page_title: Friuli
section_title: Venetian domination to Bourbon restoration
hierarchical_section_title: Friuli / History / Venetian domination to Bourbon restoration
caption_attribution_description: Veduta di Piazza Libertà, Udine; sullo sfondo il Castello
context_page_description: Friuli is an area of Northeast Italy with its own particular cultural and historical identity containing 600,000 Friulians. It comprises the major part of the autonomous region Friuli Venezia Giulia, i.e. the administrative provinces of Udine, Pordenone, and Gorizia, excluding Trieste.
context_section_description: The Patriarchate ended in 1420: surrounded by the powerful states of the Austrian Empire, the Kingdom of Hungary and the Republic of Venice, it was the theatre of a war between Hungary and Venice, and was conquered by the latter. Friuli maintained some form of autonomy, by keeping its own Parliament ruling on the old territory of the Patriarchate, an autonomy not granted to the other cities and provinces submitted to Venice (even Venetian ones); on the other side, it maintained also its feudal nobility, which was able to keep their feudal rights over the land and its inhabitants for some time.
  Friuli was the eastern border of the Stato da Tera, and suffered both from Ottoman raids and from the border wars with Austria. These wars led to poverty and instability of the rural population, with the inability to cultivate the land crossed by fighting armies and with the forced surrender of all livestock to feed traveling troops. The harvesting of timber needed to build Venetian ships caused complete deforestation of the Bassa Friulana and central Friuli. Venice took possession of collective farms belonging to rural Friulian communities, seriously impoverishing them. These properties in turn would be sold by Venice during the 17th century to raise cash to alleviate its poor financial condition.
  Beginning in the 1630s, the Venetian Republic entered a relative decline, due to the enlarging horizon of European markets (reaching now from Asia to Africa to the Americas). Venice's richest families often directed financial resources into unproductive investments (specifically real estate), while there was a loss of competitiveness in industries and services. Friuli was subject to increasing fiscal pressure, and its industries and commercial activities were affected.
  According to some historians, the political populism practiced by Venice looked for ways to limit the most oppressive and anachronistic effects of feudalism. Other researchers assert that the Venetian aristocratic government maintained a most oppressive feudal condition in Friuli. These policies were practiced by the Venetian government to ensure the support of the urban and rural population as a counterbalance to the independent tendencies and power of local oligarchies and aristocrats.
  An important jacquerie, known as Joibe Grasse 1511 (Fat Thursday 1511), was started in Udine on February 27 by starving Udinesi citizens. They were subsequently joined by the farmers and the revolt spread to the whole territory of Friûl, against the feudal rule of some noble families; some other noble family, like the pro-Venetian Savorgnan, initially supported the revolters. This insurrection was one of the largest in Renaissance Italy and it lasted from 27 February until 1 March, when it ended as Venice dispatched around one hundred cavalry to put down the rebellion. The chiefs of the revolt were executed, but the feudal powers of the Friulian noblemen were reduced.
  With the 1516 Noyon pacts the boundary between the Venetian Republic and the County of Gorizia and Gradisca, now in the hands of the House of Habsburg,  were redefined. Venice lost the upper Isonzo valley (that is the Gastaldia of Tolmino with Plezzo and Idria), but it kept Monfalcone, Marano and a series of shed feudal islands in the Western Friuli stayed with the Archduke of Austria (until 1543). Between 1615 and 1617 Venice and Austria again fought for the possession of the fort of Gradisca d'Isonzo. The so-called War of Gradisca ended with a return to the status quo.
  Beginning in 1516 the Habsburg Empire controlled eastern Friuli, while western and central Friuli was Venetian. In 1797, the year of the Treaty of Campo Formio, this part of the Friuli was surrendered to Austria. For a brief period from 1805 until the Bourbon Restoration, Friuli belonged to the Italic Kingdom.
caption: The Venetian-style Piazza Libertà in Udine. The city became de facto capital of Friuli.
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "", "Image Make": "NIKON", "Image Model": "E4100", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "E4100v1.0", "Image DateTime": "2005:02:07 13:27:30", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "216", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "300", "Thumbnail YResolution": "300", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "2050", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "7268", "EXIF ExposureTime": "2/967", "EXIF FNumber": "59/10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "50", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2005:02:07 13:27:30", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2005:02:07 13:27:30", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "3", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "33/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2288", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1712", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "1926", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Manual", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "0", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "40", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "None", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0"}