"Venice’s Secret Service" – with Ioanna Iordanou

Summary

Ioanna Iordanou (Twitter; LinkedIn) joins Andrew (Twitter; LinkedIn) to discuss Venice’s Secret Service. Her research on “centralized intelligence” during the Italian Renaissance has secured her two entries in Guiness World Records!

What You’ll Learn

Intelligence

• The origins of centralized intelligence 
• “The Council of Ten” - Venice’s spy chiefs
• “The Inquisitors of the State” - Venice’s counterintelligence body
• Venetian power in the Eastern Mediterranean 

Reflections

• The rise and fall of empires
• The relationship between geography and power

And much, much more …

*EXTENDED SHOW NOTES & FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE*

Quotes of the Week

“Considering some of the most significant challenges we face right now, such as disease, we just got over a global pandemic or migration or trade or climate change or cybersecurity, all these issues do not stop at the borders like any early modern spies, they cross borders. So even reflecting on how people dealt with these things in the past might help us make better political, social, economic decisions.” – Ioanna Iordanou.

Resources 

SURFACE SKIM

*Headline Resource 

• Venice’s Secret Service: Organizing Intelligence in the Renaissance, Ioanna Iordanou (Oxford University Press, 2014) 

*SpyCasts*

• Espionage and the Two Queens with Kent Tiernan (2023) 
• The Counterintelligence Chief with FBI Assistant Director Alan Kohler (2023) 
• The Lion and the Fox – Civil War Spy vs. Spy with Alexander Rose (2023)
• Keeping Secrets/Disclosing Secrets with Spy Chief turned DG of Australia’s National Archives David Fricker (2022)

*Beginner Resources*

• A Brief Overview of Renaissance History, Art in Context (2023) [Short article]
• Profile of a City: Venice, Renaissance Italy (2012) [Short article] 
• Brief History of the Renaissance in 5 Minutes, 5 Minutes (2022) [YouTube video]
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*EXTENDED SHOW NOTES & FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE*

DEEPER DIVE

Books

• Inventing the World: Venice and the Transformation of Western Civilization, M. F. Small (Pegasus Books, 2020)
• City of Fortune: How Venice Ruled the Seas, R. Crowley (Random House, 2013)
• A World Lit Only by Fire: The Medieval Mind and the Renaissance, W. Manchester (Little, Brown and Company, 1993) 

Primary Sources 

• The Life and Letters of Sir Henry Wotton, Internet Archive (1907) 
• The de’Barbari Map (View of Venice), Cartography Venice Project Center (1500) 
• Letter of Aeneas Silvius Piccolomini to Lord Cardinal Firmanus, Carleton College (1453) 
• The Shorter Annals of Venice, Carleton College (ca. 13th century) 

Primary Collections 

• Venetian Diplomatic Agents in England, British History Online (1202-1509)

*Wildcard Resource*

• Browse the art of Titian, an artist whose work was used as a form of payment for spies and intelligence gatherers in Venice. Not a bad paycheck! 

*EXTENDED SHOW NOTES & FULL TRANSCRIPT HERE*

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