In Venice the office of doge was first instituted about 700. John the
Deacon, referring to this incident in his _Chronicon Venetum_, written
about 1000, says "all the Venetian cities (_omnes Venetiae_) determined
that it would be more honourable henceforth to be under dukes than under
tribunes." The result was that the several tribunes were replaced by a
single official who was called a doge and who became the head of the
whole state. The first doge was Paolo Lucio Anafesto, and some
authorities think that the early doges were subject to the authority of
the emperors of Constantinople, but in any case this subordination was
of short duration. The doge held office for life and was regarded as the
ecclesiastical, the civil and the military chief; his duties and
prerogatives were not defined with precision and the limits of his
ability and ambition were practically the limits of his power. About 800
his independence was slightly diminished by the appointment of two
assistants for judicial work, but these officers soon fell into the
background and the doge acquired a greater and more irresponsible
authority. Concurrently with this process the position was entrusted to
members of one or other of the powerful Venetian families, while several
doges associated a son with themselves in the ducal office. Matters
reached a climax after the fall of the Orseole family in 1026. In 1033,
during the dogeship of Dominico Flabianico, this tendency towards a
hereditary despotism was checked by a law which decreed that no doge had
the right to associate any member of his family with himself in his
office, or to name his successor. It was probably at this time also that
two councillors were appointed to advise the doge, who must, moreover,
invite the aid of prominent citizens when discussing important matters
of state. In 1172 a still more important change was introduced. The
ducal councillors were increased in number from two to six; universal
suffrage, which theoretically still existed, was replaced by a system
which entrusted the election of the doge to a committee of eleven, who
were chosen by a great council of 480 members, the great council being
nominated annually by twelve persons. When a new doge was chosen he was
presented to the people with the formula "this is your doge, if it
please you." Nominally the citizens confirmed the election, thus
maintaining as a constitutional fiction the right of the whole people to
choose their chie