ΚΑΙ ΑΛΛΕΣ ΟΨΕΙΣ ΤΗΣ ΒΕΝΕΤΟΚΡΑΤΙΑΣ ΣΚΕΨΕΙΣ ΓΙΑ ΤΗ ΒΕΝΕΤΙΚΗ ΚΥΡΙΑΡΧΙΑ ΣΤΟΝ ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΟ ΧΩΡΟ

Abstract

The article puts forward a number of reflections with regard to the identity of Venetian rule in Greek lands from the thirteenth to the eighteenth century. Initially, it notes the different interpretative approaches to the Venetian state on the part of international bibliography, in conjunction with its respective contemporary state formations; its focus then shifts to the characteristics and basic principles of Venetian rule in the Terraferma through the historiographical production of the past 50 years and its opposing viewpoints. Based on those, the rule appears on the one hand as a refined policy of respect and integration of the various peculiarities of the periphery within the framework of the “accord” between Venice and her subjects; it was a policy that led to the creation of a multicentric system of authorities. On the other hand, the Dominio itself appears as an imposition that violates the subjects’ rights and autonomy. In recent years, and without having completely lost their momentum, the above-mentioned approaches have been enriched by the acceptance on the part of the community of experts in Venetian studies of the theoretical schema of the jurisdictional/peripheral state, which is now one of the key analytical tools in the study of Venetian rule in the territories of the Terraferma. But what about the Stato da Mar in general and of the territories of the Greek territories in particular? To begin with, there is the question of whether it is methodologically correct to study the latter as a distinct area of the former. An argument that may justify an affirmative answer to this question is the absence of statuti from the territories in question, possibly as a result of the Byzantine past of the majority of those lands and the hesitation on the part of Venetian authority, at least until the middle of the fifteenth century, to allow her subjects the use of a foreign power’s laws. A further argument is offered by the sixteenth-century administrative reform that transformed Venice’s Greek possessions, i.e. the region stretching from Corfu to the southward, into a separate administrative district within the Stato da Mar, headed by a high-ranking official, the Provveditore Generale da Mar. By distinguishing Venetian rule into an early (early thirteenth – late fifteenth/early sixteenth century) and a late phase (sixteenth-eighteenth c.), and in conjunction with the political course of Venice herself through the centuries and the renegotiation of her identity and the terms of her domination over her territories beyond the lagoon, the study reaches the following conclusions: i) the differences between the conditions prevailing in the Terraferma and those in the Stato da Mar in general mean that the application of theoretical schemata used to study the former is possible only under certain conditions, ii) definite colonialist characteristics pertaining to the fields of economy, defense and justice are evident in the domination over Greek territories, iii) one may recognise the application of principles of the jurisdictional state in the attempt to maintain balances with the bodies, the social strata, the groups of subjects, the institutional and non-institutional authorities of the territories in question. Finally, it is noted that, in order to delve deeper into the identity of Venetian rule, it is necessary to introduce into the historiography an extensive series of works pertaining to the study of non-institutional authorities as they emerge through factional rivalries, clientelism and patronage networks, marital strategies, and gendered relations.