Part 2 — CHAPTER IV. Concerning the infallible teaching of the Roman Pontiff: (continued 77)

{3592}

UTAH: A. D. 1894-1895. Provision for admission to the Union as a State.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1894-1895.

—————UTAH: End————

UTAHS, UTES, PIUTES, etc.

See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: SHOSHONEAN FAMILY.

—————UTICA: Start————

UTICA: Origin.

"The most ancient Phœnician colonies were Utica, nearly on the northern-most point of the coast of Africa, and in the same gulf (now known as the gulf of Tunis) as Carthage, over against Cape Lilybæum in Sicily,—and Gades, or Gadeira, on the south-western coast of Spain; a town which, founded perhaps near one thousand years before the Christian era, has maintained a continuous prosperity, and a name (Cadiz) substantially unaltered, longer than any town in Europe. How well the site of Utica was suited to the circumstances of Phœnician colonists may be inferred from the fact that Carthage was afterwards established in the same gulf and near to the same spot, and that both the two cities reached a high pitch of prosperity."

G. Grote, History of Greece, part 2, chapter 18.

[Transcriber's note: The meaning of the phrase '…name (Cadiz)…' appears to be ambiguous. "The site of … Utica is … about 30 km from Tunis and 30 km from Bizerte and near … Zhana, … Ghar El Melh, … El Alia, … Metline." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utica%2C_Tunisia]

UTICA: Relations to Carthage.

See CARTHAGE, THE DOMINION OF.

UTICA: Curio's defeat.

Curio, the legate or lieutenant sent first by Cæsar to Africa (B. C. 49), to attack the Pompeian forces in that quarter, undertook with two legions to reduce the city of Utica, which had became the capital of the Roman Province. Juba, king of Numidia, who was personally hostile to both Curio and Cæsar, came to the assistance of the Pompeians and forced Curio to withdraw from its besieging lines into the neighboring Cornelian camp, which was a famous military entrenchment left by Scipio Africanus. There he might have waited in safety for re-enforcements; but the wily Numidian tempted him out by a feigned retreat and then overwhelmed him. Curio and most of his men were slain.

C. Merivale, History of the Romans, chapter 16.

ALSO IN: G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 5, chapter 7.

UTICA: Last stand of the opponents of Cæsar.

See ROME: B. C. 47-46.

—————UTICA: End————

UTRAQUISTS, The.

See BOHEMIA: A. D. 1419-1434.

—————UTRECHT: Start————

UTRECHT: The Episcopal Principality.

"At the last ford of the Rhine a hamlet had in Roman times been built, possibly a fort also. Nothing is preserved regarding it but the name, which, in the mutations of language, passed from Ultrajectum into Utrecht. Towards the conclusion of the 7th century, Clement Willebrod, an English priest, who had been educated at the monastery of Ripon, coming as a missionary into those parts, succeeded, with the aid of eleven of his fellow-countrymen, in winning over the Frisian people to the Christian faith. He fixed his abode at Utrecht, of which he was afterwards appointed bishop; and gifts of land, at the time of little worth, were made to his successors by Pepin and Charlemagne. Such was the commencement of the temporal grandeur of the prince-bishops, whose dynasty attained to a power little less than sovereign during the middle ages. … With ready access to the sea, and not without an early disposition towards these pursuits which their kinsmen of the Rhineland towns were beginning to follow, the inhabitants of Utrecht soon became good sailors and good weavers, and their city throve apace. Enriched by successive grants of privileges and lands, the bishops of Utrecht gradually became powerful feudal lords."

W. T. McCullagh, Industrial History of Free Nations, chapter 8 (volume 2).

UTRECHT: A. D. 1456. The bishopric grasped by the House of Burgundy.

"Utrecht was still a separate state, governed by its sovereign bishop, who was elected by the votes of the chapter, subject to the approval of the Pope. On the vacancy which occurred towards the end of the year 1455, the choice of the canons fell upon Gisbert van Brederode, who had previously been archdeacon of the cathedral, and was held in general esteem amongst the people as well as the clergy. The Duke of Burgundy coveted so rich a prize, rather for its political importance, however, … than for any direct or immediate gain." The Duke appealed to Rome; Gisbert was put back into his archdeaconry, with an annuity for life, and David, a natural son of Duke Philip, was made bishop. "Thus the foundation was laid for the permanent union of Utrecht to the other provinces, although its final accomplishment was destined to be deferred yet many years."

W. T. McCullagh, Industrial History of Free Nations, chapter 10 (volume 2).

UTRECHT: A. D. 1576. The Spanish Fury.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1575-1577.

UTRECHT: A. D. 1579. The Union of the Seven Provinces.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1577-1581.

UTRECHT: A. D. 1712-1714. The Treaties which ended the War of the Spanish Succession, forming the Peace of Utrecht and the Treaty of Rastadt.

The long War of the Spanish Succession was brought to a close (except as between Germany and France) by negotiations at Utrecht, which resulted in the concluding of a number of treaties between the several powers concerned, constituting collectively what is known as the Peace of Utrecht. Negotiations to this end were begun by England and France early in 1711, and preliminaries were settled between them and signed in October of that year. This action of the English compelled the other allies to consent to a general conference, which opened at Utrecht January 20, 1712. The discussion of terms lasted more than a year, while the war went on. Between Germany and France the war still continued and it was at Rastadt (March, 1714), not Utrecht, that the last named powers came to their agreement of peace. The several treaties concluded at Utrecht were most of them signed on the 31st day of March. O. S., or April 11, N. S., in the year 1713, "by the plenipotentiaries of France, England, Portugal, Prussia, Savoy, and the United Provinces; the emperor resolving to continue the war, and the king of Spain refusing to sign the stipulations until a principality should be provided in the Low Countries for the princess Ursini, the favourite of his queen [a demand which he subsequently withdrew]. {3593} The chief articles of this memorable pacification were to the following purport: It was stipulated that, … Philip, now established on the Spanish throne; should renounce all right to the crown of France; that the dukes of Berry and Orleans, the next heirs to the French monarchy after the infant dauphin, should in like manner renounce all right to the crown of Spain, in the event of their accession to the French throne; that, on the death of Philip, and in default of his male issue, the succession of Spain and the Indies should be secured to the duke of Savoy; that the island of Sicily should be instantly ceded by his Catholic majesty to the same prince, with the title of king; that France should also cede to him the valleys of Pragelas, Oulx, Sezanne, Bardonache, and Château-Dauphin, with the forts of Exilles and Fenestrelles, and restore to him the duchy of Savoy and the county of Nice; and that the full property and sovereignty of both banks and the navigation of the Marañan, or river of Amazons, in South America, should belong to the king of Portugal. It was declared that the king of Prussia should receive Spanish Guelderland, with the sovereignty of Neufchâtel and Valengin, in exchange for the principality of Orange and the lordship of Châlons, and that his regal title should be acknowledged; that the Rhine should form the boundary of the German empire on the side of France; and that all fortifications, beyond that river, claimed by France, or in the possession of his most Christian majesty, should either be relinquished to the emperor or destroyed; that the kingdom of Naples, the duchy of Milan, and the Spanish territories on the Tuscan shore, should be ceded to the house of Austria; that the sovereignty of the Spanish Netherlands should likewise be secured to that family; but that the elector of Bavaria (to whom they had been granted by Philip) should retain such places as were still in his possession, until he should be reinstated in all his German dominions, except the Upper Palatinate, and also be put in possession of the island of Sardinia, with the title of king: that Luxemburg, Namur, and Charleroy should be given to the states-general as a barrier, together with Mons, Menin, Tournay, and other places; and that Lisle, Aire, Bethune, and St. Venant, should be restored to France. It was agreed that the French monarch should acknowledge the title of queen Anne, and the eventual succession of the family of Hanover to the British throne; that the fortifications of Dunkirk (the cause of much jealousy to England, and raised at vast expense to France) should be demolished, and the harbour filled up; that the island of St. Christopher (which had long been possessed jointly by the French and English, but from which the French had been expelled in 1702) should be subject to this country [England]; that Hudson's Bay and Straits (where the French had founded a settlement, but without dispossessing the English, and carried on a rival trade during the war), the town of Placentia, and other districts of the island of Newfoundland (where the French had been suffered to establish themselves, through the negligence of government), and the long-disputed province of Nova Scotia (into which the French had early intruded, out of which they had been frequently driven, and which had been finally conquered by an army from New England in 1710), should be considered as the dependencies of the British crown: that Minorca and the fortress of Gibraltar (conquered from Spain) should remain in the possession of Great Britain; and that the Assiento, or contract for furnishing the Spanish colonies in South America with negroes, should belong to the subjects of Great Britain for the term of thirty years. That these conditions, especially on the part of Great Britain, were very inadequate to the success and expense of the war, will be allowed by every intelligent man, whose understanding is not warped by political prejudices. … The other confederates had greater cause to be satisfied, and the emperor [Charles VI.] as much as any of them; yet was he obstinate in refusing to sign the general pacification, though two months were allowed him to deliberate on the terms. But he had soon reason to repent his rashness in resolving to continue the war alone. … The imperial army on the Rhine, commanded by prince Eugene, was not in a condition to face the French under Villars, who successively took Worms, Spire, Keiserlautern, and the important fortress of Landau. He forced the passage of the Rhine … and reduced Freyburg, the capital of the Breisgau. Unwilling to prosecute a disastrous war, the emperor began seriously to think of peace; and conferences, which afterward terminated in a pacific treaty, were opened between prince Eugene and Villars, at Ranstadt. The terms of this treaty, concluded on the 6th of March (N. S.) 1714 [but ratified at Baden the next September, and sometimes called the Treaty of Baden], were less favourable to the emperor than those which had been offered at Utrecht. The king of France retained Landau, which he had before proposed to cede, with several fortresses behind the Rhine, which he had agreed to demolish [but restored Freiburg]. He procured the full re-establishment of the electors of Bavaria and Cologne in their dominions and dignities; the former prince consenting to relinquish Sardinia to the emperor, in return for the Upper Palatinate. … The principal articles in regard to Italy and the Low Countries were the same with those settled at Utrecht. Relaxing in his obstinacy, the king of Spain also acceded to the general pacification."

W. Russell, History of Modern Europe, part 2, letter 23 (volume 3).

ALSO IN: J. W. Gerard, The Peace of Utrecht, chapters 24-29.

