I consoli: incunaboli del Comune?

H-Net Reviews, 2015

Public power and political system functioning in the Italian cities are highlighted. Specific attention is paid to the positive aspects of power organization under aristocracy and signoria. Keywords: public power, signoria, aristocracy, tyrant.

Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 2014

ABSTRACTThis article takes two major moments of social change in central medieval Europe, the ‘feudal revolution’ in France and the origins of Italian city communes, in order to see what they have in common. They are superficially very different, one rural one urban, and also one whose analysts focus on the breakdown of political power and the other on its construction or reconstruction; but there are close parallels between the changes which took place in France around 1000 or 1050 and those which took place in Italy around 1100. The contrast in dates does not matter; what matters is that in each case larger-scale political breakdown (whether at the level of the kingdom or the county) was matched by local recomposition, the intensification or crystallisation of local power structures which had been much moread hocbefore, and which would be the basic template for local power henceforth. In Italy, the main focus of the article, the different experiences of Pisa and Genoa are compared...

International Review of Social History, 2016

The origins of the Italian communes in the Middle Ages have long been debated in Italian and international historiography. In the twentieth century, Italian scholars focused on the importance of early urban autonomy, arguing that, at least in part, it saved the peninsula from the chaos of the disintegration of the Kingdom of Italy (Regnum Italiae), from foreign domination, and, in particular, that it gave birth to the kind of society that would later develop the civic culture of the Renaissance. Important studies on the topic were carried out during crucial moments of the formation of the contemporary Italian state, which brought communal Italy directly into the political debate. More recently, nationalist political movements have used medieval urban autonomy as a symbol of the renewed necessity for northern Italian independence. Wickham's book does not address those particular debates, the author preferring to maintain a distance from the "dogmatic" views that, according to him, have directed Italian research so far. Instead, the book relies more on the studies of other scholars who, in their different ways, have addressed the social composition of the urban classes that gave life to the new political system that started to emerge in the twelfth century. Wickham proposes to deal with the issue from a different point of view, for his aim is to analyse the very moment communal society appeared for the first time. His purpose is to understand the outlook typical of the first office holders of the communes and, more generally, of the "communal man". To do so, Wickham studies three cases in closer detail, those of Milan, Pisa, and Rome. Chosen for the availability of sourcesin particular, judicial and diplomatic records as well as more narrative accountsthose three cases are dealt with following a roughly similar structure. The sources used are explained, the political context outlined, early mentioning of consuls or assemblies highlighted, hegemonic families identified, and the role of military and juridical culture analysed. These three chapters, which form the core of the book, are preceded by an introduction in which the historiography is presented mainly by comparing Italian scholars to their international colleagues, with the latter generally appearing in a more favourable light. Here, Wickham anticipates some of the main ideas that reappear later in cases studied in more detail, such as the informality of the early communal institutions, or the reasons behind the exclusion of certain cities. The book closes with a final chapter that revisits some general arguments and considers other Italian cities. Those other cities are addressed by region or territory and show a recognizable general regional trend, with several of them (for which there is more literature available) compared among themselves to highlight developments in each location according to local peculiarities. Chapters two to four treat the three case studies by beginning in the north and moving southwards, with first Milan, then Pisa, and finally Rome. As might be expected, given their different locations, sizes, economic, and political contexts, the three cities reveal a good number of differences among them. Milan, for example, was characterized by slower detachment of the communal institutions from the bishop, with the first consuls, or civic representatives, even being part of his entourage, as was the general assembly. A change terms of use, available at .

Researching the connections of colonies in the Roman Empire is a modern theme. It aims to analyse their relations not to Rome but to one another. These kinds of studies are needed to a better understanding of the complexity of the city network of the Roman Empire. Aquileia stands in the middle of my research. It was a Latin colony founded in the later Regio X in North Italy in 181 BC. In my presentation I am going to show how literary and inscribed sources present the relations between Aquileia and other cities, and also investigate if this city truly had so complex a network as supposed. Keywords: Aquileia, colony, connections, network, North Italy

This article has been written again, with some new thoughts and the rich, recent bibliography, for the second edition and is uploaded under 'Comuni, consuetudini, statuti'

The Politics of Law in Late Medieval and Renaissance Italy, Essays in Honour of Lauro Martines, Edited by Lawrin Armstrong and Julius Kirshner, Toronto 2010, pp. 56-77., 2010