116 LaCitadeSancta
his pastoral staff and blesses the communal militia. Cavalry stand at his left,
and foot soldiers on his right. The latter hold the banner of the commune.
An inscription below reads: ‘‘The bishop with sincere heart grants to his
people a standard worthy of defense.’’ The sculpture commemorates nothing
less than the end of imperial rule and the creation of the Veronese Commune
in the 1130 s, and it is the ‘‘people’’—not the old knightly aristocracy with its
imperial connections—to whom Zeno hands his banner.^86 The lord of the
Commune is its heavenly patron, not the earthly emperor.
Other new communes resurrected forgotten bishop saints, reviving or in-
venting cults from the distant past.^87 These cults underwent a political trans-
formation. At Bologna, the cult of the city’s two earliest bishops, Saints Zama
and Justinian, dates to the early communal period.^88 But neither Zama nor
Justinian had obvious links to the new communal regime. The links had to
be invented. When they were, they focused on another saint who soon
eclipsed both Zama and Justinian, Saint Petronio. He is by far the best-
studied example of this phenomenon, and, like Ansano, he was a ‘‘new’’
saint.
The historical Petronio, who was perhaps of Gallic origin, served as
bishop of Bologna from about 432 to about 450. His contemporaries, Hilary
of Arles and Eucher of Lyons, mention him but give next to nothing in the
way of biographical information.^89 He enjoyed no cult and fell into centuries
of obscurity. Petronio first appears in a Bolognese liturgical calendar of 1019 ,
but his actual cult and first vita were both products of the communal pe-
riod.^90 On 4 October 1141 , Bishop Enrico I of Bologna ( 1130 – 45 ) preached a
sermon announcing the discovery of his predecessor’s relics in the Santo
Stefano complex.^91 The bishop claimed that, thanks to a written record
(scriptura) found during reconstruction of the altar of Saint Isidore of Seville,
a workman had located a large collection of relics. The cache included a
marble arca with the bones of Bishop Petronio. While preparing a shrine for
- See Hyde,Society and Politics,pl. 2 and p. 61 , esp. n. 15 ; M. B. Becker,Medieval Italy: Constraints and
Creativity(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1981 ), 40 ; Webb, ‘‘Cities of God,’’ 116 ; and, on this
image of Zeno, ead.,Patrons, 62 – 63. - A phenomenon studied for Modena, Reggio Emilia, Mantua, and Verona by Paolo Golinelli,
Indiscreta Sanctitas: Studi sui rapporti tra culti, poteri e societa`nel pieno Medioevo,Studi storici, 197 – 98 (Rome:
Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo, 1988 ), esp. 55 – 101. On patron saints and legitimacy generally,
see Webb,Patrons, 5 – 7. - See inscriptions concerning their relics, originally in the monastery of Ss. Narborre e Felice, now
at Santo Stefano:Iscrizioni medievali bolognesi, 114 , no. 1. On bishop saints and early communal identity, see
Golinelli,Citta`e culto, 70 – 72. - Lanzoni,San Petronio, 19 – 34. For bibliography from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century,
see Alba Maria Orselli, ‘‘Spirito cittadino e temi politico-culturali nel culto di san Patronio,’’La coscienza
cittadina nei comuni italiani nel duecento, 285 – 87 n. 1 ; for modern scientific studies, see ibid., ‘‘Excursus,’’
331 – 43. - Lanzoni,San Petronio, 35.
- Bologna, Biblioteca Universitaria,ms 1473(ca. 1180 ), fols. 265 r– 268 v; printed editions:Sermone de
Inventione Reliquiarum [S. Petronii],ed. Francisco Lanzoni,San Petronio vescovo di Bologna nella storia e nella
legenda(Rome: Pustet, 1907 ), 240 – 50 ;AS 50 (Oct.ii), 466 – 70. On this text, see Orselli, ‘‘Spirito,’’ 294.