Very severe penalties were imposed both on injured persons failing to denounce crime,462 and on the makers of false accusations.463 When one of the people received hurt through joining in some quarrel of the nobles, or in cases of conflict between master and man, the enactments were not applied, and the common law was again enforced.464 Other clauses followed touching unjust appropriation of the people's property on the part of the nobles, and obstacles interposed by them to bar the former from due receipt of income, for which offences, fines varying between one thousand and five hundred lire were prescribed in the customary way.465 A noble sentenced to any fine was forbidden to beg or collect the amount from others, since this would have made it easier to commit deeds of vengeance in common and pay the penalty by means of a general subscription. Therefore any noble begging contributions from others was condemned to a special fine of five hundred lire; while all trying to collect money for him, as well as those supplying it, were mulcted in one hundred lire.466

No appeal of any sort was permitted against sentences pronounced according to the enactments,467 since these overruled all ordinary statutes, and it was forbidden either to prorogue, suspend, or alter them, under penalty of incurring the severe punishment prescribed in the General Conclusion.468

IX.

Thus the Enactments of Justice were framed. As already stated, their object was to fortify the guilds, give greater unity to the Government and the people, humble the nobles, and promote the dispersal of associations. Only it was to be doubted whether a law of this kind could be fully carried out, or would not rather be violated by the nobles, thus sharing the fate of many earlier laws promulgated for the same purpose. Giano della Bella used his best efforts to avert this danger. He had not compiled the enactments, nor was he in office when they were discussed and passed; but he undoubtedly assisted in promoting them. On the 15th of February, 1293, shortly after they were proclaimed, he was elected to the "Priors," and on the 10th of April—namely, ten days before his term of office expired—we find that a new law, devised for the purpose of "fortifying" the enactments among which it was subsequently incorporated, was presented, discussed, and passed by all the State Councils.

This additional law, one decidedly accordant with the spirit of action rather than of debate, possessed by Giano della Bella, was of a very simple kind. It ordained that another thousand men, together with one hundred and fifty magistri de lapide et lignamine and fifty piconarii fortes et robusti, cum bonis picconibus,469 should be added to the force of one thousand popolani at the disposition of the Gonfalonier of Justice, of the Captain and Podestà. The object of this new measure was self-evident: it was intended to inflict real punishment; to thoroughly confiscate the property and demolish the abodes of all nobles doing injury to the people. Accordingly the aristocrats were provoked to fury, and their hatred of Giano could no longer be restrained. But he was nowise alarmed; on the contrary, it spurred him to new efforts, and he planned another measure, that, if carried into effect, would have proved a deathblow to the nobles.

As we have seen, the latter's position as magistrates of the Guelph Society still kept their power intact; so, in order to humble them, Giano proposed to deprive their captains "of the Seal of the Society, and of its property, which was considerable, and hand these over to the Commune. Although a Guelph, and of Guelph nationality, he hoped, by this measure, to humble the power of the magnates."470 In fact, once deprived of the seal, that was the symbol, as it were, of their separate entity; once their movable property, or funds, transferred to the Commune, their caste would have been notably enfeebled, if not destroyed, and the last stronghold of nobility lost. Giano's proposal was likewise justified by a law established by the Guelph Society, decreeing the latter to be only entitled to one-third of the property confiscated from the Ghibellines, while as matter of fact it had appropriated the whole. Hence there was some reason for compelling the Society to disgorge at least the two-thirds it had unduly usurped. To what extent Giano's plan was fulfilled, the absence of documents leaves us in ignorance. Although the incident is recorded by historians,471 the Guelph Society long continued to exercise tyrannous rule. At any rate the mere fact of proposing this law suffices to explain the increasing hatred developed against Giano, and the speedily visible signs of approaching disaster in the city.

X.

Thereupon the people rose to the emergency, and in order to be prepared for events, hastened to avert all risk of foreign war by concluding peace with the Pisans, in spite of the latter being already reduced to such extremities, that the continuation of the war would have certainly led to their still deeper humiliation and abasement. But the Florentines decided for peace in order to "fortify the position of the people, and lower the power of nobles and potentates, who often acquire renewed strength and vitality by war."472

Negotiations were set on foot during the Gonfaloniership of Migliore Guadagni (April 15 to June 15, 1293), and concluded soon afterwards during that of Dino Compagni. The terms arranged were: the restitution of prisoners; free passage through Pisa for the merchandise of all communes included in the Tuscan League, and the same right of passage, free of duty, for Pisan merchandise through the States of the League. For the term of four years the Pisans were to contrive the election of their Podestà and Captain, in such wise that one of the pair should always belong to one of the communes of the League, the other to some house not rebelled against the same, and no member of the family of the Counts of Montefeltro was ever to be chosen. Now the Pisan leader who had defended the city so valiantly, and filled the offices of Podestà, Captain of the people and of war, was precisely Count Guido Montefeltro. Hence, by the terms of the treaty, he was now forced to leave Pisa, together with all the foreign Ghibellines; and twenty-five leading citizens were also to be given in hostage. Thus the Pisans were compelled to behave with the harshest ingratitude. The count, indeed, might have made them pay dearly for it, being still in command of a numerous and most devoted army; but he preferred to bear the insult with dignity. Appearing before the Council, he recounted his services to Pisa, the ill return made for them, and then, having received the monies due to him, instantly went away. The Pisans were likewise pledged to dismantle the walls of the fortress of Pontedera, and to fill up the trenches; farther, to recall to the city all the leading Guelph exiles. On the other hand, Florence was to give back their castle of Monte-Cuccoli, and all their other possessions in Val d'Era.473

Having thus put an end to what seemed for the moment their wealthiest concern, the Florentines devoted more energy to the less important undertakings on hand. Various districts or castles, such as Poggibonsi, Certaldo, Gambassi, and Cutignano were reduced to submission. The Counts Guidi were deprived of jurisdiction over numerous domains in the upper valley of the Arno. Also possession was resumed of many others in the Mugello, which had been illegally usurped by the said Counts Guidi, the Ubaldini, and other powerful lords. A commission of three burghers of the lower class was then appointed to estimate all possessions appertaining to the city and its territory. These commissioners likewise cleared the lands of the St. Eustachio Hospital, near Florence, of many unlawful occupants, and put the estate under the direct protection of the Consuls of the Calimala Guild.474 Another fact should also be noted, if only to prove what universal energy was displayed at this juncture by the Florentine people who, as Villani phrases it, "were heated with presumption and consciousness of power." A certain man fled to Prato after committing some crime, and was given refuge there. The Republic immediately demanded his extradition, and on Prato's refusal, sentenced the Commune to a fine of ten thousand lire and the surrender of the criminal, despatching a single messenger with a letter to this effect. As the authorities of Prato were still recalcitrant, war was promptly declared, horse and foot called to arms, and the town was finally compelled to yield the point. "And this is how the hot-blooded Florentines managed their affairs."475

XI.

