Note 38 — THE FIFTY COURTESIES FOR THE TABLE, OF FRA BONVESINO[13] DA RIVA.

The mention of a slave in a Florentine household of the late 13th or early 14th century may startle some readers. I translate the note which Signor Guglielmo Manzi, the editor of the Reggimento, supplies on this subject. ‘Slavery, which abases mankind, and revolts humanity and reason, diminished greatly when the Christian religion was introduced into the Roman Empire—that religion being in manifest opposition to so barbarous a system. The more the one progressed in the world, the more did the other wane; and, as Bodino observes in his book De Republicâ, slavery had ceased in Europe, to a great extent, by 1200. I shall follow this author, who is the only one to afford us some degree of light amid so great obscurity. In the year 1212 there were still, according to him, slaves in Italy; as may be seen from the ordinances of William, King of Sicily, and of the Emperor Frederick II. for the kingdom of Naples, and from the decretals of the Popes Alexander III., Urban III., and Innocent III., concerning the marriages of slaves. The first of these Popes was elected in 1158, the second in 1185, and the third in 1198; so that the principle of liberty cannot be dated earlier than in or about 1250—Bartolo, who lived in the year 1300, writing (Hostes de Captivis, I.) that in his time there were no slaves, and that, according to the laws of Christendom, men were no longer put up to sale. This assertion, however, conflicts with the words of our author, who affirms that in his time—that is, at the commencement of the 14th century—the custom existed. But, in elucidation of Bartolo, it should be said that he implied that men were no longer sold, on the ground that this was prohibited by the laws of Christendom, and the edicts of sovereigns. In France it can be shown that in 1430 Charles VII. gave their liberty to some persons of servile condition; and even in the year 1548 King Henri II. liberated, by letters patent, those of the Bourbonnais: and the like was done throughout all his states by the Duke of Savoy in 1561. In the Hundred Tales of Boccaccio we have also various instances showing that the sale of free men was practised in Italy. These are in the 6th Tale of the 2nd Day, the story of Madonna Beritola, whose sons remained in Genoa in serfdom; and in the 6th of the 5th Day, the story of Frederick, King of Sicily; and in the 7th of the same Day, the story of Theodore and Violante. It is therefore clear, from all this evidence, that, in the time of Messer Francesco, so execrable a practice was still prevalent; and, summing up all we have said, it must be concluded that serfdom, in non-barbarian Europe, was not entirely extinguished till the 16th century.’