Joe Figliulo-Rosswurm/UC Santa Barbara JoeFigs@gmail.

com Badia Burning: The Spectacle of Violence in 14th-century Tuscany [delivered at Louisiana State University, Grad History Conference, March 2013, Baton Rouge, Louisiana] Sometime in July 1348, five men of the Bardi, one of the elite lineages excluded from Florentine political life and labelled magnates, attacked San Cristoforo Perticaia, an isolated church in the Valdarno di Sopra.i We know of this attack because its victims later lodged a denunciation with the Executor of the Ordinances of Justice, a Florentine court established in 1306 to restrain elite violence.ii Approaching the church, the Bardi and their armed followers found it defended by men of the local parish in the absence of the parish priest. Enraged at their defiance, the Bardi battered down the doors of the church and began shooting at the defenders with crossbows.iii As they attacked, the Bardi mocked their victims and the weakness of the Florentine commune. After driving out the defenders and murdering one of them, the Bardi occuppied the church and its surrounding territory in open defiance of Florence and its church.iv Although some of the Bardi were sentenced to death, the Florentine courts eventually commuted their sentences, and they were not punished.v This case raises several questions for historians studying violence and its social logic. Why did the Bardi attack the church? While doing so, why did they explicitly mock the Florentine commune and its institutions? Why did the Florentine courts not prosecute the Bardi more aggressively, given the evidence against them and the eight witnesses?vi Is there any logic to this attack, or was it simply another case of medieval elites behaving badly?vii How do we fit the textually circumscribed report of this incident in a broader context, the relationship between the nascent Florentine state and the

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magnates? Based on this case, and similar ones housed in Florences State Archive, can we identify forms of violence unique to Tuscan society in the fourteenth century? The theme of this paper is the use of ecclesiastical properties as sites of theatrical violence, and the role of violence in the complex discourse between powerful rural lords and the Florentine commune. Florentine nobles asserted dominance over rural properties while using these same properties to demonstrate their defiance of the Florentine commune and their imperviousness to its power. Because of the explicit claims of the Florentine commune to be the protector of the Florentine Churchs properties and rights, attacking these properties not only added to a magnate lineages liquid wealth; they directly defied the commune and invited retribution. Yet the commune was typically unwilling or unable to exact this retribution.viii These raids thus dramatized the communes inability to protect its subjects, the magnates de facto power over rural parishes, and asserted the magnates traditional hold over ecclesiastical properties.ix The magnates victims, the residents of Florentine Tuscany, were the means of communicating this dramatized defiance to the commune, through the denunciations they lodged with the Florentine courts. The dramatic violence of the Bardi attack was a tactic in the lineages attempt at cementing its hold over rural properties.x This violence was part of a wider discourse on the state and its limitations in late medieval Tuscany. Florentine institutions, unable to actively punish elite violence, were perversely quite capable of publicizing it.xi The core of this paper is a close reading of one case of theatrical violence. I first summarize the dynamics of fourteenth-century Florence and the cases socio-political context. I then outline how the Florentine courts functioned. After discussing the Bardi case in depth, I

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conclude with some hypotheses on what detailed case studies can offer to historians engaged in wider discussions of violence and its performance. Florentine Tuscany and the Florentine Church Before the catastrophe of the Black Death in 1348, Florence was one of the greatest cities of Europe. In 1300, its population hovered around 120,000, while the population of the city and the surrounding countryside under its control, the contado, came to about 400,000 people.xii Florentine families such as the Bardi, Peruzzi, and Frescobaldi were among the leading bankers in Europe, funding the English kings wars with France.xiii Florence was an important link in the international cloth trade; its merchants imported raw French wool, dyed and finished it, and exported it to the Mediterranean world.xiv Although the city was not yet the hub of intellectual production it would become under the Medici, early fourteenth-century Florence nevertheless had its share of cultural luminaries. Dante, Giotto de Bondone, and Fra Remigio dei Girolami exemplified the bourgeois ethos of a mercantile boomtown.xv Factional strife was, however, tearing Florence apart. By the mid-thirteenth century, the city was divided between two groups: the magnates and popolo.xvi It is hard to define the two categories succinctly or concretely, despite the efforts of scholars dating back to the 1890s.xvii I define the magnates as those elite Florentine families who provided the traditional military and political leadership of the city, and used violence as a political tactic of first resort.xviii In legal and chronicle sources of the 1290s, the magnates are identified as noble families possessing at least one knight in the past twenty years, those families which popular opinion (or publica fama) considered magnates, or those already paying security deposits as magnates.xix The phrase popolo generally refers

