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{{short description|European commune in the Middle Ages}}
{{more footnotes needed|date=June 2013}}
[[File:San Gimignano (1).jpg|thumb|right|
Defensive towers at [[San Gimignano]], [[Tuscany]], bear witness to the factional strife within communes.]]
'''Medieval communes''' in the [[Europe]]an [[Middle Ages]] had sworn allegiances of mutual defense (both physical defense and of traditional freedoms) among the citizens of a town or city. These took many forms and varied widely in organization and makeup.

Communes are first recorded in the late 11th and early 12th centuries, thereafter becoming a widespread phenomenon. They had greater development in central-northern [[Italy in the Middle Ages|Italy]], where they became [[city-state]]s based on partial [[democracy]].<ref>{{cite book |first=G. |last=Benvenuti |title=Le Repubbliche Marinare. Amalfi, Pisa, Genova, Venezia |language=it |trans-title=The Maritime Republics. Amalfi, Pisa, Genoa, Venice |publisher=Newton & Compton editori |location=Rome |date=1989}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |first=Armando |last=Lodolini |title=Le repubbliche del mare |language=it |trans-title=The republics of the sea |location=Roma |publisher=Biblioteca di storia patria |date=1967}}</ref> At the same time in [[Holy Roman Empire|Germany]] they became [[free imperial city|free cities]], independent from local nobility.

== Etymology ==
The English and French word "commune" ({{langx|it|comune}}) appears in Latin records in various forms. They come from [[Medieval Latin]] {{lang|la|communia}}, plural form of {{lang|la|commune}} (that which is common, community, state), substantive noun from {{lang|la|communis}} (common). Ultimately, the [[Proto-Indo-European]] root is ''*mey-'' (to change, exchange).

When autonomy was won through violent uprising and overthrow, the commune was often called {{lang|la|conspiratio}} (a conspiracy) ({{langx|it|cospirazione}}).

== Origins ==
During the 10th century in several parts of [[Western Europe]], [[peasants]] began to gravitate towards walled population centers, as advances in agriculture (the [[three-field system]]) resulted in greater productivity and intense competition. In [[central Italy|central]] and [[northern Italy]], and in [[Provence]] and [[Septimania]], most of the old Roman cities had survived—even if grass grew in their streets—largely as administrative centers for a [[diocese]] or for the local representative of a distant kingly or imperial power. In the [[Low Countries]], some new towns were founded upon long-distance trade,<ref>{{cite book |first=Henri |last=Pirenne |author-link=Henri Pirenne |title=Medieval Cities: Their Origins and the Revival of Trade |date=1927}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |first=Henri |last=Pirenne |author-link=Henri Pirenne |title=Mohammed and Charlemagne |date=1937}}</ref> where the staple was the woolen cloth-making industry. The sites for these ''[[ab ovo]]'' towns, more often than not, were the fortified ''[[burgh]]s'' of counts, bishops or territorial abbots. Such towns were also founded in the [[Rhineland]]. Other towns were simply market villages, local centers of exchange.

Such townspeople needed physical protection from lawless [[nobles]] and bandits, part of the motivation for gathering behind communal walls, but also strove to establish their ''liberties'', the freedom to conduct and regulate their own affairs and security from arbitrary taxation and harassment from the bishop, abbot, or count in whose jurisdiction these obscure and ignoble social outsiders lay. This was a long process of struggling to obtain [[Municipal charter|charters]] that guaranteed such basics as the right to hold a market. Such charters were often purchased at exorbitant rates, or granted, not by the local power, but by a king or by the [[emperor]], who came to hope to enlist the towns as allies in order to centralize power.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0qiYM2_HhJgC&q=Cantor,+Norman+E.+1993.+The+Civilization+of+the+Middle+Ages+(New+York:+HarperCollins) |title=The Civilization of the Middle Ages |last=Cantor |first=Norman F. |author-link=Norman Cantor |date=1994-06-03 |publisher=[[HarperCollins]] |isbn=9780060925536 |page=231 |language=en |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref>

The [[walled city]] provided protection from direct assault at the price of corporate interference on the pettiest levels, but once a townsman left the city walls, he (for women scarcely travelled) was at the mercy of often violent and lawless nobles in the countryside. Because much of medieval Europe lacked central authority to provide protection, each city had to provide its own protection for citizens - both inside the city walls, and outside. Thus towns formed communes which were a legal basis for turning the cities into self-governing corporations. In most cases the development of communes was connected with that of the cities. However, there were rural communes, notably in France and England, that formed to protect the common interests of villagers. At their heart, communes were sworn allegiances of mutual defense. When a commune formed, all participating members gathered and swore an oath in a public ceremony, promising to defend each other in times of trouble, and to maintain the peace within the city proper.

