Como se tuta questa universitade parlasse.
La rappresentanza politica delle comunità nello stato di Milano (XV secolo)

English summary

This essay continues a body of work begun some years ago on the theme of political cultures in a late–medieval territorial state – namely Lombardy under the rule of the Sforza family – with a particular focus on relations between the community and the prince. The documentary basis for this research is provided by surviving urban and rural statutes as well as political correspondence from the latter half of the fifteenth century: instructions and commands despatched by the prince to peripheral areas of the territory, reports submitted by his officials, petitions presented by the community, letters from local dignitaries and so on.

Our analysis, focused on how the pact of mutual obligation binding prince and community came to be conceptually defined, suggests that

1. even in the remoter rural areas of Renaissance Italy, politics was never just a set of practices, but the conscious product of ideal models;
2. the cultural dimension of an Italian regional state of the period was not homogeneous, but characterized by sharp differences in the communication and values of the various subjects (dukes, officials, communities, local lords), each with a distinct cultural identity [1].

Once the nature of the mutual bond between community and duke had been defined, two further questions remained to be addressed: how could a plural and problematic subject such as the community display a collective will? And how could it have its will taken into account by the prince? The first of these questions was answered by examining the practices, values and written documents of the councils and vicinanze (plenary meetings of the heads of family). Again, these assemblies were viewed differently by the various political subjects: they were frequently regarded with mistrust by the duke and his magistrates as entailing violence, rebellion and manipulation of the majority view, but defended by the community as a structured instrument for defining genuine shared requests [2].

The second question is addressed in this paper. The Lombard communities wished to gain direct access to the prince for all their members, unfiltered by written communications and peripheral or central magistracies. Since the prince never encouraged this aspiriation, a compromise was found: the dialogue between subjects and dukes was to be mediated by ambassadors and officials (sindaci). However, the role and identity of these intermediaries soon became the object of heated political debate. The local institutions (corpi), especially the lower class (popolari), in keeping with the communal tradition, wanted them to be anonymous representatives with no independent decision–making powers, that is, mere spokesmen for the collective will, legitimated exclusively by the mandate of the community, to be conferred by means of codified procedures: when these emissaries spoke to the prince, it was to be «como se tuta questa universitade parlasse» (“as though the whole community were speaking”). In contrast, the central authorities worked to undermine the unified and institutional identity of the local communites by establishing contact with groups of élite, that is the «principali» or «migliori» as they were referred to in the language of the period. Members of these groups, with or without a formal mandate, could put themselves forward as representing the other subjects by virtue of their social status and wealth. The principali themselves, however, were little inclined to claim authority without the support of the wider community.

On many occasions the different positions overlapped, with the state taking the lead in guaranteeing the instruments by which the local communities could communicate with the prince, while the communities themselves were active in raising the social status of their representatives. In contrast, at other times the conflict became particularly marked, with the subjects demanding that the right to communicate with the prince and his agents not be restricted to the local élite but open to all members of the community and to their chosen representative; as a result they were accused by the magistrates of disobeying the duke and gathering seditiously, while those of their ambassadors who did not enjoy high personal social status were banished from the court. Clearly, at stake were both the criteria for legitimating political mediation, as a crucial service linking the centre and peripheral areas of a regional state, and the definition of the community itself, as a territorial entity with a single identity and, as it were, a single “voice”.

Translation: Clare O’Sullivan

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[1] «Per non privarci de nostre raxone, li siamo stati desobidienti». Patto, giustizia e resistenza nella cultura politica delle comunità alpine nello stato di Milano (XV secolo), in Forme della comunicazione politica in Europa nei secoli XV–XVIII. Suppliche, gravamina, lettere, a cura di C. NUBOLA, A WÜRGLER, Bologna, Il Mulino, 2004, pp. 147–215.

[2] Decidere e agire in comunità nel XV secolo (un aspetto del dibattito politico nel dominio sforzesco), in I linguaggi politici nell’Italia del Rinascimento (secoli XIV–XV), a cura di A. GAMBERINI, G. PETRALIA, Roma, Viella, 2007, pp. 293–380.