politics and constitution 53
Senate or sovereign letters signed by ducal councilors, sentences passed
by the plethora of republican institutions with their seat in the capital,
pronouncements or acts of government of the Venetian rectors in the
terraferma or envoys in the colonies of the stato da mar: every type of
act produced in the course of the activities of government, from the least
important magistracy to the Doge himself, no matter how solemn or banal
it might have been, could be brought by appeal before the Avogaria.
From the most formalized notions of civil law to particular local cus-
toms, a plurality of juridical conceptions and forms were continually dis-
cussed, specified, and adapted to specific and circumscribed situations. It
was through the hermeneutical activity of the Avogaria and their interven-
tion in concrete conflicts that one could glimpse a material constitution,
a complex of rules and norms meant to regulate the forms of social life.
The basic lexicon of republican mythology, already under construction
during the 15th century, found continuous validation in the requirements
of office: prudence, fundamental equality among all patricians, internal
peace, and respect for the autonomies of the subjects of the “Dominion.”
A glance at several cases—obviously without claims to completeness—
can help us better understand the tension between legality and subjective
interests, between the liberty of the individual and the pressures exerted
by the patrician clans, and between the normative/juridical system of the
capital and those in force in the cities of the terraferma, Dalmatia, and
the Mediterranean islands under Venetian rule. In 1439, the avogadore
Luca Tron requested that the components of the Pregadi enforce a letter
emanated by the Maggior Consiglio in 1403, affirming that Venetian nobles
could not receive gifts, pensions, or salaries from other “Dominions” or
communities. It was necessary to underline that old decree to prevent
Folco Contarini from taking the post of unspecified embassy to which he
had been appointed. Previously, in fact, the latter had for years served the
duke of Mantua, living at his court and receiving from that ruler generous
compensation.10
In many other cases, we can see an analogous mechanism in which a
norm apparently buried in the archives of the Venetian chancellery is re-
exhumed for a specific purpose. In one instance, the “city laws” (ordines
Venetiarum) previously reaffirmed in 1309 had been disregarded in a
marriage case that opposed Maria Contarini and Azzone Trevisan. The
case was being appealed to the Quarantia in regard to the first sentence
10 ASV, Avogaria di comun, reg. 3648 (II), c.44r, 18/5/1439.