Enterprise and liability in Sienese banking, 1230-1350 (Speculum anniversary monographs) 9780910956956, 0910956944, 0910956952

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SPECULUM ANNIVERSARY MONOGRAPHS TWELVE

Enterprise and Liability in Sienese Banking, 1230-1350

a

Se SPECULUM ANNIVERSARY MONOGRAPHS

\aisS/ TWELVE

| BOARD OF EDITORS Bernard S. Bachrach Roberta Frank Diane Hughes

| V. A. Kolve Luke Wenger

Enterprise and Liability in Sienese Banking, 1230-1350

Edward D. English

THE MEDIEVAL ACADEMY OF AMERICA 1988

The publication of this book was made possible by funds contributed to the Medieval Academy during the Semi-Centennial Fund Drive. Copyright © 1988. Cambridge, Massachusetts By The Medieval Academy of America LCC: 86-61173 ISBN: 0-910956-94-4 (cloth); 0-910956-95-2 (paper) Printed in the United States of America

For my mother and in memory of my father

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Contents

Acknowledgments 1X Explanatory Note XI

Abbreviations X11 Introduction 1] PART ONE. THE RISE OF SIENESE BANKING

| I. Papal Banking and Politics 9

the 1290s 4]

II. The Bonsignori and European Banking to PART TWO. THE DECLINE OF SIENESE BANKING

III. The Failure of the Bonsignori 55

IV. The Failure of the Tolomei 79

the Bonsignori 101

V. The Papal Investigation into the Debts of

Conclusion 111 Bibliography 115

Index 127

, Vii

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Acknowledgments

It is a pleasure to acknowledge the help and kindness I have received while working on this book and on the theses from which it originated. I owe special debts of gratitude to Professors Leonard E. Boyle, O.P.,

and Norman Zacour, who supervised my licentiate thesis and my doctoral dissertation. Father Boyle gave me a rigorous respect for published and archival documents and their scholarly usefulness. Pro-

fessor Zacour fostered a relentless pursuit of clarity of expression. Professors John H. A. Munro, William M. Bowsky, and an anonymous reader for the Medieval Academy gave me helpful advice and encouragement on the manuscript of this book. Professor Olga Z. Pugliese assisted me with some early transcriptions of Italian. Donatella Ciampoli graciously showed me the typescript of J/ capitano del popolo a Siena before its publication. Anyone studying medieval Siena is much indebted to the many scholars, both past and present, who have published excellent documentary editions and studies on that city. Professor Mario Ascheri of the Universita di Siena continues that fine tradition of publication. Besides setting high standards of scholarship and offering encouragement, he generously assisted me in obtaining archival material for this study. Professor Anthony Molho and Dr. Gino Corti helped me to see and obtain documents in Florence and Siena. I have been helped by the staffs of several repositories and libraries, but especially by those of the Archivio di Stato in Siena, the Archivio di Stato in Florence, the Vatican Archives, the Biblioteca Comunale in Siena, and the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florence. Sincere and particular thanks must go to the Archivio di Stato in Siena and its patient

staff under Ubaldo Morandi, the past director, and Sonia Fineschi, the present director. Father Donald F. Finlay, C.S.B., generously allowed me the use of the library of the Pontifical Institute of Mediae-

val Studies. The Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, with its then director James E. Estes, made me a Senior Fellow and facilitated the completion of this book. I would also like to acknowledge the encouragement and assistance of the Medieval Academy of America, the board of editors of Specu-

lum Anniversary Monographs, Kenneth R. Bartlett, Konrad Eisen1X

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS , bichler, Stephen D. Dumont, Gordon Moran, Gail Aronow, Michael Gervers, Wesley M. Stevens, Germaine Warkentin, Andrew Hughes, and the staff of the Records of Early English Drama. For this study I owe an unlimited debt of gratitude for encouragement and help to my

wife, Mary. The virtues of this book are a joint responsibility; its shortcomings are my own.

_ Toronto

Summer 1986

X

Explanatory Note

Following the Florentine style, each year in Siena began on 25 March,

the Annunciation, rather than on the preceding | January. All dates below are in the common or modern style. When identification is secure, the names of individuals are rendered in a consistent form, according to modern Italian spelling. The names of those who appear only in one reference or whose identification is unclear are rendered in Latin in the nominative case, reflecting the spelling of the documents.

Quotations from manuscript sources are given according to the orthography of the original, but the punctuation and capitalization are my own.

4

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Abbreviations

ASF Archivio di Stato di Firenze , ASS Archivio di Stato di Siena

B ASS, Biccherna ,

ASV Archivio Segreto Vaticano

BSSP Bullettino senese di storia patria

CCR Calendar of Close Rolls (1272-) (London, 1900-)

CG ASS, Consiglio generale, Deliberazioni

CLR Calendar of Liberate Rolls (1226-) (London, 1916-) Coll. Collectoriae volumes of the Fondo Camerale Const. 1262 Lodovico Zdekauer, ed., // constituto del comune di Siena dell’anno 1262 (Milan, 1897, reprinted Bologna, 1983)

Cost. 1309-10 Alessandro Lisini, ed., // costituto del comune di Siena volgarizzato nel MCCCIX-MCCCX, 2 vols. (Siena, 1903)

CPR Calendar of Patent Rolls (1216-—) (London, 1906-) CR Close Rolls of the Reign of Henry III (1227-72) (London, 1902-38)

Cron. sen. (Anon.) Alessandro Lisini and Fabio Iacometti, Cronache se(Montauri) nesi, in Rerum Italicarum scriptores, n.s., 15/6 (Bo(Agnolo) logna, 1931-37). (With appropriate chronicler)

CV Giovanni Cecchini, Mario Ascheri, and others, eds., , Il Caleffo Vecchio del comune di Siena, 4 vols. (Florence, 1932-34, and Siena, 1940-84)

DAG ASS, Diplomatico, Archivio Generale dei Contratti

DR ASS, Diplomatico, Riformagioni

DSD ASS, Diplomatico, Convento di San Domenico DSF ASS, Diplomatico, Convento di San Francesco

DT ASS, Diplomatico, Tolomei

Malavolti, Historia Orlando Malavolti, Dell’historia di Siena, 3 vols. in 1 (Venice, 1599, reprinted Bologna, 1968)

MGH EppsSel Carolus Rodenberg, ed., Epistolae saeculi XIII e regestis pontificum Romanorum selectae, 3, Monumenta Germaniae Historica (Berlin, 1894)

RA Registra Avenionensia

Thes. novus Edmund Marténe and Ursinus Durand, eds., Thesaurus novus anecdotorum, 2 (Paris, 1717)

Xi

ABBREVIATIONS

Tommasi, Historie Giugurta Tommasi, Dell’historie di Siena, 2 vols. in 1 (Venice, 1625-26, reprinted Bologna, 1973)

X1V

Introduction

An important factor in economic development is the availability of credit at reasonable rates of interest, and this held true for the commercial revolution in thirteenth-century Europe. Innovative forms of partnership enabled deposit and commercial bankers and merchants to assemble substantial sums for loans or other profitable uses. Gaining credibility by risking their family patrimonies, entrepreneurs com-

bined their own and the funds of outsiders to provide the requisite credit for growth. The commune of Siena produced companies that were among the most successful and innovative of the time. Much of the animating force behind Siena’s growth in the field of international banking and commerce came from societates built around magnate families such as the Bonsignori and the Tolomei. The business careers of these two families mirror well the history of international and Sienese banking and commerce. Learning from customs and habits engendered by economic cooper-

ation and joint exploitation of rural properties and seigniorial rights, | members of these two families integrated capital and personnel from outside their lineages in order to participate in the expanding economy of thirteenth-century Europe.! Their abilities as flexible federations of 1. For examples of magnate families deriving unity from joint economic enterprise see Francis William Kent, Household and Lineage in Renaissance Florence: The Family Life of the Capponi, Ginori and Rucellai (Princeton, 1977), pp. 65-66; Jacques Heers, Le clan familial au moyen age: Etude sur les structures politiques et sociales des milieux urbains (Paris, 1974), p. 230; Lawrence Stone, “The Rise of the Nuclear | Family in Early Modern England: The Patriarchal Stage,” in Charles E. Rosenberg, ed., The Family in History (Philadelphia, 1975), p. 19; Robert Wheaton, “Family

and Kinship in Western Europe: The Problem of the Joint Family Household,”

, Journal of Interdisciplinary History 5 (1975), 618-19; Diane Owen Hughes, “Domestic Ideals and Social Behavior: Evidence from Medieval Genoa,” in Rosenberg, ed., The Family in History, p. 120. Raymond de Roover noted that an important

reason for Siena’s success in banking and trade over the Alps was the superior business organization of its merchants; he also lamented the dearth of studies and published documents about the organization and the financial structures of these companies: “The Organization of Trade,” The Cambridge Economic History of Europe, 3: Economic Organization and Policies in the Middle Ages, ed. M. M. Postan, E. E. Rich, and Edward Miller (Cambridge, Eng., 1963), pp. 74-75.

|

SIENESE BANKING

households to combine and to cooperate within their kinship groups and with outsiders were key elements in their successes and ultimate failures. Usually called societates in Sienese documents, these companies involved several merchants or investors joining in a partnership last-

ing for a few years. In their acts of association, members usually established the objectives of the firm, the amounts of capital to be invested by the present and future partners, and the divisions of resulting profits and losses.” Ultimate authority within the firm and the responsibility of the company’s associates to third parties were generally left vague. In theory and practice, however, members of companies were usually held to have joint and unlimited responsibility for debts. When the economic problems of late-thirteenth- and early-fourteenthcentury Europe made the risks of international business much greater, merchants and bankers naturally sought to limit their obligations. Internal discipline and the application of the principle of joint and unlimited responsibility of partners were crucial factors in the rise and fail of the fortunes of the Bonsignori and Tolomei companies. Without internal cooperation and decisiveness, companies would not be able to adapt to economic change or business cycles. Without clear claims and effective access to the assets of partners in case of solvency problems, many investors or creditors would be reluctant to deal with these. firms. Although the business activities and failures of both the Bonsignori and the Tolomei have been studied before, a new investigation can be

justified on several grounds.? Besides the appearance of more pub2. For descriptions of the organization of a business compagnia or societas see Richard W. Kaeuper, “The Societas Riccardorum and Economic Change,” in By Things Seen: Reference and Recognition in Medieval Thought, ed. D. L. Jeffrey (Ottawa, 1979), p. 163; Robert S. Lopez, The Commercial Revolution of the Middle Ages, 950-1350 (Englewood Cliffs, N.J., 1971), pp. 74-75; Adolf Berger, Encyclopedic Dictionary of Roman Law (Philadelphia, 1953), pp. 708-9. See also the articles by Thomas Wood Blomquist in the Bibliography. 3. For Sienese banking in general: Mario Chiaudano, “Le compagnie bancarie senesi nel Duecento,” in Studi e documenti per la storia del diritto commerciale italiano nel

secolo XIII (Turin, 1930), pp. 1-51; for the Bonsignori: Mario Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento: La Gran Tavola di Orlando Bonsignori,” BSSP 42 (1935), 103-43, and “Note e documenti sulla compagnia dei Bonsignori,” in Studi e documenti per la storia del diritto commerciale italiana nel secolo XII (Turin, 1930), pp. 114-42. For a general view of the Tolomei, including their business activities: Giulio Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” in // Palazzo Tolomei a Siena (Florence, 1971), pp. 7-58, and the articles cited in the following notes by Robert-Henri Bautier, Mario Chiaudano, Georges Bigwood, and Giuliana Gianelli. In his description of the role 2

INTRODUCTION

lished sources and studies, the Archivio di Stato of Siena contains much material, especially deliberations of the Consiglio Generale, that deals with the failures and bankruptcy proceedings of these societies.

| Certain aspects of the business careers of the two families, moreover, have been ignored or are in need of further elaboration. Before moving on to an additional study of the private economies of these families, their careers in international banking and commerce need fleshing Out in order to understand the sources and uses of their wealth. The role of the patrimony of a family as an essential part of the fiscal credibility and success of a societas as a business entity has not been fully appreciated. Other topics should be addressed: the role of kinship in economic organization, the interaction of Sienese and international diplomacy and politics with the careers of the companies, the impact of papal employment on Sienese and European banking, and the effects of the internal political, social, and legal environments of Siena itself, including vacillation in the theory and practice of communal legislation for the systematization of bankruptcy. In other words, their business policy, management capabilities, and organizational structures will be studied here within the context of the problems presented by the periods of growth and stagnation in the thirteenth and early-fourteenth century. The failures and resulting bankruptcy proceedings of the Bonsignori and Tolomei are indicative of the intentions, fears, and ideas of the European and Sienese mercantile community.* They demonstrate the difficulties businessmen of the early-fourteenth century had in estab-

and importance of the Council of Merchants (Mercanzia) in the economic life of Siena, William M. Bowsky looks at the practice of reprisal and bankruptcy administration using the cases of the Bonsignori and the Tolomei: A Medieval Italian Commune: Siena under the Nine, 1287-1355 (Berkeley, 1981), pp. 232-59. Bowsky rightly points out the important and pervasive part played by the Mercanzia in the economy

of Siena. The present study completes and nuances this work, especially on bankruptcy, by further research in the Archivio di Stato in Siena. It also adds many new documents to those used by Ageo Arcangeli, Quinto Senigaglia, and Armando Sapori in their studies of the principle of joint and unlimited liability. For the Mercanzia now see Mario Ascheri, Siena nel Rinascimento: Istituzioni e sistema politica (Siena, 1985), pp. 109-37. 4. Fora general study of bankruptcy see C. Pecorella and Ugo Gualazzini, “Fallimento (premessa storia),” Enciclopedia del diritto (Milan, 1967), 16:220-32. Umberto Santarelli in Per la storia del fallimento nelle legislazioni italiane dell’eta intermedia (Padua, 1964) has written a fine and exhaustive study of the cursus fallimentare according to the norms embodied in communal statutes. Evidence for the common acceptance of the principle of joint and unlimited liability, for example, can be 3

SIENESE BANKING

lishing legal procedures and institutions that protected the rights of creditors and investors, yet gave entrepreneurs the capital necessary to take advantage of opportunities. The fear of fraudulent practices and intentions in forming societates and in claiming bankruptcy was always strong.° Should the existence of such activities or goals be discovered or even suspected, the economy of the period, based so much on good faith, could not and would not function. The role of communal institutions and laws in ensuring the fulfillment of obligations and contracts, as we shall see, was also problematic in Siena around 1300. Lastly the collective and juristic personality of the company or society was not taken for granted by the business community of Siena, Tuscany, or Europe in the early-fourteenth century. The fear of fraud was one element that kept merchants, who certainly were acquainted with

corporations, especially ecclesiastical ones, from accepting that an abstract entity might possess obligations beyond or instead of the individual members of a societas. The present study takes a chronological approach to the financial and commercial activities of the two family companies. Part 1 describes and explains the success of these Sienese merchants from the early-thirteenth century until the crises of the 1290s. Part 2 examines first the failures and subsequent liquidations of the two firms between

found on pages 176 and 185; that for maintaining the responsibility of heirs for ancestors’ debts is on page 145. Research is needed on the doctrinal concepts of the jurisprudents on bankruptcy and its accompanying questions. The present study shows the practical difficulties in applying even commonly accepted norms in real situations. Giuseppe Muré has recently written a good study of another bank failure, pointing out the congenital difficulties of both the banking system and the companies themselves: “Note sulla gestione bancaria e sul fallimento della compagnia mercantile dei Peruzzi,” in Studi in memoria di Federigo Melis (Rome, 1978), 2:147-58. For later Florentine failures: Michele Luzzati, “Ricerche sulle attivita mercantili e sul fallimento di Giovanni Villani,” Bullettino dell’Istituto storico italiano per il medio evo e Archivio muratoriano 81 (1969), 173-235. 5. Fraud in the economy, society, and politics of Florence was a major problem in the fifteenth century: Thomas Kuehn, “Multorum fraudibus occurrere: Legislation and

4,

Jurisprudential Interpretation concerning Fraud and Liability in Quattrocento Florence,” Studi senesi 93 (1981), 309-50. Kuehn shows very well the “structural cen-

trality ... of personal trust and good faith in economic and social activities.” He also notes, however, that fraud could serve important functions in preserving the

legitimate interests of individuals and families (p. 343). Federigo Melis also appreciated the value of trust among businessmen: Mario Del Treppo, “Federigo Melis and the Renaissance Economy,” The Journal of European Economic History 10 (1981),

731.

INTRODUCTION

1298 and 1319 and then the papal investigation and settlement of accounts three decades later. The two eras of growth and collapse demonstrate the importance of competent and credible corporate entities In encouraging and sustaining economic growth and stability in medieval and early-Renaissance Italy and Europe.

5

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Part One

The Rise of Sienese Banking

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Papal Banking and Politics

One of the earliest references to a Sienese magnate family engaging in commercial or banking activity is the sale at Rome of cloth by some Piccolomini to the abbey of Passignano on 24 October 1193.! A decade later Bonsignore di Bernardo, from whom the Bonsignori probably took their name, formed the first recorded commercial societas in Siena, with seven other merchants, as part of an agreement with the Aldobrandeschi counts of Grosseto and the commune of Siena to cooperate in supplying salt to Siena. The merchants, the commune of Siena, and the counts each received a third of the selling price. According to a Sienese chronicler, the Bonsignori founded their company in 1209.° The first mention of Tolomei associating with outsiders for business or commerce is a recognizance of debt by two buyers of

1. Giulio Prunai, “Carte mercantili dei Piccolomini nel diplomatico fiorentino,” in Studi in onore di Amintore Fanfani, 2: Medioevo (Milan, 1962), pp. 552, 565-66; Francesco Piccolomini Naldi Bandini, “Carte mercantili Piccolomini del secolo XIII,” Miscellanea storica senese 5 (1898), 69. The family might also have been involved in a loan in Germany in 1198: Aloys Schulte, Geschichte des mittelalterlichen

Handels und Verkehrs zwischen Westdeutschland und Italien mit Ausschluss von Venedig (Leipzig, 1900), 1:247. 2. DR, 14 November 1203; for a later partial accounting see DR, 30 November 1204. See also Dina Bizzarri, “Il monopolio del sale a Grosseto,” BSSP 27 (1920), 349-80, reprinted in Studi di storia del diritto italiano, ed. Federico Patetta and Mario Chiaudano (Turin, 1937), esp. pp. 207-8, 224-30; Ubaldo Morandi, “L’ufficio della dogana del sale in Siena,” BSSP 70 (1963), 62-63; CV, 1, no. 67, pp. 94-98; Fedor Schneider, ed., Regestum Senense, 1: 713-30 Juni 1235, Regesta Chartarum Italiae, 8 (Rome, 1911), no. 416, pp. 172-74. For a general study of Sienese interest in salt from the Maremma see Patrizia Angelucci, “Ricerche sul sale maremmo nel medioevo,” Ricerche storiche 7 (1977), 119-36. The Aldobrandeschi agreed to sell only to Siena and to compel Grosseto to cooperate. David Herlihy has noted that in Pisa the salt administration was usually given to men of new wealth with no hereditary claim to serve as tax administrators but who had enough accessible assets to give security to the communal government: Pisa in the Early Renaissance: A Study of Urban Growth (New Haven, 1958), p. 88. 3. Cron. sen. (Montauri), p. 187. For the period after 1250 a later study to be based on computer-assisted analysis of the resources of the two families will show to some extent the distribution of assets among trading, banking, urban properties and rural holdings. 9

SIENESE BANKING

cloth from Manente d’Uguccione, Tolomeo de Platea Tolomei, and their socii on 10 May 1223.4 Beyond these meager notices, information on the sources of their initial wealth or the quantities of capital assembled for commercial or financial enterprise by the Bonsignori or the Tolomei is not yet clear

from the surviving sources for the first thirty years of the thirteenth century. Even identifying individuals as members of specific families can be difficult before the 1240s when the use of surnames for magnate families became more common in Siena. The participation of these magnate families in the taxation, sale, and distribution of salt indicates, however, that some of them possessed sufficient marketing and financial experience, respectable solvency, and adequate rural and urban economic and political connections to be employed in the fiscal system of the commune in the early-thirteenth century. Although its impact and significance might be distorted by the volume of surviving sources, the growth and elaboration of papal taxation during the thirteenth century offered opportunities for gain and expansion to Sienese bankers, especially the Bonsignori. At first the popes had employed the Templars for the deposit, transfer, exchange, and loan of money. As papal taxation increased and grew more com-

plex, however, the popes turned to the more reliable and efficient Italian merchants for these services. Bishops often needed loans to pay the taxes required before they could take full possession of their sees. The ability of such bankers as the Bonsignori to carry out these financial transactions and services and to lend cash to needy prelates facilitated the growth of both papal finances and their own companies. Although rarely acting as collectors themselves, the Italians received deposits, then held the money, or transferred it to the papal camera, or spent it locally for church business. This was done by the movement of actual specie, or by simple acknowledgment in accounts, or most often by instruments of exchange. The companies bore all the risks,

pledging their property as security. Loans for papal projects were negotiated on the anticipation that future taxes would be assigned to the bankers as repayment. In return the companies profited from sales to the papal court, premiums for damages arising from expenses or delays in repayment, fluctuations in the exchange rates, and investing the deposited cash.” Papal patronage and protection through ecclesi-

10 ,

4. Dina Bizzarri, ed., Imbreviature notarili, 1: Liber imbreviaturarum A ppulliensis notarii comunis Senarum MCCXXI-MCCXAXITI (Turin, 1934), no. 516, pp. 209-10, a loan of 55 Sienese pounds for pieces of cloth; see also DAG, 2 May 1219. 5. The length of time that papal deposits were left with the Italian companies affected

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

astical sanctions and diplomatic efforts to enforce repayment not only on the clergy but also on secular rulers provided some security and created a powerful incentive to develop and cultivate economic and political links with the Holy See. Just as other Italian companies often tied their business to the affairs of a prince, the Bonsignori and Tolomei were ready to take direct

employment in papal financial machinery. Commerce and banking were too linked with politics to permit much deviation from such a connection, for as Robert Reynolds has observed, “a house could grow big on ordinary business but only on princely business could it grow mighty.”° If a company was to function internationally, what better patron was there than the pope from whom to gain protection and introduction? As we shall see, the papal registers are full of sanc-

tions threatened and levied against recalcitrant debtors of papal bankers. Beginning around 1230 the relationship between the Holy See and the companies built around the Bonsignori began a period of growth

in the frequency of employment and in the amounts of money involved in transactions. It reached a peak during the 1260s when the papacy lent so much financial support to the Angevin conquest of southern Italy. With the papacy of Gregory X (1271-76) and the death

of Orlando di Bonsignore around 1273, the company of the sons of Bonsignore entered a twenty-year period of stagnation, until the fatal internal disputes and the changing economic circumstances of the last

the long- and short-term resources of the firms. As we shall see, the deposits turned over rapidly during the 1260s, but after 1270 funds were left with the Bonsignori and

the other companies for long periods until the financial crises of the 1290s. After 1270 papal business might have consisted more of liabilities such as deposits than of functioning assets such as loans. The pope could recall his deposited sums and thereby contribute to a run on the weak liquid assets of these thirteenth-century companies. Further research might reveal that the Avignonese popes left money on deposit with the Italians for periods of time which synchronize with economic trends. For Italian merchants as papal bankers: Yves Renouard, Les relations des papes d’Avignon et des compagnies commerciales et bancaires de 1316 a 1378 (Paris, 1941), pp. 59-60, 91, 534, and William E. Lunt, Papal Revenues in the Middle Ages (New York, 1934), 1:51-55. 6. Robert L. Reynolds, “Origins of Modern Business Enterprise: Medieval Italy,” Journal of Economic History 12 (1952), 364-65. Spiritual sanctions could still carry considerable weight; see, for example, Daniel P. Waley, “A Register of Boniface VIII’s Chamberlain, Theodoric of Orvieto,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 8 (1957), 146. For the motivations of bankers lending to powerful protectors see the recent study by John M. Veitch, “Repudiations and Confiscations by the Medieval State,” Journal of Economic History 46 (1986), 31-46.

, 1]

SIENESE BANKING

decade of the thirteenth century precipitated a slow collapse into failure from 1298 to 1310. The Bonsignori are known by modern historians because of the extent of their papal business and the spectacular and well-documented collapse of their banking company. The Tolomei companies, which participated in the cloth trade and were never so tied to finance and papal banking as the Bonsignori company, have been the subject of several historical investigations because of the chance survival of some

informative and nearly unique correspondence from the fairs of Champagne. In fact, much of what is known about activities at the fairs has been derived from four reports sent back from Champagne by Tolomei partners. By 1257 Rinaldo di Jacobo, Jacobo di Tolomeo, and Cristoforo di Tolomeo Tolomei had formed a society, but unfortunately their organization and much of the commercial activity of the Tolomei companies from before 1262 can be only partially reconstructed.’ In comparison to the Bonsignori, only certain individuals of the far more numerous Tolomei family were active in international commerce and banking. Their companies were, however, subject to

| the same political and economic forces. Several Sienese bankers including Bonifazio di Bonsignore (fl. 123555) and Orlando (fl. 1229-73) had entered papal service under Gregory

IX (1227-41).° By the pontificate of Innocent IV (1243-54) Orlando and Bonifazio had developed a special relationship with the pope and were referred to as “campsores nostri” and “familiares nostri.”? Under

| 7. For loans by the society to the commune: R. Archivio di Stato di Siena, Libri dellentrata e dell’uscita della Repubblica di Siena detti del camarlingo e dei quattro provveditori della Biccherna, 15 (Siena, 1939), 215-16; Sandro de’Colli, ed., Libri dell’entrata e dell’uscita del comune di Siena detti della Biccherna (Reg. 26) (Rome, 1961), pp. 15-17. The society was trusted enough to be given the important task of maintaining the ramparts of the city in 1260: DAG, 17 May 1260. 8. Les registres de Grégoire [X: Recueil des bulles de ce pape publiées ou analysées d’apres les manuscrits originaux du Vatican, ed. Lucien Auvray, Suzanne VitteClémencet, and Louis Carolus-Barré (Paris, 1890-1955), 1, no. 2391; 2, no. 2727; Adolf Gottlob, “Zur Gesellschaftliste der Buonsignori von Siena,” Historisches Jahrbuch 22 (1901), 716. See the general account made by Angelerio and his colleagues from Siena for receiving papal taxes and paying papal expenses in England,

France, and at the Roman court: Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 161, p. 314 (26 March 1233). Gregory had aided some unnamed Sienese merchants in collecting debts owed by the abbot of St. Gall in 1229: DSF, 5 June 1229, 21 October 1229. In 1235 he instructed the bishop of Bamberg to pay his predecessor’s debt to Orlando di Bonsignore Bonsignori: DSF, 17 September 1231; Lodovico Zdekauer, // mercante senese nel Dugento (Siena, 1925), pp. 48-49; MGH EppSel 1, no. 622, pp. 509-10. 9. Les registres d’Innocent IV publiées ou analysées d’aprés les manuscrits originaux du 12

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

Innocent IV Bonifazio resided at the papal court to transact business and serve as an ambassador from the commune of Siena.!° Innocent supported the activities of the Bonsignori as he threatened both the laity and the clergy with ecclesiastical penalties if they did not repay their just debts to the company. For example, on 24 December 1243 - Innocent instructed the cantor of Troyes to compel the count of Toulouse with ecclesiastical sanctions to repay a loan of 1,600 marks to a group of merchants including Orlando di Bonsignore.!! About nine years later he told the abbot of St.-Martin in Troyes to encourage the bishop of Therouane to satisfy an obligation with the Bonsignori company. Throughout 1253 and 1254 Innocent wrote letters insisting that debtors repay these Sienese bankers.!> By ensuring that creditors of ecclesiastics were repaid, the pope in reality benefited from the availability of credit to clerical and lay debtors for papal and crusading taxes.

Pope Alexander IV (1254-61) continued to use the Bonsignori as bankers. The societas built around the family included associates outside of its immediate kinship group in order to meet the growing financial needs of the papacy’s anti-Hohenstaufen political policy. On 6 February 1255 Nicholas de Anagnia, the camerarius of Alexander IV, acknowledged receiving a loan from Bonaventura di Bernardino, Bartolomeo Guidi, Hugolino Bellimonti, and Capucino Bucci, who were

Vatican et de la Bibliotheque Nationale, ed. Elie Berger (Paris, 1884-1921), 3, no. 5608 (26 March 1252), no. 6777 (7 September 1252). 10. Edouard Jordan has pointed out how Siena occasionally used Bonifazio to dispute Florentine attacks on Siena at the papal court: Les origines de la domination angevine en Italie (Paris, 1909), 1:174; CG 3, 8v (18 June 1251), 24 (5 August 1251), 61 (16 October 1251), 84 (21 November 1251). Bonifazio was said to be residing regularly at the papal court when he witnessed, on 6 September 1252, the confirmation of an earlier permission to the bishop of Siena to build a chapel in a hospital in Siena: Les registres d’Alexandre IV: Recueil des bulles de ce pape publiées ou analysées d’aprés les manuscrits originaux des Archives du Vatican, ed. Charles Bourel de La Ronciére, Joseph de Loye, Pierre de Cénival, and Auguste Coulon (Paris, 1895-99), 2, no. 2033 (27 June 1257). 11. Innocent IV, 1, no. 347; Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 182, pp. 336-37. 12. Innocent IV, 3, no. 6264 (11 January 1243); Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 178, pp. 330-31. 13. Under Innocent the business of the firm extended over western Europe. Volterra: DSF, 18 July 1253; Chiusi: Innocent IV, 3, no. 7406 (2 March 1254); Auxerre: no. 6386 (12 March 1253); Reims: no. 7197 (19 January 1254); Chalons-sur-Marne: no. 7489 (13 May 1254); Spain: no. 6381 (13 February 1253), no. 7861 (3 August 1254), no. 7980 (31 August 1254); Ireland: no. 8034 (9 September 1254); Hungary: no. 7342 (5 March 1254). 13

SIENESE BANKING all associates of the societas of the Bonsignori.'* Alexander IV later wrote to William, abbot of Cluny, to recognize the abbot’s payment of 6,000 pounds of Tours to Orlando di Bonsignore and the same group of Sienese merchants.!> By 1260 the company apparently offered the Holy See experienced personnel stationed where they were needed and the ability to carry out effectively the financial transactions necessary for the proper functioning of the papal fiscal machine. During the 1250s the Bonsignori put together a societas with merchants outside the lineage of Bonsignori di Bernardo, thus increasing their man-

power and, no doubt, their capital resources. |

Unfortunately, we do not possess any articles of association or simi-

lar instruments showing the rules of the organization or the capital contributions of the members of the Bonsignori company for this early period. The earliest roster of the societas that survives is in a donation of 7 January 1259 to the hospital of Santa Maria della Scala, the largest

and most important charitable corporation in Siena. A commercial society of thirteen men called the “societas filiorum Bonsignoris,” including Orlando di Bonsignore, gave to the rector a certain vineyard and a piece of land in an area called the “podio de Rauaciano.” The gift was intended for the support of the poor and thus to demonstrate the members’ love for God and to foster hope for the salvation of their souls, !6

Contrary to Edouard Jordan’s opinion, the Bonsignori were not the only Sienese company to move to the forefront of papal banking.!’ Under Alexander IV the Tolomei were clearly a significant part of the financial machinery of the papal camera. After granting recognition

14. Alexandre IV, 1, no. 165. | 15. Alexandre IV, 1, no. 1148 (10 February 1256). 16. ASS, Diplomatico Spedale di Santa Maria della Scala, 27 January 1259; ASS, Spedale di Santa Maria della Scala, Contratti e protocolli 71, 33v; the “societas filiorum Bonsignoris” consisted of Orlando di Bonsignore, Jacobo di Rannuccino, Albizio di Dietauita, Bartolomeo di Guido Ciabacte, Montanino di Buccio, Ugolino and Castialeone d’Ugolino Belmonti, Andrea di Jacobo, Udorrigo di Bramanzone, Forte di Ranerio, Guido d’Alamanno, Michele Stiefano, and Bernardino di Prosperino; the gift was “titulo donationis inter vivos ... ad usum pauperum dicti hospitalis . . . pro amore et reverentia Dei ac etiam pro salute animarum nostrarum et nostrorum sotiorum.” There are references to the societas from June 1257 and January 1259, when the commune paid some debts: ASS, Libri dell’entrata, 15:21516; Ubaldo Morandi, ed., Libri dell’entrata e dell’uscita del comune di Siena detti della Biccherna (Rome, 1963), pp. 19, 96. 17. Edouard Jordan, “Le saint’siége et les banquiers italiens,” in Comptes rendus du 3e congres international des catholiques (Brussels, 1894), p. 297; Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 18; Ageo Arcangeli, “Gli istituti del diritto commerciale nel costituto senese del 1310,” in Scritti di diritto commerciale ed agrario (Padua, 1935), 1:165. 14

~~ PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

to the family church of San Cristoforo in Siena on 29 April 1255, Alexander gave a general safe-conduct to Lotterengo d’Uguccione Tolomei, an associate of Rinaldo and Tolomeo di Jacobo, to conduct church business.!® The pope had earlier ordered the archbishop of Sens to pay a debt of his predecessor including damages to Rinaldo and Tolomeo di Jacobo.!? During the summer of 1255 Alexander wrote to the dean of St.-Etienne in Troyes and the abbot of St.-Martin in Troyes to order them to help the Tolomei collect some debts owed by clerical and lay clients in Spain and France; if the debts were not discharged in full within two months, excommunication and the interdict were to be applied in order to ensure compliance.“° Alexander also used the To-

lomei, and other Sienese merchants, to help finance out of English , sources an English candidate for the crown of Sicily.2! Even during a tense period of papal-Sienese relations in the summer of 1260, Alexander renewed his general safe-conduct for the company’s agent in England, Lotterengo d’Uguccione Tolomei.” Besides their expertise and organization the companies of the Bonsignori and Tolomei were attractive firms with which to do business because of their potential links with the production of silver. With the

availability of local bullion for coinage, the city of Siena and its bankers could be at an advantage in a market involving the transfer of money based on silver from northern Europe to Italy. With reliable sources of the metal near Siena, her merchants could be better able to pursue opportunities in the north with the specie they took in from papal taxes. They had the use of the money collected in the north, but 18. DT, 1 July 1255. Lottorengo was a “sotium delectorum filiorum Raynaldi et Tholo-

mei Jacobi familiarium et compsorum nostrorum” and was to be given safeconduct “pro ecclesiae Romanae negotiis”: Federico Patetta, “Caorsini senesi in Inghilterra nel secolo XIII,” BSSP 4 (1897), 335. These letters from ASS, Diplomatico Tolomei, are not in the published registers of Alexander. 19. DT, 17 June 1255. Rinaldo and Tolomeo were called “fratres, campsores, familiares nostri.” Other members of the company were Deutaviva di Guido, Bartolomeo di Pietro Tolomei, Andrea di Cristoforo Tolomei, Capitano di Bucce, and Ugolino di Belimonte. The Tolomei were supposed to have suffered great, but unspecified, damage for their devotion to the church; Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 21.

20. Graneus, a canon of Reims, was to be encouraged to repay by the abbot of St.-Martin. DT, 11 May 1255, 8 July 1255, and 21 July 1255; Robert Jowitt Whitwell, “Italian Bankers and the English Crown,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, n.s. 17 (1903), 207.

