The Greeks of Venice, 1498-1600: Immigration, Settlement, and Integration

People have always immigrated in search of better working and living conditions, to escape persecution, reconnect with family, or simply for the experience. This volume traces the history of Venice's Greek population during the formative years between 1498 - 1600 when thousands left their homelands for Venice. It describes how Greeks established new communal and social networks, and follows their transition from outsiders to insiders but not quite Venetians, an approach that offers a comparative perspective between the 'native' and the immigrant. It places Greeks within the context of multi-cultural, multi-ethnic and multi-lingual Venice. Personal stories are interwoven throughout for a more intimate account of how people lived, worked, prayed, and formed new family and social networks. Their accounts have been drawn from a large variety of sources collected from the Venetian state archives, the archives of the Venetian church and documentation held by the Hellenic Institute of Venice. The sources include notarial documents, petitions, government and church records, registries of marriages and deaths, and the census. Ultimately, this study aims to reconstruct the lives of the largest ethnic and Christian minority in early modern Venice and trace the journey of all immigrants, from foreigner to local.