Feasting,Fasting,andDoingPenance 275
stipends on Christmas and Easter, the days on which craft associations gave
a bonus to their familiars.^13
Charitable works were suitable on feasts. Florence celebrated Christmas,
Easter, and the feast of its principal patron, Saint John the Baptist, by grant-
ing pardons to the most wretched among those detained for debt in the city
prison. Those freed by this grace went in thanksgiving procession to the
baptistery church of San Giovanni, carrying candles and wearing special
hats inscribed with their names. There they made an oblation of the candles
and hats, which remained on display for a year to remind all of the mercy of
God, Saint John, and the commune of Florence. Compassion did have a
limit; a debtor could only receive this pardon once in a lifetime.^14 Modena
freed its debtors on Christmas, Easter, and the feast of its principal patron,
Saint Giminiano. That city appointed commissions of friars to decide which
paupers most deserved a pardon.^15 Communes made festivals the occasion
for other forms of public relief. At Siena, the podesta canceled thecasaticum
(a food tax) on Sundays, Holy Thursday, Christmas, and the feast of the
Assumption, lest the burden hinder anyone from enjoying the day.^16
City fathers did their part to make the festivals of the year joyous. The
Church could do no less. Ecclesiastical legislation mandated the presence of
the canons in the cathedral on feasts so that the cult could be performed
with its full splendor.^17 Ecclesiastics began their year near the beginning of
December, with the first Sunday of Advent. Advent was a penitential season
of preparation for Christmas. But the canons did no more than add Wednes-
day to the weekly fasts on Friday and Saturday. Choirs stopped singing the
joyful Gloria at the beginning of the Mass. Popular tradition claimed that
the opening verse of this hymn could not be sung again until the angels sang
it anew to the shepherds on Christmas morn.^18 But mostly the Advent season
went on with little fanfare until its last day, Christmas eve. Special obser-
vances began on Christmas eve, with the first Vespers of Christmas and the
supper that followed. Christmas eve, as a solemn vigil, was a strict fast day,
but tradition dictated that the fish dishes served be unusually sumptuous.
The clergy embellished the meal with solemn chanted blessings.^19 Among
the laity, the eve was a day for charity. In the early 1200 s, the rhetorician
Filippo of Ferrara explained that on this day the wealthy commonly invited
a group of carefully selected paupers to their dinner.^20
- For Christmas stipends, see Parma Stat.ii( 1266 ), 191 ; Piacenza,Statuta Antiqua Mercatorum Placentiae
(ca. 1200 ), 127. - Florence Stat.i( 1322 ), 5. 1 , pp. 217 – 18.
- Modena Stat. ( 1306 / 7 ), 2 : 103.
- Siena Stat.i( 1262 ), 4. 46 ,p. 416.
- E.g., Cremona Cath. Stat. ( 1247 ), 10 , pp. 454 – 55.
- Florence, Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale,msMagl.xiv. 49 , fol. 26 r.
- E.g.,Ordo Senensis, 1. 38 , pp. 32 – 33.
- Bologna, Biblioteca Universitaria,ms 1552(xvcent. copy of text dated between 1323 and 1347 ),
Filippo of Ferrara,Liber de Introductione Loquendi, 7. 23 , fol. 8 r. See Raymond Creytens, ‘‘Le manuel de
conversation de Philippe de Ferrare, O.P. ( 1350 ?),’’AFP 16 ( 1946 ): 112 n. 23 , on this manuscript.