02 - Outline Of Medieval Florence

OUTLINE OF MEDIEVAL FLORENCE Roman Florence By the end of the sixth century BC, the Romans had shaken off Etruscan domination and founded the republic. (The traditional date is 509, but that may be a bit too precise.) Now it was the Romans who began to expand, and by around 300 they dominated the Etruscan towns, including Fiesole. The Romans brought relative stability and the beginnings of trade. In time some residents of Fiesole decided they could move down into the plain and find a good spot for trade on the river. As a result, ca. 200 the first town of Florence came into being on the bans of the Arno. It was the first town because it was destroyed in 82 BC, and when the town was rebuilt (as a result of a Roman law of 59 BC which provided for civic development throughout Italy) it was situated a bit west of the original site. We can still recognize the outlines of that second Roman city on a modern tourist map. Here's the sort of map they hand you in the railroad station if you book a room in the tourist office there. Notice the innermost of the three enclosed areas contains a street pattern laid out in a rectangular pattern. Early Medieval Florence Under Roman rule, Florence was not a very important town. Then, when the Roman Empire came to an end with the Germanic invasions, that hardly impoved matters. Nor did Frankish domination of the area in the late eighth century. In fact, Florence was so insignificant in this period that some of the medieval chroniclers simply assumed it hadn't existed during those centuries, that it had been destroyed in the sixth century and lain in ruins until it was rebuilt by Charlemagne. It was really there, though. In the ninth century, under Carolingian rule, things do seem to have improved. The population doubled, from ca. 2000-2500 all the way up to perhaps 5000. More important in the long run, the basic governmental structure under the Carolingians stayed even as the Carolingians faded out. The Franks had ruled through counts. As Frankish authority decayed, a single count pulled together several counties - Lucca, Pisa, Pistoia, Siena, Florence - to create a single entity, the Margravate of Tuscany. The Margrave continued to dominate Tuscany even when the German kings (the Ottonians). arrived and the Holy Roman Empire came into being (962) . The Merchants Take Control Two important things: about this period: First, Florence became the favorite residence of the Margrave and then, around 1052, a genuine center of administration for the Margravate. Second, trade was picking up . Back to our map. Notice that the inner ring of the onion is a bit confusing. There's a horizontal line bissecting it into a small upper part and a large lower part. The large lower part represents the city wall as it was constructed in the early eleventh century. It more or less follows the old Roman walls, but with two notable differences. To the south, it slips farther down, giving the growing merchant population of the town better access to the river. To the north, though, it falls well short of the old Roman periphery. What you see on the map as a large building is the cathedral, which wasn't there yet. Instead there was an older church, Santa Reparata. The Baptistery, episcopal palace, church of Santa Reparata and margrave's palace all lay in that area, just outside the wall. In a document from 901 it's stated that the margrave's palace is outside the wall for reasons of security. The whole

2 arrangement perhaps suggests a degree of distrust between the aristocratic rulers of the city (the margrave, the archbishop) and the new merchant population. Erase that horizontal line and you have the wall as it was reconstructed in 1078. The Countess Matilda ordered this new, extended city wall because she wanted to protect her city from an attack by the Emperor Henry IV. That might seem to suggest that the old feudal nobility was still very much in charge, but in the later eleventh century the town-dwellers were asserting their right to self-government against both the bishop and the countess. Matilda's involvement in the investiture controversy on the pope's side gave the townspeople a chance to support the countess in return for privileges. We see guilds coming into being and exercising self-regulation. We see the town assuming responsibility for maintenance of the wall. We see an internal organization of the town into quarters corresponding to the four main gates. We see the development of characteristic Florenine decorative styles. The baptistery, rebuilt at this time, would function as a model for much that would come over the next few centuries.) So what we see in the new, extended city wall is the merchants reaching out and pulling the margrave and bishop into their orbit. The city had grown rapidly by the end of the eleventh century, with perhaps 20,000 residents; yet it was still constructed largely of wood. The stone buildings consisted of churches and the towers that powerful families had begun to construct (of which we'll say more later), and there were few of either. Probably the onlly churches of any impressive size were the Baptistery, San Lorenzo znd San Miniato. Of these, the last two were outside the walls. Only five towers are mentioned in eleventh-century documents (from 1077 and 1096), but there may have been more. The resultant town would have been very tightly packed and vulnerable to fires. There were no piazze in the sense we think of them today, i.e. open public spaces punctuating the dense mass of buildings. There was the old Roman forum, which had become the most important market area; and there were spaces in front of the facades of some churches, produced, not by any desire to create public spaces, but by the decision to set the church back from the limit of the land owned by the church in order to protect sacred space from undue contact with the world. The Evolution of Government In the twelfth century we see a definite town government emerge. It consists of a small council - four people representing the four quarters called "goodmen" (boni homines), then "consuls" - a council of perhaps 150 , and a meeting of the whole citizenry. Obviously it was the first group that did the most decision-making, then the second, and the meeting of entire citizenry served only to approve extraordinary business. The consuls and the council were drawn fro the upper levels of Florentine society, so the government at this stage was in the hands of a small aristocracy. But at that moment Florence was expanding much more rapidly than most other towns in the area. It was filling up with immigrants from the countryside and developing a number of crafts as well as a substantial wool industry. These new arrivals and occupations settled in the suburbis, which means quite literally the area underneath the walls (i.e. just outside the walls). More precisely, they inhabited the areas outside the main gates. The result was the new wall of 1173-75, built to contain a population of around 30,000. (map) In the process the basic division went from quarters to sestieri, six neighborhoods each providing one consul. The twelfth century witnessed the completion of a transition in which power shifted from a regional nobility theoretically holding its authority from the emperor to the city itself theoretically holding its authority from the emperor. This was part of a larger movement taking place throughout Italy, the growth of the commune. Although Florence was not