T. Macknight, Life of Bolingbroke, chapters 8-9.

G. W. Cooke, Memoirs of Bolingbroke, volume 1, chapter 13.

W. Coxe, Memoirs of Marlborough, chapters 108-110.

J. C. Collins, Bolingbroke, section 1.

A. Hassall, Life of Bolingbroke, chapter 3.

See, also, ITALY: A. D. 1701-1713; SLAVERY, NEGRO: A. D. 1698-1776; CANADA: A. D.1711-1713; and NEWFOUNDLAND: A. D. 1713.

—————UTRECHT: End————

UTRECHT SCHOOL OF ST. MARTIN.

See EDUCATION, MEDIÆVAL: NETHERLANDS.

UXBRIDGE, Attempted Treaty of.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1645 (JANUARY-FEBRUARY).

UXELLODUNUM, Siege of.

See GAUL: B. C. 58-51.

UXMAL, Ruins of.

See MEXICO: ANCIENT, THE MAYA AND NAHUA PEOPLES.

UZES, The.

See PATCHINAKS.

{3594}

V.

VACALUS, The.

The ancient name of the river Waal.

VACCÆI, The.

One of the tribes of the Celtiberians in ancient Spain.

T. Mommsen, History of Rome, book 4, chapter 1.

VACCINATION, The discovery of.

See MEDICAL SCIENCE: 18TH CENTURY.

VACOMAGI, The.

A tribe in ancient Caledonia, whose territory extended along the border of the Highlands, from the Moray Firth to the Tay.

See BRITAIN: CELTIC TRIBES.

VACSLAV.

See WENCESLAUS.

VADIMONIAN LAKE, Battle of the.

See ROME: B. C. 295-191.

VAISYAS.

See CASTE SYSTEM OF INDIA.

VALDEMAR I. (called The Great), King of Denmark, A. D. 1157-1182.

Valdemar I., King of Sweden, 1266-1275.

Valdemar II., King of Denmark, 1202-1241.

Valdemar III., King of Denmark, 1340-1375.

VALDEVEZ, The Tourney of.

See PORTUGAL: A. D. 1095-1325.

VALEA ALBA, Battle of (1476).

See BALKAN AND DANUBIAN STATES: 14-18TH CENTURIES (ROUMANIA, ETC.)

VALENCIA: A. D. 1031-1092. The seat of a Moorish kingdom.

See SPAIN: A. D. 1031-1086.

—————VALENCIENNES: Start————

VALENCIENNES: A. D. 1566. Crushing of the first revolt against Spanish tyranny in the Netherlands.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1566-1568.

VALENCIENNES: A. D. 1576. The Spanish Fury.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1575-1577.

VALENCIENNES: A. D. 1583. Submission to Spain.

See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1584-1585.

VALENCIENNES: A. D. 1656. Siege and failure of Turenne.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1653-1656.

VALENCIENNES: A. D. 1677. Taken by Louis XIV.

See NETHERLANDS (HOLLAND): A. D. 1674-1678.

VALENCIENNES: A. D. 1679. Cession to France.

See NIMEGUEN, THE PEACE OF.

VALENCIENNES: A. D. 1793. Siege and capture by the Austrians.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (JULY-DECEMBER) PROGRESS OF THE WAR.

VALENCIENNES: A. D. 1794. Recovery by the French.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1794 (JANUARY-JULY).

—————VALENCIENNES: End————

VALENS, Roman Emperor (Eastern), A. D. 364-378.

VALENTIA.

One of the Roman provinces formed in Britain, extending from the wall of Hadrian to the wall of Antoninus, covering southern Scotland. It was named in honor of the Emperor Valentinian.

See BRITAIN: A. D. 323-337; and 367-370.

VALENTINE, Pope, A. D. 827, September to October.

VALENTINIAN I., Roman Emperor (Western), A. D. 364-375.

Valentinian II., Roman Emperor (Western), 375-392.

Valentinian III., Roman Emperor (Western), 425-455.

VALERIAN, Roman Emperor, A. D. 253-260.

VALERIAN LAWS.

See ROME: B. C. 509.

VALERIO-HORATIAN LAWS, The.

See ROME: B. C. 449.

VAL-ES-DUNES, Battle of (1047).

See NORMANDY: A. D. 1035-1063.

VALLACHIA.

See BALKAN AND DANUBIAN STATES.

VALLACHS, The.

See WALLACHS.

VALLADOLID, Battle of (1813).

See MEXICO: A. D. 1810-1819.

VALLANDIGHAM, Clement L., The arrest of.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1863 (MAY-JUNE).

VALLEY FORGE: Washington's army in winter quarters.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1777 (JANUARY-DECEMBER).

VALLI. VALLUM.

See CASTRA.

VALMY, Battle of.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1792 (SEPTEMBER-DECEMBER).

VALOIS, The House of.

The direct line of the Capetian kings of France, descendants of Hugh Capet, ended in 1328, with the death of Charles IV. The crown then passed to the late king's cousin, Philip of Valois, son of Charles Count of Valois, who was the second son of Philip III. He became Philip VI. in the series of French kings, and with him began the royal dynasty or House of Valois, which came to an end in 1589, on the assassination of Henry III., yielding the throne to the Bourbon family.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1314-1328.

For source of the name.

See BOURBON, THE HOUSE OF.

VALOUTINA, Battle of.

See RUSSIA: A. D. 1812 (JUNE-SEPTEMBER).

VALTELINE, Annexation to the Cisalpine Republic.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1797 (MAY-OCTOBER).

VALTELINE WAR.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1624-1626.

VAN BUREN, Martin. Presidential election and administration.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1836, to 1841.

Defeat in Presidential Election.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1840.

The Free Soil Movement.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1848.

VANCOUVER'S ISLAND.

See BRITISH COLUMBIA.

VANDALIA, The proposed western colony of.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1765-1768.

—————VANDALS: Start————

VANDALS: Origin and early movements.

"Gibbon declares that a striking resemblance, in manners, complexion, religion, and language, indicates that the Goths and Vandals were originally one great people; and he cites the testimony of Pliny and Procopius in support of this belief. According to this theory, therefore, the Vandals are of the Teutonic stock. Other learned men have endeavoured to identify them with the Wendes; and the Wendes, as we have seen, according to the authority of Jornandes and others, were members of the Slavic race. The question has been examined, with great learning and ingenuity, by M. L. Marcus, Professor at the College of Dijon, in a work upon Vandal history. His conclusion, drawn from a comparison of what Tacitus, Pliny, Procopius, and Jornandes have left us upon the subject, is favourable to the hypothesis of Gibbon. Between the Wendes and the Vindili of Pliny, who were undoubtedly Vandals, he considers that no nearer point of union can be found than that of the Asiatic origin common to all nations of Slavic and Teutonic blood. {3595} He accounts for the fact that some confusion upon the subject subsists in ancient writers, by the supposition that the Slaves, after the great migration of Goths and Vandals to the South, occupied the locality they had abandoned on the coasts of the Baltic, and became inheritors of the name, as well as of the land, of their predecessors. Hence they were commonly, though incorrectly, called Vindili, or Vandals. … The earliest locality of the tribe, so far as authentic history can trace them, seems to have been the district between the Vistula and the Elbe. Here they were found by the Langobardi, in their migration towards the South. … In the time of Pliny, we have that writer's testimony to the fact that the Vandals were still to be found between the two rivers. But during the next two centuries their unwarlike habits must have tended to diminish their importance among their fierce and active neighbours, of whom the Goths were the most formidable, and probably the most aggressive. Tacitus, at any rate, in his tractate upon the Germans [A. D. 100], merely notices them by name. … Another half-century finds them in a strong position among the mountains which form the northern frontier of Bohemia. It is certain that they took part in the great Marcomannic war [A. D. 168-180]. … In the treaty made by Commodus, the son of Marcus Aurelius, with the Marcomanni [A. D. 180], the Vandals are one of the tribes secured from the hostility of those persevering enemies of the Roman empire. At this time, Ptolemy informs us that the Vandals occupied the districts lying around the sources of the Elbe; and all other investigation confirms the statement." A hundred years later, the Vandals appear to have been planted in a district on the Danube, east of the Theiss; from which they were soon afterwards driven by the Goths. They were then permitted by the emperor Constantine to pass the frontiers of the empire and settle in Pannonia, where they accepted Christianity and exhibited "the greatest aptitude for commerce and the arts of peace." Despite their Christianity, however, and despite their aptitude for the "arts of peace," the Vandals, after seventy years of friendly neighboring with the Romans, joined the savage pack of Alans, Sueves and Burgundians which, on the last day of the year 406, broke into Gaul and shattered the empire and the civilization of Rome beyond the Alps.

J. G. Sheppard, The Fall of Rome, lecture 7.

ALSO IN: T. Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, book 3, chapter 2 (volume 2).

VANDALS: A. D. 406-409. Final Invasion of Gaul.

See GAUL: A. D. 406-409.

A. D. 409-414. Settlement in Spain.

See SPAIN: A. D. 409-414.

VANDALS: A. D. 428. Conquests in Spain.

"After the retreat of the Goths [A. D. 418] the authority of Honorius had obtained a precarious establishment in Spain, except only in the province of Gallicia, where the Suevi and the Vandals had fortified their camps in mutual discord and hostile independence. The Vandals prevailed, and their adversaries were besieged in the Nervasian hills, between Leon and Oviedo, till the approach of Count Asterius compelled, or rather provoked, the victorious barbarians to remove the scene of war to the plains of Bætica. The rapid progress of the Vandals soon required a more effectual opposition, and the master-general Castinus marched against them with a numerous army of Romans and Goths. Vanquished in battle by an inferior enemy, Castinus fled with dishonour to Tarragona. … Seville and Carthagena became the reward, or rather the prey, of the ferocious conquerors."

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 33.

Southern Spain, the ancient Bætica, acquired from the Vandals the name Vandalusia, which became Andalusia.

R. G. Latham, Ethnology of Europe, chapter 2.

VANDALS: A. D. 429-439. Conquests in Africa.