The commune movement started in the 10th century, with a few earlier ones like [[Forlì]] (possibly 889), and gained strength in the 11th century in northern [[Italy]], which had the most urbanized population of Europe at the time. It then spread in the early 12th century to [[France]], [[Germany]], [[Spain]] and elsewhere. The English state was already very centralized, so the communal movement mainly manifested itself in parishes, craftsmen's and merchants' [[guild]]s and monasteries. State officialdom expanded in England and France from the 12th century onwards, while the [[Holy Roman Empire]] was ruled by communal coalitions of cities, knights, farmer republics, prince-bishops and the large domains of the imperial lords. In eastern Europe, the splintering of [[Kievan Rus']] allowed the formation of [[veche]] communes like the [[Novgorod Republic]]<ref>{{cite book |last1=Lukin |first1=Pavel V. |chapter=Novgorod: trade, politics and mentalities in the time of independence |editor1-last=Blockmans |editor1-first=Wim |editor1-link=Wim Blockmans |editor2-last=Krom |editor2-first=Mikhail |editor2-link=:ru:Кром, Михаил Маркович |editor3-last=Wubs-Mrozewicz |editor3-first=Justyna |title=The Routledge Handbook of Maritime Trade Around Europe 1300-1600: Commercial Networks and Urban Autonomy |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WiglDwAAQBAJ |series=Routledge History Handbooks |location=London |publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]] |date=2017 |page=305 |isbn=9781315278568 |access-date=2018-04-17 |quote=[...] West European contemporaries, being quite familiar with the particularities of the Novgorod political system, recognized it as an urban commune, a community, and described it in the same terms that they applied to their own (Burgundian or northern German) city communities. |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref> (1136-1478) and the [[Pskov Republic]]<ref>{{cite book |last1=Voivin |first1=Alexei |last2=Krom |first2=Mikhail |author2-link=:ru:Кром, Михаил Маркович |chapter=The city of Pskov in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries: Baltic trade and institutional growth |editor1-last=Blockmans |editor1-first=Wim |editor1-link=Wim Blockmans |editor2-last=Krom |editor2-first=Mikhail |editor2-link=:ru:Кром, Михаил Маркович |editor3-last=Wubs-Mrozewicz |editor3-first=Justyna |title=The Routledge Handbook of Maritime Trade Around Europe 1300-1600: Commercial Networks and Urban Autonomy |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WiglDwAAQBAJ |series=Routledge History Handbooks |location=London |publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]] |date=2017 |page=319 |isbn=9781315278568 |access-date=2018-04-17 |quote=The merchants of Pskov and Novgorod, as well as their partners from Livonian cities, formed the local communes of sworn brothers, who were responsible for their brethren's deeds. [...] Pskov had some other pre-conditions for becoming a commune (a central power vacuum, parish organization, etc.) but it is likely that trade relations favoured its communal structure as well. |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref>
(1348-1510).

One in four urban communities in France were under the administration of mayors and {{lang|fr|échevins}} (Northern France) or consuls and {{lang|fr|jurats}} (Southern France) by 1300, and this number increased rapidly in the next 2 centuries due to the financial demands of city wall-building. Many were granted the rights to assembly, and executive power was often concentrated in one elected official, the mayor or first consul, with an advisory body of {{lang|fr|conseils}}. Election was often restricted to the wealthy local merchant elite.<ref>{{cite book |first1=Graeme |last1=Small |title=Late Medieval France |date=2009 |publisher=Macmillan International Higher Education |isbn=978-1137102157 |pages=185–192}}</ref>

In medieval Spain, urban communities were self-governing through their {{lang|es|concejo abierto}} or open council of property-owners. The larger towns delegated authority to {{lang|es|regidores}} (town councillors) and {{lang|es|alcaldes}} (law officers), who managed the town and the surrounding lands as one ''communidad''. After the Middle Ages, selection of officials was changed from election to sortition, in order to resolve factional conflict.<ref name="Kamen">{{cite book |first1=Henry |last1=Kamen |author-link=Henry Kamen |title=Spain, 1469-1714: A Society of Conflict |date=2005 |publisher=[[Longman|Pearson/Longman]] |isbn=0582784646 |edition=illustrated}}</ref>{{rp|24–26}} In Cantabria, seafaring towns led by [[Burgos]] formed the {{lang|es|Hermandad de las Marismas}} (Marsh brotherhood), an organisation similar to the [[Hanseatic league]]. In the 1470s the {{lang|es|Santa Hermandad}} or Holy Brotherhood was formed, in which all municipalities sent representatives to a {{lang|es|junta general}} which would coordinate law enforcement to protect trade.<ref name="Kamen"/>{{rp|14, 19}}

