Planning the Reconquista of Venetian Istria

Abstract

The author critically edits, translates into English, and analyzes the Treaty of Pazin, a pact signed between Count Albert I of Gorizia and the Commune of Koper on July 27, 1278. The signees forged a military alliance directed against Venice, with the aim of reconquering the Istrian lands that had subjected themselves to the Venetian Commune between 1267 and 1271, that is, Poreč, Umag, Novigrad and Sveti Lovreč. First, the background leading up to the signing of this treaty is thoroughly illuminated, revealing the evolutionary thread that tied the two contrahents together in their Istrian ventures. Thus, the alliance formed in Pazin in 1278 was but a continuation of the joint efforts of the Gorizian and the Capodistrian commune, the duo’s first undertaking being the war against Patriarch Gregory fought in 1267 and 1268–1269. Second, the treaty itself is broken down, contextualized, and analyzed from the diplomatic point of view. It is shown that the document in question is a notarial sealed charter and that the surviving manuscript is one of the two originals issued in Pazin, that is, the Capodistrian exemplar. The paper then turns to the aftermath of the joint actions undertaken by the Gorizian-Capodistrian alliance, showing that the anti-Venetian coalition failed to achieve their primary objective, even though their initial prospects for achieving their goals had been high. The paper closes with an in extenso critical edition of the Treaty of Pazin and its translation into contemporary English.