THE GUILDS OF FLORENCE

LE ARTI DI FIRENZE

CHAPTER I

FLORENTINE COMMERCE AND INDUSTRY

I. FORMATIVE FORCES. Geographical position. Climate of Tuscany. "A favoured Race." Origin of Florence. Roman influences. Barbarian inroads. Charlemagne. “Firenze la Bella." The Popes. Collegium. The Commune.

II. POLITICS AND PARTIES. Countess Matilda. Grandi and Popolani. Six Sestieri. Six Consuls. Early Records wanting. The Umiliati. Feuds and warfare. "Mutar lo Stato!" Guelphs and Ghibellines. Battle of Campaldino. Machiavelli's views.

III. EDUCATION AND CULTURE. The Campanile-"Gospel of Labour." Boastings "I Spirito del Campanile." Shopkeeper-gentlemen. Dante's opinion of "Le Genti di Firenze." Learning--the companion of daily life. Petrarch's aphorism. The University of Florence. Boccaccio. English travellers in Tuscany. Thomas's Diary.

IV. TRADE ROUTES AND SEA POWER. Roman roads.

Commercial

agents. Buonaccorso Pitti. Ostellieri. Commercial Treaties. Vastness of Florentine commerce. Foreign Consuls. Six maritime Consuls. The "Arte del Mare!" Florentine navy. International law. Reprisals. Florence head of the Tuscan League.

TH

HE classic Vale of Arno was, in latest of the Dark Ages, the wholesome nursery, where fair Florence-gentle nursefostered three young sisters :-Art, Science, and Literature.

No invidious Paris fared that way, casting apples of discord before the fascinating Graces of the Renaissance. No question ever arose as to whose was the subtlest witchery, but each developed charms, distinct and rare, yet not outrivalling one the other. With harmonious voices blended, and ambrosial tresses mingled, the three interlaced their comely arms, and tossing with shapely feet the flowing draperies of golden tissue, which softly veiled the perfect contours of their beauteous forms, they gaily danced along. Their enchanting rhythm was the music of the new

A

Civilisation :-it we know-and them-but what of their origin? whence came they? and who were their forebears?

Commerce and Industry,-well-matched and well-mated pair,— very early made their busy home by Arno's healthful bed. Sheltered by the gracious cliffs of Fiesole and the umbrageous woods of San Miniato, they stretched their vigorous limbs along the virgin fields and pregnant uplands, dipping themselves anon, and theirs, in the tonic stream. Invigorated by the crisp Tuscan breezes, and cheered by the sunlit cerulean skies, they set about the rearing of their sturdy family.

Industry,-fond Mother,-kept by the domestic hearth, unwearyingly nourishing and encouraging her children,-some of whom are chiselled upon Giotto's famous Campanile,—whilst Commerce,-energetic Father,-ranged the wide world over for markets for his wares, returning, ever and a day, with hands well filled with gold and other treasures rare.

Together this strenuous pair evolved, from Nature's generous womb, the woolly web, the silky tress, and brilliant dye, which, sagely intermixed, by cunning hands, well dowered her growing offspring with health, and wealth, and wisdom too.

To the intelligent student of Florentine History it comes as a matter of no surprise that her people,-so violent in political quarrel, so refined in culture, and so magnificent in circumstance, --was all the while a nation of shrewd business men-enterprising merchants, skilful artisans, and diligent operatives.

From the twelfth to the end of the sixteenth centuries Florence easily held the first place in the life and work of the known world : she was in fact Athens and Rome combined! The reason of this pre-eminence must be adjudged to three potentialities :—accidents of climate, geographical position, and peculiarities of race.

The climate of Tuscany,-a highland country of hills and plains, partook neither of the enervating temperature of the indolent south, nor yet of the rigour of the frozen north. Men

throve mightily under stable atmospheric conditions which aided healthful labour and inspired enterprise.

Geographically, Florence was the Mistress of the intercourse of the world. In her hands she held all the northern roads to Rome, whilst, Colossus-like, her feet were placed upon the waterways of Venice and Genoa-the emporiums of the south. Pisa she ruled the seas.

From

The race of Tuscans was a fusion of many vigorous strains: Etruscan, Greek, Latin, and Teuton. Each ingredient had its special function in forming a people, physically and mentally, equal to any and every task they chose to set themselves. Dino Compagni describes the Florentines of the fourteenth century as “formati di bella statura oltra le Toscani," and calls them, "the favoured race."

Vigour of mind and body, and the free exercise of industrial instincts, were the germs whence sprang all the splendid characteristics of the Florentines of the Renaissance.

The Muse of Shelley sings thus:—

"Florence, beneath the Sun,

Of cities, fairest one! "

The origin of Florence is wrapped in mystery and obscurity. Fiesole is said to have been one of her maternal forbears, and Dante calls:

" 1

"Etruscan Fiesole-the hilly cradle of a noble race. Anyhow at a very remote period the warlike people of the hills were wont to descend to the river banks to barter with such intrepid lowlanders as adventured themselves so far.

At the junction of the Fiesolean stream,—the Mugnone,—with the Arno, gradually sprang up a small settlement of peaceful men and women, and there centred the primitive markets of the countryside. This settlement speedily became a town of considerable size and importance, and was known to the Romans, civilly, as Fluentia.

1 "Inferno," xv. 61-3.

When Julius Cæsar came to Fiesole to avenge a Roman defeat, wherein the Consul Fiorinus had been slain, he changed its name, -marked on his military chart as Campus Martis,-to Fiorentia, in honour of his kinsman's memory.

Florus ranks Florence with Spoletium, Interamnium, and Præneste as, "those splendid municipia of Italy"; and Pliny includes "Fluentini vel Florentia" in his list of Romano-Etruscan Colonies.

Whilst dates are all uncertain we know that the Romans re-built the town on the usual Castrum plan of intersecting streets, and lived there amid all the usual edifices of a Roman commercial city. A great impetus was given to her growth and trade by the making of the splendid Flaminian road, which crossed the Arno at the point where the Ponte Vecchio still unites the two portions of the modern city.

The civilisation and prosperity of the Roman Castra were swept away by the wild inroads of the barbarians from the North. Wave after wave of savagery rolled over all the land. Goths, Vandals, Longobarbs, and Saxons worked their will amid Arno's smiling fields and pleasant gardens. Last of all came Totila,—the "Scourge of God," and hewed in pieces the remnants of her folk, and made of fair Florence nothing but a dunghill and a waste.

Roman farmsteads, villas, baths, and theatres were levelled to the ground. Where, by busy gate and teeming quay and mart, had gathered crowds of skilful toilers,-from fruitful fields and prolific flocks, from sea and riverside, from busy looms and noisy shops of smiths,-instead were ruined walls and battered portals. Behind the scattered stones slouched the craven sons of hardworking sires. Their hands, devoid of honest crafts, sought only their fellow's pelf.

Along with the conquering Longobarbs, or Lombards, came many a German family, to whom tracts of Italian land were assigned for habitation and for culture. Attracted by its fruitful promise many a bearded and fur-clad barbarian settled on Tuscan soil, and there, too, their chieftains built their castles-employing