In May, A. D. 429, the Vandals passed from Spain into Africa, invited by Count Boniface, the Roman governor of the African province. The latter had been deceived by an intriguing rival, Count Aetius, who persuaded him that the imperial Court at Ravenna were planning his disgrace and death. Thus incited to rebellion, as an act of self defense, he called the Vandals to his help. The latter had just fallen under the leadership of a new and terrible king—the bold and ruthless Genseric, who was destined to make the name of his people a proverb through all time for ferocity and barbarism. To the Vandals were united the Alans, and Genseric invaded Africa with some 80,000 men. He was joined, moreover, by great numbers of disaffected native Mauritanians, or Moors, and was welcomed by swarms of the fanatical Donatists, whose "vandalism" could quite equal his own. Count Boniface shrank aghast from the terrible invasion he had summoned, and learning, too late, how foully he had been played upon, returned to his allegiance with penitent energy and zeal. He turned his arms against Genseric; but it was in vain. "The victorious barbarians insulted the open country; and Carthage, Cirta, and Hippo Regius were the only cities that appeared to rise above the general inundation. … The seven fruitful provinces, from Tangier to Tripoli, were overwhelmed. … The Vandals, where they found resistance, seldom gave quarter; and the deaths of their valiant countrymen were expiated by the ruin of the cities under whose walls they had fallen. Careless of the distinctions of age or sex or rank, they employed every species of indignity and torture to force from the captives a discovery of their hidden wealth." Defeated in a battle which he ventured, Boniface retired into Hippo Regius and stood a siege of fourteen months. A second battle, won by the Vandals, decided the fate of the city, but its inhabitants escaped, for the most part, by sea, before the barbarians broke in. The great Bishop of Hippo, the venerable St. Augustine, was in the city when the siege began, but died before it ended, in his seventy-sixth year. "When the city, some months after his death, was burned by the Vandals, the library was fortunately saved which contained his voluminous writings." Hippo fell in the summer of A. D. 431. It was not until eight years later that Carthage succumbed,—taken treacherously, by surprise, on the 9th of October, 439; being 585 years after the destruction of the ancient city by the younger Scipio. The provinces of Africa were now fully in the possession of the Vandals, and the loss of their cor

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 33.

ALSO IN: J. C. L. de Sismondi, Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 7.

T. Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, book 3, chapter 2.

VANDALS: A. D. 429-477. In Sicily.

See SICILY: A. D. 429-525.

{3596}

VANDALS: A. D. 431-533. Ruin of Africa under their dominion.

"The Vandals were bigoted Arians and their government was peculiarly tyrannical; they always treated the Roman inhabitants of Africa as political enemies, and persecuted them as religious opponents. The Visigoths in Spain had occupied two thirds of the subjugated lands, the Ostrogoths in Italy had been satisfied with one third; and both these people had acknowledged the civil rights of the Romans as citizens and Christians. The Vandals adopted a different policy. Genseric reserved immense domains to himself and to his sons. He divided the densely peopled and rich districts of Africa proper among the Vandal warriors, exempting them from taxation and binding them to military service. … They seized all the richest lands, and the most valuable estates, and exterminated the higher class of the Romans. Only the poorer proprietors were permitted to preserve the arid and distant parts of the country. Still, the number of the Romans excited the fears of the Vandals, who destroyed the walls of the provincial towns in order to prevent the people from receiving succours from the Eastern Empire. … When Genseric conquered Carthage, his whole army amounted only to 50,000 warriors; yet this small horde devoured all the wealth of Africa in the course of a single century, and, from an army of hardy soldiers, it was converted Into a caste of luxurious nobles living in splendid villas round Carthage. In order fully to understand the influence of the Vandals on the state of the country which they occupied, it must be observed that their oppressive government had already so far lowered the condition and reduced the numbers of the Roman provincials, that the native Moors began to reoccupy the country from which Roman industry and Roman capital had excluded them. … As the property of the province was destroyed, Its Roman inhabitants perished."

G. Finlay, Greece Under the Romans, chapter 3, section 5.

VANDALS: A. D. 455. The sack of Rome by Genseric.

See ROME: A. D. 455

VANDALS: A. D. 533-534. End of the kingdom and nation.

The weakened and disordered state of the Vandal kingdom, concurring with the revival of a military spirit in the eastern Roman empire, which the great soldier Belisarius had brought about, encouraged the Emperor Justinian to attempt, A. D. 533, a reconquest of the lost Roman provinces in Africa. With a fleet of six hundred ships, bearing 37,000 men, Belisarius set sail from Constantinople in the month of June and landed early in September on the African coast, about five days journey from Carthage,—having halted at a port in Sicily on the voyage. A few days later, he defeated the Vandal king, Gelimer, in a battle (Ad Decimus) fought at ten miles distance from his capital, and entered Carthage in triumph (September 15, A. D. 533), received with joy by its Roman and Catholic inhabitants, long persecuted and humiliated by the Arian Vandals. A second and decisive battle was fought some weeks afterwards at Tricamaron, twenty miles away from Carthage, and there and then the Vandal kingdom came to its end. Gelimer fled into the wilds of Numidia, was pursued, and, having surrendered himself in the March following, was sent to Constantinople, and passed the remainder of his days in peace and modest luxury on a comfortable estate in Galatia. "The fall of the Vandal monarchy was an event full of meaning for the future history of Africa. There can be little doubt that in destroying it Justinian was unconsciously removing the most powerful barrier which might in the next century have arrested the progress of Mohammedanism."

T. Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, book 4, chapter 15 (v 3).

"The bravest of the Vandal youth were distributed into five squadrons of cavalry, which adopted the name of their benefactor. … But these rare exceptions, the reward of birth or valour, are insufficient to explain the fate of a nation whose numbers, before a short and bloodless war, amounted to more than 600,000 persons. After the exile of their king and nobles, the servile crowd might purchase their safety by abjuring their character, religion, and language; and their degenerate posterity would be insensibly mingled with the common herd of African subjects. Yet even in the present age, and in the heart of the Moorish tribes, a curious traveller has discovered the white complexion and long flaxen hair of a northern race; and it was formerly believed that the boldest of the Vandals fled beyond the power, or even the knowledge, of the Romans, to enjoy their solitary freedom on the shores of the Atlantic ocean."

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 41.

—————VANDALS: End————

VAN DIEMEN'S LAND, TASMANIA: Discovery and naming.

See AUSTRALIA: A. D. 1601-1800.

VANGIONES. TRIBOCI. NEMETES.

"The Rhine bank itself is occupied by tribes unquestionably German—the Vangiones, the Triboci, and the Nemetes."—"These tribes dwelt on the west bank of the Rhine, in what is now Rhenish Bavaria."

Tacitus, Germany; translated by Church and Brodribb, with geographical notes.

VANNES, Origin of.

See VENETI OF WESTERN GAUL.

VAN RENSSELAER, Patroon Killian, The land purchases of.

See NEW YORK: A. D. 1621-1646.

VAN RENSSELAER, General Stephen, and the Battle of Queenston Heights.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1812 (SEPTEMBER-NOVEMBER).

VAN RENSSELAER MANOR.

See NEW YORK: A. D. 1621-1646; and LIVINGSTON MANOR.

VAN TWILLER, Wouter, The governorship of.

See NEW YORK: A. D. 1638-1647.

VARANGIAN SEA.

One of the ancient names of the Baltic.

R. G. Latham, Native-Races of Russian Empire, chapter 16.

VARANGIANS, OR WARINGS. THE WARING GUARD.

Varangians "was the name of the Byzantine equivalent to the 'soldiers of a free-company' In the 11th and 12th centuries. The soldiers were almost wholly Scandinavians—to a great extent the Swedes of Russia. The reasons against believing Varangian to be the same word as Frank, are: 1. The mention of Franci along with them, as a separate people. 2. The extent to which the Varangians were Scandinavians, rather than Germans of the Rhine. In favour of it is: The form of the present Oriental name for Europeans—Feringi. This, in my mind, preponderates. Connected by name only with the Franks, the truer ethnological affinities of the Varangians were with the Scandinavians of Russia."

R. G. Latham, The Germania of Tacitus, Epilegomena, section. 17.

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"Many of the Warings and probably of the English also had taken military service at an early period under the Byzantine emperors. They formed a body-guard for the Emperor, and soon gained for themselves a renown greater than that possessed by the earlier imperial guard of the Immortals. The Byzantine writers usually speak of them as the barbarian guard or as the axe-bearers. Their weapon was the Danish battle-axe, or rather bill, and seems not to have had two blades turning different ways like those of a halberd, but to have had one with a sharp steel spike projecting, so that the weapon could be used either to strike or to thrust. Anna, the daughter of Alexis the First, calls them Warings or Varangians. Nicetas speaks of them as Germans. The Western writers call them usually Danes, or 'English and Danes.' The conquest of England by William the Norman caused many of the English to emigrate to Russia and so to Constantinople, where they joined the Waring guard. … Warings and English, while occupants of the Greek palace, still spoke their own language, had their own laws, and chose, with certain exceptions, their own officers. The one in command was called the acolyth, or follower, because his place was immediately behind the Emperor."

E. Pears, The Fall of Constantinople, chapter 6. section 3.

ALSO IN: V. Thomsen, The Relations between Ancient Russia and Scandinavia, lecture 3.

See, also, RUSSIA: A. D. 862.

VARAVILLE, Battle of.

A decisive victory over the French, invading Normandy, by Duke William—afterwards the Conqueror of England—A. D. 1058.

E. A. Freeman, Norman Conquest, chapter 12, section 2 (volume 3).

VARCHONITES, The.

See AVARS.

VARIAN LAW.

See MAJESTAS.

VARIAN MASSACRE, The.

See GERMANY: B. C. 8-A. D. 11.

VARINI, The.

See AVIONES.

VARKANA.

See HYRCANIA.

VARNA, The battle of (1444).

See TURKS: A. D. 1402-1451.

VARNA, Siege and capture (1828).

See TURKS: A. D. 1826-1829.

VARUS, and his Legions, The destruction of.

See GERMANY: B. C. 8-A. D. 11.

VASCONES, The.

See BASQUES.

VASSAL.

See FEUDALISM.

VASSAR COLLEGE.

See EDUCATION, MODERN: REFORMS, &c.: A. D. 1804-1891.

VASSILI.

See BASIL.

VASSY, The Massacre of.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1560-1563.

VATICAN, THE. THE LEONINE CITY.

"The name Vatican was applied by the writers of the Augustan age to the whole range of hills extending along the western bank of the Tiber, including the Janiculum and the Monte Mario. … But the name Vaticanus has now been restricted to the small hill standing behind the Basilica of St. Peter's, upon which the Vatican Museum and the Papal Gardens are situated. This hill is a small projecting portion of the range which includes the Janiculum and Monte Mario, and it is separated from the Janiculum by a depression, along which the street of the Borgo S. Spirito runs. The derivation of the name Vatican is lost. Gellius has preserved a quotation from Varro, in which the word is said to be derived from a deity Vaticanus, the presiding god of the first rudiments of speech ('vagire,' 'vagitanus'). Paulus Diaconus gives a different explanation, founded on the supposed expulsion of the Etruscans in fulfilment of an oracle ('vatum responso expulsis Etruscis'); and from this Niebuhr and Bunsen, following him, have supposed that an Etruscan city existed here in ancient times. There appears to be no sufficient evidence of such a settlement."