Just when all was safe and tranquil outside the walls, the worst of dangers began in the city. The nobles were determined to prevent the Enactments of Justice from taking effect, and accordingly contrived that after all attacks upon the people, the offenders should be cited before judges belonging to their own party. These conducted the trial to their advantage, and thus the Podestà, without being aware of it, punished the innocent instead of the guilty. For the nobles sheltered evildoers, protected their fellow associates, and on every attempt to enforce the law, did their best to raise riots. All these proceedings were fiercely combated by the people, under the guidance of Giano della Bella, who was always reiterating the cry, "Perish the city rather than justice!" Accordingly public feeling became so inflamed that the most sanguinary measures were threatened in retaliation on the nobles. The first family to incur the worst penalties decreed by the enactments were the Galli. One of that line having mortally wounded a Florentine merchant in France, their dwellings in Florence were demolished.476 This instance easily prepared the way for sterner measures. The people clamoured for new and more vigorous sentences; therefore it was feared, says Compagni, "that were the accused left unpunished, the rector would be left to bear the brunt, and thus no accused person was granted impunity." The fury of the nobles reached its climax, and they complained, with some show of reason, that "if a horse at full gallop chanced to whisk its tail in the face of a popolano, or some one in a crowd pushed against another man's breast, or small children came to blows, there was no reason why their property should be ruined on such slender pretext."477

Accordingly they conceived the idea of conspiring to the bodily hurt of Giano, the ringleader and head of the people, and thus getting rid of him for ever. To compass his assassination seemed easy, by reason of his straightforward impetuosity and incautiousness. He had great influence over the populace, but even this was a point open to attack. As we have seen, the Lesser Guilds and the populace lived by petty industry and small trades carried on within the city; and their chief profits being derived from noble customers, the latter had much ascendancy over them and no few adherents in their ranks. Besides this, a certain amount of jealousy had already sprung up between the lowest class and the well-to-do burghers, who, being mainly concerned in the export and import trade,478 were independent of the nobles, hated them, and sought their destruction. Nevertheless these burghers could not approve of Giano's attempts to rouse the ambition and increase the strength of the lowest class, which was disgusted at being excluded from the Government and yearning to have a share in it.

Another element of strife was soon to be introduced by the election of Pope Boniface VIII. (December, 1294). This Pontiff had an immoderate appetite for temporal power, and believed that owing to the interregnum of the Empire, its rights could now be assumed by the Papacy throughout Italy and Europe. He was particularly anxious to increase his power in Florence, the leading city of Tuscany, where his own predecessors had appointed Charles of Anjou to the post of imperial vicar. Therefore he quickly began to open negotiations with the nobles, whose present weakness increased their readiness to come to terms with him, and who would have willingly resumed the government of the city in his name, just as their Ghibelline ancestors had often held it in the name of the emperor. But this was naturally opposed by the burghers, who being determined, on the contrary, to maintain the liberty and independence of the Republic, could not, albeit staunch Guelphs, side with the Pope at that moment.

Secret intrigues between Boniface and the nobles were now carried on through the Spini, rich Florentine merchants, who, as bankers to the Curia, had agents in Rome. The first step hazarded was to call to Tuscany a certain Giovanni di Celona,479 who was already on the march towards Italy with several hundred men, in response to a summons from the Pope and the nobles. The latter, intending to use his force for their own ends, had made him many promises, and with the concurrence, it would seem, of certain of the burghers. But the affair dragged, and men's passions were now outstripping the political manœuvres employed to feed the flame. Accordingly, without further delay, it was decided to hatch a scheme for the murder of Giano della Bella. "The shepherd struck down, his flock will be scattered," so said the nobles.

Only, as it fell out, the party in favour of craft prevailed over the side preferring violence. At this moment frequent excesses, perpetrated by the people, remained unpunished through the pusillanimity of the judges. The butchers in particular, led by one Pecora, an audacious ruffian, who had publicly threatened the Signory, committed worse outrages from day to day. Hence, at the popular meetings frequently held by Giano, the nobles, knowing his love of justice, would whet his indignation by saying, "Dost not see the violence of the butchers? Dost not see the insolence of the judges, who, by threatening to punish the rectors when the time of investigation arrives,480 wrest unjust favours from them? Suits are suspended for three or four years, and sentences never pronounced." Thereupon the loyal Giano would promptly reply, "May the city perish, rather than this state of things be continued! Let laws be framed to repress all this wickedness." And then the nobles would maliciously hasten to inform judges and butchers that Giano meant to crush them with new laws.481 In pursuance of this cunning scheme, they suggested a law against exiles, in the hope of soon being able to apply it to Giano himself. It seems that he was on the point of falling into the trap, but received timely warning. So then, refusing to hear another word, either from friends or foes, he forbade that any law whatever should be proposed, and threatened his enemies with death. Accordingly the meeting only served to increase the general heat and ferment.482

The nobles were not to be checked so easily. Seeing that Giano still retained many friends, and that there was no hope of conquering by craft, they held a private sitting in the church of San Jacopo Oltrarno, to discuss what should be done; and violent measures were once more suggested. Giano's personal enemy, Betto Frescobaldi, the same who had once struck him in the face at San Piero Scheraggio, spoke to this effect: "Let us cast off this slavery; let us arm and rush to the Piazza; let us kill both friends and enemies of the popular class, as many as we find of them, so that neither ourselves nor our sons may ever be crushed by them." But the promoters of intrigue were again in opposition, and Baldo della Tosa replied very quietly, "The wise knight's counsel is good, but too risky, since, should the scheme fail, we should all perish. First let us conquer (our enemies) by cunning, and excommunicate them with soft words.... And when thus excommunicated, let us harry them in such sort that they can never lift their heads again."483

