Communes and Despots in Medieval and Renaissance Italy

Description

First published 2010 by Ashgate Publishing. Building on important issues highlighted by the late Philip Jones, this volume explores key aspects of the city state in late medieval and renaissance Italy, particularly the nature and quality of different types of government. It focuses on the apparently antithetical but often similar governmental forms represented by the republics and despotisms of the period. Beginning with a reprint of Jones original 1965 article, the volume then provides eighteen new essays that re-examine the issues he raised in light of modern scholarship. Taking a broad chronological and geographic approach, the collection offers a timely re-evaluation of a question of perennial interest to urban and political historians, as well as those with an interest in medieval and renaissance Italy. List of Illustrations ix List of Maps xiii Introduction xv Note on Cover xix Part I: Communes and Despots 1. Communes and Despots: The City State in Late-Medieval Italy / P. J. Jones 3 Part II: Power and Restraint 2. The Use of Sortition in Appointments in the Italian Communes / Daniel Waley 27 3. Magnate Violence Revisited / Carol Lansing 35 Part III: Political Thought: Theory and Practice 4. Communes and Despots: Some Italian and Transalpine Political Thinkers / Robert Black 49 5. The Myth of the Renaissance Despot / Benjamin G. Kohl 61 6. Conflicting Attitudes towards Machiavelli’s Works in Sixteenth-Century Spain, Rome and Florence / Humfrey C. Butters 75 Part IV: Communes and Despots: Some Case Studies 7. From Commune to Regional State: Political Experiments in Fourteenth Century Cremona / Marco Gentile 91 8. The Gonzaga Signoria, Communal Institutions and 'the Honour of the City': Mixed Ideas in Quattrocento Mantua / David S. Chambers 105 9. Giangaleazzo Visconti and the Ducal Title / Jane Black 119 10. 'Whatever’s Best Administered is Best': Paolo Guinigi 'signore' of Lucca, 1400–1430 / Christine Meek 131 11. The Mouse and the Elephant: Relations between the Kings of Naples and the Lordship of Piombino in the Fifteenth Century / David Abulafia 145 12. Communes and Despots: The Nature of 'Diarchy' / John E. Law 161 13. Concepts of 'Libertà' in Renaissance Genoa / Christine Shaw 177 Part V: The Case of the Medici 14. Prato and Lorenzo de’ Medici / F. W. Kent 193 15. The Early Years of Piero di Lorenzo, 1472–1492: Between Florentine Citizen and Medici Prince / Alison Brown 209 16. Muddying the Waters: Alfonsina Orsini de’ Medici and the Lake of Fucecchio / Catherine Kovesi 223 17. The Medici Dukes, 'Comandati' and Pratolino: Forced Labour in Renaissance Florence / Suzanne B. Butters 249 Part VI: Culture, Art, and Patronage 18. Giovanni Bellini and the Background to Venetian Painting / George Holmes 281 19. Communes, Despots and Universities: Structures and Trends of Italian Studi to 1500 / Peter Denley 295 20. 'Aedificia iam in regales surgunt altitudines': The Mendicant Great Church in the Trecento / Julian Gardner 307 Epilogue 21. 'Communes and Despots': The Opening Paragraph / Trevor Dean 331 Index 343