I: THE FLOWER OF ITALY
We are once again find ourselves in Central Italy, midway between Rome and Siena, the famed and brilliant city of Florence, capital of Tuscany.
Founded by Julius Caesar (probably on top of an existing settlement) as an outpost and a Legionary colony guarding the way from Rome to the Alps, it had since the fall of the West have been ruled by Lombard dukes of Tuscia and the Canossa marquises of Tuscany, it had achieved its independence, or rather its direct association with the Imperial Crown of the Holy Roman Empire and became a true republic in 1115.
It was out of the struggle to attain and maintain this degree of independence that the early political struggles of Florence were defined.
In Florence, the hereditary, traditional nobility had been the "Magnates" (Magnati) which came from the estate of the "Knights / Soldiers" (Milites). Indeed in this aspect, the city's origin as a legionary outpost was still felt. While modern thinkers have a tendency to dismiss the claims of the Holy Roman Empire to be "Roman, Holy, or an Empire", medieval Florentines treated those claims with solemn gravity. The Empire was Roman since it ruled the Land of the Romans, Italy. It was sanctified by its declared mission to protect and expand the Realm if Christendom. It had the cosmic role and authority of the Emperors of yore, since it ruled over free peoples in their various autonomous polities, aligning and coordinating them towards the singular goal of universal peace based on the Law of Nature, Nations and God. Therefore, the Societas Militum of the ancient an
d honored Colony of Florence were loyal to the Emperor as their rightful liege - that is, as long as he honored their communal rights and liberties.
II: THE DOUBLE EDGE OF THE TWO SWORDS
In theory, The office of the Pope extenuated that of the Emperor - the former was the sacral head of the Church in its spiritual aspect, while the latter was the head of the laity, both guiding, under God, the faithful in unison guiding and supervising the Church.
In reality, this "Theory of the Two Swords" , which was fully flashed out in the writing of the
theologian Imperial Peter Damian in the 1090s but had origins in the writings of Pope Gelasius I and his dealing with the Byzantine emperors in the waning years of the 5th century, to be officially sanctioned by Boniface VIII's 1302 Papal Bull "Unam Sanctam" , proved to be difficult to wield
During the course of the 11th and 12th centuries, the Imperial and Papal powers clashed over various questions, not the least of which was the Investiture of Bishops with land-fiefs traditionally held by the clergy, but granted under the Emperor's authority.
But the real issue was neither Investiture nor the status of the Papal temporal possessions in central Italy: The Hohenstaufen Emperors sought authority over the Pope on the grounds that their Byzantine counterparts exercised such power over the Patriarchy of Constantinople and that such authority was exercised by the Carolingian and Ottonian emperors of the Holy Roman Empire in previous centuries.
Due to the concentration of the Pope's supporters in the German portions of the Empire around Heinrich von Welf, Duke of Bavaria, in the civil war that started after the death of Emperor Lothar II, came to be known as "Guelphs" in Italy, while the name of the Castle of Waibilin
gen or "Wibelingen", the seat of the Hohenstaufen dynasty and the battle-cry of their supporters, became "Ghibelline" in Italian.
Florence, initially a solid Ghibelline city, was moving steadily towards the Guelph faction through the Late 12th century as the Florentine constitution did.
III: THE COMEDY OF THE ARTS
Towards the end of the 12th Century, a new power was rising in Florentine politics: the Arti ("Arts, Professions") or Guilds, embodying the Popolo Grosso ("The People") - Florentine citizens which were not part of the aristocracy, in particular the Popolo Grosso - "The Fat People" - those respectable tradesmen and artisans that the increasing fortune of the Commune started to lift upwards, leading them to aspire to leadership and pretention of being a Nova Gente - "New Nobility". Organized under the Capitano del Popolo (which in Florence was usually a foreigner which was invited as to grant the People an unbiased representative), the Priors of the Arti and the Gonfaloniers of Justice they first made their wishes known in 1190 against the Magnates led by the Podestà - the traditional head of the Signoria - the government of Florence.
Possessing ever increasing wealth, the People grew ever bolder, eventually banishing the Magnati from direct political participation altogether. The Captains of the People, with a minor disturbance, now took on the reigns of power in earnest and, as the merchants of Florence had been staunch Guelphs, the Ghibellines faded, for some time out of relevance, but their role was taken over by the White Guelphs (I Guelphi Bianchi, originally named after the lady Bianca Cancillieri, over whose affections, according to legend, the feud had started) and the Black Guelphs (I Guelphi Neri, who chose the name as a foil to that of the Whites).
The important feature in all those tribulations is that, while Florence had many laudable institution and while "Florentine Freedom" became the envy of all Popoli in Italy, Florentine politics in the 13-14th centuries consisted in the most of what Dr. Fabrizio Ricciardelli had called in "the Politics of
Exclusion", or, in layman's term, Hatred.
This institutionalized Hatred found purchase not merely along class lines in the exclusion and abuse of the Magnati by the Popolo Grosso, but had also coalesced around the dominant families of each of the Arti (which were declared the co-equal, confederated basic units of the State, out of which no political activity was possible) and fused together generational family feuds with professional and business rivalries, which were welded in turn to the interests of of their external allies - the Whites wanted to assert Florentine freedom form both Papal and Imperial authority, which in practice meant that they allied themselves to the distant Imperial power against the near Papal one, while the Blacks favored Papal Supremacy or even Suzerainty over Italy as a guarantee against Imperial meddling. These two powers had supported the rival factions to the best of their respective abilities - the Emperor by bestowing titles and recognitions upon the Whites, the Pope by investing considerable sums with the Black-dominated guilds.
The result of political defeat in Florence from then on would be to be removed from the political arena - either by being banned from it by Law or by being banished from the City of Florence.
Two Florentine exiles and their respective, indeed conflicting, outlook on politics, is of the utmost interest to us as both explored the topic of Love as a focus of statecraft: Dante Alighieri and Niccolo Machiavelli.
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