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Heart of the State, Site of Tension: The Archival Turn Viewed from Venice, ca. 1400-1700*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Filippo de Vivo
Filippo de Vivo*
Affiliation:
Birkbeck, University of London
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Abstract

In recent years, a new historiographical trend has focused on archives not as mere repositories of sources, but as objects of inquiry in their own right. Particular attention has been paid to how their continually evolving organization and management reflect the political presuppositions of the institutions presiding over them. This article acknowledges this archival turn and provides an example drawn from the famous case study of the Venetian chancery between the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries, at a time of substantial developments in the management of archives. It proposes a more inclusive and socially contextualized approach in order to demonstrate that archives were not just tools of power but also sites of economic, social, and political conflict. A close reading of the very document that led to the institutional view of the Venetian archive as the “heart of the state” reveals that the patrician rulers worried about both the fragility of their archive and the reliability of the notaries in charge of it. This perspective helps to explain the exalted representation of the archive in the late Middle Ages and the early modern era—a representation that, taken at face value, continues to inspire historical analysis today—by illuminating the practical difficulties surrounding archival methods at the time. The history of archives emerges as a promising field of inquiry precisely because it can shed light on both the history of the state and the social context in which the state’s actions had to be negotiated.

Type
Political Cultures in Italy, from the Sixteenth to the Nineteenth Century
Information
Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales - English Edition , Volume 68 , Issue 3 , September 2013 , pp. 457 - 485
Copyright
Copyright © Les Éditions de l’EHESS 2013

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Footnotes

*

Funding for this research came from a Starting Grant awarded by the European Research Council. I presented previous versions of this paper at the Clark Memorial Library in Los Angeles, the Venetian Seminar at Warwick, and the Villa I Tatti/Harvard Center for Renaissance Studies in Florence. I am very grateful to Roisin Cossar, Andrea Guidi, and Cecilia Hewlett for their observations. This article is dedicated to the memory of our fellow borsista Shona Kelly Wray (1963-2012).

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52. Senato, Misti, r. 49, f. 181 (May 18, 1413), ASV, Venice.

53. Mueller, “La crisi,” 555.

54. Consiglio di Deici, Misti, r. 15, c. 114v (December 22, 1456), ASV, Venice.

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57. Mueller, “La crisi.”

58. Quoted in Alberto Tenenti, “Il senso dello Stato,” in Tenenti and Tucci eds., Il Rinascimento, 325.

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63. Andrea Da Mosto, Archivi dell’amministrazione centrale della Repubblica Veneta e archivi notarili, vol. 1 of L’Archivio di Stato di Venezia. Indice generale storico descrittivo e analitico (Rome: Biblioteca d’arte editrice, 1937), 149; Carucci et al., Guida, 4: 895, 899, 931, 948 and 949.

64. De Vivo, Information and Communication, 32-40.

65. De Vivo, “Ordering the Archive,” 236.

66. Consiglio di Dieci, Comuni, f. 351, cc. nn. (May 30, 1624), ASV, Venice.

67. Maranini, Giuseppe , La costituzione di Venezia dopo la serrata del Maggior Consiglio (Florence: La Nuova Italia, 1974), 273–96 Google Scholar; Lazzarini, , Scritti di paleografìa e diplomatica, 190 Google Scholar; Carucci, et al., Guida, 4: 906 Google Scholar; Pedani Fabris, “Veneta auctoritate notarius,” 21-28.

68. Trebbi, , “La cancelleria,” 79–81.Google Scholar

69. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 191 (July 8, 1444), c. 205 (February 13, 1451) and c. 517 (October 6, 1573), ASV, Venice; G. Lorenzi, Monumenti, 140 (July 20, 1507).

70. De Vivo, “Ordering the Archive,” 247; See also Vianello, Amelia , Gli archivi del Consiglio dei Dieci. Memoria e istanze di riforma nel secondo Settecento veneziano (Padua: Il Poligrafo, 2009 Google Scholar).

71. Cecchetti, Gli archivi, 11-13; Baschet, Les archives, 156.

72. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 143 (April 23, 1402), ASV, Venice; the document is partially published in Angiolini and Pavone, “Gli archivi,” 1659.