R. Burn, Rome and the Campagna, chapter 11.

In the ninth century, at the time of the pontificate of Leo IV., "the nations of the West and North who visited the threshold of the apostles had gradually formed the large and populous suburb of the Vatican, and their various habitations were distinguished, in the language of the times, as the 'schools' of the Greeks and Goths, of the Lombards and Saxons. But this venerable spot was still open to sacrilegious insult: the design of enclosing it with walls and towers exhausted all that authority could command or charity would supply: and the pious labour of four years was animated in every season and at every hour by the presence of the indefatigable pontiff. The love of fame, a generous but worldly passion, may be detected in the name of the Leonine City, which he bestowed on the Vatican; yet the pride of the dedication was tempered with Christian penance and humility."

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 52.

VATICAN COUNCIL, The.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1869-1870.

VATICAN LIBRARY, The.

See LIBRARIES, MODERN: EUROPE, and ITALY.

VAUCHAMP. Battle of.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1814 (JANUARY-MARCH).

VAUDOIS.

See WALDENSES.

VAUGHT'S HILL, Battle of.

See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1863 (FEBRUARY-APRIL: TENNESSEE).

VAVASSOR, VAVASOUR.

See FEUDAL TENURES; also CATTANI.

VECTIGAL, THE. VECTIGALIA.

"Pascua—Vectigalia-Publicum-are the terms employed to denote generally the Revenues of Rome, from whatever source derived. Pascua, i. e. Pasture lands, signified Revenue; because, in the earliest ages, the public income was derived solely from the rent of pastures belonging to the state. … Vectigal is the word used more frequently than any other to denote the Revenue of the state generally. … Publicum, in its widest acceptation, comprehended every thing which belonged to the community at large."

W. Ramsay, Manual of Roman Antiquity, chapter 8.

"Cicero states that there was a difference between Sicily and all the other Roman provinces in the management of the Vectigal, which is the name for the contribution which the provinces made to the Roman State. All the provinces except Sicily paid either a fixed land-tax (vectigal stipendiarium) or tenths [decumæ] or other quotæ of their produce, and these tenths were let at Rome by the censors to the Publicani, who paid the State a certain sum for the privilege of collecting the tenths and made out of them what profit they could. … The tenths of wheat and barley were let in Sicily to the Publicani, but sometimes a community would bid for its tenths and pay them itself."

G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 3, chapter 4.

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VECTIS. The ancient name of the Isle of Wight.

E. H. Bunbury, History of Ancient Geography, chapter 24, section 2 (volume 2).

VEDAS. VEDIC HYMNS. VEDISM.

See INDIA: THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS, and IMMIGRATION AND CONQUESTS OF THE ARYAS.

VEHMGERICHTS. VEHMIC COURTS.

"In times when political, social, and legal life are in process of fermentation, and struggling towards a new order of things, the ordinary tribunals lose their authority, and from the body of the people men spring up to protect the right in a primitive fashion, and to punish the criminal who has escaped the ordinary penalties of the law. Thus, at the close of the Middle Ages, or, more precisely, the first half of the 15th century, the Vehmgerichts (or Vehmic Courts, also called Free Courts, Franchise Courts, Secret Courts) rose to an authority which extended all over Germany, which knew no respect of persons, and before which many evil-doers in high places, who had bade defiance to the ordinary tribunals, were made to tremble. The name 'Vehme' is derived from the old German 'vervehmen,' which means to ban, or to curse. The Vehmic courts were peculiar to Westphalia, and even there could only be held on the 'Red Land'—that is, the district between the Rhine and the Weser. They were dependent on the German Emperor alone, and their presidents, the Free-counts, received from the Emperor in person, or from his representative, the Elector of Cologne, the power of life and death. They traced their origin to Charlemagne, who, respecting the legal customs of the old heathen Saxons, introduced county courts among them after they had been converted to Christianity. For, even in the most ancient times, the Saxon freemen used to assemble at an appointed season, after they had held their great sacrifice, and hold a 'Thing' under the presidency of one of their oldest members, called the Grave, or Count, where they inflicted punishment and administered justice. The Vehmic court consisted of a Free-count and a number of assessors, who were called 'The Initiated,' because they knew the secrets of the holy Vehme. There must be at least fourteen of these assessors, but there were generally twice that number. As it was no secret when a man was all assessor, and as it contributed greatly to the safety of his person, since people took good care not to molest a member of the holy Vehme, it gradually came about that men from every German province obtained admission into the number of assessors. When the Emperor Sigismund was elected into the number of 'The Initiated' at the Franchise Court of Dortmund, the number of assessors is said to have amounted to 100,000, among whom were many princes and nobles. And about a thousand assessors are said to have been present when the ban was issued against Duke Henry of Bavaria in 1429. … There was a 'secret court' to which only the initiated had access, and a 'public court' which was held in the morning in the light of day at a known court-house. The presidents' chairs were always set in the open air under a lime, oak, pear, or hawthorn tree, an often near a town, castle, or village. At Dortmund the president's chair was placed close to the town wall under a lime-tree, which, though sadly shattered, is still standing between the rails inside the railway station. Round the stone table were ranged three stone benches for the assessors; on the table there was carved in relief the German imperial eagle, and on it was placed the sword of justice, … The Vehmic court which was originally, and was bound to be, a public one, gradually altered its character, enveloped itself in mysterious darkness, and under the cloak of secrecy lent itself to all sorts of unrighteous objects. In 1461, accordingly, princes and cities leagued together to suppress the irregularities of these courts, and as soon as the orderly administration of justice came into existence with the rise of the new princely authority, they perished from their own impotence."

A. W. Grube, Heroes of History and Legend, chapter 13.

ALSO IN: Sir W. Scott, Introduction to "Anne of Geierstein."

A. P. Marras, Secret Fraternities of the Middle Ages, chapter 5.

VEII. VEIENTINE WARS.

See ROME: B. C. 406-396.

VELABRUM, The.

See FORUM BOARIUM.

VELETRI, Battle of.

See ITALY: A. D. 1744.

VELETRI, Battle of (1849).

See ITALY: A. D. 1848-1849.

VELIBORI, The.

See IRELAND. TRIBES OF EARLY CELTIC INHABITANTS.

VELITES.

The light infantry of the Roman army, as distinguished from the heavy-armed legionaries. "The velites did not wear any corslet or cuirass, but their tunic appears to have been formed of leather. … It is possible also that the velites sometimes wore, instead of leather, a tunic of quilted linen."

C. Boutell, Arms and Armour, chapter 4.

VELLICA, Battle of.

See CANTABRIANS.

VELLINGHAUSEN, or KIRCH-DEN-KERN, Battle of (1761).

See GERMANY: A. D. 1761-1762.

VELLORE, Sepoy mutiny and massacre at (1806).

See INDIA: A. D. 1805-1816.

VELOCASSES, The.

See BELGÆ.

VENATIONES.

Contests of wild beasts with each other or with men, in the Roman amphitheatres, were called Venationes.

W. Ramsay, Manual of Roman Antiquities, chapter 10.

VENDEE, The War in La.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (MARCH-APRIL), (JUNE), (JULY-DECEMBER); 1793-1794 (OCTOBER-APRIL); and 1794-1796.

VENDEMIARE, The month.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1793 (OCTOBER) THE NEW REPUBLICAN CALENDAR.

VENDEMIARE: The 13th.

See FRANCE: A. D. 1795 (OCTOBER-DECEMBER).

VENEDI, The.

"The Venedi extended beyond the Peucini and Bastarnæ [around the mouths of the Danube] as far as the Baltic Sea; where is the Sinus Venedicus, now the Gulf of Dantzig. Their name is also preserved in Wenden, a part of Livonia. When the German nations made their irruption into Italy, France, and Spain, the Venedi, also called Winedi, occupied their vacant settlements between the Vistula and Elbe. Afterward they crossed the Danube, and seized Dalmatia, Illyricum, Istria, Carniola, and the Noric Alps. A part of Carniola still retains the name of Windismarck derived from them. This people were also called Slavi."

Tacitus, The Germans, note to Oxford Translation, chapter 46.

"The Venedi [of Tacitus] … are obviously the Wends—the name by which the Germans always designate the neighbouring Slavonian populations; but which is no more a national name than that of Wälsch, which they apply in like manner to the Latin races on their southern frontiers."

E. H. Bunbury, History of Ancient Geography, chapter 26, section. 2, foot-note (volume 2).

See, also, SLAVONIC PEOPLES, and VANDALS.

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VENEDI OF BOHEMIA, The.

See AVARS: 7TH CENTURY.

VENEDOTIA.

See BRITAIN: 6TH CENTURY.

VENETA.

See (in Supplement) COMMERCE, MEDIÆVAL.

VENETI OF CISALPINE GAUL, The.

One of the tribes or nations of Cisalpine Gaul bore the name of the Veneti. The Veneti occupied the country between the rivers Adige and Plavis and seem to have been considerably civilized when they first appear in history. They became allies of the Romans at an early day and were favorably dealt with when Gallia Cisalpina was added to the dominions of Rome. "No ancient writer distinctly states to what race the Veneti belonged. They are said to have resembled the Illyrians in dress and manners; but the very way in which this statement is made shows that its author did not regard them as Illyrians. … I have no doubt that the Veneti belonged to the race of the Liburnians, and that accordingly they were a branch of the wide-spread Tyrrheno-Pelasgians, in consequence of which they also became so easily Latinized." The capital city of the Veneti was Patavium (modern Padua). "Patavium was a very ancient and large town, and it is strange that it appears as such in Roman history all at once. It is mentioned as early as the fifth century [B. C.], during the expedition of the Spartan Cleonymus; it is also spoken of at the time of Caesar and of the triumvirs. But Strabo is the first who describes Patavium as a large town, and in such a manner as to make it evident that it was an ancient place. He says that, next to Rome, it was the wealthiest city of Italy. … In the time of Augustus it was a large commercial and manufacturing place."

B. G. Niebuhr, Lectures on Ancient Ethnography and Geography, volume 2, page 246.

VENETI OF WESTERN GAUL, The.

