Doge (title)

A doge (/doʊdʒ/ DOHJ, Italian: [ˈdɔːdʒe]; plural dogi or doges; see below) was an elected lord and head of state in several Italian city-states, notably Venice and Genoa, during the medieval and Renaissance periods. Such states were referred to as crowned republics. Doges wore a special hat, the Corno ducale and usually ruled life-long.

The office of the doge in English is termed a dogeship.

The word doge comes from Venetian Italian, and, like its standard Italian cognate duce (as in Mussolini's title "Il Duce"), is derived from the Latin dux, meaning either "spiritual leader" or "military commander". The political term doge reached English via French, along with the related English derivation duke.

In standard Italian, the two derivations from the Latin word dux – duce and duca (both masculine; feminine: duchessa) – are not interchangeable. Duca is an aristocratic and hereditary title similar to the English word duke.

The wife of a doge is styled a Dogaressa.

The title of doge was used for the elected chief of state in several Italian "crowned republics". The two best known such republics were Venice (where in Venetian he was called doxe [ˈdoze]) and Genoa (where he was called a dûxe [ˈdyːʒe]) which rivalled each other, and the other regional great powers, by building their historical city-states into maritime, commercial, and territorial empires. Other Italian republics to have doges were Amalfi and the small town of Senarica.

After 1172 the election of the Venetian doge was entrusted to a committee of forty, who were chosen by four men selected from the Great Council of Venice, which was itself nominated annually by 12 persons. After a deadlocked tie at the election of 1229, the number of electors was increased from forty to forty-one. 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 affected by 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 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.

Initially, the doge of Genoa was elected without restriction and by popular suffrage. Following reforms in 1528, plebeians were declared ineligible, and the appointment of the doge was entrusted to the members of the Great Council, the Gran Consiglio.