73. Lorenzi, Monumenti, 59 (March 26, 1423).

74. Ibid., 72 (September 1, 1445).

75. Consiglio di Dieci, Misti, r. 15, c. 191r (October 31, 1459), ASV, Venice.

76. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 143 (April 23, 1402), ASV, Venice.

77. Carucci et al., Guida, 4: 894-95.

78. Collegio, Cerimoniali, r. 2, c. 1 (February 12, 1594), ASV, Venice. The series had reached six volumes by 1797: see Carucci et al., Guida, 4: 890.

79. Inventory by Antonio de Negri in Secreta, Indici, b. 6, ASV, Venice.

80. Lorenzi, Monumenti, 77 (May 28, 1451).

81. For example, Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 245 (August 11, 1462), ASV, Venice.

82. Consiglio di Dieci, Misti, r. 15, c. 191 (October 31, 1459), ASV, Venice.

83. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 108, c. 14 (October 30, 1600), ASV, Venice.

84. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 22, c. 820 (January 30, 1611), and 162 (May 30, 1624), ASV, Venice. Inquisitori di stati, b. 924, c. nn., in the same repository contains a list of the senators who accessed the Secreta in the years 1698-99, specifying which manuscripts they had consulted.

85. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 108, c. 6-9 (April 21, 1600), ASV, Venice.

86. See for example Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 360 (May 5, 1522), b. 187, c. 636 (September 24, 1587); Senato Terra, r. 81, c. 130v (October 14, 1611), ASV, Venice.

87. See Vivo, de , Information and Communication, 46–57 Google Scholar.

88. Lazzarini, Scritti di paleografìa e diplomatica, 168-69. The notarii presbyteri continued to register private deeds in Venice until the early sixteenth century, even though pope Eugene IV prohibited this practice in 1433. See Giorgio Cracco, “Relinquere laicis quae laicorum sunt. Un intervento di papa Eugenio IV contro i preti-notai di Venezia,” Bollettino dell’Istituto di storia della società e dello stato veneziano 3 (1961): 179-89. For comparisons, see Bartoli Langeli, Notai, 59-86, and Frances Andrews, “Living like the Laity? The Negotiation of Religious Status in the Cities of Late Medieval Italy,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 20 (2010): 27-55.

89. Segarizzi, Arnaldo , “Cenni sulle scuole pubbliche a Venezia nel secolo XV e sul primo maestro d’esse,” Atti dell’Istituto Veneto di Scienze Lettere ed Arti 75 (1915-16): 637–65 Google Scholar; Nardi, Bruno , Saggi sulla cultura veneta del Quattro e Cinquecento (Padua: Antenore, 1971), 30–44 Google Scholar; and Ross, James B. , “Venetian Schools and Teachers, Fourteenth to Early Sixteenth Century: A Survey and a Study of Giovanni Battista Egnazio,” Renaissance Quarterly 29, no. 4 (1976): 521–66 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

90. Trebbi, “La cancelleria,” 87, and “Il segretario,” 44. Candidates’ translating skills are mentioned in Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 503 (September 27, 1570), ASV, Venice.

91. The only exception was promotion to grand chancellor, who was chosen by the Great Council on the Ten’s recommendation.

92. Bellavitis, Identité, mariage, mobilité sociale, 69-70 and 324-25.

93. Trebbi, “La cancelleria,” 89-97; Zannini, Burocrazia e burocrati, 23-60.

94. Bellavitis, , Identité, mariage, mobilité sociale, 72–73 Google Scholar.

95. On the idea of a citizen “serrata,” see Cozzi, “Politica, società, istituzioni,” 144, and Grubb, “Elite Citizens.”

96. Trebbi, “La cancelleria,” 76-77.

97. Trebbi, “Il segretario,” 42.

98. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 143 (April 23, 1402), ASV, Venice.