But quite suddenly a fitting opportunity for violence spontaneously arose. Corso Donati, one of the most powerful and arrogant of Florentines, induced some of his followers to assault Messer Simone Galastroni, and a riot ensued in which one man was killed and two wounded. Both sides laid complaints; but when the affair was brought before the judges charged to try the case, one of them, influenced by the usual party spirit, arranged that the notary should reverse the depositions of the witnesses. When the case, thus garbled, was brought before the Podestà, Giano di Lucino, he acquitted Donati, and condemned Galastroni. Thereupon the people who had witnessed the riot, and knew all the circumstances, rose to arms, shouting through the streets: "Perish the Podestà; he shall perish by fire!" They made for the palace, faggots in hand, to burn down the door, and expecting to be actively assisted by Giano della Bella. But, on the contrary, he sided with the magistrates, whose authority he invariably held in respect. Nevertheless, the door of the Podestà's palace was consumed, his horses and chattels were stolen, his men captured, and his papers scattered and torn. And as many persons knew him to possess indictments against them, they took care to destroy his official documents. He and his wife contrived to escape to an adjoining house, and obtained refuge there. Corso Donati, who was in the palace at the time, saved his life by flying from roof to roof.

The Councils assembled the next day, and for the honour of the Republic decided to restore all the Podestà's stolen property to pay him his salary and send him away. Thus order was re-established at once, but public feeling was still very inflamed, and the nobles saw that the moment for wreaking vengeance on Giano had finally arrived. In fact, some of the people were his foes, owing to the numerous calumnies purposely launched against him, and among others the charge of having promoted decrees to the hurt of the judges and butchers; some, again, were furious because he had sided with the Podestà, while others denounced him as the author of the riot. Accordingly, profiting by the general confusion and uncertainty, his enemies succeeded in obtaining the premature election of a Signory opposed to his views; and he was speedily cited before the new magistrates on the charge of having caused the disturbance. At this the whole city rose in tumult. Some desired his condemnation; but the populace hastened to assume his defence. Thereupon he decided to go away, and left Florence on the 5th of March, 1295, for he shrank from being the cause of civil strife, hoped that his departure would open the eyes of the wiser citizens, and that the latter would speedily procure his recall. However, in this his calculations were at fault, for he had many more enemies than he imagined. Accordingly he was sentenced in contumacy in the name of the enactments he had urged, and of which he was held to be the author. The Pope hastened to congratulate the Florentines, and Giano realised that his star had set. So, acting with his usual impetuosity, he unhesitatingly removed to France, where he possessed some share in the Pazzi bank, and died there in exile. His Florentine houses were demolished, his friends and relations condemned to punishment, but the Enactments of Justice long remained in force.484 With regard to Giano, Villani remarks that "every one who became a leader of the people or the masses in Florence was invariably deserted." He adds that "on account of this novelty, there was great perturbation and change in the people and city of Florence, and that henceforth the artisans and populace had little power over the Commune; and that the government remained in the grasp of rich and powerful burghers."485

XII.

These concluding words from the chronicle of a skilled observer such as Villani enable us to understand more completely the general character of the revolution described; for as this was the natural outcome of many preceding disturbances, its study throws a new light on earlier events.

When the Florentines succeeded in destroying the castles of feudal and Ghibelline nobles scattered over their territory, and in forcing the conquered to inhabit the city, the Republic became split, as we have seen, in two parties, constantly at strife: the one composed of Ghibelline lords, the other of Guelph popolani. When the Hohenstauffens of Naples and Palermo called all the Ghibellines of Italy to arms, the magnates of the party took the lead in Tuscany, with Frederic and Manfred to back them, again dominated Florence and drove out the Guelphs. But when the Swabians fell and were replaced by the House of Anjou, the Empire became weakened, and Italian policy took a new turn. The Guelphs once more triumphed in Florence, and the democratic element, already constituting the real strength of the State, wreaked vengeance on the Ghibellines, who seemed to be almost annihilated. Only as it chanced, at this moment, the Guelphs were split into two factions, the nobles on one side, the people on the other; and this division led to another and equally bitter struggle, undertaken for the purpose of crushing the magnates outright. Thus the latter were driven to crave admission to the guilds, to assume democratic habits, and even to discard their old family names, unless resigned to exclusion from the government. After a prolonged series of different legal measures and revolutions, the Enactments of Justice finally achieved the aim that the Florentine Republic had so long—and, indeed, from its birth—kept in view, namely, the triumph of democracy.

But the Republic comprised the populace as well as the people; and although both orders were united in fighting the nobles, they split apart as soon as their common victory was assured. Thus the party of the rich burghers, or Greater Guilds, gradually sprang into being. At first there were twelve of these guilds, and they seemed to be at one with the nine Lesser Trades, afterwards increased to fourteen; but, as time went on, these fell more widely apart from the remaining seven, and strictly Greater, Guilds, and began to struggle against them, thus constituting the party of the rich burghers or popolo grasso. The formation and successful career of this party, so long at the head of the Government, dates, as Villani tells us, from the defeat of Giano della Bella, whose downfall was caused by the temporary alliance of the nobles and the more powerful section of the people. The latter soon divided both from the nobles and lower class, was equally victorious over either party, and constituted one of the most energetic, sharp-witted, and intelligent democracies of which history has record. It comprised the richest and most vigorous section of the people, known for that reason as the popolo grasso, and gradually became master of the city. And albeit this state of things was a natural result of past revolutions, it was undoubtedly precipitated by the Enactments of Justice. These had been promoted by Giano, with the aid of the people, to be used as a weapon against the nobles. He fell a victim to the latter, when they hoodwinked the people by feigning to unite with them for the nonce. It was certainly altogether against his own will that Giano helped to promote the formation of a party, that, issuing from the wreck of the nobles and populace, finally excluded both alike from all participation in the government of Florence.

