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Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000

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Rome, Ravenna and

Venice, 750–1000
Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present,
and the Construction of City Identity

VERONICA WEST-HARLING

1
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1
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To Chris Wickham, who made this book possible,

and, always, to my husband, John-Dominic.
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Contents

List of Figuresix
List of Maps xi
List of Tables xiii
List of Plates xv
List of Abbreviations xvii
Preface xxi

Introduction1
1. A Tale of Three Cities: History and Histories 39
2. The Actors: the Elites and the Populus, I: Rome 108
3. The Actors: the Elites and the Populus, II: Ravenna and Venice 193
4. The Stage: Places of Power, Instruments of Control 275
5. Exercising Power in the City: the Public Space 398
6. Memory and the Construction of City Identity 465
7. Concluding Thoughts 515

Bibliography 521
Index 653
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List of Figures

4.1. Aristocratic residences, ninth and tenth centuries, Rome 295

4.2. Tenth-century aristocratic monastic foundations in Rome 343
5.1. The Itinerary of Einsiedeln415
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List of Maps

1. Italy in 750 45
2. Italy in 800 46
3. Italy in 1000 47
4. Early Medieval Rome 48
5. The Duchy of Venice 97
6. Early Medieval Ravenna 307
7. Venice/Rialto in the ninth and tenth centuries 309
8. Estates of the main Ravenna monasteries in the ex-Exarchate and
the Pentapolis 349
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List of Tables

2.1. Genealogy of the Theophylact/Alberic family 129

3.1. Genealogy of the Duchi Sergi204
3.2. Genealogy of the Traversara206
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List of Plates

1. Excavation of a ninth-century house in the Forum of Nerva, Rome

2. Reconstruction of a ninth-century house in the Forum of Nerva, Rome
3. Apse mosaic, S. Marco, Rome, showing the patron and restorer
Pope Gregory IV (828–44)
4. Model of the Forum of Trajan in the ninth–tenth century
5. Portrait of Otto III in the abbey church of Pomposa
6. Lost mosaic of the triumphal arch of the monastic church of S. Maria
in Pallara (S. Sebastianello) on the Palatine, showing the founder
Peter Medicus offering his foundation to St Sebastian, second half
of the tenth century
7. Portrait of the primicerius Theodotus, S. Maria Antiqua, Roman Forum,
eighth century
8. Lost portraits of Pope Leo III and Charlemagne in the church
of S. Susanna, Rome, c.800
9. Ceiling mosaic, chapel of S. Zeno, church of S. Prassede, Rome, ninth century
10. Pieve of S. Giovanni del Tò, Brisighella (Romagna), ninth–tenth century
11. Crypt of the monastery of S. Zaccaria, Venice, tenth century
12. Carolingian coins, Louis the Pious, in use in Venice (VINECIAS)
13. Epigraph from the tombstone of a COSTANZA, Correr Museum
courtyard, Venice
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List of Abbreviations

AF Kurze, F., ed., Annales Fuldenses; sive, Annales regni Francorum orienta-
lis, SS in usum scholarum (Hanover, 1891); tr. Reuter, T., ed., TheAnnals
of Fulda, Manchester Medieval Sources Series (Manchester, 1992).
Agnellus, LP Liber pontificalis ecclesiae Ravennatis qui et Andreas dicitur, ed.
Mauskopf Deliyannis, D., Corpus Christianorum Corpus Medievalis
199 (Turnhout, 2006) pp. 143–357; tr. Mauskopf Deliyannis, D., The
book of pontiffs of the church of Ravenna (Washington, DC, 2004).
AIVSLA: Atti dell’Istituto Veneto per le Scienze, Lettere ed Arti.
ARF Kurze, F., ed., Annales regni Francorum, inde ab a. 741 usque ad a. 829,
SSRG in usum scholarum 6 (Hanover, 1895); tr. in Scholtz, W., and
Rogers, B., eds., Carolingian Chronicles: Royal Frankish Annals and
Nithard’s Histories (Ann Arbor, MI, 1972).
ASB Waitz, G., ed., Annales Bertiniani, SSRG in usum scholarum (Hanover,
1883); tr. Nelson, J. L., ed., The Annals of St-Bertin, Manchester
Medieval Sources Series (Manchester, 1991).
ASRSP: Annali della Società Romana di Storia Patria.
Astronomer Tremp, E., ed., Die Taten Kaiser Ludwigs/Thegan. Das Leben Kaiser
Ludwigs/Astronomus, SSRG n.s. 64 (Hanover, 1995); tr. Dutton, P.,
ed., Two Lives of Louis the Pious: Thegan and the Astronomer
(Harmondsworth, 1969).