== Social order ==
{{Integralism}}
According to [[Adalberon (bishop of Laon)|Adalberon]], society was composed of the [[Estates of the realm|three orders]]: those who fight (the nobles), those who pray (the clergy), and those who work (the peasants). In theory, this was a balance between spiritual and secular peers, with the third order providing labour for the other two. The urban communes were a break in this order. The Church and King both had mixed reactions to communes. On the one hand, they agreed safety and protection from lawless nobles was in everyone's best interest. The commune's intention was to keep the peace through the threat of revenge, and the Church was sympathetic to the end result of peace.

However, the Church had its own ways to enforce peace, such as the [[Peace and Truce of God]] movement, for example. Some communes disrupted the order of medieval society in that the methods the commune used, [[eye for an eye]], violence begets violence, were generally not acceptable to Church or King. There was an idea among some that communes threatened the medieval social order. Only the noble lords were allowed by custom to fight, and ostensibly the merchant townspeople were workers, not warriors. As such, the nobility and the clergy sometimes accepted communes, but other times did not. One of the most famous cases of a commune being suppressed and the resulting defiant urban revolt occurred in the French town of [[Laon]] in 1112.<ref>{{cite book |author-link=Frank Barlow (historian) |first=Frank |last=Barlow |title=The Feudal Kingdom of England 1042-1216 |edition=4th |date=1988 |page=261}}</ref>

== Rural communes ==
{{main|Peasant republic}}
The development of medieval rural communes arose more from a need to collaborate to manage the commons than out of defensive needs. In times of a weak central government, communes typically formed to ensure the safety on the roads through their territory to enable commerce ([[Landfrieden]]). One of the more successful of these medieval communities was the one in the alpine valleys north of the [[Gotthard Pass]]. This later resulted in the formation of the [[Old Swiss Confederacy]]. The Swiss had numerous written acts of alliance: for each new canton that joined the confederacy, a new contract was written.

Besides the Swiss {{lang|de|[[Eidgenossenschaft]]}}, there were similar rural alpine communes in [[County of Tyrol]], but these were destroyed by the [[House of Habsburg]]. Other such rural communes developed in the [[Graubünden]], in the French Alps ([[Republic of the Escartons]] or Briançonnais), in the [[Pyrenees]], in northern France ([[Roumare]]), in northern Germany ([[Frisia]] and [[Dithmarschen]]), and also in Sweden and Norway. The colonization of the [[Walser]] also is related.

Pyrenean villages such as [[Vicdessos]], in common with many other montane communities, enjoyed far greater liberties than those enjoyed in the north of France. The Counts of Foix granted these villages charters recognising their right to governance and both civil and criminal justice administered by their own consuls, and exemption from fees on the use of forests, waters, mines, pastures, mountains, meadows and tolls on trading with other villages. They even successfully won their case against payment of taxes to King [[Philip IV of France]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=John Victor Drendel, Kathryn Reyerson |title=Urban and Rural Communities in Medieval France Provence and Languedoc, 1000-1500 |date=1998 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=9789004108509 |pages=188–190}}</ref> The [[Vallée d'Aspe]] was another medieval Pyrenean republic, based in [[Accous]] and under the suzerainty of the Viscounts of Bearn.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Findlay Muirhead, Marcel Monmarché |title=Southern France |date=1926 |publisher=Macmillan & Company Limited |pages=398}}</ref> The rights of the republic was confirmed by King Louis XIII when he united Bearn to France.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Count Henry Russel |title=Pau and the Pyrenees |date=2023 |publisher=Books on Demand |isbn=9783382163860 |page=68}}</ref> These communities thrived in natural isolation and lack of seigneurial interest in interference, particularly in the Western Pyrenees such as the Vallée d'Aspe (governed by their own ''jurats''), [[Ossau Valley|Vallée d'Ossau]], as well as the independent legislative assemblies in the Valley of [[Cauterets]], or the Vallée d'Azun. These communities, called ''beziau'', signed treaties with other villages generally meant to govern access to pastures.<ref>{{cite book |last1=J. B. Bury |last2=J. R. Tanner |last3=C. W. Previté-Orton |last4=Z. N. Brooke |title=The Cambridge Medieval History - Vol. 5 ; Contest of Empire and Papacy |date=1926 |publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=9780521045377 |pages=654–655}}</ref>