21. Patetta, “Caorsini senesi,” pp. 335-36; Matthew Paris, Chronica majora, ed. Henry Richards Luard (London, 1876-80), 5:581; Robert Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze (Florence, 1973), 6:549. 22. DSF, 1 July 1260. 15

SIENESE BANKING

they were still able to send the wealth collected to the Holy See by sending cloth or financial instruments to the head office in Siena and from there to the papal treasury in the form of paper or silver. Access to or actual possession of silver bullion or sound coinage by the Bonsignori or Tolomei firms, or any other Sienese company, added credibility to their ability to produce money or credit when and where they were committed to doing so, through bullion, coins, or instruments acceptable to the developing network of Italian bankers.” The pope, in fact, had a role in the securing by the companies of rights over the silver mines of Montieri, a town west of Siena. During the twelfth century the bishop and commune of Siena had acquired from their owner, the bishop of Volterra, interests in his silver mines at Montieri and the surrounding area.*4 In February 1253 Ranieri, the bishop-elect of Volterra, an important official in Innocent IV’s finan-

cial administration, received papal approval to redeem the strategic castle and silver mines of Montieri from the Scotti banking concern of

Siena. Frederick of Antioch, the son of Frederick II, had illegally pledged them to the Scotti and the commune of Siena. Innocent agreed to Ranieri’s proposal to regain control by purchase and the negotiation of a loan of 6,000 marks with the Bonsignori and Tolomei family banks. The bishop was, moreover, supposed to ensure that the bankers received only the financial returns of the fortress and silver mines and not the administration of justice and permanent control or ownership of the castle and its jurisdiction. The commune of Siena was to stop receiving a pension from these ecclesiastical properties.2° On 5

23. Information on the process of returning profits from the north or any indication of a balance of payments between the two regions is not readily available from the sources. I intend to try to reconstruct the techniques of transfers, the flow of funds, and Sienese monetary policies in later publications. The influence on the Sienese economy of these mines also awaits further research. 24. Ugo Guido Mondolfo, // populus a Siena nella vita della citta e nel governo del comune fino alla reazione antimagnatizia del 1277 (Genoa, 1911), p. 17; he refers to DR, November 1137, 19 December 1178, and September 1181. In 1225-26 the Tolomei made loans to the bishops of Volterra and Massa and received as security the silver mines “nel cuore delle colline Metallifere” near Montieri: Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 16. For the “usury” collected by the Sienese in their loans to the bishop see Enrico Fiumi, “Sui debiti usurari del vescovado di Volterra nell’eta comunale,” in Volterra e San Gimignano nel medioevo, ed. Giuliano Pinto (San Gimignano, 1983), pp. 261-77. 25. DR, 25 February 1253; Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 16; ZJnnocent IV, 3, no. 6347; MGH EppSel 3:158-59 (no. 190). Innocent had tried earlier to get these holdings restored to the bishopric of Volterra; Innocent IV, 3, no. 5141 (13 March 1251); Jordan, Origines, 1:178. 16

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS |

March 1253 Bishop-elect Ranieri contracted a loan of 6,600 Sienese pounds from the Bonsignori and Tolomei societates and gave as security the castle and silver mines of Montieri.”“ With these mines pledged as security, they made numerous loans to the bishop of Volterra.2” On 18 July 1253 Innocent wrote to the Bonsignori and the Tolomei to confirm his approval of the loan.** The pontiff also wrote to the bishop of Siena requesting him to see that the bankers did not molest the bishopelect of Volterra about the transaction.”? Ranieri went into debt again with the two companies on | September 1254 as his costly commitment to raising troops for the papacy grew.*° For the next thirty years both the Bonsignori and the Tolomei continued to receive payments on the bishopric’s debts from Ranieri and his successor and from annual cen-

suses on Montieri and other pledged properties. Rinaldo di Jacobo, Jacobo di Tolomeo, and Cristoforo di Tolomeo Tolomei continued to lend money to the bishop until the Tolomei company gained complete | 26. DSF, 5 March 1253; Quinto Senigaglia, “Le compagnie bancarie senesi nei secoli XIII e XIV,” Studi senesi 25 (1908), 51-53. Ranieri was to get back from the Scotti the “cassaro et burgo de Monterio cum argentifodinis et venis,” which were then given “pignori” to the two associations. The bishop-elect was also to repossess Ger-

falco, Travale, Prata, Monteciriota, and Monticelli, all towns in the immediate area. The sizes of these loans vary in the documents without any discernible pattern. The Bonsignori and Tolomei also had to give assurances to the commune of Siena that they would not hand over to the Florentines any castles that might come into their possession. 27. Robert-Henri Bautier, “Les Tolomei de Sienne aux foires de Champagne d’apres un compte-rendu de leurs opérations a la foire de mai de Provins en 1279,” in Recueil de travaux offert aM. Clovis Brunel (Paris, 1955), pp. 107-8. Bartolomeo di Cristoforo Tolomei allied himself and his associates with Orlando and Bonifazio di Bonsignore: Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 2, 15; Schulte, Geschichte des mittelalterlichen Handels, 1:256. Bautier has suggested that the Tolomei did not get involved in finance until they cooperated with the Bonsignori in securing control of silver mining at Montieri and Massa. 28. Innocent IV, 3, no. 6878; MGH EppSel 3:191-92 (no. 222). 29. DSF, 18 July 1253. Innocent referred to the loan as being 6,600 Pisan pounds. The pope had already written to Ranieri giving further permission to pledge the “cassarum et argentariam castri Montieri” to the bankers: Innocent IV, 3, no. 6861 (11 July 1253). This document says 6,000 marks at the weight of Montieri. 30. The loan was for 6,000 Sienese pounds to be repaid in two years with security being the towns of Chiusdino and Casale, some monastic properties, and the “cassarum Monterii cum omnibus et singulis argentifodinis et venis montis Monterii.” The document includes the text of a letter from Innocent IV giving permission for such a transaction: DSF, 1 September 1254; Senigaglia, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 5356. Alexander IV, the new pope, also tried to secure the payment of papal taxes to Ranerio: Alexandre IV, 1, no. 983 (12 July 1255), no. 1219 (8 March 1256); MGH EppSel 3:362 (no. 404).

| : 17

STENESE BANKING

possession of a mine at Montieri in 1277.7! Although excluded from any further claims, the commune of Siena was pacified by a payment of 364 Sienese pounds every two years from the returns from Montieri.>? In addition to these payments the commune received the prospect of extending its authority. The consolidation of communal control over towns and holdings in its theoretical domain could follow the attainment of rights over these areas by its citizens. In the meantime the Bonsignori and Tolomei acquired limited ownership, for an extended period of time, of materials that could be helpful in ensuring

profitable banking functions. Once again, however, the lack of sources, such as account books or other internal company documents, prevents detailed evaluation of the impact of access to silver and other metals on the careers of these banking companies. The bishop-elect of Volterra had been forced into debt to aid Innocent IV in his efforts to limit or eliminate Hohenstaufen influence in Italy after the death of Frederick II in 1250. By the end of that decade the Bonsignori, Tolomei, and all the other Sienese international and papal banking companies were confronted with political choices that could ruin their economic activity. On the other hand, the financing of military campaigns simultaneously offered opportunities for profit.

By means of huge loans from Tuscan bankers the pontiffs tried to resolve the issue of Hohenstaufen control by financing Charles of Anjou’s invasion. While Innocent IV and Alexander IV. attempted to keep Frederick’s sons Conrad and Manfred from consolidating their regimes in Italy, Siena and Florence duelled for control of Tuscany. The two contests came to overlap in the 1260s when events and the French popes, Urban IV and Clement IV, forced the Tuscan cities to take sides. The Bonsignori and other Sienese banking concerns were 31. Fedor Schneider, ed., Regestum Volaterranum (788-1303), Regesta Chartarum Italiae, 1 (Rome, 1907), no. 851 (18 December 1277). For the Tolomei involvement

in mining at Massa see DR Massa, 3 January 1237, 2 January 1255, 2 January 1266; Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 16. 32. Schneider, Regestum Volaterranum, nos. 670 (19 October 1256), 671 (19 October 1256), 698 (23 March 1258), 722 (20 May 1261), 726 (29 August 1261), 760 (1 May 1265), 763 (17 December 1265), 764 (18 December 1265), 769 (31 August 1266), 819 (18 December 1275), 843 (20 August 1277), 900 (21 April 1283), 914 (26, 30 Octo-

ber, 3 November 1284). In addition to the returns from the mines the two companies received an annual census of 215 Sienese pounds. For a payment to the commune of Siena see Morandi, Libri dell’entrata, p. 34 (May 1258). On 18 December 1277 the bishop of Volterra gave a silver mine to the Tolomei for their services: Schneider, Regestum Volaterranum, no. 851; Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” p. 2. Giulio Prunai cited some documents to show the Tolomei engaged in mining operations near Massa Marittima: DR Massa, 3 January 1237, 2 January 1255, 2 January 1266; Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 16. 18

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

also faced with a much more complicated political environment at home, since the internal politics of the town were also deeply influenced by foreign affairs. Political factions within Siena took sides in these conflicts outside the city, and local struggles for political and economic power became linked with foreign affairs.2? The Bonsignori tried to deal with the situation by maintaining financial and political ties with everyone for as long as possible. Although the Tolomei initially pursued the same strategy, they eventually had to leave the city and later came to play leading roles in the Guelf party of Siena. Within Tuscany the commune of Siena sought to maintain control of its contado and to expand its power over towns and areas that were not already under its sway. Its principal rival was Florence, which sought territorial expansion over the same lands and towns. These conflicts were exacerbated by the struggle for control of the governments of Florence and Siena between fluid political factions that were only beginning to bear the vague labels of Guelf or Ghibelline. Political conflict at all levels became more divisive as Sienese bankers were caught between sides that were becoming more intransigent. Despite growing partisanship and conflict, the Bonsignori came to enjoy during the 1260s a near monopoly in papal financial affairs while at the same time maintaining their position 1n a Siena that was turning more

and more antipapal. ,

In 1260 Siena was governed by a group of men called the TwentyFour. It was a regime in which members of the popolo of Siena were to hold half of the offices of the government and half of the seats on elected committees. Its interests were to be further protected by the Capitano del Popolo.*4 The government did not as yet place any re-

strictions on magnate participation in government or on any families specifically. The attitude of the communal government towards 33. The details of these internal struggles are discussed in my unpublished doctoral dissertation, “Five Magnate Families of Siena, 1240-1350” (University of Toronto, 1982), chap. 4. Subsequent publications and further research based on collective biography are forthcoming.

34. P. Luigi Sbaragli, “I mercanti di mezzana gente al potere in Siena,” BSSP 44 (1937), 48-59. See English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp. 128-39, and the literature

cited there; Danilo Marrara, “I magnati e il governo del comune di Siena dallo statuto del 1274 alla fine del XIV secolo,” in Studi per Enrico Fiumi (Pisa, 1979), p.

| 243. Two books by Ugo Guido Mondolfo remain the best studies of politics in Siena before the advent of the regime of the Nine in 1287: Le cause et le vicende della politica del comune di Siena nel secolo XIII (Siena, 1904) and II populus a Siena. George Holmes has recently described the politics of this period in chapters 1 and 2 of Florence, Rome and the Origins of the Renaissance (Oxford, 1986). 19

SIENESE BANKING

magnate families in general, however, began to evolve toward the exclusionary policies adopted more fully in the 1270s. At the beginning of the 1260s the commune of Siena maintained a cautious Ghibelline or Hohenstaufen orientation in its foreign policy. The regime was wary of being antipapal but was committed to opposing Florentine ambitions within Tuscany. Although the ideological commitments behind Siena’s foreign policy are difficult to document, opportunism, practical interests, and habits were most likely the main

factors rather than devotion to the ideals of pope or emperor. In 1260 Siena did not have organized Guelf or Ghibelline parties, but these organizations were to become established during the following ten years. Siena had spent the 1250s waging intermittent war with Florence but trying to avoid confrontations with the Holy See and the descendants of Frederick II. Part of her strategy in dealing with her neighbor was to ally with one of the principal factions vying for control of Florence, and this usually brought Siena into ieague with the Florentine Ghibelline party.3° When this party was expelled from Florence in 1258, Siena gave shelter to the exiles, although this was contrary to treaties agreed upon in 1254 and 1255.3’ The exiles arrived in

Siena and began to assemble an army by pawning properties to rich Sienese families such as the Salimbeni.*® The commune of Florence requested their expulsion but was summarily refused by Siena on 2 Oc-

tober 1258.9 In the following year the commune sought aid against a belligerent and Guelf Florence from Manfred, the Hohenstaufen claimant to the crown of Sicily, but at the same time the Sienese did not want to be bound by a commitment to attack the papacy.” By September 1260 Siena found herself facing a large invading Florentine army. With the aid of exiled Florentine Ghibellines and German merce35. “En réalité on était guelfe ou gibelin par intérét ou par habitude. On n’était pas guelfe pour obéir au pape, ni gibelin parce qu’on voulait combattre l’Eglise ou la hiérarchie,” Jordan, Origines, 1:194 (quote), 173-203, especially 202-3. Siena’s treaties with Manfred specifically excluded any action against the pope. Edouard Jordan has emphasized the lack of ideological motivation in dealing with this conflict among the laymen of these Tuscan cities. 36. DR, 22 June 1251; Guido Mengozzi, “Documenti danteschi del R. Archivio di Stato di Siena,” in Dante e Siena (Siena, 1921), pp. 105-8. 37. Jordan, Origines, 1:194. 38. Villani, Cronica 6.76. The Salimbeni provided the exiles with 20,000 florins on the security of some properties: Jacques Heers, Parties and Political Life in the Medieval West (Amsterdam, 1977), pp. 189-90. 39. Jordan, Origines, 1:194.

40. Ibid., pp. 201-3. 20

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

naries sent by Manfred, the Sienese destroyed a large Florentine army

a few miles east of Siena at Montaperti on 4 September 1260. The Guelf government of Florence collapsed and the exiled Ghibelline fac-

tion returned to power in that city. Alexander IV turned on the ambivalent Sienese and excommunicated them on 18 November 1260.7! Even so the Sienese remained reluctant to take direct action against the pope. In the spring of 1261 they helped form a Ghibelline league explicitly aimed not against the pope but against the exiled Guelfs of Florence taking refuge at Lucca, the center of resistance to Ghibelline domination of Tuscany.” It was only with the death of Alexander on 25 May and the election of Jacques Pantaleon of Troyes as Urban IV on 29 August 1261 that events began to threaten the position of the Bonsignori and the Tolo-

mei within Siena. Recognizing both the weaknesses and the importance of the banking companies, Urban sought to intimidate the merchants of Siena and to separate them from the communal government by releasing their debtors from obligations and threatening to confiscate their property in Rome and elsewhere. In January of 1262 he renewed Pope Alexander’s excommunication and forbade the payment of debts to any Sienese banker or merchant.*? Urban had decided initially, however, that the Bonsignori were too valuable an instrument of financial policy to include them in his economic war on Siena. From 31 December 1261, when he recommended them to the king of England, the pope maintained a consistent policy of exempting them from any sanctions against Sienese businessmen, and in fact he built much of his financial administration around them.” As we shall see, the Bonsignori were never forced to cut their ties with the Ghibelline regime in Siena and go into exile when the conflict between the city and the Holy See became more intense. Although their participation 41. Fortunato Donati, “Lettere politiche del secolo XIII sulla guerra del 1260 fra Siena e Firenze,” BSSP 4 (1897), 102, 105-6; Jordan, Origines, 1:223; Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” p. 22; Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 21; Tommasi, Historie, 2, bk. 6, p. 13. Alexander had previously warned Siena to remove some unspecified restrictions on ecclesiastical liberty in the city: Alexandre IV, 2, no. 2854 (23 March

1259); MGH EppSel 3:453-54 (no. 491). ,

42. Jordan, Origines, 1:208-10. 43. Les registres d’Urbain IV: Recueil des bulles de ce pape publiées ou analysées d’apres les manuscrits originaux du Vatican, ed. Jean Guiraud and Suzanne Clémencet (Paris, 1899-1958), 1, cameral no. 71 (26 January 1262). The original letter of January 1262 is not in the published registers, but it is mentioned in this letter exempting some merchants from its force. 44. Urbain IV, 1, cameral nos. 51 and 52; Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 186, p. 339; Patetta, “Caorsini senesi,” p. 339. 21

SIENESE BANKING

in the communal government was less active than before Montaperti, Orlando di Bonsignore, his family, and his associates in the company did not leave Siena until 1270, when the Guelfs began their return to power and Orlando became one of the leaders of a Ghibelline government in exile. During the 1260s he was in the somewhat ambiguous position of serving in the field army of Ghibelline Siena and at the same time being in charge of the principal banking company of the pope.” Urban maintained his hard line against most Sienese bankers, unreconciled to his policies in Tuscany and toward Manfred. His sanctions, however, had been successful in separating several magnate families with banking or commercial societies from the Ghibelline regime of the Twenty-Four. The crucial point for the Tolomei, Salimbeni, and Piccolomini came when Urban IV moved against Sienese banking and commercial interests which were vulnerable throughout Italy and the north. Falling more under the ardently Ghibelline influence of Provenzano Salvani and his family, the commune of Siena showed itself ready to sacrifice its citizens’ interests by recalling merchants from France and the papal curia. On 7 November 1262 the government of Siena reacted to Urban’s economic pressure by ordering its merchants, primarily the society of the Bonsignori, to return from France and the papal court, but little change apparently resulted from this attempt at economic warfare by depriving the pope of his most useful company.“© In the midst of these diplomatic maneuvers violence erupted in Siena itself in the fall of 1262 when a member of the Twenty-Four was murdered by Salimbene di Ranieri Salimbeni aided by some Tolomei and Malavolti.4’ Since early October Sienese bankers with papal connections had been pleading for negotiations. On 28 November 1262 45. For Orlando’s military activity in 1260 see “Lettera di Vincenti e compagni, da Siena, a lacomo di Guido Cacciaconti, in Francia (1260),” transcribed in Arrigo Castellani, ed., La prosa italiana delle origini, 1: Testi toscani di carattere pratico, 1: Trascrizioni (Bologna, 1982), no. 36, p. 268; for detailed studies of his career as both a Guelf and a Ghibelline, see Giuliano Catoni, “Bonsignori, Orlando,” Dizionario biografico degli Italiani, 12 (Rome, 1970), p. 412; English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp. 445-46. 46. CG 10, 88. By 9 November the Sienese were well aware that the pope wanted “diuidere ciuitatem Senarum” and diminish the “honorem et bonum” of the commune: CG 10, 89. 47. CG 10, 96 (3 December 1262); Peter R. Pazzaglini, The Criminal Ban of the Sienese Commune, 1225-1310 (Milan, 1979), pp. 73, 175-76; Tommasi, Historie, 2, bk. 6, p. 22; Jordan, Origines, 2:341; Giuseppe Martini, “Siena da Montaperti alla caduta dei Nove (1260-1355),” BSSP 68 (1961), 81. In retribution the commune of Siena, spurred on by Provenzano Salvani, assaulted the palace of the Salimbeni: Cron. sen. (Anon.), p. 62.

22 ,

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

Sienese ambassadors to the Holy See reported on the possibility of a reconciliation between Manfred and Urban IV. Although the banking families had hoped for a settlement and the lifting of the sanctions, the ambassadors said that there was little chance for such developments and, in fact, that the pope and the Guelfs were demanding that the regime in Siena be dislodged from power. It had become clear that the possibility of any accommodation between Siena and Urban was growing more doubtful. If anything, papal pressure on Siena’s merchants was growing. Recognizing a deteriorating situation in Siena and the developing confrontation with the Holy See, so dangerous to their economic interests, members of twenty-six of Siena’s richest families, including the Salimbeni, Tolomei, and Piccolomini, left the city in the beginning of December 1262, perhaps according to a prearranged plan. Despite offers of safe-conducts to entice them back, the exiles were to form the

nucleus of Siena’s Guelf party.” Responding quickly, on 5 January 1263, to this opportunity to gather allies against the regime in Siena, Urban IV exempted fourteen additional Sienese companies from his earlier economic sanctions.°° The pope followed this by forming a pact with the new exiles on 6 March 1263. Besides extending to them his special protection and implying the granting of further compensation for damages, he gave permission to debtors to honor obligations to the exiles, promised the recovery of any losses or damages sustained for their loyalty to the church, absolved them from oaths taken to Manfred, and encouraged them to seek peace with Lucca and other Guelf cities of Tuscany. The pontiff also recognized their residence at a small fortified town, Radicofani, on the border between Siena and papal territory in Tuscany.*! During 48. Martini, “Siena da Montaperti,” p. 82; Julius von Pflugk-Harttung, [ter [talicum (Stuttgart, 1883), pp. 675-77; Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 163. 49. Tommasi, Historie, 2, bk. 6, p. 23 (a list of the twenty-six families); CG 10, 95v (4 December 1262); Jordan, Origines, 2:343; DR, 12 December 1262. 50. Urbain IV, 2, ordinaire no. 175: “... eligentes magis acerbitatem pati exilii quam dulcedine natalis soli... , civitatem Senensem per devotionis habundantiam reliquerunt, se ad terram ecclesie ac devotorum ejus cum suis familiis transferendo.” Urban reaffirmed his prohibition on repayment to any unapproved Sienese in France, Germany, and England; Patetta, “Caorsini senesi,” p. 340. The list of exiles included several Tolomei, Piccolomini, and Salimbeni. Urban later allowed the Hospital of Santa Maria della Scala to celebrate the offices of the church, if they were done in secret: ASS, Diplomatico di Spedale di Santa Maria della Scala, 8 April 1264.

51. Urbain IV, 2, ordinaire no. 274 (6 March 1263); Martini, “Siena,” 83; Tommasi, Historie, 2, bk. 6, p. 23; Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 22-23. 23

SIENESE BANKING

the rest of 1263 and into 1264 Urban tried to counter moves by the regime in Siena against Radicofani and against Lucca.*? The Bonsignori maintained their special relationship with the papal camera until Urban died in October 1264. He had supported them in

collecting from both the laity and the clergy, just as the Bonsignori had reciprocally continued to transfer papal taxes from much of western Europe.» The Bonsignori, despite the hostility between their home city and the Holy See, managed to stay on in Siena and continue, with their partners and fellow citizens, to play an important role in the financial system of the Holy See. Besides maintaining his employment

of the society of the Bonsignori, Urban had tried in 1263 and 1264 both to maintain his restored links with the great exiled banking companies of such magnate families as the Tolomei, Salimbeni, and Piccolomini™ and to foster a reconciliation between these families and the

commune, thus hoping to draw Siena away from Manfred.» The commune itself hoped for and tried to encourage a return to Siena of some of the exiles, especially the Tolomei. Pietro di Cristoforo, Meo di Rinaldo, Meo d’Incontrato Tolomei, Ranieri di Turchio Piccolomini, and others were captured and held for ransom by German mercenaries

at the abbey of Spineto in the late summer of 1263. In an attempt to curry favor with the Tolomei, the commune of Siena on 23 September 1263 paid 13,200 Sienese pounds to gain freedom for the captives in return for their oaths of allegiance to Siena and Manfred and for renunciations of any ties to the Guelfs of Florence or Siena.*© Despite pledging allegiance to Siena and the Ghibelline cause, the same Tolo-

mei later returned to the Guelf party. In fact, Pietro di Cristoforo Tolomei became one of the chiefs of the Sienese Guelfs on 20 June 1265, when Pope Clement IV recognized him and Notto di Salimbene Salimbeni as captains of the Guelf party. The new organization was to

52. Urbain IV, 2, ordinaire no. 252 (4 June 1263), no. 253 (4 June 1263), no. 337 (9 August 1263), no. 846 (5 June 1264); MGH EppSel, 3, no. 613, pp. 606-8; 607, n. 2; ASS, B 36, 65. The regime in Siena made a payment for an attack on Radicofani. 53. See Urbain IV, 1, cameral nos. 161-63 (5 July 1263), nos. 172-78 (13-26 October 1263); Martini, “Siena da Montaperti,” pp. 85-86 n. 21. 54. Urbain IV, 2, ordinaire no. 521 (January-February 1264), no. 511 (28 February 1264).

55. Cron. sen. (Anon.), p. 63. 56. DR, 23 September 1263. The men involved were Pietro di Cristoforo, Meo di Rinaldo, Regolino di Pietro, Meo di Pietro, Meo d’Incontrato, all of them members of the Tolomei family, and Ranieri di Turchio and Niccold di Ranieri Piccolomini; they posted 1,000 pound deposits for compliance.

24

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

be governed by a council of twelve and had a set of now-lost statutes.>’

Between 1260 and 1265 the commune of Siena lost the once-strong allegiance of three of its most prominent families, the Piccolomini, Salimbeni, and Tolomei, and in fact had driven them into armed opposition. Political rivalries with other families within the city, and the vulnerability of their papal and foreign banking affairs, had caused them to forge a government-in-exile. After Urban’s death in October 1264, Gui Foulcroi was elected to the papacy, in February of 1265, and took the name Clement IV. A lawyer from Languedoc and a former adviser to Louis IX, Clement pursued the policies of Urban to their objective: the destruction of Manfred’s position in the Italian peninsula. By promising to use the full financial resources of the church, the new pope managed to persuade the ambitious Charles of Anjou to attempt to displace Manfred and take control of southern Italy. The plan of the timid Urban was to be carried to completion by his successor Clement. At the heart of the proposed Guelf alliance were the Tuscan banking companies headed by the Bonsignori. Although Urban had begun to marshal papal taxes for crusades in the Holy Land and Italy, the clergy had been slow in collecting and transferring the funds. Clement turned to the Bonsignori for coordinating the Italian bankers and for making the collection and transfer processes of the tenth of 1264 more efficient.-? A few days after his election, Clement reaffirmed their position in the papal financial system. On 28 February 1265 he recommended the company of Orlando di Bonsignore Bonsignori and his partners Bonaventura di Bernardino, Ranieri di Jacobo, and Francesco di Guido to Simon of Brie, the cardinal of Santa Cecilia and legate to France.°? Always exempt from 57. DR, 20 June 1265; Jordan, Origines, 2:347-49; Mondolfo, J/ populus a Siena, pp. 43-44. 58. Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 17-18. 59. Les registres de Clément IV, ed. Edouard Jordan (Paris, 1893-1945), no. 1427; Thes. novus, 2:101-3, ep. 4. The letter listed the company’s agents: “Facium Juncte, Hugonem Jacobi, Bonsignorem Raynerii, Tholomeum Manentis, Manum et Blandum Addebrandi, Guscum Trapillicini, Lottum Hugolini, Jacobum Gili, Bindum Ildebrandini, Aldebrandum Ildebrandini, Paltonem Deutesalve, Vivolum Salvanelli, Gregorium Rigoli, Dentavivam Guidi, Bindum Falconis, Bonfilium Contadini, Incontratum Philippi, Facium Berignonis, Jacobum Skermi, Conradum Jacobi, Bettum Ferrantis, Tholomeum Jacobi, Thomam Viviani, Leonardum Jannis, Facium Fanerii, Pacchinam Ranerii, Meum Monalderti. . . qui in terris et locis tuae legationis existunt.” Clement said “quod ipsi . . . certis personis familiaribus dilecti filii nobilis viri .. Comitis Provinciae pro ipso libere mutuarunt non modicas pecuniae quantitates.”

| 25

SIENESE BANKING

Urban’s excommunication, these bankers were now even more favored

by the new pope in order to facilitate his loans and financial aid to Charles of Anjou. Thus a family from an excommunicated Ghibelline city took the greatest part of any Italian company in financing an expedition to destroy the leader of the Ghibelline party. To take full advantage of the opportunities, the Bonsignori family under the leadership of Orlando di Bonsignori had formed a company with Bonaventura di Bernardino, Ranieri di Jacobo, Francesco di Guido, and twenty-three other Sienese merchants to lend Charles of Anjou 89,000 pounds of Tours out of a total loan of 200,000 pounds. Repayment was primarily to be made from a papal tenth levied on Provence and later on southern Italy and Sicily. The property of the pope and other ecclesiastics served as security.” The financing of the Guelf alliance in Italy was made more attractive to banking companies by the prospect of their own economic penetration of southern Italy and the possibility of obtaining lucrative positions in the new Angevin government. The Tuscans hoped to replace local businessmen in trade and commerce and to serve in the administration of the new government.

Throughout 1265 and 1266 Clement assigned the returns of the tenth of 1264 to repay the Bonsignori consortium.®! In November and December of 1265 Bonaventura di Bernardino, a partner, made cru60. Martini, “Siena da Montaperti,” pp. 87-88 n. 26; Jordan, Origines, 2:547-49, 555; John H. Mundy, Europe in the High Middle Ages, 1150-1309 (London, 1973), p. 171; Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 6:784; Arcangeli, “Istituti del diritto commerclale,” p. 165 n. 2; Yves Renouard, Les villes d’Italie de la fin du Xe siécle au début du XIVe siécle (Paris, 1962), 2:335. Bonaventura di Bernardino and Francesco di Guido, who are often the only bankers mentioned in the papal and Angevin documents, were closely allied with Orlando from at least 1260. Mario Chiaudano lists only some of the transactions demonstrating this association: “Compagnie bancarie,” p. 18 n. 1. The earliest list of the members of the societas does not name Bonaventura and Francesco, but perhaps Bernardino di Prosperino and Guido d’Alamanno were their fathers and predecessors in close economic association with the Bonsignori family: ASS, Diplomatico, Spedale di Santa Maria della Scala, 17 January 1259. 61. Clément IV, no. 728 (27 April 1265), 2,000 pounds of Tours; no. 1428 (28 February 1265) and Thes. novus, 2:103, ep. 5, 2,000 pounds of Tours; no. 1460 (28 April 1265) and Thes. novus, 2:127, ep. 59, a request to pay the Sienese before some Florentines; no. 1464 (3 June 1265) and Thes. novus, 2:139-40, ep. 69, 2,000 pounds of Tours; no. 1465 (6 July 1265) and Thes. novus, 2:149-50, ep. 84, for 9,000 pounds of Tours (the pope told Simon of Brie, “solutionem hujusmodi ante alia omnia debita studeas quantocius expedire”); no. 1469 (23 July 1265) and Thes. novus, 2:168, ep. 109, 2,932 pounds provided by Francesco di Guido and the Scala bank of Florence; no. 1480 (30 November 1265) and Thes. novus, 2:248-49, ep. 191, 10,000 pounds of Tours; no. 1482 (30 December 1265) and Thes. novus, 2:258-59, 26

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

cial cash advances to facilitate the advance of the army of Charles of Anjou into Italy. These were followed by further critical and decisive loans in March of 1266. With such financial backing Charles was able to assemble an army, lead it to southern Italy, and defeat Manfred at Benevento on 26 February 1266. With the subsequent defeat

and execution in 1268 of the last of the Hohenstaufen, Conradin, Charles consolidated his hold on southern Italy and Sicily. While the Bonsignori had been able to continue to live in Ghibelline Siena and take an active and significant role in the Guelf alliance, the Tolomei had not been so adroit in coping with both powers. When the

internal politics of Siena and the economic pressure of Urban IV forced a decision about allegiance in the 1260s, the Tolomei tried to steer a course consistent with maintaining their papal ties and their po-

sition in the cloth and financial markets of northern Europe. Other than four letters from the fairs in Champagne, a few references in Angevin records, and several notices in the published account books of an unidentified Sienese company during the period 1277 to 1282, there is little from which to reconstruct the company’s organization and commercial activity from 1260 to 1300. Nevertheless the four letters are especially valuable for illustrating and explaining how the fairs functioned for Sienese merchants in the third quarter of the thirteenth century and what the company of the Tolomei tried to accomplish there. Although its papal business connections never recovered from the conflicts of the 1260s, the firm continued its commercial and financial business on a smaller scale with little direct papal patronage.

ep. 208; no. 1483 (1 January 1266) and Thes. novus, 2:262-63, ep. 212, another 10,000 pounds brought the total lent to 50,000 pounds by these “liberales” merchants; no. 1484 (19 January 1266) and Thes. novus, 2:269-70, ep. 222. As security for this loan of at least 60,500 pounds of Tours, the pope pledged his property, jewels, and sacred vessels; thus Simon should repay the huge amounts “ne Urbis ecclesiae irreparabile damnum subeant.” Charles was still collecting money six years later: Sergio Terlizzi, ed., Documenti delle relazioni tra Carlo I d’Angio e la Toscana (Florence, 1950), no. 429, pp. 233-34 (28 April 1272). 62. Using the copies of Clement IV’s letters printed in Thesaurus novus anecdotorum, Norman Housley has a good description of the absolutely crucial role of the Bonsignori in the papal financing of Charles’s expedition during the crisis of 1265-66: The Italian Crusades: The Papal Angevin Alliance and the Crusades against Christian Lay Powers, 1254-1343 (Oxford, 1982), pp. 226-30. 63. Guido Astuti, ed., // libro dell’entrata e dell’uscita di una compagnia mercantile senese del secolo XIII (1277-1282) (Turin, 1934), passim; Bautier, “Tolomei aux foires 1279,” pp. 110-11; Georges Bigwood, “Les Tolomei en France au XIVe siecle,” Revue belge de philologie et d’histoire 8 (1929), 1109-30.

2/

SIENESE BANKING

Increasing the economic pressure begun under Alexander IV, Pope

Urban wrote on 4 August 1262 to the bishop of Siena to order the Tolomei and some other papal bankers to account for monies received in repayment for a loan dating from the time of his predecessor.“ The balance might not come out in favor of the company, since such audits

were susceptible to manipulation for political ends by questioning documentation and exchange rates or by threatening charges of usury. On 14 September 1262 Andrea di Cristoforo Tolomei wrote a letter from the fairs in Champagne to his sedentary partners and kinsmen in

Siena, Tolomeo di Jacobo, Orlando di Baldistricca, and Pietro di Cristoforo Tolomei.© Besides describing business and political con-

ditions at the fairs and listing transactions involving loans and exchanges, Andrea reported on the main objective for attendance at the fairs. He described the dispatch of Federigo Doni to Flanders to purchase cloth with money obtained at the fairs by exchanges of money, interest from loans, and sales of imported luxury goods. The cloth was ultimately to be sent back to Italy for sale.© After listing defaults by bishops and abbots because of papal sanctions, Andrea expressed anx-

lety about the firm’s ability to continue to conduct business at all. Count Theobald of Champagne had granted a safe-conduct, but Andrea felt it prudent to hire merchants from Parma to go to Flanders to acquire cloth for the company.®’ Deprived of the threat of papal sanc64. Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 46; Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 167, pp. 317-18. The letter mentioned Jacobo di Rinaldo, Cristoforo di Tolomeo, Tolomeo di Rinaldo Tolomei, and several of their associates and agents. 65. Cesare Paoli and Enea Piccolomini, eds., Lettere volgari del secolo XIII scritte da Senesi (Bologna, 1871), pp. 25-48, 134-43, newly edited in Castellani, Prosa italiana, 1/1, no. 37, pp. 273-89, with photographs in 1/2, plates 386-88. 66. Paoli and Piccolomini, eds., Lettere volgari, pp. 33, 37, 46 (on pages 41-43 is the letter describing the use of Parmesan merchants to circumvent papal sanctions); Castellani, ed., Prosa italiana, 1/1, no. 37, pp. 273-89, 1/2, plates 386-88; Mario Chiaudano, “Contratti di cambio in una lettera mercantile senese inedita del 1269,” Atti della Reale accademia delle scienze di Torino, classe di scienze morali, storiche

e filologiche 66 (1931), 637; Cesare Paoli, Siena alle fiere di Sciampagna (Siena, 1898), pp. 26-28, 30-31; Armando Sapori, “Le compagnie mercantili toscane del Dugento e dei primi del Trecento,” in Studi di storia economica medievale, 3rd ed. (Florence, 1955), 2:768-69. For the role of Sienese merchants, the movement of capital, and the ultimate decline of the Champagne fairs see Gérard Sivéry, “Mouvements de capitaux et taux d’intérét en occident au XII Ie siécle,” Annales: Economies, sociétés, civilisations 38 (1983), 137-50, and L’économie du royaume de France au siécle de Saint Louis (vers 1180-vers 1315) (Lille, 1984), pp. 228-48. 67. Castellani, ed., Prosa italiana, 1/1, no. 37, pp. 273-89, 1/2, plates 386-88; Paoli and Piccolomini, eds., Lettere volgari, pp. 25-48, 124-43; Paoli, Siena alle fiere, pp. 26-28. Andrea recalled his agents from England because of his fear that Henry III might comply with papal sanctions. Papal legates in England sequestered Si28

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

tions to aid collections and faced with the possible withdrawal of princely protection, the Tolomei were vulnerable to default by clerical

and lay clients. The very nature of their business involving cloth, credit, and monetary exchanges made them responsive to Urban’s pressure. Besides this financial threat to the banking interests of some members of the Tolomei family, the commune of Siena moved more firmly under the control of families unfriendly to the whole clan. The rise of their rivals in internal politics and the adoption of an antipapal foreign policy drove the Tolomei and twenty-five other families from the city in December of 1262.© A chronicle from the fifteenth century asserts that the palaces of the Tolomei and several other magnate fam-

ilies were promptly burned.” On 5 January 1263 Urban showed his appreciation for their action and freed them from the sanctions imposed on Sienese merchants.” The pontiff soon sponsored their return to England in February of 1263 by writing to Queen Eleanor, the wife of Henry III, asking her to permit them to function in England, a region vital for their commercial activity in the wool and cloth trade.”! Unlike the Bonsignori, who were never included in papal sanctions, the Tolomei company managed to return to papal favor but failed to

increase its participation in papal banking. Although taking a small part in the financing of Charles of Anjou’s conquest of southern Italy, they never made a financial commitment to him equivalent to that of the Bonsignori. They consequently played a much smaller role in his administration. ’* Even their leadership of the Sienese Parte Guelfa in

enese debts and handed them over to loyal merchants from Lucca: Whitwell, “Italian Bankers,” pp. 215-16. 68. Tommasi, Historie 2, bk. 6, p. 23; Jordan, Origines, 2:343. 69. Biblioteca Comunale di Siena, MS A III 25, fol. 31, a compilation attributed to Domenico Aldobrandini; Guido Pampaloni, “Il palazzo,” in // Palazzo Tolomei a Siena (Florence, 1971), p. 77; Edward D. English, “Urban Castles in Medieval Siena: The Sources and Images of Power,” in The Medieval Castle: Romance and Reality, ed. Kathryn Reyerson and Faye Powe (Dubuque, Iowa, 1984), pp. 175-98. 70. Urbain IV, 2, ordinaire no. 175. He reaffirmed this a year later in ordinaire no. 521 (January-February 1264); the second letter contains a breakdown of the cities in which certain Tolomei agents were to work. 71. Other Sienese merchants were to be shunned, but the following Tolomei or their representatives had returned to devotion to the church: Pietro and Andrea di Cristoforo, Guglielmo and Meo di Rinaldo, Federigo Doni: Paoli and Piccolomini, eds., Lettere volgari, pp. 104-5 (11 February 1263); Patetta, “Caorsini senesi,” p. 341; Whitwell, “Italian Bankers,” p. 215; Martini “Siena da Montaperti,” p. 82; Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 22; Curzio Mazzi, “Mercanti senesi nei secoli XIII e XIV,” BSSP 30 (1923), 224. 72. Pietro di Cristoforo received Monteauto sul Montemaggio (Monte Bosco), and the

29

SIENESE BANKING 1269 failed to bring them additional Angevin or papal patronage or employment. The company of the Tolomei did, however, continue its trade in northern Europe well after the problems of the 1260s. On 29 November 1265 Andrea wrote again to the head office in Siena. Besides giving further information on business conditions at the fairs and on a trip of a factor, Federigo Doni, to England, Andrea reminded his partners of

the effect on the money markets of Champagne and Italy of the financing of Charles of Anjou’s expedition against the Hohenstaufen in Italy. The company should be prepared to take advantage of the glut of letters of exchange and pounds of Tours that the campaign would bring into the Italian peninsula. The price of pounds of Tours would get lower in Italy; and since they were needed in the north to purchase cloth, the company should purchase some in Italy for possible future use in the north. 2 On 30 April 1269 Andrea di Cristoforo wrote again

from Troyes to Tolomeo di Jacobo, then in exile at Castello de la Pieve.’4 As was clear in the two earlier missives, the business of the company in France was not limited to banking operations, since Federigo Doni was in Flanders to purchase cloth. Once again the firm was buying and selling spices, wool, silk, and wax to obtain money at the

fairs, which would then be used to buy cloth for export back to Siena.’> As can be seen from a letter sent from the fairs in 1279, the Tolomei still maintained an active participation in business at the fairs a decade later. Luca di Bonsignore, who was probably not related to the magnate family of the Bonsignori, reported on his activity and that of the other two representatives of the firm, Cino di Pietro and Tofano di Bonsignore, at the May fair of Provins. Tolomeo di Rinaldo Tolocompany was granted privileges to trade in the regno: English, “Five Magnate Fam-

ilies,” pp. 242-43; Prunai, “La famiglia Tolomei,” p. 22. The registers of Clement IV only refer to them on one occasion when the pope acknowledged their return of a deposit from the time of Urban IV: Clement IV, no. 745 (22 June 1265). The letter of 30 May 1269 by Andrea di Cristoforo did not mention any Tolomei participation in Angevin or papal taxation, which apparently was primarily handled by

the Bonsignori, the Salimbeni, and Florentine bankers: Castellani, ed., Prosa italiana, 1/1, no. 45, pp. 413-20, 1/2, plates 391-92; Chiaudano, “Contratti di cambio 1269,” pp. 627-50. 73. Paoli and Piccolomini, eds., Lettere volgari, pp. 49-58, 142-47; Castellani, ed., Prosa italiana, 1/1, no. 43, pp. 401-7, 1/2, plates 389-90; Robert S. Lopez and Irving W. Raymond, eds., Medieval Trade in the Mediterranean World (New York, 1955), pp. 392-94; Patetta, “Caorsini senesi,” p. 342. 74. Chiaudano, “Contratti di cambio 1269,” pp. 627-50, text pp. 644-50; Castellani, ed., Prosa italiana, 1/1, no. 45, pp. 413-20, 1/2, plates 391-92. 75. Chiaudano, “Contratti di cambio 1269,” pp. 634-35.

