- 7. The Greek Colonies at Venice, Ancona, Bibbona, Naples.
At the end of this chapter I add a note about colonies of Uniates now extinct. The most important of these was at Venice. The most Serene Republic, by her conquests in the Levant, had a great number of Christians of the Byzantine rite under her authority. Ever since the fourth crusade she had interests and possessions in Greek lands. At the fourth crusade (1204) Venice obtained Crete, then the land of Methone and Korone, at the bottom of the Peloponnesus. Soon after she occupied Chalkis in Euboia. By the fifteenth century Venice held, besides these, all Euboia, Kerkyra, and most of the land that is now Dalmatia. In the wars of the seventeenth century she conquered the Peloponnesus. The Peace of Karlowitz (1699) left this to her. The Peace of Passarowitz (1718) restored the Peloponnesus to the Turks, but left Dalmatia with its islands to Venice. The long centuries of Venetian occupation have left a marked impression in these countries. In all the coast towns of Dalmatia Italian is still talked. Kerkyra has a large Catholic-Latin population; there are Latin Catholics in great numbers in many Greek islands.[1] Meanwhile, after the fall of Constantinople (1453) a number of Greek merchants fled to Venice and there formed an established Greek colony.
Now the policy of the Republic was curiously different with regard to the Greeks in her conquered territories and those at the city itself. In the conquered lands the Government was not tolerant of schism. Latin bishops were set up throughout Dalmatia, Albania, the Peloponnesus. These had authority from the Government to visit the Greek clergy and schools, and to impose on them Catholic professions of faith. They did not make the people Latins, but they did all they could to make them Uniates. Those who would not accept union with Rome were punished severely. Large numbers were sent to the galleys; others managed to flee to Trieste or to other Italian cities, where Venice had no power.[2] There was, indeed, a regular persecution of the Orthodox by the Venetian Government in its Levantine colonies; a fact that is the more curious since the Government itself was constantly in a state of interdict. The meaning of this policy is, of course, obvious. It was to
