This step was
taken for more than one reason of internal organization and policy,
and it was also made urgent by the encroachments of the Lombards,
which had become a menace to Venetian territory and commerce.
The republic (Venetian) on her part contemplated with inquietude the
rise of one monarchy after another on the skirts of the Lagoon, for the
Venetians not unnaturally feared that as soon as these fresh usurpers
had established themselves, they might form the design of adding the
islands of the Adriatic to their dominion, and of acquiring possession
of the commercial advantages which belonged to the situation held by the
settlers. For the Lombards, though not ranking among maritime
communities, were not absolutely strangers to the laws of navigation, or
to the use of ships, which might place them in a position to reduce to
their control a small, feeble, and thinly peopled area, separated from
their own territories only by a narrow and terraqueous strait. Moreover,
the predatory visits of Leupus, duke of Friuli, whose followers
traversed the canals at low tide on horseback, and despoiled the
churches of Heraclia, Equilo, and Grado, soon afforded sufficient proof
that the equestrian skill of the strangers was capable of supplying to
some extent any deficiency in nautical knowledge.
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