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to the collectivity of non-elite residents of Florence and its contado. A distinction was typically made between the popolo grasso, the wealthiest guildsmen, bankers and rentiers, and the popolo minuto, lesser guildsmen, urban artisans, and shopkeepers.xx Popolani were members of the Florentine popolo. The popolo succeeded in wresting control of Florence away from the magnates and their allies among the merchant plutocracy twice between 1293 and 1343, both times for a period of only a few years.xxi The definitive expression of popular animosity toward the magnates was the Ordinances of Justice. Promulgated in 1293 with revised editions later in 1293 and a definitive redaction in 1295, the Ordinances expressed the determination of the urban merchants and shopkeepers to restrain the arrogance and violence of the elite. This group also laid claim to the highest offices of the commune. The Ordinances were an ideological justification of a new regime, which also reflected a fundamental shift in the sources of political power from military service to economic activity.xxii The Florentine church was at the center of these struggles. A recent study estimates that church property constituted perhaps 33% of all taxable wealth in Florentine Tuscany by 1320.xxiii Ecclesiastical rights, such as control of parish churches or monasteries and their revenues, were essential assets for the magnate lineages.xxiv In some cases, elite lineages seem to have formed specifically to ensure continued control over ecclesiastical rights. Under pressure from the popolo during the late thirteenth century, magnate lineages often clashed over the revenue from church properties.xxv Members of the popolo grasso, the wealthiest members of the popolo such as international bankers and cloth merchants, acquired ecclesiastical properties as one way

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of entering the elite.xxvi Tithes-the tenth of all revenues paid to the church-of rural parish churches often found their way into the hands of the local nobility.xxvii Church property played a fundamental role in the Florentine economy in general, and the wealth of elite lineages in particular. It is no surprise, then, that the Florentine commune positioned itself as the guardian of the Florentine church during the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. Rubric XXIII of the 1295 Ordinances of Justice identified the magnates as the primary threat to the goods and possessions of churches, monasteries, and hospitals.xxviii Since many scandals are arising from the cause of churches and possessions pertaining to the church, the ordinance directed the Capitano del Popolo to inquire into the occupation of churches or monasteries, and force magnates to return any ill-gotten goods to ecclesiastical foundations.xxix The 1322-1325 statutes of the Capitano del popolo and Podest reveal an ongoing effort to protect church property from occupation and confiscation by laymen, usually magnates.xxx These statutes are a collection of laws originally promulgated at various points in the thirteenth and fourteenth century, and cannot be taken as reflecting the concrete reality of the 1320s.xxxi They do, however, give us a sense of the sort of threats to church property and prelates that lawmakers envisioned as plausible, especially in the countryside. Church patrons are required to cease living in houses belonging to these churches, and to also cease living off their churches revenues and lands.xxxii The Capitano del popolo and Podest are entreated to defend monasteries and their residents from laymen and robbers, and prosecute those who assault or murder clerics. This was, apparently, a favored pasttime of the Pazzi lineage, who the statutes identify as having recently murdered clerics.xxxiii

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As part of the communes efforts at constraining magnate crimes, it established the office of the Executor of the Ordinances of Justice in 1306.xxxiv The Executor was charged with enforcing the Ordinances, auditing communal officials at the end of their term in office, and supervising the communal prisons. He was also required to be a foreign popolano.xxxv Proceedings were typically opened by anonymous written denunciations (tamburagioni) placed in a box (the cassetta or tamburo) outside the palace of the Executor.xxxvi Once a week, the Executor and Capitano del Popolo opened the box in the presence of notaries from their respective entourages (famiglie), and recorded the denunciations in registers. Denouncers were required to note whether witnesses knew of the crime by sight (de visu) or via publica fama, public renown.xxxvii Denunciations were copied into the Executors registers in the language of original composition: either Latin heavily inflected by volgare, or Tuscan dialect. There were many advantages to this system of anonymous denunciations, from the denouncers point of view: unlike in accusatorial procedures, the person initiating the case was not responsible for the accuseds judicial expenses if the case did not result in prosecution.xxxviii Furthermore, the tamburo system offered the denouncer the protection of anonymity.xxxix If the Executor thought there was enough evidence to convict a magnate, he forwarded the case to the civil or criminal court of the Podest. This court then held a trial and passed a sentence.xl Through a spirit of committing.evil deeds:xli The Bardi at S. Cristophano Let us return, now, to the Bardi case that I opened with. The attack occurred sometime in July 1348, but was not reported to the Executor until 24 January 1348/49.xlii The attack occurred as the Black Death was ravaging Florence and its countryside: this

