Between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, Venice
transformed itself from a struggling merchant commune to a powerful
maritime empire that would shape events in the Mediterranean for
the next four hundred years. In this magisterial new book on
medieval Venice, Thomas F. Madden traces the city-state's
extraordinary rise through the life of Enrico Dandolo (c.
1107-1205), who ruled Venice as doge from 1192 until his death. The
scion of a prosperous merchant family deeply involved in politics,
religion, and diplomacy, Dandolo led Venice's forces during the
disastrous Fourth Crusade (1201-1204), which set out to conquer
Islamic Egypt but instead destroyed Christian Byzantium. Yet
despite his influence on the course of Venetian history, we know
little about Dandolo, and much of what is known has been distorted
by myth.
The first full-length study devoted to Dandolo's life and times,
"Enrico Dandolo and the Rise of Venice" corrects the many
misconceptions about him that have accumulated over the centuries,
offering an accurate and incisive assessment of Dandolo's motives,
abilities, and achievements as doge, as well as his role--and
Venice's--in the Fourth Crusade. Madden also examines the means and
methods by which the Dandolo family rose to prominence during the
preceding century, thus illuminating medieval Venice's singular
political, social, and religious environment. Culminating with the
crisis precipitated by the failure of the Fourth Crusade, Madden's
groundbreaking work reveals the extent to which Dandolo and his
successors became torn between the anxieties and apprehensions of
Venice's citizens and its escalating obligations as a Mediterranean
power.
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