kings came from the Spanish
house of Aragon. The center of
the peninsula remained under
the rather shaky control of the
papacy. Lack of centralized
authority had enabled numerous
city-states in northern and cen-
tral Italy to remain independent
of any political authority.
In the course of the four-
teenth century, two general ten-
dencies can be discerned in Italy:
the replacement of republican
governments by tyrants and the
expansion of the larger city-
states at the expense of the less
powerful ones. Nearly all the
cities of northern Italy began
their existence as free com-
munes with republican govern-
ments. But in the fourteenth
century, intense internal strife
led city-states to resort to tem-
porary expedients, allowing rule by one man with dicta-
torial powers. Limited rule, however, soon became
long-term despotism, as tyrants proved willing to use
force to maintain power. Eventually, the tyrants tried
to legitimize their power by purchasing titles from the
emperor (still nominally ruler of northern Italy as Holy
Roman emperor). In this fashion, the Visconti became
the dukes of Milan and the d’Este the dukes of Ferrara.
The other change of great significance was the devel-
opment of regional entities as the larger states expanded
at the expense of the smaller ones. To fight their battles,
city-states came to rely on mercenary soldiers, whose
leaders, calledcondottieri (kahn-duh-TYAY-ree), sold
the services of their bands to the highest bidder. These
mercenaries wreaked havoc on the countryside, living by
blackmail and looting when they were not actively
engaged in battles.
By the beginning of the fifteenth century, three
major states came to dominate northern Italy. Located
in the fertile Po valley, where the chief trade routes
from Italian coastal cities to the Alpine passes crossed,
Milan was one of the richest city-states in Italy. Politi-
cally, it was also one of the most agitated until mem-
bers of the Visconti family established themselves as
hereditary dukes of Milan and extended their power
over all of Lombardy. The republic of Florence domi-
nated the region of Tuscany. In the course of the four-
teenth century, a small but wealthy merchant oligarchyassumed control of the Floren-
tine government, led the Floren-
tines in a series of successful
wars against their neighbors,
and established Florence as a
major territorial state in north-
ern Italy. The other major
northern Italian state was the
maritime republic of Venice,
which had grown rich from com-
mercial activity in the eastern
Mediterranean and northern
Europe. Venice remained a sta-
ble political entity governed by a
small oligarchy of merchant-
aristocrats who had become
extremely wealthy through their
trading activities. Venice’s com-
mercial empire brought in enor-
mous revenues and gave it the
status of an international power.
At the end of the fourteenth
century, Venice embarked on
the conquest of a territorial state in northern Italy to
protect its food supply and its overland trade routes.The Decline of the Church
Q FOCUSQUESTION: How and why did the authority
and prestige of the papacy decline in the fourteenth
century?The papacy of the Roman Catholic Church reached the
height of its power in the thirteenth century. Theories
of papal supremacy included a doctrine of “fullness of
power” as the spiritual head of Christendom and claims
to universal temporal authority over all secular rulers.
But papal claims of temporal supremacy were increas-
ingly out of step with the growing secular monarchies
of Europe and ultimately brought the papacy into a
conflict with the territorial states that it was unable
to win.Boniface VIII and the Conflict with the State
The struggle between the papacy and the secular
monarchies began during the pontificate of Pope Boni-
face VIII (1294–1303). One major issue appeared to be
at stake between the pope and King Philip IVA
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Century262 Chapter 11 The Later Middle Ages: Crisis and Disintegration in the Fourteenth CenturyCopyright 2017 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).
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