3 officially recognized as a commune by the emperor until 1183, it was already one in in the period after the death of Matilda (1115). In other words, the commune was seen as a self-governing body. That seems to suggest that power was held largely by the town government, but in the twelfth century most power was exercised on a more particular level. The sestieri enjoyed a certain degree of independence and even exercised their own mini-foreign policies just outside their gates. Within the sestieri, individual parishes exercised control, and so did powerful nobles. Factionalism Here we arrive at the towers and their significance. the noble families, in their struggle to control their neighborhoods and fend off incursions by other noble families, built towers next to their houses. They were accessible from the houses but not from the street and not at street level. Some of them belonged to a single family, others to a group (consorteria) of noble families. In the documents of the later twelfth century we can find at least thirty-five different towers mentioned, but some historians would suggest that there were at least three times that number, a remarkable thing to ponder when we consider that most of them were within the area of the old pre-1173 walls. These towers have largely disappeared from Florence. More precisely they're still there, but have been chopped off and incorporated into houses. Other cities - Bologna, Spoleto, preeminently San Gimignano - still have whole ones, though. The powerful families were a disruptive element, and the central government of Florence, such as it was, had trouble pacifying them. In fact, they carried their factionalism over into the central government itself. It was partly to escape this situation that, toward the end of the twelfth century, the Florentines introduced a new element in their government, the podestà. He was hired for a specific period to run the government. It came to be assumed that he should be a foreigner and above the factional disputes. Picture a modern city manager and you have something vaguely resembling a podestà, or at least the closest to it we can come in the way of a contemporary analogy. Florence was hardly unique in this respect. During the same period we find podestàs being hired in other cities. Did it work? Of course not! Arriving unaligned was a whole lot easier than staying that way. Obviously money talked then as it does now, but even if we forget about buying the podestà the fact remains that the very task of keeping the peace in the face of powerful consorterie (as the tower associations were called) forced him to side with one group against another. You don't unite a highly factionalized society just by hiring one uncommitted person to lead it. That doesn't make the factions disappear. In fact, the factions were about to become more organized within themselves and wreak a new kind of havoc on the city. The event that set them off was the Guelf-Ghibelline rivalry, which was destined to have a long-term effect on Italian politics. In order to appreciate what was at stake we need to know that in the thirteenth century the Hohenstaufen emperors, Frederick I and his son Henry VI, made the popes very, very nervous. Frederick had made a major effort to reestablish imperial control in northern Italy and to extend it into central Italy. That was just what the pope did not want to see, since he himself claimed authority over the papal states and thought that authority was necessary to maintain an independent papacy. Maintaining an independent papal territory in central Italy meant combatting any attempt to unite Italy into a single entity. The popes played their cards well. They supported the northern Italian cities in their resistence to Frederick, and the emperor finally had to allow them virtual independence in return for a purely formal recognition of imperial overlordship and financial contributions. Unfortunately that left Frederick free to concentrate his attention on central and southern Italy. Southern Italy was then the Kingdom of Sicily (also called the kingdom of Southern

