Society, Administration And Identities In Latin Greece 135
In all cases, these communities were open to all city-dwellers. In reality,
however, though unofficially, the reins of power were held by but a small num-
ber of eminent families, mainly of Latin extraction, though at the same time
Greek residents were not entirely excluded. In this framework, the local popu-
lation was divided between the citizens (cittadini), frequently holding titles of
the feudal nobility, and the populace (popolo). The communities of this type
developed mainly from the 14th to the 16th centuries. They appeared in the
regions of Modon and Coron, and chiefly in areas which yielded voluntarily
to Venice after the second half of the 14th century, such as Nauplia, Argos, the
islands of Euboea, Tenos, Aegina and the Northern Sporades, and the cities of
Naupactus and Monemvasia.
The third category, that of “open” communities of the urban populace,
which were to gradually evolve into the closed communities of citizens (citta-
dini)/nobles, are to be noted in most of the Ionian Islands which were incorpo-
rated into the Venetian state between 1386 and 1500. The first civic communal
council of citizens (cittadini) was set up on the island of Cythera (1363–1797)
in the second half of the 16th century. Its organisation came about following
a petition drawn up by thirty prominent families of the area, mainly land-
owners of Latin and Greek descent, who also constituted its original mem-
bers and who were to hold the status for life and hereditarily. The communal
council retained its closed character until the end of Venetian rule in 1797.
However, the number of its members was to increase, particularly after 1669
when it admitted large numbers of Cretan refugees, Cretan nobles as well
as cittadini.
Developments in the capital of the Ionian Island of Corfu (1386–1797)
proved to be a good deal more complex. Venetian after 1386, at the invitation
of its inhabitants, Corfu elicited privileges from Venice while conserving social
characteristics dating from the previous Angevin period. During the first years
of Venetian rule there existed in the capital of the island, the city of Corfu,
a community composed of both Latins and Greeks whose members were
nobles, landowners/feudal lords, traders, shipowners, secretaries and notaries,
professionals and craftsmen. From early on, nevertheless, there appeared at
its interior an informal social hierarchy made up of inhabitants of the city at
whose head were great landowners/feudatories and rich merchants.
In this milieu, from the middle of the 15th and until the 16th century, sys-
tematic changes took place towards the creation of a “closed” Corfiot com-
munity: a) the institution of flexible organs with only a few members, such
as the Small Council of 150, b) the “cleaning up” of the General Council via
the gradual institution of civic criteria (expulsion of foreigners, illegitimates,
manual workers, non-residents of the city) and c) establishment of the registry