Using dogesr to work with Venetian doges family types

Introduction

For the longest part of its existence, Venetian noble families used tactical marriage (Telek 2017) to improve the lot of their case or dynasties. Since access to nobility was closed by the beginning of the XIV century, and then enlarged little by little, there was a kind of stratification in the nobility, and marrying older families was a way of improving the political, commercial and social prospects for your own family.

Using data from dogesr (Merelo-Guervós 2022), we will, in this vignette, see to what extent that happened and how different types of families married with each other.

Set up

We load the datasets needed; doges describes doges and their marriages, families includes data for every noble family.

devtools::load_all(".")
#> ℹ Loading dogesr
data("doges")
data("families")

This will import the data from the dogesr package into the data.doges data frame, and family data in the family.types list. Let’s merge them into a single data frame. The table of all family names and their corresponding family type is shown below.`

marriages.types <- 
  data.frame( doge.family = data.doges$Family.doge,
              dogaressa.family = data.doges$Family.dogaressa,
              fam.type.doge = unname( unlist ( family.types[ data.doges$Family.doge ] )),
              fam.type.dogaressa = unname( unlist ( family.types[ data.doges$Family.dogaressa ] ))
)
knitr::kable(marriages.types)

doge.family	dogaressa.family	fam.type.doge	fam.type.dogaressa
Orso		Nuovissime	NA
Leone		Unknown	NA
Cornicula		Unknown	NA
Teodato		Unknown	NA
Gioviano		Unknown	NA
Fabriciaco		Nuove	NA
Teodato		Unknown	NA
Gaulo		Unknown	NA
Monegario		Estinte	NA
Galbaio		Estinte	NA
Galbaio		Estinte	NA
Antenoreo		Unknown	NA
Participazio		Estinte	NA
Participazio		Estinte	NA
Participazio		Estinte	NA
Tradonico		Estinte	NA
Participazio		Estinte	NA
Participazio		Estinte	NA
Candiano		Estinte	NA
Pietro	Sanudo	Unknown	Apostoliche
Participazio		Estinte	NA
Candiano		Estinte	NA
Participazio		Estinte	NA
Candiano	Candiano	Estinte	Estinte
Candiano	Candiano	Estinte	Estinte
Candiano	diToscana	Estinte	NA
Orseolo	Malipiero	Estinte	Ducali
Candiano		Estinte	NA
Memmo	Candiano	Apostoliche	Estinte
Orseolo	Candiano	Estinte	Estinte
Orseolo	dUngheria	Estinte	NA
Barbolano		Unknown	NA
Flabanico		Estinte	NA
Contarini		Apostoliche	NA
Selvo	Selvo	Nuove	Nuove
Faliero	Bembo	Apostoliche	Evangeliche
Michiel	Corner	Apostoliche	Evangeliche
Faliero	Faliero	Apostoliche	Apostoliche
Michiel	Michiel	Apostoliche	Apostoliche
Polani	Michiel	Apostoliche	Apostoliche
Morosini		Apostoliche	NA
Michiel	diBoemodo	Apostoliche	NA
Ziani		Vecchie	NA
Malipiero		Ducali	NA
Dandolo	Bembo	Apostoliche	Evangeliche
Dandolo	Minotto	Apostoliche	Nuove
Ziani	diSicilia	Vecchie	NA
Tiepolo	Storlato	Apostoliche	NA
Tiepolo	diSicilia	Apostoliche	NA
Morosini		Apostoliche	NA
Zeno	daPrata	Vecchie	NA
Tiepolo	Ghisi	Apostoliche	Nuove
Tiepolo	diBrienne	Apostoliche	NA
Contarini		Apostoliche	NA
Dandolo		Apostoliche	NA
Gradenigo	Morosini	Apostoliche	Apostoliche
Gradenigo	Zantani	Apostoliche	Nuove
Zorzi		Vecchie	NA
Soranzo		Vecchie	NA
Dandolo	Contarini	Apostoliche	Apostoliche
Gradenigo	Cappello	Apostoliche	Nuove
Dandolo	Morosini	Apostoliche	Apostoliche
Faliero	Gradenigo	Apostoliche	Apostoliche
Faliero	Contarini	Apostoliche	Apostoliche
Gradenigo	Cappello	Apostoliche	Nuove
Gradenigo	Borromeo	Apostoliche	NA