30 ,

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

mei, the addressee, was now the director of the company. Luca reported on sales, payments received, profits and losses, and the state of

the firm’s merchandise at Provins, Lagny, and Troyes.’ The main activity of agents continued to be selling merchandise imported from Italy to finance the purchase of cloth in Flanders and at the fairs for export to Italy.’ Robert-Henri Bautier concluded his introduction to the letter by pointing out a developing problem for all Sienese businessmen at the fairs. The number of failures and uncollectible debts was rising, making business in general more difficult. This was com-

pounded by a retreat from the north by the old network of Sienese merchants, perhaps initially a consequence of papal pressures but ultimately more a result of economic change and a growing dominance by Florentine companies. The Sienese could no longer compete and were

being replaced by new men. Unfortunately we do not have further documentation until after 1300 to evaluate the activity of the Tolomei outside of Siena. While difficulties for the Tolomei and Bonsignori companies outside of Siena continued after 1262, the political environment in Siena fluctuated between domestic acceptance of the need to reach a compromise with the Holy See and warfare within and outside the city over domestic and foreign affairs. In June of 1265 the captains and the corporation of the Guelf party of Siena met at Citta della Pieve near Lake Trasimeno to await instructions from the pope and to appoint an acceptable representative to assist in forming alliances.’® By July they had agreed on the bishop of Arezzo and had armed him with a subsidy of 1,500 pounds that was to last for the coming year or until the Guelf exiles returned to Siena.”? After the battle of Benevento in 1266, Clement sought to reconcile the Ghibellines holding Siena with his allies, Charles of Anjou and the exiled Sienese Guelfs. His representative, Bernardo Languiselli, managed to get the Aldobrandeschi, a great feudal family from southern Tuscany, the communes of Orvieto and Siena, and the exiled Sienese Guelfs to agree to a solemn peace in the cathedral of Orvieto in August of 1266.°° Soon afterwards, however, when the last of Frederick II’s male descendants, Conradin, en76. Bautier, “Tolomei aux foires 1279,” pp. 106-29. 77. Ibid., pp. 116-17, followed by examples. 78. Daniel P. Waley, The Italian City-Republics (New York, 1969), p. 215. 79. Ibid., p. 215; Clément IV, no. 1732 (22 June 1265). DR, 2 July 1265 is a copy of this letter. 80. DR, 12 August 1266; Clément IV, no. 1072 (25 May 1266). Clement had tried earlier, but the commune of Siena had refused his terms according to Tommasi, Historie, 2, bk. 6, pp. 35, 39, 40, and Malavoiti, Historia, 2, bk. 2, fol. 33. 31

SIENESE BANKING

tered Italy, the Sienese government promptly renounced the treaty and refused to readmit the exiled Guelfs. Early in Charles’s campaign in Tuscany in 1267 there was another abortive agreement between the

two Sienese factions.*! The Bonsignori and the Tolomei, who had stayed in the city with their associates, remained in a tenuous position among contesting factions of their fellow citizens, while other Tolomei took active roles in the exiled Guelf party. After the Sienese government fought against Charles at Poggibonsi in November of 1267, Clement reaffirmed the sentences of excommu-

nication. Further condemnations in the spring of 1268 did not weaken the resolve of the Ghibellines running the government of Siena.*? On 5 April 1268 after citing his previous efforts at reconciliation, Clement excommunicated the regime in Siena. He also declared their property confiscated for use in financing crusades; deprived the

city of privileges, jurisdictions, and territorial rights; nullified any existing oath or contract with them; and lastly threatened to put the Sienese church under the jurisdiction of Florence and to deprive all her clergy of their benefices.*4

The problems of the Ghibelline regime continued to grow when a committee established to reform the government called the Sixty (Ses-

santa) was accused of favoring the exiled Guelf nobles. Riots followed and several members of the Sessanta were massacred by an enraged mob.® Despite external threats and internal dangers it was only after Conradin’s defeat and execution and the overwhelming defeat of the Sienese army at Colle on 12 June 1269 that any real change 81. DR, 13 May 1267; Clément IV, no. 472; Martini, “Siena da Montaperti,” p. 93. This has been published in Mondolfo, Popolus a Siena, doc. 4, pp. 71-82. For Charles’s entry into Tuscany see Clément IV, no. 1168 (18 January 1267). During the summer of 1267 Clement again sent envoys to urge the bishop of Siena to assist in restoring peace to Siena and Tuscany: Clément IV, no. 1237 (23 or 30 July 1267),

no. 1239 (4 August 1267), no. 1246 (20 or 21 August 1267); Martini, “Siena da Montaperti,” pp. 93-94. 82. Clément IV, no. 1278 (23 or 24 November 1267); Thes. novus, 2:542-43, ep. 559 (26

November 1267). The sentences were to be read in churches in Rome and other cities.

83. Clement had declared the “Universitas Guelforum Senensium” exempt from his November decrees: Clément IV, no. 580 (12 February 1269). The Guelfs had naturally supported Charles’s efforts to establish peace with terms favorable to them, but the regime in Siena failed to cooperate. The pope had asserted that property of the adherents of that regime, “cives Senenses intrinsecos,” was open to seizure, and their debtors were requested not to repay loans. 84. Clément IV, no. 694; for the full text see MGH EppSel 3:706-8 (no. 678). See also Clément IV, no. 702 (17 May 1268); MGH EppSel 3:717-18 (no. 686). 85. For a brief summary of events see Martini, “Siena da Montaperti,” p. 96. 32

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

occurred in the composition or policies of the government of Siena. On 4 August 1270 Siena finally submitted to Charles of Anjou as the head of the Guelf party of Italy and allowed the Guelf exiles to return to the city.®© This amounted to a capitulation to the Guelf alliance and led to a revolution in communal government. The Guelfs returned to carry out vengeance on their long-time enemies and to establish a new regime which ruled through a council called the Thirty-Six. When the government of Siena was reconciled with the Holy See and Charles of Anjou, Orlando di Bonsignore Bonsignori, the head of the family, fled into exile at Cortona, where Ghibelline partisans from Siena had established their headquarters.°’ Orlando became, until his death around 1272, a leader of this faction. Despite his difficulties with the new Guelf government of Siena, Orlando continued to play a circumspect but important role in Charles’s financial system in combination with Bonaventura di Bernardino and Francesco di Guido. At the same time the company continued to be clearly identified with Orlando himself in papal transactions.®8 While politics might require a prudently unobtrusive participation by the Bonsignori in Angevin business, the rise to prominence of Bonaventura and Francesco could also reflect shifts in the structure of power and capital within the firm. In

the meantime the composition of the company also changed when three associates, Restauro (Ristoro) and Guidone di Giunta and their nephew Lando di Fazio, withdrew on 22 January 1273, soon after the death of Orlando.*’ Perhaps they left because of disagreement or dis86. Terlizzi, Documenti, no. 229, pp. 132-36; Cron. sen. (Montauri), p. 224. DR, 30 March 1271, is a later copy of the agreement. 87. Charles offered pardons to the Ghibellines of Siena but demanded that the Sienese government take harsh measures against anyone who did not take advantage of them: Terlizzi, Documenti, no. 340, p. 188 (16 April 1271); no. 342, pp. 189-91 (17

April 1271), a pardon accompanied with threats and pledges to respect Sienese

rights; no. 351, p. 194 (18 April 1271); no. 383, p. 209 (19 July 1271), the Ghibellines now were to pay a fine of 6,000 ounces of gold; no. 385, pp. 209-10 (23 July 1271), a reference to those in Cortona seeking pardons; no. 513, pp. 271-72 (4

February 1273), an order to Siena to capture the rebels operating out of Cortona; no. 547, pp. 292-93 (31 May 1273), an order to the commune of Siena demanding the destruction of the houses of the Ghibellines not in obedience to Charles. 88. Orlando was not always mentioned specifically, but his company was used throughout Clement’s pontificate: Clément IV, nos. 726, 729, 731, 735, 738-39, 746-48, 753-56, 761 (Lunt, Papal Revenues, 2, no. 364, pp. 239-40), 779-84, 789, 794, 796-98, 803. 89. DAG, 22 January 1274; Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento,” p. 115, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 48-52. Fazio d’Orlando Bonsignori and his brothers Orlando di Bartolomeo Malavolti, Andrea di Jacobo, Francesco di Guido, Jacobo Ranuccini, and Bonaventura di Bernardino all continued their participation in the compa33

SIENESE BANKING

satisfaction with the leadership and business of the company after it lost the eminent and experienced Orlando. Oriando’s death then could have heralded a decrease in the control that the Bonsignori family exercised over the company, but the lack of articles of association, account books, or business letters from this period makes confirmation of such a conclusion about management impossible. Although perhaps nominally still in control, the descendants of Bonifazio and Orlando di Bonsignore no longer as clearly dominated the affairs of the company. The Bonsignori consortium continued to be employed after Charles was secure in his newly won kingdom. Throughout the 1270s the Bonsignori group made loans to Charles’s government, received payments on these loans, effected transfers to other governments for the king, and collected taxes.” During June and July of 1270 Charles employed the Bonsignori and their associates to receive the payments due froma composition with traditionally Ghibelline Pisa.?! The new king of Sicily and leader of the successful Guelf alliance trusted and perhaps shrewdly employed the ambivalently Guelf Bonsignori, even with their

leadership of the Sienese Ghibelline party in exile, to receive a fine from one of the most prominent Ghibelline strongholds. On 22 May 1271, in return for its great services, Charles granted the society of Bonaventura di Bernardino and Francesco di Guido a safe-conduct for two years for the Kingdom of Sicily, Tuscany, Provence, and

ny. The departing members could now do business on their own and join other companies. 90. Terlizzi, Documenti, no. 206, p. 118 (1S June 1270); no. 272, pp. 160-61 (14 March 1271), the tenth on France was still being used to repay them for previous loans; no. 273, pp. 161-62 (14 March 1271); no. 275, p. 163 (16 March 1271); no. 278, p. 164 (16 March 1271); no. 354, p. 195 (25 April 1271); no. 281, p. 165 (18 March

1271). Charles submitted to the jurisdiction of the papal curia if enforcement became necessary to secure repayment of the loan: no. 367, p. 201 (13 June 1271); no. 369, p. 202 (13 June 1271). The duke of Burgundy paid a subvention to Charles through the company: no. 425, pp. 231-32 (9 April 1272); no. 664, pp. 345-46 (12 September 1273); no. 710, pp. 379-80 (22 October 1275). Charles paid his annual census of 8,000 ounces of gold to the Holy See through agents of the firm: no. 740, pp. 405-7 (7 October 1276); no. 744, pp. 409-10 (24 October 1276); no. 745, p. 410 (29 October 1276); no. 761, p. 423 (23 January 1277); no. 764, p. 425 (20 March 1277); no. 765, p. 426 (22 March 1277); Alain de Boiiard, ed., Documents en fran¢ais des archives angevines de Naples, \: Les mandements aux Trésoriers (Paris, 1933), p. 100. 91. Terlizzi, Documenti, nos. 200 and 201, pp. 115-17 (6 June 1270); no. 204, p. 117 (6 June 1270); no. 205, pp. 117-18 (11 June 1270); no. 208, p. 119 (15 June 1270); no. 217, pp. 126-27 (17 July 1270). 34

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

France.” As had become usual in its Angevin business, the members of the Bonsignori family were not mentioned specifically, and the

, partners Bonaventura and Francesco were cited as the heads of the company. After Orlando’s death and the eclipse of the Sienese Ghibel-

line party, Niccolo di Bonifazio and Fazio d’Orlando Bonsignori openly appear again in Angevin affairs: on 22 October 1275 they were

mentioned when Charles of Anjou paid the consortium his annual papal census of 8,000 ounces of gold.” If employment by the Angevin government in southern Italy brought

fewer opportunities after 1275, papal affairs from 1270 to the mid1290s offered the Bonsignori intermittent employment which fluctuated in intensity according to pontificates. The Bonsignori never recovered the near monopoly they had possessed under Clement IV. Pope Gregory X (1271-76, Tebaldo Visconti of Piacenza) preferred to rely on his fellow townsmen the Scotti. Interested primarily in the Holy Land, Gregory did not finance additional expensive operations such as Charles of Anjou’s expedition. According to the surviving documentation, he only used the services of the Bonsignori on one occasion in the Levant, when on 31 March 1272 they transferred 1,000 ounces of gold to the archbishop of Tyre.” There is, however, some indication that the company returned to a special relationship with the papal

camera during the short pontificate of John XXI (1276-77, Peter of Spain), a scholar who had once lived in Siena. John employed them to assist in the handling of the sexennial tenth for the Holy Land which the Second Council of Lyons had granted in 1274. On 1 October 1276

he ordered the Scotti, Gregory’s favorites, to pay 12,000 pounds of 92. Terlizzi, Documenti, no. 358, pp. 196-97: “propter grata et accepta servitia.” Charles’s letter listed the Sienese merchants, all associates of the firm: “Hugonem et Renerium Iacobi, Guidonem Ioncte, Berard(um) Alebrandi, Lottum Hugolini, Iacobum Egidii, Andream Iacobi, Gregorium dictum Gonellam, Bartum Biviani Boieti, Facium Beringnonis, Iacobum Romei, Castellinum Baroncelli, Salvinum Bonsegnoris, Gregorium Peniti, Iacobum Rainucini, Gasconem Trapillicini, Sarthinum Marci et Bartholomeum Bramanzonis, Bonifatium Corradini et lacobum Alebrandini” and, of course, Bonaventura di Bernardino and Francesco di Guido. 93. Terlizzi, Documenti, no. 710, pp. 379-80 (22 October 1275); the census was to be forwarded to the Holy See through “Faucium Berinionis, socium Bonaventure Bernardini, Nicolai Bonifacii et Facii Bollandi, Bonsenioris Pagani, Giletti Bartholomei, Henrici Bandi, Alebrandini Bannutii, Iohannis de Balcis, Protolomei Manentis, Raynerii lacobi Barmontini, Gregorii Guinnelle et Matthei Albici . . . de societate quondam Bonsenioris de Senis.” The money was originally assigned to Charles

by “Facio Berinionis .. . pro censu debito annuatim.” 94. Les registres de Grégoire X et Jean X XI: Recueil des bulles de ces papes publiées ou analysées d’apres les manuscrits des Archives du Vatican, ed. Léon Cadier and Jean

Guiraud (Paris, 1892-1906), no. 364 (31 March 1272). 35

SIENESE BANKING | Tours deposited with them, to the Bonsignori, “mercatoribus nostris.”?> This special but limited relationship continued under Nicholas

Ill (1277-80, Giovanni Orsini), who ordered Cistercian and Cluniac

| abbots in England to pay 10,000 pounds of Tours, deposited with them since the time of Gregory X, to representatives of the Bonsignori

and Rimbertini of Florence.” Although the total amounts deposited with the Bonsignori are not readily ascertainable from extant papal records, considerable quantities could have been left with the Bonsignori and other Italian companies during the 1270s and early 1280s. When they were drained off quickly after 1290, many of the companies which had participated in papal finance in the 1270s and 1280s

probably no longer had sufficient assets to make loans or even to , cover deposits already made with them. Relations between the old allies, the papacy and Charles of Anjou,

were strained throughout the 1270s as the Holy See found that the threat of Hohenstaufen encirclement had been replaced by the more dangerous direct intervention in papal affairs by the Angevins. The whole situation, however, changed in 1282, when the island of Sicily was lost to Charles in the Sicilian Vespers and the subsequent Aragonese intervention. There followed twenty years of intermittent and indecisive warfare. Popes Martin IV, Honorius IV, Nicholas III, Nicholas IV, and Boniface VIII became increasingly involved in financing the Angevin effort to retake the island of Sicily. Although the internal workings of Angevin governmental finance are obscure because of the 95. Grégoire X et Jean XXI, no. 92. On 15 June 1276 at New Temple in London Bartolomeo Marci, a representative of the Bonsignori company, acknowledged receiving on behalf of several Italian companies 1,411 marks from the first year of the tenth for the Holy Land: Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 155, pp. 307-8. 96. Les registres de Nicholas III: Recueil des bulles de ce pape publiées ou analysées d’apres les manuscrits originaux du Vatican, ed. Jules Gay and Suzanne Vitte-Clémencet (Paris, 1898-1938), no. 718 (9 October 1278): “Bonisingne Bonacursi et Peponi Banaprise de societate Rimbertinorum de Florentia et Renaldo Delmantellato ac Conrado Beringnonis de societate filiorum quondam Bonsingnoris.” In 1278 Nicholas supported the firm in its efforts to collect a debt of 15,000 bisanti Saracenati from the archbishop of Nicosia: no. 107 (19 July 1278). The archbishop had been lent the money by “Fatio Benguionis, Ventura Bonamiki, Manfredo Ranutii et Bindo Clariti civibus et mercatoribus Senensibus, mutuantibus pro se Bonaventura Bernardini, Raynerio Jacobi, Clarito Johannis et Guillelmo Bencivenni, ac ceteris eorum socils, de societate filiorum quondam Bonsignoris de Senis.” Bartolomeo Bellinzoni and Andrea Clariti of the society of the sons of Orlando Bonsignori and the Rimbertini were to be paid by a papal fine from the city of Asti: no. 744 (7 May 1279). In February 1280 part of a tenth on England was deposited with the Bonsignori: Emilio Re, “La compagnia dei Riccardi e il suo fallimento alla fine del secolo decimoterzo,” Archivio della Societa romana di storia patria 37 (1914), 96. 36

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

destruction of archives, under Honorius IV the Bonsignori took an active part in the handling of papal monies raised to recapture Sicily.”

Even with some employment in papal business, which in any case _ went increasingly to the Florentines, the unsettled conditions probably damaged any positions the company had in Angevin finance and administration and in the trade and commerce of southern Italy. As a principal papal collector in France under Clement IV, Simon of Brie, Pope Martin IV (1281-85), had had many dealings with the company. In financial difficulties because of his aggressive policy in the Romagna, Martin as pontiff appointed the firm to handle a tenth collected in the rich province of Tuscany,”® but the Bonsignori did not regain their monopoly and increasingly had to function in conjunction with bankers from Lucca, Pistoia, and especially Florence. The Bonsignori account books for this period (outlined for Clement VI’s investigation in 1344 into the company’s debts to the Holy See) make frequent mention of Tuscan banking concerns, such as the Pulci, Rim-

bertini, Mozzi, and others, none of whom came from Siena or had been very active under Clement IV or other pontiffs.””7 While cooperating with other family firms, the Bonsignori were active on behalf of the papacy in northern France during the 1280s and were still functioning in England, Scotland, Denmark, and Germany, particularly in

handling the large sums of money from a crusading tenth levied on England.!® Under Honorius IV (1285-87), they served in the Middle East when the pope employed the company to transfer money to the 97. Les registres d’Honorius IV publiées d’apres le manuscrit des Archives du Vatican, ed. Maurice Prou (Paris, 1886-88), no. 609 (20 September 1286). The archbishop

of Arles was to assign all the French returns from a tenth levied for Sicily to the Bonsignori and the Ammanati of Pistoia. 98. Les registres de Martin IV: Recueil des bulles de ce pape publiées ou analysées d’apres les manuscrits originaux des Archives du Vatican, ed. Francois OliverMartin (Paris, 1901-35), nos. 4, 20. Chiaudano claimed that the Florentines already held a predominant position in cameral affairs under Martin, but merchants from other cities were clearly deeply involved, according to fols. 509-10, 512 of ASV, RA 76, edited in Edward D. English, “Registra Avenionensia LXXVI: The Bonsignori of Siena in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries” (licentiate thesis, Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, Toronto, 1975). Martin was well acquainted with Florentine bankers: Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 3:310-12. See also Armando Sapori, Le marchand italien du moyen Gge (Paris, 1952); Paul Fabre, “Les décimes ecclésiastiques dans le royaume d’Arles de 1278 a 1283,” Annales du Midi 4 (1892), 377-79; for events in the Romagna, see Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 6:568. 99. English, “Bonsignori,” passim. 100. William E. Lunt, Studies in Anglo-Papal Relations during the Middle Ages, |: Financial Relations of the Papacy with England to 1327 (Cambridge, Mass., 37

SIENESE BANKING

Levant in 1285.!°! In 1284-85 he ordered collectors to assign money from a tenth levied by Martin IV on Italy to the Bonsignori and several other Tuscan companies.!? In spite of a setback under Gregory X, they managed to maintain their papal connection, but the volume and quality of their business had declined by 1287. The Bonsignori returned to a prominent position as papal bankers with Nicholas IV’s (1288-92) financial support for Charles of Salerno’s attempts at the reconquest and reorganization of the divided kingdom of his late father in southern Italy and Sicily.!°? Besides assisting the reconquest of Sicily by the Angevins, Nicholas wanted simultaneously

to aid the beleaguered crusaders in the Holy Land. By August 1288 money was flowing into the companies; the Bonsignori were especially

active in the Angevin patrimony of Provence and in handling the returns from the lucrative Tuscan church.!®* The 1344 papal investigation into the alleged debts of the company to the papal camera found the account books of the firm for this period. Even before they discovered these documents, the commission had asserted that the Bonsignori collected but never forwarded 80,000 florins to Nicholas’s treasury. Although the accounting procedures that led to the confirmation of this amount are not clear from the transcripts contained in Registra Avenionensia 76,!° the excerpts from the account books show that the Bonsignori were involved in the transfer of large sums of money all over Europe. Besides reestablishing and expanding his financial links with the Bonsignori, Nicholas IV supported the company with ecclesiastical sanctions. Taking advantage of its close connections with his treasury, 1939), pp. 655~59; ASV, RA 76, 509-10v, 512; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 11724, 128-29. 101. Honorius IV, no. 183 (11 October 1285), no. 184 (11 October 1285), no. 617 (19 September 1286), no. 618 (19 September 1286). This society of Bonaventura di Bernardino had three representatives in the Levant: Claritus Johannis, Jacobus Franki, and Sensus Bosi. 102. Housley, Italian Crusades, pp. 232-33, contains a list of assignments from the published papal register of Honorius. 103. Les registres de Nicholas IV: Recueil des bulles de ce pape publiées d’apreés le manuscrit original des Archives du Vatican, ed. Ernest Langlois (Paris, 1887-93), 1, nos. 96-100 (26-30 April 1288), nos. 103-5 (1 May 1288); 2, no. 7015 (28 April 1288); Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 6:575-76. Nicholas used the Bonsignori, the Riccardi of Lucca, the Pulci-Rimbertini of Florence, and the Clarenti of Pistoia to receive and transfer the tenth for the Kingdom of Sicily. 104. Nicholas IV, 1, nos. 601-3 (12 August 1288); 2, no. 7109 (21 August 1288), nos. 7232-33 (23 May 1289). 105. English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 116-43, 146-59, a transcription of ASV, RA 76, 508v24v.

38

PAPAL BANKING AND POLITICS

the company persuaded Nicholas to threaten Perugia in 1290 for delaying repayment of a loan of 5,000 florins borrowed to pay a papal fine.!©° In addition to brandishing excommunication and the interdict, Nicholas appeared willing to enforce repayment of the debt by the confiscation of property and the doubling of the debt if there should be any further delay in payment. In other difficult circumstances, Nicholas came to the firm’s rescue when, in 1291, Philip IV of France imprisoned Italian merchants operating in his kingdom. The pope wrote on two occasions, in May 1291 and in March 1292, to ask Philip

to release merchants working for the apostolic camera, among whom / were representatives of the Bonsignori.!°’ After referring to the usefulness of the companies for financing the supplying of hard-pressed Acre, Nicholas told Philip that his action was a scandal to the eyes of all Christians and that if the king had any reverence for the church, he would free the merchants immediately. Philip eventually did release the Italians to continue their business, but the incident was symptomatic of the times and indicative of the future. Political conflicts in France disrupted the flow of papal business and the repayment of ecclesiastical loans. The resulting cash flow problem and the disruption of the transfer of funds back to Italy would make the Bonsignori or any contemporary firm unable to repay its own creditors or depositors. The fragile faith of customers would vanish; and the weakness of the company’s reserves would result in a run that would quickly lead to bankruptcy. Besides suffering lost opportunities for profitable activities and the imposition of large fines in France, the vulnerable Bonsignori company must have found it difficult to appear quite as likely to cover obligations to creditors.

Despite these efforts by Pope Nicholas to help the Bonsignori, 106. On this excellent case study of the employment of ecclesiastical sanctions see William M. Bowsky, The Finance of the Commune of Siena, 1287-1355 (Oxford, 1970), pp. 205~9; Sergio Bertelli, // potere oligarchico nello stato-citta medievale (Florence, 1978), p. 126. Note also Bowsky’s observation on the benefits accruing to acommune when it had among its own citizens a banking company rich enough to help with the financial problems of the city. 107. Nicholas IV, 2, no. 7326 (28 May 1291); Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 187, pp. 339-40. The king was asked to free those “de societatibus filiorum Bonsignoris”

and of the Spini, Pulci-Rimbertini, Lambertini, Riccardi, and Clarentini, and those “qui quorumque socii nostre sunt camere precipui mercatores et ecclesie romane diutius utiliter servierunt.” Nicholas admitted that perhaps the merchants were delinquent in attending to the needs of the crown, but because of the requirements of the Holy Land and the great scandal “totius Christianitatis,” Philip ought to release them. Several months later the pope reiterated his pleas to allow them to

function again “ob reverentiam Jesu Christi”: Nicholas IV, 2, no. 7393 (145 March : 1292).

39

SIENESE BANKING

everything was not going well with their papal connection. In a significant letter written on 9 May 1292 to Niccolo di Bonifazio Bonsignori in Siena, Fazio d’Orlando admitted that the Gran Tavola (or company of the Bonsignori) was having problems in collecting and transferring papal funds.!°® There were disagreements about the rates of exchange,

and the factors of the company were unable to prove that they had transferred a sum of money from the tenth of 1291 to Philip IV of France. The letter indicates two of the main problems in taking part in an international fiscal operation such as that of the pope. Many different varieties of money were exchanged as the companies transferred funds all over Christendom. The rates at which they were exchanged determined the profit or loss to the firm and the funds available tothe _ papacy or client. The money market in various locations cannot have been that predictable, so rates accepted initially only too readily became subjects of discontent and conflict later. This letter may well represent a string of complaints, disagreements, and conflicts over rates and receipts. Another problem for the Bonsignori was their vulnerability in dealing with such powerful clients as the Holy See and the king of France. Companies could not afford to alienate them since ultimately they had little leverage on these powerful customers and patrons. The collection of debts suffered if the firm did not possess a patron willing to apply powerful sanctions. Although further indications of the problems of the company under Pope Nicholas IV are unclear, relations continued

to deteriorate. By the end of his pontificate the Bonsignori were no longer on active service in the financial machinery of the Holy See. As the 1344 investigation shows, however, they still apparently possessed the large quantities of deposited funds from earlier business. By the 1290s the papal patronage of the Bonsignori company was in decline. In the mid-thirteenth century the Bonsignori, and to a lesser extent the Tolomei, had skillfully created a series of business societates that were able to take advantage of the growing needs of ecclesiastical finance. While it is difficult to say who followed whom, the companies and the Holy See expanded their economic penetration of Europe despite and because of several political conflicts. Armed with adaptable internal structures and backed by the patrimonial assets of rich fami-

lies, these firms managed their affairs ably and generally pursued shrewd strategies of political and economic opportunism to rank among the most prominent companies of the thirteenth century. 108. English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 158-59, with the transcription completed on page 145; ASV, RA 76, 524v and 519 (a letter of 9 May 1292).

40

II

The Bonsignori and

| European Banking to the 1290s Participation in papal taxation was not the only way in which the Bonsignori companies functioned in the economy of thirteenth-century Europe. Their able marshaling of resources and manpower coincided with the growth of the papacy’s need for money. The great importance of papal banking in the rise of the Bonsignori bank may be exaggerated because of the chance survival of numerous documents linking the growth of papal financial machinery with the employment of the Bonsignori. Other sources that might have shown the popes following the successful Bonsignori company into areas new to papal taxes have not come down to us. Papal patronage and employment were often crucial to the initial entry by companies into a region, but representatives of the firms such as the Bonsignori soon sought other customers and fields of enterprise. From as early as 1227 Sienese merchants appear in records from England, and representatives of the Bonsignori make their first documented appearance in 1249.! Over the following fifty years there are about three hundred references in published records from the British Isles to factors and partners of the various companies headed by the Bonsignori family. Found throughout the Close, Patent, and Liberate Rolls of the English crown and the calendars of papal letters, they first appeared in England as papal bankers and remained a banking and financial concern, combining the transfer of funds with loans to both clerical and lay clients. During the 1250s and 1260s papal employ1. CLR, Henry III, 1:41 (13 July 1227), the repayment of a 400 mark loan to some Sienese merchants who had made a loan to the archdeacon of Coventry at the papal court. Neither the Bonsignori nor the Tolomei were involved in this loan. According to Matthew Paris, the Sienese had a reputation for collecting usury: Chronica ma-

, jora, 4:8; Patetta, “Caorsini senesi,” pp. 311-14; Whitwell, “Italian Bankers,” pp.