"The Veneti were one of the Armoric states of the Celtae. Their neighbours on the south were the Namnetes or Nannetes (Nantes), on the east the Redones, and on the north the Curiosolitae, and the Osismi in the north-west part of Bretagne, in the department of Finistère. The chief town of the Veneti was Dariorigum, now Vannes, on the bay of Morbihan in the French department of Morbihan, which may correspond nearly to the country of the Veneti. The Veneti were the most powerful of all the maritime peoples who occupied the peninsula of Bretagne. They had many vessels in which they sailed to the island Britannia, to Cornwall and the parts along the south coast of England, as we may assume. They surpassed all their neighbours in skill and experience in naval affairs."

G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 4, chapter 6.

The Veneti, "together with the Aulerci, Rhedones [or Redones], Carnutes, Andi and Turones, occupied the whole space between the lower Seine and the lower Loire, and were apparently closely united among themselves."

C. Merivale, History of the Romans, chapter 7.

"The Andes [Andi] are the people whom Tacitus names the Andecavi, and the copyists of Ptolemy have named Ondicavae. They were west of the Turones, and their position is defined by the town Juliomagus or Civitas Andecavorum, now Angers on the Mayenne."

G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 4, chapter 6.

"In my opinion these Veneti were the founders of the Veneti in the Adriatic, for almost all the other Keltic nations in Italy have passed over from the country beyond the Alps, as for instance the Boii and Senones. … However, I do not maintain my opinion positively; for in these matters probability is quite sufficient."

Strabo, Geography; translated by Hamilton and Falconer, book 4, chapter 4, section 1.

VENETI OF WESTERN GAUL, The. Cæsar's campaign.

Cæsar's third campaign in Gaul, B. C. 56, was directed against the Veneti and their Armorican neighbors. These tribes had submitted themselves in the previous year to Cæsar's lieutenant, the younger Crassus; but the heavy exactions of the Romans provoked a general rising, and Cæsar was called to the scene in person. The Veneti were so amphibious a race, and their towns were generally placed so much out of the reach of a land army, that he found it necessary to build a fleet at the mouth of the Loire and bring it up against them. But the Veneti were better sailors than the Romans and their ships were more strongly built, so that the advantage would have still remained to them if Roman inventiveness had not turned the scale. Cæsar armed his men with hooked knives at the end of long poles, with which they cut the rigging of the Venetian ships and brought down their clumsy sails, which were of leather. By this means he overcame and destroyed them, in a great naval fight. When the survivors submitted, he ruthlessly slew the senatorial elders and sold the remnant of the people into slavery.

Cæsar, Gallic Wars, book 3, chapters 7-16.

ALSO IN: G. Long, Decline of the Roman Republic, volume 4, chapter 6.

C. Merivale, History of the Romans, chapter 7.

Napoleon III., History of Cæsar, book 3, chapter 6.

VENETIA.

See VENICE.

—————VENEZUELA: Start————

VENEZUELA: Aboriginal inhabitants.

See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: CARIBS AND THEIR KINDRED, and COAJIRO.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1499-1550. Discovery and naming of the province. Its first occupation by German adventurers.

"The province contiguous to Santa Martha on the east was first visited by Alonso de Ojeda, in the year 1499.

See AMERICA: A. D. 1499-1500.

The Spaniards, on their landing there, having observed some huts in an Indian village, built upon piles, in order to raise them above the stagnated water which covered the plain, were led to bestow upon it the name of Venezuela, or little Venice. … They made some attempts to settle there, but with little success. The final reduction of the province was accomplished by means very different from those to which Spain was indebted for its other acquisitions in the new world. The ambition of Charles V. often engaged him in operations of such variety and extent that his revenues were not sufficient to defray the expense of carrying them into execution. Among other expedients for supplying the deficiency of his funds, be had borrowed large sums from the Velsers of Augsburg, the most opulent merchants at that time In Europe. By way of retribution for these, or in hopes, perhaps, of obtaining a new loan, he bestowed upon them the province of Venezuela, to be held as an hereditary fief from the crown of Castile, on condition that within a limited time they should render themselves masters of the country, and establish a colony there. … {3600} Unfortunately they committed the execution of their plan to some of those soldiers of fortune with which Germany abounded in the 16th century. These adventurers, impatient to amass riches, that they might speedily abandon a station which they soon discovered to be very uncomfortable, instead of planting a colony in order to cultivate and improve the country, wandered from district to district in search of mines, plundering the natives with unfeeling rapacity, or oppressing them by the imposition of intolerable tasks. In the course of a few years, their avarice and exactions, in comparison with which those of the Spaniards were moderate, desolated the province so completely that it could hardly afford them subsistence, and the Velsers relinquished a property from which the inconsiderate conduct of their agents left them no hope of ever deriving any advantage. When the wretched remainder of the Germans deserted Venezuela, the Spaniards again took possession of it."

W. Robertson, History of America, book 7.

ALSO IN: F. Depous, Travels in South America, chapter 1.

See, also, EL DORADO.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1718-1731. Embraced in the viceroyalty of New Granada. Raised to a distinct captain-generalship.

See COLOMBIAN STATES: A. D. 1536-1731.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1810-1819. The War of Independence. Miranda and Bolivar. The great Earthquake.

See COLOMBIAN STATES: A. D. 1810-1819.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1821. Beginning of the Emancipation of Slaves.

See COLOMBIAN STATES: A. D. 1821-1854.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1821-1826. Confederation with New Granada and Ecuador in the Republic of Colombia, and the breaking of the Confederacy.

See COLOMBIAN STATES: A. D. 1819-1830.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1829-1886. Summary record of revolutions and civil wars. The strife of the Yellows and the Blues.

"In all countries, under whatever name they may be known, there are two great political parties; the conservatives and the reformers. … Venezuela is no exception to the general rule; there is the 'Oligarquia,' which desires to let things alone, and the 'Liberal' party, which wishes to remould them in accordance with the spirit of the age. The Spanish misgovernment left a legacy of bitterness and anarchy that has been the cause of much misery. Political passion runs very high in the country, and its history for a generation between these two parties has been a continual struggle, always more or less warlike. The existence of Venezuela in an independent capacity is due, in a large measure, to the personal ambition of Paez, by whose influence the great Liberator was exiled from his fatherland, and the republic separated from Colombia. Whatever may have been the real wishes of the people, the death of Bolivar put an end to all thoughts of re-union; and Paez became its first constitutional president. The second president was the learned Dr. José Maria Vargas, whose election in March 1835 was said to have been irregular, and led to the ' Revolucion de las Reformas.' He was deposed and expelled in July, but in August recalled to power! General Paez now took the field against the ' reformistas,' and a civil war ensued, continuing until March 1836, when they were completely subjugated, and treated with great rigour by order of the Congress, but against the desire of Paez, who entreated to be allowed to deal with them clemently. In 1836, Dr. Vargas resigned the presidency, and after the remainder of his term had been occupied by three vice-presidents, General Paez, in 1839, became again the legitimate head of the nation. Now that the grave had closed over Simon Bolivar, the passions which had prevented the recognition of his greatness died also, and on the 17th of December 1842, the ashes of the immortal Liberator were transferred from Santa Maria with every mark of public respect and honour and received a magnificent national funeral, in the Temple of San Francisco, in Caracas. The fifth president was General Soublette, and the sixth General Jose Tadeo Monagas, who was elected in 1847. A great part of the Venezuelan people believe that all the evils that have fallen upon the republic since 1846 have had their origin in the falsification of votes, said to have taken place during the election of Monagas for president. The liberal candidate was Antonio Leocadio Guzman; and it is asserted that he had a majority of votes. … Monagas did not have an easy tenure of office, for the opposition of Paez led to two years of civil war. Here it may be noted to the credit of the liberal party that, at a time when many of its opponents were prisoners, it abolished the penalty of death for political offences. To his brother, General Jose Gregorio Monagas, afterwards president of the republic, was due the emancipation of the slaves. The famous law of March 24th, 1854, conceded liberty and equal rights to all; but by a strange irony of fortune, he who had given the precious boon of freedom to thousands died himself incarcerated in a political prison. … At the beginning of 1859 the discontent of the liberals had reached a pitch which led to the outbreak of the War of the Federation. It was in this struggle that the present leader of the liberal party first displayed his military skill." Antonio Guzman Blanco, born in 1830 and educated for the law, lived some years in the United States, part of the time as Secretary of Legation at Washington. Driven from Venezuela in 1858, "his expatriation soon after brought him in contact, first in St. Thomas and afterwards in Curazao, with General Falcon, then the head of 'los liberales.' Falcon landed in Venezuela in July 1859, and proclaimed the Federal Republic. Many rose to support him, and in Caracas, on the 1st of August, the president, Monagas, was arrested; the next day the same troops declared against the Federation, and fired upon the people! So commenced the five years' War of the Federation, which has left, even to the present day, its black and ruined tracks across the face of the country. On the 30th of September was fought the battle of Sabana de la Cruz, resulting in the fall of Barquisimeto. In this action, so fortunate for the liberals, Guzman Blanco made his acquaintance with war, and showed so much military talent and energy that he was induced to leave his civil duties and take a 'comandante's' commission. The victory of Santa Ines, in December of the same year, followed. … The attack on San Carlos followed soon after, and was a disaster for the federals, who lost their general, Zamora, and were forced to retreat. {3601} Falcon sought aid in Nueva Granada." The next year Guzman Blanco won the victory of Quebrada-seca, October 21, 1862. "Other victories followed, and were crowned by the grand and decisive combat of the 16th, 17th, and 18th of April, which gave the province of Caracas to the Federals, and led to a treaty between the two parties. The peace of Coche was arranged by Señor Pedro José Rojas, secretary to the Dictator, as Paez was sometimes called, and Guzman Blanco, as representative of Falcon, the chief of the revolution. Paez, by this treaty, undertook to abdicate 30 days later, when an assembly of 80, nominated in equal parts by the chiefs of each party, was to decide on a programme for the future. The assembly met in Victoria, and nominated Falcon President and Guzman Blanco provisional vice-president of the Federation. Falcon entered Caracas in triumph on July 24, 1863, and Guzman Blanco became Minister of Finance and of Foreign Relations." Guzman Blanco visited Europe in 1864 and 1867 to negotiate loans. "Meanwhile, in Caracas, the 'oligarquia,' which now assumed the name of the Blue party (El Partido Azul), was not idle, and its activity was increased by dissensions in the opposition. A section of the liberal party [or 'los amarillos'-'Yellows'] had become greatly disaffected to Marshal Falcon, who abdicated in favour of two revolutionary chiefs, Bruzual and Urrutia. This led to the treaty of Antimano, by which the 'partido azul' recognized the new government, but directly afterwards proclaimed the presidency of General José Tadeo Monagas. Three days' sanguinary combat, at the end of July 1868, gave it possession of Caracas." Guzman Blanco, returning at this juncture from Europe, was driven to take refuge in the island of Curazao; but in February, 1870, he reappeared in Venezuela; was supported by a general rising; took Caracas by assault, and defeated the Blues in several battles. "The congress of plenipotentiaries of the states met at Valencia, and nominated Guzman Blanco provisional president, and by the end of the year the enemy was nearly everywhere defeated."

