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Servants of the Republic: Patrician lawyers in Quattrocento Venice. / Scott Lee Jones

Swansea University Author: Scott Lee Jones

Abstract

Lawyers have widely been recognized as playing a role in the transition from the medieval to the modem state. Their presence in Renaissance Venetian politics, however, remains largely unexplored. Relying primarily on a prosopographical analysis, the thesis explores the various roles played by lawyer...

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Published: 2010
Institution: Swansea University
Degree level: Doctoral
Degree name: Ph.D
URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa42517
Abstract: Lawyers have widely been recognized as playing a role in the transition from the medieval to the modem state. Their presence in Renaissance Venetian politics, however, remains largely unexplored. Relying primarily on a prosopographical analysis, the thesis explores the various roles played by lawyers, dividing those roles into three main categories: diplomats, territorial governors, and domestic legislators. What emerges is a clear pattern of significant involvement by legally trained patricians in the Venetian political system. Noble lawyers were most often ambassadors, serving in many of the principal courts inside and outside of Italy as Venice was extending her influence on the Italian peninsula. They also served as administrators of Venetian rule throughout the Venetian terraferma (mainland) state. Lastly, their domestic political officeholding further confirms their continuing participation, as they held many of the most important domestic offices throughout the Quattrocento. The thesis ends with short biographies of each of the nearly three-dozen lawyers who make up this study, as well as chronologies of the offices they held. These chronologies include archival references for each office.
Keywords: European history.;Law.;Political science.
College: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences