(i) Political and economic life

The history of Benedetto Accolti's native city, Arezzo, followed a characteristic pattern for a Tuscan city-state at the end of the middle ages: rapid expansion was succeeded by internal disruption, leading to loss of independence and prolonged civic decline. The climax of the Aretine commune's growth had been reached during the thirteenth century and was followed by almost a century of factional conflict and foreign war, culminating in the surrender of Arezzo to Florence in 1384. Florentine rule brought an end to overt political turmoil, but it also coincided with an economic depression from which Arezzo did not begin to recover until at least the sixteenth century.

For most of the thirteenth century Arezzo had prospered and its commune had grown stronger, but Arezzo's rise brought the commune into conflict with neighbouring towns, especially Florence and Siena, and in 1289 Arezzo was decisively defeated by Florence at the battle of Campaldino. This humiliation was followed by more than twenty years of dissension among Arezzo's leading families. Two factions, called the Verdi and the Secchi, emerged and eventually the Secchi prevailed, installing their leader, Guido Tarlati, bishop of Arezzo, as despot in 1312. The signoria of Guido Tarlati temporarily restored Arezzo's prestige: he built a new circuit of walls which greatly enlarged the city, restored Arezzo's dominions in the countryside, introduced a new silver and copper currency and replenished the city's treasury. He reached the highpoint of his career when he crowned Louis of Bavaria as emperor in Milan in 1327, but he died a few months later, bequeathing the signoria to his brother, Pier Saccone.