Dolfin		Apostoliche	NA
Celsi	Ghisi	Nuove	Nuove
Corner	Corner	Evangeliche	Evangeliche
Contarini		Apostoliche	NA
Morosini	Condulmiero	Apostoliche	Nuovissime
Venier	daMosto	Ducali	NA
Steno	Galina	Nuove	NA
Mocenigo	Cappello	Ducali	Nuove
Foscari	Priuli	Ducali	Ducali
Foscari	Nani	Ducali	Nuove
Malipiero	Dandolo	Ducali	Apostoliche
Moro	Sanudo	Ducali	Apostoliche
Tron	Morosini	Ducali	Apostoliche
Marcello	Barbarigo	Ducali	Ducali
Marcello	Contarini	Ducali	Apostoliche
Mocenigo	Zorzi	Ducali	Vecchie
Vendramin	Gradenigo	Nuovissime	Apostoliche
Mocenigo	Michiel	Ducali	Apostoliche
Barbarigo	Ruzzini	Ducali	Nuove
Barbarigo	Soranzo	Ducali	Vecchie
Loredan	Giustinian	Ducali	Evangeliche
Grimani	Loredan	Ducali	Ducali
Gritti	Vendramin	Ducali	Nuovissime
Lando	Pasqualigo	Ducali	Nuove
Donato	Giustinian	Ducali	Evangeliche
Donato	Da Mula	Ducali	Nuove
Trivisan		Ducali	NA
Venier		Ducali	NA
Priuli	Dandolo	Ducali	Apostoliche
Priuli	Diedo	Ducali	Nuove
Loredan	Pasqualigo	Ducali	Nuove
Loredan	Cappello	Ducali	Nuove
Mocenigo	Marcello	Ducali	Ducali
Venier	Contarini	Ducali	Apostoliche
Da Ponte	Canali	Nuove	NA
Cicogna	Morosini	Nuovissime	Apostoliche
Grimani	Morosini	Ducali	Apostoliche
Donato		Ducali	NA
Memmo		Apostoliche	NA
Bembo		Evangeliche	NA
Donato		Ducali	NA
Priuli	Barbarigo	Ducali	Ducali
Contarini		Apostoliche	NA
Corner	Delfino	Evangeliche	NA
Contarini		Apostoliche	NA
Erizzo		Nuove	NA
Molin		Nuove	NA
Contarini	Loredan	Apostoliche	Ducali
Corner	Priuli	Evangeliche	Ducali
Valier	Pisani	Nuove	Nuove
Pesaro	Barbarigo	Nuove	Ducali
Contarini		Apostoliche	NA
Sagredo		Nuove	NA
Contarini		Apostoliche	NA
Giustinian		Evangeliche	NA
Morosini		Apostoliche	NA
Valier	Querini	Nuove	Vecchie
Mocenigo		Ducali	NA
Corner	Corner	Evangeliche	Evangeliche
Mocenigo		Ducali	NA
Ruzzini		Nuove	NA
Pisani	Badoero	Nuove	Evangeliche
Grimani		Ducali	NA
Loredan		Ducali	NA
Foscarini		Nuove	NA
Mocenigo	Corner	Ducali	Evangeliche
Mocenigo	Contarini	Ducali	Apostoliche
Renier	Donato	Nuovissime	Ducali
Renier	Dalmet	Nuovissime	NA
Manin	Grimani	Soldo	Ducali

Let’s create an adjacency matrix for this

marriages.just.types <- marriages.types
marriages.just.types$doge.family <- NULL
marriages.just.types$dogaressa.family <- NULL
marriages.just.types$fam.type.doge <- paste0(marriages.just.types$fam.type.doge,"♂")
marriages.just.types$fam.type.dogaressa <- paste0(marriages.just.types$fam.type.dogaressa,"♀")
levs <- c(unique(unlist(marriages.just.types$fam.type.doge, use.names = FALSE)),unique(unlist(marriages.just.types$fam.type.dogaressa, use.names = FALSE)))
types.adjacency <- table(lapply(marriages.just.types, factor, levs))
types.adjacency <- types.adjacency[,-c(1:9)]
types.adjacency <- types.adjacency[-c(10:18),]
knitr::kable(types.adjacency)

	NA♀	Apostoliche♀	Estinte♀	Ducali♀	Nuove♀	Evangeliche♀	Nuovissime♀	Vecchie♀
Nuovissime♂	2	2	0	1	0	0	0	0
Unknown♂	8	1	0	0	0	0	0	0
Nuove♂	8	0	0	1	3	1	0	1
Estinte♂	17	0	3	1	0	0	0	0
Apostoliche♂	18	8	1	1	5	3	1	0
Vecchie♂	5	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Ducali♂	10	9	0	5	8	3	1	2
Evangeliche♂	3	0	0	1	0	2	0	0
Soldo♂	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	0

The heaviest link seem to be between the evangeliche and apostoliche cases, although “Not available” is the heaviest column for doges, who either did not marry or married some non-patrician family; this happened most frequently in the pre-Serrata (Puga and Trefler 2014) times.

