Power or exclusive noble rights. The Venetian patriciate and the aggregation of new families in the XVIIth century

Power in Venice was synonymous with noble status. The Venetian patriciate, the long-time ruling elite, conceived this linkage as an effective barrier against claims of other social groups. At the second half of the 17th century, the patriciate, decimated in number and unable to fund the war of Crete, contemplates the aggregation of newcomers in return for money. After a long debate the idea of an official aggregation is rejected. The proposal demands in fact a difficult choice: sharing power with others means also ceding the patrician exclusive noble status. The debates preceding the vote reveal the patrician belief in the congenital nature of nobility and thus in its incommunicability. Consequently, the unwillingness to give up its qualitative distinction and lose its noble reputation produces an ambiguous solution: the patriciate incorporates 125 families by exercising the sovereign's right to reward the subject for his services, avoiding thus an official ennoblement. -English summar