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The ‘backbone’ of the Serenissima: Venice and the trade with the Holy Roman... 621

until and during the Thirty Years War, when the monarchy was under
strong pressure to finance the war effort .
20
This necessarily had to be a great problem for Venice and its Ger-
man merchant colony. The Venetians were engulfed in an intense war
with the Ottoman Empire from 1645 to 1669 and thus needed a strong
trading position more than ever. The war did in fact even help the
Dutch, as they were now conducting the shipping services between
Venice and the Ottoman Empire . All the more it was important to
21
strengthen the role of the city as a place for permanent turnover be-
tween the Mediterranean and Central Europe. The Venetian politicians
of the age were up to the task, as shall be shown in the following.

3. Getting Back on Track in the Second Half of the 17 Century
th

The Venetians and the authorities in Tyrol were very much aware
of the loss of transit in the early 1650s. They also saw that the traffic
along the Splügen in Grisons was doing rather well in the 1650s, de-
spite the fact that the Spanish-governed Duchy of Milan was still em-
broiled in warfare with France and its allies. It seems as if the trans-
alpine traffic of the Duchy of Milan was only hampered for one year,
1655, when Pavia was besieged . By contrast, traffic along the Tyro-
22
lian passes was not satisfactory, as the Splügen was the only pass that
retained a non-shrinking traffic in the 1650s . Under these circum-
23
stances, the Austrian government in Innsbruck approached the Re-
public of Venice in 1656 to enter into negotiations to facilitate trade
along the Tyrolean routes. The goal was to attract merchants back to
the Tyrolean routes and away from the Stato di Milano, which, accord-
ing to the Austrians, was benefiting «mirabilmente» from the high tolls
and charges between Augsburg and Venice . After some rather quick
24
negotiations, it was agreed to reduce the transit duties by ¼, both in

20 On the toll increases of the mid-16 th century see: O. Stolz, Die Verkehrsverb-
indungen des oberen Rhein- und Donaugebietes um die Mitte des 16. Jahrhunderts,
«Zeitschrift für die Geschichte des Oberrheins», A. 38 (1923), pp. 60-88; G. Bückling,
Die Bozener Märkte bis zum Dreissigjährigen Kriege, Leipzig 1907, pp. 47-55.
21 J. Georgelin, Venise cit., p. 66.
22 A. Segarizzi, Per il dazio di Rovereto, «Tridentum», A. 7 (1904), p. 122. Segarizzi
has presumably transcribed the wrong year as he writes 1653 instead of 1655, when
the siege actually took place.
23 It may be that the Duchy of Milan needed many materials for the war effort and
thus, the traffic was even helped by the continuation of the conflict between Spain and
France after 1648. On the traffic via Grisons in the 1650s, see: S. Buć, Beiträge zur
Verkehrsgeschichte Graubündens: Der Churer Gütertransit im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert,
Eggerling, Chur, 1918, p. 73.
24 Asv, Cs, II Ser., 73, 20. Dezember 1656.

Mediterranea – ricerche storiche – Anno XIX – Dicembre 2022
ISSN 1824-3010 (stampa) ISSN 1828-230X (online)