We shall now turn our attention to the Italian states:  Venice and Amalfi were the first which directed their labours to the arts of domestic industry, the forerunners and causes of commercial prosperity.  New wants and desires being created, and a taste for elegance and luxury formed, foreign countries were visited.  Muratori mentions several circumstances which indicate a revival of a commercial spirit; and, as Dr. Robertson remarks, from the close of the seventh century, an attentive observer may discern faint traces of its progress.  Indeed, towards the beginning of the sixth century, the Venetians had become so expert at sea, that Cassiodorus addressed a letter to the maritime tribunes of Venice, (which is still extant,) in which he requests them to undertake the transporting of the public stores of wine and oil from Istria to Ravenna.  In this letter, a curious but rather poetical account is given of the state of the city and its inhabitants:  all the houses were alike:  all the citizens lived on the same food, viz. fish:  the manufacture to which they chiefly applied themselves was salt; an article, he says, more indispensable to them than gold.  He adds, that they tie their boats to their walls, as people tie their cows and horses in other places.

In the middle of the eighth century, the Venetians no longer confined their navigation to the Adriatic, but ventured to double the southern promontory of Greece, and to trade to Constantinople itself.  The principal merchandize with which they freighted their ships, on their return-voyage, consisted of silk, the rich produce of the East, the drapery of Tyre, and furs; about a century afterwards, they ventured to trade to Alexandria.  Amalfi, Genoa, and Pisa followed their example; but their trade never became very considerable till the period of the crusades, when the treasures of the West were in fact placed in their hands, and thus fresh vigour was given to their carrying trade, manufactures, and commerce.

There are a few notices, however, respecting the commerce of Venice, and the other states of Italy, prior to the crusades, which it may be necessary very briefly to give.  About the year 969, Venice and Amalfi are represented, by contemporary authors, as possessing an equal share of trade.  The latter traded to Africa, Constantinople, and, it would appear, to some ports in the east end of the Mediterranean; and Italy, as well as the rest of Europe, entirely depended on these two states for their supply of the produce of the East.  At the beginning of the eleventh century, the citizens of Amalfi seem to nave got the start of the Venetians in the favor and commerce of the Mahomedan states of the East:  they were permitted to establish factories in the maritime towns, and even in Jerusalem; and those privileges were granted them expressly because they imported many articles of merchandize hitherto unknown in the East.

In the middle of the same century, Pisa rose into eminence for its commerce; it traded principally with the Saracen king of Sicily, and with Africa.  The Genoese also, at this period, are represented as possessing a large portion of the trade of the Levant, particularly of Joppa.