This is a story of centuries-old naked land grabs and strategic strongholds in Italy, all in the name of two warring factions, the Guelphs and the Ghibellines
This is about the subtext, setting power exercised according to the law against power enforced by a dominant ‘princeps’ whose will is law….
The Guelphs and Ghibellines arose from the political divisions rooted in the Investiture Controversy, way back in the 11th and 12th centuries, about whether secular rulers or the pope had the authority to appoint bishops and abbots
Key to the political confrontation between these two parties was the periodic election of a new Emperor of the Holy German Empire by the Confederate German States, an opportunity for some states to invite the Pope to support their preferred candidate whose loss (in 1220) set Imperial interests of the elected Emperor, Frederic II von Hohenstaufen (1197-1250) against the Holy See...
Frederic von Hohenstaufen would become one of the most brilliant figures of the Middle Ages and, by opening a channel for the Germans to meddle in politics of Italian city-states from the 13th century on, unstable and fluid battlelines were drawn for centuries to come
The Ghibellines, supporters of the German Emperor dominated Italian politics in opposition to the pope, and the Guelphs sought strength from backing the Roman Catholic Church, which was never loath of furthering its own civilian interests
Imperial interests were bound to clash time and again throughout the 14th century with the pope's ambitions to secure stately rights for the Holy See in central Italy
This is how Italy became a battlefield between Italian condottieri, Imperial (German) armies and French troops supporting the Holy See - in effect a confrontation between the great powers of the day vying for dominance in Western Europe - with multiple and repeated alliance reversals....
Foreign involvement in conflict between the city states of Florence, Ghibellines by political choice, and Sienna, dominated by the Guelph faction at the time and allied with the French, led to bloody reckoning, reaching a high point in the battle of Scannagallo (1554), leaving the huge number of 5000 dead Sienese (and French) soldiers on the field and enacting undisputed Florentine dominance
However much the Catholic Church tipped the scales in Italy's city-states, there is a very contemporary reading of their conflicted governance
The Italian cities were focused on regional dominance but, with the emergence of a pre-capitalistic system in Florence and a sharp divide on concepts of governance, the conflict between Guelphs and Ghibellines remains eerily relevant today
Regional dominance
Geographical expansion, land grabs and control at the borders have a familiar ring
It has been true in Italy throughout the centuries
From Naples in the South to Milan and Venice in Northern Italy, no strongman stood by, always giving in to temptation and expanding at every turn
Constrained by the Papal Estates of the Holy See, the ambitions of the Kingdom of Naples to push into Northern territories aligned with the Ghibellines and came under pressure of the Pope's natural allies
Florence, alternatively Ghibelline supporting the German Emperor and Guelph (after 1250 and following the death of Frederic) to secure its economic independence, remained focused on its power in Central Italy - and precious access to the sea after victory over Pisa (in 1406)...
Arezzo, further North, a Guelph State and a natural ally of the Pope, kept ambitions of its own alive, planning to dominate a territory competing with Florence under another powerful figure, Bishop and local lord Guido Tarlati (died 1327)
And then there was Northern-most Milan, inevitably exposed to interference by European powers, a spoil of choice disputed by France and the German Emperor...
Not a century could pass without another invasion, both South (with the Kingdom of Naples a prize falling successively under German, French and Spanish influence) and North where Milan - and later on Venice - inevitably fell to successively French and German control
The struggle to expand political influence under the guise of flimsy and ultimately forgotten differences has arguably been repeated throughout the ages
The evolving economic (and capitalistic) interests might support a more credible interpretation of perennial conflict....
Contemporary global powers have forgotten nothing of the playbook
Early capitalism
Florence shows the way...
Hugely successful in commerce and in financial dominance from the 13th until the mid-15th century, Florence carries to this day the fame of the House of Medici, founded in 1396 and going bankrupt in 1494
In many ways, political upheaval within this proud 'Republic', fiercely independent of overlords, was a battle for power and economic control by the moneyed minority of traders and financiers...
Quite consequential in building a block of oligarchic power, the Ordinances of Justice were a series of statutory laws enacted between the years 1293 and 1295, consolidating control of the Guilds over the Republic
From that time, and over the next 150 years (approx. 1434), wealthy trading and banking houses expanded on an international scale...
While the business strategies of these extremely astute (and moneyed) families will not be discussed in this setting, the influence exercised in terms of governance is striking
The subtext, writ large, is all about the law of the land, securing stability and control by the few....
The law of the land
Possibly apocryphal, letters exchanged between Florence (in its Guelph guise) and Sienna (steadfast Ghibelline) quoted by Ernst Kantorowicz are a cut-and-dry comment about who won the argument (Florence...)
Florence the Guelph wrote to the Imperial city of Sienna
"It is true that the Imperial Majesty holds fulsome power because she is not bound by the law. However, her Majesty does live according to the law and she cannot take hold of what does not belong to her, so as to not violate the law or commit an injustice when compelling others to submit to her power."
To which Ghibelline Sienna responded
"It belongs to the roman 'princeps' to rise as victor above all others, in peace and in war, and his subjects cannot contend to a similar heightened position. Indeed, if all conditions were equal, the very word of 'princeps' would be an empty vessel because one cannot be elevated without all others being downsized. And the law of nations which has established the inequal status of each, and determined their ranks and degrees would be nil and void."
The rise of Florence to European (and for these Medieval times, global) economic and financial dominance according to the law could be read as a rebuke of all the worldly powers hoping to bend the rule of law to their whim ...through the ages
It rings just as true right today, and in the words of the Temptations (1973) - The Law of The Land
"What goes around, comes aroundAnd what goes up, yeah, must come downIt's the law of the landWhether you like it or you understandIt's the law of the land"
There is no doubt at all that the U.S. Supreme Court is carefully weighing the argument of the Florentine writers...