BEFAR Bibliothèque des Écoles françaises d’Athènes et de Rome.

Benericetti C8–9 Benericetti, R., ed., Le carte ravennati dei secoli ottavo e nono (Faenza,
2006).
Benericetti X/1 Benericetti, R., ed., Le carte del decimo secolo nell’archivio arcivescovile
di Ravenna, I: 900–957 (Ravenna, 1999).
Benericetti X/2 Benericetti, R., ed., Le carte ravennati del decimo secolo: Archivio
Arcivescovile: aa. 957–976 (Imola, 2002).
Benericetti X/3 Benericetti, R., ed., Le carte ravennati del decimo secolo: Archivio
Arcivescovile: aa. 976–999 (Imola, 2002).
Benericetti X/4 Benericetti, R., ed., Le carte ravennati del secolo decimo: archivi minori:
Monasteri di Sant’Andrea maggiore, San Vitale e Sant’Apollinare in
Classe (Faenza, 2006).
BenSor Zucchetti, G., ed., Il Chronicon di Benedetto monaco di S. Andrea del
Soratte e il Libellus de imperatoria potestate in urbe Roma, FSI 55
(Rome, 1920), pp. 1–187.
BHL Bibliotheca Hagiographica Latina, Brussels, 1898–1911.
BISI Bullettino dell’Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medioevo.
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xviii List of Abbreviations

CARB: Corso di cultura sull’arte ravennate e bizantina.

CB Krautheimer, R., Corbett, S., Frankl, W., and Frazer A. K., eds., Corpus
Basilicarum Christianarum Romae. The Early Christian Basilicas of
Rome (IV–IX Cent.), 5 vols (Città del Vaticano, 1937–77).
CC Gundlach, W., Codex Carolinus. MGH Ep. III (Berlin, 1892).
CCCM : Corpus Christianorum Series Medievalis.
CCSL Corpus Christianorum Series Latina.
Cessi I Cessi, R., ed., Documenti relativi alla storia di Venezia anteriori al Mille,
I: Secoli V–IX, (Padua, 1940, anastatic edn Polizzi, C. F., Venice, 1991).
Cessi II Cessi, R., ed., Documenti relativi alla storia di Venezia anteriori al Mille,
II: Secoli IX–X, (Padua, 1940, anastatic edn Polizzi, C. F., Venice, 1991).
CVL Codice diplomatico veneziano (secc. XI–XIII) a cura di Luigi Lanfranchi,
1940–84.

Davis, LPC8/ Davis, R., 1989, The book of pontiffs, 3 vols.: 1. The ancient biographies
Davis, LPC9 of the first ninety Roman bishops to AD 715, Liverpool, 2010; 2. The lives
of the eighth-century popes, Liverpool, 1992; 3. The lives of the ninth-
century popes, Liverpool, 1995.
DBI Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani.
DV Documenti veneziani by A. Pazienza, http://saame.it/fonte/documenti-
veneziani/ (2015).

Einhard Pertz, G.H., ed., Einhardi Vita Karoli Magni, SSRG in usum scholarum
25, (Hanover, 1839); tr. Ganz, D., ed., Einhard and Notker, Two Lives of
Charlemagne (Harmondsworth, 2008).

Flodoard, Annals Lauer, P., ed., Les Annales de Flodoard (Rheims, 1905).
FSI Fonti per la Storia d’Italia.

Gesta Berengarii Dümmler, E., ed., Gesta Berengarii imperatoris: Beiträge zur Geschichte
Italiens im Anfange des zehnten Jahrhunderts (Halle, 1871) (incl.
Invectiva in Romam pro Formoso papa, 137–54); also Stella, F., ed.,
Gesta Berengarii: scontro per il regno nell’Italia del 10. secolo (Pisa,
2009).

IE Del Lungo, S., ed., Roma in età carolingia e gli scritti dell’anonimo
Augiense, Misc. SRSP (Rome, 2004).

