experience as a state that identified totally with the citizens' commercial interests proved invaluable. The Venetians accepted their changed circumstances "and acted accordingly" (Polak 64). They adopted an aggressive policy toward their enemies on the Italian mainland, or Terraferma, conquered a number of smaller cities, and established a more or less permanent truce with Milan and Florence. The Republic then re-oriented itself from east to west. It maintained what it could of its trade links--which was not an inconsiderable amount of activity--and shifted its economic policies to emphasize industry, rather than trade, as the main source of economic growth. The glass industry was the first to be transformed in this manner and this action had far-reaching consequences for both the economic and aesthetic history of glass.
The origins of the Venetian glass industry are quite obscure. Glass was first made in Syria around 3000 BC, but it was not until around 50 BC, in the same region, that glassblowing was discovered. Previously glass had been cas
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