For a long time, at any rate, this party raised the power of the Republic to a very lofty height, and directed its policy for more than a century. The moment of its consolidation coincided with that in which Florence became the seat of Italian culture, and hence of the general culture of Europe. Nor is there any cause to be surprised by the vast intellectual, political, and moral success of the commercial democracy of Florence. In the days of the Hohenstauffen, the Italian aristocracy undoubtedly constituted the most cultivated and civilised part of the nation; all great political questions, and the great struggles between the Papacy and the Empire, in which the whole of Europe took so lively a share, were alike carried on by that class. The Court of Frederic II. had been the headquarters of those contests, and the most dazzling centre of mental light in the world at the time. The language spoken there was the language of courtiers; the Court was sceptical, and the first poets were princes or barons. The Emperor Frederic, his son Enzo, and his secretary, Pier della Vigna, gave voice to the first notes of the Italian muse. It was a privileged and limited order, in which literature and science still retained the characteristics of chivalry and scholasticism. In imitation of their French and Provençal masters, these poets lauded some imaginary woman or some fantastic and unreal love in obstinately artificial verse. They were never able to cast off mediæval and conventional forms. At the same time, however, the merchants and working men of our republics, more especially of Florence, were scouring the world, founding banks and business firms throughout the East and the West; they were studying jurisprudence, always and everywhere demonstrating a special aptitude for framing laws, creating new institutions, and directing vast concerns. By this means they acquired that practical knowledge of mankind and the universe, that sense of truth and reality, so entirely absent from pre-existent literatures, and precisely required to originate the first literature of the modern world.

Naturally, however, those merchants, solely versed in commerce and petty local politics, lacked the breadth and loftiness of thought, the mental culture and refinement needed to solve the hard problem without help. At the same moment, Florence, the most active and intelligent of Italian republics, was enduring the series of great and radical changes, already described, which after much sanguinary strife and a new rearrangement of social conditions, suddenly raised her to a truly fortunate position. Owing to her successes in war, Florence now commanded every highway of commerce, and, by the amazingly rapid extension of her trade, was enabled to acquire mighty and no longer contested preponderance in Tuscany and become its chief as well as its central city. The actual antagonism between the Pope and the Angevins, together with the altered conditions of the Empire, enabled her to steer cautiously between those rival powers and assume for the first time great and genuine political importance in Italy. Thus the extent of her concerns and the circle of her ideas were simultaneously enlarged. The two most intelligent and most hostile classes of her citizens, namely, the now powerful traders and the nobles now reduced to equality with them, became transformed and definitely fused in one class during the course of their fierce conflict, excluding, on the one hand, the lowest order of the people, and on the other, those of the nobles who, whether aspiring to absolute rule or obstinately clinging to feudal customs and the authority of the Empire, remained blindly opposed to municipal institutions which were nevertheless predestined to triumph. Need we then feel surprised if at this moment art and literature put forth their fairest blossoms, and in the life-giving air of freedom were seen to expand their leaves and shed their fragrance through the world? It is enough to read the records and glance at the laws of the Republic in order to discern that in the closing years of the fourteenth century a new spirit was stirring the people and a new sun, as it were, rising in the sky.

Every page of the chronicles records the undertaking of very important public works, the erection of city squares, canals, bridges, and walls. And simultaneously with these, the most enduring monuments of modern art were springing up from the ground. During the same period Arnolfo di Cambio worked on the Baptistery, began the church of Santa Croce, and, according to the chroniclers, received from the Signory a solemnly worded order to reconstruct the old cathedral from the foundations by erecting a new one "of the most magnificent design the mind of man could conceive, rendering it worthy of a heart expanded to much greatness by the union of many spirits in one."486 Undoubtedly it was then that Arnolfo laid the first stone of the fane considered by many the finest church in the world. At the same time a great number of monumental buildings and public works were being also carried on: Santo Spirito, for instance, Orsammichele, and Santa Maria Novella. In 1299 Arnolfo likewise began the Palace of the Signoria, another marvel of modern architecture, that seems to be so thoroughly in character with the Republic and expressive of the youthful vigour then animating the Florentine people. In the same year the construction of new walls, suspended since 1285, was also resumed. And while churches, public buildings, and private palaces were rising on all sides, Giotto's brush was employed to cover their walls with a lavish profusion of lofty and immortal compositions; sculpture rivalled painting in decorating temples with imperishable works, and gave birth to the Tuscan school that was afterwards to culminate in Donatello, Ghiberti, the Della Robbia, and Michelangelo. What, too, are the names most frequently occurring in the records of those times, and amid the struggles promoting or following the Enactments of Justice? At every turn, among the Priors, the Gonfaloniers, and ambassadors, or at hot debates in council, we meet with Dante Alighieri, Brunetto Latini, Giovanni Villani, Dino Compagni, and Guido Cavalcanti, the creators of Italian poetry and prose. The Divine Comedy bristles with continual allusions to the events, amid which it was conceived, and which all seem to be informed by the same spirit, since, even in a thousand varying garbs, it always asserts its identity. Therefore the Enactments of Justice are neither the work of a single individual, nor suddenly improvised by Giano della Bella, but rather the outcome of many revolutions: a body of statutes proving and explaining the definite form and character of the Florentine Republic. The same character, albeit less splendidly displayed, appertained in varying degree to the other Italian communes. But of them all Florence was ever the most original and brilliant example.

NOTE TO CHAPTER VIII.

At this point it is necessary to allude to a question that has recently arisen concerning the Enactments of Justice. Signor Salvioli and Prof. Pertile, when describing certain Bolognese statutes of 1271 for keeping the nobles in check, took it for granted that the Florentine enactments of 1293 had been copied from those. But the Bolognese statutes of 1271 having never been unearthed, the hypothesis met with little favour. When Prof. Gaudenzi edited the "Ordinamenta sacrata et sacratissima" of Bologna in 1282–84 (Bologna, the Merlani Press, 1888), he noted their marked resemblance to the Enactments of Justice of 1293, and considered it to be beyond a doubt that the latter had been derived from the former. Indeed, he went to the point of asserting as a fact "Che in genere i rivolgimenti e gli ordini di Firenze non furono che l'imitazione di quelli di Bologna" (Preface, p. v.).

The decided injustice of this last assertion has been already pointed out by Dr. Hartwig, in his recent precious work on Florentine history ("Ein Menschenalter Florentinische Geschichte, 1250–1293" (Freiburg, 1889–91), extracted from vols. i., ii., and v. of the "Deutsche Zeitschrift für Geschichtwissenschaft"). For in truth Florentine laws and institutions issue very directly from the history of Florentine society and Florentine revolutions, which are very different from those of Bologna.