JnD Berto, L. A., ed. and tr., Istoria Veneticorum. Giovanni Diacono, Fonti
per la storia dell’Italia medievale (Bologna, 1999).

LiP Zucchetti, G., ed., Il Chronicon di Benedetto monaco di S. Andrea del

Soratte e il Libellus de imperatoria potestate in urbe Roma, FSI 55
(Rome, 1920), pp. 191–210.
Liutprand: Antapodosis and Historia Ottonis: Becker, J., ed., Die Werke Liudprands
von Cremona, SSRG in usum scholarum (3rd edn, Hanover, 1977), and
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List of Abbreviations xix

Chiesa, P., ed., Liutprand of Cremona, Antapodosis; Homelia paschalis;

Historia Ottonis; Relatio de Legatione Constantinopolitana (Turnhout,
1988); tr. Squatriti, P., The Complete Works of Liutprand of Cremona
(Washington, DC, 2007).
LP I and LP II Duchesne, L. ed., Le Liber pontificalis, 2. sér., (Rome, 1886–1957) (3rd
vol.: ed. Vogel, C.).

MEFRA Mélanges de l’École française de Rome Antichité.

MEFREM Mélanges de l’École française de Rome Moyen Âge.
MGH Monumenta Germaniae Historica, https://www.dmgh.de/
AA: Auctores antiquissimi
Cap: Capitularia
Ep: Epistolae Karolini aevi
Poema: Poema latinae
SRL: Scriptores Regum Langobardorum
SS: Scriptores
SSRG: Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum.
MIÖG: Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung.

Nithard Nithardi Historiarum libri IIII, ed. Pertz, G. H., MGH SSRG (Hanover,
1870); tr. in Scholtz, W., and Rogers, B., eds., Carolingian Chronicles:
Royal Frankish Annals and Nithard's Histories (Ann Arbor, MI, 1972).
Notker Haefele, H. F., ed., Taten Kaiser Karls des Grossen Notker der Stammler,
SSRG n.s. 12 (Berlin, 1962); tr. Ganz, D., ed., Einhard and Notker, Two
Lives of Charlemagne (Harmondsworth, 2008).

Origo Cessi, R., ed., Origo Civitatum Italiae Seu Venetiatum (Chronicon
Altinate et Chronicon Gradense), FSI 73 (Rome, 1933).

PBSR: Papers of the British School at Rome.

PL Patrologia Latina, ed. J-P. Migne, 1844–65, http://pld.chadwyck.co.uk/.

QFIAB Quellen und Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven und Bibliotheken.

Regino Kurze, F., ed., Chronicon Regino Prumiensis, SSRG 50, (Hanover, 1890);
tr. MacLean, S., ed., History and Politics in Late Carolingian and
Ottonian Europe: The Chronicle of Regino of Prüm and Adalbert of
Magdeburg, Manchester Medieval Sources Series (Manchester, 2009).
RF Giorgi, I., and Balzani, U., eds., Il Regesto di Farfa, 5 vols (Rome,
1879–1916).
RS Allodi, L., and Levi, G., eds., Il Regesto Sublacense del secolo XI (Rome,
1885).

Settimane: Settimane di Spoleto.

SMN Fedele, P., ed., ‘Tabularium S. Mariae Novae ab an. 982 ad an. 1200’,
ASRSP 23 (1900), pp. 171–237.
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xx List of Abbreviations

SMVL Hartmann, L. M., ed., Ecclesiae S. Maria in Via Lata Tabularium, 3 vols
(Vienna, 1895–1913), I.
SR I: Storia di Ravenna I, Susinni, G., ed., L’evo antico (Venice, 1990).
SR II.1 Storia di Ravenna II, Carile, A., ed., Dall’età bizantina all’età ottoniana.
1. Territorio, economia e società (Venice, 1991).
SR II.2 Storia di Ravenna II, Carile, A., ed., Dall’età bizantina all’età ottoniana.
2. Ecclesiologia, cultura e arte (Venice, 1992).
SR III Storia di Ravenna III, Vasina, A., ed., Dal Mille alla fine della signoria
polentana (Ravenna, 1993).
SSAB Monaci, A., ed., ‘Regesto dell’abbazia di Sant’Alessio all’Aventino’,
ASRSP 27 (1904), pp. 351–98.
SSAG Bartola, A., ed., ‘Il Regesto del monastero dei SS Andrea e Gregorio Ad
Clivum Scauri’, 3 vols, Codice diplomatico di Roma e della regione
romana 7, SRSP (Rome, 2003).
SSCD Fedele, P., ed., Le carte del monastero dei SS Cosma e Damiano in Mica
Aurea, re-ed. Pavan, Pt I: sec X e XI (Rome, 1981).
SV: Cracco Ruggini, L., Pavan, M., et al., eds., Storia di Venezia. Dalle orig-
ini alla caduta della Serenissima I: Le origini. L’età ducale (Rome, 1992).