208-9; CPR, Henry III, 4:41-42 (9 May 1249). ,

2. A systematic search through these sources and the excerpts from account books gathered by a 1344 papal investigation into an alleged debt to the Holy See of 80,000 florins did not reveal any evidence of direct involvement by the company in the wool trade. Some loans might have been secured on the basis of wool, but the Bonsignori

do not seem to have ever traded in wool or cloth. T. H. Lloyd recognized the marginal involvement of all the Sienese firms in that trade in England: The English Wool Trade in the Middle Ages (Cambridge, Eng., 1977), p. 40. 41

SIENESE BANKING

ment and patronage in the British Isles for the Bonsignori were frequent under Alexander IV, Urban IV, and Clement IV, although later popes were to rely less and less on the firm during the following de-

cades.° _

Henry III had agreed to pay 135,541 marks to cover the expenses for promoting his ambitions in southern Italy. As part of this affair, in the mid-1250s Florentine and Sienese bankers were repaid between

70,000 and 80,000 marks from taxation on the English church for repayment of loans to the crown.* Although often overshadowed in the business of the crown by the Riccardi company during the latethirteenth century, the representatives of the Bonsignori society occasionally paid the retaining fees owed by the crown to royal agents at | the papal court and handled annual censuses due the Holy See.> The 3. Patetta, “Caorsini senesi,” p. 334; Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 10 (26 September 1261), cameral nos. 51 and 52 (31 December 1261); Whitwell, “Italian Bankers,” pp. 210-11 (144 May 1262); Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 209 (November 1262); Clément IV, no. 761 (23 May 1266); Lunt, Papal Revenues, 2, no. 364, pp. 239-40. Honorius IV wrote the king of Scotland, Alexander III, asking him not to hinder his agents who were collecting the tenth for the Holy Land: Honorius IV, no. 66 (5 July 1285); Lunt, Papal Revenues, 2, no. 275, pp. 100-101. Martin IV in 1280 and 1281 deposited a tenth for the Holy Land with the Bonsignori and a number of other Italian companies: Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 6:699; Re, “La compagnia dei Riccardi,” p. 96. By then the monopoly of the Bonsignori was clearly broken. See Lunt, Financial Relations England, appendix 6, pp. 655-59, for an outline of deposits as they

stood in 1283. ,

4. Lunt, Financial Relations England, pp. 255-90; T. H. Lloyd, Alien Merchants in England in the High Middle Ages (New York, 1982), p. 169. As Lloyd notes, these were repayments of loans, so the use of such funds as new or additional working capital becomes less obvious. The absence of account books makes it difficult, if not impossible, to reconstruct the uses to which funds were put or to describe the sending of profits back to Siena. 5. Henry III contracted some loans with Bernardo Prosperini and Aldobrando Aldobrandini, the principal Bonsignori agents in England: 500 marks, CLR, Henry III, 3:306 (9 May 1249); 300 pounds, p. 243 (10 July 1249); 700 pounds, p. 257 (20 October 1249); 500 pounds, CPR, Henry III, 4:130 (25 February 1252); 1,000 pounds, p. 189 (24 April 1253); Patetta, “Caorsini senesi,” pp. 336-37; 1,000 marks, CLR, Henry III, 3:304 (6 October 1250); 2,250 marks, CPR, Henry III, 4:631 (29 May 1258); Richard W. Kaeuper, Bankers to the Crown: The Riccardi of Lucca and Eadward I (Princeton, 1973), passim. For the payments to the agents see CLR, Henry III, 6:207-8, 227 (16 March and 10 May 1268); for the census see Urbain IV, 1, cameral nos. 48 and 53 (13 December 1261); Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 147, p. 302 (4 February 1262), and 2, no. 230, pp. 50-51 (26 September 1262); Nicholas IV, 2, no. 7015 (28 April 1288). In 1285 Eleanor of Castile, the wife of Edward I, bor-

rowed from the Bonsignori, the Pulci-Rimbertini, and the Bardi an unspecified amount on the security of fines from condemned Jews: Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 6:704. Michael Postan’s observation about Italian bankers being naturally

42

| THE BONSIGNORI AND EUROPEAN BANKING Bonsignori only became directly involved again in royal finances dur-

ing the declining years of the firm from 1290 to 1310. The crown, however, had decided on several occasions to “raid the coffers” of the company during Edward I’s Welsh Wars (1277-88).° Although documentation showing their effects on companies such as that of the Bonsignori is lacking, the economic and monetary maneuvers and bullionist policies of the English crown increased during the 1290s. They included a prohibition in 1299 on the export of silver coin, plate, and bullion

without a royal license. These machinations complicated a money market and transfer system already struck by changes in papal taxa| tion and the manipulation of wool as a political and economic weapon.’ In addition to coping with the consequences of war in France and tension between the Holy See and the English crown, the Bonsignori had to participate in an unwieldy consortium of eleven Italian companies trying to replace in royal finances Edward I’s formerly reliable Riccardi company.’ The Frescobaldi were later to emerge, at least tem-

| porarily, as adequate replacements for the Riccardi. Well positioned and experienced in the wool trade, they were far better suited to profit from Edward’s reliance on wool and its customs duties for security and repayment than the financially oriented Sienese, especially the Bonsignori. The ultimately unsuccessful careers of the Riccardi and Frescobaldi reflect well the environment also experienced by the Bonsignori in England from 1290 to 1310. France was the most lucrative area for both the Holy See and the Bonsignori, with changing conditions similar to those in England. Besides less interest in the actual production of wool, the major difference was that France contained the fairs of Champagne, which in the led into royal finance and the wool trade seems only partially applicable to the Bon-

signori: “The Trade of Medieval Europe: The North,” in Medieval Trade and Finance (Cambridge, Eng., 1973), p. 206. 6. For summaries of the contributions of the Bonsignori to the financing of the Welsh wars see Lloyd, Alien Merchants in England, pp. 185-89; for 1290-91, see pp. 170, 196; for Bonsignori loans between 1298 and 1300 see pp. 190-91; on the problems encountered in replacing the Riccardi see Richard W. Kaeuper, “The Frescobaldi of Florence and the English Crown,” Studies in Medieval and Renaissance History 10 (1973), 46. 7. The royal policy limiting the transfer of wealth outside the kingdom of England cannot have made it easier to return remittances to Siena; for the bullionist mentality and policies of the crown and their effects on exchange contracts in England see John H. A. Munro, “Bullionism and the Bill of Exchange in England, 1272-1663: A Study in Monetary Management and Popular Prejudice,” in The Dawn of Modern Banking (New Haven and London, 1979), pp. 189, 198-200. 8. Kaeuper, Bankers to the Crown, chap. 5, and “Frescobaldi of Florence,” p. 46. 43

SIENESE BANKING

second half of the thirteenth century functioned as the major money market of Europe and the clearinghouse for Italian merchants operating north of the Alps. In 1222 Count Thibault of Champagne had taken the Sienese under his protection and had granted them permission to conduct business within this territory.” By 1246 the Sienese had their own consulate to supervise their activities at the fairs of Lagny, Troyes, Provins, and Bar-sur-Aube.!° The Bonsignori and their representatives were settled in the area at least by 1264. Houses owned by members of the family itself were noted in tax evaluations at Bar-surAube in 1264 and 1279.!! Although documentation is sparse, the Bonsignori and other Sienese companies, as we shall see, remained active

at the fairs throughout the thirteenth century. Papal patronage and employment for the Bonsignori were continuous in France throughout the period from 1240 to 1300, with maximum utilization under Urban IV and Clement IV in the 1260s.!* The great marshaling of money to finance the campaign of Charles of Anjou to conquer southern Italy was based on the taxation of Charles’s possessions in southern France and Clement IV’s demands on the French church.!3 While Nicholas III, Honorius IV, and Nicholas IV employed the Bonsignori in a reduced capacity in the 1280s and 1290s, other Italian companies slowly came to replace them in France. '*

In addition to papal assignments, the first notice we have of Bon9. Félix Bourquelot, Etudes sur les foires de Champagne (Paris, 1865), 1:175; Charles Verlinden, “Markets and Fairs,” in The Cambridge Economic History of Europe, 3: Economic Organization and Policies in the Middle Ages, ed. M. M. Postan, E. E. Rich, and Edward Miller (Cambridge, Eng., 1963), p. 128. Mario Chiaudano went so far as to claim that the Sienese gained an absolute predominance at the fairs: Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 11-12. 10. Robert-Henri Bautier, “Les foires de Champagne: Recherches sur une évolution historique,” in Recueils de la Société Jean Bodin, 5: La foire (Brussels, 1953), p. 126; Verlinden, “Markets and Fairs,” p. 131. 11. Elizabeth Chapin, Les villes de foires de Champagne des origines au début du XIVe siécle (Paris, 1937), p. 123. 12. See Martini, “Siena da Montaperti,” pp. 85-86, for a partial list of Urban’s assignments; also Urbain IV, 1, cameral nos. 9, 40, 72, 73, 121, 155, 159, 166, 180, 480; 2, ordinaire nos. 426, 458, 567, 1518; Clément IV, nos. 735, 746, 747, 748, 753-56, 796, 803.

13. According to a Tolomei partner resident at the fair of Bar-sur-Aube, the Bonsignori collected 23,000 pounds of Provins from the Cistercians alone: Chiaudano, “Contratti di cambio Tolomei 1269,” p. 649. | 14. Nicholas ITT, no. 107 (19 July 1278); Honorius IV, no. 609 (20 September 1286); Nicholas IV, 2, no. 5758 (23 July 1291). See English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 145, 157-59, for letters documenting Bonsignori cooperation with the dominant Florentine firms.

44

THE BONSIGNORI AND EUROPEAN BANKING

signori activity in France was in 1250 when they received privileges from the abbot of St.-Germain-des-Prés in Paris, who favored them with business instead of French or other Italian merchants.!°? According to surviving documents, their main field of endeavor was cambium contracts between Genoa and the fairs. As part of a system of commercial lending, they financed the purchase and transfer of wool from northern Europe. From December 1251 to March 1253 Roffredo Bra-

manzoni made, in his own name and that of his associates in the Bonsignori company, numerous notarial instrumenta ex causa cambii

in Genoa with the conclusion of the contract at the fairs of Champagne.'© For example, on 27 March 1253 Roffredo acknowledged receiving 390 Genoese pounds and promised that the company would pay 700 pounds of Tours the following May in Champagne.!’ Such instruments typically involved extensions of credit and the exchange of monies, with companies being takers or sellers of foreign exchange On One occasion and at other times being deliverers or buyers. The Bonsignori company continued its permanent representation at Genoa

from 1257 to 1268, when Tolomeo di Manente made contracts similar to those of Roffredo.!8 15. Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 6:619 (26 January 1250); Grégoire LX, 1, no. 988 (19 December 1232) and no. 549 (28 February 1231); Innocent IV, 3, no. 6386 (12 March 1253) and no. 7489 (13 May 1254). Quinto Senigaglia called France the true center of Sienese business activities: “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 152-53. 16. Mario Chiaudano, “Notizie sulla sede di Genova della Gran Tavola di Orlando Bonsignori (1251-1262),” La Diana 8 (1933), 109-14, and “I Rothschild del Duecento,” p. 139 (8 November 1251), p. 140 (13 November 1251); Renée Doehaerd, ed.., Les relations commerciales entre Génes, la Belgique et ’Outremont d’apres les archives notariales génoises aux XIITe et X1Ve siécles (Brussels, 1941), 2, no. 642, pp. 341-42 (7 December 1250); no. 698, p. 368 (31 October 1251); no. 699, p. 369 (31 October 1251); no. 745, pp. 397-98 (10 June 1252); no. 750, pp. 402-3 (18 June 1252); no. 775, pp. 418-19 (31 October 1252); no. 776, pp. 419-20 (1 November 1252); no. 778, p. 421 (12 December 1252); no. 779, pp. 421-22 (12 December 1252); no. 785, pp. 425-26 (7 March 1253); no. 793, pp. 430-31 (13 March 1253). 17. Doehaerd, Relations, 2, no. 802, p. 436 (26 March 1253). They were instrumenta ex

| causa cambii: de Roover, “The Organization of Trade,” pp. 67, 70. 18. Doehaerd, Relations, 2, no. 989, p. 538 (16 January 1257); no. 1045, p. 572 (August 1259); no. 1049, p. 574 (8 September 1259); no. 1050, p. 574 (8 September 1259); no. 1056, pp. 577~78 (12 September 1259); no. 1070, p. 586 (24 September 1259); no. 1088, p. 595 (23 October 1259); no. 1089, pp. 595-96 (25 October 1259); no. 1094, pp. 598-99 (31 October 1259); no. 1095, p. 599 (31 October 1259); 3, no.

1129, p. 519 (15 December 1259); no. 1146, pp. 626-27 (26 January 1262); no. 1256, p. 696 (28 June 1267); no. 1260, p. 698 (9 January 1267); no. 1272, pp. 704-5 (15 March 1268); no. 1273, p. 705 (15 March 1268); Chiaudano, “Notizie Genova,”

pp. 109-14. Aldobrandino Aldobrandini and Ranieri Bonaccorsi transferred 20 marks from England for a cleric: Doehaerd, Relations, 2, no. 1113, p. 611 (3 De45

SIENESE BANKING

Genoa seems to have been a key point for the Bonsignori business network; but we cannot be sure of the role of other cities, since few contracts from other places and at the fairs have survived. By 1253 the Bonsignori branch at Genoa had reached such a state of development that one of the major Genoese banks, that of the Leccacorvo, in cooperation with the Bonsignori, tried to establish and manage a mint

near the city. Their intention was to control the striking of silver groats or strong deniers and thus have a means of coping directly with monetary confusion and fluctuation.!? The silver content of coinage from the mint would presumably rise or fall according to its perceived and perhaps desired value. The plan failed because of lack of cooperation from the commune of Genoa. Such an operation would have been

of great benefit to a company trying to ensure profits from the exchange of various silver coinages. After 1268, besides references to its papal business, little is known about the company of the Bonsignori in France or at Genoa. Apart from an allusion in a Tolomei business letter of 1279 noting the receipt of a payment on an old debt owed to the Bonsignori, Scotti, and Tolomeli, there is only the mention of a branch office at Paris in the roll of the taille of 1292.”

While the papal camera turned less and less frequently in France to companies built around the Bonsignori, the political environment of the kingdom for Sienese merchants in general was not always favorable, with the crown periodically exacting large fines. On 24 April 1277 King Philip III seized some unnamed Sienese merchants on the grounds they were collecting usury.*! The Consiglio Generale of Siena met on 20 May to discuss how to react to this arrest and the accompanying exactions demanded by the crown. Ambassadors were sent with full power to negotiate the release of the prisoners and the restoration of confiscated property.2” Although the details of the negotiations cember 1259), also no. 1057, p. 578 (12 September 1259). Pietro Ugolini worked for the Bonsignori in Genoa in 1262: Doehaerd, Relations, 3, no. 1156, pp. 634-35 (7 October 1262); no. 1157, pp. 635-36 (10 October 1262). 19. Robert S. Lopez, “The Dawn of Medieval Banking,” in The Dawn of Modern Banking (New Haven and London, 1979), p. 19. This was at about the same time as the appearance of gold coinage at Genoa and Florence. 20. Bautier, “Les Tolomei aux foires 1279,” p. 127. A German paid off a bill for pep_ per he had bought from the Bonsignori, the Scotti, and the Tolomei.

21. Villani, Cronica 7.53. ,

22. The podesta moved that since “nova et gravia et sinistra in preiuditium et dampnum mercatorum et etiam totius communis Senarum de partibus Francie venerunt, scilicet quod dominus rex Francie vir illustris nuper precepit processum contra Senenses ac etiam contra Lombardos in partibus Francie commorantes faciendo capi et arrestari in persona et rebus,” the Consiglio Generale was asked to agree to the 46

THE BONSIGNORI AND EUROPEAN BANKING

have not survived, Philip III eventually received 60,000 Parisian pounds from the Sienese.?? While evidence is lacking for the direct effect on the Bonsignori, it is likely that the most prominent Sienese firm had to contribute to the large fines. Some years later in 1291 Bonsignori were jailed by Philip IV and ultimately were forced to contribute to another payment of 60,000 Parisian pounds.*4 Just as Edward of England was to do later, on 17 August 1296 Philip issued an order forbidding the export of money, precious metals, jewels, or negotiable documents from France. Moving from earlier temporary checks on transfers of wealth, Philip now adopted a general policy of bullion control.” If France had earlier been a lucrative field of operations, by the last decade of the thirteenth century the growth and elaboration of royal fines, of export regulations, and of hostilities with England and the Holy See were making the kingdom a more dangerous and risky region in which to do business. Besides conducting papal and other business in England and France, the company of the Bonsignori was active in Italy, Spain, Germany, and the Levant as a papal agent. Urban IV, Clement IV, Nicholas III, and Nicholas [IV employed the company to collect clerical legacies and fines due the Holy See from throughout the Italian peninsula.2° Deutaviva di Benello was the company’s representative in Venice from 1258 to at least 1261. In 1258 he made a contract with Ranieri di Rustichi-

no Piccolomini to exchange Venetian pounds at Venice for Sienese

payment of funds “pro ambaxiatoribus et nuntiis et licteris mictendis.” The motion passed: CG 21, 85-—85v (20 May 1277); Robert Davidsohn, Forschungen zur dlteren

Geschichte von Florenz (Berlin, 1896-1908), 3, no. 96, p. 29; Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” p. 26; Paoli, Siena alle fiere, pp. 34-36. 23. Senigaglia, “Compagnie bancarie,” p. 156; Camille Piton, Les Lombards en France et a Paris (Paris, 1892-93), 2:48. 24. Nicholas IV, 2, no. 7326 (28 May 1291); no. 7384 (30 October 1291); no. 7393 (15 March 1292). Philip had moved not just against the Sienese, but also against the Spini, Frescobaldi, Pulci-Rimbertini, and the Riccardi: Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 187, pp. 339-40; Senigaglia, “Compagnie bancarie,” p. 196. A few years later, in 1296, the Consiglio Generale was asked to intervene for a Sienese merchant, Nuccio Bandinelli, who had spent twenty years in France and was now suffering harassment due to the problems of the Bonsignori and “propter magnas extorsiones quas dominus rex Francie fecit dicto Nuccio et aliis Toschanis”: CG 49, 53v (24 February 1296); Davidsohn, Forschungen, 3, no. 244, p. 57. 25. T.S. R. Boase, Boniface VIIT (London, 1933), p. 139. 26. Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 17 (9 December 1261), at Rome; Clément IV, no. 731 (18 May 1265), at Pisa, no. 726 (22 April 1265), at Ferrara; Nicholas LIT, no. 744 (7 May 1279), at Genoa; Nicholas IV, 2, no. 7113 (29 August 1288), at Capua, I, no. 1992 (6 January 1290), at Cividale del Friuli. 47

SIENESE BANKING

pounds at Siena.*’ On 5 July 1263 Gregory, the patriarch of Aquileia, received confirmation of the exemption from papal sanctions for the

representatives of the Bonsignori within his jurisdiction (Jacobo di Romeo, Martinello di Rubeo, Roffredo di Ranieri, and Tosetto di Ajuto).7® A few weeks later the patriarch contracted a loan from the Bonsignori. By 1269 he had pawned his jewelry and church plate to secure another loan of 3,900 Venetian pounds.’ Although not giving the Bonsignori a monopoly as papal bankers after 1280, Martin IV and Nicholas IV ordered collectors to transfer to the camera money gathered in Tuscany and Latium through the faithful and expert society.2° Papal patronage still functioned in central Italy until the last decade of the thirteenth century. Although documentary evidence for their business in Germany, the Balkans, the Low Countries, and Spain is rare, representatives of the company were present in these places on papal business. In 1231 the bishops of Bamberg, Salzburg, and Cologne received loans from the firm, while papal collectors at Trier and Zagreb were ordered to enforce payments of loans on ecclesiastical clients of the Bonsignori.?! In 1261 Urban IV assigned deposits from collections in Germany to the company’s factor Deutaviva di Benello.*? In the Low Countries the ruling dynasty was the principal client. On her abdication in 1278, Countess Margaret of Flanders, despite a reputation for frugality, owed 11,000 Parisian pounds to various Sienese

and Florentine companies including the Bonsignori. Her successor, Guy (1278-1300), borrowed 5,300 pounds of Tours from the company 27. ASF, Diplomatico Ricci, 5 August 1258; Prunai, “Carte mercantili Piccolomini,” p. 588, no. 55. 28. Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 162 (5 July 1263). 29. Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 277 (25 July 1263); Zdekauer, Mercante senese, p. 52 (5 September 1269). The loan was contracted to pay for the legacies and the burial of the late patriarch. 30. Despite disorder and dissension in Siena Martin IV ordered the collector of the tenth for the Holy Land from Tuscany and Marittima to transfer the funds to the Bonsignori, citing the “fidelitate probata et experta industria dilectorum filiorum Tholomei Manenti, Bandi Yidebrandi,” the factors in Tuscany for the company: Martin IV, no. 4 (20 April 1281); Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 3:310-12, 6:568; Sapori, Le marchand italien, pp. li-lii. Nicholas IV, 1, nos. 96-100 (26-30 April 1288), contains a long list of collectorates from which the Bonsignori were supposed to transfer the money. 31. DSF, 17 September 1231; Zdekauer, Mercante senese, pp. 48-49; Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 29 (25 January 1262), no. 370 (17 June 1263); MGH EppSel 3:520-22 (no. 540); Arcangeli, “Istituti del diritto commerciale,” p. 167. 32. Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 43 (17 December 1261), no. 44 (7 December 1261); Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1, no. 153, p. 306. 48

THE BONSIGNORI AND EUROPEAN BANKING

from 1281 to 1292.73 By the last decade of the thirteenth century, the Bonsignori were being drawn into the dangerous business of financing princes in volatile Flanders. Besides highlighting the prominent role of the Bonsignori in the 1250s and 1260s, Eloy Benito Ruano and Peter Linehan have started to illuminate the impressive Italian financial penetration of the Iberian peninsula.** Their efforts demonstrate the need for studies evaluating the interaction of regional Iberian economies and papal fiscal policy in order to advance beyond a simple chronicle of appointments of collectors and the levying of taxes. By the 1290s then the Bonsignori and Tolomei companies and all Sienese or Italian merchant bankers were facing difficult political and economic circumstances. England and France were intermittently at war, both militarily and economically.*° The Holy See under Boniface

VIII was in conflict with Philip IV over papal taxation, deeply involved in costly Italian politics, and committed to fulfilling the ambitions of the Gaetani family. The financing of these conflicts and ambitions was to require the withdrawal of money on deposit with Italian companies and the obtaining and granting of huge loans with little security or hope of repayment. Transfers of remittances from clients

and profits by trade, especially wool, by exchange contracts at the fairs of Champagne, or by bullion or coin all became more difficult to accomplish both among branches in the north or back to Siena itself. Unfortunately in the case of Siena the extant documents show the re-

sults of the problems in the form of bankruptcy proceedings, rather than symptoms demonstrating the increasing costs of transfers. The older generation of Italian banking and trading companies was also threatened by the emergence of new firms, primarily Florentine, who were not burdened by earlier papal or royal demands or delinquent loans and were thus able to respond to opportunities arising from the conflicts and the resulting problems of the older companies. 33. E. B. and M. M. Fryde, “Public Credit, with Special Reference to North-Western Europe,” in The Cambridge Economic History of Europe, 3: Economic Organization and Policies in the Middle Ages, ed. M. M. Postan, E. E. Rich, and Edward Miller (Cambridge, Eng., 1963), p. 494; Senigaglia, “Compagnie bancarie,” p. 158. 34. Peter Linehan, The Spanish Church and the Papacy in the Thirteenth Century (Cambridge, Eng., 1971), pp. 129-30, 142, 145-46; Innocent IV, 3, nos. 6381, 7861, 7909, 7980; Urbain IV, 1, cameral no. 71; Clément IV, nos. 729, 780, 789; Eloy Benito Ruano, La banca toscana y la orden de Santiago durante el siglo XIII (Valladolid, 1961), pp. 31-41; see his transcriptions on pages 91-97 and 105-9. 35. Norman Housley has estimated that papal, French, and English demands totaled , about a million florins and created a credit crisis in the 1290s: Italian Crusades, pp. 239-40.

49

SIENESE BANKING

While new firms emerged, certain Florentine companies such as the Spini or Mozzi, members of the older banking establishment, likewise suffered financial dislocation and ultimate failure around the turn of the century and were replaced by the initially smaller but experienced family companies of the Frescobaldi or Bardi. The earlier Florentine firms had been moving more and more into papal finance throughout the thirteenth century, and after 1292 they and eventually even newer firms dominated the business of the Holy See. Beginning with the striking of the gold florin in 1252, Sienese financial and commercial dominance had been at risk as the Florentines usurped Sienese organizational forms, expanded their involvement in

the industrial production of cloth, and benefited from their new © reliable gold coinage. The Sienese lacked the water needed for medieval industrial development, centered primarily on textiles; further-

more, they may have remained too dependent on silver during an epoch in which gold was becoming the standard.*° During the course of the thirteenth century the fairs of Champagne, the main financial arena of the Sienese, had developed into the clearinghouse of Europe

| where money, textiles, and credit were exchanged to balance the accounts of merchants and bankers. The fairs, however, were in decline by the last decade of that century, as new routes, new centers, and new taxation systems contributed to the creation of a changed economic environment. The development of the Florentine cloth industry cannot have made it as profitable to import finished cloth from the north

into Italy, thus greatly handicapping the return of profits to Siena. David Abulafia, furthermore, has pointed out how Siena and other Italian cities could not compete with Florence in southern Italy. Florence was able to dominate the commerce of the Angevin south because of her growing domestic textile industry and her ability to bring wool

and other cloth from northern Europe to be exchanged for the raw materials and food stuffs produced in the south.37 Combined with judicious loans to the government, this trade made Florence more and more the dominant intermediator in the commerce and banking of the south. The Bonsignori and Tolomei companies were faced with a greatly 36. Robert S. Lopez, “Back to Gold, 1252,” Economic History Review, 2nd ser. 9 (1956), 219-40; David Herlihy, “Pisan Coinage and the Monetary Development of Tuscany, 1150-1250,” American Numismatic Society, Museum Notes 5 (1954), 143-68.

37. David Abulafia, “Southern Italy and the Florentine Economy, 1265-1370,” Eco-

, nomic History Review, 2nd ser. 34 (1981), 384, 387. 50

THE BONSIGNORI AND EUROPEAN BANKING

changed economic and business environment demanding strong and innovative leadership. Although both firms tried to reorganize and continue in business, neither succeeded and both underwent long processes of bankruptcy and liquidation. As they had done before 1300, the careers of the two societies continued to reflect the history of Sienese international commerce and banking. Papal patronage, capable management, and the skillful integration of outsiders into societates built around wealthy families had brought great success to Sienese merchants in the thirteenth century; but in the fourteenth century, internal discord and financial insolvency overcame the Bonsignori and Tolomei companies. Before 1300 records from all over Europe illuminate the growth and success of Sienese international commerce and

banking; after that date, the history of the two firms, and Sienese business in general, must be drawn primarily from communal records

at Siena. The two companies and several other firms built around magnate families failed to meet the challenges of the troubled European economy around 1300. Their collapse brought their problems of bankruptcy and liquidation home to the city of Siena. As we shall see, the reaction and efforts of the commune to protect its merchants were to make their recovery or their replacement by other Sienese societies very difficult.

51

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Part Two

The Decline of sienese Banking

BLANK PAGE

III

The Failure of the Bonsignori

Sometime in 1289 the Bonsignori company managed another reorganization typical of thirteenth-century associations, in which the capital of the firm was restored, new members were brought into the societas, and profits and losses from earlier business ventures were calculated and divided.! The only information we have concerning the 1289 reorganization is a description from Sigismondo Tizio’s History of Siena, written in the early-sixteenth century.” Tizio gives only a brief notice, but he might have seen documentary evidence, since he gives specific information, such as the names of the notary and of twentythree individual participants, including five Bonsignori and eighteen outsiders, and the amounts of money invested by some of them. Fazio d’Orlando and Niccolo di Bonifazio Bonsignori, the heads of the two main branches of the Bonsignori family, were listed first, with Ugo, Guglielmo, and Bonsignore d’Orlando following later. Eighteen outsiders took part, including Bonaventura di Bernardino and Ranieri di Jacobo who contributed 6,800 and 5,200 Sienese pounds respectively. The others gave amounts varying between 1,200 and 3,000 pounds. The reported investments came to a total of 35,700 Sienese pounds, but Tizio omits information on the contribution of the Bonsignori to the capital of the company. Quinto Senigaglia has chosen to interpret 1. Gino Arias, Mario Chiaudano, Armando Sapori, and Edouard Jordan have all written about certain aspects of the famous bankruptcy of the Bonsignori. William M. Bowsky was the first to publish a short analysis of the later years of the floundering company using the many documents preserved in the Archivio di Stato in Siena: Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 248-53. I looked at many of the same documents in the course of reserach for my licentiate thesis and doctoral dissertation on magnate families in Siena. Although Bowsky has presented a fine outline of the proceedings and their impact on Siena and the regime of the Nine, the events themselves and the accompanying ideas about merchant responsibility and good faith are worthy of more detailed treatment. As in the case of many topics dealing with the well-studied regime of the Nine, one is deeply in debt to the work of several earlier archivists and scholars especially that of Bowsky with its careful and extensive archival research. 2. Biblioteca Comunale di Siena, MS B III 7, Sigismundo Tizio, Storia di Siena, 2:173 (for a transcription see Senigaglia, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 50-51); de Roover, “Organization of Trade,” p. 75; Sapori, “Compagnie mercantili,” pp. 778-79, 78184; Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento,” pp. 134-35. 55

SIENESE BANKING |

this omission as indicating that the company had two types of associates: the Bonsignori, who, as gerenti, had joint and unlimited liability coupled with definite authority over the affairs of the firm, and a second group of socii who had joint but limited responsibility accord-

ing to the size of their contribution.? Armando Sapori has rightly | pointed out that Tizio does not include the crucial clauses upon which any adequate evaluation of intended responsibility or authority can be based. All that can be said with assurance is that the Bonsignori company renewed itself in 1289 and included investors from outside the family, some of whom had been allied with the firm for years. On 12 September 1292, after the usual three-year duration of association for such companies, the Bonsignori renewed their economic society with a large number of outsiders in a charter forming the “soci-

etas filiorum Bonsignoris.” Niccolo di Bonifazio was initially the only | adherent from the Bonsignori family. Ugo and Guglielmo d’Orlando Bonsignori with several other major participants joined in March of 1293. Matteo Albizi, a socius from the 1289 societas, disappeared and

was replaced by Manfredi, the son of Bonaventura di Bernardino, who had been a partner for twenty-five years. The charter contains

| nothing to clarify or define the responsibility of the adherents to the creditors and clients of the renewed firm. This omission is not surprising, however, since the investors in the society probably knew the accepted practice of joint and unlimited responsibility and would have

little need or inclination to include it in their instrument of association. The ultimate decision-making power was vested in a majority of the associates named in the charter, and not with any particular individuals or inner council.4 Armando Sapori has suggested that the par3. Senigaglia, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 182, 190-95, 207; he thought the Bonsignori contributed labor to the company while the others invested capital. In the liquidation of the firm twenty years later distinctions between partners and factors do not seem to have been made by the Mercanzia or any commission assigning responsibility for debts or deposits. We cannot be sure of this, since the records of the pro-

cesses of the actual calculations and allocations are only known to us at second hand. Everyone mentioned, however, in the surviving documents of liquidation for the Bonsignori or Tolomei companies seems to have been considered an associate or partner. 4. DAG, 12 September 1292: “. . . promittimus inter nos ad inuicem, recipientibus pro nobis et aliis sotiis nostris qui ratificabunt hunc contractum et unus altrii [sic] facere et procurare omnia et singula que utilia fuerint ipsi Sotietati predicte, et que pertinebunt seu pertinere pot[uJerunt ad fructum ac profectum com[mune] et utilitatem dicte Sotietatis, prout dixerit maior pars nostrum et aliorum sotiorum de dicta Sotietate qui ratificabunt hunc contractum.” This agreement survives in a copy made

on 7 October 1294 and contains the text of the original document plus the later adherence of March 1293. For a full transcription see English, “Five Magnate Fam56

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

ticipants were nervous about the business of this commercial societas, since they knew they were responsible, even beyond their investment,

for any debts contracted by the firm. Partners outside the family, therefore, recognized their dangerous vulnerability and responsibility and sought a clear voice in, and power over, the affairs of the company.° Such anxiety and diffusion of control could not have made it any easier for the Bonsignori family, or anyone else, to direct the course of business or to respond readily to changing economic circumstances. Such concern for authority and control also argues against the theory that joint and unlimited responsibility was assumed to be restricted to the familial core of the company —that 1s, the Bonsignori family. Again in three years, in the fall of 1295, the company appointed two procurators for six months to conduct business on behalf of the societas. Three documents survive which limit the amounts of money for which the two men, who were also associates (“consotii’”’), could take responsibility in the name of the company when acting as procurators.® On the other hand, terms for the loans and the interest or damages to be earned from them were left up to the negotiating ability and discretion of the procurators, Corrado Berignone and Manfredi di Ranuccio de Balzis. The socii making the appointment were jointly responsible at least up to the amounts specified in the agreement. The society was trying to limit the responsibility of its partners or investors for business conducted by representatives in the field, but at the same time maintain reasonable freedom of action for these factors or procurators. Unfortunately the subsequent detailed activity of the procurators of the firm is not clear from surviving documents, nor is there any indication as to where or how the company employed these men. As we have seen, the decade of the 1290s was not an opportune time for the company of the Bonsignori to have internal disputes, since it was going to have to adapt its strategy and structure to problems in its papal banking connection, to tense relations between the Holy See and the king of France, and to warfare in the principal regions of its economic activity, France and England. Word was also spreading among other Italian banking companies that the company of the Bonsignori

p. 116, n. 1. , ilies,” pp. 266-73. Partially transcribed in Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento,”

5. Sapori, “Compagnie mercantili,” pp. 787-88. 6. DAG, 29 October 1295. Two documents survive in Siena (Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 45-48); one sets the limit of responsibility of the procurators at 1,000 pounds of Provence, the other at 1,500 pounds. I found yet another charter setting the limit at 2,000 pounds: ASF, Diplomatico Ricci, 29 October 1295; see transcription in English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp. 287-89.

57

SIENESE BANKING

was becoming a questionable or unreliable firm with which to do business. In a letter of 5 December 1297 representatives of the Riccardi of Lucca expressed concern in company correspondence about the hon-

esty and solvency of the Bonsignori. At the fairs of Champagne the | Riccardi company had lent representatives of the Sienese firm large sums of money upon promise of repayment in England and Ireland. As far as the writer of the letter was aware, the debt had not been repaid and the associates of the Bonsignori in France were being evasive | about its repayment.’ The commune of Siena itself might have perceived some problems in the repayment of funds, or at least its actions

placed a further demand on the resources of the company. On 16 March 1296 the Consiglio Generale approved the appointment of Bindo Detisalui to see that Geri Montanini, a representative of the society

of the sons of Orlando Bonsignori, repaid 10,000 florins on deposit

for the commune with the firm.°® |

The problems of the Bonsignori company came to a head at the end of another three-year period. On Saturday 9 August 1298 all the nonBonsignori associates of the 1295 societas, except Corrado Berignone, presented a petition to the Consiglio Generale of the city.” The petitioners justified their requests by affirming the basic soundness of the societas and mentioning the rich benefits that the commune of Siena had gained from this important and respected company. According to the petition, the firm had represented Siena well in dealings with clerical and lay leaders, had aided fellow Sienese merchants, and had borne a heavy burden for the commune of Siena in farming customs duties, in granting loans, and in providing horses. The petitioners admitted to

internal discord, some of which was allegedly fomented by jealous rivals from Siena. Despite the malicious attacks of these rivals, they claimed that the company had already paid 200,000 florins to creditors. In the opinion of the petitioners the societas was still capable of carrying out its commitments if a further run on the company could be 7. London, Public Record Office, E101/601/5, p. 5. There is a photograph and a transcription in Federigo Melis, Documenti per la storia economica dei secoli XIIIXVI (Florence, 1972), pp. 138-39. See also Kaeuper, Bankers to the Crown, p. 20; “Societas Riccardorum,” pp. 164-65, has an English translation of part of the letter. 8. CG 49, 62v-63. A special representative of the commune, Bindo Detisalui, was to see that 7,700 florins was paid to specified ambassadors in Rome and that 2,300 florins was paid to the camerarius and four provisors of the city. 9. CG 54, 43-46. Mario Chiaudano has partially transcribed the petition and the response of the Consiglio Generale: “I Rothschild del Duecento,” pp. 135-39, and “Note e documenti sulla compagnia dei Bonsignori,” pp. 136-42; Lopez and Raymond have an English translation of part of the petition in Medieval Trade, pp. 298302. See also Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 248-49. 58

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

avoided and if malevolent creditors could not hope to ruin individual associates by singling them out for the total debts of the company. As in the case of every contemporary company, as every business client of the firm knew, the assets of the firm were scattered around Europe in diverse investments with set terms that could not be recalled at a moment’s notice. In the view of the petitioners, enemies of some of the associates should not be allowed to try to reduce to ruin certain partners at the expense of the whole societas, or ultimately the city of Siena, which stood to lose one of its most beneficial institutions. The petitioners then made three requests to ensure the survival of the company. First, since certain unspecified individuals were bent on destroying some of the members of the company, the commune should pass legislation limiting the responsibility of the participants to the proportion of their individual investment in the capital of the company. The enemies of individual socii of the company would then be deterred from immediately demanding the return of their loans and investments, since a bankruptcy would not ensure the confiscation of the complete wealth or property of their foes. The well-established principle of joint and unlimited responsibility of each member of a banking and commercial compagnia was to be abandoned or at least modified. Compensation was to be proportionally allocated but still to cover the amount lent or invested. Second, a delay must be legislated to enable the partners to recall what they could and then to satisfy their creditors; this request was allegedly based on custom, sound business practice, and imperial legislation. Third, an embassy should be sent to the pope to ask his help and intervention, especially with

creditors at the papal court. Everything the petitioners sought was claimed to be reasonable, beneficial to all Sienese, and necessary to avoid reprisals on other Sienese merchants. The petition ended with a

call for quick action, since the factors of the company at Rome had | already been forced to flee because of extreme pressure. The reaction of the Bonsignori family itself to the proposals put forward by their partners is not evident. The non-Bonsignori associates clearly felt themselves to be in a desperate situation, since publicity about internal discord could only add to their problems. The details of the motives or events behind the attacks on the company and its individual participants cannot as yet be explained or demonstrated. As research progresses on the biographies of the associates of the Bonsignori and on the family itself, perhaps the animosities troubling the

company can be made clear. | Four men spoke on the petition. Ciampolo di Jacobo Gallerani, whose daughter was shortly to marry into the Bonsignori family, said 59

SIENESE BANKING

that the requests were without value and should be denied. His view might have represented that of the Bonsignori family. Uguccione Malavolti, a cousin of one of the petitioners, encouraged the council to agree to the proposals for the good of the commune and its members. Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei and Viva di Viviano di Guglielmo, a member of the Vignari family whose members served on the ruling Council of the Nine, suggested the appointment, by the Council of the Merchants (the Mercanzia), of a committee of wise and impartial merchants to establish concord among the associates and between them and their creditors. The committee was then to report back to the government of the commune on the real state of affairs of the company. The Consiglio Generale ultimately accepted this last suggestion, but the actual count of votes is absent from the record of this meeting. No morato-

rium on debt collection was decreed, nor was anything done at this stage of the collapse to modify the principle of joint and unlimited responsibility.

