Certain leading political economists, notably K. Bücher (Die Bevölkerung von Frankfurt a. M. im 14ten und 15ten Jahrhundert, i., Tübingen, 1886; Die Entstehung der Volkswirtschaft, 5th ed., Tübingen, 1906), and, in a modified form, W. Sombart (Der moderne Kapitalismus, 2 vols., Leipzig, 1902), have propounded the doctrine of one gradual progression from an agricultural state to modern capitalistic conditions. This theory, however, is nothing less than an outrage on history. As a matter of fact, as far as modern Europe is concerned, there has twice been a progression, separated by a period of retrogression, and it is to the latter that Bücher’s picture of the agricultural and strictly protectionist town (the geschlossene Stadtwirtschaft) of the 14th and 15th centuries belongs, while Sombart’s notion of an entire absence of a spirit of capitalistic enterprise before the middle of the 15th century in Europe north of the Alps, or the 14th century in Italy, is absolutely fantastic.[9] The period of the rise of cities till well on in the 13th century was naturally a period of expansion and of a considerable amount of freedom of trade. It was only afterwards that a protectionist spirit gained the upper hand, and each town made it its policy to restrict as far as possible the trade of strangers. In this revolution the rise of the lower strata of the population to power played an important part.
The craft-gilds had remained subordinate to the Rat, but by-and-by they claimed a share in the government of the towns. Originally any inhabitant holding a certain measure of land, freehold or subject to the mere nominal ground-rent above-mentioned, was a full citizen independently of his calling, the clergy and the lord’s retainers and servants of whatever rank, who claimed exemption from scot and lot, to use the English formula, alone excepted. The majority of the artisans, however, were not in this happy position. Moreover, the town council, instead of being freely elected, filled up vacancies in its ranks by co-optation, with the result that all power became vested in a limited number of rich families. Against this state of things the crafts rebelled, alleging mismanagement, malversation and the withholding of justice. During the 14th and 15th centuries revolutions and counter-revolutions, sometimes accompanied by considerable slaughter, were frequent, and a great variety of more democratic constitutions were tried. Zürich, however, is the only German place where a kind of tyrannis, so frequent in Italy, came to be for a while established. On the whole it must be said that in those towns where the democratic party gained the upper hand an unruly policy abroad and a narrow-minded protection at home resulted. An inclination to hasty measures of war and an unwillingness to observe treaties among the democratic towns of Swabia were largely responsible for the disasters of the war of the Swabian League in the 14th century. At home, whereas at first markets had been free and open to any comer, a more and more protective policy set in, traders from other towns being subjected more and more to vexatious restrictions. It was also made increasingly difficult to obtain membership in the craft-gilds, high admission fees and so-called masterpieces being made a condition. Finally, the number of members became fixed, and none but members’ sons and sons-in-law, or members’ widows’ husbands were received. The first result was the formation of a numerous proletariate of life-long assistants and of men and women forcibly excluded from following any honest trade; and the second consequence, the economic ruin of the town to the exclusive advantage of a limited number. From the end of the 15th century population in many towns decreased, and not only most of the smaller ones, but even some once important centres of trade, sank to the level almost of villages. Those cities, on the other hand, where the mercantile community remained in power, like Nuremberg and the seaboard towns, on the whole followed a more enlightened policy, although even they could not quite keep clear of the ever-growing protective tendencies of the time. Many even of the richer towns, notably Nuremberg, ran into debt irretrievably, owing partly to an exorbitant expenditure on magnificent public buildings and extensive fortifications, calculated to resist modern instruments of destruction, partly to a faulty administration of the public debt. From the 13th century the towns had issued (“sold,” as it was called) annuities, either for life or for perpetuity in ever-increasing number, until it was at last found impossible to raise the funds necessary to pay them.
One of the principal achievements of the towns lay in the field of legislation. Their law was founded originally on the general national (or provincial) law, on custom, and on special privilege. New foundations were regularly provided by their lord with a charter embodying the most important points of the special law of the town in question. This miniature code would thenceforth be developed by means of statutes passed by the town council. The codification of the law of Augsburg in 1276 already fills a moderate volume in print (ed. by Christian Meyer, Augsburg, 1872). Later foundations were frequently referred by their founders to the nearest existing town of importance, though that might belong to a different lord. Afterwards, if a question in law arose which the court of a younger town found itself unable to answer, the court next senior in affiliation was referred to, which in turn would apply to the court above, until at last that of the original mother town was reached, whose decision was final. This system was chiefly developed in the colonial east, where most towns were affiliated directly or indirectly either to Lübeck or to Magdeburg; but it was by no means unknown in the home country. A number of collections of such judgments (Schöffensprüche) have been published. It is also worth mentioning that it was usual to read the police by-laws of a town at regular intervals to the assembled citizens in a morning-speech (Morgenspraehe).[10]
To turn to Italy, the country for so many centuries in close political connexion with Germany, the foremost thing to be noted is that here the towns grew to even greater independence, many of them in the end acknowledging no overlord whatever after the yoke of the German kings had been shaken off. On the other hand, nearly all of them in the long run fell under the sway of some local tyrant-dynasty.