Thegan Tremp, E., ed., Die Taten Kaiser Ludwigs / Thegan. Das Leben Kaiser
Ludwigs / Astronomus, SSRG n.s. 64 (Hanover, 1995); tr. Dutton, P., ed.,
Two Lives of Louis the Pious: Thegan and the Astronomer
(Harmondsworth, 1969).
Thietmar Holtzmann, R., ed., Thietmari Merseburgensis episcopi Chronicon (2nd
edn, Berlin, 1955); tr. Warner, D. A., ed., Ottonian Germany: the
Chronicon of Thietmar of Merseburg, Manchester Medieval Sources
Series (Manchester, 2001).

VZ Valentini, R., and Zucchetti, G., eds., Codice e topografico della città di
Roma. 4 vols (Rome, 1940–53).
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Preface

This book is the principal outcome of an AHRC-funded project entitled From

Byzantine to Ottonian empires: Venice, Ravenna and Rome, imperial associations
and the construction of city identity, c.750–1000, awarded jointly with C. Wickham
in the History Faculty of Oxford University. I am grateful to the AHRC for fund-
ing the project, and to the History Faculty, which provided the administrative
and logistical support to me as a Research Fellow. I should also like to thank the
two universities which awarded me a Visiting Professorship and a Visiting
Fellowship respectively, during my research time in Italy: the Università Ca
Foscari of Venice (Dipartimento di Studi Umanistici) and the Università Roma—
La Sapienza (Dipartimento di Storia, Culture, Religioni. Sezione di Storia
Medievale e Paleografia) in 2012 and 2013.
During the time of this project, I have incurred debts to innumerable people:
colleagues, librarians, and administrative staff across institutions and research
centres. My first, and most considerable debt of all, is to Chris Wickham, who not
only enabled me to instigate the project and to make it viable, but spent hours
discussing its implications, listening to, and challenging my assumptions, reading
the text as I went along, and generally providing intellectual enlightenment and,
above all, staunch friendship and moral support. To him, this book is dedicated.
A core group of colleagues have constituted my main academic network
throughout the years of research and writing. Most notable of these have been
Stefano Gasparri and Sauro Gelichi in Venice, and Paolo Delogu and Riccardo
Santangeli Valenzani in Rome, who have taken time to provide discussions and
archaeological visits, as well as, in the process, becoming real friends. Many other
colleagues have helped at some point, and I thank them all for their time and
interest. They are F. de Rubeis, A. Rapetti, G. Ortalli, G. Ravegnani, M. de Min,
F. Borri, D. Calaon in Venice; R. Cosentino, P. Novara, E. Cirelli, A. Carile,
A. M. Orselli, A. Augenti, R. Savigni, M. Bondi in Ravenna; L. Capo, U. Longo,
A. Rovelli, Lucia Sagui, M. Serlorenzi in Rome; and, in a more general way, C. La
Rocca, and a whole group of younger scholars now working in this field in Italy:
A. Pazienza, C. Moinè, F. Veronese, M. Betti, I. Barbiera, and C. Provesi. To them,
I would add my colleagues in the UK who, over the years, have stimulated ideas
and revisions in my views through personal contact, especially C. Goodson,
J. Nelson, T. Brown, J. Herrin, C. Leyser, and J. Smith, and, on the European/
international scene, F. Bougard, A. Peters Custot, T. Granier, E. Crouzet Pavan,
H. Keller, W. Pohl, C. Jäggi, E. Schoolman, and D. Deliyannis.
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xxii Preface

