Abstract
Fo. the age in which he lived, the words of the Bolognese agriculturalist quoted above ring ironically upon the ear. How, asked Crescenzii, should one choose and furnish a farm? His answer was, ‘ If you should find yourself in a dangerous neighbourhood, subject to the control of powerful enemies, it is safer to abandon such a place rather than insanely and recklessly to put yourself in a position, where, unless by some chance a Lord with great wealth should be persuaded to build a castle, you will have to prepare yourself for death.’ Were there no protection from a Lord and were there robbers and bandits, and you still decided to stay, Crescenzii gives advice on how to fortify the place, with streams, ditches, dykes, hedges, palisades, and a watchtower, ‘ where the head of the household and his servants may take refuge with their property when there is need ’ Try too, he advised, to find some place where they do not often change their lord.2 It is needless to remark that Romagna was just such an area as Crescenzii had advised his reader to quit.
Looking at all ways of making money, I hold that there is nothing superior to agriculture, nothing, as Cicero observes, more abundant, sweeter, or worthier of a free man. It is in the cultivation of the farm that one finds most easily the peaceful life.
Pier. De’. Crescenzi.1
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
M. Placucci, ‘Usi e pregiudizii de’ contadini della Romagna’, Forlì, 1818, Titolo IV, reprinted in Romagna tradizional., ed. P. Toschi, Bologna, 1952, 99 f.; ‘Documenti inediti relativi all’ inchiesta napoleonica del 1811 nel dipartmento del Rubicone’, in ibid., 33.
‘Gli statuti di Forlimpopoli’, ed. U. Santini, AM., 3, XXII, 1904. In the statutes of the fourteenth-century printed by Santini, any labourer not working land as ordered in the statutes was supposed to give his lord four sextario. for each tomatur. he held; p. 159. In the statutes of 1536, it was provided that he was to take no more than half a stai. of com from his patron for the sowing of each tornatura; ibid., 160.
Statuta Faventia., 258–9. See ‘Over-population and Underemployment in the Italian Countryside’ in R. Dumont, Types of Rural Econom. (English translation), London, 1957, 237. On mezzadri. see, too, F. Vochting, Die Romagna: eine Studie uber Halbpacht und Landarbeiter Wesen in Italie., Karlsruhe, 1927.
Theiner, II, 490–516. For succinct accounts of all the Romagnol feudality mentioned in Dante, see Casini, Scritti dantesch. cit. and R. Torraca, Scritti dantesch., Naples, 1912— especially ‘Le rimembranze di Guido del Duca’, 131–7. See also G. Mini, I nobili romagnoli della Divina Commedi., Forlì, 1904,
P. Toynbee, A dictionary of proper names and notable matters in the works of Dant., Oxford, 1898.
Ezra Pound, A Draft of Thirty Canto., London, 1954.
E. Gaddoni, ‘Il testimonio di Maghinardo’ cit. The seals of Bernardino Orgogliosi, Alessandro de’ Conti Romena, Malatesta da Verucchio, and Ugo dei Sassi are illustrated in G. Cencetti, ‘Sigilli medievali del Museo Civico di Bologna’ AM., 1951–3 (Studi storici in memoria di Luigi Simeon., Vol. I). For the seals of Guido and Bernardino da Polenta, see plate 3 of G. Gerola, A proposito dell’ Aglugia da Polenta,.Florence, 1914.
I fioretti del glorioso messere Santo Francesc., ed. G. Passerini, Florence, 1903.
F. Antonini, Della antichiti Sarsin., Faenza, 1769. 306–11.
For a full discussion of the emphyteutic lease, see F. Grossara, ‘La “ concordia ”’, SR. III, 1952.
G. Ballardini, Anno MCCXX: atto di liberazione dalla servitù della gleba e di concessione di un tenimento de IV agro faentin., Faenza, 1907.
For the controversy on the abolition of serfdom in the Bolognese; A. Palmieri, ‘Sul riscatto dei servi della gleba nel contado bolognese’, Archivio Giuridic., 3, VI, 1906;
Santini, ASI. 4, XVII, 1919, 142–5;
Palmieri, ‘Ancora sul riscatto dei servi alla gleba’, AMR. 4, IX, 1919, 142–5; ibid.,.‘Lotte agrarie bolognesi nei secoli XIII e XIV’, AMR. 4, xxii, 1923,7-63.
Burchi, 77, Antonini, 306–11; on later feudalism see G. Natali, ‘La Repubblica Cispadana e P abolizione dei feudi’, AME. III, 1938.
There is a plan of Castiglioncho in D. Mini, Marrad., Castrocaro, 1892.
For adherents of Malatesti and Ordelaffi in 1389; Documenti diplomatici tratti dagli archivi milanes., ed. L. Osio, Milan, 1864–72, I, 278–93.
G. Vitali, Memorie storiche riguardanti la terra di M. Fior., Rimini, 1828, 33 f.
In these rural communes, often called the Casa Comunale; e.g..at Tossignano in March 1259 ‘domus comunis’ — ACap. Imola, VII, 124. By the fifteenth century this had a loggi. and a ‘sala maggior.’ — AN. Imola, Rogiti di Nanne Zanelli di Tossignano (heceforth cited as Zanelli), 3 October 1433, 6 July 1433. Castel dell’ Alpe met, ‘in domo sive pallatio dicti Communis’, R. Caggese, Classi e comuni rurali nel medio evo italian., Florence, 1907, I, 353. For a meeting of Castrocaro, ‘in domo comunis in generali consilio comunis congregato’, under its podestà. and vice-podestà., AN. Ravenna, Memoriale I, 1 May 1304.
U. Toschi, Un comune del Subappenino Romagnol., Imola, 1928, 30.
Ibid., 35, 41, 108; G. Bagli, ‘Bandi malatestiani’, AM., 3, II, 1885.
M. Spallicci, La poesia dialettale romagnol., Forlì, 1953, 17–26.
F. Cocco, ‘Analisi storica e semantica della parola “ Trébbo ”’, in Il mondo agrario tradizionale nella Valle Padan., Modena, 1963, 105–112, and U. Foschi, ‘Antichi giochi dei contadini romagnoli’, ibid., 127–140. Sorbelli, Comune rural., 249–55.
A. Zoli, ‘La caccia nel territorio di Ravenna nel secolo XIII’, La Romagn., 1910, 235. In 1304, the Abbot of San Vitale leased to one Domenico ‘fisherman’ the ‘vallem de Bartina ad piscandum, venandum et aucupandum, illuminandum pro tertia parte piscium et venationis’ — AS. Ravenna, A.C.R.S., Vitale, Volume 623, f.23, 19 January 1304. These rights were also leased for money. Two years later, the Abbot leased hunting and fishing rights for the ‘vallem Bartinae’ for £R.27 a year, ibid., ACR, S. Vitale, Vol. 623, f.24, 1306.
P. Jones, ‘A Tuscan monastic lordship in the later Middle Ages’, Journal of Ecclesiastical Histor., V, 1954, 181; Mittarelli, 526.
L. Quadri, Vita massaese attraverso i secol., Massa Lombarda, 1910.
Sorbelli’s evidence for dissodament. and the enclosure of common property comes almost entirely from the sixteenth century, Sorbelli, 235–8. Palmieri sees a rise in the value of land in the second half of the fifteenth century; A. Palmieri, La montagna bolognes., Bologna, 1929, 370.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 1965 John Larner
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Larner, J. (1965). The Countryside. In: The Lords of Romagna. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-00589-5_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-00589-5_6
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-00591-8
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-00589-5
eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)