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Chapter 7 - 1230–1420

Barons, Babylonian Captivity, and Black Death: The Apogee and Agony of Late Medieval Rome

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 September 2021

Hendrik Dey
Affiliation:
Hunter College, City University of New York
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Summary

There is substantial consensus that the years around 1230 represent a sociopolitical inflection point at Rome, when the “barons” began definitively to surpass the rest of the urban nobility and constitute themselves as a class apart – the barones Urbis as opposed to the ordinary nobiles Urbis. This local superelite, never exceeding 12–15 families, would exercise “a crushing hegemony over Roman political life” for more than a century, until the popular backlash that crystallized around Cola di Rienzo in 1347. Even then, their eclipse was temporary. Across the period c. 1230–1420, the barons were the most consistently influential actors on the Roman stage. Whether as cardinals (and sometimes popes), senators, or ‘private’ agents, they would play an outsized role in shaping – for better and for worse – the urban environment for the rest of the Middle Ages: for better, in that baronial patrons sponsored a preponderance of the most impressive monuments and artistic commissions attempted in Rome; for worse, in that they subverted the mechanisms of communal government and made Rome the arena for their bloody rivalries.

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The Making of Medieval Rome
A New Profile of the City, 400 – 1420
, pp. 214 - 254
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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  • 1230–1420
  • Hendrik Dey, Hunter College, City University of New York
  • Book: The Making of Medieval Rome
  • Online publication: 30 September 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108975162.009
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  • 1230–1420
  • Hendrik Dey, Hunter College, City University of New York
  • Book: The Making of Medieval Rome
  • Online publication: 30 September 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108975162.009
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • 1230–1420
  • Hendrik Dey, Hunter College, City University of New York
  • Book: The Making of Medieval Rome
  • Online publication: 30 September 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108975162.009
Available formats
×