A large number of people have helped me obtain access to the resources of

their respective institutions, which have provided the basis of the research work:
the BAUM, Marciana, and Cini Foundation libraries, the Archivio di Stato, the
Archivio del Patriarcato, the libraries of the Deputazione di Storia Patria per le
Venezie and that of the Ateneo Veneto in Venice; the Classense library (with the
outstanding support of Dott.ssa C. Giuliani), the University Library, the Archivio
centrale dello Stato, Archivio Comunale, and Archivio Storico Diocesano in
Ravenna; the libraries of the École Française, Deutsches Historisches Institut,
Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medioevo, the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, and
the Vallicelliana in Rome. Without them, their resources, and their staff, who
have stoically coped with innumerable requests for arcane papers and for large
numbers of photocopies and scans, there would be no academic work possible,
and every scholar needs to thank their staff with humility. Equally, the various
bodies which are in charge of the archaeological patrimony and of the custody of
churches and museum artefacts have allowed me access to normally closed sites,
and provided help: the Soprintendenza Archeologica for Ravenna-Classe (site of
Classe) and the Soprintendenza Archeologica di Roma (for example for the
closed parts of the Crypta Balbi or the recent excavations on the Palatine),
the Patriarchate of Venice (for the churches of S. Antonin and S. Lorenzo, for
ex­ample), the Museo Archeologico at the Correr, the then Proto of the basilica of
S. Marco, Dott. E. Vio, who granted me access to the Cortile of the basilica, and
discussed in detail the crypt of S. Marco. To each and every one of them, I am
grateful for their time, courtesy, and patience. I am also indebted, as usual, to my
home library, the Bodleian, which has been my scholarly basis for many years,
and whose staff have never ceased to be valued colleagues.
A project of this kind has need of administrative support, especially when
much of the time funded has been spent working abroad. First and foremost,
I should like to thank the History Faculty, in particular its Research Officer
A. Mooney, and its Finance Officer J. Smith, the first for contributing to the
­putting together and success of the grant application, the second for unfailingly
keeping up her good humour in the face of suitcases full of Italian receipts and
complex payments required—thanks to her, I actually managed to live in Italy
with ease. On the Italian side, the staff at Ca’Foscari (especially E. Conte and
D. Biancato) and at La Sapienza, who provided me with the practical facilities,
such as an office, library access, and IT support, have greatly contributed to creat-
ing a pleasant environment for the time I was welcomed there. Last but certainly
not least, I should like to express my most heartfelt thanks to the Warden and
Fellows of All Souls College in Oxford, who kindly allowed me to become associ-
ated with the college during this period. The college not only provided me with all
the facilities, such as an office (with an uncommonly comfortable chair, courtesy
of the Bursar, S. Beaver), Common Room, and dining rights, and access to the
Codrington Library at all times, but also, and above all, gave me a wonderful
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Preface xxiii

environment for work, intellectual stimulation, and such a socially congenial

background as to make it the most enjoyable time of my working life so far.
This book has been contracted to Oxford University Press from early on,
and I am grateful to the Delegates of the Press for accepting to publish it. I am
especially grateful to my Editor, Cathryn Steele, who has had to put up with
the in­ev­it­able delays and hiccups over the years, without losing either her good
humour or her belief in its eventual delivery. Thanks also to D. Gasparri and to
A. Pazienza for checking the scientific apparatus, tidying up, improving, and
catching innumerable errors, and to P. Stanworth and D. McDonough for
­helping with IT issues.
It is customary to leave thanks of a personal nature till the end—but they
should run in the background in a continuum. Without my husband’s support,
understanding, and forbearance—not to mention the occasional help with
drawing up tables—in the middle of upheavals, international moves, and career
changes, I could simply not have completed this book. To him, my thanks reach
well beyond words.
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Introduction

This book is about the common heritage of Byzantine Italy in three main cities of
particular significance. It is a study of Rome, Ravenna, and Venice, not only as
individual cities but through a detailed look at the way in which various elements
of their social, cultural, and ideological history compare with one another across
the three. Its purpose is to highlight how their heritage, originally late antique
but somewhat transformed by the period of rule of the Eastern Roman Empire
(more commonly called Byzantine) remained, changed, or disappeared between
750 and 1000.

