The history of Venice differs in many ways from that of other Italian states. Built on a network of islands that destined her geographically for a great sea-power, she had looked from earliest times not to territorial aggrandisement, but to commercial expansion for the satisfaction of her ambitions. In this way she had avoided the strife of feudal landowners, and even the Guelf and Ghibelline factions that had reduced her neighbours to slavery. Elsewhere in Italy the names of cities and states are bound up with the histories of mediaeval families; Naples with the quarrels of Hohenstaufen, Angevins, and Aragonese: Rome with the Barons of the Campagna, the Orsini and Colonna: Milan with the Visconti, and later with the Sforza: Florence with the Medici: but in Venice the state was everything, demanding of her sons and daughters not the startling qualities and vices of the successful soldier of fortune, but obedience, self-effacement, and hard work. The Doge, or Duke, the chief magistrate of Venice, has been compared to a king; but he was in reality merely a president elected for life, and that by a system rendered as complicated as possible in order to prevent wire-pulling. Once chosen and presented to the people with the old formula, ‘This is your Doge an’ it please you!’ the new ruler of the city found himself hedged about by a hundred constitutional checks, that compelled him to act only on the well-considered advice of his six Ducal Councillors, forbade him to raise any of his family to a public office or to divest himself of a rank that he might with years find more burdensome than pleasant. He was also made aware that the respect with which his commands were received was paid not to himself but to his office, and through his office to Venice, a royal mistress before whom even a haughty aristocracy willingly bent the knee.