Things I couldn't have made up about Venice

Getting voted off the island

Any Venetian citizen could accuse someone of misdeeds by writing the denunciation down and slipping it through specially placed "Lion's Mouth" slots in the Palazzo Ducale's walls. While this activity sounds like prime breeding ground for backstabbing, it was a highly regulated procedure. All accusations had to be signed and witnessed, and if they proved merely to be slanderous and not actionable, the would-be denouncer was in serious legal trouble of his own.

Secret corridors of power

The real governing of the Venetian Republic was not done in plain sight. True power was wielded in a network of low-ceilinged, wooden-plank corridors and tiny offices wrapped around the public palace like a clandestine cocoon, the entrances hidden behind secret doors set into all those fancy oil paintings and carved woodwork of the public rooms. Here private secretaries kept records and compiled accusations made against people both lowly and high-placed.

(above excerpted from ReidsItaly)

Government By Paranoia

• The Doge is the elected monarch for life. For this reason, the chosen candidate is usually quite old - don't want him around too long.
• The Major Council is 480 patrician family heads who vote laws into power.
• The Minor Council is 6 advisors to the Doge, chosen by the Major Council to limit his power.
• The Quarantia is a supreme tribunal of 40 members, the final court of appeal in Venice.
• The Council of Ten is a secret group selected from the Major Council who wield most of the real power.
• The Supreme Tribunal of 3 state inquisitors uses secret methods to ensure that no one person rules Venice from behind the scenes. The one red inquisitor is chosen by the Doge, and the two black inquisitors are chosen by the Council of Ten.

Election By Insanity

"New regulations for the elections of the doge introduced in 1268 remained in force until the end of the republic in 1797. Their object was to minimize as far as possible the influence of individual great families, and this was effected by a complex elective machinery. Thirty members of the Great Council, chosen by lot, were reduced by lot to nine; the nine chose forty and the forty were reduced by lot to twelve, who chose twenty-five. The twenty-five were reduced by lot to nine and the nine elected forty-five. Then the forty-five were once more reduced by lot to eleven, and the eleven finally chose the forty-one who actually elected the doge. None could be elected but by at least twenty-five votes out of forty-one, nine votes out of eleven or twelve, or seven votes out of nine electors."

(above excerpted from Wikipedia)