Organizations such as that of the Gran Tavola, the name of the Bonsignori company in the 1290s, or its contemporaries had certain congenital difficulties. Financial institutions then operated on a fractional reserve system, and most assets were difficult to recall, so that a panic among creditors could produce a fatal run on the bank. Almost all the companies from around 1290 mentioned in a 1344 papal investigation into the debts of the Bonsignori to the Holy See failed between 1300 and 1310: the Riccardi in 1300, the Ammanati in 1303, the Mozzi in 1308, and the Pulci-Rimbertini group in 1310. With a few minor exceptions the generation of companies active around 1290 had been completely replaced by other firms by 1310, having failed to survive the crucible of the changing political and economic environment of those two decades. The political events in northern Europe and Italy required a talent for innovation, internal discipline, and sound management. Already hampered by inaccessible and insufficient capital, the internal disunity of the Bonsignori consortium handicapped its

ability to respond to fluctuating economic conditions in northern | Europe where governments disrupted monetary and commodity markets in the pursuit of war. To meet these challenges the Bonsignori

company had to obtain majority agreement from its partners. The 1298 petition indicates a fissure between the Bonsignori family and the other associates. Under these circumstances innovations in techniques and organization or modifications in business activity were not easy to effect. Several months later, on 31 December 1298, the Consiglio Generale approved the appointment of Duccio Sachetti, Jacobo d’Uguccione, 60

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

Terio Prioris, and Pietro Bonfigliuoli to act as arbitrators, with the power to levy fines of 500 Sienese pounds to enforce their rulings. !° Unfortunately records showing their efforts do not survive; but whatever they tried or accomplished, they failed to stem the tide of deterioration. The commune also apparently sent an embassy of eight citizens and the captain of the people to the court of Boniface VIII in January of 1299, although Giugurta Tommasi, the sometimes unreliable sixteenthcentury historian, is the only source indicating this effort.'! The commune did not come more directly to the rescue of the petitioners at this

| time. The reasons for not acting more decisively are not clear, but they could have arisen from sympathy for or fear of the Bonsignori family and its friends, complex political or economic rivalries, or reluctance to set dangerous and untried juridical precedents in the principles of responsibility of debtors to creditors or of societates to third parties. The reaction of the papacy to the plight of the Bonsignori after 1298

remained ambivalent, although Ambrogio da Colle and Jacobo da Montecerconi, two Dominican witnesses examined in Clement VI’s 1344 investigation, testified that Boniface VIII made some effort to settle the discord within the partnership. !2 On the other hand Boniface added to a general liquidity crisis for all papal banking companies, be-

cause the financing of his ambitious policies required the return of monies held on deposit for years and prevented further lucrative holding of deposited funds. On 10 April 1295 he appointed two curial officials to regain money deposited with the Bonsignori company.!? Later that year Boniface granted an extension to the abbot of Cluny for the

repayment of a loan of 37,800 pounds of Tours made by the Bon10. CG 54, 87v-88: “. . . quicumque ex sotijs dicte sotietatis non obseruauerit laudem uel ea que laudata fuerint debeat cadere et cadat in penam comuni Senarum quingentarum libr. den. Sen. pro quolibet articulo quod non obseruauerit et pro quali-

bet uice....” 11. Tommasi, Historie, 2, bk. 7, pp. 141-42. The legation supposedly included Sozzo Salimbeni, Naddo Piccolomini, and Niccold Malavolti. 12. ASV, RA 76, 491v—-92 and 493v-94; transcribed in English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 7375, 78-81. 13. ASS, Diplomatico Bigazzi, 10 April 1295 (transcribed in English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp. 281-83), contains a list of those deemed responsible for debts of the company. Boniface gathered and spent about 2,400,000 florins during his reign, one-third of that for the conflict over Sicily alone: Friedrich Baethgen, “Quellen und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der papstlichen Hof- und Finanzverwaltung unter Bonifaz VIII.,” Quellen und Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven und Bibliotheken 20 (1928-29), 189. The Bonsignori and the other older companies must not have benefited from this great circulation of money, but years of research would be required to verify such an observation. 61

SIENESE BANKING

signori in the time of Nicholas IV.'* The pontificate of Boniface VIII,

furthermore, saw a continuation of the shift in papal patronage to banking companies from other Italian towns, especially Florence. This policy was often based on political considerations to facilitate papal

diplomacy in Europe and Italy and to further Gaetani family ambitions in Tuscany. Often using his economic power for political ends, Boniface remembered his long acquaintance with the Spini family of Florence and sent his support to its faction in the struggle for control of that city. The Mozzi and Cerchi families were consequently abandoned, despite their

long careers in papal financing. In Pistoia Boniface preferred the Chiarenti to the Ammanati; and in Lucca he made little effort to help either the bank or the family of the Riccardi because of their lengthy association with the Colonnese, the main rivals of the pope’s family in the papal states.!> To suspicious papal eyes the Bonsignori were not to be relied upon because of their reputation for inconstancy in the Guelf cause and for Ghibelline sentiments, attributes well embodied in the

careers Of Orlando di Bonsignore and of his nephew Niccolo di Bonifazio.!© -

Although the problems of the Bonsignori company had become public in Siena and its crucial papal connection was severed, business in England continued between 1290 and 1308. In 1290 and 1291 the crown had borrowed 1,500 pounds sterling, and it gave Jacobo Bramanzoni, a factor of the company, its protection in 1294.!’ In April 1300 King Edward I pardoned the company for contravening laws reg_ ulating the export or import of specia or unsound coinage.'® The Bon- _

signori made loans to the royal treasury and took part in the financing of government policy on the security of the wool customs in| 1302 and 1305. By 1304, however, Edward had to apply pressure on 14. Boniface VIII, 1, no. 293 (21 June 1295). 15. Boase, Boniface VIII, pp. 17, 84-85, 111, 247-48, 287; Heers, Parties and Political Life, p. 69. The whole question of papal ambitions, especially in Tuscany, needs to be studied. 16. For Orlando, see p. 22, n. 45, above; for Niccolo di Bonifazio (..1275~1314), see Giuliano Catoni, “Bonsignori, Niccolo,” Dizionario biografico degli Italiani, 12 (Rome, 1970), pp. 410-12; English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp. 441-43; and William M. Bowsky, Henry VII in Italy: The Conflict of Empire and City-State, 13101313 (Lincoln, Nebr., 1960), passim. Niccold’s career as a Ghibelline began with an attack on Siena in 1281 and included service under Emperor Henry VII. 17. CPR, Edward I, 2:411, 422; 3:84 (the protection, 22 August); CCR, Edward I, 3: 204.

18. Whitwell, “Italian Bankers,” pp. 212-13; CPR, Edward I, 3:531. Three days later

the Bonsignori joined in a loan of 1,900 pounds to Edward. | , 62

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

the weakening company to release deposited money to John Russell, who was on his way to Gascony on royal business.!? The factor in London, Jacobo Bramanzoni, seems to have carried on business and did not close his accounts in that city until 1 November 1308.2° The

last reference to the company in England occurs on 16 July 1309,

, when Edward II ordered the Exchequer to draw up accounts with a number of Italian companies including the Bonsignori.*! Although the documentation is not extensive, the company clearly did not suffer an immediate collapse in its affairs in England and France after the 1298 petition.

About the same time Pope Clement V (1305-14) proved no more helpful to the company than had Boniface VIII. Clement recognized the implications of the collapse of such firms and sought on several occasions to limit any damage that might result from the demise of an important banking company, especially since the Bonsignori probably still owed the papal camera considerable sums from the time of Nicholas IV.22 Yves Renouard has suggested that Clement V in fact abandoned the use of all Italian bankers in the machinery of papal finance because of the losses sustained by the disintegration of the Gran Tavola.73

By the first years of the fourteenth century the Gran Tavola of the sons of the Bonsignori was in profound difficulties, without much expectation of help from the political powers that were also its primary customers. Papal business and support were important to the continued prosperity — apparently to the very survival—of the company 19. CPR, Edward I, vols. 3 and 4; CCR, Edward I, 3 and 4; Davidsohn, Storia di Firenze, 6:443-44; Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1:170-73. 20. Georges Bigwood and Armand Grunzweig, eds., Les livres des comptes des Gallerani (Brussels, 1961-62), 2:144. 21. CCR, Edward II, 1:165. In addition to this activity in England the company maintained its business in France, at least until 1307: Georges Bigwood, Le régime juridique et économique du commerce de largent dans la Belgique du moyen age (Brussels, 1920-21), 2:314-15; as we shall see, the company maintained its links with the French crown, since Philip IV claimed it owed him 54,000 pounds of Tours. 22. Regestum Clementis Papae V, ex Vaticanis archetypis S.D.N. Leonis XIH P.M. iussu et munificentia, nunc primum editum cura et studio monachorum Ordinis S. Benedicti, ed. Benedictines of Monte Cassino (Rome, 1885-92), Annus secundus, no. 2296 (August-September 1307), transcribed in Lunt, Papal Revenues, 1:32425, no. 171. The pope wanted satisfaction from companies “que nunc sunt collapse.” See also Clement V, Annus quintus, no. 6328 (14 July 1310), Annus septimus, no. 7700 (27 February 1312). 23. Renouard, Relations des papes d’Avignon et des compagnies commerciales, pp. 94-98. 63

SIENESE BANKING

of the Bonsignori. When that financial link and patronage were removed, the cash flow of the firm was seriously damaged, making in turn the satisfaction of panicking creditors even more difficult. The statutes of the commune of Siena offered creditors some assurance that they could expect help in collecting their debts from Sienese citizens, especially if they themselves were citizens. Laws were in place to proceed against debtors, even those owing to foreigners. Sons were responsible for the obligations of their fathers, and sanctions included

loss of citizenship and the ban.** William M. Bowsky has observed that the commune had certain goals when dealing with the bankruptcies of its own citizens. The commune sought to establish a hierarchy of creditors: Sienese citizens at home, Sienese citizens suffering damage because of the failure of their co-citizens’ companies in France, and, lastly, foreigners.** The bankruptcies of the Bonsignori and the Tolomei confirm his suggestions on communal goals; however, the seriousness Of vacillation on the principle of joint and unlimited responsibility must be taken more into account when evaluating the actual practices followed by communal justice and contemporary concepts of business organization and trust. The dilatory tactics of the regime on enforcement, the fraudulent shielding of assets by claiming 24. For the basic procedures for bankruptcy processes according to Sienese statutes see Const. 1262, D. II, rub. 49, 67, 73, 74, 75, 79, 89, 90; Cost. 1309-10, 1, D. Il, rub. 63, 85, 86, 94, 95, 97, 103, 134; Quinto Senigaglia, “Lo statuto dell’Arte della Mercanzia senese (1342-43),” BSSP 15 (1908), D. IV, rub. 78, 79, pp. 182-83. The property of insolvent debtors could be confiscated and distributed to their creditors. The defrauding of creditors by flight was given particular consideration in determining intent; fleeing bankrupts suffered the loss of their citizenship and could be banned at the request of their creditors. Debtors as individuals were to pay, but the responsibility of partners in a compagnia or societas for the corporation’s debts was not clearly defined in the statutes. As we shall see, however, if the societas caused a damaging reprisal, the partners were proportionately responsible for those damages (Cost. 1309-10, 2, D. IV, rub. 103, pp. 201-2), a direct result of the default of the Bonsignori in France. The commune, as far as can be learnt from the surviving sources, never resorted to humiliating depictions of bankrupt magnates in frescoes on public buildings, either as a punishment or as a means of coercing repayment, in the case of the Bonsignori or Tolomei. For such uses of art see the works of Gino Masi, Gherardo Ortalli, and Samuel Y. Edgerton, Jr., in the Bibliography. For a discussion of sons being held responsible for the sins of their fathers see Kenneth Pennington, “Pro peccatis patrum puniri: A Moral and Legal Problem of the Inquisition,” Church History 47 (1978), 137-54.

25. Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 256-57. Bowsky also pointed out the commune’s preference for its own courts, the possibility of defending assets as parts of dowries, the use of embassies to advocate the causes of companies elsewhere, and frequent dilatory tactics consisting of elaborate procedures and the appointments of numerous commissions. 64

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

them as part of untouchable dowries, and the complications in assigning proportional responsibility to every debtor from a failed company must have shaken Sienese investors and customers as much as foreign creditors. Besides not functioning as a true patron of either the Bonsignori or Tolomei companies in their bankruptcies, the commune of Siena cannot be considered as readily and consistently supportive of the citizen creditors of the firm. The initial efforts of the government of Siena in 1298 to stabilize the Bonsignori company did not reestablish faith in the firm or prevent reprisals in places outside the jurisdiction of the commune. On 20 December 1301 the Nine brought a petition to the Consiglio Generale which had been forwarded to them by the Council of the Merchants.

As part of its effort to liquidate the debts of three members of the Bonsignori society with some Genoese and Florentine merchants, from such families as the Mozzi, Cerchi, Pazzi, and Bardi, the Mercanzia asked the Consiglio Generale for aid and advice on the means to avoid reprisals on all Sienese businessmen.2© The Mercanzia had been unable to sell off the assets of the three merchants because buyers were afraid their titles to the property could be found to be invalid and because the properties were already occupied by true or false creditors. To counter this reluctance to purchase, the Council of the Merchants sought recognition from the commune for the validity and legality of its sales. Several prominent magnates spoke in favor of recognition

and added that Sienese creditors should be paid before the foreign creditors and that the Council of the Merchants should investigate alleged debts to be sure all of them were valid.2” The General Council voted 234 to 23 to follow the advice of Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei 26. CG 60, 106-9, 109v-13. The men responsible were “Signorinus” and “Minus Bonsignoris” and “Meus Jacobi Gilij” (probably Bonsignore and Guglielmo d’Orlando Bonsignori and a relative or heir of “Pagnus Giliocti”). If these identifications are correct, they had all been associated with the company for the preceding decade. The deliberations explictly link them with the “societas et socii fillorum Bonsignoris,” the name of the Bonsignori company. The debts, however, could have been contracted on their own without the company being involved. 27. CG 60, 108v, 111v-12v. Among the speakers were Federigo di Rinaldo Tolome!, Tavena di Deo Tolomei, Cino di Ghino Saracini, and Mino Prete di Guido Malavolti. They reiterated the sanctity of the dowry and encouraged the payment of Sienese creditors first. Wives were responsible for the debts of their husbands, but assets set aside as dowries were to be exempt from confiscation to pay creditors. Wives were their husbands’ first creditors in any hierarchy of creditors: Santarelli, La storia del fallimento, pp. 40, 42, 243-44. Such a principle was well defined in Sienese law in the thirteenth century: Const. 1262, D. II, rub. 66-68, pp. 224-25, rub. 73, pp. 226-27; Cost. 1309-10, D. II, rub. 85, 1:422-23, rub. 98, 1:424. 65

SIENESE BANKING

that all of the debts be verified and that the true dowries of the debtors be completely respected. As we shall see, security of dowry was to be protected during the next twenty years in Siena in legislation and in

instructions to committees carrying out the liquidation of assets of debtors. Problems continued, and on 5 February 1302 the Consiglio Generale was approached again by the Mercanzia for further power to pay off the foreign creditors of the company. In order to satisfy fully the debts of those three merchants associated with the Bonsignori compa-

ny, the Mercanzia wanted power to sell confiscated livestock and instruments of credit.2* The council granted the request after an endorsement by Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei, but the actual vote count is oddly omitted. The record of the outcome is limited only to a statement saying it attained the minimum majority necessary, two-thirds. The Mercanzia cannot have moved quickly enough to avoid problems. On 9 April 1302, after hearing that reprisals were being declared against Sienese merchants in several places, the Consiglio Generale ordered the Council of the Merchants to appoint a commission of twelve men, six at large and two from each ferzo of the city. Besides investigating and reforming the company, the commission was to ensure that Sienese merchants and bankers maintained or regained freedom of movement for business and avoided further petitions seeking reprisals.2? The ensuing discussion explored more closely the guidelines for the committee and included comments by members of two of the city’s most prominent families, the Salimbeni and Tolomei. Meo Chigi unsuccessfully sought that the Mercanzia be empowered to confiscate all the property of the society of the sons of the Bonsignori. Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei wanted to limit the interference of the Mercanzia to a seizure of all the books and documents necessary for the committee’s investigation and for the enlightenment of creditors on the true financial status of the company. Benuccio di Benuccio Salimbeni spoke in favor of a reorganization of the societas directed by appointees of the Mercanzia and enforced by the government. Heeding the advice of Benuccio, the Consiglio Generale agreed that a reformation of the company should be carried out and that if any new information came to light, it should be reported to the General Council 28. CG 61, 46-47v, 48-49. The distribution was to include “bestias et alias res” belonging to those responsible. 29. CG 61, 80-83v: “quod per ipsos consules debentur eligi sex sapientes viri de ipsorum suppositis mercantie et duo uidelicet per terzerium, qui super predictas debeant maturius prouidere.” 66

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

by the Nine and the Mercanzia. The reprisals were to be lifted by liquidating the debts of the Bonsignori.*? When his advice was explicitly approved by the council, Tavena di Deo Tolomei requested that several of those who had earlier presented the petition requesting aid in dealing with the problems of the Bonsignori company be exempted from responsibility for these debts.>! We do not know if responsibility was actually extended to the associates of the three specific merchants

cited in the discussion, but the principle of joint responsibility continued to be questioned. The problem of the debts of the Bonsignori remained unresolved, and on 9 May 1302 the petition from the previous December was again presented to the council.3* The Council of the Merchants was once more empowered to carry out a liquidation and any resulting transfers

of property were to be legitimate. The dowries of the wives of the responsible parties were explicitly mentioned as being secure from creditors.*?

Problems continued for the company in June, when three prominent Romans requested that the commune require five associates of the society to pay their debts to them.*4 The records of the deliberations of the Consiglio Generale preserve descriptions of the contents of several speeches on this matter. The comments of several members of the most prominent families of Siena reflect the concerns of bankers or merchants involved in similar business activities and facing the same issues as those the committee was trying to resolve in the liquida-

30. CG 61, 83-83v. Federigo sought the appointment of a secret committee to check

the books of the company. ,

31. CG 61, 82v. Tavena mentioned Geri Montanini, Fazio Berignone, Manfredi del Balzo, Mino di Neri di Jacobo Ranuccini, Manfredi di Bonaventura, and Meo d’Orlando Malavolti.

| 32. CG 61, 97-105v. The names of the Florentine and Genovese merchants bringing the petition are included. The liquidation of property to pay creditors was recognized in Sienese law: Const. 1262, D. I, rub. 74-75, pp. 227-28. It was reaffirmed: Cost. 1309-10, D. Ul, rub. 97, 1:428-29; Senigaglia, “Statuto” 2.26, p. 99. 33. CG 61, 98v, 103v: “cum additione quod dotes dominarum predictarum Signorini, Mini et Mei scilicet uere dotes et premitus date ab eis vel patribus, fratribus vel alijs pro eis sint et debeant esse salue; et prius et ante omnia tales dotes integre debeant dari, assignari, reddi et restitui eis de bonis eorum Signorini, Mini et Mei... .” The votes approving such proposals were 196-10 and 199-5 on the final reading (fol. 105v).

34. CG6l, 115-18v (2 June 1302). The money was owed to Pandolfo de Sabello, Jacobo di Napoleone, and Matteo di Rinaldo Orsini. With the exception of Manfredi del Balzo, those responsible for the debts were the same men Tavena di Deo Tolomei tried to get exempted earlier (see n. 31, above). 67

SIENESE BANKING

tion.2> Pandolfo de Sabello, a senator of Rome, was joined in this petition by two members of the Orsini family. All of the speakers in the council supported the repayment of such powerful individuals. Besides agreeing with the others that the books and contracts of the com-

pany should be carefully gathered and checked to verify the debts, Salamone di Guglielmo Piccolomini believed that if the assets of the company were to be confiscated, each of the associates must be held proportionately responsible.*© Although not heeding that request, the Consiglio Generale agreed with the recommendation of Federigo di

Rinaldo Tolomei that the Council of the Merchants be given full power to rectify the situation, that the officials of the government cooperate fully with the investigation and liquidation, that no other Sienese merchant be allowed to suffer any damage, and that the papers

of the company be obtained and carefully consulted to verify the debts.2’ Federigo’s motions obtained a majority vote of 109 to 99. Since a statute did not have to be altered or a new one promulgated, a simple majority was all that was necessary.*® The closeness of the vote, however, indicates that many members of the council were willing to delay a reconciliation with these prominent men, perhaps preferring the more scrupulous inquiry encouraged by Salamone di Gu-

glielmo Piccolomini. He had also argued that the Mercanzia be instructed to force the associates of the company to return their documents to Siena for consultation and to make the brothers, fathers, and sons of those involved in the suit produce whatever records of the firm they possessed.7?

, While the ultimate outcome of this earlier inquisition and possible liquidation is not clear, the problems of the Bonsignori were still unresolved and causing difficulties four years later. On 16 March 1306 | the Council of the Merchants received instructions from the General Council to appoint a committee to deal with twenty-three reprisals laid against Sienese merchants. The Bonsignori were responsible for those

at Rome, Naples, and Milan.“ A month and a half later the route 35. The magnate speakers included Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei, Pietro Forteguerri,

Ciampolo Gallerani, and Tavena di Deo Tolomei: CG 61, 116-18. | 36. CG 61, 116v: “. . . si ipsum creditum peruenit in corpus dicte sotietatis confixtum est, consuluit quod quilibet ex sotiis dicte sotietatis teneat[ur] ...ad soluendum partem sibi contingtem de dicto debito.”

37. CG 6l, 116. 38. CG 61, 118v. 39. CG 61, 116v-17. 40. CG 68, 101-3v. At Rome Luca de Sabella, a relative of Pandolfo, was still pursuing , the Bonsignori. A list of associates of the companies responsible for causing the reprisals was not included. 68

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

_ to France was threatened, when reprisals were laid against Siena at Sarazano.*! The problem that ultimately led to the confiscation and distribution

of the property and assets of the Bonsignori to their creditors and those damaged by their failure was the general attack on all Sienese merchants launched by Philip IV in the summer of 1307.42 While jailing merchants and confiscating their property, Philip wrote on 5 July 1307 to the government of Siena demanding its cooperation in securing payment of 54,000 pounds of Tours allegedly owed to the crown by the Bonsignori company. In the letter, which was read to the Consiglio Generale on 30 September 1307 and again on 7 October,*® Philip claimed that the representatives of the Bonsignori company had fraudulently left the kingdom still owing the 54,000 pounds. Reprisals aris41. CG 68, 132-34, 134v-36 (26 April 1306). Jacobo Bramanzoni was cited as defaulting on a 125 mark debt. 42. Cron. sen. (Agnolo), p. 298. Bowsky has pointed out how important this attack was in forming Sienese procedures in dealing with reprisals against her citizens, especially in starting to define the responsibility toward creditors of partners in failed companies: each partner was responsible in proportion to his investment; if any partner could not pay, the others were again proportionately responsible for his share of the debt; this responsibility could be applied to sons, grandsons, and heirs; and a distinction was drawn between partners (compagni) and factors (fattori): Medieval Italian Commune, p. 241, and Dina Bizzarri, “Le rappresaglie negli sta-

, tuti e nei documenti del comune di Siena,” BSSP 20 (1913), 224-26, both based on Cost. 1309-10, vol. 2, D. IV, rub. 99-107, pp. 294-305, dated 30 April 1308. Those who caused the reprisals were considered responsible for any damages that any Sienese merchant might suffer because of them, and the statutes of the commune show a particular concern for problems in France: Cost. 1309-10, vol. 1, D. I, rub. 183, pp. 163-64; D. II, rub. 103-5, pp. 431-34, rub. 132, pp. 446-47, rub. 277, pp. 510-11; Senigaglia, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 156-57; Arcangeli, “Istituti del diritto commerciale,” pp. 189, 198-201, 211. 43. CG71, 102v—4v (30 September 1307), 107~9v, 110-13v (7 October 1307). The texts

of the letter begin on folios 103, 108, 111. There are transcriptions in CharlesVictor Langlois, “Notices et documents relatifs a ’histoire de France au temps de Philippe le Bel,” Revue historique 60 (1896), 317; and English, “Five Magnate Fam-

ilies,” p. 117 n. 32. The money is probably connected with the deposit on 25 May 1303 of 58,000 pounds of Tours with the Bonsignori and Philip’s favorite bankers, Albizzo (Biche) and Musciatto (Mouche) Franzesi; both Franzesi bankers were dead by 1307: Davidsohn, Forschungen, 3, no. 441, p. 89; Bowsky, Medieval Italian , Commune, pp. 253-54; see also above, p. 56 n. 4. According to the law of Siena and elsewhere, flight itself led to a presumption of fraud and bankruptcy: Santarelli, La storia del fallimento, pp. 40-43, 55-57, 123-25; Const. 1262, D. II, rub. 67, 74, 83, pp. 225-27; Cost. 1309-10, D. II, rub. 97, 1:428. The consequence of such flight could be extended to the sons of those fleeing, and they could suffer the ban and ejection from the city: Const. 1262, D. II, rub. 74, p. 227; Cost. 1309-10, D. II, rub. 95, 1:426-27. 69

SIENESE BANKING

ing from the difficulties of the Bonsignori now threatened all Sienese merchants in their lucrative French markets. From the ensuing discussions in the Consiglio Generale, it is clear that the procedures to be followed in response to this crisis arising from a banking collapse were not readily agreed upon, nor was the principle of joint and unlimited responsibility of associates unequivocally asserted and maintained. The comments of two councillors are preserved with the first reading of the letter. Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei said that the Mercanzia should alleviate the situation by appointing a committee of merchants both from those who did business in France and from those who did not.“ Bardus Detauiue added that the appointees should include three or four merchants from each ferzo, but only from among those conducting business in France. The motion to establish a committee appointed by the Mercanzia passed by 171 to 45, but neither the number

of its members nor the state of their French business connections was specified. Therefore it might have been left to bankers or merchants, probably some of whom were interested parties, to carry out objectively a process against the Bonsignori and to effect impartially a reorganization of the company in order to satisfy themselves, the king of France, and other creditors. A week or so later the council, possibly spurred on by mass arrests

in France, once again considered the letter. A note of urgency was added by the podesta and the captain of the people, who emphasized that action must be taken to regain the favor of Philip IV and to assure the health and safety of the businessmen in France. These communal officials suggested the formation of a committee, of unspecified number, to act on this matter and to try to remove the reprisals imposed by the French monarch.* All the speakers on this question, 44. CG 71, 103v-4: “. . . consuluit quod ipse vult quod hoc totum negotium remaneat ad plenum in offitium Comsolatus ciuitatis Senarum, quo vna cum sapientibus viris mercatoribus ciuitatis et etiam cum militibus et judicibus, sicut consules mercantie voluerint, ac etiam cum illis personis que habeant facere in illis partibus Francie, et que ibi non habeant facere, . . . in negotio dicto faciant et prouideant omnia que viderint faciendi.” 45. CG71, 108 (7 October 1307): “ad conseruandam gratiam dicti domini regis et pro salute et saluamento mercatorum ciuitatis Senarum qui habent facere in dicto remgno Francie. . . quod eligantur et eligi debeant et in quo numero et quantitate certi bonj, legales et sapientes viri, qui per se et alios sapientes quos eligere secum voluerint et habere prouideant, exequantur et faciant omnia et singula supradicta.” Philip’s reprisals prompted the commune to try to regulate their removal more clearly: Cost. 1309-10, D. IV, rub. 99-107, 2:194-205 (30 April 1308), and later ASS, Statuti di Siena 26 (1337), fol. 118; the specifics of these laws are clearly presented in Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, p. 241. 70

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

including three Tolomei and a Malavolti, agreed on the appointment of several men, knowledgeable in business, who were to work with the Mercanzia and do what was necessary to give rapid satisfaction to Philip and his treasury. Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei said that no expenses were to be incurred by the public purse, but he did not specify who should cover the costs of the investigation and process. The council eventually decided, by a vote of 151 to 56, to appoint a total of eighteen men, or six from each of the three sections of the city, to settle the

question in conjunction with the Mercanzia. They were explicitly given power to liquidate the assets of the Bonsignori company in order to satisfy the creditors of the company and lift the reprisals. Despite the urgency created by the condition of those held in prison and the obvious danger to Sienese business in France, little seems actually to have been accomplished. The same matter came up in the Consiglio Generale almost a year later, on 5 September 1308. The podesta and the captain of the people again requested that something be done about Philip [V’s reprisals against Sienese banking and commerce in France. According to reports a committee with eighteen members had proven too awkward and dilatory and had been unable to meet with

the Council of Merchants because of the absences and illnesses of members. Since financial losses and the danger of permanent harm to Siena’s economic position in France were growing, the two officials sought the appointment of two or three men to act together with the Mercanzia to settle speedily the question of the French government’s claims against the Bonsignori.* By a vote of 168 to 34, the Consiglio Generale agreed to a reduction in the number of those receiving the balia, or power, to effect a settlement lifting the sanctions. Even though

, Sienese businessmen were suffering confiscations and imprisonment in France, the regime in Siena was reluctant to intervene effectively. In November the Consiglio Generale was still reluctant to take decisive steps to end the controversy. Another proposal by the podesta and the captain of the people to impose a tax on all Sienese businessmen active in France to pay off the crown’s claims on the Bonsignori was turned down by the council, in a rare failure to get the necesssary two-thirds majority.*’ Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei emphatically op46. CG 73, 113v-17v, 120-24v (5 September 1308): “quod dominj consules mercantie ciuitatis Senarum, qui nunc sunt et qui pro tempore fuerint, seu duo uel tres eorum possint et eis liceat auctoritate presentis consultii in locum predictorum XVIII seu partis eorum alios bonos viros in eodem numero substituere et subrogare” (fol. 114v).

47. CG 03, 167-71v (20 November 1308): “. . . pro liberatione et salute dictorum ciuium et mercatorum et pro executione premissorum, domini consules mercantie.. . 71°

SIENESE BANKING

posed the tax. Although the proposal could not have reached the Con-

siglio Generale without considerable support among leaders of the business community, Federigo, who spoke on nearly every item brought before the assembly during the first decade of the fourteenth century,

might well have presented the views of the merchant-banking elite be- | hind the regime of the Nine. Even though the tax was to be repaid to the merchants from the property of the members of the Bonsignori consortium, the regime, or at least the General Council, was still reluctant to levy what was in effect a forced loan on citizens to cover the business failure of the company of a prominent family. Although the Bonsignori had repaid 10,000 pounds of Tours by February of 1309, Philip IV had not yet released any of the longsuffering Sienese merchants. On the first and second of that month the Consiglio Generale finally committed the government of Siena to strong measures. It was proposed that the Mercanzia confiscate and sell property of the members of the Bonsignori company to pay off the debts to the king and reimburse any Sienese citizens who had suffered harm in France.* The legislation explictly mentioned security of ten-

ure to those purchasing Bonsignori property and full respect for dowry rights of the wives of company members. Company associates had fifteen days to gain exemptions from confiscations to cover their debts. They were, significantly, only responsible to the extent of their own share of the capital of the company.” The proposal passed the Consiglio Generale with little recorded opposition, although the vote

possint et eis liceat auctoritate presentis consilij omnes et singulos prefatos ciues et mercatores et ipsorum bona taxare et certam pecunie talliam eis et cuilibet ipsorum indicere et imponere.. .” (fol. 168v). At about the same time a procurator of the Florentine companies of the Cerchi, Alabanti, and Circuli seized and sold some properties confiscated from the Bonsignori and their associates to cover a debt of 4,500 florins. The seizure had the approval of the Nine: DAG, 14 November 1308. 48. CG 74, 64-67v, 68-7lv, 72-76 (1 and 2 February 1309): “. . . consulum mercantie Senarum exinde et pro eis et de ipsis omnibus satisfiat de rebus et bonis tam vivorum quam defunctorum sotiorum dicte sotietatis tam culusque preterite quam presentis et culusque eorum; et quod dominj consules mercantie Senarum qui sunt et fuerint infuturum aut tres eorum nomine et vice comunis Senarum possint teneantur et debeant ad suas manus reducere res et bona omnia que sunt uel fuerunt sotiorum dictorum uel alicuius eorum uel esse quandocumque consueuerant siue pro suis publice possideri a dicto tempore citra; et ipsa bona et ex eis, pro eo quod ipsis consulibus iustum videbitur, vendere et dare in solutionem ad plenum pro satisfac-

tione dicte monete.. .” (fol. 68v). Cron. sen. (Agnolo), p. 298; DR, 2 February 1309, a copy made on 10 July 1313. 49. CG 74, 70: “eo quod ipsum talem contingeret pro rata suorum capitalium seu capitalis de summa.” 72

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

was 211 to 92 and close to the necessary two-thirds majority. The regime in Siena was prepared to confiscate and sell property to cover debts, even if the owners were a rich magnate family and their associates. Liability was still joint, but limits on the responsibility of associates were set in proportion to the amount they had originally invested in the total capital of the company. This was to be the principle usually followed through the failures of both the Bonsignori and Tolomei companies. After these steps were taken in February 1309, the records of the Consiglio Generale for the following four months contain evidence that the committee acted to deal effectively with the consequences of the failure of the Bonsignori. Further pressure on the commune was

added in March when Florence sent ambassadors on behalf of the Mozzi and Cerchi to demand satisfaction for the debts of the Bonsignori.’ Unfortunately the complete details of the investigation into the company’s records to determine its debts and assets do not survive, except in requests to the Consiglio Generale to approve liability in a few specific business transactions, to recognize legitimate dowries, and to grant reimbursements to the merchants damaged by Philip IV’s reprisals. As part of the settlement, the regime recognized that an opportunity must be given to allow the compagnia members to reach an arrangement to reimburse the businessmen damaged in France. On 27 June 1309 a motion passed the General Council to permit a safe return to the city by members of the company.*! The safe-conduct was repeated on 28 August and 30 September 1309, with the church of the Augustinian friars in Siena, among other places, being specified for holding negotiations.** The associates of the company slowly returned to Siena and agreed to the arbitration set by the committee from the Mercanzia. 50. ASF, Missive I Cancelleria (Registri) 1, 109-9v, 113-14v, 115 (14 March 1309). 51. CG 74, 172-74. 52. CG 75, 71v-76v (28 August 1309), 100-104 (30 September 1309). Those given the safe-conduct were “dominus Niccolaus, dominus Vgo, Guillielmus et Bonsignore de Bonsignoribus, dominus Manfredus Bonauenture, Curradinis Fatij, Manfredus Ranuccij, Gerius Montaninj, Bindus Chiaritj, Thommassus dominj Fatij Bonsignori, dominus Minus, Tofus, Landus et Ciancha Nerij, Jacobi Ranuccij, Landus et Niccola Mei domini Orlandj, Bernardinus Angelj Benuenutj, Michus et alij filij Ture Bonanichi, Andreas et Galganus domini Bandi, Manente Tolomei, Guillielmus et Vannuccius Curradj Beringnonis, Andreas domini Manfredj et omnes filij predictorum sotiorum et cuiusque eorum et quilibet eorum possint et eis et cuilibet eorum liceat venire secure ad civitatem Senarum et in ea stare et morari secure, videlicet aput locum fratrum heremitarum Sancti Agustinj de Senis et aput abatiam de Arcu uel in alio loco uel locis ordinandis a consulibus mercantie usque ad kalen-

, 73

SIENESE BANKING

The process of liquidation had to establish who was a member of the company, allocate responsibility for the debts of the company, collect and sell off assets, and then reimburse creditors. Some individuals managed to prove that they were not associates. Bonaventura di

Bartolomeo Marzi convinced the Mercanzia, and then the General Council, that he had not been a socius of the company since November 1294.° Mino di Manno Mignanelli, the heir of an alleged member, Currado di Forta Salvani, likewise successfully claimed that he should not be responsible for any imposition levied on the company.” Later, in August 1309, Manfredi di Matteo Albizi was exempted by the Mer-

canzia from an impost of 800 florins placed on him as an heir of a - company member.°> This reference to 800 florins is the only piece of evidence we have for the size of the fines levied to clear up the company’s debts; but by itself it is not of much aid in evaluating the distribution of responsibility, since we do not know the position of Manfredi or his father, Matteo, in the company, how much they had ever invested, the size of the fines distributed among the other associates, or which articles of association and set of investments were taken as the basis for assignments of responsibility. The process also included an investigation into the validity of individual contracts, during the course of which the committee and the selected merchants viewed and had copied an extensive number of charters. Eventually the Mercanzia had to be reimbursed 3,375 Sienese pounds for expenditures on the gabelle tax on instruments written to carry out the liquidation of the property of the Bonsignori.°® The Consiglio Generale granted its approval to fifty-one of these transactions

involving citizens and others under the jurisdiction of Siena.’ The true and just debts and damages of Sienese citizens were to be recog-

das octubris” (fol. 75). They were to be under the ban until accords were reached

with their creditors: Const. 1262, D. II, rub. 67, p. 225.