The Context

The Terminology: Some Difficult Words

First of all, a little lexical explanation. It is a well-known fact that historians of

early medieval Italy have the difficult task of needing to define the words they use,
notably Byzantine and Carolingian, in order to make clear what each of them
understands by these words, which were never used by contemporaries. Such
words were mostly coined by historians over the last several hundred years, and
can lead to some confusion about what is meant in a specific context. This is
especially true of the word Byzantine. In practice, the subjects of the rule of the
emperor in Constantinople called themselves ‘Romans’ until the end of that polity
in the fifteenth century, though they began to accept the variation of ‘Eastern
Roman’ from the sixth to seventh centuries. The controversy was already in place
in the ninth century, as we will see later in the discussions between Western and
Eastern emperors. As far as the Emperor Justinian was concerned, when he
‘reconquered’ Italy in the mid-sixth century, he ‘restored’ the Roman Empire. But
the inhabitants of Italy themselves made a distinction between ‘Italian’ and ‘Eastern
Roman’, meaning Greek. Scholars have, over time, come to use the word Byzantine
when talking about the Eastern Empire, with its capital in Constantinople, as a
form of shorthand, which helps distinguish the ethnic groups established in the
post-Roman kingdoms in western Europe, from the subjects of the Eastern Roman
emperor. I will also use the term Byzantine in this way.
In addition, however, also by tradition, the inhabitants of some areas of Italy
have also been labelled as members of ‘Byzantine Italy’. The term is used of them

Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000: Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present, and the Construction of City Identity.
Veronica West-Harling, Oxford University Press (2020). © Veronica West-Harling.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754206.001.0001
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2 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

during the period of the rule of the Eastern Roman emperor over Italy, from
Justinian until 750 in northern and central Italy, and until the eleventh century in
the southern part (called Langobardia minor in the administrative language of
Constantinople). In the context of this work, I am also using the word Byzantine
in these two ways. The first is when referring to the people under the rule of the
emperor in Constantinople, especially after 750, when this rule no longer applied
to Italy, except in Venice and the south. When they claimed descent from the
‘original’ inhabitants since ‘times immemorial’, that is to say before the Lombards
settled in Italy, the inhabitants of my three cities called themselves Romans. From
the ninth century onwards, however, they also used the term Italian, but mostly
the narratives call them simply Romans in Rome, Ravennati in Ravenna, and
Venetians in Venice.
But there is a second form of use of the word Byzantine in this book. It refers to
a set of values and traditions: political, judicial, administrative, familial, cultural,
religious, artistic, and so on, which were perceived as being different from the
Lombard or Frankish ones, and generally referenced their origins in the ‘Roman’,
that is to say the late antique, period. These values, regarded as part of this long
tradition by Justinian, led to their becoming adopted by both Italians and Greeks
as they began to mix and evolve. The mix created a society associating itself with
the old, Roman, as well as the new, Italian, order, and I will call this mix, in the
context of this book, Byzantine.
One reason for doing so is in order to differentiate between the Italian society
of the mixed late antique, Greek, and Lombard kind, and the more recent immi-
grants, the Franks (with some other groups associated with them—Alamans,
Burgundians, Bavarians). Here we have once again both an ethnic and social
concept of the ‘Franks’, as the Italians saw them; and a political one, linked to
the Frankish dynasty which controlled the ex-Lombard kingdom of Italy from
Pavia, after Charlemagne had conquered it in 774. These rulers are known as
Carolingians. Although some historians would prefer to use the word only for the
kings from Charles Martel to the end of the rule of Charles the Bald in Francia,
others, especially Italian, German, and French historians, use it for Italy until the
death of Charles the Fat in 888, as do I.

The Geography: Why These Cities?

The richest and most politically complex regions in Italy in the earliest Middle
Ages were the Byzantine sections of the peninsula, thanks largely to their con­
tinued links with the most coherent early medieval state, the Byzantine Empire.
But what happened to them when those links broke, in the eighth century?
My purpose in this book is to interpret the way in which the three main cities of
Byzantine northern and central Italy—Rome, Ravenna and Venice—dealt with
the end of Byzantine rule from 750 onwards. By the beginning of the ninth
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Introduction 3

