Magistrato alla Sanità
The office of the Magistrato alla Sanità was retained until the Fall of the Republic of Venice, during which it was briefly replaced by a health committee and eventually superseded by other magistracies entirely.
[2] Venice's commercial dealings with vessels coming from other Mediterranean ports made the city particularly susceptible to foreign diseases; it was consequently one of the early urban centres in Europe to be devastated by the Black Death, the outbreak of the plague in 1347.
[3] Yet given the limited knowledge of the causes of the disease at the time and the resulting inability to enact adequate containment measures, the committee was largely tasked with the removal and burial of the highly contagious corpses.
[4] Beginning in 1423, the authority to determine the most efficient means to contain and eradicate frequent infections and to coordinate efforts between various government offices was completely delegated to the Full College, the executive committee of the Senate.
[7] Nevertheless, a dedicated committee, the three provveditori alla sanità, was established by the Senate on 7 January 1486 (Venetian year 1485) to defend the city from the second major outbreak of the plague.
[3] They were henceforth chosen from among the broader ruling patrician class and were aggregated to the Senate as an external committee with authority to propose legislation concerning health matters but without vote.
[12] The inferior hierarchical position of the provveditori alla sanità, below senatorial dignity, limited their ability both to interact with higher-ranking offices throughout the government and to enforce the norms and directives aimed at safeguarding public health, particularly in the territories subject to Venice on the Italian mainland and overseas.
[13] Legislation on 9 December 1674 further defined the sopraprovveditori alla sanità as a magistratura serrata (closed magistracy): they could not be elected to an alternative committee until the end of their term, the objective being to ensure that they had sufficient time to gain practical experience in dealing with the complex and critical matters of public health.
[2] Upon its institution as a permanent body, the provveditori alla sanità were tasked with safeguarding the public health of the state, with particular attention to preventing the spread of foreign diseases within the republic's territory, a regular threat for a city with an extensive reliance on international trade routes that facilitated contagion.
From the offices of the magistracy, inside the public granaries near Saint Mark’s Square, it was possible to control the arrival of all ships and to prevent the disembarking of passengers and the unloading of cargo until health inspections were conducted.
[15] In order to enable control and quarantine of disease outbreaks, officials of the Magistrato alla Sanità were able to impose periods of isolation of at least 14 days, upper length dependent on the situation in the port of question, and to cordon off areas of the city.
[12][22] This authority was limited in 1539 when the Council of Ten, responsible for the security of the state, decreed that certain sentences could be appealed to the esecutori contro la bestemmia (executors against blasphemy) and the savi all'eresia (sages for heresy).
The accusations, which could be deposited in receptacles located throughout Venice and in the subject cities, generally concerned the failure to observe quarantine procedures and the removal of infected goods from the lazarets, the presence of beggars and migrants, the presence of medical charlatans and the trafficking in unauthorized medicines, the sale of infected meat or rotten food, the failure to maintain hygiene in stores and animal stalls, the polluting of the canals and streets, and unauthorized burials.
[26] Although the Magistrato alla Sanità had supreme authority in matters of public health, jurisdiction over vagrants and beggars was shared beginning in 1588 with the provveditori sopra ospedali e luoghi pii (superintendents of hospitals and recovery houses).
