A
Signoria (from
Signore or
Lord) was an abstract noun meaning (roughly)
'government; governing authority; de facto sovereignty; lordship in
many of the
Italian city states
during the medieval and renaissance periods.
The perennial "power vacuum" of medieval Italy
In the sixth century AD the
Emperor Justinian reconquered Italy from the
Ostrogoths. The invasion of a new wave of
Germanic tribes, the
Lombards, doomed this attempt to resurrect the
Western Roman Empire but the
repercussions of Justinian's failure resounded further still. For
the next thirteen centuries, whilst new
nation-states arose in the lands north of the
Alps, the Italian political landscape was a patchwork of feuding
city states, petty tyrannies, and foreign
invaders.
For several centuries the armies and
Exarchs,
Justinian's successors, were a tenacious force in Italian affairs -
strong enough to prevent other powers such as the
Arabs, the
Holy Roman
Empire, or the
Papacy from establishing a
unified Italian state, but too weak to drive these "interlopers"
and recreate Roman Italy.
Later Imperial orders such as the
Carolingians, the
Ottonians and
Hohenstaufens also managed to impose their
overlordship in Italy. But their successes were as transitory as
Justinian's and a unified Italian state remained a dream until the
nineteenth century.
No ultramontanian Empire could succeed in unifying Italy - or in
achieving more than a temporary hegemony - because its success
threatened the survival of medieval Italy's other powers: the
Byzantines, the Papacy, and the
Normans. These - and the descendants of the
Lombards - who became fused with earlier Italian ethnic groups -
conspired against, fought, and eventually destroyed any attempt to
create a dominant political order in Italy.
It was against this vacuum of authority that one must view the rise
of the institutions of the Signoria and the
Communi.
Signoria versus the commune
In Italian history the rise of the Signoria is a phase often
associated with the decline of the
medieval commune system of government and
the rise of the dynastic state. In this context the word Signoria
(here to be understood as "Lordly Power") is used in opposition to
the institution of the Commune or city republic.
Indeed, contemporary observers and modern historians see the rise
of the Signoria as a reaction to the failure of the
Communi to maintain law-and-order and suppress party
strife and civil discord. In the anarchic conditions that often
prevailed in medieval Italian city states, people looked to strong
men to restore order and disarm the feuding elites.
In times of anarchy or crisis, cities sometimes offered the
Signoria to individuals perceived as strong enough to save the
state.
For
example, the Tuscan state of Pisa
offered the
Signoria to Charles VIII of
France in the hope that he would protect the independence of
Pisa from its long term enemy Florence
.
Similarly,
Siena
offered the Signoria to Cesare Borgia.
Types of Signoria
The composition and specific functions of the Signoria varied from
city to city.
In some states (such as Verona
under the
Della Scala family or Florence in the
days of Cosimo de Medici and
Lorenzo the Magnificent) the
polity was what we would term today a
single party state in which the
dominant party had vested the Signoria of the state in a single
family or dynasty.
In Florence this arrangement was unofficial as it was not
constitutionally formalized before the
Medici
were expelled from the city in 1494.
In other
states (such as the Milan
of the
Visconti) the dynasty's right to
the Signoria was a formally recognized part of the
Commune's constitution, which had been "ratified" by the
People and recognized by the Pope or the Holy
Roman Empire.
Origins of the word Signoria
In a few states the word Signoria was sometimes used to refer to
the constitutional government of the Republic rather than the
dictatorial power exercised by an individual tyrant or
dynasty.
For
example, the word Signoria was sometimes used in Renaissance times
to refer to the Government of the Republics of Florence or of
Venice
- as in Shakespeare's Othello where Othello says:
- "Let him do his spite:
- My services which I have done the signiory
- Shall out-tongue his complaints"
(Act one, scene one)
Occasionally the word Signoria referred to specific organs or
functions of the state.
The Signoria
of Florence was the highest executive organ, while the Signoria
of the Republic of
Venice
was mainly a judicial body.
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