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may explain the delay in reporting it. The perpetrators were Andrea, Francesco, and Tocto, sons of Filippozzo de Bardi, and their relatives Bindo son of Andrea di Bardi and Ceri Buonaguidi. Andrea and Francesco were prominent members of the lineage, among those banned from Florence following a failed coup in 1340.xliii Assembling an armed band on a Bardi estate in the Florentine Chianti, they rode to the church of S. Cristoforo Perticaia.xliv They found the church vacant and the rector absent; the Black Death may have killed him. Certain men of the parish were, however, guarding it, and locked the doors upon the companys arrival. The Bardi men and their followers smashed down the door and began shooting crossbow quarrels at the churchs defenders. The Bardi and their followers beat several of the defenders, hacked one to death, and occupied the church. Given the imperfect tense used, it appears that they held onto the church for several months after the attack. The anonymous denouncer closed by noting that the affair was against the form of justice and the Ordinances of justice, and begged the Executor to punish the miscreants.xlv This clause may be a reference to the statutes cited above. It is likely that the attack on the church was motivated in part by economic considerations. The Bardi banking company had gone bust in 1346, and the devastation and social disruption caused by the Black Death gave Tocto and his minions an opportunity to assert proprietary rights over S. Cristoforo Perticaia. I focus here on two elements of this case: the context for the attack, and the dialogue that appears in it. The attack seems to have occurred during the daytime, in public: the church faced on the towns piazza.xlvi Eight men of S. Cristoforo and sixteen other men, some from Florence, were cited as witnesses to the crime and what the Bardi said to their victims: this was a performance of domination as much as an occupation.xlvii

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I would like to suggest that the attack was the sort of violent direct action that could initiate a medieval legal claim: the Bardi were declaring their rights over the church of S. Cristoforo in the most direct way possible.xlviii The brazenly public attack gave it this claim legal standing, if not in the courts, then at least in publica fama, public renown or reputation.xlix This claim would have been reinforced when the Bardi went unpunished for the attack and occupation-as noted above, their sentences were eventually cancelled.l To a certain extent, this sort of attack was unexceptional, perhaps rooted in the legal and political culture of Florentine Tuscany: similar direct action appears in numerous twelfth-century court cases and numerous other cases reviewed by the Executor.li Tuscan nobles habitually used humiliating violence to maintain and reassert their claims over property and servile dues. The description of the attack indicates that the intent seems to have been to publicize the Bardi claim, and humiliate the churchs defenders, not to massacre them. It is striking that despite shooting at the defenders and beating them, the Bardi only killed one man: this is the sort of semi-ritualized violence typical of a feuding culture.lii In some ways this raid was simply business as usual in Florentine Tuscany. By 1348, however, the state was a real presence in the countryside: we only know of the incident because someone in the piviere of S. Leolino a Rignano thought it worthwhile to involve the Florentine commune.liii The denouncer may not have sought the conviction and execution of the Bardi. Perhaps, rather, he (she?) was increasing the stakes outside the court, by threatening the Bardi men with state action.liv Either way, Tuscan elites were not entirely free to do as they wished in the countryside by the 1340s,

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and this leads me to the second aspect of the case. As they attacked, the Bardi men mocked their victims and the Florentine commune, saying: We have already many times broken the popolo of Florence[,] well can we safely smash [the popolo] of S. Cristophano in Porticaia once again [and] another time and the tamburo is at Florence[,] for that reason we are here in the contado and do it here in our wisdom[,] and we will hang you like robbers over these oak trees[,] you and whoever disobeys.lv This reads like a mixture of elite arrogance and outraged propriety. Certain of escaping punishment, Tocto and his relatives are still aware of the Florentine communes institutions: the tamburo may have been in Florence, but one of the Porticenese made it there to initiate an inquest. Tocto, Andrea and Francesco themselves had been banned from Florence already, for the failed conspiracy of 1340.lvi Nevertheless, Tocto (or whichever Bardi was speaking) seems to imply a legitimate claim to the church and local juridical rights: that is the implication, in any case, of the threat to hang the defenders like robbers.lvii If the attack was in the first instance a claim on the church and its revenues, it was also an open challenge to Florence to do something about this attack. When they failed to appear in court, the Podest did, initially, condemn Francesco and Tocto to death, and fined Andrea and Ceci. But their sentences were then cancelled in a general amnesty of1352/53.lviii While the Florentine courts may not have been primarily interested in suppressing violence, they were certainly colluding in the oppression of those they claimed to protect.lix I will close by suggesting the multifaceted nature of the theater of violence I allude to in the title of this paper. As they attacked S. Cristoforos hapless defenders, the Bardi seem to have had in mind the reaction not only of the material witnesses, but of Florentine officials. Whoever denounced the attack also served as a go-between for the

