Venezia, la Dalmazia e Bisanzio (secoli IX-XII)

Over time, the Adriatic has been a place for economic and political relations and exchanges, for the development of urban communities and social groups, for cultural intersections and civilisations. A space that, in the centuries taken into consideration, was decisive for the survival or emancipation of ‘state’ or political entities of different nature and specific weight (whether an empire, a city-state, a kingdom or an indigenous centre...), hence also a fought-over space, a place of military clashes and divisions of areas of influence. For many protagonists of this period, it was therefore decisive to control the sea or to find some economic, political or military agreement. This paper aims to highlight the juridical and non-juridical ‘instruments’ that, in the central centuries of the Middle Ages, allowed different subjects (Venice, Byzantium and those who ruled Dalmatia) to interact and coexist in the Adriatic. It also aims to point out the changing balances and power relations between them and how each part perceived the concerned maritime space.