Giovanni Battista Barbaro

Who is Giovanni Battista Barbaro?

Giovanni Battista Barbaro was a leading producer of silk who supplied the majority of the royal courts in Europe, the Papacy, and the Emperor of China. Born of the noble Venetian Barbaro family, from the line of Alessandro Barbaro, Agostino Barbaro and Nicolo Barbaro, Giovanni originally held the titles "Patrician of Venice" and "Nobile", the latter granted to the family following the fall of the Republic of Venice near the end of the 18th century. Giovanni produced silk within the Barbaro's Southern Italian estate of Catanzaro where the mulberry trees were plentiful. The leaves of the tree are a requirement for breeding the Bombyx mori, the finest silk-producing moth. Giovanni's title of Nobile was also structured into an Albergo and recognized within the Kingdom of Naples as "Baron dell'Albergo". The Barbaro family has a long tradition of establishing political relationships with Asian leaders, beginning first with Giosafat Barbaro who had diplomatic meetings with the Mongol Khan and befriended Ming Emperor Zhengtong. Giovanni was equally celebrated at the Imperial Chinese Court of Emperor Jiaqing, and Giovanni earned the Asian courtly title of "Prince Wei Long" (translated as "The Great Imperial Dragon Prince of the West). With this title was the granting of a red imperial dragon with five claws as a Barbaro symbol. [ It is important to note that Chinese emperors made a distinction between a "Mang", a four-clawed dragon, and a "Long", a five-clawed dragon. The Long was exclusively the symbol for Imperial princes and the gold-colored Long was solely for the Chinese emperor. Red is a color that symbolizes good fortune and the direction west in Chinese art.] In Europe, Barbaro was awarded the Grand Cross of the Imperial Order of Merit (the Order of Franz Joseph), the highest award for excellence in the fields of commerce and diplomacy. Giovanni's descendents established a tradition of taking on a Latin name, in honor of the Holy Roman Emperor, and a predecessor's name, in honor the House of Barbaro. This naming tradition continues today with Vitus (b. 1973) who in 2004 took on his family's substantive title from his surname, "Albergo", as associated with the family's courtesy title 'Baron dell'Albergo". He is styled HIllH Count Vitus Sebastian Barbaro, Patrician of Venice.