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Bardi and the commune, reporting the Bardi sense of imperviousness to the Florentine courts for Tocto and his compagnia. The fama of the attack was thus spread not only in the vicinity of Perticaia, but also made its way into the Florentine institutional network. The lineages claim to the church was thus amplified and broadcast further than the attack on its own would have. This complex information network further points to the attack as a form of defiance, mocking the communes claim to be the guardian of the Florentine church. Raids like this one were a double blow: they underlined the states inability or unwillingness to prosecute magnates, as well as its inability to protect church property. Conclusion What does this case study offer for historians working on violent action? It points to the historically contingent nature of violent action: violence is not a transhistorical category. Violence, at least public violence like that practiced by the Bardi, always has an audience.lx The aim of Tocto and his relations was public humiliation and the assertion of claims, not aimless mayhem. The incident fits into a pattern discernible in Florentine Tuscany in the twelfth century. The victims, victimizers, and observers would probably have been familiar with the logic of raiding a church as a way of asserting a claim to it.lxi Violence is thus structured by society, while also structuring it.lxii Another point I wish to underline is the importance of the state in late medieval rural life. State institutions affected patterns of violence insofar as courts like the Executors office became involved as possible mediators in local disputes. What these institutions did not do was just as important as what they did. Portraying itself as the defender of popolani and the church, the Florentine commune ended up being neither in the case discussed above. Yet it did succeed at inserting itself into the petty disputes,

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fights, and quarrels at the village level so necessary to gain legitimacy in a fundamentally local, face-to-face society.lxiii Doing so, the Florentine commune was gradually edging out other sources of power in the fourteenth-century countryside, or absorbing preexisting arrangements into itself.lxiv The wretched case of the men of S. Cristoforo Perticaia lies at the core of this process. It is through micro-studies such as the one outlined above that we can reconstruct the role of violence in state-building and social change. ' ' ''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
The case is from the Archivio di Stato di Firenze [hereafter ASF], Atti dellEsecutore degli Ordinamenti di Giustizia [hereafter AdE] 119, 26 recto-27 recto [hereafter AdE, 119.26r-27r, etc.]. ii The Archivio di Stato di Firenzes Sistema Informatico provides a useful introduction to the Executors court: http://www.archiviodistato.firenze.it/siasfi/cgibin/RSOLSearchSiasfi.pl?_op=printcomparch&id=IFBA3736XX&livello=&_cobj=yes&_langua ge=eng&_selectbycompilationdate=SI AdE, 119.26r. AdE, 119.27r. v For the condemnations and eventual commutation of the sentences, see: ASF, Atti del Podest [hereafter AdP], 404.81r-v and 404.90r. vi AdE, 119.26r. vii For the historiography on medieval aristocrats and violence, see Daniel Lord Smail, Violence and predation in medieval mediterranean Europe, Comparative studies in society and history 54 (2012): 7-34. viii The best general account of the relationship between Florence and its Church is George W. Dameron, Florence and its Church in the Age of Dante (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2005).
iv iii i

See George W. Dameron, Revisiting the Italian magnates: church property, social conflict, and political legitimation in the thirteenth-century commune, Viator 23 (1992), 167-83, for the role of ecclesiastical properties in thirteenth-century political conflicts. x The best account of the Bardi, one of Florences premier banking families, remains Armando Sapori, La crisi delle compagnie mercantili dei Bardi e dei Peruzzi (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1926). xi See Smail, Violence, 14-21, for the role of courts as publicists. xii John M. Najemy, A History of Florence, 1200-1575 (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, Inc.), 97.

