doge

The doge's prerogatives were not defined with precision, and though the position was entrusted to members of the inner circle of powerful Venetian families, after several doges had associated a son with themselves in the ducal office, this tendency towards a hereditary monarchy was checked by a law which decreed that no doge had the right to associate any member of his family with himself in his office, or to name his successor. After 1172 the election of the doge was finally entrusted to a committee of forty, who were chosen by four men selected from the Great Council of Venice

Great Council of Venice

The Great Council of Venice , originally the Consilium Sapientis was a political organ of the Republic of Venice between 1172 and 1797 and met in a special large hall of the Palazzo Ducale....

, which was itself nominated annually by twelve persons. After a deadlock

Deadlock

A deadlock is a situation where in two or more competing actions are each waiting for the other to finish, and thus neither ever does. It is often seen in a paradox like the "chicken or the egg"...

ed tie

Tie (draw)

To tie or draw is to finish a competition with identical or inconclusive results. The word "tie" is usually used in North America for sports such as American football. "Draw" is usually used in the United Kingdom, Ireland and the Commonwealth of Nations and it is usually used for sports such as...

at the election of 1229, the number of electors was increased from forty to forty-one.

New regulations for the elections of the doge introduced in 1268 remained in force until the end of the republic in 1797. Their object was to minimize as far as possible the influence of individual great families, and this was effected by a complex elective machinery. Thirty members of the Great Council, chosen by lot

Sortition

In politics, sortition is the selection of decision makers by lottery. The decision-makers are chosen as a random sample from a larger pool of candidates....

, were reduced by lot to nine; the nine chose forty and the forty were reduced by lot to twelve, who chose twenty-five. The twenty-five were reduced by lot to nine and the nine elected forty-five. Then the forty-five were once more reduced by lot to eleven, and the eleven finally chose the forty-one who actually elected the doge. None could be elected but by at least twenty-five votes out of forty-one, nine votes out of eleven or twelve, or seven votes out of nine electors. A detailed description of this process, and the ceremonial procession that followed, is preserved in Martin Da Canale's work 'Les Estoires de Venise' (English translation by Laura K. Morreale, Padua 2009).

In a ceremonial formula for consulting the Venetians, when a new doge was chosen, before he took the oath of investiture he was presented to the people with the formula: "This is your doge, if it please you." This practice came to an end in 1423, after the election of Francesco Foscari

Francesco Foscari

Francesco Foscari was doge of Venice from 1423 to 1457, at the inception of the Italian Renaissance.-Biography:Foscari, of an ancient noble family, served the Republic of Venice in numerous official capacities—as ambassador, president of the Forty, member of the Council of Ten, inquisitor,...

, who was presented with the unconditional words "Your doge".

Regulations

While doges had great temporal power at first, after 1268, the doge was constantly under strict surveillance: he had to wait for other officials to be present before opening dispatches from foreign powers; he was not allowed to possess any property in a foreign land.

The doges normally ruled for life (although a few were forcibly removed from office). After a doge's death, a commission of inquisitori passed judgment upon his acts, and his estate was liable to be fined for any discovered malfeasance. The official income of the doge was never large, and from early times holders of the office remained engaged in trading ventures. These ventures kept them in touch with the requirements of the grandi.

From July 7, 1268, during a vacancy in the office of doge, the state was headed ex officio, with the style vicedoge, by the senior consigliere ducale (ducal counsellor).

Ceremony

One of the ceremonial duties of the doge was to celebrate the symbolic marriage of Venice with the sea. This was done by casting a ring from the state barge, the Bucentaur

Bucentaur

The bucentaur was the state galley of the doges of Venice. It was used every year on Ascension Day up to 1798 to take the doge out to the Adriatic Sea to perform the "Marriage of the Adriatic" – more accurately, "Marriage of the Sea" – a ceremony that symbolically wedded Venice to the sea every...

, into the Adriatic

Adriatic Sea

The Adriatic Sea is a body of water separating the Italian Peninsula from the Balkan peninsula, and the system of the Apennine Mountains from that of the Dinaric Alps and adjacent ranges...

. In its earlier form this ceremony was instituted to commemorate the conquest of Dalmatia

Dalmatia

Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....

by Doge Pietro II Orseolo

Pietro II Orseolo

Pietro II Orseolo was the Doge of Venice from 991 to 1009.He began the period of eastern expansion of Venice that lasted for the better part of 500 years...

in 1000, and was celebrated on Ascension Day. It took its later and more magnificent form after the visit of Pope Alexander III

Pope Alexander III

Pope Alexander III , born Rolando of Siena, was Pope from 1159 to 1181. He is noted in history for laying the foundation stone for the Notre Dame de Paris.-Church career:...

and the Holy Roman Emperor

Holy Roman Emperor

The Holy Roman Emperor is a term used by historians to denote a medieval ruler who, as German King, had also received the title of "Emperor of the Romans" from the Pope...

