Well, Ragusa is typically included in lists of maritime and merchant republics, so I'm completely down with Splato. I'm actually asking because I'm looking at doing an EU4 run as a custom merchant republic - Genoa and Venice just aren't doing it for me - and I need some ideas :) I'm actually...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maritime_republics
What other, non-historical trade empires could theoretically exist in mid-15th century Italy, what lands would they control and what ports would their trade go through abroad?