century, Rome and Ravenna, the two old capitals of Byzantine Italy, and Venice,
the newcomer taking over some of that role, were struggling to find their place in
the world of the new Carolingian Empire, and by the mid-tenth century they
again had to position themselves with respect to the reborn Western Empire of
the Ottonians. Their solutions were eventually very different, but how did they get
to them?
The story covered here is that of three (significant) Italian cities at a specific
time over 250 years. They were chosen not necessarily because they were three
‘capitals’ or because they were successful, but on account of their shared heritage
from the period of Byzantine control of central and northern Italy, in other words
because they seem to represent the last perceived forms of Roman government
and culture in Italy from Rome northwards. Other cities continued the tradition
into the eleventh century, during which we see the final retreat of the Eastern
emperors from the south of Italy, including from the very important cities of
Naples and Amalfi. Moreover, a study of the three cities cannot be entirely sep­ar­
ated from their relations with the great ‘capitals’ of Milan and Pavia, as well as with
their more immediate neighbours—Bologna in the case of Ravenna, or Verona
and Padua in the case of Venice. However, the material available for such a geo-
graphically vast study would made it unmanageable within the scope of one book.
For that reason, I decided to confine the present work to northern and central
Italy (including Rome with its vast documentation), and to suggest further com-
parative work at a later stage.
It has also seemed appropriate to use these three cities on account of their dif-
ferent status with regard to the Eastern Empire, and to the Lombard and Frankish
kingdoms. Ravenna, Rome, and Venice each had different continuing political
relations with East and West. After 750 Ravenna became formally part of the
Frankish Empire, not directly but as part of the Patrimonium of St Peter, the papal
lands granted to the popes by the Franks. At the end of the ninth century, Ravenna
became effectively part of the Kingdom of Italy under the rule of the first Italian
kings. Rome was formally independent but conditioned by Frankish power after
774, when Charlemagne took over the Lombard kingdom. Venice remained
notionally still part of Byzantium until it became in effect independent in official
as well as practical terms. How did these differences play out in practice?

The Methodology: How to Articulate the Debate

When I first engaged in this study, I had no specific theory as to whether I was
going to find:

a. that the Roman/Byzantine past that these three cities shared meant that
they would have similar structures, which they carried through into the
post-1000 period;
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4 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

b. that this Roman/Byzantine past carried weight in the three cities in the
same manner;
c. whether the Roman/Byzantine features, whatever we may come to include
among them, were maintained over time, or abandoned in favour of devel-
oping others which were closer to those of other Italian cities without a
Byzantine heritage;
d. whether, indeed, there had been such unifying features in the first place.

The construction of this book arises, therefore, not from putting forward a
‘thesis’, but from a determined effort to engage with the source material first, and
allow it to drive the questions which need asking as a result. The book focuses on
presenting and interpreting the evidence, supplying my own understanding of it,
rather than offering a firm conclusion first and defending it subsequently. It is to
be hoped that it will allow the reader to accompany me in my study of the source
material, while ultimately allowing them to draw different conclusions from my
own, should they so wish.
In order to present the evidence, I nevertheless had to question it in specific
ways. I decided to divide this questioning along two lines of argument. These
seem to me to provide the key elements towards suggesting some answers. The
first of these arguments is: did these three cities, with their shared cultural past,
continue to have features in common? Can one say that such features definitely
show them to have preserved a strong heritage from a Roman/Byzantine trad­ition?
The second argument is this: did the ‘Roman’ past remain ingrained in the physical
and mental habits in a manner that would lead these cities to develop differently
from the great cities of Lombard tradition, which were their close neighbours and
sometimes rivals? Or is it the case that the mix of inhabitants and immigrants
from the rest of Italy, to various degrees, led to a mix of political and administra-
tive structures of power, of economic instruments, of social, cultural, and religious
adaptation, which would make these three originally ‘Roman/Byzantine’ cities
indistinguishable from their ‘Lombard/Frankish’ neighbours?
These two lines of inquiry arise from the sources themselves. These include
narratives specific to each city, or reflected in the writings of foreign visitors;
documents regarding judicial, economic, and social intercourse, including, for
example, formulaic texts at the beginning and end of charters granting land and
rights; and a large body of physical buildings and artefacts (churches, monasteries
and palaces, mosaics, frescoes, relics and ritual processions, coins, and the archae-
ology of houses and public spaces, to name but a few). As always, one of the main
difficulties for early medieval historians is that their evidence tends to come almost
invariably from the political, social, or intellectual elite among con­tem­por­ar­ies—
because it was this elite who wrote, commissioned writing, or built in lasting
materials. It was its members who founded and dedicated churches, built and
decorated monasteries and palaces, made or received gifts of relics and land.
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Introduction 5

