Description
Book SynopsisVenice''s Secret Service is the untold and arresting story of the world''s earliest centrally-organised state intelligence service. Long before the inception of SIS and the CIA, in the period of the Renaissance, the Republic of Venice had masterminded a remarkable centrally-organised state intelligence organisation that played a pivotal role in the defence of the Venetian empire. Housed in the imposing Doge''s Palace and under the direction of the Council of Ten, the notorious governmental committee that acted as Venice''s spy chiefs, this ''proto-modern'' organisation served prominent intelligence functions including operations (intelligence and covert action), analysis, cryptography and steganography, cryptanalysis, and even the development of lethal substances. Official informants and amateur spies were shipped across Europe, Anatolia, and Northern Africa, conducting Venice''s stealthy intelligence operations. Revealing a plethora of secrets, their keepers, and their seekers, Venice''s Secret Service explores the social and managerial processes that enabled their existence and that furnished the foundation for an extraordinary intelligence organisation created by one of the early modern world''s most cosmopolitan states.
Trade ReviewThis book includes many of the kinds of stories one hopes to find in a history of espionage: state-ordered poisonings; letter interceptions and invisible ink ... This is an intriguing twist on recent works. * Rosa Salzberg, Jahrbuch für Kommunikationsgeschichte *
I found much to admire in this work, and I expect I will find myself returning to it repeatedly. Iordanou has done a great service to the field in parsing the complexity of the Venetian intelligence system. * Eric R. Dursteler, Journal of Modern History *
This is a book that will fascinate anyone interested in intelligence services, the history of information management, the development of cryptography, or the history of Venice. * Professor Tom Wilson, Information Research *
Table of ContentsIntroduction 1: Venice and Venetian Intelligence in the European Panorama 2: State Secrecy, a Venetian Virtue 3: Renaissance Venice's Intelligence Organisation 4: Venice's Department of Cryptology 5: Venice's Secret Agents 6: Extraordinary Measures Epilogue: Venice's Secret Service: An Evaluation