J. M. Spence, The Land of Bolivar, volume 1, chapter 8.

From the liberation of Venezuela to the present time, "every successive President seems to have been employed, during his short lease of power, in trying to enrich himself and his adherents, without the least consideration for his unfortunate country. On paper all the laws are perfect, and the constitution all that could be desired, but experience has shown that the influence of the executive power is able to subdue and absorb every other power, legislative or judicial. One law which the Congress passed, viz:—that of division of the National property among the defenders of the country, as the only way of rewarding their heroic services, has become a precedent of very bad import. At first, those who had risen and driven out the Spaniards divided the land among themselves, but as successive Generals strove for and gained the Presidency they again forfeited the property of the opposing party, and divided their possessions among their own followers. … Paez, Vargas, Paez, Zea, Soublette, Paez, Gil, Monagas, Falcon, Monagas, Polidor, Pulgar, Blanco, Linares, Blanco, Crespo, and again Blanco, have succeeded each other with marvellous rapidity, the principal occupation of the deposed President being to conspire against his successor. Some of them succeeded to power more than once, but Don Gusman Blanco alone, since Bolivar, seems to have got a firm hold of the Government, and although, by the letter of the Constitution, he can only hold power for two years at a time, and cannot possibly hold two terms consecutively, yet the intervening Presidents were little more than dummies to keep his seat warm. … At present [1886] Don Gusman Blanco is supreme. He is reported to be immensely wealthy, and is a man of great capacity and intelligence."

W. Barry, Venezuela, chapter 5.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1869-1892. The constitution. The rule of General Blanco. The Revolution of 1889.

"The Venezuelan Constitution is modelled after the American Constitution, with modifications grounded upon the Calhoun doctrine of State rights.

See CONSTITUTION OF VENEZUELA.

The confederation consists of eight States, which are supreme and coordinate in their sovereign rights. The National Government represents, not the people, but the States. … In 1869 opened an era of peace and progress under the political domination of General Guzman Blanco. For 20 years, whether he was the head of a Provisional Government established by force of arms, or the constitutional Executive, or Minister to France, his will was the supreme force in the State. … He suppressed Clericalism and established genuine religious liberty. He built rail-ways, improved the public roads, and adorned the cities. … He developed the industries and commerce of the country, and promoted its prosperity by a policy at once strong and pacific. It was a system of political absolutism. … A reaction against it was inevitable. … The signal for a political revolution was raised by university students in October, 1889. They began operations by flinging stones at a statue of Guzman Blanco in Caracas. … It was a singularly effective revolution, wrought without bloodshed or excitement. This political movement was successful because Guzman Blanco was in Paris, and his personal representative in the executive office was not disposed to resent public affronts to his patron. The President, Dr. Rojas Paul, was a wise and discreet man. … He reörganized his Cabinet so as to exclude several of the devoted partisans of Guzman Blanco, and brought Dr. Anduesa Palacio into the field as a candidate for the Presidency. … Anduesa's administration, instead of being an era of reform, reproduced all the vices and corruption of the old order, and none of its progressive virtues. After two years it ended in civil war, usurpation, and the enforced resignation of Anduesa."

I. N. Ford, Tropical America, chapter 12.

VENEZUELA: A. D. 1892-1893. Constitutional Government restored.

Anduesa Palacio resigned in favor of Vice President Villegas, and the legality of the succession was disputed by the opposition, under ex-President Joaquin Crespo. The civil war continued, and three short-lived dictatorships were set up in succession; but in October, 1892, Crespo entered Caracas and established a constitutional government. In June, 1893, a new constitution was adopted. In October, Crespo was elected President for a term of four years.

—————VENEZUELA: End————

VENI, VIDI, VICI.

See ROME: B. C. 47-46.

{3602}

—————VENICE: Start————

VENICE: A. D. 452. The origin of the republic.

When Attila the Hun, in the year 452, crossed the Alps and invaded Italy, "the savage destroyer undesignedly laid the foundations of a republic which revived, in the feudal state of Europe, the art and spirit of commercial industry. The celebrated name of Venice, or Venetia, was formerly diffused over a large and fertile province of Italy, from the confines of Pannonia to the river Addua, and from the Po to the Rhætian and Julian Alps. Before the irruption of the barbarians, fifty Venetian cities flourished in peace and prosperity. … Many families of Aquileia, Padua, and the adjacent towns, who fled from the sword of the Huns, found a safe though obscure refuge in the neighbouring islands. At the extremity of the Gulf, where the Adriatic feebly imitates the tides of the ocean, near a hundred small islands are separated by shallow water from the continent, and protected from the waves by several long slips of land, which admit the entrance of vessels through some secret and narrow channels. Till the middle of the 5th century these remote and sequestered spots remained without cultivation, with few inhabitants, and almost without a name. But the manners of the Venetian fugitives, their arts and their government, were gradually formed by their new situation; and one of the epistles of Cassiodorus, which describes their condition about seventy years afterwards, may be considered as the primitive monument of the republic. … Fish was the common, and almost the universal, food of every rank: their only treasure consisted in the plenty of salt which they extracted from the sea."

E. Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, chapter 35.

"The inhabitants of Aquileia, or at least the feeble remnant that escaped the sword of Attila, took refuge at Grado. Concordia migrated to Caprularia (now Caorle). The inhabitants of Altinum, abandoning their ruined villas, founded their new habitations upon seven islands at the mouth of the Piave, which, according to tradition, they named from the seven gates of their old city. … From Padua came the largest stream of emigrants. They left the tomb of their mythical ancestor, Antenor, and built their humble dwellings upon the islands of Rivus Altus and Methamaucus, better known to us as Rialto and Malamocco. This Paduan settlement was one day to be known to the world by the name of Venice. But let us not suppose that the future Queen of the Adriatic sprang into existence at a single bound like Constantinople or Alexandria. For 250 years, that is to say for eight generations, the refugees on the islands of the Adriatic prolonged an obscure and squalid existence,—fishing, salt-manufacturing, damming out the waves with wattled vine-branches, driving piles into the sand-banks; and thus gradually extending the area of their villages. Still these were but fishing-villages, loosely confederated together, loosely governed, poor and insignificant. … This seems to have been their condition, though perhaps gradually growing in commercial importance, until at the beginning of the 8th century the concentration of political authority in the hands of the first doge, and the recognition of the Rialto cluster of islands as the capital of the confederacy, started the Republic on a career of success and victory."

T. Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, book 2, chapter 4 (volume 2).

VENICE: A. D. 554-800. A dukedom under the Exarchs of Ravenna.

See ROME: A. D. 554-800.

VENICE: A. D. 568. A refuge from the invading Lombards.

See LOMBARDS: A. D. 568-573.

VENICE: A. D. 697-810. The early constitution of government. Origin of the Doges. Resistance to Pippin, king of the Lombards. Removal to the Rialto and founding of the new capital city.

"Each island had at first its own magistrate: the magistrates of the most considerable being called Tribunes Major, the others, Tribunes Minor, and the whole being equally subject to the council-general of the community; which thus constituted a kind of federal republic. This lasted nearly three hundred years, when it was found that the rising nation had fairly outgrown its institutions. Dangerous rivalries arose among the tribunes. … At a meeting of the Council-General in A. D. 697, the Patriarch of Grado proposed the concentration of power in the hands of a single chief, under the title of Doge or Duke. The proposition was eagerly accepted, and they proceeded at once to the election of this chief. 'It will be seen (remarks Daru) that the Dogeship saved independence and compromised liberty. It was a veritable revolution, but we are ignorant by what circumstances it was brought about. Many historians assert that the change was not effected till the permission of the Pope and the Emperor was obtained.' The first choice fell on Paolo Luca Anabesto. It was made by twelve electors, the founders of what were thenceforth termed the electoral families. The Doge was appointed for life: he named his own counsellors: took charge of all public business; had the rank of prince, and decided all questions of peace and war. The peculiar title was meant to imply a limited sovereignty, and the Venetians uniformly repudiated, as a disgrace, the bare notion of their having ever submitted to a monarch. But many centuries passed away before any regular or well-defined limits were practically imposed; and the prolonged struggle between the people and the Doges, depending mainly on the personal character of the Doge for the time being, constitutes the most startling and exciting portion of their history." The third Doge, one Urso, alarmed the people by his pretensions to such a degree that they slew him, and suppressed his office for five years, substituting a chief magistrate called "maestro dell a milizia." "The Dogeship was then [742] restored in the person of Theodal Urso (son of the last Doge), who quitted Heraclea [then the Venetian capital] for Malamocco, which thus became the capital." In his turn, Theodal Urso lost the favor of the people and was deposed and blinded. "It thenceforth became the received custom in Venice to put out the eyes of deposed Doges." Later in the 8th century the Dogeship was secured by a family which went far towards making it hereditary, and rendering it boldly tyrannical; but the yoke of the would-be despots—Giovanni and Maurice, father and son—was broken in 804, and they were driven to flight. The head of the conspiracy which expelled them, Obelerio, was then proclaimed Doge. {3603} "The events of the next five years are involved in obscurity. One thing is clear. Pepin, King of the Lombards [son of Charlemagne], either under the pretence of a request for aid from the new Doge, or to enforce some real or assumed rights of his own, declared war against the Republic, and waged it with such impetuosity that his fleet and army, after carrying all before them, were only separated from Malamocco, the capital, by a canal. In this emergency, Angelo Participazio, one of those men who are produced by great occasions to mark an era, proposed that the entire population should remove to Rialto, which was separated by a broader arm of the sea from the enemy, and there hold out to the last. No sooner proposed than done. They hastily embarked their all; and when Pepin entered Malamocco, he found it deserted. After losing a large part of his fleet in an ill-advised attack on Rialto, he gave up the enterprise, and Angelo Participazio was elected Doge in recognition of his services, with two tribunes for counsellors. One of his first acts was to make Rialto the capital, instead of Malamocco or Heraclea, which had each been the seat of Government at intervals. 'There were round Rialto some sixty islets, which the Doge connected by bridges. They were soon covered with houses. They were girt with a fortification; and it was then that this population of fugitives gave to this rising city, which they had just founded in the middle of a morass, the name of Venetia, in memory of the fair countries from which their fathers had been forcibly expatriated. The province has lost its name, and become subject to the new Venice.'"

