Last episode, we saw the lagoon encircled by Frankish forces, but the Venetians survived Pepin’s siege and escaped submission to the new feudal order taking root in the rest of Europe. The peace treaty between the Byzantines and the Holy Roman Empire – the Pax Nicephori – is the real reason the Franks did not…
Read MoreIH Season 1: Venice, episode 4: War Comes to the Lagoon We left off last episode with Maurizio, the son and co-Doge of Doge Giovanni Galbaio, looking down from the tower of the Patriarch of Grado’s residence, as said patriarch plummeted to his death in the piazza below. The overwhelming show of force in not…
Read MoreIH Season 1: Venice, episode 3: The First Doges Last episode we explored the Venetian lagoon and the forces that helped give the people a shared cultural, economic, and political identity during the roughly 300 years after the historical founding of Venice. Now, let’s talk religion and politics. Much like their geography, the religious power…
Read MoreItalian Histories Season 1: Venice, episode 2 Last episode, we explored the origins of the people who populated the Veneto region and its lagoons, and found that a Venetian identity extended back hundreds of years before the fall of the Roman Empire. We also bumped into an important question I’d like to explore more fully…
Read MoreItalian Histories Season 1: Venice, episode 1 Venetian history begins during the tumultuous end of the Western Roman Empire and I believe it will be helpful to go over the period with some broad strokes before circling back for a more detailed look. The splitting of the Roman empire was itself precipitated by the start…
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Welcome to Italian Histories, I’m Jordan Bradley and I’m excited to share this new podcast which explores the varied histories of the peoples and regions of the Italian peninsula. My great grandfather immigrated to the States from Vallata, a little mountain town, on the outskirts of Campania, east of Napoli, in 1912. My great grandmother…
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