Venetian Albania

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The Venetian Albania at the time of its greatest expansion in 1448

Venetian Albania ( Italian Albania veneta ) is a historical-geographical term that the Venetian administration used since the 15th century for the possessions of the Republic of Venice on what is now the mainly Montenegrin Adriatic coast . As the further north Dalmatia and the Ionian Islands off the Greek coast was the Venetian Albania an independent administrative district under the leadership of an in Cattaro based Provveditore . With partly changing borders, the area around the Bay of Kotor was owned by the Serenissima from 1420 to 1797. The Venetian Albania with its strongly fortified coastal towns formed an important outpost against the advance of the Ottoman Empire along the Adriatic coast.

history

The formation of the province and its expansion

Ruins of a Venetian palato in Risano

At the turn of the 14th to the 15th century, the Republic of Venice expanded on the Adriatic coast of the Balkan Peninsula . With the exception of Ragusa , the Venetians were able to subjugate all important cities in Dalmatia , on the Bay of Kotor and further south to Durazzo . The most important goal of the Senate was to get an uninterrupted chain of bases and ports in hand, which should secure the sea route to the Levant . In addition to the old rivalry with the Kingdom of Hungary , on which the Dalmatian cities were more or less dependent, the consideration that the small principalities in Albania, Montenegro and Herzegovina would not be able to withstand the advance of the Turks in the long term played a decisive role . The decision was therefore made in Venice to take the coastal cities before the Ottomans took hold there.

Starting with Durazzo (1392) and Scutari (1396), the Venetians took possession of all coastal towns up to the Bay of Kotor in the following 50 years: Cattaro, Risano , Perasto and Téodo (1420/21), Budua (1442), Dulcigno , San Stefano , Antivari with Spizza and Castellastua and Alessio (1443). Added to temporarily places came in the interior, so the Skadar Lake or the castle Croia .

The administration and military protection of all these possessions was only moderately organized until the second third of the 15th century. The Venetians contented themselves with setting up a Rettore or Capitano in the individual cities , who was responsible for military affairs and collecting taxes on site. If supraregional coordination was required, the Gulf captain (Italian: Capitano di Golfo ), the commander in chief of the Venetian fleet in the Adriatic, was entrusted with this.

The shock after the defeat in the 2nd Venetian Turkish War (1463-1479), but also the general trend of that time towards the rationalization of rule and administration, led to the fact that the Senate and the government of Venice turned the towns on the Montenegrin coast into a province under the leadership of a province Provveditore summarized. Alessio, Scutari and Croia had to be ceded in 1479; so the bay of Cattaro, Téodo, Budua, Antivari and Dulcigno remained for the administrative district called “Venetian Albania” . The now quite isolated central Albanian port city of Durazzo was not included. But it fell to the Turks as early as 1503.

In the north, Venetian Albania bordered the territory of the Republic of Ragusa at Prevlaka until 1699 . There were repeated clashes between the two republics .

The country's name Albania is in the Veneto speak, the antonym to Montenegro , the adjacent mountain land that was not in the hands of the Republic. Both toponyms appear at about the same time in the Venetian sources in the 15th century, while today's Albania was still part of the Epiro (German mainland) at this time . However, the boundaries were fluid. In the course of the 16th century the Venetian sources used the pair of terms Albania veneta and Albania turca more and more frequently to distinguish the "two" Albania from each other.

Only a few Albanians lived in the Venetian province, mainly in the cities of Dulcigno and Antivari. Most of the residents were long-established Romans or Slavs . Among the latter there was a significant proportion of Orthodox Christians . There were also soldiers from outside, mostly Italians from the Terraferma, but also mercenaries from many parts of Europe .

The Venetian supremacy from the 16th to the 18th century

In the 20-year peace period after 1479, the Venetians expanded the fortifications of most of the coastal cities and stationed an independent naval unit in the Bay of Kotor under the command of the Provveditor there.

In order to ensure cooperation in the Adriatic region, the Provveditore of the Venetian Albania had to send regular reports not only to the Senate in Venice, but also to the Governor of Dalmatia.

The Venetians intervened only moderately in the internal affairs of the individual cities. Most of the time the city statutes were left untouched, and only a Venetian nobleman was appointed head of the city. The regiment of officials dispatched from the lagoon city was only tough when the military necessity required it. For example, special taxes were levied on fortification construction.