Frederick I

Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor

Frederick I Barbarossa was a German Holy Roman Emperor. He was elected King of Germany at Frankfurt on 4 March 1152 and crowned in Aachen on 9 March, crowned King of Italy in Pavia in 1155, and finally crowned Roman Emperor by Pope Adrian IV, on 18 June 1155, and two years later in 1157 the term...

to Venice in 1177. On state occasions the Doge was surrounded by an increasing amount of ceremony, and in international relations he had the status of a sovereign prince

Prince

Prince is a general term for a ruler, monarch or member of a monarch's or former monarch's family, and is a hereditary title in the nobility of some European states. The feminine equivalent is a princess...

.

The doge took part in ducal processions, which started in the Piazza San Marco

Piazza San Marco

Piazza San Marco , is the principal public square of Venice, Italy, where it is generally known just as "the Piazza". All other urban spaces in the city are called "campi"...

. The doge would appear in the center of the procession, preceded by civil servants ranked in ascending order of prestige and followed by noble magistrates ranked in descending order of status. Francesco Sansovino

Francesco Sansovino

Francesco Tatti da Sansovino was a versatile Italian scholar and man of letters, also known as a publisher. He was born in Rome, the son of Jacopo Sansovino, but soon moved to Venice then studied law at Padua and Bologna....

described such a procession in minute detail in 1581, and his verbal description is confirmed and complemented by Cesare Vecellio

Cesare Vecellio

Cesare Vecellio was an Italian painter and engraver of the Renaissance, active in Venice.He was the cousin of the painter Titian. Like Titian, he was born at Cadore in the Veneto. He accompanied Titian to Augsburg in 1548, and seems to have worked as his assistant. Many of Cesare's pictures were...

's 1586 painting of a ducal procession in the Piazza San Marco.

From the 14th century onwards the ceremonial crown and well-known symbol of the doge of Venice was called corno ducale, a unique kind of a ducal hat

Ducal hat

The ducal hat of the Duchy of Styria is a jagged crown made out of silver-gilt. Believed to be produced in the 15th century, it was refashioned with pearls and enameled in 1766....

. It was a stiff horn-like bonnet, which was made of gemmed brocade or cloth-of-gold and worn over the camauro

Camauro

A camauro is a cap traditionally worn by the Pope of the Catholic Church....

, a fine linen cap with a structured peak reminiscent of the Phrygian cap

Phrygian cap

The Phrygian cap is a soft conical cap with the top pulled forward, associated in antiquity with the inhabitants of Phrygia, a region of central Anatolia. In the western provinces of the Roman Empire it came to signify freedom and the pursuit of liberty, perhaps through a confusion with the pileus,...

, a classical symbol of liberty. Every Easter Monday

Easter Monday

Easter Monday is the day after Easter Sunday and is celebrated as a holiday in some largely Christian cultures, especially Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox cultures...

the doge headed a procession

Procession

A procession is an organized body of people advancing in a formal or ceremonial manner.-Procession elements:...

from San Marco

St Mark's Basilica

The Patriarchal Cathedral Basilica of Saint Mark is the cathedral church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Venice, northern Italy. It is the most famous of the city's churches and one of the best known examples of Byzantine architecture...

to the convent

Convent

A convent is either a community of priests, religious brothers, religious sisters, or nuns, or the building used by the community, particularly in the Roman Catholic Church and in the Anglican Communion...

of San Zaccaria where the abbess

Abbess

An abbess is the female superior, or mother superior, of a community of nuns, often an abbey....

presented him a new camauro crafted by the nuns. This was worn by the Doge along with golden robes, slippers and a scepter for ceremonial duties.

Death and burial

Until the 15th century, the funeral service for a deceased doge would normally be held at St Mark's Basilica

St Mark's Basilica

, where some early holders of this office are also buried. After the 15th century however, the funerals of all later doges were held at the Basilica di San Giovanni e Paolo, and twenty-five doges are buried there.

The last Doge

As the oligarchical element in the constitution developed, the more important functions of the ducal office were assigned to other officials, or to administrative boards, and he who had once been the pilot of the ship became little more than a figurehead. The last doge was Ludovico Manin

Ludovico Manin

Ludovico Manin was the last Doge of Venice. He governed Venice from 9 March 1789 until 1797, when he was forced to abdicate by Napoleon Bonaparte.-Early life:...

, who abdicated on 1797, when Venice passed under the power of Napoleon's France following his conquest of the city.

While Venice would again shortly declare itself a republic, attempting to resist annexation by Austria, it would never revive the dogal style, but various titles including dictator

Dictator

A dictator is a ruler who assumes sole and absolute power but without hereditary ascension such as an absolute monarch. When other states call the head of state of a particular state a dictator, that state is called a dictatorship...

and collective heads of state, including a triumvirate

Triumvirate