4 Italy and Sicily, in fact a number of things), the old kingdom established by the Normans in the eleventh and early twelfth centuries. Just before his death in 1191 Frederick managed to arrange the marriage of his son and heir Henry to the heiress of the Norman kingdom. As a result, for the first time the pope was faced with an emperor who was on more or less friendly terms with northern Italy and actually ruled the south. Then in 1196 the whole house of cards seemed to collapse with the unexpected death of Henry VI. His son, Frederick, was in Palermo and was only two, but the imperial election was in Germany and had to wait while the Hohenstaufen family, having a chosen an older, more obviously German member of the family as its candidate, fought a civil war with the Welf family, who claimed the imperial title for one of theirs. Pope Innocent III saw a golden opportunity and negotiated with both contestants. The price would be willingness to make no claims concerning southern Italy and to keep hands off central Italy as well. We needn't follow him in his succession of choices and disillusionments. The important thing is that he finally threw his considerable support behind little Frederick, who agreed to everything the pope demanded. Once he became emperor, though, he did everything he had promised not to do. Eventually Innocent's successors had to face the fact that Frederick felt a great deal more Sicilian than he felt German and that he was primarily interested in uniting Italy. Frederick died in 1250, but the battle continued as his illegitimate son Manfred took charge of Hohenstaufen fortunes in Italy. Guelfs and Ghibellines As the battle between popes and Hohenstaufens took on a new intensity, various Italian cities lined up behind one or the other, and the result was the Guelf-Ghibelline rivalry. Why Guelf? Why Ghibelline? A little reflection will lead us to notice that "Guelf" looks very like "Welf," and is in fact an Italian version of the name. The Welf family had held land in Italy and the rivalry with the Hohenstaufens had extended south of the Alps, so it wasn't all that odd for the pro-papal faction to adopt the name of the anti-Hohenstaufen faction already in existence. "Ghibelline" seems harder to explain. It actually comes from "Waiblingen," which was a Hohenstaufen castle in Germany and a battle cry used by some Hohenstaufen knights. So the Guelf-Ghibelline rivalry was a split between those who supported the pope and those who supported the emperor; but it was more than that. It reflected regional rivalries. The Florentines tended to be Guelf, so it's no great shock that the Sienese, the Florentine's major rivals for control of Tuscany, tended to be Ghibelline. Aligning themselves with one of the two gave them support from outside the region. In fact, it was more than that. Within cities powerful factions fought for power, and they achieved leverage by being Guelf or Ghibelline. If you want to see all these levels working together look at the fourteenth-century Florentine historian Giovanni Villani. He's perfectly aware that the Hohenstaufen were trying to win the Tuscan cities to their side against the pope; and he's very aware that the struggle between Siena and Florence involved much more than papal-Hohenstaufen choices. He's aware that the Ghibelline faction, chased out of Florence in 1251, could find sanctuary in Siena and then find support in their attempt to regain power. But why was there a Guelf-Ghibelline rivalry within Florence? Villani doesn't talk about the pope versus the emperor, or Florence versus Siena. He talks about a jilted fiancee and the shame her family had to wipe away through vengeance. In the year 1215, when Gherardo Orlandi was podestà of Florence, Bondelmonte dei Buondelmonti promised to marry a young woman from the house of Amidei, honorable and noble citizens. Later, as Buondelmonte, a

5 graceful and skillful horseman, was riding through the city, a woman from the house of Donati called to him and criticized the marriage agreement he had made, saying his betrothed was neither beautiful nor fine enough for him. "I've been saving my own daughter for you," she said, and showed the daughter to him. The daughter was very beautiful and immediately with the devil's connivance, Buondelmonte was so smitten that he married her. The first girl's family met together, smarting from the shame Buondelmonte had placed upon them, and they were filled with a terrible indignation that would destroy and divide the city of Florence. Many noble houses plotted together to bring shame on Buondelmonte in reprisal for these injuries. As they were discussing whether they should beat or wound him, Mosca dei Lamberti spoke the evil words, "A thing done has a head," that is, they should kill him. And thus it happened, for on Easter morning the Amidei of Santo Stefano assembled in their house, and as Buondelmonte came from the other side of the Arno nobly attired in new, white clothes, riding a white palfrey, when he arrived on this side of the old bridge, precisely at the foot of the pillar where the statue of Mars stood, he was pulled from his horse by Schiatta degli Uberti, assaulted and wounded by Mosca Lamberti and Lambertuccio degli Amidei, and finished off by Oderigo Fifanti. They had with them one of the Counts of Gangalandi. As a result, the city was thrown into strife and disorder, for Buondelmonte's death was the cause and beginning of the cursed Guelf and Ghibelline parties in Florence. To be sure, there were already divisions among the noble citizens, and these parties already existed because of the quarrels and disputes between church and empire; yet it was because of Buondelmonte's death that all the noble families and other Florentine citizens were divided into factions, some siding with the Buondelmonti, leaders of the Guelf party, and others with the Uberti, leaders of the Ghibellines So it all comes down to family pride and family vendettas. Does that seem simplistic? Yes, certainly, but it contains a profound truth. A famous American politician, Tip O'Neil, once said, "All politics is local." He was making much the same point. In Florence the GuelfGhibelline struggle was the sum total of numerous struggles between families, in some cases even within families. Guelf and Ghibelline fortunes varied. The Guelfs were chased out of Florence in 1248, but then they managed to chase the Ghibellines out in 1251. In 1260 a Hohenstaufen-SieneseFlorentine Ghibelline coalition dealt the Florentine Guelfs a disastrous defeat at Montaperti, a story remarkably well told by Villani. He turns it into a Greek tragedy of sorts, with the Florentine ruling class playing the part of the tragic hero brought to ruin by pride. The Florentine Ghibellines, led by Farinata degli Uberti, had pulled Manfred and the Sienese into an alliance, but had to lure the Florentine Guelfs into the trap. The Florentine exiles, through whose effort King Manfred had sent Count Giordano with the eight hundred German knights, decided that they still would have done nothing if they could not draw the Florentines out into the field, since the Germans were paid for only three months and one and a half months already had passed since their arrival. The exiles had no money to hire them for a longer time, nor could they expect more from Manfred. Once their contract was up, the Germans would return to Apulia without having done anything, thus leaving the Tuscan Ghibellines in danger again. Concluding that the situation could not be rectified without great skill and strategy, they turned the matter over to Farinata degli Uberti and Gherardo

