28 Chapter II
tration in the Golden Book. So few had been admitted, over the centuries, that
where in 1367 there had been 240 noble families, there were only 111 in 1796.
When the last doge was elected, in 1789, some of the older patricians complained
that he was an upstart whose family had bought its way into the Golden Book as
recently as 1669. In 1796, the last year of the ancient republic, with a population at
that time of 130,000, only 1,218 persons attended the meeting of the Great Coun-
cil, the constituted body in which all citizen- nobles met in person. It may be
added, to illustrate the trend toward aristocracy, that Venetian nobles now scorned
the trade on which the wealth and fame of the city were founded, and usually lived
at leisure on landed estates on the dependent mainland of Venetia.^7
Milan, like Hungary and Bohemia, belonged to the Hapsburg empire, but was
governed as a separate unit. The chief public body was the Council of Decurions,
60 in number. To qualify for this council or other civic office it was necessary to be
a patrician of the city. There were 297 patrician families in 1769, in a population of
about 130,000. Most of these families were of merchant ancestry several genera-
tions back, but in 1652 they had introduced the rank of cavaliere patrizio, a kind of
knightly or noble patrician, and in 1716 they had passed a rule that, to qualify as a
patrician, one must prove noble status and a hundred years’ residence by one’s fam-
ily in the city. A family lost patrician status if none of its members held office for
three generations, or if a member “derogated” by going into trade. Patricians of the
city and landed nobles of the surrounding duchy mixed as equals in the eighteenth
century. In fact, nobles sought the more desirable status of patrician, since patri-
cians occupied the numerous complicated magistracies which defended Milanese
liberties against Hapsburg encroachment.^8
In the mountains above Milan lay the cantons of Switzerland, a heterogeneous
federation of small communities, some sovereign, some subject to others, but in-
cluding some of the most exclusive and some of the most popular states of the day.
The rural canton of Uri, for example, was one of the most democratic. Every year
the villages elected a Landammann. Even here, however, the tendency to inheri-
tance of position is apparent. That it existed in Uri suggests that it was due not
merely to the ambitions of individuals but to a general willingness of most people
to let others undertake public business, and the fact that only a few, under condi-
tions of the time, had the breadth of outlook or qualities of character needed even
for simple office. At any rate, the thirty- seven persons who acted as Landammann
of Uri from 1700 to 1798 represented only twelve family names. For sixty- five of
the ninety- eight years the Landam mann was named either Bessler, Püntner, or
Schmid. Son often succeeded father.^9
Bern, on the other hand, was highly aristocratic. No one was admitted to its
citizenship between 1651 and 1790, which is to say that citizenship was purely
hereditary. Noncitizens might reside permanently in the town by promising to
continue in the same occupation and to train one son in it. Those among the citi-
7 A. Bozzola, “L’ultimo doge e la caduta della Serenissima,” in Nuova Rivista Storica, XVIII
(1934), 30–58.
8 F. Valsecchi, L’Assolutismo illuminate in Austria e in Lombardia (Bologna, 1934), II, 37–40; J. M.
Roberts, “L’aristocrazia lombarda nel 18 secolo,” in Occidente, VIII 1952), 305–25.
9 Dictionnaire historique et biographique de la Suisse, “Uri.”