Some Southern-European medieval communes were influenced by the Italian precedent, but many northern ones (and even the Swiss communes north of Gotthard Pass) may well have developed concurrently and independently from the Italian ones. Only a few of these medieval rural communes ever attained [[imperial immediacy]], where they would have been subject only to the king or emperor; most still remained subjects of some more or less distant [[Homage (feudal)|liege]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Im Hof |first=Ulrich |author-link=:de:Ulrich Im Hof |title=Geschichte der Schweiz |trans-title=History of Switzerland |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6ngVpSXg8ZIC&pg=PA153 |page=153 |year=2007 |publisher=[[Kohlhammer Verlag]] |isbn=978-3-17-019912-5 |via=[[Google Books]]}}</ref>

== Evolution in Italy and decline in Europe ==
[[File:BattagliaLegnano.jpg|thumb|right|The defence of the [[Carroccio]] during the [[battle of Legnano]] (1176) by [[Amos Cassioli]] (1832–1891)]]

During the 11th century in northern Italy a new political and social structure emerged. In most places where communes arose (e.g. [[France]], [[United Kingdom|Britain]] and [[Flanders]]), they were absorbed by monarchical states. But in northern and central Italy, some medieval communes developed into independent and powerful [[Italian city-states|city-states]].

The breakaway from their feudal overlords by these communes occurred in the late 12th century and 13th century, during the [[Investiture Controversy]] between the Pope and the [[Holy Roman Emperor]]. [[Milan]] led the [[Lombard League|Lombard cities]] against the Holy Roman Emperors and defeated them, gaining independence ([[battle of Legnano|battles of Legnano]], 1176, and [[battle of Parma|Parma]], 1248). Meanwhile, the republics of [[Republic of Venice|Venice]], [[republic of Pisa|Pisa]] and [[Republic of Genoa|Genoa]] were able to conquer their [[Thalassocracy|naval empires]] on the Mediterranean sea (in 1204 Venice conquered three-eights of the Byzantine Empire in the [[Fourth Crusade]]). Cities such as Florence, [[Parma]], [[Ferrara]], [[Verona]], [[Padua]], [[Lucca]], [[Siena]], [[Mantua]] and others were able to create stable states at the expenses of their neighbors, some of which lasted until modern times. In [[southern Italy]], which then formed the [[Kingdom of Sicily]], autonomous communes were rarer, [[Republic of Sassari]] in Sardinia being one example.<ref name="Dizionario1615">{{Cite book|title=Sardinian Historical Dictionary|page= 1615}}{{full citation needed|date=October 2023}}</ref>

In the [[Holy Roman Empire]], the [[Holy Roman Emperor|emperors]] always had to face struggles with other powerful players: the land princes on the one hand, but also the cities and communes on the other hand. The emperors thus invariably fought political (not always military) battles to strengthen their position and that of the imperial monarchy. In the [[Golden Bull of 1356]], emperor [[Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor|Charles IV]] outlawed any {{lang|la|conjurationes, confederationes}}, and {{lang|la|conspirationes}}, meaning in particular the [[league of towns|leagues of towns]] but also the rural communal leagues that had sprung up. Most leagues of towns were subsequently dissolved, sometimes forcibly, and where refounded, their political influence was much reduced. Nevertheless, some of these communes (as [[Frankfurt]], [[Nuremberg]], [[Hamburg]]) were able to survive in Germany for centuries and became almost independent city-state vassals to the Holy Roman Emperors (see [[Free imperial city]]).

== Examples ==
Listed alphabetically by the name of the modern states where possible.

===Austria===
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of Bregenz.gif
}} [[Bregenz Forest|Bregenz]]

=== Croatia ===
* {{Flagicon image|St. Blaise - National Flag of the Ragusan Republic.svg}} [[Republic of Ragusa|Ragusa]]
* {{Flagicon image|Coat of Arms of Republic of Poljica.svg}} [[Republic of Poljica|Poljica]]

=== France ===
*[[Republic of the Escartons]]

