Note J — NOTES. (continued 4)

"It is extremely difficult to ascertain the origin of the trades-corporations, even in those towns which have been the longest and the best disciplined.—Sandi, in his Civil History of Venice (t. ii. part 1, lib. iv. p. 767), after having reckoned sixty-one trades-corporations existing in that capital at the beginning of his century, declares that it is impossible to assign to each of these corporations the date of its origin, or that of its first statutes. This historian nevertheless consulted all the archives of the republic; he contents himself with observing, that none of the corporations are anterior to the fourteenth century." (The notes which accompany this chapter are those of Capmany himself.)