6 Ciccia dei Lamberti, who craftily dispatched two wise friars minor with a message for the people of Florence. These friars were first exposed to nine powerful Sienese who went to great lengths to convince the friars that the government of Provenzano Salvani, the current ruler of Siena, was odious to them and they would willingly surrender the land to the Florentines for a price of ten thousand gold florins. They further promised that, under the pretense of fortifying Montalcino, they would come as far as the river Arbia and then, with a force provided by them and their followers, would turn over to the Florentines the gate of Santo Vito in the Via d'Arezzo. The friars, having been exposed to this fraud and deceit, came to Florence with letters and seals from the aforesaid Sienese and appeared before the elders of the people. They said they could offer a means of performing great deeds to the honor of the people and commune of Florence, but the matter was so secret that it had to be revealed under oath only to a few. Then the elders chose from among themselves Spedito di Porte San Pietro, a man of great enterprise and daring, one of the principal leaders of the people, and with him Gianni Calcagni di Vacchereccia. Once the oath had been taken on an altar, the friars disclosed the plot and displayed the letters. Led by desire rather than prudence, the two elders believed in the plan. They immediately raised the ten thousand gold florins, placed them on deposit, and summoned an assembly of magnates and people. They argued that, in order to provide for Montalcino, it was necessary to dispatch to Siena a force even greater than the one which had been at Santa Petronella the preceding May. Count Guido Guerra and the nobles of the great Florentine Guelf houses, knowing more than the People about warfare and nothing at all about the bogus plan, aware as well that a new German force was at Siena and that the Florentines had made a poor showing at Santa Petronella against an assault by one hundred Germans, failed to see the wisdom of the proposed campaign. Seeing that the citizens held various opinions on the proposal and were hesitant to dispatch another army, they argued that Montalcino could be provided for at little expense, since the town of Orvieto was willing to take on that responsibility, and that the Germans had been paid for only a threemonth term, half of which was already over. If the Florentines let matters stand without launching a campaign, the Germans would soon be back in Apulia, leaving the Sienese and the Florentine exiles worse off than before. The spokesman for this view was Tegghiaio Aldobrandi degli Adimari, a wise and brave knight of great authority, and his advice was by far the best offered. The aforesaid elder Spedito, a very presumptuous man, gave that advice a rude answer, saying Tegghiaio should check his pants if he was afraid. Tegghiaio replied that, when it came to action, Spedito would not dare to be where Tegghiaio placed himself in the battle. When he had said this, Cece dei Gherardini arose to repeat what Tegghiaio had said. The elders commanded him to be quiet and set a fine of one hundred pounds for anyone who spoke against their orders. The knight was willing to pay it in order to oppose the campaign, but the elders refused and doubled the fine. He again wished to pay it, so the fine became three hundred pounds. When he still wanted to talk and pay, the penalty became his head, and there the debate ended. Thus through a proud and thoughtless people the worst advice won out, namely that the army should leave immediately.

