Gedemo Genova City-State

Genova (Genoa) City-State Trait: Your Trade Routes earn +1 Gold for passing through Trading Posts in your own cities. Your Harbor Districts get an additional Great Admiral Point per turn. City-State Type: Trade History: Genoa, a small, poor fishing village of 4,000 inhabitants, started to become independent from the Holy Roman Empire around 1096, as a free commune. The participation of the Genoese Fleet in the Crusades enriched it enormously. During the First Crusade, Genoa obtained one third of Byblos and Acre (one third of the port's incomes). Other small colonies were formed in Tartous (Syria), Tripoli (Lebanon) and Beirut. However, the Muslim reconquest in the following century removed Genoese presence from the Holy Land. Genoa also established colonies on the Spanish Mediterranean coast from Valencia to Gibraltar, but these were also short-lived. These colonies consisted usually of a city quarter (or even a single square) with wooden single- or double-floor houses with workshops in the lower floor. Direct territorial expansion of Genoa began in the 13th century with the occupation of Corsica and northern Sardinia. Genoa remained dominant in the Tyrrhenian Sea after the decisive naval victory against Pisa in the Battle of Meloria (1284). Genoa had also started to form colonies of Ligurians in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea in second half of the 13th century. The Genoese presence was not based on military occupation, but on economic "concessions" of Genoese and Ligurian families associated with the local traders and dominant classes. The fall of the eastern colonies caused a deep economical crisis which eventually turned in an unstoppable decline for the Republic of Genoa as a major European power. While its longtime rival, the Republic of Venice, was able to maintain some continuity between the capital and its eastern possessions, Genoa could not. It thus moved its interests in the western Mediterranean, establishing flourishing communities in Cadiz