ix

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'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''
R.A. Goldthwaite, The economy of renaissance Florence (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 2009), is the best recent survey of Florences economy. See Sapori, La crisi, 5-94, for the banking activities of the Bardi and Peruzzi in England. For the Florentine textile trade, see Hidetoshi Hoshino, Industria tessile e commercio internazionale nella Firenze del tardo medioevo, eds. Franco Franceschi, Sergio Tognetti (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2001). xv In general, see Najemy, History, 45-56, for non-elite culture during the 1290s-1310s. xvi The literature on this topic is vast. See in particular Christiane Klapisch-Zuber, Retour la cit: Les magnates de Florence, 1340-1440 (Paris: Editions de lEcole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, 2006), 7-13; Najemy, History, 61-95; and Silvia Diacciati, Popolani e magnati. Societ e politica nella Firenze del Duecento (Spoleto: centro italiano di studi sullalto medioevo, 2011). xvii Gaetano Salvemini, Magnati e popolani in Firenze dal 1280 al 1295 (Milan: Feltrinelli Editore, 1966 [1899]) remains the classic of this debate. xviii Silvia Diacciati, Popolani e magnati: societ e politica a Firenze nel Duecento (Istituzioni e societ, 15. Spoleto: Centro italiano di studio sullalto medioevo, 2011), 329-30. xix Carol Lansing, The Florentine Magnates. Lineage and faction in a medieval commune (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1991), 13, 16. xx George Dameron, Revisiting,179. See Najemy, A history of Florence, 35-9, for a detailed discussion of the difficulty in precisely defining the popolo. xxi See Najemy, History, 36-39, for this periodization. See Lansing, Florentine Magnates, 164-91, for this factionalism, and Andrea Zorzi, Politica e giustizia a Firenze al tempo degli ordinamenti antimagnatizi, in Ordinamenti di giustizia fiorentini, ed. Vanna Arrighi (Florence: Archivio di Stato di Firenze, 1995), 105-47, for the practice of vendetta. xxii Diacciati, Popolani e magnati, in my opinion privileges cultural differences over economic and social circumstances in the struggle between the magnati and popolani. xxiii Dameron, Florentine Church, 115. xxiv Lansing, Florentine Magnates, 65. xxv Dameron, Episcopal power and florentine society, 1000-1320 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1991), 147. xxvi Dameron, Episcopal power, 147. xxvii Dameron, Florentine Church, 125. xxviii Salvemini, Magnati [1899 ed.], 411, rurb. XXIII. xxix Salvemini, Magnati, 411, rubr. XXIII: Item cum occasione ecclesiarum et possessionum ad ecclesiam pertinentium multa scandala oriantur. xxx Statuti della repubblica fiorentina, ed. Romolo Caggese, rev. ed. eds. Giuliano Pinto, Franesco Salvestrini, Andrea Zorzi, 2 vols. (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1999 [1921])[hereafter Statuti, [volume #], [book number], [rubric number]]. xxxi See Najemy, Corporatism, 72-78, for a detailed discussion of this problem. xxxii Statuti, I.II.rubr. VIIII. xxxiii Statuti, I.III.rubr. V, I.IV.rubr. LXVIII, and Statuti, II.III.rubr. CXIII, respectively. xxxiv See Irene Fabii, Elenchi nominativi degli Esecutori degli Ordinamenti di giustizia in carica del 1343-1435 (Florence: Archivio di Stato di Firenze, N31bis, 2004), for the duties of the Executor. The provision establishing the Executor is Statuti del Comune di Firenze, 3.31r-33r (23 December 1306). xxxv See Zorzi, I rettori di Firenze. Reclutamento, flussi, scambi (1193-1313), in I podest dellItalia comunale. Parte I: Reclutamento e circolazione degli ufficiali forestieri (fine XII sec.-met XIV sec.), ed. Jean-Claude Maire Vigueur (Rome: cole franaise de Rome, 2000), 481-82, for the election and qualifications of the Executor.
xiv xiii

