COUNCIL OF TEN (Consiglio di elieci). The supreme body in the Venetian Government from the beginning of the fourteenth century till the overthrow of the Republic in 1797. The crea tion of the Council of Ten was but the final step in the process by which the oligarchic party succeeded in obtaining sole control of the Government. beginning with the so-called "Clos ing of the Grand Council" in 1297. Its imme diate cause was a popular uprising in 1310 headed by the noble families of Tiepolo and Que rini. After the suppression of the revolt the Council of Ten was constituted as a secret body for the pu•po:re of discovering and punishing all the participants in the conspiracy. Created at first for a few days, its existence was pro longed from time to time until, in 1335, it Was made permanent. In spite of its name, the Coun cil consisted of seventeen members, ten Coun selors of the Black Robe, elected for a year, six Counselors of the Red Robe, chosen for eight months, and the Doge. In times of great emer gency the Council was augmented by a ginntc of twenty or more of the noblest citizens, so that until 1595 it was officially known as the Con siglio di dicci e giunta. The powers exercised
by the Council were unlimited and touched upon every affair of public and private life. Its decisions, from which there was no appeal, were arrived at in secret, and its sentences were often carried out in the same manner. In spite, how ever, of its arbitrary acts and the relentlessness with which it visited punishment upon those who offended it„ the Council of Ten was popu lar with the large mass of citizens in that it in sured internal tranquillity and the equitable ad ministration of justice and preserved the State against the ambition of powerful nobles. In 1539 the discovery of treasonable behavior on the part of certain of the Ten led to the erea 1 ion of the Inquisilori di stato, to whom the Council delegated its police functions, reserving to itself the trial of offenders brought before it by the inquisitors. Legend has pictured the Council of Ten as a horrid tribunal. whose history is one of stealth and secret murder, but as a matter of fact its influence in Venice, though absolute for five centuries, was far from malignant.