53. CG 74, 92-93v (18 February 1309). 54. CG 74, 128-29v (30 April 1309).

55. DR, 22 August 1309. , 56. CG 74, 131v-32, 134-34v (28 May 1309), for grants of 350 Sienese pounds, CG 74, 154-55, 161-6lv, 162v, 163-63v (19 and 20 June 1309), and of 3,025 pounds to cover “cabella contractuum factorum uel fiendorum occasione bonorum et possessionum sotiorum sotietatis Bonsingnorum de Senis datarum et assingnatarum per consules mercantie ciuibus et mercatoribus Senarum habentibus facere in rengno Francie et etiam mulieribus pro dotibus ipsarum.” For the gabelle on contracts see Bowsky, Finance of the Commune of Siena, pp. 151-57. 57. CG 74, 155v-60 (20 June 1309), 164v-69v (24 June 1309), CG 75, 117-23 (30 Octo-

| ber 1309), 146v-53v (6 December 1309). 74

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

nized and paid, especially those resulting from Philip IV’s efforts to recover the 54,000 pounds.*8

The ban and 500-pound fines had been laid against those who had fled, but both were lifted once they agreed to the settlement set by the committee.°? Whatever hesitation the government had had in sorting out the company’s affairs and in liquidating the assets of one of its greatest banking companies was now gone. The Mercanzia and the select committee were going to great lengths to determine the fiscal condition of the company and to ensure that the burden of rectifying the situation was at least theoretically borne proportionately by those re-

sponsible for the problems.” |

In November 1309 the failure process went into its final stages when

the Consiglio Generale voted by 186 to 71 to empower the Nine, the primary executive body of the commune, and the committee appointed earlier by the Mercanzia to force a conclusion to the problems of the Bonsignori. In order to accomplish this, they were to establish a secret council to effect an end to any discord still existing between the asso-

ciates of the Bonsignori and the Sienese merchants damaged in France.*! Two speakers suggested that troops be used against any re58. CG 74, 164v-69v (24 June 1309). The objective of the liquidation is clear: “ad manus suas reducere res et bona que sunt et fuerunt sociorum sotietatis magne tabule Bonsingnorum de Senis a certo tempore citra et de ipsis bonis et rebus vendere et alienare et in solutum dare ciuibus et mercatoribus Senarum, qui habent facere in regno Francie pro satisfaciendo eisdem de summa et quantitate LIIJJ™. libr. tur.” 59. For the specifics of the case of Gerio Montanini, a partner in the company: CG 74, 143-46v (8 June 1309); CG 74, 150-50v (12 June 1309). Federigo di Rinaldo Tolomei encouraged the approval of Gerio’s petition: “in nomine Dei et pacis et concordia predictorum . . . qui deuenerint ad concordiam” (fol. 146); the settlement was “secundum impositam sibi factam per tres sapientes viros electos per dominos consules et sex sapientes viros per terzerium, qui vna cum ipsis consulibus habebant arbitrium et baliam super factis et negotijs sociorum sotietatis Bonsingnorum et comuni Senarum” (fol. 151v). For flight as indicative of bankruptcy, see n. 43, above. 60. The government of Florence found it difficult to ensure that creditors received their due in the failures of the Bardi and the Peruzzi in 1343. The regime was sensitive to the interests of foreign creditors, although this was aimed primarily at avoiding damaging reprisals and consisted more of promises than action: Armando Sapori, La crisi delle compagnie mercantili dei Bardi e dei Peruzzi (Florence, 1926), pp. 183, 190, 192; see also Luzzati, “Ricerche sulle attivita mercantili.” John M. Najemy has pointed out the dangers inherent when a government dominated by guilds unfriendly to magnate families appointed the committee to enforce a settlement with creditors, including the sale of enormous landholdings: “Guild Republicanism in Trecento Florence: The Successes and Ultimate Failure of Corporate Politics,” American Historical Review 84 (1979), 62-63. It is not clear as yet that the Bonsignori liquidation was so political. 61. CG 75, 123v-25v (24 November 1309): “quod dominj Nouem per se et cum sapien75

SIENESE BANKING

calcitrant parties to the enforced settlement. A few days later another safe-conduct was granted to specified associates to return to Siena and cooperate in the solution.©

| On 22 December 1309 the provision to establish the last committee for effecting a composition between the Bonsignori and the Sienese involved in France was passed by a vote of 202 to 24. Twelve men and the Nine were to make sure a legitimate and solemn agreement was reached by the two groups. When endorsing the proposal, Federigo di

Rinaldo Tolomei requested that all the clauses of the agreement be © presented in writing to the Nine and that the decisions reached by earlier committees be respected. After its appointment this new committee acted quickly and on 16 January 1310 submitted a program for approval to the Consiglio Generale.“ Regrettably the details of the final liquidation and distribution of fiscal responsibilities were not preserved, but some company members quickly reached agreement with this settlement. On 1 February 1310 ten of them were given another safe-conduct to return to the city and pay off their obligations before the first of May 1310.© In June of 1310 money collected from the sale of properties confiscated from members of the company was paid to other companies built around magnate families: the Tolomei received 4,320 pounds of Tours, the Squarcialupi 8,000 pounds, the Malavolti 5,000 pounds, and the Forteguerri 2,000 pounds.™ A chance survival of notes froma

meeting, about two months later, of the Consistoro, the Nine itself, reveals that many disputes still existed between the Bonsignori family

and their associates and friends and between the company and the damaged Sienese merchants.°’ Tension had been compounded by paytibus eis visis procurent et faciant et viam et modum inueniant quod predicta ad concordiam reducantur; qui domini Nouem exequendo decretum dicti secreti consilij elegerunt ad hec” (fol. 124). 62. CG75, 126-30v (26 November 1309), 168-74v (30 December 1309). The same associates or descendants were named in n. 52, above. 63. CG 75, 159v-61. 64. CG 76, 50-53v. 65. CG 76, 64-68v: “. . . tractata sit et tractari, ordinari et compleri velit cum effectu concordia et compositio inter socios sotietatis Magne Tabule Bonsignorum de Senis

ex vna parte et mercatores Senenses qui habent facere in regno Francie qui soluerunt et soluere promisserunt et securauerunt domino Regi Francie ex altera

parte...” (fol. 64). 66. DAG, 26 June 1310; Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento,” p. 124. 67. DR, 31 August 1310: “.. . peruenit multorum relactione quod occasione dictarum

, possessionum rerum et bonorum sic possessarum et quesitarum per dictos mercatores dampnifictos et possessionis earum parata erat oriri et suscitari et fieri maxi76

THE FAILURE OF THE BONSIGNORI

ments being made to the large and important family companies first. The regime of the Nine was not about to let this controversy continue, so 500-pound fines for each obstruction were placed on any parties unwilling to accept the settlement.” Later in the year Sienese merchants from France were still suffering the consequences of the Bonsignoris’ problems and petitioning for adjustments in their compensation, including exemptions from taxes on properties once assigned to them by the commission but never actually possessed. On 28 October 1310 two merchants complained to the Consiglio Generale that despite their payment of 300 florins to the crown,

their agent in France, Cione di Filippo, was imprisoned and their property confiscated there because of the collapse and flight of the Bonsignori.©? The General Council voted 198 to 14 to help them seek redress and the release of their agent. On 7 December 1310 merchants in France asked to be excused from paying the gabelle on properties supposedly assigned to them for damages. They cited particular difficulties in gaining possession of these castles and lands on account of the adroit, and allegedly fraudulent, use of dowries as an exemption from confiscation. The Consiglio Generale agreed with their petition in a 152 to 54 vote.”

More than twelve years had passed since the petition for help in stemming the slide toward bankruptcy. The loss of papal employment me rixe et litigia inter dictos mercatores et homines dampnificatos ex [una] parte et dictos sotios dicte sotietatis Buonsignorum et eorum consanguineos et amicos pro eis et alias personas ex altera [parte]”; Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento,” p. 124; “Compagnie bancarie,” p. 21. Fear was expressed that the parties involved might resort to arms to settle their accounts. 68. DR, 31 August 1310. The vote was 7 to 2 to have the podesta enforce compensation. The houses and palaces of family members and associates were open to confiscation to cover the damages done to other Sienese merchants. A deadline of fifteen days was set for cooperation. 69. CG77, 65v-72v; Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, p. 251. This is a petition by “Cinus Vgonis” and “Landus Mannj” asking redress, because they had not been able to take possession of the property given them as compensation for their losses in France: “. . . nullum haberent regressum uel ius in bonis sotiorum dicte sotietatis Bonsingnorum.” The regime had appointed arbitrators to settle their differences

with the Bonsignori: Neri di Gabriello Piccolomini, Masso Ranucci, Nigio di Ranieri Ugurgeri, and Neri Bonichi, a member of a family prominent in the regime of the Nine. 70. CG 77, 95-96v (7 December 1310). See the partial translation dealing with the dowry exemption in Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 251-52. Members of the company were still coming forward to comply with the decisions of the arbitrators: CG 77, 105-8v (26 December 1310), CG 78, 148v-50 (25 April 1311), CG 79, 67-68v (23 July 1311).

, 77

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in the early 1290s, internal dissent, and finally the failure to satisfy the French crown, all combined to enfeeble and eventually to destroy the largest of Siena’s international banking companies. The papal connection and the Bonsignori family’s ability to integrate outsiders into effective companies had failed the Gran Tavola after a forty-year period

of success. The government of Siena had responded reluctantly to some of the partners’ call for help and later temporized on establishing a process to carry out an orderly bankruptcy and compensation proceeding. The principle of joint and unlimited responsibility of all members of an economic societas was not permanently overturned, but at one point responsibility was limited to the proportion of the capital invested by an associate. The use of dowries as an exemption from confiscation was clearly recognized as legitimate, but was perhaps abused by the associates. Undercapitalized, with assets difficult to liquidate

quickly, the Gran Tavola probably had first met the demands on its resources produced by a run by paying its creditors with money deposited with it by the Holy See and Philip IV. By such a short-term expe-

dient, the company survived for a few more years, only to collapse when the deposits finally came due or were called. The ensuing cursus fallimentare proved to be long and complicated with dangerous implications for feelings of trust and security in Sienese companies.

78

IV

The Failure of the Tolomei

Soon after the Bonsignori and their associates in the Gran Tavola had

experienced the series of events and processes that led to a partial settlement of their obligations around 1310, companies formed by members of the Tolomei family endured similar problems.! The period 1310 to 1320 was to encompass the failure of the Old and the New Tolomei Companies and the less well documented failures of other companies of such magnate families as the Gallerani, Malavolti, Forteguerri, and Squarcialupi. After 1310 the Tolomei failed to integrate successfully more outsiders into their affairs and lost their position in their major field of operations, France. Consequently they were subjected to a series Of investigations into their solvency and joint and unlimited liability. They did not manage their affairs successfully in the changed economic situation in northern Europe or in the fluid legal and political environment of Siena. A series of Consiglio Generale deliberations demonstrates the continued vacillation by the Sienese about the joint and unlimited responsibility of debtors. The numerous different opinions expressed by council members show how controversial and confused the maintenance of the principle of joint and unlimited liability had become. Conflicting opinions by key speakers on liability, dilatory tactics of the regime on enforcement, preference for domestic over foreign creditors, and decisions on limiting responsibility created an environment

that was harmful to the fiduciary aspect of Sienese commerce and banking. Sienese businessmen ruined their reputations in France, and the commune did not foster much faith in its ability to assist in collecting just and reasonable debts. Too many customers were losing confidence in the Sienese when the Florentines presented themselves as an alternative with reliable coinage, a growing industrial base in cloth manufacturing and trade, and a better reputation in dealing with recalcitrant debtors. The Old Company of Jacobo Tolomei survived from its beginnings in the mid-thirteenth century into the fourteenth century. After 1270, 1. Bowsky has written the only summary of the failure of the Tolomei companies: Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 254-56. 79

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however, documentation becomes rare, so continuity in membership and activity is less evident than for the Bonsignori companies.” In 1293 the company was active at Cortona near Siena, but reprisals laid against unspecified Sienese merchants resulted in the seizure of 2,000 Sienese pounds worth of the firm’s woad. On 23 January the General Council ordered the podesta and the councils of the knights and of the merchants to help the Society of Jacobo Tolomei to recover its confiscated woad.? Ciolo Provenzani, a member of a family that had been deadly enemies of the Tolomei thirty years before, spoke in favor of giving the company the full support of the government of Siena and of appointing a committee of six to see that restitution was made.* Six months later the problem had not been resolved, so the Consiglio Generale voted to send an embassy to request the lifting of the reprisals and to get compensation for the Tolome1. In the meantime an embassy from Cortona had made it clear that only by reimbursing the damaged Cortonese magnates could the Tolomei and the commune of Siena hope to see the restoration of property to the family and of freedom to trade to all Sienese merchants.° Although the ultimate outcome of the , efforts of the commune of Siena is not clear, the company of the sons of Jacobo Tolomei remained in existence in 1293, doing business near Siena but already harmed by the deteriorating position of Sienese merchants. While it is not clear whether the Tolomei themselves had

2. The Tolomei family can be divided into two branches from the early-thirteenthcentury: the descendants of Tolomeo and of Jacobo. The participants in the Old and New Companies were exclusively from among the descendants of Jacobo. A partial genealogy of the family tracing participants in the companies from 1250 to 1320 can be found on p. 81. The dates assigned are their first and last appearances in a surviving document. The other main lineage of the family did not produce any recorded

, participants in a commercial or banking society except Francesco di Sozzo Tolomei (fl. 1309-41), who formed a partnership with one other man after the dissolution of the companies of his cousins (on 1 October 1321): Paoli and Piccolomini, Lettere volgari, pp. 110-15; for detailed analyses of this firm: Chiaudano, “Compagnie bancarie,” pp. 31-34, and Sapori, “Compagnie mercantili,” pp. 798-800. 3. CG 45, 35-36v (23 January 1293). The “societas et nobiles viri de societate filiorum Ser Jacobi de Tolommeis” had suffered the damage because of a “petitionem quo-

80

rumdam magnatum de Cortona,” to which the government of Cortona had responded by seizing “maximam quantitatem guadi”: Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 244-45, esp. n. 200.

4. CG 45, 36-36v.

5. CG 46, 33-34 (23 July 1293). Although his advice was not officially approved by the council, Salamone di Guglielmo Piccolomini spoke strongly in favor of compelling the Sienese responsible for the reprisals to cover their obligations; or if they could not be found, it was to be collected “de filiis et heredibus eorum” (fols. 33v-—34).

PARTIAL TOLOMEI GENEALOGY

Cecco (fl. 1310-18)

Cristoforo Andrea ——— Francesco (fl. 1237-73) (fl. 1253-1310) (fl. 1311)

Pietro —— Cino (fl. 1304-30) (fl. 1307-10)

Mino Nello

, Pietro

(fl. 1262-99) (fl. 1306-35)

(fl. 1301-48)

Meo Larino (fl. 1299-1316) (fl. 1309-18)

Mino (fl. 1299-1336)

Simone ——— Mino (fl. 1278) (fl. 1278-1307)

Jacobo

(fl. 1214-46?) Tolomeo (fl. 1214-59)

Nigio

, Iidebrandino

(fl. 1306-33)

(fl. 1246-59)

Tolomeo Bindo — Bindo

(fl. 1193-12497) (fl. 1307-12) (fl. 1307-12) Baldistricca ——- Orlando

(fl. 1215-63) (fl. 1247-1307) | Jacobo ———— Guido ————- Mino

(fl. 1258-97) (fl. 1262) (fl. 1301-37)

Rinaldo Federigo (fl. 1237-70) (fl. 1263-1311)

, (fl. 1284-1310) = Giovanni

, Stricca (fl. 1263-1309) | Pietro (fl. 1284-1310)

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caused the reprisals at Cortona in 1293, those after:1312 often resulted from the activities of the Tolomei companies themselves. In the first decade of the fourteenth century, agents of the Old Com-

pany were still active at the fairs in France, just as forty years before. _

From 1306 through 1308 Pietro di Saladino, Vanne di Guido, and | Francesco di Jacobo, associates and factors, carried out exchanges at Bordeaux, Lagny, Nimes, and Provins.® A document dated 7 November 1307 lists ten members of the Tolomei family and two outsiders as participants in a company.’ A few years later the same family mem-

bers active in this company formed the New Company with many more participants from outside the lineage and dropped the old name

, — the society of the sons of Jacobo Tolomei. On 21 March 1310 ten Tolomei, and ultimately twelve outsiders, established the New Society of the Tolomei for three years from the following first of May.® By this entity, seemingly distinct from the Old

Company of the sons of Jacobo, family members expanded their business interests and tried to cooperate with outsiders under strict rules. Although the recent failure of the Bonsignori cannot have been reassuring, their collapse might have appeared to offer opportunities in the local and international economies. The New Company, unlike the Bonsignori, could attempt to combine banking with commercial connections and experience. If still extant and accessible, the links of the old Tolomei firm with the wool trade could make competition with the Florentine merchant-banking companies more viable and fruitful. The 1310 document of incorporation contains thirteen articles to be followed by all the associates, each of whom were to invest 500 Sienese pounds for the initial capital of the company. With its powers limited to ensuring compliance with organizational clauses, a com6. Bigwood, “Tolomei en France,” p. 1111; DT, 30 December 1306; Bautier, “Tolomei

aux foires 1279,” pp. 110-11. , ,

7. DT, 7 November 1307. The associates of the society of the sons of Jacobo Tolomei agreed to an exchange at the fair at Nimes; the Tolomei were Bindo di Bindo, Andrea di Cristoforo, Mino di Simone, Federigo di Rinaldo, Nigio d’Ildebrandino, Giovanni di Stricca, Nello di Mino, Mino di Stricca, Cione di Pietro, and Orlando di Baldistricca. The outsiders were Francesco di Jacobo and Piero di Saladino. 8. DT, 21 March 1310. There is a transcription of this important document on pages 374-89 of Giuliana Giannelli, “Atto costitutivo della Societas Talomeorum de Senis (1310),” Studi senesi 65 (1953), 367-90. The Tolomei clan might have been undertaking a general reordering of its affairs in the first half of 1310: DT, 3 June 1310, transcribed in English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp. 343-47; fifty-seven Tolomei then appointed procurators for any litigation that might arise. The exact and re_ puted relationships between the old and new companies are not clear in the surviving

documentation. |

82

THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI

mittee of six (five Tolomei and one outsider) was established. Not explicitly given control of the daily business of the firm, the committee was empowered to admit new members, who apparently had to fulfill only the requirement to invest 500 Sienese pounds. The other articles it was to enforce concerned the duties of individual associates or representatives, such as periodically filing accounts and reports on activity or explaining damages to the society’s property. In addition the rules set limitations on the ability of members to spend, lend, or pledge beyond the amount of their share of the initial capital. Members were to keep business secret and to leave their capital on deposit until a scheduled, planned dissolution when profits and losses were to be assigned according to amounts invested. Certain clauses, furthermore, defined how heirs of deceased associates could maintain their participation in the firm, forbade business links of associates with other companies,

and pledged the members to follow the statutes of the merchants’ guild, or Mercanzia, of Siena. The company intended to pursue business and banking by land and sea, at the fairs of Champagne, at the papal curia at Avignon or elsewhere, and in Provence, Genoa, Florence, Pisa, Lucca, and France. The Tolomei in the societas, all descendants of Jacobo della Piazza, were given distinctive authority in the Operation over admissions and internal administration through their

majority control of the central committee. Within the limits established in the act of the association, each member had the same flexible powers to negotiate business in the name of the firm. It was not always necessary to have the transaction approved by any particular individual or set of individuals in the company. Though given little explicit authority about the actual business of the company, one branch of the Tolomei continued in business in alliance with a majority of outsiders,

but under predetermined regulations on responsibility and internal communication and control. Few documents illustrate in detail the affairs of the New or Old Company, but a Tolomei company did conduct business in France in 1310 and 1311.9? Enterprise there came to an inglorious end in 1311, when Francesco d’Andrea Tolomei, with two of his father’s partners in the 1310 company, Bindo and Giovanni di Bindo Ildebrandini, and their factors, were accused of fleeing France with premeditated intent and of carrying off money deposited with them by such powerful companies as the Bardi and Peruzzi. The case was to drag on for years through the French legal system, until 1337, when the Parlement of 9. Bigwood, “Tolomei en France,” pp. 1115-17; Bautier, “Tolomei aux foires 1279,” p. 111. 83

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Paris at last ended the case by refusing a request made on the basis of it for reprisals against all Sienese merchants in France.!° The absence of legal records, accounts, or contracts involving the company makes it difficult to explain these events, but by 1311 a company identified with the Tolomei had essentially forfeited a reputation for trustworthiness in France, the richest market for Italian bankers. In 1312 the commune of Siena again faced the problems of equitably discerning a company’s responsibility and liability. Although the Tolomei were not mentioned, a committee of six men was selected by the Nine in February of 1312 to establish ordinances to set terms for

| satisfying the creditors of a company, to bring about order among the associates of a society, and to find ways to calculate the obligations between interacting business entities. The resulting ordinances were presented to and approved by the Consiglio Generale on 11 March 1312, but unfortunately, as is frequently the case, the actual ordinances were not included with the record of the deliberations. Fraud was probably of prime concern.!! Despite the complicated Bonsignori liquidation, the procedures for bankruptcy were obviously not yet unequivocally established. Over the next seven years the problems of the Tolomei company were to force further detailed consideration of such difficulties.

Just as in the case of the Bonsignori company, internal discord among the associates began a long process of collapse for the New Tolomei company. On 26 April 1312 the podesta and captain of the peo- |

ple responded to a petition from some unspecified members of the firm and proposed to the Consiglio Generale of Siena that the government intervene in the “Societas Noua Tolomeorum” to effect a reform

in that contentious company.!* Certain unnamed associates had al10. Bigwood, “Tolomei en France,” p. 1128. The Peruzzi family of Florence was still carrying in their books the bad debts of the New Company several years later (132543): Armando Sapori, ed., J libri di commercio dei Peruzzi (Milan, 1934), pp. 109-10, 158; the bad debts did not stop Verde di Ranieri Peruzzi from marrying Mino di Meo Tolomei with an 850-florin dowry and spending 1,020 pounds on the costs of marriage in 1336 (pp. 333, 372). 11. CG 80, 86v-88v, passed by 195 to 72 (fol. 88v). The ordinances were written by “dominum Nerium Renaldj, Minum Accarigi, dominum Mocatam de Maconibus, dominum Corradum dominj Johannis, iudicem Cionem Bartholomei et Simonem dominj Jacobi.” The incipits and explicits of the beginning and ending clauses are recorded, but they are not very enlightening beyond the opening: “in primis vt civitas Senarum suis ciuibus non fraudetur etc.” 12. CG 80, 119-24 (26 and 27 April 1312): “. . . facere congregare et conuenire sotios sOtietatis, que diceretur esse in discordia . .. prouidere deberent super reformatio-

ne sotietatis eorum....” 84

THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI

ready requested the podesta to convene the members of the company to effect an internal accord before him and other officials of the com-

mune. Apparently this had not settled the matter, so a larger committee of ninety men, thirty from each third of the city, had tried to resolve the matter by devising some unspecified ordinances to reform the company and satisfy its creditors. In the face of these unsuccessful attempts, the council was now asked to consider these ordinances and decide whether their procedures would guarantee respect for the full rights of creditors. Without elaborating, the officials of the town asserted that any composition claimed to have been reached by the associates was to be ignored.!3 After voting 242 to 4 on 26 April to consider the motion further, the council agreed to meet the following day, with none of the involved parties present, in order to decide on a course of action. The next day they followed the advice of Meo di Bartolomeo Piccolomini and agreed to the proposed and unexplained reorganization of the society, including provisions to detain recalcitrant members, but by a 170 to 37 vote they delayed any final steps against the company until September. During the discussion Meo di Bartolomeo was adamant that all obligations to creditors be given the fullest satisfaction and favor in any decisions.'4 The podesta himself was to oversee and enforce this concord, which was to be reported in full to the city council. No committee of merchants was to be involved as yet. The government of Siena once again intervened in the affairs of a company operated by one of the commune’s most powerful magnate families. On 10 September 1312 the problems of all debtors and the Tolomei in particular came before the Consiglio Generale. On the question of debtors in general, the podesta emphasized Siena’s need for domestic harmony during the dangerous period when the emperor Henry VII, with such Ghibelline exiles from Siena as Niccolo di Bonifazio Bonsignori in his entourage, was close at hand and threatening the Guelf regimes of Tuscany. The podesta observed that the nobles and citizens of Siena were so burdened by debts and bans arising from their nonpayments that they could not come to the aid of the threatened commune.’ He went on to request in particular the advice of the council 13. CG 80, 119v: “non obstante quadam compositione quam allegant dicti sotij ad inuicem inter se fecisse.” They might have been concerned for the rights of creditors. 14. CG 80, 123v. Meo asserted “quod omnis fauor qui dari debet ex suo consilio supradicto illis qui habent instrumenta contra dictos sotios et sotietatem et quemlibet ipsorum detur et dari debeant per dictum dominum potestatem et suos iudices.” 15. CG 81, 103v-7. At the present stage of research it is not clear if the citizenry were 85

, SIENESE BANKING on handling discord within the Tolomei societas. The assembled members voted 308 to 55 to extend the period of grace for settling the problems of all debtors until 1 November 1312 and to grant safe-conducts to permit the debtors’ return to Siena. On the matter of the Tolomei, the General Council granted another extension to the company until early January of 1313, thereby following the advice of Guglielmo di Guglielmo Piccolomini. Guglielmo also repeated the earlier opinion of his kinsman Meo di Bartolomeo that all instruments or contracts undertaken by the Tolomei societas be honored unless they were proven

to be canceled or paid. The vote, however, was a bit closer than in April—270 to 83. For whatever reasons beside fear of offending a dangerous family clan, the Tolomei were given more time. Perhaps the government granted the delays so that creditors from Siena might be repaid first by the ailing company, which if given time might at least be able to meet all of its Sienese obligations. On 30 October 1312 the General Council agreed on an extension,

until 1 January 1313, of the period in which the debtors had to reach settlements with their creditors. It was aimed at achieving domestic accord and foreign debts were apparently of secondary concern. A secret council or commission was to be selected to facilitate this. Criminals and debtors to the commune were excluded from the safe-conduct, but debtors to any institution, entity, or person were to be given a chance

to reenter the city. On 31 December 1312 the safe-conduct was extended to 1 March 1313, but a freeze was legislated for six months on the ability of debtors to sell their property without first settling their obligations.!© Although neither Tolomei company was specifically mentioned in either set of deliberations, they could have benefited from the delays but felt the increasing communal pressure to pay at least their local debts. There is no evidence in 1312 or 1313 that the - Tolomei or their associates were involved with the emperor Henry VII, who was in Tuscany, or his allies, the Ghibelline exiles from Siena. In January 1313 the problem again came up for discussion in the Consiglio Generale when approval was sought for unspecified statutes

so financially paralyzed by debt and pursued by creditors as to be unable to give fiscal aid to the commune. Perhaps the effects of the collapse of the Bonsignori company were that pervasive. A detailed study of the private economies of the associates and partners of the Gran Tavola is forthcoming. 16. CG81, 118-20 (30 October 1312), and CG 81, 149-51 (31 December 1312). The “secretum consilium” was to see that any “persone, vniversitas, collegio” satisfy its debts with “cuiuscumque persone, vniversitatis, collegij seu loci.” Debtors to the commune were to be seized and detained (CG 81, 150). 86

THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI

securing the rights of creditors as established by the podesta in his reform of the New Company of the Tolomei.!” Two prominent Tolomei and a former associate in the Gran Tavola of the Bonsignori spoke to

this motion. Enjoining full guarantees for the rights of creditors, , Mino di Meo Tavena Tolomei requested a delay until May of 1313 for the enforcement of the podesta’s settlement. Jacobo d’Andrea Tolomei thought ihe Nine should elect two or three suitable men who would,

with the cooperation of the Mercanzia, work out an agreement between the Tolomei and their creditors. Geri Montanini, once a member

of the bankrupt Bonsignori company, suggested that the Mercanzia and the Tolomei associates themselves elect two or three merchants to investigate the problems of the company. These men were to devise a settlement between the factors of the company and three or four representatives of the socii of the firm. Balances were to be calculated according to the records made available by the company. Besides suggesting more time for the company to gather its resources, the speakers from the Tolomei family were trying to involve the Mercanzia from which they perhaps expected a sympathetic hearing. On the other hand, creditors without influence on the guild could not help but be uneasy with proposals to have it participate in the settlement. The Consiglio Generale did not endorse these schemes; but, at the request of Naddino Tuccij, it did direct that government intervention be delayed until the following May. When the May deadline arrived, the Consiglio Generale decided by a vote of 140 to 43 that the reform of the company be carried out as structured in 1312.!* All of the decisions on responsibility to creditors made by the committee were to be respected, although the deadline for compliance with the government’s provisions was extended until midJuly. Unfortunately, none of the procedures or guidelines established

by the government during 1312 and early 1313 was included in the records of the Consiglio Generale’s discussions. It is also unclear if anything actually was done at this time about settling the debts of the Tolomei or any other Sienese company. The first stage of the failure of the New Company of the Tolomei probably amounted to no more than temporizing on the part of the commune because of the dangerous proximity of Henry VII and the exiled Sienese Ghibellines. The commune could not risk alienating one of its magnate families and 17. CG 82, 58v-61 (13 January 1313): “... super proposita facta occasione sotiorum noue sotietatis Talomeorum de Senis et creditorum suorum sollempniter reformatum quod dominus potestas Senarum teneatur et debeat tenere et facere. .. .” The vote was 193 to 56 (fol. 61). 18. CG 82, 145-46v (14 May 1313). 87

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thus give the Ghibellines important allies. On the death of Henry in 1313 and with the reconciliation and return of some of the exiles in early 1314, steps against the Tolomei and other magnate family companies became much easier to take. As we shall see, the second stage

of the bankruptcy did eventually lead to the confiscation and sale of the assets of some of the Tolomei and other magnates to cover their debts, but the process was to take years with the actual guidelines for the liquidation unclear. The second stage of the collapse of the New Company of the Tolomei began in Genoa in February of 1314 and took five years to be resolved by legislation by the Consiglio Generale. Questions were frequently to arise in the council’s deliberations about procedures to be followed and about the membership of the committees setting those procedures and overseeing the settlement. These discussions and topics are illustrative of the tensions inherent in liquidations and of the problems encountered by a commune trying, whether objectively or not, to effect a composition acceptable to powerful debtors and creditors. The decisions of the council formed the legal and political environment for commerce and banking in Siena during and after the second decade of the fourteenth century. On 11 March 1315 a notary of the Consiglio Generale read aloud in Italian a letter from some Sienese merchants in Genoa. On 27 February that commune had granted reprisals against Sienese businessmen in Genoa because of the unpaid debts of the Tolomei. In their letter, originally sent to the Council of the Merchants, the Sienese businessmen asked for aid in obviating the reprisals.!? The General Council heard the observation by a member of the company, Nello di Mino Tolomei, that those Tolomei responsible should cover any expenses suffered by the commune in lifting the reprisals and also listened to the pleas by Mandredi de Balzis that no relatives of either the Tolomei or the merchants suffering damages in Genoa be allowed to serve on the committee to lift the reprisals. The council, however, decided by an exact two-thirds majority to follow the advice of Guglielmo di Guglielmo Piccolomini.”” Guglielmo wanted the Mercanzia to elect three men from each terzo from among those doing business in Genoa and from among those owed money by the Tolomei. The appointees were to report back to the Consiglio Generale within eight days. If a majority of

19. CG 85, 88v-92 (11 March 1315). ,

20. CG 85, 90-92. Manfredi said the Nine and the Council of the Merchants should elect men “qui non sint de Tholomeis nec eorum intime coniunctis parentola nec de illis qui habent facere uel negotiari Janue uel recipere a dicta sotietate Tholomeorum.” 88

THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI

the council approved their measures to life the reprisals, the podesta was to carry them out.”! A week later, on 18 March, the provisions made by this committee were approved by the Consiglio Generale.” One of the statutes passed on 18 March 1315 required each new podesta to seek within eight days of entering office the advice of the Consiglio Generale on failed societies. Accordingly Benvenuto Todini d’Ancona raised the question on 3 July, the first day of his office. Although on this particular occasion and during the following year the Tolomei company was not mentioned, the council considered general regulations for unspecified failed companies.”> The counselors again approved the suggestions of Guglielmo di Guglielmo Piccolomini, who

said that the podesta should seize the sons of the associates of these failed but unnamed societies but postpone such a step until Novem-

ber. In the meantime the Nine and the Council of the Merchants should elect two or three from each ferzo to force cited debtors to pay their creditors. All the sons of debtors fourteen years of age or older

were to be held responsible, and no foreigner was to be given the equivalent ability to cite Sienese debtors with such stringent communal enforcement.4 In July of 1316 the problems of failed companies were brought to the attention of the General Council, and this time the Tolomei were discussed. The council agreed with Ciolo Provenzani that the podesta, the captain of the people, and the Nine should review the ordinances passed so far, modify them if they deemed it necessary, and put them into effect. Guccio Gregorii recommended that the books of failed societies, and especially those of the Tolomei, should be secured and 21. CG 85, 90v. Guglielmo described the men to be elected by the Council of the Merchants as “de illis qui habent et facere et negotiari Janue, et de illis qui debent recipere uel habere a sotietate de Tholomeis.” 22. CG 85, 94-96v (18 March 1315). At the second and final consideration, the provisions were passed by a 181 to 51 vote (fol. 96v). Guglielmo di Guglielmo spoke in their favor here, too (fols. 94v-95, 96). The statutes were dated 13 March 1315 and, with their lost amendments from 2 May 1319, set the standards for dealing with failed societies; they were cited throughout the failure of the Tolomei (see following notes) and afterwards; for examples of applications, see CG 93, 39v-4lv (7 January 1320), CG 96, 50v-Slv (20 January 1322), and CG 99, 37-39v (3 January 1324).

23. CG 86, 20v-23v (3 July 1315). 24. CG 86, 22. The vote was 215 to 51. Nello di Mino Tolomei wanted enforcement of the ordinance left to the discretion of the Nine (fol. 22v). The discussion is followed by a list of statutes that must be overridden to permit the advice of Guglielmo and the ordinances to take effect (fol. 23-23v). I intend to discuss age and responsibility for debts in Siena in “Emancipation and Paternal Control in Siena: Four Examples of Magnate Practice,” forthcoming. 89

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authenticated.2> Although we do not have the records of any immediate process resulting from these decisions, it is clear that the problems of the companies of the Tolomei and of other magnate families were demanding more direct action from the commune. At last the commune faced its responsibility to establish the means to investigate, to reform or to dissolve, if necessary, the companies of magnate families in order to satisfy their creditors. Originally drawn up in May of 1316 and given a preliminary approval on 19 October, ordinances were presented on 19 November to the Consiglio Generale and given assent.”© The detailed procedures were aimed not just at any particular company of the Tolomei but also at three societates of other magnate families. The legislation also sought to establish a framework of time for investigation and enforcement. The societies involved were _ the New and Old Tolomei companies and those of the Malavolti, the Gallerani, and the Forteguerri.2’ A committee of ten arbitrators was 25. CG 87, 36-40 (7 July 1316), Ciolo Provenzani on fol. 38, Guccio Gregorii on fols. | 38v-—39. The vote was 195 to 40 in favor of the advice of Ciolo. Andrea di Mengo Crescenzi, probably a Noveschi, wanted a three-man committee, without any relative of either the creditors or the debtors, to enforce the ordinances and ensure that

“,..Nullus pro debito alterius puniatur” (fol. 37v). 26. CG 87, 152-53 (19 October 1316): “Approbatio certorum ordinamentorum factorum occasione debitorum et creditorum et societatum fallitarum”; CG 87, 200207v (19 November 1316). The General Council might have commissioned, or have seen, the ordinances earlier in 1316, but the deliberations of the Consiglio Generale for the first semester of 1316 no longer exist. 27. CG 87, 200v, 204v. The podesta was “conuenire omnes. . . socios . . . societatis noue Tolomeorum, societatis veteris Tolomeorum sive filiorum Ser Jacobj, societatis Malauoltorum, societatis Galleranorum et societatis Forteguerrorum in aliquo loco uel locis in ciuitate Senarum uel abibj eos ibj tenere et tenerj facere reclusos ita ... per ciuitatem Senarum ire non possint nec inde exire.” Those this side of the Alps had a month to appear, and those north of the Alps had three months. In the case of the Gallerani, arbitrators, elected by the partners to reach a settlement with their creditors, could not meet a deadline and asked for an extension until 1 April, because this “laudabile opus inceptum remaneat inperfectum” (fol. 76). The extension was granted: CG 88, 76-79v (1317); but when the society petitioned again on 17 March 1317, citing delays arising from the service of two arbitrators on the Nine (Agnolo Guiffoli and Guccio Tosi) and problems in getting together with creditors, the General Council refused to grant another extension until 1 June despite the suggestion of the Nine: CG 88, 124-26 (17 March 1317). No other details have come to light that disclose the fate of the company, except that four years later one creditor of the Gallerani, Niccoluccio di Jacobo Spizerii, excused his own problems in coming to terms with his creditors by blaming the unpaid debts owed to him by the Gallerani: CG 85, 88-90v (25 February 1321); Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, p. 254 n. 223. For the Malavolti see ASS, Statuti di Siena 26, D. II, fol. 119 (“Quod sotij Malauoltorum ligentur ad predictam”], which applies to them the same standards as those applied to the Tolomei.

