Italy
Genoa in the 14th Century
Genoa has a complicated history. For most of the Middle Ages it was a republic, but it never was able to tame its rural nobility. Part of this was sheer topography: the city is between mountains and the sea, and the Genovese nobles built impregnable castles in the surrounding mountains. No matter how matters fared within the city, a noble family could always retreat to its rural fastness and wait out the troubles.
Throughout our period, the city was in frequent conflict with its rival Venice while at the same time had to deal with powerful and jealous neighbors in France, Savoy, and Milan. Each of these ruled Genoa at one time or another between 1300 and 1500.
Genoa, like Venice and Pisa, had profited immensely from the Crusades and had established outposts in the eastern Mediterranean and into the Black Sea. In addition, Genoa was a major power in the western Mediterranean, where its main rivals were Naples and Aragon.
Fourteenth Century
Genoa did well out of the Crusades. In particular, it had good relations with the reconstituted Byzantine Empire in the later 13th century. The city gained key trading rights and outposts in the Black Sea, which was becoming a major source of trade goods between East and West.
1339 Genoa creates the office of the doge in deliberate imitation of Venice. The hope was to imitate also the stability of that city, for Genoa had been torn by faction for decades. Family and clan factions were particularly vicious and difficult in Genoa, including the alberghi which were coalitions of families that adopted a common surname for the purpose of mutual defense. They even built fortifications within the city and controlled districts, very much like gangs.
The first doge of Genoa, Simone Boccanegra, lasted only five years, as both commoners and nobles alike regarded him with suspicion. He voluntarily went into exile in 1344 and more conflict followed until the city accepted the Visconti of Milan as a signoria in 1353. Boccanegra returned, led a rebellion against foreign rule, and was restored as doge in 1356.
The dogeship was nevertheless a stormy office in the following decades, as no one doge could long rule without the support of noble families, which immediately would generate opposition from other noble families. This pattern was brought to a temporary end when the ruling doge in 1396 surrendered the city to the King of France. Again the hope was that an outside (and presumably neutral) power could bring some stability to the city.
Despite chronic internal factionalism, Genoa nevertheless ran an empire. The factionalism was repeated in its colonies, so that this family or that family tended to dominate in this or that area: Sardinia, Corsica, Chios, Galata, and all the way to the Crimea. The rivalries on the streets of Genoa seldom got in the way of foreign affairs, at least in the fourteenth century.