Chapter I · ITALY IN THE DARK AGE (continued 2)

[1146-1204 A.D.]

Elated by success and jealous of the counts Guidi by whose possessions she was nearly surrounded, Florence assembled an army in February, 1146, and besieged Monte Croce, a castello about nine miles distant which belonged to that family; but confidence in superiority of force created carelessness of conduct, and Count Guido aided by the people of Arezzo defeated them with great loss. For a time they were quieted by this sharp military lesson, and a crusade the following year under the emperor Conrad III carried off some of their more enterprising and devout spirits to Palestine; amongst them Dante’s ancestor Cacciaguida, who, after having been knighted by Conrad, fell in battle against the infidels.e

So while the towns of Lombardy were leaguing together boldly to defend the most cherished interests of independence, the little Tuscan republic was only busy extending her territory, and increasing at the expense of her neighbours, she was already the cunning Florence of the fifteenth century, for whom egoism is the fundamental principle of politics. However, it will not do to be unjust; while fighting and subduing the neighbouring nobles she was also striking a blow at expiring Germanism; it was the municipality triumphing over the members of the feudal body, as at Legnano it triumphed over their chief. The emperor Frederick Barbarossa was well aware of it; and when he came to Florence in 1184, after the Peace of Constance, he listened with interest to the complaints of the nobles, and was well pleased to take from the city the sovereignty which she had violently assumed over the surrounding country, contrary to written law. The Florentines submitted without a murmur to this severe sentence; they knew that they had only to wait and to let the storm pass over. In fact, four years later all the surrounding districts had once more submitted to the burghers.

Ten years later they gained still further advantage by the interregnum which left Germany a prey to the struggles of Otto IV and Philip of Swabia and made Italy “a widow of her king.” It was then that they formed a Guelf league on the model of the Lombard League, and succeeded in subduing that part of the rural nobility which had till then remained independent. The nobles were forced to take an oath of fidelity to the republic and to promise to live peacefully and quietly in the town.

In the midst of these political disturbances the trade and wealth of the city constantly increased. She had till then depended on Pisa, a much richer and more flourishing town, to which she acted, so to say, as bank; after destroying Fiesole, which dominated her completely by its position and hindered her commerce, in the twelfth century, she made a swift step forward and became, first the rival of Siena, later on that of Pisa itself.

[1138-1239 A.D.]

This is the period which the Florentines of the following century were in the habit of lauding as the golden age of the republic. The people were still chivalrous and industrious; their manners were simple; dresses were made of coarse material, women were honest and modest; young girls were not married before the age of twenty; and men did not seek “the largest dowry, but the best reputation.”

It would, however, be a great mistake to think that this period of virtuous patriarchal customs, sobriety, and simple living was free from disturbance. This people of Florence was a passionate race who had not yet passed through two centuries of revolution, nor yet experienced the paternal and enervating despotism of the Medicis, nor seen the armies of Charles V. The state of the town was far from being a calm one, and whether, because judiciary affairs had increased to too great an extent, or because the consuls were lacking in requisite authority, it soon became necessary, in order to maintain order and justice in the town, to follow the example of the other republics and call in a foreign podesta.

“Vice increasing in the town,” says Malaspina,n “and cases of ill-will and disputes becoming more frequent among the citizens, it was decided in the interest of the republic, in order to facilitate the punishment of crime and to prevent all interception, bribery, or intimidation of justice, that a foreigner of gentle birth should be appointed to the office of podesta for one year, to decide all trials with his judges, to render justice, pronounce condemnation of wealth and body, and to carry out the laws of the republic of Florence. Nevertheless the government of the consuls did not cease, since it kept the direction of all other business, and in this manner the town was governed till the period when the first nation of Florence was formed.”m

As the two famous names of Guelf and Ghibelline originated in these two rival houses of Bavaria and Franconia, and by their pernicious influence destroyed Italian prosperity and happiness, a short account of them will not here be irrelevant, especially as they were the principal though remote source of that inveterate disunion which has left the peninsula a constant prey to transalpine ambition. For many ages these factions prowled over Italy like lions seeking whom they could devour; they divided city from city, house from house, family from family; they tore asunder all domestic ties, undermined the dearest affections, and scattered duty, obligations, and humanity to the winds. But these fatal appellations were originally nothing more than the distinctive names of two princely German families whose chiefs were rivals in personal ambition and feudal power. The enmity of one to the popes was reason sufficient for the other’s determined adherence to the holy see; and though mere leaders of a petty feud, their names became from circumstances the rallying cry of two great opinions which, penetrating with the wonted subtilty of religious and political rancour into the smallest branches of national life, affected Italy and Germany to the quick.

When Conrad III was crowned king of Italy, the last four emperors had been chosen from the house of Franconia, a family that received its name from the castle of Waiblingen, or Gueibelinga, situated amongst the Hertfeld Mountains in the diocese of Augsburg and which was called indiscriminately “Salic” or “Gueibelinga.” The rival house, originally of Altdorf, at this period governed Bavaria, and in consequence of several of its princes being named “Guelfo” or “Welf,” both the family and its partisans received that appellation. The two last Henrys of the Ghibelline house of Franconia had long contests with the church, as already related, while the Bavarian Guelfs on the contrary always declared themselves its protectors from the days of Guelf IV, son of Albert Azzo, lord of Este, in 1076. From this branch is descended in a direct line the royal family of England and from his brother Folco the ancient marquises of Este, dukes of Ferrara, Modena, and Reggio.

These things, springing as they did from rivalry and disappointment, sharpened hereditary feuds, while the pontiff’s support of Lothair augmented the Ghibellines’ enmity to holy church; these names were not, however, permanently attached to the two factions until 1210, when Innocent III drove the fourth Otto from the imperial throne and took young Frederick of Sicily under his charge. The pope was then supported by the Ghibellines; but when the same Frederick turned to rend the church, the Guelfic banner again waved over it, and there continued until the final dissolution of these adverse factions, long after the original cause of their quarrels had melted entirely away.e

[476-1250 A.D.]

Such were the changes which the space of seven centuries from the fall of the Roman Empire accomplished in Italy. Towards the end of the fifth century the social tie, which had made of the empire one body, became dissolved, and was succeeded by no other. The citizen felt nothing for his fellow-citizen; he expected no support from him, and offered him none. He could nowhere invoke protection; he everywhere saw only violence and oppression. Towards the beginning of the twelfth century the citizens of the towns of Italy had as little to expect from abroad. The emperor of the Germans, who called himself their sovereign, was, with his barbarian army, only one enemy more. But universally, where the circle of the same wall formed a common interest, the spirit of association was developed. The citizens promised each other mutual assistance. Courage grew with liberty; and the Italians, no longer oppressed, found at last in themselves their own defence.

When the inhabitants of the cities of Italy associated for their common defence, their first necessity was to guard against the brigandage of the barbarian armies, which invaded their country and treated them as enemies; the second, to protect themselves from the robberies of other barbarians who called themselves their masters. Their united efforts soon insured their safety; in a few years they found themselves rich and powerful; and these same men, whom emperors, prelates, and nobles considered only as freed serfs, perceived that they constituted almost the only public force in Italy. Their self-confidence grew with their power; and the desire of domination succeeded that of independence. Those cities which had accumulated the most wealth, whose walls enclosed the greatest population, attempted, from the first half of the twelfth century, to secure by force of arms the obedience of such of the neighbouring towns as did not appear sufficiently strong to resist them. These greater cities had no intention to strip the smaller of their liberty; their sole purpose was to force them into a perpetual alliance, so as to share their good or evil fortune, and always place their armed force under the standard of the dominant city.b

FOOTNOTES