GAETA

The economic and political power of the Docibilan rulers of Gaeta can only be appreciated fully if it is treated within the context of a comparison with the fortunes of other contemporary families in Gaeta. This subject has only been patchily dealt with in the Gaetan historiography so far. Both Merores and Fedele have discussed certain eleventh-century clans, but neither really addressed those of the tenth century. And Delogu, whilst recognising the importance of the early Docibilans' relationships with the sons of count Anatolius and with Kampulus the prefect, did not examine the family histories of either man or cast his net wider to discuss other noble families.

One reason for this oversight may be that during the tenth and early eleventh centuries, the use of surnames to identify blood ties was still extremely rare at Gaeta, which renders the tracing of tenth-century lines of descent less obviously simple. Only one of the families to be discussed in this chapter, the Caracci, consistently used that surname after their first appearance in 1020, relatively late. It is likely that they derived it from the genitive form of the name of an ancestor, Caraccius, losing the final -i. In a similar way, for ease of identification, I have created genitive-form surnames based on their earliest or most prominent member for the families discussed in this chapter.