From the fall of the Venetian Republic to the Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia

The revolutionary events of the end of the 1700s also caused the fall of the Venetian Republic. The Republic no longer had its former military and political strength and found itself particularly exposed to the effects of the fighting between France and Austria in 1796-97.

The Venetian territories had been freely and repeatedly crossed and occupied by the armies at war, also because Venice, which had proclaimed unarmed neutrality, could not defend them.

Napoleon, who already had complete control of Verona, used the pretext of anti-French insurrections in this town and in other parts of Veneto to make his army advance menacingly towards the lagoon, and this move by itself was sufficient to cause the fall of the old regime that disintegrated without resisting.

In Vicenza the old order collapsed on 26th April 1797 when Girolamo Barbaro, the last Governor of the Republic, left the town. On the following day the French troops of General La Hoz made their entry and their presence stimulated the creation of administrative and legal systems inspired by the revolutionary doctrines. At the same time the town was subjected to the payment of a heavy war tax corresponding to 4,000,000 Veneto liras, the first of many others, as well as all sorts of requisitions and the obligation to maintain the French garrison.

With the Treaty of Campoformio of 17th October 1797, that sanctioned the disappearance of the Venetian Republic, the Veneto territories together with Istria and Dalmatia were turned over to Austria.

Bottoni con l'emblema repubblicano della città. Governo Municipale di Vicenza, 1797