The office and title of
doge, in relation to
Venetia (region) and
Venice (city), emerged from older offices (Latin ) that existed in the late
Roman and early
Byzantine empires.
Byzantine era During the second half of the 6th and throughout the 7th century, the Byzantine province of
Venetia was gradually reduced to coastal lagoons, while the hinterland was occupied by the
Lombards. The remaining Byzantine regions along the coast were governed by a
magister militum, subordinated to the imperial
exarch of Ravenna. In 639, the provincial governor of Byzantine Venetia was
magister militum Mauricius, and the same office was in the first half of the 8th century held by Marcellus, as recorded in a later document known as the
Pactum Lotharii (840). Initially, the seat of local administration was situated in
Oderzo, and later moved first to
Eraclea (
Cittanova), and then to
Malamocco, to be finally settled in
Rialto (Latin
civitas Rivoalti, the Venice proper) since the first half of the 9th century. The first historically attested doge was
Orso Ipato, who served in the first half of the 8th century, while accounts on his alleged predecessors
Paolo Lucio Anafesto and
Marcello Tegalliano were created by later
Venetian chronicler
John the Deacon at the beginning of the 11th century, and then expanded by later chroniclers. According to modern scholars, those accounts are not considered as reliable. In the latter half of the eighth century,
Mauritius Galba was elected doge and took the title 'master of the soldiers, consul and imperial duke of the province of Venice'. Doge
Justinian Partecipacius (d. 829) used the title 'imperial
hypatos and humble duke of Venice'. These early titles combined
Byzantine honorifics and explicit reference to Venice's subordinate status. Titles like , , , and were granted by the emperor to the recipient for life but were not inherent in the office (, ), but the title belonged to the office (, ). Thus, into the eleventh century the Venetian doges held titles typical of Byzantine rulers in outlying regions, such as
Sardinia. As late as 1202, the Doge
Enrico Dandolo was styled , a title granted to him by
Alexios III Angelos. As Byzantine power declined in the region in the late ninth century, reference to Venice as a province disappeared in the titulature of the doges. The simple titles (duke of the Venetians) and (duke of the Venetias) predominate in the tenth century. The plural reflects the doge's rule of several federated townships and clans.
Dukes of Dalmatia and Croatia After defeating
Croatia and conquering some Dalmatian territory in 1000, Doge
Pietro II Orseolo adopted the title , 'Duke of Dalmatia', or in its fuller form, , 'Duke of the Venetians and Dalmatians'. This title was recognised by the
Holy Roman Emperor Henry II in 1002. After a Venetian request, it was confirmed by the Byzantine emperor
Alexios I Komnenos in 1082. In a
chrysobull dated that year, Alexios granted the Venetian doge the imperial title of , and recognised him as imperial over the
Dalmatian theme. The expression ('by the grace of God') was adopted consistently by the Venetian chancery only in the course of the eleventh century. An early example, however, can be found in 827–29, during the joint reign of Justinian and his brother
John I: , 'by divine grace dukes of the Venetian provinces'. According to the
Venetiarum Historia, written around 1350, Doge
Domenico Morosini added ('and lord of Istria') to his title after forcing
Pula on
Istria to submit in 1150. Only one charter, however, actually uses a title similar to this: (1153).
Post-1204 The next major change in the dogal title came with the
Fourth Crusade, which conquered the Byzantine Empire (1204). The Byzantine honorific had by this time been dropped and was replaced by a reference to Venice's allotment in the
partitioning of the Byzantine Empire. The new full title was 'By the grace of God duke of the Venices, Dalmatia and Croatia and lord of a fourth part and a half [three eighths] of the whole Empire of Romania' ( [or ] [or ] ). Although traditionally ascribed by later medieval chroniclers to Doge Enrico Dandolo, who led the Venetians during the Fourth Crusade, and hence known as the
arma Dandola, in reality the title of 'lord of a fourth part and a half of the Empire of Romania' was first claimed by the ambitious Venetian
podestà of Constantinople, Marino Zeno, in his capacity as the Doge's representative in the 'Empire of Romania', and it was only subsequently adopted as part of the dogal title by Doge
Pietro Ziani. The Greek chronicler
George Akropolites used the term to translate , 'lord', which has led to some confusion with the Byzantine court title of
despot. The latter title was never claimed by the doges, but was sometimes used by the Venetian
podestàs of Constantinople in their capacity as the doge's representatives. The title of 'lord of a fourth part and a half of the whole Empire of Romania' was used in official titulature thereafter, with the exception, after the
re-establishment in 1261 of the
Byzantine Empire under the Palaiologos dynasty, of Venice's relations with the Byzantine emperors, when that part of the dogal titulature was substituted by 'and lord of the lands and islands subject to his dogate' () or similar formulations. In a similar manner, the disputes between Venice and Hungary over Dalmatia and Croatia led to the kings of Hungary addressing the doges of Venice without that part of their title, while in turn the Venetians tried to force the Hungarian kings to drop any title laying claim to the two provinces. This dispute ended in the
Treaty of Zadar of 1358, where Venice renounced its claims to Dalmatia; a special article in the treaty removed Dalmatia and Croatia from the doge's title. The resulting title was , 'Duke of the Venices and the rest'. Even though Dalmatia would be regained by Venice in the early 15th century, the title was never modified, and remained in use until the
end of the Republic. Even when the body of such documents was written in Italian, the title and dating clause were in Latin. ==Selection of the doge==