As to the other question, that is, whether the Florentine enactments, of 1293 were really derived from the Bologna statutes of 1282, I feel considerable doubt, and believe that no definite solution can be reached until fresh researches in the Florence Archives have corroborated the result of Prof. Gaudenzi's studies of Bolognese documents. Meanwhile I need merely remark—That the people's struggles with the magnates, and the harsh and often cruel laws promulgated against them, were not exclusively confined to Florence, but incidents of very common occurrence in the history of our communes. Notwithstanding many points of general resemblance, these conflicts and laws varied very much in different communes. Hence, in order to prove to what extent the Bolognese enactments served as models for those of Florence, it is not enough to compare the two codes and note their respective dates. As plainly proved by the events we have related, and additionally confirmed by all the later researches of Hartwig, Del Lungo, and Perrens, the Florentine ordinances are found to be a synthesis of other and much earlier laws against the nobles, and sometimes literal reproductions of them. The enactments themselves quote a law of 1286 frequently mentioned by historians, and, as we have seen, even the "Consulte" of 1282 refer to an earlier law against the nobles. These anterior laws are the veritable source of the Florentine enactments, which, however, are not solely designed, like the Bolognese ordinances, for the repression of the nobles, but to promote the transfer of the government to the Greater Guilds, a change already inaugurated in Florence as far back as 1250. It is this double purpose that constitutes their specific character. It behoves us to unearth more of these laws in the Florence Archives and collate them with those of Bologna before deciding that the Enactments of Justice, so peculiarly connected with the whole course of Florentine history, were mere copies of the Bolognese ordinances. Professor Gaudenzi's publications do honour to his historical research. But I venture to repeat that, in my opinion, the question cannot be really settled without fresh investigation of the Florentine rolls. This task is now being carried on by Signor Salvemini, and I hope that he may make some new and profitable discovery. The problem is interesting enough to claim solution.

DOCUMENTO.487

V.

CHAPTER IX.489
THE FLORENTINE REPUBLIC IN DANTE'S TIME.

I.

AFTER the enforcement of the Enactments of Justice (1293) and the expulsion of Giano della Bella, the Florentine Republic passed through a phase of extraordinary and almost delirious confusion. Its incidents are very familiar to us, owing to the splendid series of chroniclers and historians who, from that moment, began to record the minutest particulars of all that occurred under their eyes. Modern writers have also studied that period and ransacked its archives; more especially Professor Del Lungo, who has recently given proofs of an industry and learning which cannot be sufficiently praised. Nevertheless, I believe that some useful work may be done by trying to bring all those facts together and scrutinising their organic unity, in order to ascertain whence they proceeded, whither they tended, and thus explain, if possible, the primary cause of so much disorder and the real significance of the new revolutions undertaken. I may also add that such investigation might prove to have much historical importance, since it concerns the time in which not only a new art, new literature, and new civilisation first sprang into being, but when the old mediæval social order was decaying and fading away, and the society of the Renaissance beginning to take shape.

In the midst of these events the figure of Dante Alighieri stands forth in giant mould, instantaneously arousing the most earnest attention, and enhancing the value of all his surroundings.

As we have frequently observed and repeated, the history of Florence runs a very plain course down to the year 1293, through the series of wars and revolutions, during which the Guelph inhabitants of the city first attacked the Ghibelline feudal lords, who, castled on every surrounding hill, impeded all trade; and then, having conquered them, demolished their strongholds, and forced them to dwell inside the city walls, subject to the laws of the Commune. Next, the people were compelled to combat and break down the surviving feudal element that sought to assert itself in the city. Before the year 1293 this too had been destroyed, and only the Grandi were left, namely, nobles stripped of their titles and of the old feudal privileges of their class. The Enactments of Justice, which dissolved their associations and excluded them from all share in the government, had increased, on the other hand, the strength of the guilds and the people. These accordingly were the masters of Florence, and the new law supplied them with a most efficacious means of continuing the persecution and routing the nobles in the tribunals of the State. The terms Guelph and Ghibelline were still retained, but had lost their original meaning. The old aristocracy, constituting the real nucleus of the Ghibelline party, having now disappeared, the city was wholly Guelph. The general condition of Italy also fostered this state of things. In fact, owing to the fall of the Hohenstauffens and the success of the Angevins, summoned to Italy by the Pope, the Guelph party had triumphed throughout the Peninsula. The murder of Conradin (1298) had proved the death knell of the Ghibellines.

The triumph of France was more and more assured, and during the interregnum of the Empire Philip the Beautiful played almost the part of an emperor. At the same time Boniface VIII. loudly declared that the Pope stood above all kings and princes of the earth, and that all were bound to yield him submission.

But division still reigned in Florence. First of all, germs of future discord were lurking in the bosom of the people itself, owing to its subdivision into rich people (popolo grasso), or the Greater Guilds, and small people (popolo minuto), or Lesser Guilds, having the populace at their back. The Greater Guilds, at the head of the principal manufacturing business and the vast export and import trade, were always ready to undertake fresh wars, which, by burdening the city with taxes, greatly diminished the internal luxury upon which the Lesser Guilds, engaged in small crafts, depended for their daily support. It needed little to convert this clash of material interests into a political conflict, especially when we remember that the Greater Guilds had taken possession of the government without allowing the Smaller Crafts any share in it. For the moment, however, the lower class, although so turbulent and numerically strong, lacked cohesion and experience, and had no leading men at its head. But although without real elements of political strength, and still incapable of forming a party, it was excellently suited to swell the ranks of already constituted parties having the wit to use its aid in their progress to power.

The nobles, on the other hand, although defeated, persecuted, and oppressed, were by no means stamped out, and still retained some measure of influence and skill. The expulsion of Giano della Bella was an instance in point; for, by contriving to make the people believe him its foe, they induced it to desert him and then provoked the mob to attack him. Although deprived of legal authority, the nobles were still practically strong. Always boasting of their victory of Campaldino, they had undoubtedly played a prominent part in all the greater wars of the Republic in past times, and even now made far better soldiers than the popular class. As the wealthy proprietors of town and country mansions, castles, and farms, they were undistracted by commercial cares, and had more leisure for military pursuits; while the material independence they enjoyed made them all the more sensitive to the sting of political ambition. It was natural that they should seek and obtain the co-operation of the populace in their contest with the burghers. Thus, in junction with the former, they constituted a vast and dangerous body of agitators, but without organic cohesion, and all equally ineligible to office, inasmuch as the nobles had been excluded from power in 1293, and the populace had never been allowed any share of it.