From Roman times the country had remained thickly studded with towns, each being the seat of a bishop. From this arose their most important peculiarity. For it was largely due to an identification of dioceses and municipal territories that the nobles of the surrounding country took up their headquarters in the cities, either voluntarily or because forced to do so by the citizens, who made it their policy thus to turn possible opponents into partisans and defenders. In Germany, on the other hand, nobles and knights were carefully shut out so long as the town’s independence was at stake, the members of a princely garrison being required to take up their abode in the citadel, separated from the town proper by a wall. Only in the comparatively few cathedral cities this rule does not obtain. It will be seen that, in consequence of this, municipal life in Italy was from the first more complex, the main constituent parts of the population being the capitani, or greater nobles, the valvassori, or lesser nobles (knights) and the people (popolo). Furthermore, the bishops being in most cases the exponents of the imperial power, the struggle for freedom from the latter ended in a radical riddance from all temporal episcopal government as well. Foremost in this struggle stood the cities of Lombardy, most of which all through the barbarian invasions had kept their walls in repair and maintained some importance as economic centres, and whose popolo largely consisted of merchants of some standing. As early as the 8th century the laws of the Langobard King Aistulf distinguished three classes of merchants (negotiantes), among whom the majores et potentes were required to keep themselves provided with horse, lance, shield and a cuirass. The valley of the Po formed the main artery of trade between western Europe and the East, Milan being besides the point of convergence for all Alpine passes west of the Brenner (the St Gotthard, however, was not made accessible until early in the 13th century). Lombard merchants soon spread all over western Europe, a chief source of their ever-increasing wealth being their employment as bankers of the papal see.
The struggle against the bishops, in which a clamour for a reform of clerical life and a striving for local self-government were strangely interwoven, had raged for a couple of generations when King Henry V., great patron of municipal freedom as he was, legalized by a series of charters the status quo (Cremona, 1114, Mantua, 1116). But under his weak successors the independence of the cities reached such a pitch as to be manifestly intolerable to an energetic monarch like Frederick I. Besides, the more powerful among them would subdue or destroy their weaker neighbours, and two parties were formed, one headed by Milan, the other by Cremona. Como and Lodi complained of the violence used to them by the former city. Therefore in 1158 a commission was appointed embracing four Roman legists as representatives of the emperor, as well as those of fourteen towns, to examine into the imperial and municipal rights. The claims of the imperial government, jurisdictional and other, were acknowledged, only such rights of self-government being admitted as could be shown to be grounded on imperial charters. But when it came to carrying into effect these Roncaglian decrees, a general rising resulted. Milan was besieged by the emperor and destroyed in 1162 in accordance with the verdict of her rivals. Nevertheless, after a defeat at Legnano in 1176, Frederick was forced to renounce all pretensions to interference with the government of the cities, merely retaining an overlordship that was not much more than formal (peace of Constance in 1183). All through this war the towns had been supported by Pope Alexander III. Similarly under Frederick II. the renewal of the struggle between emperor and pope dovetailed with a fresh outbreak of the war with the cities, who feared lest an imperial triumph over the church would likewise threaten their independence. The emperor’s death finally decided the issue in their favour.
Constitutionally, municipal freedom was based on the formation of a commune headed by elected consuls, usually to the number of twelve, representing the three orders of capitani, valvassori and popolo. Frequently, however, the number actually wielding power was much more restricted, and their position altogether may rather be likened to that of their Roman predecessors than to that of their German contemporaries. In all important matters they asked the advice and support of “wise men,” sapientes, discretiores, prudentes, as a body called the credenza, while the popular assembly (parlamentum, concio, consilium generale) was the true sovereign. The consuls with the assistance of judices also presided in the law-courts; but besides the consuls of the commune there were consules de placitis specially appointed for jurisdictional purposes.
In spite of these multifarious safeguards, however, family factions early destroyed the fabric of liberty, especially as, just as there was an imperial, or Ghibelline, and a papal, or Guelph party among the cities as a whole, thus also within each town each faction would allege adherence to and claim support by one or other of the great world-powers. To get out of the dilemma of party-government, resort was thereupon had to the appointment as chief magistrate of a podestà from among the nobles or knights of a different part of the country not mixed up with the local feuds. But the end was in most cases the establishment of the despotism of some leading family, such as the Visconti at Milan, the Gonzaga at Mantua, the della Scala in Verona and the Carrara in Padua.
In Tuscany, the historic rôle of the cities, with the exception of Pisa, begins at a later date, largely owing to the overlordship of the powerful margraves of the house of Canossa and their successors, who here represented the emperor. Pisa, however, together with Genoa, all through the 11th century distinguished itself by war waged in the western Mediterranean and its isles against the Saracens. Both cities, along with Venice, but especially the Genoese, also did excellent service in reducing the Syrian coast towns still in the hands of the Turks in the reigns of Kings Baldwin I. and Baldwin II. of Jerusalem, while more particularly Pisa with great constancy placed her fleet at the disposal of the Hohenstaufen emperors for warfare with Sicily.
Meanwhile communes with consuls at their head were formed in Tuscany much as elsewhere. On the other hand the Tuscan cities managed to prolong the reign of liberty to a much later epoch, no podestà ever quite succeeding here in his attempts to establish the rule of his dynasty. Even when in the second half of the 15th century the Medici in Florence attained to power, the form at least of a republic was still maintained, and not till 1531 did one of them, supported by Charles V., assume the ducal title.