Lombard League

The wars of the Staufen emperors with the Lombard League have attracted a lot of attention in recent years, and modern scholars have spent much effort correcting the romantic mistakes of nineteenth-century national scholarship. Yet a good deal of work remains to be done. A detailed comparison of the two decisive battles in these conflicts allows us to examine serious issues in medieval warfare, including medieval generals’ decision-making processes, the role of chivalry in those processes, the external conditions that shaped military operations, and the utility of force, perceived and actual, in achieving political objectives. Both Frederick I and his grandson Frederick II emerge as capable commanders who pursued rational military policies and made the best decisions possible under the circumstances, despite the different outcomes of these two campaigns.

"Resumo: A partir da década de 1980 surgiu uma nova forma de analisar a guerra no período medieval, o Paradigma Estratégico Vegeciano (PEV), centrado na importância da Logística e das fortificações. Por outro lado, os estudos nesta área concentram-se nas realidades das guerras anglo-francesas. Assim, nosso artigo objetiva avaliar a utilidade do PEV na análise de uma campanha no contexto ítalo-germânico de Frederico I Barbarossa.

Abstract: From the 1980’s came a new way to analyze warfare in the medieval period, the Vegetian Strategic Paradigm (VSP), centered on the importance of Logistics and fortifications. On the other hand, studies in this area are focused on the realities of the Anglo-French wars. Thus, our article aims to evaluate the usefulness of the VSP in the analysis of a campaign in the Italian-German context of Frederick I Barbarossa."

The first quarter of the thirteenth century is generally regarded as a period of declining imperial presence in northern Italy, and this paper tests that view by considering one of the imperial prerogatives recognised by the Peace of Constance in 1183, that is,  the appellate jurisdiction. After considering the testimony of contemporaneous juridical works, the paper compares it to the proceedings of a Paduan dispute from 1211-1212. That dispute provides unique evidence on the activity of imperial appellate judges, but also contains references to an alleged statute of the Lombard League complementing the terms of the Peace of Constance, and even information regarding the status of the League in a period when no other evidence about it survives. This study underlines how the hierarchical features of the appellate jurisdiction made it a crossroads between developments and power struggles at the local and regional levels, and even beyond. It also suggests not to underestimate the enduring significance of the Peace of Constance and of imperial involvement in the appellate jurisdiction in the early thirteenth century.

"L’autore esamina i mutamenti strutturali della Lega Lombarda dopo la saldatura dell’alleanza col Papato contro Federico II nel 1239. Alla luce di fonti che sono passate inosservate da questo punto di vista, tra le quali le opere del maestro di retorica Guido Faba, si mostra come, in concomitanza con l’escalation che portò il conflitto con l’imperatore a prendere le forme di una vera e propria crociata nel 1240, da soggetto giuridico dotato di propri organi di governo la Lega si trasformò in un’alleanza multilaterale dedita per lo più a questioni militari e diplomatiche. Allo stesso tempo la Lega si trovò inserita in una più vasta pars ecclesie guidata da una serie di legati papali, che però non assunsero una carica formale all’interno della societas. La Lega tuttavia conservò alcune vestigia di una propria identità all’interno della pars Ecclesie almeno fino al 1252, e sono riscontrabili tracce di attriti tra alcuni dei suoi membri (soprattutto Bologna) e il legato papale. Infine anche la leadership del legato, almeno nelle forme assunte nel 1239, venne meno intorno al 1258-9, sia a causa del fallimento della crociata contro Ezzelino da Romano, che per una precisa politica di disimpegno del Papato.

The author examines the structural changes of the Lombard League after the welding of its alliance with the Papacy against Frederick II in 1239. In the light of overlooked sources such as the works of the Bolognese rhetorician Guido Faba, the paper argues that the escalation that brought the conflict against the emperor to take on the trappings of the crusade in 1240 coincided with the transformation of the League from a corporate body into little more than a multilateral alliance devoted to military and diplomatic matters. Moreover, the League came to be included in a larger Pars Ecclesie and fell under the leadership of a series of papal legates. The League, however, kept some vestiges of its identity inside the Pars Ecclesie at least until 1252, and there is evidence of frictions with the papal legate, especially from Bologna, while the leadership of the legate, at least in the forms acquired after 1239, came to an end in 1258-9, after the failure of the crusade against Ezzelino da Romano and following a deliberate policy of the Papacy."

This is the first book devoted to the Lombard League, an association created by the city republics of northern Italy in the 12th century in order to defend their autonomy and that of the papacy in a momentous struggle against the German holy roman emperor Frederick I Barbarossa. Consequently, the League has enjoyed an iconic status, and in the 19th century was glorified as a precursor of the Italian struggle for independence in political and historical pamphlets as well as in paintings, novels and even operas.

The League played a crucial role in the evolution of Italy's political landscape, but it did more than ensuring its continued fragmentation. Historiography, in fact, has overlooked the collegial cooperation among the medieval Italian polities and this volume offers new interpretations, by examining the League's structure, activity, place in political thought and its links with regional identities.

Using documentary evidence, histories, letters, inscriptions and contemporary troubadour poems as well as rhetorical and juridical treatises, Dr Raccagni argues that the League was not just a momentary anti-imperial military alliance, but was rather a body that also provided collective approaches to regional problems, ranging from the peaceful resolution of disputes to the management of regional lines of communication, usurping, in some cases, imperial prerogatives. Yet the League never rejected imperial overlordship per se, and here it is revealed how it survived after the end of the conflict against Frederick I, one of its most lasting legacies being the settlement that it reached with the empire, the Peace of Constance, which became the Magna Carta of the northern Italian polities.

This paper reconsiders the political thought of Boncompagno da Signa in the light of his overlooked praise for the holy roman emperor and his equally overlooked criticism for the city republics. It argues that rather than just supporting the city republics, he addressed kingship, backing constitutional monarchy and the rule of law. This is contextualised in the aftermath of the Peace of Constance, and the similarities with the views of contemporary jurists are examined, underlining neglected contractual aspects in their theories of government and the use of the Ius Italicum to justify the prerogatives of the Italian cities within the Empire. Finally, concerning Boncompagno‟s legacy, connections are underlined with the sixth canto of Dante's Purgatory.

Scholarship has attributed to the Italian rhetoricians of the central Middle Ages a very significant role in the development of political discourse, but their testimony concerning the momentous struggle fought from 1226 to 1250 between the Lombard League, the Papacy and Emperor Frederick II has not been studied in depht. This paper approaches it by focusing on the works of Guido Faba, starting from a papal privilege issued to the Lombard cities that only features in his Dictamina Rhetorica, but also comparing them to those of his main colleagues, Boncompagno and Bene da Firenze, and considering the impact of the above-mentioned struggle upon Italian universities. It argues that the privilege is a verisimilar didactic exercise supporting the contested validity of the Peace of Constance (the settlement reached between the League and Frederick Barbarossa in 1183) and of its recognition of the League, that the conflict between the Empire and the League attracted considerable attention in contemporary arts schools, which were deeply involved in it, but that Faba's works are particularly rich in evidence covering it and the involvement of the Papacy, which should be linked to his strong Bolognese background.