Dandolo Family

Dandolo Family, an ancient Italian family distinguished in the history of Venice. It rose quickly to prominence when expansion from the lagoons to the mainland began. By the 11th century it was rich, and by the 12th (when the branches of San Luca, San Severo, and San Moisè can already be distinguished) it was competing for the highest posts in church and state. In the middle decades of the 12th century, when Enrico di Domenico Dandolo, as patriarch of Grado from 1146 to 1154, strove to defend his prerogatives against Pietro Polani (doge from 1130 to 1148) and the Michiel family, the whole Dandolo family was exiled until, after about 10 years, peace was made on the basis of political concessions and matrimonial alliances.

As the power of the Michiel family declined, trouble arose between the restless Dandolo family and the Ziani family, headed by the doge Sebastiano, who wanted to impose a policy of peace and internal reform instead of his predecessors’ war program. In 1192 the elderly Enrico Dandolo (d. 1205), of the branch of San Luca, himself became doge. His rule was chiefly important for his preponderant role in promoting the Fourth Crusade, which led to the overthrow of the Greek Byzantine Empire and the establishment of the Latin Empire in its place. He reserved a wide field of activity in the East for his own family: Marco Dandolo became lord of Andros, and Giovanni founded a powerful company that long exploited the colony of Tyre. The Dandolo policy, however, proved an embarrassment to Venice when the colonists tended to secede. In reaction against it, the Ziani and Tiepolo families came to power in Venice for much of the 13th century, so that the Dandolo family had to confine its energies to Crete, to the Negropont (Euboea), to the Aegean islands, and to Dalmatia.

Reaction in turn against the Tiepolo family brought Giovanni Dandolo (d. 1289), of the San Severo branch, to the dogeship in 1280, in a period of internal crisis in Venice. At the same time, the conflict between Venice and Genoa was on the point of developing into a general Mediterranean crisis. When this came to a head, two more Dandolo doges had to bear the brunt of it: Francesco from 1329 to 1339 and Andrea from 1343 to 1354. Seeking allies near and far, the Dandolo doges resolutely refused compromise and also surmounted the further disasters of earthquake, plague (1348), financial crisis, and ultimate defeat by the Genoese (1354).

After Andrea, no Dandolo was ever doge again, but members of the family still held high offices in the Venetian service until the fall of the republic.