II.

At this time the world began to perceive what results the subtle craft of the Florentines was capable of achieving. The art of secretly becoming masters of the State, that, at a later period, gave Cosimo and Lorenzo dei Medici such triumphant supremacy in the Republic, enabling them to hold sovereign rule while remaining private citizens in the eyes of the law, this art was now discovered by the nobles. It consisted in leaving republican institutions untouched, and showing no desire to be concerned in them, yet contriving that none save personal adherents should be admitted to power. The offices of the Guelph Society afforded an efficacious means to this end, for, as we know, the nobles were eligible to those offices, and when holding them could declare any citizen a Ghibelline, confiscate his property, and exclude him from the government at their own pleasure. Thus, without being members of the Signory, they had found a more or less legal method of preventing their worst enemies from entering it. Giano della Bella was fully awake to this danger, and had tried to avert it; but the nobles had frustrated his purpose by compassing his expulsion from the city.

As another useful means of regaining their forfeited power, the nobles managed to obtain the right of choosing the magistrates, in order to exercise a personal influence over them. Many of the magistrates were foreigners who came provided with foreign notaries, chancellors, and subordinate judges, while certain others, as, for instance, the Podestà and the Captain of the People, were necessarily bound to be knights—that is to say, nobles. They gave judgment in political as well as civil and criminal cases. In fact, it was the function of the Podestà and Captain, in junction with the Gonfalonier, to enforce the enactments; and besides this, political and common law were so intermixed at the time, that it was impossible to separate the one from the other. Originally, as we have already seen, the Podestà was the virtual head of the Commune. He commanded the army, signed treaties of peace; and even as ancient historians recorded Roman events in the name of the Consuls in office, so the Florentine chroniclers registered the events of their city under the name of its Podestà and even occasionally of its Consuls. But towards the close of the thirteenth century things were changed. With the destroyal of feudalism, the development of civil equality and increased recognition of Roman law, the political importance of those offices was lessened. The Podestà and Captains of the People were gradually lowered to the status of ordinary high judges. Hence both they and their subordinates steadily declined in authority and strength; and being worse paid and less feared, became more open to bribery, and more easily subjected to the influence of the nobles. Many of these officers came from Romagna, and the Marches, and the greater number from Gubbio. Reared under tyrannical governments and trained to Roman law in the school of Bologna, they had no previous knowledge of the real significance of party conflicts in Florence, and seldom succeeded in acquiring it; hence they also failed to discern the true meaning of laws such as the Enactments of Justice, which were mainly political laws. All this contributed to render them easily and blindly subservient to those desiring to use them as tools. In fact, the whole literature of the period teems with fierce invectives against "the wicked, accursed, and perverted judges bringing ruin upon cities."490

Thus by favour of the lower class and the mob, by the unjust verdicts of the Captains of the Guelph Society and the corruption of alien judges, the nobles endeavoured to regain their lost ground and again seize possession of the government. Nor was it an altogether impossible plan, seeing that at this moment (as will be presently shown) they received powerful foreign aid. But unity was indispensably required, and no unity was to be secured among a party composed of not only different, but heterogeneous elements. Accordingly it was already easy to foresee that, sooner or later, the fiercest discord must inevitably break out in their midst.

Dino Compagni remarks in his Chronicle, that "the powerful citizens were not all nobles by birth, but were sometimes styled Grandi for other reasons."491 The Grandi, in fact, were composed of ancient aristocratic families, despoiled of feudal privileges and titles; of old-established burghers raised to a higher position on the score of their wealth and of those proclaimed Grandi by the people for the sole purpose of subjecting them to the penalty of exclusion from power. Naturally the old aristocracy were full of distrust and contempt for new-comers, who often continued (if not personally, by means of their kinsmen) to carry on trades and manufactures, and thus maintain their relations with the rich burghers opposed to the lower classes, whereas the latter were more in sympathy with the really influential and aristocratic section of the Grandi. Nor was this all. The latter party likewise comprised country nobles, such as the Ubertini, the Pazzi of Valdarno, and more particularly the Ubaldini owning nearly the whole of the Mugello and dominating it with their fortified castles. The fortress of Montaccenico, one of their main strongholds, guarded by a triple circuit of walls, had been founded by the Cardinal Ottavio degli Ubaldini, who has a place in Dante's "Inferno," and who once said, "If I ever had a soul, I have lost it, for the sake of the Ghibelline cause." All these territorial lords clung to their feudal traditions with far greater tenacity than the rest, and being very hostile to the people, were equally opposed to the Republic, which was always at strife with them. When residing in the city they were undoubtedly compelled, like the others, to obey the common laws; but in their own castles they and their kindred still asserted the rights of feudal barons.

In order to sap the strength of the Pazzi and Ubertini, the Florentines, in 1296, established the two colonies of San Giovanni and Castelfranco between Figline and Montevarchi in the Upper Valdarno. All adherents of the nobles willing to settle on these domains were freed from vassalage and exempted from taxation for ten years.492 But measures of this kind would have been useless against the Ubaldini, and prolonged and sanguinary hostilities had to be engaged with them. By logical rule these territorial lords should have been Ghibellines and imperialists; but the Empire was now distant and feeble, France and the Pope were menacing close at hand. Accordingly they rather tended to combine with the Guelph nobles of Florence, and more particularly with those of ancient descent, thus forming a new element in that curious agglomeration of diverse forces. Also, seeing that private jealousies and hates are always readier to burst into flame when unrestrained by the organic unity and common interest of a well-organised party, it will be easy to understand what confusion and disorder prevailed.

III.