7 Villani describes how, when the army was assembled, "it departed at the end of August. With pomp and circumstance they led forth the carroccio and a bell which they called Martinella, the latter being placed on a cart with a wooden castle on wheels." Meanwhile, while the Florentines were preparing for their campaign, those in Siena who had devised the plan sought to strengthen it by sending other friars to Florence. They plotted treason with certain powerful Ghibellines who had remained in Florence. These Ghibellines were to join the campaign. Then, once the troops were in battle order, they were to desert the ranks and join their own group, thus throwing the Florentines into confusion. Those in Siena hatched this plot because it seemed to them that they were greatly outnumbered by the Florentines. And so it occurred. It almost didn't, though. Farinata's plot was so complex and was understood by so few people that it almost self-destructed when a Ghibelline within the Florentine army - one of those who were ready to switch sides when the battle began - got wind of the phony plot to open the gates of Siena to the Florentines and thought it was real. Once the Florentine army was established in the hills of Montaperti, those wise elders who had approved the plan and were now leading the army waited for the Sienese traitors to open the gate for them as promised. Meanwhile, an eminent Ghibelline named Razzante, from the Porta San Pietro section in Florence, got wind of what the Florentine leaders were waiting for. With the consent of other Ghibellines in the army (who had treason on their minds), he fled from the Florentine camp on horseback and went to Siena. His mission was to inform the Florentine exiles there that the city was to be betrayed and that the Florentines were well provided with knights and foot-soldiers. He advised those within not to recommend battle. Farinata managed to keep Razzante from reporting the story within Siena and even use him for his own purposes. When the two plotters Farinata and Gherardo heard his message, they said to him, "You'll kill us if you spread this news around Siena, because you'll frighten them. We want you to say just the opposite. If we don't fight while we have these Germans, we're dead! We'll never get back to Florence. Death and defeat would actually be better for us than to go begging around the world any longer." They preferred to stake their future on a single decisive battle. Having been set straight by Farinata and Gherardo, Razzante promised to speak as they suggested. With a garland on his head and a very cheerful expression on his face, he and the other two rode on horseback to a meeting at the palace, where all the people of Siena, the Germans and other allies were gathered. There he joyfully announced the great news from the traitors in the Florentine camp. The army, he said, was ill-prepared, poorly-led and disunited. A determined attack would defeat them. When Razzante had delivered his false report, the Sienese all armed, shouting "battle, battle!" The Germans asked and received a promise of double pay, and their group led the assault through the San Vito gate, the very one that was supposed to be given to the Florentines. The other knights and people followed close behind them. When those in the Florentine army who were waiting for the gate to be surrendered saw that the Germans, other knights, and the people of Siena were all coming out toward them looking very warlike, they were surprised and rather dismayed at this sudden appearance and unforeseen attack. They

8 were even more dismayed when many Ghibellines in their camp, knights and foot-soldiers alike, upon seeing the enemy forces, fled to the opposite side as they had so treacherously planned. The result was a slaughter that left the city of Florence wide open to the Ghibellines. At that point the Ghibelline alliance was in a position to destroy Florentine predominance so thoroughly as to cancel them out as a serious rival to Siena. They decided to raze the walls of the city. It was the leader of the Florentine Ghibellines, Farinata degli Uberti, who prevented it. Here again we have Villani to thank for a dramatic story. At this time the Pisans, Sienese, Aretines, Count Giordano, and all the other Ghibelline leaders of Tuscany met at Empoli.. .. At this meeting all the neighboring cities, Count Guido, Count Alberto, those of Santafiore, the Ubaldini and all the nearby barons agreed that, for the good of the Ghibelline party, the city of Florence should be completely demolished and reduced to an open village so that it would never again be renowned, famous or powerful. At that proposal the valiant and wise knight Farinata degli Uberti rose and spoke in opposition. In his speech he recalled two old proverbs: "The ass chews up his turnips as he knows how," and "the lame goat can go if the wolf doesn't meet him." Farinata combined these proverbs, saying, "As the ass knows how, so the lame goat goes; thus he chews up his turnips if the wolf doesn't meet him." One wonders if Farinata's hearers were as confused by this as we are. His main point was clear enough, though. He was against destroying Florence as a power. Apparently others continued to disagree, because he eventually stated his position very clearly. He said, finally, that even if there were no others with him, as long as he had life in his body he would defend Florence with sword in hand. When Count Giordano saw what sort of man Farinata was, noting his authority and great following, he recognized that the Ghibelline party would be torn apart by the plan and he abandoned it. Thus our city of Florence escaped fury, destruction and ruin through the action of a single good citizen; yet the people of Florence were ungrateful toward Farinata and his family, as we shall see later. Nevertheless, even if an ungrateful people fails to recognize his deed, we should nevertheless commend and perpetuate the memory of this noble and virtuous citizen who acted in the manner of Camillus, the good ancient Roman whose story is told by Valerius and Titus Livius. We should read Dante's treatment of Farinata with Villani in mind. Guelf Dominance By this point the Hohenstaufens were as strong as they'd ever been in Italy, but their true weakness was about to appear. Manfred was responsible for extending Ghibelline power to the point where it looked almost unassailable. Manfred was also the Ghibelline's main problem, though. As long as Frederick II was the Ghibelline leader, the pope had found it difficult to rally much support among European kings. They might not have approved of Frederick, but he was a king like them, and responding to the pope's call for a crusade against him might set a very ugly precedent. Manfred was a different story. He had no legitimate claim to rule the territory he had conquered. For that reason it's not suprising that the pope was able to work out a deal with Charles of Anjou, a younger brother of King Louis IX of France. Charles was to destroy Manfred and his nascent Italian kingdom. For his trouble Charles could have the kingdom of Sicily and Southern Italy. In 1266, at the battle of Benevento, he did just that. Manfred was killed there

