and some bridge foundations are all that remain of Roman Padua today.
The people ?ed to the hills and returned to eke out a living among the ruins;
the ruling class abandoned the city for Laguna, according to a chronicle. The city
did not easily recover from this blow, and Padua was still weak when the Franks
succeeded the Lombards as masters of north Italy.
At the beginning of the 11th century the citizens established a constitution,
and during the next century they were engaged in wars with Venice and Vicenza
for the right of water-way on the Bacchiglione and the Brenta. The citizens, in
order to protect their liberties, were obliged to elect a podestà, and after 1174
their choice fell ?rst on one of the Este family.
In 1236 Frederick II established his tyrannical vicar Ezzelino da Romano in
Padua and the neighbouring cities, where he practised frightful cruelties on the
inhabitants. When Ezzelino was unseated in June 1256 Padua enjoyed a period
of rest and prosperity: the university ?ourished; the basilica of the saint was
begun; the Paduans became masters of Vicenza. But this advance brought them
into dangerous proximity to Can Grande della Scala, lord of Verona, to whom
they had to yield in 1311.
As a reward for freeing the city from the Scalas, Jacopo da Carrara was
elected lord of Padua in 1318. From that date till 1405 nine members of the
enlightened Carrara family succeeded one another as lords of the city. It was a
long period of restlessness, for the Carraresi were constantly at war; they were
?nally extinguished between the growing power of the Visconti and of Venice.
Padua prospered economically, and culturally, and in 1405 passed under
Venetian rule, and so remained till the fall of the republic in 1797. The city was
governed by two Venetian nobles, a “podestà” for civil and a captain for military
affairs.
After the fall of the Venetian republic the history of Padua follows the history of
Venice under the French and Austrians. In 1866 Padua and the rest of the
Veneto became part of the united Kingdom of Italy.
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