===Germany===
* {{Flagicon image|DEU Butjadingen COA.svg}} [[Butjadingen]]
* {{Flagicon image|DEU Stadland COA.svg}} [[Stadland]]
* {{Flagicon image|Wappen landhadeln.jpg}} [[Land Hadeln]]
* {{Flagicon image|DEU Berching COA.svg}} [[Berching]]
* [[Stedingen]]
* [[Kehdingen]]
* {{Flagicon image|Hanseatenwimpel.svg}} [[Hanseatic League]]
* {{Flagicon image|Flagge Kreis Dithmarschen.svg}} [[Dithmarschen|Dithmarchen]]
* {{Flagicon image|Flagge Land Wursten.svg}} [[Land Wursten]]
* {{Flagicon image|DrapeauMulhouse.svg}} [[Republic of Mulhouse|Mulhouse]]
* [[List of free imperial cities|Free imperial cities]]
* [[Imperial Estate|Imperial Estates]]
* [[List of imperial villages|Imperial villages]]

=== Greece ===
*{{Flagicon image|Byzantine imperial flag, 14th century.svg}} [[Byzantine commonwealth|Byzantium]]

=== Iceland ===
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of The Icelandic Commonwealth.svg}} [[Icelandic Commonwealth|Iceland]]

=== Italy ===
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of the Republic of Ancona (c. 1177-1532).svg}} [[Republic of Ancona|Ancona]]
* {{Flagicon image|Coat of arms of Republic of Genoa.svg}} [[Republic of Genoa|Genoa]]
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of the Republic of Noli.svg}} [[Republic of Noli|Noli]]
* {{Flagicon image|Merchant Flag of the Republic of Lucca (13th century-1799).svg}} [[Republic of Lucca|Lucca]]
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of the Republic of Pisa.svg}} [[Republic of Pisa|Pisa]]
* {{Flagicon image|Antica Bandiera della Repubblica di Siena (XIII Secolo).svg}} [[Republic of Siena|Siena]]
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of Florence.svg}} [[Republic of Florence|Florence]]
* {{Flagicon image|Repubblica_di_Massa-Bandiera.svg}} [[Republic of Massa|Massa Marittima]]
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of the Golden Ambrosian Republic.svg}} [[Golden Ambrosian Republic]]
* {{Flagicon image|San Gimignano-Stemma.svg}} [[San Gimignano]]
* {{Flagicon image|Bologna-Stemma.svg}} [[Towers of Bologna|Bologna]]
* {{Flagicon image|Pavia-Stemma.svg}} [[Towers of Pavia|Pavia]]
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of Sassari (1259–1323).svg}} [[Republic of Sassari|Sassari]]

===Jerusalem, Kingdom of===
In today's Israel, Palestine and Lebanon (1099-1187)
*[[Acre, Israel|Acre]] commune (est. 1232)

=== Low Countries ===
* {{Flagicon image|Frisian flag.svg}} [[Frisian freedom]]

=== Russia ===
* [[Pskov Republic|Pskov]]
* [[Novgorod Republic|Novgorod]]

=== Sweden ===
* {{Flagicon image|Flag of Gotland.svg}} [[Gotland]]

=== Switzerland ===
*{{Flagicon image|Early Swiss cross.svg}} [[Old Swiss Confederacy]]

=== Turkey ===
*[[Commune of Antioch|Antioch]]

== References ==
{{reflist}}

== Sources ==
* Jones, Philip. 1997. ''The Italian City-State: From Commune to Signoria''. (Oxford: [[Oxford University Press]])
* Lansing, Carol, 1992. ''The Florentine Magnates: Lineage and Faction in a Medieval Commune''. (Princeton: [[Princeton University Press]])
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20050208035823/http://vialardi.org/VdSF/Statuti.Biella-1.html Sella, Pietro, "The Statutes of the Commune of Bugelle (Biella)"] 1904. 14th-century statutes of a Piedmontese commune (Latin and English translations), express the nature of the commune in vivid detail, productions of medieval society and the medieval personality.
*Tabacco, Giovanni, 1989. ''The Struggle for Power in Medieval Italy: Structures of Political Rule, 400-1400'', translator, Rosalind Brown Jensen (New York: [[Cambridge University Press]])
* Waley, Donald, 1969 etc. ''The Italian City-Republics'' (3rd ed. New York: Longman, 1988.)
* [http://www.uoguelph.ca/history/urban/citybibIV02.html Guelph University, "The Urban Past: IV. The Medieval City"] A bibliography.

== External links ==
* [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/31950/31950-h/31950-h.htm#ar75''Encyclopædia Britannica'' 1911:] "Medieval commune"
* {{in lang|it}} [http://www.itinerarimedievali.unipr.it/ Itinerari medievali: risorse per lo studio del Medioevo]

{{Middle Ages}}

[[Category:Medieval communes|*]]