The Republic of Venice (Quarterly Review, October, 1874, volume 137), pages 417-420.

In 803 Charlemagne concluded a treaty, at Aix-la-Chapelle, with Nicephorus I. the Byzantine or Eastern Emperor, establishing boundaries between the two empires which disputed the Roman name. "In this treaty, the supremacy of the Eastern Empire over Venice, Istria, the maritime parts of Dalmatia, and the south of Italy, was acknowledged; while the authority of the Western Empire in Rome, the exarchate of Ravenna, and the Pentapolis, was recognised by Nicephorus. The commerce of Venice with the East was already so important, and the Byzantine administration afforded so many guarantees for the security of property, that the Venetians, in spite of the menaces of Charlemagne, remained firm in their allegiance to Nicephorus. … Venice, it is true, found itself in the end compelled to purchase peace with the Frank empire, by the payment of an annual tribute of thirty-six pounds of gold, in order to secure its commercial relations from interruption; and it was not released from this tribute until the time of Otho the Great. It was during the reign of Nicephorus that the site of the present city of Venice became the seat of the Venetian government, Rivalto (Rialto) becoming the residence of the duke and the principal inhabitants, who retired from the continent to escape the attacks of Pepin [king of Italy, under his father, Charlemagne]. Heraclea had previously been the capital of the Venetian municipality. In 810 peace was again concluded between Nicephorus and Charlemagne, without making any change in the frontier of the two empires."

G. Finlay, Byzantine Empire, 716-1057, book 1, chapter 2, section 1.

ALSO IN: H. F. Brown, Venice, chapters 1-2.

VENICE: 8th Century: Still subject to the Eastern Empire.

See ROME: A. D. 717-800.

VENICE: A. D. 810-961. Spread of commerce and naval prowess. Destruction of Istrian pirates. Conquests in Dalmatia.

"During the ninth, and the first sixty years of the tenth centuries,—from the government of Angelo Participazio, to the coming into Italy of Otho the Great,—the Venetian affairs, with brief intervals of repose, were wholly occupied with civil commotions and naval wars. The doges of the republic were often murdered; its fleets were sometimes defeated; but, under every adverse circumstance, the commercial activity, the wealth, and the power of the state were still rapidly increasing. In the ninth century the Venetians, in concert with the Greeks, encountered, though with indifferent success, the navies of the Saracens; but the Narentines, and other pirates of Dalmatia, were their constant enemies, and were frequently chastised by the arms of the republic The Venetian wealth invited attacks from all the freebooters of the seas, and an enterprise undertaken by some of them who had established themselves on the coast of Istria deserves, from its singularity and the vengeance of the republic, to be recorded in this place. According to an ancient custom, the nuptials of the nobles and principal citizens of Venice were always celebrated on the same day of the year and in the same church. … The Istrian pirates, acquainted with the existence of this annual festival, had the boldness [A. D. 944] to prepare an ambush for the nuptial train in the city itself. They secretly arrived over night at an uninhabited islet near the church of Olivolo, and lay hidden behind it with their barks until the procession had entered the church, when darting from their concealment they rushed into the sacred edifice through all its doors, tore the shrieking brides from the arms of their defenceless lovers, possessed themselves of the jewels which had been displayed in the festal pomp, and immediately put to sea with their fair captives and their booty. But a deadly revenge overtook them. The doge, Pietro Candiano III., had been present at the ceremony: he shared in the fury and indignation of the affianced youths: they flew to arms, and throwing themselves under his conduct into their vessels, came up with the spoilers in the lagunes of Caorlo. A frightful massacre ensued: not a life among the pirates was spared, and the victors returned in triumph with their brides to the church of Olivolo. A procession of the maidens of Venice revived for many centuries the recollection of this deliverance on the eve of the purification. But the doge was not satisfied with the punishment which he had inflicted on the Istriots. He entered vigorously upon the resolution of clearing the Adriatic of all the pirates who infested it: he conquered part of Dalmatia, and he transmitted to his successors, with the ducal crown, the duty of consummating his design."

G. Procter, History of Italy, chapter 1, part 2.

{3604}

VENICE: A. D. 829. The translation of the body of St. Mark. The Winged Lion of St. Mark.

"In the second year of the reign of Doge Giustiniano Particiacio there was brought to Venice from Alexandria the body of the holy evangelist St. Mark. For, as Petrus Damianus says, Mark was brought from Alexandria into Venice, that he who had shone in the East like the morning star might shed his rays in the regions of the West. For Egypt is held to be the East and Venice the West. There he had held the rule of the Church of Alexandria, and here, being, as it were, born again, he obtained the sovereignty of Aquileia. Now this is how the thing was done. The king of the Saracens wishing to build himself a palace in Babylon, gave command that stones should be taken from the Christian churches and other public places, that they might build him a splendid house. And at that time there came by chance to the Church of St. Mark, Bon, tribune of Malamocco, and Rustico da Torcello, who had been forced by the wind, contrary to the edicts of Venice, to put in to the harbour of Alexandria with ten ships laden with merchandise, and they observing the sadness of the guardians of the church (two Greeks, by name Stauratio, a monk, and Theodoro, a priest), inquired the cause. And they answered that by reason of the impious edict of the king they feared the ruin of the church. Thereupon they prayed them to give them the holy body that they might carry it to Venice, promising them that the Doge of Venice would receive it with great honour. But the keepers of the church were filled with fear at their petition, and answered reproaching them and saying: 'Know ye not how the blessed St. Mark, who wrote the Gospel, St. Peter dictating at his request, preached in these parts and baptised into the faith the men of these regions? If the faithful should become aware, we could not escape the peril of death.' But to that they answered: 'As for his preaching, we are his firstborn sons, for he first preached in the parts of Venetia and Aquileia. And in peril of death it is commanded, "If they persecute you in one city, flee ye to another," which the evangelist himself obeyed when in the persecution at Alexandria he fled to Pentapolis.' But the keepers said: 'There is no such persecution now that we should fear for our persons.' But while they spake, came one and broke down the precious stones of the church, and when they would not suffer it they were sorely beaten. Then the keepers seeing the devastation of the church, and their own great danger, listened to the prayer of the Venetians and appointed them a day when they should receive the holy body. Now the body was wrapped in a robe of silk sealed with many seals from the head to the feet. And they brought the body of St. Claudia, and having cut the robe at the back and taken away the body of St. Mark, they placed in its stead the blessed Claudia, leaving the seals unbroken. But a sweet odour quickly spread into the city, and all were filled with astonishment, and not doubting that the body of the evangelist had been moved, they ran together to the church. But when the shrine was opened and they saw the garment with the seals unbroken, they returned quickly to their homes. And when the body should be borne to the boats, they covered it with herbs and spread over it pork-flesh for the passers-by to see, and went crying, 'Khanzir, khanzir!' which is the Saracen's abomination. And when they reached the ships they covered it with a sail while they passed through the Saracen ships. And as they sailed to Venice the ship which bore it with many others was saved from peril of shipwreck. For when the ships had been driven in the night by a tempestuous wind and were not far from Monte, the blessed St. Mark appeared to the Monk Dominic and bade him lower the sails of the ships. Which, when they had done, the dawn appearing, they found themselves close to the island which is called Artalia. And ten of them, having asked and obtained pardon for breaking the edicts of the Doge, they came to the port of Olivola. And the Doge, and the clergy, and the people came to meet them, and brought the body, with songs of thanksgiving, to the Doge's chapel."

Old Chronicle; translated in "The City in the Sea," by the Author of "Belt and Spur," chapter 3.

"Our fathers did not welcome the arrival of the captured eagles of France, after the field of Waterloo, with greater exultation than the people of Venice the relics of the blessed Evangelist. They abandoned themselves to processions, and prayers, and banquets, and public holidays. … The winged 'Lion of St. Mark' was blazoned on the standards, and impressed on the coinage of the Republic. … The Lion became the theme of many political symbols. Thus it was represented with wings to show that Venetians could strike with promptitude; sitting, as a sign of their gravity in counsel—far such is the usual attitude of sages; with a book in its paws, to intimate their devotion to commerce; in war time the book was closed, and a naked sword substituted."

W. H. D. Adams, The Queen of the Adriatic, pages 42-43.

See, also, LION OF ST. MARK.

VENICE: A. D. 1032-1319. Development of the constitution of the aristocratic Republic. The Grand Council. The Council of Ten. The Golden Book.

"It was by slow and artfully disguised encroachments that the nobility of Venice succeeded in substituting itself for the civic power, and investing itself with the sovereignty of the republic. During the earlier period, the doge was an elective prince, the limit of whose power was vested in assemblies of the people. It was not till 1032 that he was obliged to consult only a council, formed from amongst the most illustrious citizens, whom he designated. Thence came the name given them of 'pregadi' (invited). The grand council was not formed till 1172, 140 years later, and was, from that time, the real sovereign of the republic. It was composed of 480 members, named annually on the last day of September, by 12 tribunes, or grand electors, of whom two were chosen by each of the six sections of the republic. No more than four members from one family could be named. The same counsellors might be re-elected each year. As it is in the spirit of a corporation to tend always towards an aristocracy, the same persons were habitually re-elected; and when they died their children took their places. The grand council, neither assuming to itself nor granting to the doge the judicial power, gave the first example of the creation of a body of judges, numerous, independent, and irremovable; such, nearly, as was afterwards the parliament of Paris. In 1179, it created the criminal 'quarantia'; called, also, the 'vecchia quarantia,' to distinguish it from two other bodies of forty judges, created in 1229. The grand council gave a more complete organization to the government formed from among its members. It was com·posed of a doge; of six counsellors of the red robe, who remained only eight months in office, and who, with the doge, formed the 'signoria'; and of the council of pregadi, composed of 60 members, renewed each year. … {3605} In 1249, the sovereign council renounced the election of the doge, and intrusted it to a commission drawn by lot from among the whole council; this commission named another: which, reduced by lot to one fourth, named a third; and by these alternate operations of lot and election, at length formed the last commission of 41 members, who could elect the doge only by a majority of 25 suffrages. It was not till towards the end of the 13th century that the people began to discover that they were no more than a cipher in the republic, and the doge no more than a servant of the grand council,—surrounded, indeed, with pomp, but without any real power. In 1289, the people attempted themselves to elect the doge; but the grand council obliged him whom the popular suffrages had designated to leave Venice, and substituted in his place Pietro Gradenigo, the chief of the aristocratic party. Gradenigo undertook to exclude the people from any part in the election of the grand council, as they were already debarred from any participation in the election of a doge. … The decree which he proposed and carried on the 28th of February, 1297, is famous in the history of Venice, under the name of 'serrata del maggior consiglio' (shutting of the grand council). He legally founded that hereditary aristocracy,—so prudent, so jealous, so ambitious,—which Europe regarded with astonishment; immovable in principle, unshaken in power; uniting some of the most odious practices of despotism with the name of liberty; suspicious and perfidious in politics; sanguinary in revenge; indulgent to the subject; sumptuous in the public service, economical in the administration of the finances; equitable and impartial in the administration of justice; knowing well how to give prosperity to the arts, agriculture, and commerce; beloved by the people who obeyed it, whilst it made the nobles who partook its power tremble. The Venetian aristocracy completed its constitution, in 1311, by the creation of the Council of Ten, which, notwithstanding its name, was composed of 16 members and the doge. Ten counsellors of the black robe were annually elected by the great council, in the months of August and September; and of the six counsellors of the red robe, composing a part of the signoria, three entered office every four months. The Council of Ten, charged to guard the security of the state with a power higher than the law, had an especial commission to watch over the nobles, and to punish their crimes against the republic. In this they were restrained by no rule: they were, with respect to the nobility, the depositaries of the power of the great council, or rather of a power unlimited, which no people should intrust to any government. Some other decrees completed the system of the 'serrata del maggior consiglio.' It was forbidden to the quarantia to introduce any 'new man' into power. In 1315, a register was opened, called the Golden Book, in which were inscribed the names of all those who had sat in the great council. In 1319, all limitation of number was suppressed; and, from that period, it sufficed to prove that a person was the descendant of a counsellor, and 25 years of age, to be by right a member of the grand council of Venice."