9 and the Ghibelline alliance lay in ruins. The Guelfs took control of Florence in 1267. Florence was now the principal city in Tuscany and would remain so. The Primo Popolo Much had changed in the course of the struggle. In the first place, the power of the old, great families was curtailed. A good many of the towers disappeared, and with the the tower associations. Part of this was a result of the fact that many of the old nobility tended to lean toward the Ghibelline side and went down with it. There were great families on both sides, though, and the result of successive waves of Guelf-Ghibelline victories was the destruction of many urban fortresses. When the Ghibellines took over in 1248 they destroyed thirty-six important Guelf fortified residences. When they seized power in1260, they proceeded to destroy around 100 Guelf palazzi and perhaps 600 smaller buildings. Around 85 towers were demolished in the process. The most notable act of destruction, though, was the demolition of the Uberti palazzo after 1267 and the law decreeing that nothing be built on the spot in the future. It now constitutes the Piazza di Signoria, and the Palazzo dei Priori is built on the edge of the old Uberti land. The power of the old families was limited by more than the Guelf-Ghibelline contest, though. Throughout the thirteenth century new families flooded into Florence from the countryside and tried their hand at the commercial pursuits that were flourishing there. These were the new people about whom Dante felt uncomfortable. A number of them prospered and wanted to exercise their share of power. The Guelf-Ghibelline contest aided them inasmuch as both sides needed support and were willing to buy the support of the newly successful by granting them a share of power. The first result of this movement was the primo popolo, which is hard to translate. To say "the first people" means nothing. To say "the first democracy" gives us a peculiarly modern notion of what it entailed. The popolo in question was not "the people" in the sense of all the people. It was the "better sort." At any rate, "the people" seized control and the government of Florence passed into the hands of twelve anziani, "ancients," two from each of the sestieri. The citizens were organized in twenty military companies, each with its own banner (gonfalone), under a single leader, the capitano del popolo, who could mobilize them by ringing a bell. The podestà didn't disappear, but his role changed. He gradually took on a police function. This division of the people into twenty gonfaloni had important repercussions for life in Florence. The gonfalone became a neighborhood with its own sense of identity and its own internal power structure. Finances during the primo popolo should the growing strength of Florence as an economic center. We see increased international acceptance of letters of credit as well as more sophisiticated procedures for granting loans, and we see the gold florin, internationaly important for its stable, universally recognized value, first minted in 1252. (The silver florin had been in use since 1235.) The images on the coins are significant. Rather than carried the images of popes, imperors or kings, Florentine coins bore representations of the lily, symbol of the city, and John the Baptist, its patron saint. The primo popolo also had an important effect on Florentine buildings. It ordered the demolition of some towers and the reduction of all the rest to a maximum height of 50 braccia, which is equivalent to around 29 metres. That is still a rather high tower - slightly over 95 feet, and thus higher than the 78 feet from floor to tip of vault in Notre Dame Cathedral (though slightly less than the 118 feet of Chartres) - but it is worth pondering that one of the towers destroyed in 1248 is reputed to have been 75 metres tall, which would make it over 246 feet. The Secondo Popolo

10 The primo popolo went out in 1260 with the Guelfs, but it didn't come back in with them in 1267. For a while Florence was ruled by an essentially aristocratic government, but from 1282 on a relatively quiet revolution took place. The secondo popolo came into being. In it, Florentine government became an extension of the guilds. Not all of the guilds, at least not at first. There was a distinction between the greater and lesser guilds, the arti maggiori and the arti minori. The greater guilds included: the judges and notaries the calimala guild (which dealt with foreign cloth); the cambio guild (bankers); the lana guild (wool producers); the Por Santa Maria guild (retailers on the leading shopping street, plus the silk merchants); the physicians and apothecaries (the latter including dealers in oriental spices); the furriers. These were the guilds who came to power. In doing so, they allow five of the lesser guilds to share power to some extent. These were: the butchers, the shoemakers, the blacksmiths, the builders, the rigattieri (second hand dealers). Leaders of the twelve guilds selected six priors who served for two months. During their tenure they lived together in a single house with their families, and contact with others was strictly supervised. In 1292 the base was broadened even widerby including the rest of the lesser guilds. The government now included: the winesellers, the innkeepers, the sellers of salt, oil and cheese, the tanners, the armorers, the ironworkers, the girdlemakes, the woodworkers, and the bakers. It's important to realize that the guilds often contained more than just the occupations in the title. Dante belonged to the physicians' and apothecaries' guild, which seems bizarre but wasn't. As a literateur that's where he belonged.

