While the power and name of the Romans was passing away under the imbecile rule of the Greek emperors, and commerce and navigation shared in the general decay, a new maritime power, the State of Venice, destined to become the greatest of the Italian republics, was imperceptibly increasing in strength and renown. From the time when the inhabitants of that portion of Italy, now known as Venetian Lombardy, were driven by Alaric, the barbarian conqueror, to seek refuge in the small islands of the Adriatic, near the mouth of the Brenta, their progress had been one of almost uninterrupted prosperity. Devoting their attention exclusively to the pursuits of commerce, and avoiding, by every means in their power, interference with the affairs of their neighbours, the Venetians drew towards their infant colony all whose habits and tempers induced them to seek industrial pursuits. Among these, many families of Aquileia, Padua, and other towns, fleeing from the sword of the Huns and similar barbarous tribes, found a safe but obscure refuge. A modern writer[360] has eloquently described Venice as “immoveable on the bosom of the waters from which her palaces emerge, contemplating the tides of continental convulsions and invasions, the rise and fall of empires, and the change of dynasties;” and certainly no description could be more true of the splendour and position of Venice, and of the policy of its rulers, when at the height of its prosperity. [Sidenote: The cause of its prosperity.] [Sidenote: A.D. 997.]