J. C. L. de Sismondi, History of the Italian Republics, chapter 5.

"When the Republic was hard pressed for money, inscriptions in the Golden Book were sold at the current price of 100,000 ducats. … Illustrious foreigners were admitted, as they are made free of a corporation amongst us. … The honour was not disdained even by crowned heads. … The original 'Libro d' oro' was publicly burned in 1797, but extracts, registers, and other documents are extant from which its contents might be ascertained."

The Republic of Venice (Quarterly Review, volume 137, page 433).

ALSO IN: E. Flagg, Venice, the City of the Sea, introduction.

Mrs. Oliphant, The Makers of Venice, chapter 4.

H. F. Brown, Venice, chapters 5 and 9.

VENICE: A. D. 1085. Acquires the sovereignty of Dalmatia and Croatia.

See BYZANTINE EMPIRE: A. D. 1081-1085.

VENICE: A. D. 1099-1101. The first Crusade.

"The movement of the crusades brings Venice to the very forefront of European history. Her previous development had been slowly preparing the way for her emergence. The Council, held at Clermont in 1095, resolved that the armament should leave Europe early in the following year. The Pope and the leaders of the Crusades were obliged to turn their attention to the question of transport for the vast and amorphous mob, which, without discipline, with no distinction of ranks, with no discrimination between soldier and monk, between merchant and peasant, between master and man, was now bent on reaching the Holy Land, almost as eager to die there as to achieve the object of their mission, the recovery of the Sepulchre. The three maritime states of Italy—Genoa, Pisa, and Venice—were each ready to offer their services. Each was jealous of the other, and each determined to prevent the other from reaping any signal commercial advantage from the religious enthusiasm of Europe. Venice was not only the most powerful, but also the most eastern, of the three competitors. It was natural that the choice should fall on her. When the Pope's invitation to assist in the Crusade reached the city, however, it seems that the Government did not at once embrace the cause officially in the name of the whole Republic. There was, at first, a tendency to leave the business of transport to private enterprise. But on receipt of the news that Jerusalem had fallen, the Venetian Government began to take active steps in the matter. … The Crusade was accepted with enthusiasm. The whole city engaged in preparing a fleet which should be worthy of the Republic. Then, after a solemn mass in S. Mark's, at which the standard of the Cross and the standard of the Republic were presented to the leaders, the soldiers of the Cross embarked on the fleet which numbered 200 ships, and set sail down the Adriatic, making for Rhodes, where they were to winter. At Rhodes two incidents of great significance in Venetian history took place. The Eastern Emperors had never viewed with favour the incursion of the Crusaders. The creation of the kingdom of Jerusalem was really a usurpation of Imperial territory. Alexius I. now endeavoured to persuade the Venetians to withdraw from the enterprise. In this he failed; Venice remained true to the Cross, and to her commercial interests. It is at this point that we find the beginnings of that divergence between Constantinople and the Republic, which eventually declared itself in open hostility, and led up to the sack of Constantinople in the fourth Crusade.

{3606}

Alexius, finding that the Venetians were not inclined to obey him, resolved to punish them. An instrument was ready to his hand. The Pisans saw with disfavour the advent of their commercial rivals in Eastern waters. They were willing to hoist the Imperial standard as opposed to the crusading cross, and to sail down upon the Venetians at Rhodes. They were defeated. The Venetians released all the prisoners except thirty of the more prominent among them who were detained as hostages. The first fruits of the Crusade, as far as Venice was concerned, were the creation of two powerful enemies, the Emperor and the Pisans."

H. F. Brown, Venice, chapter 6.

VENICE: A. D. 1102. Hungarian conquest of Dalmatia.

See HUNGARY: A. D. 972-1114.

VENICE: A. D: 1114-1141. Wars for Dalmatia with the Hungarians.

See HUNGARY: A. D. 1114-1301.

VENICE: A. D. 1127-1128. Beginning of quarrels with the Byzantine Empire.

"Previous to this time [about 1127], the Venetian republic had generally been a firm ally of the Byzantine empire, and, to a certain degree, it was considered as owing homage to the Emperor of Constantinople. That connection was now dissolved, and those disputes commenced which soon occupied a prominent place in the history of Eastern Europe. The establishment of the Crusaders in Palestine had opened a new field for the commercial enterprise of the Venetians, and in a great measure changed the direction of their maritime trade; while the frequent quarrels of the Greeks and Franks compelled the trading republics of Italy to attach themselves to one of the belligerent parties, in order to secure a preference in its ports. For a short time, habit kept the Venetians attached to the empire; but they soon found that their interests were more closely connected with the Syrian trade than with that of Constantinople. They joined the kings of Jerusalem in extending their conquests, and obtained considerable establishments in all the maritime cities of the kingdom. From having been the customers and allies of the Greeks, they became their rivals and enemies. The commercial fleets of the age acted too often like pirates; and it is not improbable that the Emperor John had good reason to complain of the aggressions of the Venetians. Hostilities commenced; the Doge Dominico Michieli, one of the heroes of the republic, conducted a numerous fleet into the Archipelago, and plundered the islands of Rhodes and Chios, where he wintered. Next year he continued his depredations in Samos, Mitylene, Paros, and Andros. … Peace was re-established by the emperor reinstating the Venetians in the enjoyment of all the commercial privileges they had enjoyed before the war broke out."

G. Finlay, History of the Byzantine and Greek Empires, book 3, chapter 2, section 2.

VENICE: A. D. 1177. Pretended Papal Grant of the sovereignty of the Adriatic. Doubtful story of the humiliation of Frederick Barbarossa.

A "notable epoch in early Venetian history is the grant on which she based her claim to the sovereignty of the Adriatic. In the course of the fierce struggle between Alexander III. and Frederick Barbarossa [see ITALY: A. D. 1174-1183], the Pope, when his fortunes were at the lowest, took refuge with the Venetians, who, after a vain effort at reconciliation, made common cause with him, and in a naval encounter obtained so signal a victory that the Emperor was compelled to sue for peace and submit to the most humiliating terms. The crowning scene of his degradation has been rendered familiar by the pencil, the chisel, and the pen. … The Emperor, as soon as he came into the sacred presence, stripped off his mantle and knelt down before the Pope to kiss his feet. Alexander, intoxicated with his triumph and losing all sense of moderation or generosity, placed his foot on the head or neck of his prostrate enemy, exclaiming, in the words of the Psalmist, 'Super aspidem et basiliscum ambulabis' &c. ('Thou shalt tread upon the asp and the basilisk' …). 'Non tibi, sed Petro' ('Not to thee, but Peter'), cried the outraged and indignant Emperor. 'Et mihi et Petro' ('To both me and Peter'), rejoined the Pope, with a fresh pressure of his heel. … Sismondi (following a contemporary chronicler} narrates the interview without any circumstance of insult, and describes it as concluding with the kiss of peace. There are writers who contend that Alexander was never at Venice, and that the Venetians obtained no victory on his behalf. But the weight of evidence adduced by Daru strikes us to be quite conclusive in favour of his version. … In return for the good offices of Venice on this occasion … Alexander presented the reigning Doge, Ziani, with a ring, saying, 'Receive this ring, and with it, as my donation, the dominion of the sea, which you, and your successors, shall annually assert on an appointed day, so that all posterity may understand that the possession of the sea was yours by right of victory, and that it is subject to the rule of the Venetian Republic, as wife to husband.' … The well-known ceremony of wedding the Adriatic, religiously observed with all its original pomp and splendour during six centuries, was in itself a proclamation and a challenge to the world. It was regularly attended by the papal nuncio and the whole of the diplomatic corps, who, year after year, witnessed the dropping of a sanctified ring into the sea, and heard without a protest the prescriptive accompaniment: 'Desponsamus te, mare, in signum veri perpetuique domini' (we espouse thee, sea, in sign of true and perpetual dominion)."

The Republic of Venice (Quarterly Review, October, 1874, volume 137), pages 421-423.

ALSO IN: G. B. Testa, History of the War of Frederick I. against the Communes of Lombardy, book 11.

Mrs. W. Busk, Mediæval Popes, Emperors, Kings, and Crusaders, book 2, chapter 8 (volume 2).

VENICE: A. D. 1201. Cause of Hostility to Constantinople.

"Of late years the Venetians had had difficulties with the New Rome. … These difficulties arose, in great measure, from the fact that the influence of Venice in Constantinople was no longer sufficient to exclude that of the other Italian republics. … But the hostility to Constantinople reached its height when the Venetians learned that Alexis had, in May 1201, received an embassy from Genoa, and was negotiating with Ottobono della Croce, its leader, for the concession of privileges for trade in Romania which Venice had hitherto regarded as exclusively her own. From this time the Doge appears to have determined to avenge the wrongs of his state on the ruler who had ventured to favour his rivals."