With regard to religious institutions, the Venetians also transferred their state church system to the distant province. That is, the government of the republic spoke the decisive word in the occupation of the dioceses and abbeys, sometimes also the parishes. The interference of the Holy See has always been rejected. The traditional coexistence of Catholics and Orthodox was tolerated. There were a number of churches on the Bay of Kotor that were shared by both denominations.

Turkish Wars

View of Herceg Novi (Castelnuovo) in the 17th century. The Turkish mosque in the center of the city is easy to see

In the 3rd Venetian Turkish War from 1499 to 1503, the republic lost possessions in Greece, but was largely able to assert itself in Venetian Albania and Dalmatia. Antivari was first captured by the Ottomans in 1528, but returned soon afterwards. For almost the entire 16th century, a state of war with reciprocal attacks prevailed on the Turkish-Venetian borders in the Balkans. The Venetian Albania was mostly affected by this, although the area was only a secondary theater of war.

The 5th Venetian Turkish War from 1570 to 1573, which went down in history with the naval battle of Lepanto , ended with a bitter defeat for the Republic of Venice. After the loss of Cyprus in 1571 , the Serenissima also had to cede Antivari and Dulcigno in 1573. In 1699, however, the acquisition of Castelnuovo succeeded . With that, all fortified places on the Bay of Kotor were Venetian. Since the Peace of Passarowitz in 1718, the Venetian-Turkish borders have remained peaceful.

Dissolution of the province

With the end of the Republic of Venice, Venetian Albania came under Austrian rule together with Dalmatia in 1797. The census taken shortly thereafter showed 38,000 residents in the area. After a French interlude in Napoleon's time , the Congress of Vienna confirmed Austria's ownership of the territory in 1815. The area on the Bay of Kotor lost its independent administration and became part of the Crown Land of Dalmatia as a district . With that the term Venetian Albania disappeared from history, occasionally afterwards Austrian Albania was used instead . Today the coastal region is part of Montenegro.

economy

Until the end of the Turkish wars in the 18th century, the economy of Venetian Albania was very hampered by the isolated location on the border and the frequent raids. There was little fertile farmland in the small coastal area. Food had to be imported for the fortress garrisons. Fishing had a certain importance. Many Bocchese , as the inhabitants of the Bocche di Cattaro were called, hired themselves as seamen. Local merchants, especially those from Perasto and Cattaro, have been increasingly successful in merchant shipping since the 17th century, rivaling Ragusa. In the 18th century the shipping companies from Perasto alone had more than 100 ships. When rule passed to Austria in 1797, a total of almost 400 ships and 2500 seamen were counted.

While the Mark Republic had to spend more money on the province than taxes were collected in the 15th and 16th centuries, the balance for the lagoon city was positive in the 18th century.

literature

  • Oliver Jens Schmitt : The Venetian Albania. (1392–1479) (= Southeast European Works. Vol. 110). Oldenbourg, Munich 2001, ISBN 3-486-56569-9 (also: Munich, University, dissertation, 2000).
  • Peter Bartl: Le picciole Indie dei Veneziani. On the position of Albania in trade relations between the Balkans and the Appennine Peninsula. In: Munich Journal for Balkan Studies. Vol. 4, 1981/1982, ISSN  0170-8929 , pp. 1-10.
  • Peter Bartl: The Venetian Turkish War in 1690 according to the letters of the papal officer Guido Bonaventura. In: Southeast Research . Vol. 26, 1967, pp. 88-101.
  • Giuseppe Gelcich: Memorie storiche sulle bocche di Cattaro. Self-published, Zara 1880, ( digitized version ).
  • Bartolomeo Cecchetti : Intorno agli stabilimenti politici della repubblica veneta nell'Albania. In: Atti del Regio Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti. Serie 4, Vol. 3, 1874, ZDB -ID 211805-1 , pp. 977-998 .
  • Giuseppe de Brodmann: Memorie politico-economiche della citta e territorio di Trieste, della penisola d'Istria, della Dalmazia fu Veneta, di Ragusi e dell'Albania, ora congiunti all'Austriaco Impero. sn Venezia 1821, ( digitized ).