ABSTRACT
The institutions of the Italian city-republics 1 were constantly reshaped and at last effaced by the interplay of the forces of social and aristocratic faction, combined with frequent external crises and the pressure of individual ambition. Before the end of the thirteenth century a number of towns had fallen to the rule of a despotic dynasty, and by the middle of the fifteenth Venice alone among the greater cities had maintained its independence and preserved a fully republican system of government.