, 90

THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI

to be selected by the companies and their creditors, or appointed by the Nine and the Mercanzia if no agreement could be reached by the parties involved. The arbitrators would have three days to devise a settlement and their decisions on debts were to be final. All the debtors then had a month to pay up or face fines, at the discretion of the Nine, for contumacy or flight from Siena. Even the arbitrators themselves were to be detained until the composition was reached.”° Several days later, on 23 November, these strong measures were limited in application to the five particular companies.2? The New Company of the Tolomei and the other magnate firms, along with the distinct Old Tolomei societas, were now considered to have failed. The first steps had

been taken to force a liquidation of the companies, but questions about the degrees of responsibility of each associate were left unclarified. Another two or three years were to pass before statutes were defined that offered guidelines for such problems. Following what had become accepted practice, the podesta, at the beginning of his term of office in 1317, asked the Consiglio Generale what was to be done about bankrupt societates.*° The council agreed on 7 January with the proposals put forward by Guglielmo di Guglielmo Piccolomini. Mentioning the New Society of the Tolomei by name,

Guglielmo asserted that those who wanted to satisfy their creditors were responsible only to the extent of the percentage of their contribution to the capital of the company and were to be absolved accordingly. Those paying could still be considered, nonetheless, jointly respon-

sible for the debts of the company and be brought together to face those obligations.?! The associates who failed to pay were to be held

jointly responsible first for all of the remainder of the debts of the company. For the other failed companies, Guglielmo and the council agreed that a committee of nine from among the creditors of the company (three from each third of the city) should make whatever provisions were deemed necessary to ensure satisfaction of the creditors of 28. CG 87, 200-207v. The ordinances and their enforcing clauses were approved by a 189 to 30 vote. Andrea di Mengo Crescenzi was strongly opposed even to a second reading of the proposals (fol. 203), but he was alone in his opposition. Only two men, however, spoke in their favor. 29. CG 87, 219v-20v. 30. CG 88, 34v-39 (7 January 1317). 31. CG 88, 37v. The associates of the society called the “societas noua Tholoméorum” were to pay within two months “partem debitj seu debitorum dicte sotietatis . . .

pro rata et secundum ratam suorum capitalium qui habent... in societate predicta, non obstante quod ipsi socij sint insolidum obligatj uel possint insolidum conuenir].”

9]

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the firms.?2 While the bankrupt Tolomei society was to be discussed periodically over the next two years, the Consiglio Generale had decided what was to be the practice for allocating responsibility. Unlike the liquidation of the Bonsignori, the records of the actual liquidation of the Tolomei company do not survive, even in partial reports to the General Council. As we shall see, the decisions reached in November

, of 1316 and January of 1317 coincide with those dated January 1319 and preserved in a collection of statutes from 1337. They thus probably reflect the procedures actually followed in the liquidations of the Tolomei and of the other companies. On 8 July 1317 the details of a prospective composition were debated in the Consiglio Generale. In the discussions following the request by the podesta for advice on failed companies, speakers blamed the Tolomei as the primary cause of the reprisals against Sienese merchants, but disagreed over the participation of creditors or relatives of the debtors on any committee assigning responsibilities. In the end all that the council approved was a careful inquisition on and listing of the houses and possessions of the associates of the failed companies. A majority of the general council, however, would have to be obtained for any subsequent assignment to creditors. Evidently the measures taken so far had not brought about a settlement between the Tolomei companies and their creditors.* 32. CG 88, 37v-38: Guglielmo “proposuit . . . quod reliqui socii dicte sotietatis qui sic non voluerent infra dictum terminum. .. intelligantur insolidum obligati ad vniuersum debitum dicte societatis.” Arrigo di Ranieri Piccolomini wanted a committee elected “de melioribus et ditioribus” to decide the fates of all the companies (fol. 35v). Andrea di Mengo Crescenzi suggested that a more objective committee with a broader social base be appointed to supervise the resolution of the debts: “,.. quorum nullus est de debitoribus seu creditoribus dictarum societatum fallitarum, sed vnus sit de mediocribus seu de gente mediocrj et alter de minoribus seu de gente minuta dicte civitatis . . .” (fol. 36). Guglielmo’s proposals passed by a 184 to 74 vote (fols. 38v-39), somewhat less than the usual overwhelming support for victorious measures in the Consiglio Generale. 33. CG 89, 47-52v (8 July 1317). After the council rejected proposals by five other _ counselors (fol. 51v), the advice of Neri di Gabriello Piccolomini was approved by a vote of 184 to 78 (fol. 52). Neri said “quod. . . debeat facere diligentem inquisitionem...de omnibus et singulis domibus, bonis et possessionibus dictarum societatum fallitarum et sociorum ipsorum.” The General Council was then to decide ownership by a “secretum scrutinium... per maiorem partem”; and if it so decided, the council would see that “possessio debeat darj et assignarj creditoribus” (fol. 51). Guglielmo di Guglielmo had earlier blamed the New Tolomei company , for the reprisals that the merchants of the city were suffering and asked specifically that inquisitions be made on the properties of the Tolomei, Malavolti, and Forteguerri families (fol. 49v).

92

THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI

Six months later, on 4 January 1318, the General Council again had to consider proposals to deal with the debts of the Tolomei and other magnate companies. Although the council ultimately voted to postpone for eight days taking any steps on the proposals brought to its attention, counselors expressed opinions on the problems of failed companies and on the Tolomei in particular.*4 Nello di Mino Tolomei, a partner in the Old Company (of the sons of Jacobo Tolomei) wanted the Nine to elect two or three men from each third of the city to make the companies of the New Tolomei, the Malavolti, Forteguerri, and Squarcialupi reach agreements with their creditors. The Squarcialupi, for the first time, were listed with other magnate family firms in bankruptcy. Nello also stated that the associates of the Old Company of

the Tolomei, including himself, should not be treated in the same manner as those of the other companies, but instead be held responsible to their creditors strictly according to the percentage of their individual investments in the total capital of the company.*° After Nello spoke, Naddino Tuccij proposed that the New Tolomei be allowed to satisfy their creditors at a rate of 10 soldi per pound and that no one be allowed to buy any of their property until the individual associate or seller had paid accordingly.2° Guglielmo di Guglielmo Piccolomini

argued that the urban and rural assets of the New Tolomei partners should be frozen for five years; if anyone had already purchased anything from the Tolomei, he should be expelled from possession. Guglielmo went so far as to recommend that advocates or procurators of the associates of the companies should not be allowed to make a case for their clients against any of these provisions.’’ Still temporizing, the council was not yet ready to establish clear guidelines on responsibility or to decide whether to treat all failed societies of magnate families

alike. ,

34. CG 90, 39v-43 (4 January 1318). Vannes Spinelli suggested the eight-day postponement and his suggestion was approved by a 176 to 50 vote (fol. 43-43v). 35. CG 90, 41v-42. Nello believed that “nullo modo predictj possint aliqua ordinamenta vel provisiones facere quod socij societatis veteris Tolomeorum uel aliquis seu aliqui eorum teneantur uel tenerj possint vitra ratam eorum capitalium.” 36. CG 90, 42-42v. By Easter each associate of the New Tolomei should be allowed to satisfy his obligation by paying “soldos decem denariorum pro qualibet et de quali-

bet libra.” ,

— 37. CG 90, 4lv. A fine of 1,000 Sienese pounds was to be levied on anyone violating ~ Guglielmo’s proposals. Neri di Gabriello Piccolomini recommended that no one be allowed to flee to Montalcino, a major town of the contado: “ . . . nullus de societatibus fallitis ciuitatis Senarum stet, habitet uel moretur in terra di Monte Alcino” (fol. 42v). 93

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Following the opinions of Benuccio di Benuccio Salimbeni, the General Council decided a week later that the Nine and the Council of the Merchants should elect two men from each third of the city and a judge from the communal government to review the previous statutes on failed companies, amend them if necessary, and effect a settlement

| within a month.?® Although their ideas were not given explicit approval by the council, other speakers gave more detailed ideas on bringing

an end to the matter by seeking formal declarations of bankruptcy against the New Society of the Tolomei and the Squarcialupi. Nello di Mino Tolomei repeated his proposal that all of the associates of the family firms be held responsible only according to the percentages of their investments in the total capital of the societates. Nello added that

satisfaction could be obtained from sales of the possessions of the , associates under the direction of a commission appointed by the Nine. The values of the confiscated properties were to be determined by that committee and the proceeds of the sales turned over to the firms’ creditors. Obligations of 50 Sienese pounds or less were to be covered only by cash payments.” Besides observing that the New Company of the Tolomei had been bankrupt for at least a year and should have been declared a failed company, Vannes Capitani next offered some solutions to the problems encountered by the commissions.” Accused par-

ties had denied that they were the sons, brothers, or fathers of the partners, since otherwise they were responsible for the debts of those partners. According to Vannes five witnesses were all that were needed to prove a relationship.*! By 11 February 1318 the ordinances on bankrupt companies had been revised and rewritten, but the General Council granted another 38. CG 90, 47-53 (11 January 1318). Benuccio’s proposals (fol. 52-52v) were approved 185 to 74. 39. CG 90, 50v-51. After demanding that failed Bonsignori and Gallerani partners pay him what they owed him, Nello wanted the other magnate companies to pay “pro rata” and singled out the Old Tolomei by stating “quod quilibet de societate veterj

que dicitur aut dicebatur Tolomeorum seu Jacobi... teneatur...soluere... eorum creditoribus pro rata solum eorum capitalium que quisque ipsorum misit in dicta societate.” They were to be given until 1 March to reach accord. 40. CG 90, 49-49v. Vannes stated that the titles to the properties of the Tolomei associates should be clarified since “dicta societas et socij fefellerunt et ante per unum annum”; he went on to say “quod approbat dictam societatem nouam Tolomeorum pro societate fallita.” 41. CG 90, 49v. Vannes asserted that “. . . si siquis negaret se esse filium, fratrem aut

patrem alicuius dictorum sociorum, ...per quinque testes... probatum fuerit esse seu fuisse.” He also moved that no partner or heir be allowed to escape his responsibility for the debts by claiming to be a cleric unless he was truly “in sacris ordinibus.” 94

THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI

delay of a month and suggested that further efforts at concord (“voluntaria concordia”) be made in the meantime.” Exactly a month later the ordinances were given the assent of the Consiglio Generale, so that now presumably a means was established to facilitate an accord between the failed companies of the magnates and their creditors.” In the customary deliberation on all failed companies at the beginning of each semester, the council made on 3 July 1318 two decisions

about the societies of the Tolomei. The comments of two speakers were approved. Vannes Capitani said the partners of the New Society of the Tolomei were to be given a month to satisfy fully their creditors or the podesta was to ensure that the associates paid their shares. In addition no one was to be permitted to work or cultivate the properties of the members of the society.“ Dino di Bando specified how the partners of the Old Company of the Tolomei should be held responsible for the debts of the firm: all the socii enumerated in the books of the company were jointly responsible to each creditor as written in the books for the amount specified in the particular transaction and proportionately according to their investment in the capital of the firm.* 42. CG 90, 75-77. The ordinances had been written by the notary Pietro de Meo Albertion 1 February and were read to the council. Cino Saracini said that only a fifteenday delay should be given to the Malavolti company (fol. 76-76v). A delay was finally granted on the advice of Branca Accarigi by a 184 to 61 vote (fols. 76v77). Branca was a director of the Accarigi bank and participated in a pacification imposed on the Tolomei and Salimbeni in 1337: William M. Bowsky, “The Buon Governo of Siena (1287-1355): A Mediaeval Italian Oligarchy,” Speculum 37 (1962), 374; Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 74, 253. 43. CG 90, 92v-94v (11 March 1318): “Pro ordinamentis factis occasione debitorum et creditorum et societatum fallitorum.” The ordinances were read in Italian to the council, but are not included with the record of the deliberation. 44. CG 91, 35-38v (3 July 1318). Vannes stated that “possessiones que fuerunt . . . dic-

torum sociorum... tempore quo dicta societas .. . fefellit .. . que dicto domino potestate dabuntur inscriptis [creditoribus] . . . non laborentur uel colantur . . . per aliquem seu aliquos aliqua ratione uel modo” (37-37v). Vannes’s proposal was approved 152 to 64 (fol. 38). 45. CG 91, 37v. Dino was recorded as saying “quod omnes et singuli socij societatis veteris Tolomeorum de Senis, scriptj in libro seu libris dicte societatis, intelligantur et sint, autoritate et vigore presentis consilij, insolidum obligatj cuilibet creditor) dicte sotietatis scripto, seu qui reperiretur scriptus, in libro seu libris societatis predicte in ea, videlicet summa et quantitate pecunie que et prout scripta est in dictis libro seu libris ad positam cuiusque creditoris recipere debentes, ac si eidem essent per instrumentum guarentigie obligatj.” Dino also noted that certain associates had already been excused by the Consiglio Generale; his motion was approved by a 170 to 46 vote (fol. 38). Meo di Tigo di Leo (Tigolei) wanted yet another delay until the government and the Council of the Merchants could see what would be “vtile” for the commune (fol. 36v). 95

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The remarks of both Vannes and Dino are reflected in the final regulations established to bring an end to the problems of the failed societies. Although the absence of documents precludes a complete presentation of the final stages of the Tolomei liquidation, a collection of statutes drawn up in 1337 by the government of Siena preserves several decisions dealing with that liquidation. Dated 14 January 1319, they show how far the regime of the Nine was in the end willing to go to enforce the payment of debts on an insolvent company of a recalcitrant magnate family. Although we do not possess the deliberations of the Consiglio Generale from the first semester of 1319, the statutes collected around 1337 contain what were probably the final regulations

of the liquidation of the Tolomei and other companies. As we shall see, they contain answers to some of the problems we saw recurring in the deliberations on liquidating business societies. The reputation of

Siena and its merchants or bankers for reliability and trust cannot have been maintained under such doubt about Siena’s ability and will to enforce repayment of creditors and in the face of such vacillation about the unlimited responsibility of partners. The risks of creditors increased since many debtors would be difficult first to find and then to force to pay more than a limited percentage of the total indebted-

ness of the company.

Although the creditors of the New Company of the Tolomei were to be given full restitution, the associates were limited in their liability to their share of the capital invested in the company.*° By 1 March 1319 all those who had been members of the New Society of the Tolomei were to pay their creditors their shares of the debts (or guarantee such payments), according to the percentage of their original investments in the total capital of the firm. The podesta was to enforce the petitions of creditors against the possessions of the associates and their heirs. Liability was therefore joint but limited in that it had to be allocated

proportionately for each specific loan or creditor. If this was or became standard procedure, creditors or customers could find much of their business insufficiently, or at least questionably, secured. 46. ASS, Statuti di Siena 26 (1337), D. II, fols. 118-19 (the rubrication is unclear); in particular see fol. 118: “Prouisiones pro et contra illos de sotietate nova Tolomeorum, edite sub annis domini millesimo trecentesimo XVIII°, indictione secunda, die XIIIJ mensis Januarii. Et primo quod soluens pro rata partis contingentis capitale quod miseret liberetur a toto”; debtors “qui soluere uoluerint uel dicto modo satisdare de dictis creditis pro rata eorum et cuiusque eorum capitalium que miserint seu haberent [corrected from hitarent] in sotietate predicta.” The rubrics of the 1337 collection of statues are now published in Donatella Ciampoli, J/ capitano del popolo a Siena nel primo Trecento con il rubricario dello statuto del comune di Siena del 1337 (Siena, 1984), pp. 59-121. 96

, THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI On the other hand, the statutes do demonstrate that the government, although delaying action as long as possible, would eventually take and enforce measures against the members and assets of companies responsible for deposits or other banking or commercial transactions. One rubric from those dealing with the Tolomei in the 1337 statutes made it difficult for any guilty or uncooperative party to sell or lease his property, since anyone taking possession of it was to be subject to a fine of 300 Sienese pounds.*’ The next rubric gave the government the right to detain the members of the society or their heirs until they had satisfied their creditors. The Tolomei and their asso-

clates were, furthermore, banned from entering several important towns of the Sienese contado which also happened to be some of the main rural seats of the family.*® The statutes went on to answer the question of just who was a member of the Tolomei society and therefore responsible for its debts. If the instrument originally forming the societas contained a person’s name, that individual was deemed culpable for the contracts agreed to by that society.“? The extent of responsibility in specific contracts might be lowered to a percentage; but once responsibility was established, the commune of Siena had adopted legal procedures to enforce repayment. Bowsky’s short account of reprisals issued by the commune of Pisa in June of 1319, however, indicates that it might have been easier to legislate ways of dealing with bankrupt companies than to carry them out quickly on debtors who avoided responsibility by flight.>° Pisa had granted a reprisal against Sienese merchants because of the Tolomei defaults. Siena sent ambassadors to request that the reprisal be lifted, since the commune was trying to arrange a settlement of the affair.

The Sienese also asked that Pisa hold Bindo Bindi, a socius of the Tolomei who had fled to avoid his obligations. According to Bowsky, 47. ASS, Statuti di Siena 26 (1337), D. II, fol. 118v [“De pena satisfacientium ut supra”]. The decisions of the podesta on any question of possession or documentation of ownership had to come before the Consiglio Generale for scrutiny. 48. ASS, Statuti di Siena 26 (1337), D. II, fol. 118v [“De executione fienda contra dictos sotios non satisfacientes”]: “Grossetam, Castrum Montis Policiani, Castrum Montis Alcini, Terra de Casolis, Terra de Chiusdino, Castrum Mofn]tis Latronis, Castrum Montis Celli, Yschia et Castrum de Monterio.” 49. ASS, Statuti di Siena 26 (1337), D. II, fols. 118v-19 [“Qui intelligantur sotij dicte sotietatis”]: “Omnes et singuli qui scripti sunt in instrumento sotietatis predicte .. . sint et habeantur et censeantur pro ueris sotijs dicte sotietatis.” Although a date is not given for the incriminating articles of association, a specific notary, Dietisalvus Philippi, is cited as writing the document. He wrote the 1310 act: Giannelli, “Atto costituto societas Talomeorum,” p. 338. 50. Bowsky, Finance of the Commune, pp. 194-95 n. 14. 97

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the Pisans agreed to suspend the sanctions temporarily but demanded that the commune of Siena effect an agreement in the matter. The last references to this affair are two petitions submitted to the Consiglio Generale in 1333. On 30 August 1333 Bindino, Meo, and Gal-

- gano, once partners themselves and sons of the associate Nigio d’Ildebrandino Tolomei, asked that a compromise, worked out by three arbitrators, be approved by the council. By a vote of 167 to 69 the assembly passed the sentence which called on these Tolomei to pay their debts at 13 soldi 4 denari to the pound, to be carried out in florins worth 58 soldi.°! In other words, creditors of the company were to receive two-thirds of what they were owed. On 28 December 1333 Mino di Geri Baglioni, who was a partner in 1310 and had served on the Nine, presented another petition seeking the council’s agreement to a settlement effected by the same arbitrators. This time, however, Mino was only responsible for 8 soldi on the pound (40 percent) — an amount

which hypothetically corresponded to his investment in the capital of , the company. From then on, however, any legitimate creditor of Mino was to receive 10 soldi on the pound or 50 percent.** Both of these

| assignments were made notwithstanding the ordinances passed in 1312, 1316, and 1319 regulating bankruptcy and liquidation of assets.*? Even though each socius had contributed 500 Sienese pounds to the 1310 company, responsibility for the debts of the firm was seemingly 51. CG 114, 44-46v. The arbitrators appointed by the commune (Pietro di Duccio Saracini, Ceccho di Meo Mellone Ugurgieri, and the judge, Meo di Tederigho) had allocated responsibility “secundum capitalia eorum seu patris eorum” and declared “quod ipsi predicti filij Nigij darent et soluerent eorum et olim dicti Nigij patris eorum et predicte sotietatis Thalomeorum creditoribus tredecim sol. et IIIJ° den. pro qualibet libra pro uera sorte secundum scripturas librorum dicte sotietatis”: Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 256-57. The exchange rate for a florin was 60 soldi 6 denari on 30 August 1333 and had averaged about 59-60 from 1315 to 1319: Carlo M. Cipolla, Studi di storia della moneta, 1: I movimenti dei cambi in Italia dal secolo XIII al XV (Pavia, 1948), pp. 161-64, 181. 52. CG 114, 105v-10 (28 December 1333): “. . . tunc de ea staretur probation) iuridice soluendo dictos octo sol. pro rata suorum capitalium, que dictus Minus habuerat et habebat in sotietate predicta, prout in libris ipsius sotietatis apparet.” For Mino di Geri Baglioni, see Bowsky, “The Buon Governo of Siena,” p. 376 n. 35, and p. 379 n. 53. The Bardi and Peruzzi paid off their debts at a rate of 37 percent for the Peruzzi and 48 percent for the Bardi: Sapori, Crisi delle compagnie, p. 174. For the effects of these failures on the Florentine economy see Brucker, Florentine Politics, pp. 16-17, and Carlo M. Cipolla, The Monetary Policy of Fourteenth-Century Florence (Berkeley, 1982), pp. 9-15. 53. CG 114, 46 and 107; see above, nn. 11, 26, and 46 of this chapter. These ordinances were to be applied at least in all cases involving the Tolomei company. Only the rules from 1319 survive. 98

THE FAILURE OF THE TOLOMEI

allocated to each partner according to different percentages. There could have been additional agreements forming societates after 1310 with unequal contributions to the capital of the company and thus differing percentages of responsibility. Responsibility and participation | were supposed to be decided according to the state of the company in March of 1318 as stated by the provisions regulating the bankruptcy and preserved in the 1337 collection of statutes. Further explanations of the reasoning behind assignations of liability are stymied by the lack of documentation for capital investment after 1310 and by the absence of records showing how associates were assigned liability for specific obligations. It is not clear if in reality it made any difference _ whether one was a partner or a factor and had given consent to a particular transaction. It does seem likely that each participant in the company was assigned a percentage of the number of debts in question that was based on the extent of his initial participation. Specific _ debts were then assigned to fill his quota. Then the arbitrators finally awarded so many soldi on the pound to each creditor. Practice continued to assign liability in proportion to investment. In 1312 the international commerce and banking of Siena was just recovering from the damage caused by the collapse and liquidation of the Bonsignori company. Any difficulties arising from these events were compounded because of the problems of the New Tolomei company in France, their difficulties in integrating the participation of outsiders into their family firm, and the disruptions in communications and commerce in Tuscany caused by the expedition of the emperor Henry VII. A repetition of the delays involved in the Bonsignori liquidation and a failure to quash skepticism about Sienese reliability engendered by vacillation on the principle of joint and unlimited liability would cause irreparable harm to the ability of Sienese citizens to conduct international and regional commerce and banking. From 1310

to 1319 the Consiglio Generale had to deal on numerous occasions with reprisals arising from failed companies and with the administration of enforced compositions between creditors and debtors. While the New Company of the Tolomei was a prime cause of some of these

problems, other major Sienese commercial or banking companies founded around the Gallerani, Malavolti, Forteguerri, and Squarcialupi families were also involved. The careers of the Piccolomini and Salimbeni companies during and after this period are unclear because of meager documentation.” After the difficulties of the second decade 54. For short histories of the companies formed by the magnate families of the Malavolti, Salimbeni, and Piccolomini, see English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp. 5599

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of the fourteenth century and until the pontificate of a Piccolomini pope, Pius II, in the mid-fifteenth century, there seems little reason to believe that any Sienese merchants played significant roles in trade or banking outside of the immediate environs of Siena. A major factor in this withdrawal might have been a depleted reputation for reliability or solvency caused by the undercapitalization of the companies themselves and by the slow and tentative efforts of the government of Siena to enforce satisfaction of debts.

100 ,

58, 74-76. For some evidence of the involvement of the Salimbeni in the luxury cloth trade in 1338 see Cron. sen. (Agnolo), p. 521.

The Papal Investigation into the Debts of the Bonsignori

Although the Bonsignori and their associates had reached agreements by 1310 with most of their creditors, one major client from outside the city had not yet been satisfied: thirty-five years later the papal camera sought reimbursement. This effort led to a jurisdictional dispute between the commune of Siena and the Holy See about ascertaining the liability of the heirs of bankrupts and enforcing restitution on them for the debts of their ancestors.! Despite efforts by the commune in the early-fourteenth century to decide such issues, the events of the 1340s were to demonstrate problems about the descending responsibility of debtors and the enforcement of obligations — issues similar to those that had been disruptive for the law and economy of Siena earlier in the century. Armando Sapori believed that Siena saw the error of its ways and restored the full power of the principle of joint and unlimited responsibility of all partners in a failed company.” The maneu1. The ensuing papal investigation and the Sienese response merit detailed investigation themselves, since many documents were not taken into consideration in the articles by Gino Arias, Edouard Jordan, and Mario Chiaudano. The dispute has implications for papal-Sienese relations, for the reconstruction and fate of the patrimony of the Bonsignori, and for the course of Sienese politics. I intend to cover these topics elsewhere. The emphasis in this chapter will be on its importance for the principle of joint and unlimited liability. 2. Sapori, “Compagnie mercantili,” p. 805 (he bases his assertion on the 1342 collection

of statutes for the Mercanzia); Senigaglia, “Statuto” 2.20 (fol. 26), pp. 114-15: [“Che ciascuno compagno sia tenuto en tutto”]. The commune tried on two other occasions to regulate bankruptcy procedures. On 25 January 1325 the General Council agreed to a proposal to have the Nine and the Council of Merchants appoint a committee of three men to assist in establishing an agreement between debtors and their creditors. They were to grant three-month moratoria and only then was the podesta to detain recalcitrant debtors. Those who had reached a settlement were then to have their names removed from the Liber clavium that was kept to list unreconciled bankrupts. The records of the deliberations are preserved in ASS, Statuti di Siena 23 (1323-39), 136-37v. On 13 July 1338 the council granted a general moratorium until 1 January 1339 for all bankers and merchants pursued by creditors. If settlements had not been reached by then, all that was necessary to cover their debts was to be sequestered and sold. In order to encourage the use of fideiussori to stand for debts, the council limited their responsibility and protected creditors by demanding that their names be written “in quodam libro qui stet in loco publico in curia mercantie et 101

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vers of the commune during the papal investigation and confrontation indicate, however, that when an outside power was involved, liability was still joint, but based on the ratio of one’s investment in the failed firm. The Holy See claimed that it had not received satisfaction for the large sums allegedly deposited with the firm under Popes Nicholas III and Nicholas IV. In 1312 Clement V sought unsuccessfully to recover some of the camera’s losses by transferring the responsibility for debts owed to failed Italian companies to the Holy See.’ As we have seen, the collapse of the Bonsignori, combined with the failures of other Italian banking companies, likely had already caused Clement to use the clerical collectors themselves to transfer funds. In attempting to revive claims of the papal treasury on the Bonsignori in 1316, John XXII reasserted the obligations of the family and company members, but only

, managed to encourage the city of Cambrai to continue its investigations into the debts of the Gran Tavola that it had begun during the

pontificate of Clement V.* |

In the 1340s, amid the collapse of the great Florentine banking houses of the Bardi and the Peruzzi, Clement VI saw the need to assert and clarify papal claims and those of the rest of the church against the assets of all bankrupt firms. On 5 August 1343 he granted full powers

to Pietro Vitalis, the primicerius of Lucca, to collect debts due the papacy in Tuscany and also to gather confiscations from heretics in Genoa.° On 9 January 1344 he ordered Pietro and two other clerics to

possit per quemcumque videri . . . pro quanta quantitate et quantum tempus”: CG 123, 9-10v, and Statuti di Siena 23, fols. 538-40. 3. Clément V, Annus septimus, no. 7700 (27 February 1312); Renouard, Relations des papes, pp. 94-98. 4. Charles Samaran and Guillaume Mollat, La fiscalité pontificale en France au XIVe siecle (Paris, 1905), pp. 156-57; Jean XXII: Lettres communes analysées d’apres les registres dits d’Avignon et du Vatican, ed. Guillaume Mollat (Paris, 1904-47), 1, no. 5469 (23 November 1316). In 1322 the commune tried to avoid having an interdict placed on the city because of the debts of the Franzesi to the Holy See. The commune was to seize and sell “pro iusto pretio” the houses, palaces, towers, and shops of the Franzesi family that were located in the popolo of San Desiderio. The council agreed to postpone any action against property until they could obtain opinions from learned men on the validity of any excommunication for not cooperating: CG 96, 122v-—25v (24 May 1322), 126-28 (25 May 1322), 139-41 (16 June 1322). Bowsky

(Medieval Italian Commune, p. 180) correctly concludes that nothing came of the threats, and I have not discovered any legal opinions that the government might have obtained. For the Franzesi see Langlois, “Notices et documents,” pp. 322-27, and Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 253-54. 5. Clément VI: Lettres closes, patentes et curiales interessant les pays autres que la 102

THE PAPAL INVESTIGATION

provide the Holy See with information on the deposits made with the Bonsignori family some fifty years earlier, in the time of Nicholas IV.® Apparently they reported that the money would be worth pursuing, so on 2 March 1344 he ordered Pietro Vitalis and Francesco de Massiis, the Franciscan bishop of Aquilonia, to extract from the Bonsignori and their associates the 80,000 florins allegedly owed to the Apostolic Camera for over fifty years.’

| The two clerics proceeded to Siena and began their formal inquiry into the facts of the matter on 7 July 1344.° The first part of the process in ascertaining events and responsibilities dating from 1288 to 1310 consisted of a series of eight questions to reveal the amounts and times of deposits, the existence of company records, the names of the associates of the company and their heirs, and the existing property of those still responsible.’ Using this set of eight questions, Vitalis and de Massiis examined thirty clerical and lay witnesses from the sixth through

, the seventeenth of July.'° Although some friars questioned claimed to remember events from half a century before, most of the witnesses pleaded ignorance. The investigators were able, however, to piece together some information. They learned, in particular, of the existence of many books and records of the company hidden in the crypt of the Dominican church in Siena. On 20 July they moved the inquiry to San

Domenico and found accounts and letters of the company dealing especially with papal business in England and Scotland in the time of Nicholas IV.!! They returned on 22 July and discovered additional

France, ed. Eugene Déprez and Guillaume Mollat (Paris, 1900-1961), nos. 239-43 (hereafter cited as Clément VI); Clément VI: Lettres closes, patentes et curiales se rapportant a la France, ed. Eugene Déprez, Jean Glénisson, and Guillaume Mollat (Paris, 1910-61), 1, no. 323 (hereafter cited as Clément VI, France). Gino Arias

transcribed parts of the process against the Bonsignori, but made many errors: “Documenti inediti Vaticani sui Bonsignori,” in Studi e documenti di storia del diritto (Florence, 1902), pp. 29-73; for a complete and accurate transcription, see English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 61-159.

6. Clément VI, France, 1, no. 599. |

7. Clément VI, no. 425; ASV, RA 76, 487-87v; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 61-63. For payments for their services and expenses, see K. H. Schafer, Die Ausgaben der apostolischen Kammer unter Benedikt XII., Klemens VI. und Innocenz VI. (13351362) (Paderborn, 1914), pp. 231-33, 263-64. 8. ASV, RA 76, 488v; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 64-65. 9. ASV, RA 76; English, “Bonsignori,” p. 64. 10. ASV, RA 76, 488v-506; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 65-111. 11. ASV, RA 76, 507-7v; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 111-13. The Bardi and Peruzzi also hid their books and made fictitious sales to preserve their patrimonies: Gene A. Brucker, Florentine Politics and Society, 1343-1378 (Princeton, 1962), p. 17.

103

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correspondence and records dealing with company activity for the Holy See in Italy during the pontificate of Boniface VIII.!* After examining the documents, they decided on 18 August to summarize the

accounts of the company and to copy important letters discussing papal business.!> Seventeen folios preserved in the Vatican archives contain their summaries of deposits and transcriptions of two letters to the partners in Siena. The letters describe the course of papal business and give an account of the company’s relations with other Italian bankers.!4 Although it is not clear by using the information available to us how they did so, the investigators concluded that the company owed the 80,000 florins to the Holy See. On 30 September 1344 Clement VI wrote to the government of Siena requesting its cooperation in collecting the money from the heirs of members of the Bonsignori company.!>° Siena naturally was not overly anxious to encourage this blatant infringement of its jurisdiction, so Clement and his representatives received little immediate help from

the commune. |

Clement waited until 4 April 1345 to act again; he then appointed

and gave full powers to Pietro Vitalis, Francesco de Massiis, and Guglielmo Truelli, a canon of Auxerre, to get the cooperation of the commune and to extract the 80,000 florins from the heirs.!© On 7 April 1345 the pope repeated his instructions to secure the 80,000 florins, to

confiscate property if necessary, and to enforce these demands with ecclesiastical sanctions. !”

