industry and production in the venetian terraferma 293
obstruction” to the “privileges of the Dominante” and concluding with the
complex tax system that governed production and exchange.3
In the wake of caizzi’s discoveries, a series of studies looked to deepen
our knowledge of the leading lights in the region’s manufacturing sector:
see angela Maria Girelli’s work on silk manufacturing in Verona, Ivo Mat-
tozzi on the paper industry, and Mario Infelise on the remondini printing
house in Bassano.4
under the influence of the new interpretation of 17th-century Lombardy
proposed by domenico sella, in the early 1980s there began to develop an
alternative vision of early modern Veneto manufacturing that differed from
caizzi’s thesis.5 Instead of the contrast between a renaissance past better
left behind to free up space for growth opportunities, there were attempts
to plot a course which, though tortuous and marked by phases of crisis
and transformation, underlined elements of continuity, reconstructed an
uninterrupted narrative and permitted the revision of judgments regard-
ing the regional economic picture still dominated by a generalized, grim
pessimism. the feeling common among scholars was that there was still
much work to be done. Walter panciera exemplified this belief in his work
of the mid-1980s. regarding industrial activities in operation in the zone
around Vicenza in the early modern period, he noted that “without fear of
contradiction it should immediately be observed the research in the field
of the economic history of the Venetian terraferma in the early modern
period, particularly in the manufacturing sector, is just beginning and is
far from having established the bases for producing even a general sketch
of any completeness.”6
even in 1998, in a note commenting upon panciera’s fundamental
book on wool-working in the Venetian republic between the 16th and
18th centuries7 (which it would be no exaggeration to define as pioneering
3 Bruno caizzi, Industria e commercio della repubblica veneta nel XVIII secolo (Milan,
1965).
4 angela Maria Girelli, Il setificio veronese nel Settecento (Milan, 1969); Ivo Mattozzi, Pro-
duzione e commercio della carta nello Stato Veneziano settecentesco. Lineamenti e problemi
(Bologna, 1975); Mario Infelise, I remondini di Bassano (Bassano del Grappa, 1980).
5 domenico sella, “Le attività manifatturiere nelle valli bergamasche,” in aldo de
Maddalena, Marzio achille romani, and Marco cattini, eds., Storia di Bergamo: il tempo
della Serenissima, vol. 3: Un Seicento in controtendenza (Bergamo, 2000), pp. 83–98.
6 Walter panciera, “Le attività manifatturiere nel Vicentino tra XVI e XVIII secolo e la
cartiera di dueville,” in claudio povolo, ed., Dueville. Storia e identificazione di una comu-
nità del passato (Vicenza, 1985), p. 1035.
7 Walter panciera, L’arte matrice. I lanifici della repubblica di Venezia nei secoli XVII e
XVIII (treviso, 1996).