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Caduff, Magnati, 25. See Statuti I.V.rubr. LXVIII, for the tamburo. Caduff, Magnati, 26. See Chris Wickham, Fama and the law in twelfth-century Tuscany and Thomas Kuehn, Fama as a legal status in renaissance Florence, in Fama. The politics of talk and reputation in medieval Europe, eds. Thelma Fenster and Daniel Lord Smail (Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2005), for publica fama in medieval Italian law. xxxviii Caduff, Magnati, 28. xxxix Klapisch-Zuber, Retour, 118. For a discussion of much later tamburagioni and judicial secrecy, see Allie Terry-Fritsch, Networks of urban secrecy: Tamburi, anonymous denunciations and the production of the gaze in fifteenth-century Florence, in The visual culture of secrecy in early modern Europe, eds. Timothy McCall et. al. (Kirksville, MO, 2013), 162-81. xl Caduff, Magnati, 24. xli The quote is from AdE.119.26r. xlii AdE, 119.26r. The Florentine new year began on March 25, the Feast of the Annunciation. All information for the attack is from AdE, 119.26r-27v, unless otherwise noted. xliii Sapori, La crisi, 129, for this conspiracy and the list of Bardi banned from Florence. xliv The definitive guide to Florentine Tuscanys populi/pievi for this period are Paolo Pirillos two volumes: Forme e strutture del popolamento nel contado fiorentino: I/I**. Gli insediamenti nellorganizzazione dei populi (prima met del XIV secolo) (2 vols.: I, I**) and II. Gli insediamenti fortificati (1280-1380) (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2005) [hereafter Pirillo, Forme.I/I**/II]. I have identified S. Cristophano in Porticaia as Pirillos San Cristoforo Perticaia (Pirillo, 2106), in the piviere of S. Leolino a Rignano.' xlv AdE, 119.27r: la predicta chiesa occoparono e tennerono ocupata contra forma della Ragione e degli ordini predicti de la iustitia per la quale cosa vi si pregha che vi piaccia sopra le dicte coseli dicti melfitii trovare e punire seguitando gli dicti ordini del la iustitia del comune di Firenze. xlvi AdE, 119.26v: le quale cose confinati da I via in mezzo piazza a ii e iii della detta chiesa. xlvii For similar cases, see Carol Lansing, Magnate violence revisited, in Communes and despots in medieval and renaissance Italy. Essays in honor of Philip Jones, eds. John E. Law and Bernadette Paton (Farnham, UK: Ashgate Publishing Co., 2010), 35-45. xlviii See Chris Wickham, Courts and conflict in twelfth-century Tuscany (Oxford: Oxford UP, 2003), 216, for this issue. xlix Wickham, Fama and the law in twelfth-century Tuscany, 22: The public arena, then, incorporated public direct action into its knowledge about rights and wrongs. l See AdP, 404.81r-v, 90r for the cancellations. li See Wickham, Courts, 213-23, for relevant cases and analysis. lii For medieval European feuding and law in eleventh-century France and Germany, see Stephen D. White, "Debate: The 'Feudal Revolution,' II." Past & Present 152 (1996): 205-23, and Timothy Reuter, "Debate: The 'Feudal Revolution,' III." Past & Present 155 (1997): 177-95. liii For the organization of Florences liv See on this topic Massimo Vallerani, La giustizia pubblica medievale. Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005 [Eng. trans.: Medieval public justice, trans. Sara Rubin Blanshei. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2012].
xxxvii xxxvi

AdE, 119.27r: Noy abbiano gia piu volte rotto il popolo di Firenze[,] ben possiamo rompere sicuramente quello di S Cristophano in Porticaia[.] E ancora a una per una altra volta e se il tanburo e a Firenze[,] a la ragione e noi siamo in contado e farella a nostro senno e impiccharevi commo ladri super queste querce[,] voi e quique a dissobidira. lvi Sapori, La crisi, 129.

lv

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See AdE, 50.31r; 65.4r-5v; 68.7r; and 69.15r, for an homicide case involving the Adimari, which the Signoria dismissed due to the murder having taken place within Adimari jurisdiction. lviii AdP, 404.80r-v. lix Wickham, Courts, 217. lx This is in direct contrast to the hidden violence practiced by totalitarian regimes such as the Nazis: see George Orwells perceptive comments on this issue, in regard to Gandhis nonviolence: Reflections on Gandhi, in Shooting an elephant and other essays (New York: Harcourt Brace & Co., 1950), 99-102. lxi See William Ian Miller, Humiliation and other essays on honor, social discomfort, and violence (Ithaca: Cornell UP, 1993), 55-56, for this three-tiered perspective. lxii Cf. Wickham, Courts and conflict, 306-07. lxiii R.I. Moore, The origins of European dissent (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994 [1977]), 282. lxiv For the formation and consolidation of the Florentine contado and distretto, see Andrea Zorzi, Lorganizzazione del contado e del distretto, in La trasformazione di un quadro politico. Ricerche su politica e giustizia a Firenze dal comune allo Stato territoriale (Florence: Florence UP, 2008), 209-256.'
lvii

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