Notwithstanding the powerful support of one kind or another furnished to the nobles from abroad, and in spite of their really menacing attitude, there remained one inexorable truth that must be always kept in view, since it affords the best explanation of the phase of Florentine history. It consisted in the fact that the aristocratic faction, doomed to decay and dissolution, was confronted by the young and vigorous party united in the Greater Guilds, bound by common interests, and constituting the real motive power and future of the Commune. The history of those times is nothing more, in short, than the history of the process by which the Greater Guilds succeeded in becoming the very core of the Republic, in spite of the numerous obstacles in their path, and likewise succeeded in eliminating all hostile or alien elements. For some time past these guilds, and especially the first five, on which all the others were more or less dependent,493 had been prospering to an extraordinary degree. And when their position was farther strengthened by the Enactments of Justice, their statutes, with the amendments then introduced, very clearly showed that in augmenting their own wealth they purposed not only to enrich the Republic, but also to heighten its power. Before long the five leading guilds jointly constituted an Universitas Mercatorum that rose to the authority of a regular commercial tribunal in 1308, and issued a definite set of statutes in 1312. Indeed all this may be considered the main part of the reforms promoted by Giano della Bella,494 and the point on which, favoured by the conditions of the period, he was most successful. We have the best proof of this in the fact that incessant party strife notwithstanding, the prosperity of Florence increased, at that time, to a positively prodigious extent. Villani repeatedly alludes to this state of prosperity and general well-being, adding that continual festivities were then held in Florence, and that the Republic could call to arms as many as 30,000 men in the city, and 70,000 in the territory.495 What was of still greater moment, its bankers manipulated the chief trade of the world, and flooded all markets with Florentine goods. They conducted the affairs of the Roman Curia; they managed nearly the whole commerce of France and Southern Italy; all the sovereigns of Europe came to these bankers for aid, and frequently employed keen-witted, enterprising Florentines in their mints, their treasuries, and their embassies. Thus money flowed into the city from all sides; and it was at this moment, so it is said, that Boniface VIII., giving audience to the ambassadors of various powers, and finding to his surprise that all of them were Florentines, cried out, "You Florentines must be the fifth element!" As a natural result of this state of things the petty Republic became a first-class power, wielding everywhere, and over Italy in particular, a preponderating influence. All neighbouring cities, great and small, tried to copy the laws and institutions they deemed the source of its amazing prosperity. Even Rome herself seemed desirous to organise her magistracies, councils, and Commune on the Florentine pattern.496

It was this that most irritated the Popes in their perpetual struggle with the Roman municipality, and now specially irritated Boniface VIII., who seemed determined to crush the Commune. But he was strenuously opposed by the nobility and people, who gave him no truce, and drove him to wander, almost a fugitive, from town to town. Of haughty temper and boundless ambition, his conception of the papal authority rose to the height of craving universal rule. Hence he could not be resigned to the stubbornness of the Romans, and still less to the example and encouragement afforded them by Florence. He therefore conceived the plan of subduing the latter city and reducing it almost to the condition of a fief of the Church, under a governor of his own choice. Having once formed this scheme, he began to prosecute it with his customary ardour. There was certainly a good chance of success, save for one insurmountable obstacle that he omitted to take into account. The chance in his favour was the fact that Florence, being now a republic of traders, had small means of offering armed resistance. The army of 100,000 men, so proudly enumerated by Villani, consisted of a species of national guard of artisans and peasants having the barest smattering of military training, with no officers and no generals fitted to take command. It comprised no mounted troops, since nobles alone could find time for the requisite cavalry training. The Commune naturally feared to place any trust in the nobles of the town, while those of the territory were avowedly hostile. The Companies of Adventure, afterwards open to hire, had not yet begun to be established. Nevertheless, an army was needed, and, moreover, one commanded by competent leaders, if the Republic wished to preserve its authority in Italy, and protect its trade from the growing jealousy of its neighbours. This was the reason formerly inducing its rash acceptance of Vicars nominated by the Popes, and that had also induced it to confer supremacy for ten years on Charles of Anjou, who had accordingly supplied the State with captains and soldiery. Why should not Boniface be able to clench a similar bargain on even more effective and permanent terms? The Republic's need of a military leader was as urgent, nay, more urgent than before; while the consent and support of the nobles might be considered assured. But the insurmountable obstacle, unforeseen by the Pope, was that the Florentines had always wanted and still wanted defenders, but refused to have rulers; nor would it be easy to induce them to yield this point, either by craft or persuasion. The subject on which they were most tenacious, and would never give way, was the popular government of the guilds, and this government would have to be destroyed or reduced to submission before the Pope's scheme could be carried into effect.

The task certainly had its difficulties. In fact, the problem could only be solved by force, and Boniface was not the man to shrink from employing it; hence collision was unavoidable. As an additional complication, the Republic, about to bear the brunt of the Pope's fury, was thoroughly and determinately Guelph, not only Guelph from sentiment or by force of old traditions, but even more from motives of interest. In fact, it had risen to existence by centuries of struggle with powerful Ghibellines and aristocrats, and had finally built up the government of the guilds on the ruins of those adversaries' strength, and greatly assisted therein by the success of the Angevins summoned to Italy by the Popes. The chief trade of the Republic, and main source of its vitality and power, was that carried on with France, with Southern Italy—now held by the Angevins—and with Rome. Hence it could not entertain the idea of rousing the enmity of the French king, Pope, and Angevins, who were all allied at the time. Besides, the Ghibelline party in Tuscany was then represented by all the cities hostile to Florence. Sienna, Arezzo, and Pistoia inclined more or less openly to the Ghibelline side. The Pisan Republic, which had so zealously assisted Conradin's cause, still flaunted the Ghibelline flag. This State was in perpetual rivalry with Florence, and sought to bar her from access to the sea, the command of which was now more pressingly needed than before. The strife between these republics could only end in the annihilation of the one or the other. Therefore the Florentines were compelled to keep on good terms with the Pope, yet at the same time forced into opposition against him. In this condition of affairs all will understand why Florentine history should be so complicated and obscure.

IV.

After the expulsion of Giano della Bella, the nobles seemed again masters of the city for a time; and their spirits were immoderately raised by their success in procuring the election of a Signory (June 15, 1295) exclusively composed of their own friends. By the beginning of July they had concerted their plans, and repaired to the Piazza armed for the fray. But the people were already gathered there and in superior force, so that civil war would have instantly broken out had not certain friars and citizens intervened, and fortunately contrived to pacify the public excitement. Nevertheless, the Signory being favourable to the nobles, determined to turn the opportunity to account, and on July 6, 1295, managed to get the Bill passed that, as we have previously related, was incorporated in the enactments for the purpose of modifying them and considerably attenuating their severity.497

