164 LaCitadeSancta
The first up makes the first offering. This aspect of the cult may not actually
be medieval, but it certainly captures the lay ethos of candle offering.^138
We catch glimpses of the crowd dynamics as people made their offerings.
In early-fourteenth-century Perugia, members of the large Confraternity of
the Virgin had an annual offering.^139 At the sounding of the church bells,
people formed up, women and men separately, to receive candles from those
in charge, giving them in return a money offering ( 2 d.). The people heard a
sermon while holding their candles, the sexes on separate sides of the church.
This finished, the men went in procession with lighted candles, singing a
vernacularlauda,around the nave and cloister before depositing their can-
dles. The women, however, remained, with their lighted candles, ‘‘devoutly
and quietly’’ in the church. Men as well as women were to show proper
devotion at candle offerings. At Parma, the population made mass candle
offerings on the feasts of the Assumption of Mary ( 15 August) and of Saint
Lucy ( 13 December). On one occasion, pushing and shoving in the line of
candle offerers got out of hand. In response, the city rectors, Giovanni Nessi
and Giovanni Arlotti, joined the council of ‘‘ancients’’ (anziani) in leveying a
£ 300 parm. fine for jostling or shouting.^140 This may have stopped the push-
ing, but some impatient citizens resorted to throwing their candles over oth-
ers’ heads toward the altar. The city enacted a fine for that too.^141
As the century wore on, offerings multiplied. By the 1260 s, the Bolognese
podesta, knights, judges, notaries, and other officials were obliged to make
processions and candle offerings at the churches of the Dominicans, Francis-
cans, and Augustinians, as well as an offering at the tomb of the new city
patron, Saint Petronio, in Santo Stefano.^142 By the end of the century, this
multiplication of offerings threatened to turn devotion into routine. As traffic
in candles increased, so did occasions for abuse. The merchant guild at Pia-
cenza once discovered adulterated candles on sale in their town. They or-
dered them publicly burned in the Piazza Santa Brigida and imposed a 3 s.
placen. fine on adulterators.^143 Bologna and Parma were plagued by inferior
votive candles. They legislated on wick quality (fine linen to be used), wax
purity (beeswax only), and appointed a commission to examine the candle
molds and oversee production.^144 Such legislation affected candles for reli-
gious use only, not those for simple illumination. Votive wax quality affected
the integrity of a corporate act of worship and devotion. Inferior wax shamed
the commune. Some cities directly supervised the production of candles for
- I am obliged to Fr. Eugenio Marino, O.P., of Santa Maria Novella in Florence for describing
the feast at Gubbio to me. - ‘‘Statuto della Congregazione della Vergine di Perugia ( 1312 )’’ 1 , Meersseman,Ordo, 2 : 1063.
- Parma Stat.i( 1232 ), p. 282.
- Ibid. ( 1228 – 55 ), 202.
- Bologna Stat.i( 1262 ), 5. 2 , 1 : 441.
- Piacenza,Statuta Antiqua Mercatorum Placentiae, Statuta Varia Civitatis Placentiae,Monumenta Histor-
ica ad Provincias Parmensem et Placentinam Pertinentia, 1 (Parma: Fiaccadori, 1855 ), 108. - Parma Stat.i( 1228 – 55 ), p. 202 ; Bologna Stat.ii( 1294 ), 5. 153 , 1 : 572 – 75.