TheHolyCity 129
The usual vehicles for the popular revolution were small neighborhood or
craft associations. After claiming political space by military uprisings, these
collectively organized to form a larger corporation, the Popolo itself.^187 Some
of these corporations had an overtly religious quality; craft guilds were com-
monly pious associations in origin. At Ferrara, early-twelfth-century records
of the shoemakers’ guild show that it was originally a purely religious associa-
tion and only later a craft guild, and then later a corporation of the Popolo.^188
By 1233 , at Padua, the Popolo consisted offratalie,the local word for such
societies, based on craft.^189 These probably had origins similar to those of
the shoemaker’s guild at Ferrara. At Parma the most important organs of
the Popolo were the neighborhood militia associations: thevicinia, rua,or
contrada(all three meaning neighborhood, the last,contrada—plural:contrade—
commonly used everywhere). Thefratalieelected their consuls in the neigh-
borhood chapel (ecclesia viciniae) and met there at the ringing of the church
bell.^190 At Cremona parishes (parrochie) themselves formed the Popolo. They
were grouped into quarter associations, and each owed a quota of soldiers
to the city. Of the fifty-seven cappelle of Cremona, the largest, San Michele
in Porta San Lorenzo (which was itself divided into districts), owed 759 sol-
diers, while smaller chapels like San Martino in Porta Portuzzi (Porta Por-
tusii) owed as few as ten. The total number of soldiers owed by the four
quarters was 5 , 826.^191 If Cremona had something like twenty-five thousand
people, the military component represented a large percentage of the adult
male population, perhaps over half. Verona assessed local cappelle for units
of the militia in the same way.^192 Such grassroots organizations of the Popolo
seem voluntary and local, which makes sense in light of the dictum, formu-
lated by the theorist of communal polity Albertano of Brescia, that nothing
could be more ‘‘absurd’’ than a ‘‘free’’ city whose government was feared
instead of loved.^193 It could be loved because it was made up of neighbors.
Sadly, neither of these cities has preserved documents revealing the internal
organization of these neighborhood societies. Bologna has the best docu-
mented neighborhood societies. There, the backbone of the Popolo was the
Societa`delle Armi.^194 Under the popular regime, these societies (along with
the craft guilds known as the Societa`delle Arti) elected the city councils and
- Menant, ‘‘Transformation,’’ p. 127 – 28.
- See Hyde,Society and Politics, 80.
189 .Liber Regiminum Padue( 1223 ), 306 ; Padua Stat., 1. 31 , pp. 129 – 30 ; the commune eventually sup-
pressed anyfrataliathat was not subordinate to the commune: ‘‘Statuti extravaganti [padovani],’’ ed.
Maria Antonietta Zorzi,L’ordinamento comunale padovano nella seconda meta`del secoloxiii: Studio storico con
documenti inediti,Miscellanea di storia veneta 5 : 3 (Venice: Deputazione di Storia Patria per le Venezie,
1931 ), doc. 5 ( 1293 ), p. 205. - Parma Stat.i( 1233 ), p. 99 ;( 1241 ), p. 12.
- Cremona Stat. ( 1270 ), 101 – 2.
- Verona Stat.ii( 1276 ), 5. 32 , pp. 688 – 90.
- Powell,Albertanus, 59.
- Hyde,Society and Politics, 110 – 12.