The Ordinances of Justice In 1293 the Ordinances of Justice were passed. They were heavily concerned with guaranteeing justice for the popolo over against the grandi, the magnates. It's important to realize that we're not talking about the aristocrats, the nobles, over against the commoners, much less over against the lower class. The popolo were people with enough weight to take their place in a guild. The grandi might be from old families descended from the feudal nobility, but that wasn't the principal issue. The grandi were seen as those who combined wealth and power with a tendency to victimize the popolo. At that time 147 families were so designated. A gonfaloniere (standard-bearer) of justice was appointed to execute justice against these designated bullies. Extra penalties were in force when a grande injured a popolano. The grandi were denied membership in the priorate, leadership of guilds, and several other offices. It might strike us that we're seeing a nascent utopia here, with the laws working to protect the little, weak, poor people from the big, strong, rich ones. Of course it was more complicated than that. Note that the popolo were not the entire mass of the people and didn't even include the genuinely poor working class that labored in the wool industry. And the grandi became such by designation. Obviously this was a sytem that gave some powerful people the chance to stigmatize other powerful people who happened to be their political enemies. Note, too, that the term grandi cannot be translated as "nobles." Of the 147, most were such in the sense that they were descended from the old feudal nobility; but thirty-three were commoners who had moved from the countryside and made a great deal of money.

11 Incidentally, the "second people" changed the basic organization of the city back into quarters. It is hard to overstate the importance of the "second people." Matters like how the priors were chosen, how many guilds could participate and how they shared power, etc. would vary over the following decades, but the basic structure - a government built on the guild system, with membership in a guild equivalent to citizenship and ability to hold office would last for two centuries. Moreover, it was under the "second people" that the city we visit today began to take shape. A significant number of the buildings tourists now feel required to see in Florence were begun within a remarkably short period. The baptistry is much older, eleventh century, while the Bargello (which now houses a major art gallery) was actually begun in 1254 - thus under the "first people" - to accomodate the podestà; but the other major attractions were begun between 1280 and 1298. It was during this period - in fact in 1296 - that the cathedral was begun, although a good deal of it would be done in the fourteenth century, the bell tower would not be done until then, and the cupola (the dome) would not be attempted until the fifteenth century. In 1298, work on the palace of the priors commenced. The arrival of the mendicant orders contibuted to the building program in an important way. The Dominicans and Franciscans had been in Florence for decades -the Franciscans settled into the Santa Croce area sometime in the 1220s and the Dominicans took possession of Santa Maria Novella in 1221, in each case after a short stay elsewhere in the city - but the building we associate with the Dominicans today, Santa Maria Novella, was begun in 1280; and the one we associate with the Franciscans, Santa Croce, was begun in 1296. These churches were the homes of particular religious orders, but they were considered public buildings which reflected on the honor and importance of Florence. (Santa Croce is described in documents as founded by the commune or the people "to benefit souls and increase the prestige of the city.") Nor, if we wished to be thorough, could we stop with the Franciscans and Dominicans, who were simply the most prominent of the wave of mendicant orders that swept into Florence in the thirteenth century. The Augustinians and Servites arrived in 1250, the Humiliati one year later, the Order of Penitence of Jesus Christ (better known as the saccati) in 1259, and the Carmelites in 1268. Except for the Augustinians, these orders arranged themselves in a band throughout the area just beyond the twelfth-century wall, the area where new growth was occurring; and the Augustinians settled in the area across the Arno that, although within the walls, was just filling up. In other words, the mendicant orders fit well into the Florentine expansion. They were a mobile force capable to moving where they were needed, and in the new population they found a flock in need of pastoral ministry. They also encounterd less conflict with the local clergy there than they would have within the the wall, where the parish system was more established and the mendicants would have been cutting more deeply into clerical revenues. And land there was less expensive than in the tightly-packed area within the walls. (Notice that one prominent tourist stop, the Ponte Vecchio (Old Bridge), has not been mentioned. What we see today is actually a "New Old Bridge" built after the "Old Old Bridge" was swept away by a flood in 1333. What was there before that year had been built in the twelfth century and had been called the Ponte Vecchio at least as early as 1220.) The contribution of the "Second People" to the shaping of Florence goes much deeper than a few buildings. They were the first group to think seriously about how the streets should be laid out and where there should be open spaces. It was also they who were responsible for the sixth, last and biggest wall Florence would receive. (map)It was started in 1284 and finished only in 1333. It was, in fact, so big that the city never filled it, thanks largely to the arrival of the Black Death in 1348.