99. Lazzarini, Scritti di paleografìa e diplomatica, 190 (on 1311), and Lorenzi, Monumenti, 77 (May 28, 1451). In the sixteenth century a Venetian ambassador recommended the same measure to colleagues for the custodians of their own archives. Cavalli, Marino , Informatione dell’offitio dell’Ambasciatore di Marin Cavalli il Vecchio, ed. Bertelé, Tommaso (Florence: Olschki, 1935), 80 Google Scholar.

100. Baschet, Les archives, 175-76.

101. Consiglio di Dieci, Comuni, r. 64, c. 151v (December 18, 1614), ASV, Venice.

102. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 207 (January 19, 1452), ASV, Venice.

103. Consiglio di Dieci, Misti, r. 15, c. 167v (January 24, 1459), ASV, Venice.

104. See for example, Consiglio di Dieci, Comuni, f. 257, c. nn. (September 25, 1606), ASV, Venice.

105. As early as 1283, doge Giovanni Dandolo’s compilation of laws included a special twelve-leaf section in the Liber Officiorum devoted to regulations concerning public notaries. This clearly distinguished between notarii curie and other notarii. See Cessi, Deliberazioni, 2: 225-28.

106. Ibid., 2: 226.

107. Contarini, Gasparo, De Magistratibus &Repvblica venetorvm Libri quinque (Paris: Ex Officina Michaeli Vascosani, 1543), 110 Google Scholar.

108. Neff, “A Citizen in the Service.”

109. Pizzati, Anna, “Gerardo, Giacomo,” in Dizionario biografico degli italiani (Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia italiana, 1961)Google Scholar, s.v.

110. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 193 (June 18, 1449), ASV, Venice; the law had to be repeated in 1499, ibid., c. 317.

111. Compilazione delle leggi, b. 107, c. 629 (March 17, 1598), ASV, Venice. See also b. 108, c. 315 (May 22, 1640).

112. Alvise Cherini or Querini, who had also recited the funeral oration for the great chancellor Francesco Girardo the previous year. See de Vivo, Information and Communication, 210.

113. Fabris, Pedani, “Veneta auctoritate notarius,” 155 Google Scholar.

114. Scarabello, Gianni, “Dolce, Agostino,” in Dizionario biografico degli italiani (Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia italiana, 1991)Google Scholar, s.v.

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116. Fabris, Pedani, “Veneta auctoritate notarius,” 159 Google Scholar.

117. Neff, “A Citizen in the Service,” 48.

118. V. Riccardo Predelli and Pietro Bosmin, eds., I libri commemoriali della Republica di Venezia. Regesti (Venice: Deputazione Veneta di Storia Patria, 1876-1914), 5: vii-viii.

119. There are, for example, doodles on the end pages of registers 23 (Regina) and 24 (Stella) in Maggior Consiglio, Deliberazioni, ASV, Venice.

120. Dean, Carolyn, “Beyond Prescription: Notarial Doodles and Other Marks,” Word &Image 25, no. 3 (2009): 293–316 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

121. Maggior Consiglio, Deliberazioni, r. 23, c. 8 (September 21, 1455), ASV, Venice.

122. See above, note 40.

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124. The comparative history of archives in late medieval and early modern Italy is the subject of a four-year team project which I am currently leading at Birkbeck, University of London, funded by the European Research Council. See http://www.bbk.ac.uk/history/archives/ .

125. Klein, “Costruzione dello stato.”

126. “Raccomandomi alle Signorie vostre e di nuovo le riprego mi mandino da potere vivere ... io non posso vivere di promesse ... Arei possuto avere le spese e potre’le avere da la Corte; non le voglio e pel passato me ne sono valuto poco, parendomi onore di vostre Signorie e mio fare così. E andando io lemosinando qua 4 ducati e 3 ducati ... .” Niccolò Machiavelli, Legazioni. Commissarie. Scritti di governo, Edizione Nazionale delle opere, ed. Denis Fachard and Emanuele Cutinelli-Rèndina (Rome: Salerno editrice, 2004), 2: 507; See also Guidi, Andrea, Un segretario militante. Politica, diplomazia e armi nel cancelliere Machiavelli (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2009), 37–137 Google Scholar. I would like to thank Andrea Guidi for drawing my attention to this passage.

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