Let’s look at this in a Sankey diagram

library(tidyr)
#> 
#> Attaching package: 'tidyr'
#> The following object is masked from 'package:testthat':
#> 
#>     matches
#> The following object is masked from 'package:igraph':
#> 
#>     crossing
library(dplyr)
#> 
#> Attaching package: 'dplyr'
#> The following object is masked from 'package:testthat':
#> 
#>     matches
#> The following objects are masked from 'package:igraph':
#> 
#>     as_data_frame, groups, union
#> The following objects are masked from 'package:stats':
#> 
#>     filter, lag
#> The following objects are masked from 'package:base':
#> 
#>     intersect, setdiff, setequal, union
library(tibble)
#> 
#> Attaching package: 'tibble'
#> The following object is masked from 'package:igraph':
#> 
#>     as_data_frame
links <- types.adjacency  %>% as.data.frame() 
nodes <- data.frame(
  name=c(as.character(links$fam.type.doge), as.character(links$fam.type.dogaressa)) %>% 
    unique()
  )
links$IDsource <- match(links$fam.type.doge, nodes$name)-1 
links$IDtarget <- match(links$fam.type.dogaressa, nodes$name)-1

library(networkD3)
links <- links[ links$Freq > 0,]
sankeyNetwork(Links = links, Nodes = nodes,
                     Source = "IDsource", Target = "IDtarget",
                     Value = "Freq", NodeID = "name", 
                     sinksRight=FALSE)

We are mostly interested, however, in the social links formed by different types of noble families, so we will simply eliminate those rows and columns to have a clearer picture.

types.adjacency <- types.adjacency[-1,-1]
links2 <- types.adjacency  %>% as.data.frame() 
nodes2 <- data.frame(
  name=c(as.character(links2$fam.type.doge), as.character(links2$fam.type.dogaressa)) %>% 
    unique()
  )
links2$IDsource <- match(links2$fam.type.doge, nodes2$name)-1 
links2$IDtarget <- match(links2$fam.type.dogaressa, nodes2$name)-1
links2 <- links2[ links2$Freq > 0,]
sankeyNetwork(Links = links2, Nodes = nodes2,
                     Source = "IDsource", Target = "IDtarget",
                     Value = "Freq", NodeID = "name")

What we see here is the popularity of apostoliche dogaresse, and of ducali doges. But also how common marrying up was. Apostolochie families couldn’t marry up, since they were in the first post-Serrata batch, so they married with other similar families as well as evangeliche. These, despite being only four families, were quite popular in terms of providing wives for other doges.

Ducali families, being newer to the noble families pool, married preferably up: apostoliche, vecchie and evangeliche, as well as their own class. Only a relative minority married other nuove families. Nuove families, however, did not manage to marry into any apostoliche family; while the few nuovissime and soldo (paid positions) also married up, to apostoliche and ducali families, respectively.

Conclusions

In (Merelo-Guervós 2022) we hinted at the possibility that marrying in Venetian nobles families was done tactically, so that the commercial and political prospects of both families were enhanced. What we examine in this report is how intermarriage among the different types of families work, and found that, in general, family classes tended to marry older families, thus improving their position in the social network and/or solidifying it by making links to families with higher social capital.

References

Merelo-Guervós, J. J. 2022. “What Is a Good Doge? Analyzing the Patrician Social Network of the Republic of Venice.” arXiv. https://doi.org/10.48550/ARXIV.2209.07334.

Puga, Diego, and Daniel Trefler. 2014. “International Trade and Institutional Change: Medieval Venice’s Response to Globalization.” The Quarterly Journal of Economics 129 (2): 753–821. https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qju006.

Telek, Ádám. 2017. “Marrying the Right One – Evidence on Social Network Effects in Politics from the Venetian Republic.” https://editorialexpress.com/cgi-bin/conference/download.cgi?db\_name=SAEe2017\&paper\_id=520.