12 Population How many people were there in Florence? That is a very hard question to answer. Some scholars have estimated around 50,000 inhabitants in 1200, 75,000 in 1260, 85,000 in 1280, and 95,000-100,000 in 1300. That's would mean the population doubled in the thirteenth century alone. Other scholars would feel less comfortable with these figures, thinking it too high, although they would be less skeptical about the idea of the population doubling. In any case, Florence was one of the biggest cities in Europe, comparable to Milan, Venice and Genoa but still smaller than Paris, which probably had at least 150,000 inhabitants. (London was not even in the running. Its population in 1300 has been estimated as high as 50,000, but as low as 20,000. A guess of 30,000 might not be all that inaccurate.) Villani gives us a sense of it size and complexity. While we may not want to accept his numbers precisely as he provides them, there is no reason to doubt that he is at least in the ball-park, and the way he has gone about arriving at them is remarkably in tune with what we might expect a modern social historian to do. Since we have described the income and expenditure of the commune of Florence during this period (ca. 1338), it seems fitting to mention other important features of our city so that our successors in later times can be aware of any rise or decline in the condition and power of our city, and so that the wise and worthy citizens who rule in future times can advance its condition and power through the record and example of this chronicle. Careful investigation has established that at that time there were in Florence approximately 25,000 men capable of bearing arms, ages fifteen to seventy, all citizens, of which 1,500 were noble and powerful citizens required as Grandi to post the customary guarantees. There were then around seventyfive fully-equipped knights. We find of course that before the government of the "second people," which is still in power, there were more than 250 knights, but after the people began its rule the Grandi had neither the status nor the authority they formerly enjoyed. We learn from the taxes collected at the gates that around 5,900,000 gallons of wine entered Florence yearly, and in times of abundance there would be around 1,120,000 gallons more. The city required approximately 4,000 oxen and calves, 60,000 sheep, 20,000 goats and 30,000 pigs annually. During the month of July 4,000 loads of melons came through the San Friano gate and were distributed throughout the city. During this period the following offices in Florence, each of which administered justice and had the right to torture, were held by foreigners: The podestà; the captain and defender of the people and the guilds; the executor of the ordinances of justice; the captain of the guard or conservator of the people, who had more power than the others (though all four of the offices just mentioned could administer punishment); the judge handling civil justice and appeals; the judge in charge of taxes; the official concerned with female ornamentation; the official concerned with the merchants; the official concerned with the Lana guild; the ecclesiastical officials; the court of the bishop of Florence; the court of the bishop of Fiesole; the inquisitor; and other dignitaries of our city which should not be left unmentioned if those who come after us are to be properly informed. Within the walls, Florence was laid out and built up well, with many lovely houses. At that time construction went on continually and techniques were improved in order to

13 make the buildings comfortable and luxurious. Examples of every sort of improvement were imported from abroad. Cathedrals, churches for friars of every order, and magnificent monasteries were built. Beyond this, there was no citizen, Popolano or Grande, who had not built or was not building a large and rich estate in the countryside, with an expensive mansion and other buildings even better than those in the city. Each one of them was sinning in this respect, and they were considered mad for their inordinate expenditure. It was such a marvelous thing to see that most foreigners unfamiliar with Florence thought, when they came from abroad, that the sumptuous buildings and beautiful palaces occupying a three-mile area around the city were a part of the city itself, in the manner of Rome, to say nothing of the sumptuous palaces, towers, courts and walled gardens farther from the city, which would have been called castles in any other territory. In short, it was determined that, within a six-mile radius of Florence, there were more than twice the number of sumptuous and noble mansions found in Florence itself. Why was Florence so successful in this period? Location, location. When we think of location and medieval cities we immediately think of rivers. Land transportation was bad and expensive. River traffic was cheaper and more reliable. Few successful medieval towns were far removed from a navigable river. As rivers go, the Arno left much to be desired. It did provide a route to the sea by way of Pisa, and it was navigable inland as far as Arezzo; but it was treacherous, given to flooding, silting up, and all the other nasty tricks rivers play. Probably its most important contribution to Florentine prosperity was the role it played in the wool industry. On the other hand, despite all the difficulties of land routes, some were so important that they did a great deal for the cities that were on them. Florence was on the Via Francigena, the great road down from the north down to Rome. It shared that honor with Bologna and Siena, among other places. That was a powerful asset. The Via Francigena brought statesmen and pilgrims heading for Rome. Like Siena, Florence developed a large number of hospitia, an all-purpose word which has led to the English "hospice," but also to the words "hospital," "hotel" and "hostel." A medieval hospitium did all that and more. it might provided a place for travelors to spend the night, tend the sick and dying, or care for the poor. But the same roads that brought pilgrims brought merchants. The sorts of product Florence produced was adaptable to land transportation because it consisted of goods that were fairly expensive for their weight: good cloth, gold- and silverwork, and above all that lightest and most transportable of precious goods, theoretical money. By the end of the thirteenth century Florentine bankers were on their way to developing a large northern European clientele and a number of eager ecclesiastical customers in Rome, including the pope. Much of what was just said could also apply to Siena, which was also on the Via Francigena, was also a cloth town, and also did well in banking. Obviously playing the right cards in the Guelf-Ghibelline helped Florence a great deal, while being Ghibelline did Siena little good after 1266. In short, by 1300 we find a solidly Guelf Florence that was doing extremely well commercially. Even the exiled Ghibellines had moved closer to reconciliation with their vanquishers, partly because in the later thirteenth century the popes worked hard to broker a settlement which would reintegrate the Ghibellines into Florentine society and thus eliminate a disgruntled exile community. Life should have been sweet, but it was not. In the first year Florentine tranquillity would be shattered by a major feud. This time the Guelfs

14 didn't need the Ghibellines to produce a major crisis. They created one within their own ranks.

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