May and June were spent citing the heirs of the members of a com12. ASV, RA 76, 507v-8; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 113-15. 13. ASV, RA 76, 508v; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 115-16. 14. ASV, RA 76, 508v-23v; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 115-56—the records; ASV, RA 716, 524-24v, 519; English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 156-59, 145 — the letters from 1291. A list of the associates and their descendants on fol. 517v is transcribed in English, “Bonsignori,” pp. 143-45. Summaries of receipts and expenses can be found on fols. 520-23v or pp. 146-56, but no record of a balance has been found. 15. Clément VI, France, 1, no. 1138. 16. ASV, Coll. 431, 1-1v; Clément VI, France, 1, no. 1611. Coll. 431, 1-96v, preserves the correspondence for the second part of the process to obtain the 80,000 florins, including letters of citation, the defendants’ appointment of procurators, and the documents imposing excommunication on the members of the government of Siena and an interdict on the city on 18 November 1345 (fol. 96-96v). ASV, Coll. 383, 354-72v, is a copy of the first twenty-two folios of Coll. 431. 17. Clément VI, France, 1, no. 1620; ASV, Coll. 431, 1v-2. The judges also received

1'% florins a day for expenses to support themselves in Florence, from where they , now conducted the case: Clément VI, France, 1, no. 1622; see also Clément VI, nos. 653 and 654 (21 April 1345). 104

THE PAPAL INVESTIGATION

pany now defunct for more than thirty-five years. Little progress was made beyond citations, since the alleged heirs were uncooperative and

the commune refused to provide information on properties or tax evaluations, let alone help enforce confiscations. On 22 July 1345 the Consiglio Generale passed a resolution to appoint a committee of six to deal with the inquiry in Siena and to send two ambassadors, one lay and one clerical, to the papal court to demand the cessation of this ecclesiastical infringement of the commune’s jurisdiction.!® Eventually the patience of the pope was exhausted, so on 24 and 27 September 1345 he instructed his representatives to threaten the commune with full ecclesiastical penalties if it did not permit sequestration of property sufficient to cover the debts.!? The articles threatening excommunication and the interdict were presented to the government on 5 October 1345, along with a list of questions about the properties and the owners from whom the confiscations were due.” Continuing to support the accused heirs, who vehemently denied that they were heirs, the commune remained unmoved. On 18 November 1345 the threatened ecclesiastical sanctions were applied to the city and its government.7! Whether out of a desire to maintain its jurisdiction over bankruptcy proceedings involving its citizens and the church or because of the influence and connections of the descendants of the associates of the Gran Tavola, the commune of Siena was willing to resist the Holy See and to endure the penalties laid down by Clement. We know little of the effectiveness of these ecclesiastical sanctions, or of the events of the next twelve months, except that the papacy tried to enforce fully the measures taken against the town and that some local Franciscans refused to comply.”? Although Siena was not the vulnerable international financial center of the mid-thirteenth century, 18. CG 137, 5-6v (22 July 1345). 19. Clément VI, France, 2, no. 1996 (27 September 1345); ASV, Coll. 431, 35-36v. The latter document even lists the property sought by the Holy See. 20. ASV, Coll. 431, 37v-77v. 21. ASV, Coll. 431, 96-96v; Cron. sen. (Agnolo), p. 547; Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento,” p. 125. 22. Clément VI, France, 2, no. 2316 (14 February 1346), an order to Pietro Vitalis and Guglielmo Truelli to compel the Sienese to observe the sanctions. At the same time Clement sought further documents in Assisi on the old Bonsignori company and its heirs: Clément VI, France, 2, no. 2321. For the Franciscans see Clément VI, no. 867 (5 January 1346), no. 1256 (28 October 1346), and Clément VI, France, 2, no. 2916 (28 October 1346). The friars sought a legal opinion on their noncompliance from Griffolo of Montepulciano, who asserted that since the convent was outside the walls of the city, ecclesiastical services should be allowed to continue: DSF, 1 February 1346. 105

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the pressure of the papacy succeeded in forcing the commune to begin

to negotiate by electing ambassadors to the pope on 20 November 1346.23 On 3 December 1346 the ambassadors at the curia asserted the

impropriety of the interdict, suggesting at the same time that the city might cooperate with Clement VI’s policies and ambitions in the Patrimony of St. Peter. They claimed that Boniface VIII had excluded the interdict as a means of coercing the payment of debts. Blatantly lying by ignoring numerous taxation evaluations, they claimed that the rec- |

ords of the town contained little about the property of any of the heirs. After asserting that the papal inquiry had not spent enough time gathering information, they concluded with a polite request that the illegal and unnecessary sanctions be lifted.” Although the papal reaction to these proposals and objections is unclear, the regime in Siena decided to try to reach an accommodation with the Holy See on 7 March 1347.” The Consiglio Generale passed a motion, amended by Conterio di Goro Sansedoni, to elect secretly a commission of nine men to effect a settlement. It was to consist of three magnates, three men of middle rank, and three of a lower rank from each ferzo.26 On 25 April 1347 a composition, produced by the committee, was imposed on the descendants, in which each proportionally was to contribute over several years to a total of 16,000 florins. They were to pay according to the shares of their ancestors in the capital of the old company. Those considered responsible were named, and a committee of three descendants was appointed to oversee the distribution of financial responsibility.2”7 A chronicler, Agnolo di 23. CG 139, 41-42. It was to be a “secretam oratorum electionem”; no descendants of the Bonsignori or their former associates were to take part in the embassy; the ambassadors were to serve at the pleasure of the Consiglio Generale until the first of March 1346. 24. ASV, Instrumenta Miscellanea 1719b. There is a transcription in Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento,” pp. 140-42, also p. 125. The Consiglio Generale voted in favor of securing a truce with the papacy at about the same time: CG 139, 43v44v (25 November 1346). 25. CG 140, 21v-22. 26. CG 140, 22: “quod domini Nouem gubernatores comunis Senarum teneantur et debeant secreto eligere tres bonos et sufficientes viros de quolibet terzerio seu pro quolibet terzerio ciuitatis Senarum, unum virum de magnatibus, alterum de gente media, et reliquum de minoribus, qui eligendj prudenter simul secreto conueniant in loco secreto et prouideantur et prouidere debeant in predictis et circa dictam materiam ut els visum fuerit conuenire et prouis quas fecerint reducantur et reduci debeant infra otto dies . . . (Conterius domini Gori Sansedoni).” 27. CG 140, 30v-32v: “quod descendentes ex sotiis predictis conferant et conferre te- nantur et debeant pro omnibus et singulis expensis et sumptibus factis et que in posterum fierent pro obtinendis relaxatione et remotione dictarum sententiarum 106

THE PAPAL INVESTIGATION

Tura, asserts that the penalties were lifted that day, but we do not have any papal or communal document confirming this.28 In fact, the

sanctions were apparently still in effect in December of 1347, when the : Concistoro, the chief governing body of the city, had to respond to another letter of Pietro Vitalis seeking a composition with the heirs of the Bonsignori and their associates, who were temporarily now to pay only 15,000 florins over the next five years.2? Only then would the interdict be lifted. At the urging of Minuccio di Cione Maconi, the Nine decided on 30 December to elect yet another committee of two men

from each terzo to bring about a settlement and report back to the Concistoro.*" If the Bonsignori, their associates, and the commune itself were trying to delay or evade a settlement, they were succeeding very well. In July of 1348 Andrea de Tuderto replaced the late Pietro Vitalis and was given power to receive payments from the descendants and

, then lift any ecclesiastical sanctions in force.?! It seems that ecclesiastical sanctions remained on the city and its governors until late in 1348,

| even during the worst of the Black Death that summer. During the pestilence and its accompanying paralytic effect on government, the penalties only slowly overcame the jealousy of the commune for its jurisdiction and the influence of those responsible for the debts. In September of 1348 the Consiglio Generale again tried to bring about a settlement of the Bonsignori problem. A notary read in Italian the ordinances put forward by a committee to effect such a concord and thus lift the “unjust” excommunications and interdict on the regime and the city. Finally agreeing to the old settlement of April of 1347, the shrunken General Council voted 111 to 31 on 16 September in favor of the ordinances.** Six weeks later the Consiglio Generale gave soluere et conferre pro rata capitalium sotiorum olim dicte sotietatis et pro capitalibus que sotij predictorum descendentium dudum in dicta sotietate habuerunt. Ad quam conlationem faciendam dominus capitaneus guerre dictos descendentes pro rata dictorum capitalium cogere teneatur et debeat.” Giovanni Turre, Ciampolo Bonsignori, and Tommasso di Manfredi Ranucci were to distribute responsibility among the heirs, but instructions for or details of their distributions of liability have not come to light. It was approved by a 340 to 20 vote (fol. 32). 28. Cron. sen. (Agnolo), p. 551; Tommasi, Historie, 2, bk. 10, p. 306; Malavolti, Historia, 2, bk. 6, fol. 108. 29. ASS, Concistoro 2, 72-72v (29-30 December 1347). 30. ASS, Concistoro 2, 72. On 30 December they elected “Thomuccius Jacobi, Johannes Nicholinj, Buoristorus Dote, Andreas Ciecchi, Andreas Gheggi, et Guidus Frederighi” (fol. 72v). 31. Clément VI, no. 1681 (3 July 1348), no. 1706 (8 September 1348), no. 1989 (1 May 1349).

32. CG 143, I5v. 107

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its full approval to provisions ordering the officials of the government

to carry out fully the liquidation of enough properties to satisfy the Holy See.3? The officials were strictly limited, however, to enforcing payments on the descendants according to the shares of their ancestors in the original capital of the company. If anyone could not cover his allotted share, the others were proportionately responsible for the deficiency.*4 The principle of joint and unlimited liability was maintained again, but the liability of an individual investor or heir, although joint,

was related to his share or his ancestor’s share in the capital of the company. By 26 January 1356, 6,000 florins of the agreed reimbursement of 16,000 has been paid and acknowledged.*° Additional payments were expected in the late autumn of the same year.*° A partial absolution of the descendants and their procurators was sought on 29 March 1356.?’

Although we do not know the shares of the capital of the particular ~ company on which the allocation of liability was assessed, some indication of the ratio of partners and family members can be inferred by two notices of their shares in the 16,000 florins. The heirs of one partner were held responsible for paying back 516 florins, while Niccolo Novello di Filippo Bonsignori owed 2,711 florins.2* Members of the 33. CG 143, 30-31v (29 October 1348). 34. CG 143, 31. The officials were “compellere predictos obligatos et quemlibet eorum pro rata suorum capitalium et corum fideiussores et heredes et successores corum et cuiuscumque ipsorum ad deponendum ipsum pecunie quantitatem soluendam.” The motion passed by a 112 to 25 vote (fol. 31v). 35. DAG, 26 January 1356; ASV, Coll. 246, 88v-89, partially transcribed by Mario Chiaudano, “I Rothschild del Duecento,” pp. 125-26; Cron. sen. (Agnolo), p. 551. There is a detailed record of payments by individuals with their guarantors in DAG, 26 January 1356. The annual amount due the Holy See had also been changed to 1,000 florins in ten payments over ten years. 36. DAG, 28 November 1356; a subcollector was to receive the payments and make a report on their receipt by 1 January 1357. 37. DAG, 29 March 1356, contains a list of those appointing procurators to obtain absolution. 38. DR, 14 December 1349. Viviano and Manfredino di Balzetti then paid 119 florins to Andrea de Tuderto and promised to pay the rest of the 516 florins. A judge

| granted them possession of two pieces of land and a house from the estates of the , heirs and sons of a partner in the company. Niccold Novello had died by 12 November 1349, but the trustees of his estate had arranged for Giovanni d’Angnolino Salimbeni to pay Andrea de Tuderto what Niccolo owed the camera: DAG, 12 November 1349. The financial difficulties of the Bonsignori family forced members to try to protect their patrimonies. I have shown some of the maneuvers during this period in a study of testamentary practices and the use of wills as historical sources: “La prassi testamentaria delle famiglie nobili a Siena e nella Toscana del Tre- Quattrocento,” in J ceti dirigenti nella Toscana del Quattrocento, ed. Riccardo 108

THE PAPAL INVESTIGATION

Bonsignori family had to sell properties to cover their liabilities for the

company. Apparently not impoverished, Ciampolo d’Ugo was still | able to arrange the marriage of his daughter Agnese to a member of the prominent Saracini family and to promise a large dowry of 1,200 florins in 1357.39 The fulfillment of their obligations to the Holy See, nevertheless, could have furthered a redistribution of wealth within the Sienese elite and disrupted the balance of resources among magnate clans. Giovanni d’Angnolino Salimbeni paid the 2,711 florins owed to the papal collector and other debts of NiccolO Novello, in exchange for which he later occupied the castle of Montenero.” A committee from the Mercanzia then gave Giovanni title to the castle in return for a payment of 11,864 florins to the estate of Niccolo to cover his debts. The executors of NiccolO complained strongly that Montenero was worth far more. The castle fit well into the consolidation of properties south of the city being carried out by Giovanni and his family.*! In the second half of the fourteenth century Sienese politics were to be interlaced with the rivalries and ambitious policies of such magnate families as the Salimbeni. Even the partial impoverishment of the Bonsignori family and its associates made them less able to balance the ambitions of another magnate family. The career of the Gran Tavola of the Bonsignori came to an end with this postscript in the 1340s. Protective of its citizens and jurisdiction, the commune of Siena at first temporized, but it had to back down when Clement VI showed a strong determination to recover the money. To evade responsibility for the debts of their ancestors, the descendants of the Bonsignori family and their partners in the Gran Fubini (Florence, 1987), pp. 463-72; for the wills of Guglielmo d’Orlando and Niccolo Novello di Filippo Bonsignori see ASS, Particolari, Famiglie senesi, b.29 (Archivio generale, 4 June 1348) transcribed in English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp. 417-21, and DSF, 23 April 1348, in English, “Five Magnate Families,” pp.

406-12. |

39. For examples of the continued wealth of the Bonsignori family see DAG, 8 August 1349, 4 October 1350, and DR, 26 March 1351. For the marriage arrangements and other examples of the continued wealth of the family see DAG, 14 January 1358, 26 February 1361, and 27 July 1363. 40. DAG, 12 November 1349. Giovanni agreed to pay Niccold’s papal debt. The /fideicommisari of Niccolo had earlier difficulty disposing of his properties and executing his will because of questions on ownership of properties encumbered with debt: DAG, 8 August 1349. For the approval of the sale of Montenero and details of the problems of the estate of Niccolo Novello see DR, 26 March 1351. 41. The Tolomei had also obtained an important and strategic possession (Trequanda) from the bankruptcy of the Franzesi family almost forty years earlier: Bowsky, Medieval Italian Commune, pp. 253-54. 109

SIENESE BANKING

Tavola were willing to deny their descent. Papal pressure, however, finally forced them to accept obligations for debts contracted half a century earlier. Again, however, responsibility was, as far as the commune of Siena was willing to enforce it, to be joint but limited according to a ratio based on the investments of ancestors in a long bankrupt

company. ,

110

Conclusion

The ability to organize themselves into dynamic and adequately capitalized companies brought considerable success in the thirteenth century to Sienese merchants from magnate families. The expected application of the principle of joint and unlimited responsibility of company members for the debts of the firm and the additional security provided by the patrimonies of participating magnate families gave both customers and depositors enough confidence to trust these business entities. In union with partners from outside the family, the Bonsignori and, to a lesser extent, the Tolomei assembled the necessary capital, took advantage of the opportunities available in ecclesiastical bank-

ing, and protected carefully their papal links through mid-century crises in both international and local politics. The financial changes of the 1290s demonstrated the weaknesses of these companies, particularly their dependence on papal and princely patronage, the constant need for sound and innovative management, and their undercapitalization and lack of liquid resources. Eventually the company of the Bonsignori lost its sound reputation and internal cohesion, as the partners from outside the family publicly submitted a damaging petition for communal aid to gain time to stem a run on their assets. The Gran Tavola paid off many debts in the meantime, but probably quickly exhausted its available capital and that of its depositors. This expedient delayed a final reckoning until Philip IV of France demanded his deposits in 1307. The failure of the firm to reimburse him brought his wrath down on other Sienese merchants, who

were forced to cover the debts of the Bonsignori company. These badly damaged businessmen then commenced a complicated process over three years to force the commercial and political community of Siena, acting through the Mercanzia, to confiscate the assets of the partners in the Gran Tavola to cover damages. As Bowsky has observed, the Mercanzia followed a dilatory cursus fallimentare that included numerous embassies and commissions to ascertain the facts of the matter. These tactics eventually resulted, as he also noted, in adequate compensation, at least for those first in the hierarchy of creditors supported by the Mercanzia—Sienese citizens. Concomitant with these maneuvers, the commune weakened the principle of joint and unlimited liability by adopting a standard of joint liability in which each partner was limited according to the ratio of his investment in the 111

SIENESE BANKING

original company, thus greatly complicating collections from bankrupts or defaulters. A few years later, in 1312, the New Company of the Tolomei, along with the Old Company and several other firms built around Sienese magnate families, followed the Bonsignori’s pattern of organizational problems and flight from creditors in France and elsewhere. The resulting reprisals forced the commune to confront again the problems of bankrupt banking and commercial companies at whose cores were members of its most prominent families. From 1312 to 1319 the Mercanzia, again acting for the commune and regime of the Nine, carried out, or let happen, another long bankruptcy proceeding —that of the Tolomei. Added to these dilatory and unreassuring tactics, the principle of joint but proportional liability became established in Sienese

statutes. As was common in the law of the period, the dowries of wives remained safe from other creditors. Despite the preservation of the responsibility of agnatic descendants of debtors, creditors, if their

debtors defaulted or went bankrupt, encountered new difficulties in | Siena in collecting what they were owed. The cases of the companies of the Bonsignori and the Tolomei reveal just how difficult and long such recoveries could be. In the 1340s Pope Clement VI faced similar tactics and legal difficulties when he tried to collect money deposited with the firm fifty years earlier. Partners and heirs were still jointly responsible for debts but only according to the ratio of their initial investment in the Gran Tavola. Again the defense of property for reasons of dowry was in-

voked; and, as in the earlier bankruptcies, charges were made of , fraudulent concealment and transfers of assets to wives. The application of joint and unlimited responsibility to third parties was not restored in the 1340s, at least where a foreign creditor was concerned. The merchant community in Siena, or at least that part of it represented by the Mercanzia, was ready to accept, despite the strong reluctance displayed in the deliberations of the Consiglio Generale, a more abstract idea of a banking or commercial societas divided into shares

and whose participants were only responsible up to a certain point. The effects of this weakening of a generally accepted concept of liability are difficult to trace in the surviving sources of the first half of the fourteenth century. The relationship of third parties to these companies can only be partially reconstructed in the capital formation and

careers of the firms before 1320, and then mostly when they were struggling to collect their deposits or loans. Even less documentary evidence exists after that date; and within the context of these modifications in commercial law, little is indicated beyond the disappearance 112

CONCLUSION

of large societates built around magnate families and concerned with international business. The weakening of the principle of joint and unlimited liability, of course, did not affect the responsibilities of most debtors who had entered contracts as individuals and were thus fully liable. Those standing surety for the debts or pledges of others, likewise, do not seem to have had their obligations weakened. Tampering with the liability of partners in corporate bodies toward third parties affected primarily those actually forming the entity and then mostly

when business went so bad as to force bankruptcy. Depositors and customers in exchange contracts over periods of time cannot have found the situation reassuring for collecting their funds should problems arise. Proportional liability might encourage some investors, but depositors or clients would be deterred by the prospect of identifying and enforcing obligations on all those responsible in order to collect even a percentage of their funds. The merchants of the period, very conscious of fraud and evasion within an economic and institutional system weak in agencies of enforcement, no longer formed in Siena those societates that had served the Bonsignori and Tolomei so well in the thirteenth century. The commune’s response to only the consequences of the problems of the companies and not the causes did little to restore the confidence of businessmen whose mentality and usual technical organization demanded trustworthy reputations and honorable intent. The fiduciary aspects of business contracts and contacts in an age of arbitrary governments and unpredictable economic fluctuations had to be maintained. Yet the maintenance of honor and the good name of the family was not a strong enough motivating force to encourage these Sienese families to pay their debts. A reputation for economic solidarity had been valuable in the growing economy and society of the thirteenth century. On the other hand, financial difficulties brought, as we saw, a reluctance to admit one’s paternity, kinship, or partnership. The political influence necessary to avoid or minimize ruinous confiscations, however, must have required considerable joint action among one’s

kinsmen and friends. Family solidarity cannot be assumed to have been destroyed by the economic disasters that partially befell some members of these two magnate families. Much of the banking system of Siena collapsed between 1307 and 1319 as not just the Bonsignori and Tolomei firms failed, but also those built around the Malavolti, Squarcialupi, Forteguerri, and other magnate families. The merchants and bankers of Siena did not produce a second generation of companies in the early-fourteenth century

as the Florentines did. The mercantile community in charge of the 113

SIENESE BANKING

commune of Siena, while trying to protect its members and perhaps to improve the possibilities for forming banking and commercial companies by making the risk of partnership less, made it more hazardous for third parties to invest funds and thus assist in replacing the casualties of the economic changes of the early-fourteenth century. Besides these financial difficulties and institutional changes, Siena’s other disabilities worked against new companies taking the place of these bankrupt and liquidated firms. While much research remains to be done,

the economy of Siena probably became more a regional one with a comparatively weak industrial base in the cloth trade, difficult access to the sea, stronger financial competition from Florence and other Italian cities, and a geographical displacement arising from the papal court’s relocation from Rome to Perugia, and eventually to Avignon.

114

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125

BLANK PAGE

Index

Accarigi, Branca, 95n 26n, 33, 33n, 34, 55; members of the Alabanti, company (Florence), 72n society of, 38n

Alberti, Pietro de Meo, 95n Bonfigliuoli, Pietro, 61 Albizi, Manfredi di Matteo, 74 Bonichi, Neri, 77n

Albizi, Matteo, 56 Boniface VIII, pope, 36, 49, 61, 104, 106 Aldobrandeschi, 9, 31 Bonsignore di Bernardo, 9, 14 Aldobrandini, Aldobrando(ino), 42n, Bonsignori, family and company, 10, 12,

45n 18, 19, 24, 27, 30n, 38n, 46, 55, 64,

Alexander IV, pope, 13, 14, 18, 21, 28 64n, 77n, 94n, 111, 113; in England,

Ambrogio da Colle, 61 29, 41-43, 62-63; in France, 39-40, 43Ammanati, company (Pistoia), 60, 62 47, 69-75; in Genoa, 46; in Italy, 34,

Andrea de Tuderto, 107, 108n 47; in the Levant, 47; in Spain, 47-49;

Andrea di Jacobo, 33n members of, 14n, 25n, 35n, 36n, 48n, Andreas Ciecchi, 107n 73n; papal agents of, in Germany, 47. Andreas Gheggi, 107n See also Bonsignori, Orlando, society Angevins, 11, 34-36. See also Charles of of the sons of; Gran Tavola

Anjou Bonsignori, Bonifazio di Bonsignore, 12,

Anti-Hohenstaufen policy, 13 13, 17n

Aquileia, 48 Bonsignori, Bonsignore d’Orlando, 55, Arezzo, bishop of, 31 65n Avignon, 114 Bonsignori, Ciampolo d’Ugo, 107n, 109

| Bonsignori, Fazio d’Orlando, 33n, 35, 40, 55

Baglioni, Mino de Geri, 98, 98n Bonsignori, Guglielmo d’Orlando, 55, 56,

Balzetti, Manfredino di, 108n 65n, 109n

Balzetti, Viviano di, 108n Bonsignori, Niccolo di Bonifazio, 35, 40,

Bamberg, bishop of, 12n, 48 55, 56, 62, 85

Bandinelli, Nuccio, 47n Bonsignori, Niccolo Novello di Filippo, Bankruptcy, flight as presumption of, 108, 108n, 109, 109n; death of, 108n 64n, 69n; systemization of, 3n, 64-65, | Bonsignori, Orlando, society of the sons

78, 85, 96 of, 58. See also Bonsignori, family and Bardi, company (Florence), 42n, 50, 65, company 83, 98n, 103n; failure of, 75n, 102 Bonsignori, Orlando di Bonsignore, [1,

Bellimonti, Hugolino, 13 12n, 14, 17n, 22, 25, 33, 62; death of, Bellinzoni, Bartolomeo, 36 33-34; exile of, in Cortona, 33 Benevento, battle of, 27 Bonsignori, Ugo d’Orlando, 55, 56 Berignone, Corrado, 31, 36n, 57, 58 Bonsignoris, Minus, 65n

Berignone, Fazio, 67n Bonsignoris, Signorinus, 65n Bernardino di Prosperino, 26n Bramanzoni, Jacobo, 63

Bindi, Bindo, 97 Bramanzoni, Roffredo, 45 Bonaccorsi, Ranieri, 45n Bucci, Capucino, 13

Bonaventura di Bernardino, 13, 25, 26, Bullion control (England), 43, 47, 62 127

INDEX

Buoristorus Dote, 107n Eleanor, of Castile, wife of Edward I, |

Burgundy, duke of, 34n 42n

Eleanor, queen, wife of Henry III, 29

Capua, 47n 62

Capitani, Vannes, 94, 95 English crown, monetar:’ policies of, 43,

Casale, 17n, 99n

Cerchi, company (Florence), 62, 65, 72n,

73 Fairs, of Bar-sur-Aube, 44; of Cham-

Charles of Anjou (Charles I, king of pagne, 12, 27-28, 30-31, 44, 50, 82-83;

Sicily), 18, 25-27, 29-30, 32-35 of Lagny, 44; of Provins, 44; of

Charles of Salerno, 38 Troyes, 44

Chiarenti, family (Pistoia), 62 Ferrara, 47n

Chigi, Meo, 66 Flanders, 28

Chiusdino, 17n, 97n Florence, 20, 32, 50, 73, 83; merchants of,

Cino di Pietro, 30 31, 37, 37n, 49-50, 65, 67n, 79 Cinus Vgonis, 77n Forteguerri, family and company, 76, 79, Cione di Filippo, 77 90, 92n, 93, 99, 113

Circuli, company (Florence), 72n Forteguerri, Pietro, 68n

Cividale del Friuli, 47n Foulcroi, Gui. See Clement IV Clarenti, company (Pistoia), 38n Francesco de Massiis, bishop of Aqui-

Clariti, Andrea, 36 lonia, 103-4 —

32n, 35, 37, 44 34 .

Clement IV, pope, 18, 24-25, 27n, 32, Francesco di Guido, 25-26, 26n, 33, 33n,

Clement V, pope, 63, 102 Francesco di Jacobo, 82 Clement VI, pope, 61, 102-3, 112 Franzesi, Albizzo (“Biche”), 69n Cluny, abbot of, 61. See also William Franzesi, company, 102n, 109n Colle di Valdelsa, battle of, 32 Franzesi, Musciatto (“Mouche”), 69n

Cologne, bishop of, 48 Fraud and good faith, 4, 4n, 39, 55, 64,

Colonnese, 62 | 79, 84, 113

Conrad (Hohenstaufen), 18 Frederick II, emperor, 16, 20 Conradin (Hohenstaufen), 27, 31-32 Frederick of Antioch (Hohenstaufen), 16

Cortona, 33, 80 Frescobaldi, company (Florence), 43, Crescenzi, Andrea di Mengo, 90n, 91n, 47n, 50 92

Crusading tenth (England), 37

Gallerani, Ciampolo di Jacobo, 59, 68n Gallerani, family and company, 79, 90,

De Balzis (Del Balzo), Manfredi di Ra- 90n, 94, 99

nuccio, 57, 67n, 88 Genoa, 45-46, 47n, 83, 88, 102; merDelmantellato, Renaldo, 36 chants of, 65, 67n

Detauiue, Bardus, 70 Gerfalco, 17n

Detisalui, Bindo, 58, 58n Ghibellines, 19-20, 22, 62, 85; in FlorDeutaviva di Benello, 48 ence, 20; in Pisa, 34; in Siena, 87. See

Dino di Bando, 95 also Henry VII

Doni, Federigo, 28, 29n, 30 Gran Tavola, 40, 60, 76n, 78, 86n,

128 )

Dowries and liability, 65n, 67, 67n, 72- 87, 105, 111. See also Bonsignori, fam-

73, 78, 112 ily and company

Gregorii, Guccio, 89, 90n |

Gregory IX, pope, 12

Edward I, king of England, 43, 62 Gregory X, pope, 11, 35, 38

INDEX

Gregory, patriarch of Aquileia, 48 Malavuiti, Mino Prete di Guido, 65n Griffolo of Montepulciano, 105n Malavolti, Niccolo, 61n

Grosseto, 9 Malavolti, Orlando di Bartolomeo, 33n Guelfs, 19-20, 22-24, 62 Malavolti, Uguccione, 60 Guidi, Bartolomeo, 13 Manente d’Uguccione, 10

Guido d’Alamanno, 26n Manfred (Hohenstaufen), 18, 20n, 21,

Guidone di Giunta, 33 23-25, 27

Guidus Frederighi, 107n Manfredi di Bonaventura, 56, 67n

Guiffoli, Agnolo, 90n Marci, Bartolomeo, 35n

Guy, count of Flanders, 48 Margaret, countess of Flanders, 48 Martin IV, pope, 36-38, 48, 48n. See also Simon of Brie

Henry III, king of England, 28n, 42,42n Martinello di Rubeo, 48

Henry VII, emperor, 85-88, 99 Marzi, Bonaventura di Bartolomeo, 74 Hohenstaufen, family, 13, 20, 36 Massa, bishop of, 16n

Honorius IV, pope, 36-37, 44 Massa Marittima, 18n

Meo di Tederigho, 98n Meo di Tigo di Leo, 95n

Ildebrandini, Bindo di Bindo, 83 Mercanzia (Merchant Guild), 56n, 60, Ildebrandini, Giovanni di Bindo, 83 65-66, 68, 71-72, 74-75, 83, 87, 89, 91, Innocent IV, pope, 12-13, 16n, 17, 18 101n, 109, 111-12 Merchants, Cortonese, 80; Florentine, 31, 37, 37n, 49-50, 65, 67n, 79; Genoese,

Jacobo da Montecerconi, 61 65, 67n; Luccan, 29n, 37; Parmesan,

Jacobo di Napoleone, 67n 28

Jacobo di Romeo, 48 Meus Jacobi Gilij, 65n

Jacobo d’Uguccione, 60 Mignanelli, Mino di Manno, 74

Johannes Nicolinj, 107n Milan, 68 John XXI, pope, 35 Montalcino, 93n, 97n

John XXII, pope, 102 Montanini, Geri, 58, 67n, 87 Montaperti, battle of, 21 Monteauto sul Montemaggio (Monte

. . Bosco), 29n

Lando di Fazio, 33 Monteciriota, 17n Landus Mannj, 77n Montenero, 109n

Languiselli, Bernardo, 31 Montepulciano, 97n

| Leccacorvo bank (Genoa), 46 | Monticelli, 17n

Liability, 2, 55-56, 59, 64, 69n, 72-13, Montieri, 16, 16n, 17, 17n; mining at,

78, 89, 95-97, 99, 101, 111-12; of heirs, 16-18 101-2, 105, 109 Mozzi, company (Florence), 37, 50, 60,

Luca de Sabella, 68n 62, 65, 73 Luca di Bonsignore, 30 Lucca, 21, 24, 83; merchants of, 29n, 37

Naples, 68 New Company (Tolomei). See Tolomei,

Maconi, Minuccio di Cione, 107 family and company Malavolti, family and company, 22, 71, New firms, emergence of, 31, 49 76, 79, 90, 90n, 92n, 93, 95n, 99, 99n, Nicholas III, pope, 36, 44, 102

113 Nicholas IV, pope, 36, 38, 44, 48, 62, 102

Malavolti, Meo d’Orlando, 67n Nicholas de Anagnia, 13

129

INDEX Old Company (Tolomei). See Tolomei, Ranieri, bishop-elect of Volterra, 16-18

family and company Ranieri di Jacobo, 25-26, 55

Orsini, family, 68 Ranucci, Masso, 77n ,

Orsini, Giovanni. See Nicholas III Ranucci, Tommasso di Manfredi, 107n

Orsini, Matteo di Rinaldo, 67n Ranuccini, Jacobo, 33n

Orvieto, 31 Ranuccini, Mino di Neri di Jacobo, 67n Restauro (Ristoro) di Giunta, 33

Pagnus Giliocti, 65n Riccardi, company (Lucca), 36n, 38n, Pandolfo de Sabello, 67n, 68 39n, 42-43, 47n, 58, 60, 62

IV Roffredo di Ranieri, 48

Pantaleon, Jacques, of Troyes. See Urban Rimbertini, company (Florence), 36-37

Parma, merchants of, 28 Rome, 68, 114

Pazzi, company (Florence), 65 Russell, John, 63 , Perugia, 39, 114 Peruzzi, company (Florence), 75, 83-84, | Sachetti, Duccio, 60

98n, 102, 103n; failure of, 75n Salimbeni, Benuccio di Benuccio, 66, 94

Peruzzi, Verde di Ranieri, 84 Salimbeni, family, 20, 20n, 22-25, 30n, Peter of Spain. See John XXI 66, 95n, 99, 99n, 100n; palace of, 22 Philip Ill, king of France, 46-47 Salimbeni, Giovanni d’Angnolino, 108n, Philip IV, king of France, 39-40, 49, 109

63n, 69-72, 111 Salimbeni, Notto di Salimbene, 24

100 Salt, 9

Piccolomini, Arrigo di Ranieri, 92n Salimbeni, Salimbene di Ranieri, 22 Piccolomini, family, 9, 22-25, 99, 99n, Salimbeni, Sozzo, 61n Piccolomini, Guglielmo di Guglielmo, 86, Salvani, Currado di Forta, 74

88-89, 89n, 91, 92n, 93 Salvani, Provenzano, 22

Piccolomini, Meo di Bartolomeo, 85-86 Salzburg, bishop of, 48

Piccolomini, Naddo, 61n Sansedoni, Conterio di Goro, 106 Piccolomini, Neri di Gabriello, 77n, 92n, Saracini, Agnese, 109

93n Saracini, Cino di Ghino, 65n, 95n

Piccolomini, Niccolo di Ranieri, 24n Saracini, family, 109 Piccolomini, Ranieri di Rustichino, 47 Saracini, Pietro di Duccio, 98n

Piccolomini, Ranieri di Turchio, 24, 24n Scala, company (Florence), 26n Piccolomini, Salamone di Guglielmo, 68, Scotti, company, 16, 35, 46

80n Sicilian Vespers, 36

Pietro di Saladino, 82 Siena, commune of, 9, 18, 19, 29, 31, 33,

Pisa, 34, 47n, 83, 97 104-5; bishop of, 13n, 17, 28; excom-

Pistoia, 62 munication and interdict of, 104-10;

Pius II, pope, 100 regime of the Sixty (Sessanta) in, 32;

Poggibonsi, battle of, 32 regime of the Thirty-Six in, 33; regime

Prata, 17n of the Twenty-Four in, 19; church of

Prosperini, Bernardo, 42n San Domenico in, 103

Provence, 38, 83 Silver, coinage of in Genoa, 46; mining Provenzani, Ciolo, 80, 89, 90n and production of, 15-16; and Bon- : Pulci, company (Florence), 37 | signori and Tolomei companies, 17-18 Pulci-Rimbertini, company (Florence), Simon of Brie, 25, 26n, 37. See also

38n, 39n, 42n, 47n, 60 © Martin IV

Spinelli, Vannes, 93n Spini, company (Florence), 39n, 47n, 50,

Radicofani, 23-24 62 130

INDEX

Spizerii, Niccoluccio di Jacobo, 90n Tolomei, Lotterengo d’Uguccione, 15 Squarcialupi, company, 76, 79, 93, 99, Tolomei, Meo d’Incontrato, 24, 24n

113 Tolomei, Meo di Nigio, 98

St.-Etienne in Troyes, dean of, 15 Tolomei, Meo di Pietro, 24n

St. Gall, abbot of, 12n Tolomei, Meo di Rinaldo, 24, 24n, 29n St.-Germain-des-Prés, abbot of, 45 Tolomei, Mino di Meo (Tavena), 81, 84,

St.-Martin in Troyes, abbot of, 13, 15 87 Tolomei, Mino di Simone, 82n Tolomei, Mino di Stricca, 82n

Templars, 10 Tolomei, Nello di Mino, 81, 88, 89n, 93-

Terio Prioris, 61 94 Theobald of Champagne, 28 Tolomei, Nigio d’Ildebrandino, 81, 82n,

Therouane, bishop of, 13 98 Thibault, count of Champagne, 44 Tolomei, Orlando di Baldistricca, 28, 81, Thomuccius Jacobi, 107n 82 Tigolei, Meo di, 95n Tolomei, Pietro di Cristoforo, 24, 24n, Tizio, Sigismondo, 55 28, 29n

Todini, Benvenuto, d’Ancona, 89 Tolomei, Regolino di Pietro, 24n |

Tofano di Bonsignore, 30 Tolomei, Rinaldo di Jacobo, 12, 15, 17, | Tolomei, Andrea di Cristoforo, 15n, 28, 81

29n, 30, 82n Tolomei, Tavena di Deo, 65n, 67, 67n,

Tolomei, Bartolomeo di Cristoforo, 17n 68n Tolomei, Bartolomeo di Pietro, 15n Tolomei, Tolomeo, descendants of, 80n,

Tolomei, Bindino di Nigio, 98 81

Tolomei, Cione di Pietro, 81, 82n Tolomei, Tolomeo de Platea, 10, 81 Tolomei, Cristoforo di Tolomeo, 12, 17, roomes Tolomeo di Jacobo, 15, 28, 30,

28n Tolomei, family and company, 9-10, 14, Tolomei, Tolomeo di Rinaldo, 28n, 30 18-19, 22-25, 30, 40, 46, 64, 64n, 66, Tolomei family, church of San Cristoforo 71, 76, 79, 82n, 83-84, 88, 89n, 92n, of, 15; genealogy of, 81; palace of, 29 95n, 109n, 111, 113; failure of, 73; liqg- | Tolomeo di Manente, 45 uidation of assets of, 96; members of, | Tosetto di Ajuto, 48 15n, 82n, 97n; New Society or Com- —_—‘ Tosi, Guccio, 90n

pany of, 82, 84, 84n, 87, 88, 90n, 93, | Toulouse, count of, 13 96, 98, 99; Old Company of, or society Transfers of remittances, 10, 15-16, 40,

93, 94n Travale, 17n | of the sons of Jacobo, 79-83, 90n, 91, 49

Tolomei, Federigo di Rinaldo, 60, 65, Trier, 48

65n, 66, 68, 68n, 70-71, 75n, 76, 81, Troyes, cantor of, 13. See also St.-Etienne

82n in Troyes, St.-Martin in Troyes

Tolomei, Francesco d’Andrea, 81, 83 Truelli, Guglielmo, canon of Auxerre,

Tolomei, Francesco di Sozzo, 80n 104, 105n Tolomei, Galgano di Nigio, 98 Tuccij, Naddino, 87, 93 Tolomei, Giovanni di Stricca, 81, 82n Turre, Giovanni, 107n Tolomei, Guglielmo di Rinaldo, 29n Tyre, archbishop of, 35 Tolomei, Jacobo (della Piazza), company

of the sons of, 79-83, 90n, 91, 93, 94n .

Tolomei, Jacobo d’Andrea, 87 Ugolini, Pietro, 46n

Tolomei, Jacobo di Rinaldo, 28n, 81 Ugurgeri, Nigio di Ranieri, 77n Tolomei, Jacobo di Tolomeo, 12, 17 Ugurgieri, Ceccho di Meo Mellone, 98n 131

INDEX

Urban IV, pope, 18, 21-22, 23n, 28, 44; 104, 105n, 107 death of, 24; economic pressure from, Volterra, bishop of, 16, 16n, 18, 18n. See

27 also Ranieri, bishop-elect of Volterra

Usury, 16n ,

Water, lack of, for industrial develop-

Vanne di Guido, 82 ment, 50 Venice, 47 William, abbot of Cluny, 14 Vignari, Viva di Viviano di Guglielmo, 60 Wool, 41n, 49 Visconti, Tebaldo, of Piacenza. See Gregory X Vitalis, Pietro, primicerius of Lucca, 102, Zagreb, 48

132