Some of these modifications were of a purely formal kind, but others encroached on the substance of the law. As the enactments now stood, accomplices in the offences decreed punishable were no longer classed with the direct authors of crimes, a single Capitanus homicidii now being recognised. Nor was the testimony of two witnesses of good repute any longer considered sufficient proof of the crime, the testimony of three witnesses now being required. Finally it was no longer indispensable that candidates to the Signory should be practically engaged in some trade, continue artem exercentes; their enrolment in the guild of the trade being decreed sufficient proof of their eligibility, qui scripti sint in libro seu matricola alicuius artis. This last concession was, in fact, slighter than it appeared, seeing that even before then the practical exercise of trade had been more often apparent than real. But the principle for which men had fought was now cast aside, and putting together the various concessions granted in 1295, we plainly see that the amendment of the law was a genuine victory for the nobles. In fact, the popular discontent ran high at the passing of this Bill, and Villani tells us that the Signory who had proposed and carried it were treated with much contumely and scorn on leaving office, and even greeted with volleys of stones in the public streets.498 Accordingly a popular reaction ensued that proved to be the germ of new and serious discord among the citizens. The first step taken was to deprive the nobles of certain of their weapons; the next to proclaim some of the less factious aristocrats members of the popular class, in order to weaken their party.499 Besides this, fresh laws were soon decreed to restore the pristine force of the enactments, followed by other measures of the same kind, culminating in the creation of a new magistrate for the express purpose, as will be seen, of ensuring the strict fulfilment of the law. But it was impossible for these changes to be effected without fresh discord and bloodshed in the city.

For there was not only fiercer strife just then between the nobles and the people, but the former now split into two divisions, formed respectively of those bent on doing away with the enactments, and those who had renounced that idea. These new factions were designated by the names of the two families acting as leaders, namely, the Donati and the Cerchi. The latter were of humble origin, but had made their way up and were now counted among the richest merchants in the world. They boasted a wide-spreading kindred, numerous friends, owned vast estates both in town and country, and lived in grand style. They had recently purchased many palaces of the Counts Guidi, members of the oldest Florentine nobility; and by lending their houses at St. Procolo to the Signory, to whom no palace had yet been assigned, were more easily enabled to keep in favour with the heads of the State. Villani, being of the opposite party, says that the Cerchi were "easy-going, innocent, and savage." They were, in fact, business folk, unpractised in warfare, and with small aptitude for political intrigue. The term "savage" was applied to them on account of their humble descent, and Dante himself, though an adherent of their party, speaks of it as "savage" (selvaggia). In virtue of their origin and continued practice of trade, they were liked and esteemed by the people, and their avowed opposition to the Donati500 won them still higher favour. Besides the advantages of wealth and of wide-spreading family ties, their courtesy of manner helped to advance their popularity.

On the contrary, the "gentle-born and warlike" Donati, as Villani calls them, were of old feudal descent. Messer Corso, the head of the family, was a daring, shrewd, hard-hitting man, of moderate means, but so immoderately haughty and ambitious as to tolerate no equals, and least of all among the enriched merchants. He was known as the baron, and Compagni, who was on the Cerchi side, says that whenever Corso rode through the streets, "he seemed the lord of the earth" ("che la terra fosse sua"). Many magnates of the city, many nobles of the territory, and particularly the Pazzi of the Upper Valdarno, considered him their leader. Some of the merchants also adhered to him, and among others the Spini, who owned a bank in Rome, and as business agents for the Pope and the Curia, drove a very profitable trade. This Donati faction was detested by the burghers, but in favour with the populace, who greeted the baron with shouts of applause as he passed through the streets. But although Corso's courage and subtlety stood him in good stead during the struggle now impending, his arrogance alienated many followers and disposed them to join the Cerchi. The Cavalcanti were among his opponents, and that graceful poet and valorous knight, young Guido Cavalcanti, had conceived so special and deadly a hatred for him that the two never met in the streets without drawing their swords. The Donati's influence in the city was chiefly owed to the favour of the captains of the party, while that of the Cerchi was maintained by the support of the Signory. Thus the palace of the Guelph Society and of the Priors became the headquarters, as it were, of the two opposing camps. The two families likewise owned neighbouring estates in the country and dwelt near each other in town. Their respective houses were situated in the St. Piero quarter or sesto of the city, which, on account of the continual disturbances occurring there at the time, was known by the name of "The Scandalous Sesto" (Sesto dello Scandalo). Everything served as fuel to the flame. Words uttered by either party were reported and exaggerated to the other. How Corso Donati always spoke of Guido Cavalcanti as Guido Cavicchia; how, when alluding to the head of the family and party chief, Vieri de' Cerchi, he would ask, "Has the ass of Porta brayed to-day?" On the other hand, the Donati were styled by their adversaries "The Ill-famed," as being men of bad repute and doers of evil.

It is not easy to exactly ascertain how and when these parties first became known as Bianchi and Neri, for the chroniclers are rather vague and not altogether agreed upon the point. Both names were of old usage in Florence as distinctive family appellations; in fact, there had already been White Cerchi and Black Cerchi, but the latter afterwards became the chiefs of the White party.501 The same names had then been employed to designate two opposite factions of the Cancellieri house waging fierce strife in Pistoia. The Florentines, who exercised great authority in that town, mediated between the two sides to bring them to make peace; and to achieve this intent sent some members of the Pistoian, Bianchi, and Neri to Florence. The Whites were quartered in the Frescobaldi palace, the Blacks in the house of certain Cerchi, to whom they were related. But this measure had a very unexpected result, for, as Villani502 remarks, even as one sick sheep infects another with disease, so the Pistoians communicated their party hatred to the Florentines, who thus became increasingly divided. At all events, from that time the Donati were Blacks, the Cerchi Whites.

Hence it may be clearly seen that this division of parties no longer corresponds with that of the Guelphs and Ghibellines. Principles are set aside and personal passions and hatreds more and more dominant. But, in the nature of things, no Florentine family at the time could have a better claim to be entitled Ghibellines than the Donati, a line boasting feudal descent, and connected with the oldest nobility of the city and its territory. The head of the house was Messer Corso, who, after the death of his first wife, contracted a second marriage with one of the Ubertini, an old Ghibelline family that had been always opposed to the popular government, and seemed to have the very blood of the tyrants of Romagna and Lombardy in its veins. Yet it was principally through Corso Donati that events again took another unexpected turn. Spurred by his devouring ambition, he started a secret intrigue with Boniface VIII. through his Roman agents, the Spini, and the Pope believed that at last he had found a man after his own heart.503 And before very long these secret practices produced visible results.