CIVITAS SIBI FACIAT CIVEM: BARTOLUS OF SASSOFERRATO'S DOCTRINE ON THE MAKING OF A CITIZEN* BY JULIUS KIRSHNER ARCHIVES in Italy are repletewithmunicipal statutesenacted during the late Middle Ages and Renaissance, whichgranted citizenship (civilitas, cittadinanza) to thousands ofindividuals, their families and their male descendants. Investiga- tionson citizenship-legislation in Siena,Perugiaand Florence have demonstrated how the legal definition of citizenship differed from city to city,how different forms ofcitizenship could existside by side in a single city, and howtheseforms were undergoing a gradual amalgamation in the trecento.1 These complexities, combined withthe fact that the state of research on this subject is still in its infancy, prevent us from reducing the historical development of citizenship in Italian citiesto a fewexact models.2 Nonetheless a general pattern of what one may call the making ofa citizen has begunto emerge. For themost part, theorigins ofnewcitizens can be tracedback to thecontado, castellanies, and communities subject to the imperium of the city.Sometimes * I am indebtedto Professor Domenico Maffeiof the University of Siena and to my colleague Hanna Grayfor their critical reading ofthispaper. I also wishto thanktheAmerican Philosophical Societyfora travelgrant whichenabled me to spend the summer of 1970 in the libraries of Rome and Florence.All references to the Digest, hereafter cited as D., to the Code,hereafter cited as C., and to the Institutes, hereafter cited as I., are foundin Corpusiuris civilis, edd. T. H. Mommsen, W. Kroll,P. Krueger, and R. Schoell (3 vols. Berlin, 1928-1929). 1This theme has been treatedby A. Pertile, Storiadeldiritto italiano(Torino,1894), ii, pp. 124ff.; D. Bizzari, "Ricerchesul diritto di cittadinanzanella costituzione comunale," Studi senesi,XXXII (1916), 19-136,reprinted in her collected studies, Studi di storia del diritto italiano, edd. F. Patetta and M. Chiaudano (Turin, 1937), pp. 61-158; W. M. Bowsky,"Medieval Citizenship: The Indi- vidual and the State in the Communeof Siena, 1287-1355," Studiesin Medievaland Renaissance History, iv (Lincoln,Nebraska, 1967), 193-238; P. Riesenberg, "Civism and Roman Law in Four- teenth-Century Italian Society," Explorations in Economic History, vii (Fall-Winter, 1969-70), 237- 54; J. Kirshner, "Paolo di Castro on Cives Ex Privilegio: A Controversy over the Legal Qualifica- tions forPublic Office in Early Fifteenth-Century Florence," in RenaissanceStudiesin Honor of Hans Baron, edd. A. Molho and JohnA. Tedeschi (Florence,1971), pp. 227-64. P. Molmenti, Venice (6 vols., Chicago, 1906), i, 169-77; F. C. Lane, "The Enlargement of the Great Council of Venice,"Florilegium Historiale; Essays Presented toWallaceK. Ferguson, edd. J. G. Rowe and W. H. Stockdale(Toronto, 1971),258-60. For a controversial analysis ofdifferent conceptions ofcitizenship held by medieval philosophers, jurists, and publicists, see W. Ullmann, Principles ofGovernment and Politicsin the MiddleAges(London,1961),passim; idem., A History ofPoliticalThought: TheMiddle Ages(Baltimore, 1965), passim;"The Rebirth oftheCitizenon theEve ofthe'Renaissanice' Period," in Aspectsof theRenaissance, ed. A. R. Lewis (Austin, 1967), 5-25. Ullmann's interpretation has been attackedby G. Post in SPECULUM, XLIII (1968), 389-90; and by P. Grendler in Renaissance Quarterly, xxi (1968), 442. 2 Bowsky's methodological statement on the study of citizenship underscores the pitfallscon- fronting the scholarwho approachesthis topic "solely from the vantage point of political theory and Rechtsgeschichte." As he emphasizes (and I am in complete agreement with him): "Researchmust accountfor actual practice and mustrelatea studyofcitizenship to immigration and naturalization, socio-economic conditions, and thestructure and aimsofgovernment." "Medieval Citizenship," 238. 694 This content downloaded from 128.135.012.127 on April 05, 2016 10:46:22 AM All use subject to University of Chicago Press Terms and Conditions (http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/t-and-c).