Inevitably, my evidence too comes principally from this elite, sometimes secular,
most often ecclesiastical (popes, bishops, monks); and, therefore, it is its activities
and impact that are most directly accessible. It is possible, though not always easy,
to perceive the views of non-elite inhabitants of the cities, for example through
accounts of religious festivals, choices of popular saints, and the naming of
children, or sales and leases of property among a poorer economic group than
that usually found in the main charters. I shall naturally attempt to incorporate as
much of this material in the two chapters which open with an examination of the
secular and ecclesiastical elite (Chapters 2 and 3), but subsequently include the
other actors in the urban landscape, occasionally allowing us to look as far down
the social scale as the slaves in Venice.
Of these sources, I shall need to ask a variety of questions, of which the follow-
ing are but a few examples. A first set of questions relates to the people in the city.
Who were they, how did they function within the life of the city, how did they
define themselves in terms of social status, role, and relations to one another?
This requires an examination of the main actors in the urban context of each city:
their families, their self-definition, their wealth, their influence, their choices of
alliances with external powers, royal or imperial. These questions will be discussed
in Chapters 2 and 3, the first relating to Rome, the second to both Ravenna and
Venice—a division based on the purely pragmatic grounds that there is a great
deal more source material relating to Rome than to the other two, which could
thus be treated within a single chapter.
Having first defined these urban inhabitants, from the elite ruling families to
the mid-ranking traders, artisans, and the less wealthy and prestigious, the next
logical step is to see how they interacted with one another. Standing behind
the popes, archbishops, or doges who officially ruled the city were the aristocratic
families which provided the ruling figures. Who made the political choices in
the city? To what extent did different factions fight for control? In all three cities,
there was almost constant strife between families and groups, ruling through the
election of their members at the highest post possible (pope, doge, archbishop),
or through controlling major centres of power, such as monasteries or public
space. In Chapter 4, I shall be examining how this was done, through the building
of palaces, churches, and monasteries as centres of power; through the providing
of relics, art, and charitable support for rival families or for the ordinary people to
admire, be impressed by, and to create respect; and lastly through the display of
power through the coins they used, the titles they attributed to themselves, or the
gifts they exchanged. To give a few practical examples: changes in the topography
of the city, for example with the expansion of the Leonine City as the rising papal
centre of power around the Vatican, or in the move by the doges of Venice of their
seat of government to the heart of the island known as Rivoalto (Rialto) in 810/11,
reflect a real or perceived political and religious move in these cities’ allegiances.
How did the process function in Rome, where the role of the pope was the key
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6 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

factor in any founding or restoring of churches and monasteries until the tenth
century, when aristocratic factions chose to become involved in such patronage?
In Chapter 5, I will continue to examine how power was displayed and exercised,
this time through control over the activities and ceremonial of city life, from
inaugurations, ceremonies ritual, and the use of public space for peaceful and
cohesive actions or for forms of violent dissent. From these we can begin to see
how internal city politics influenced the choices which underlie the creation of
each city’s identity, which I will discuss in Chapter 6.
A second set of questions relates to the forms of control over the urban fabric
which were not associated solely with power and wealth within the city but also
with the importance or otherwise of the links of that city with the external powers
in place in Italy, above all the emperors (Byzantine, Carolingian, Ottonian) and
the kings. This requires a closer look at the impact of such external powers in the
life of the city—or indeed in some cases at the lack of it. What was the role of
Rome and Ravenna as imperial residences? We know of Charlemagne’s impact in
Rome at the Vatican, of the Ottonians’ rebuilding on the Palatine and the Aventine
in Rome, and of their palaces in Ravenna. Did this have an influence on these
cities’ civic perception? How, if at all, did kings and emperors manifest their
presence in the life of the city, for example through patronage and display. How
did this contribute to a perception of that city as associated with an imperial past
and/or present, western or eastern? In Chapter 6, I propose to add to the discussion
about the creation of an urban identity around internal figureheads, ceremonies,
or signifiers of power, with a look at the extent to which acceptance or rejection
of imperial and royal authority also contributed to the strengthening of that
urban identity.
By the time these two sets of questions are discussed in the final chapters, it
will have become possible, in my view, to find some answers to the two original
arguments: did these cities, with their shared cultural past, continue to have fea-
tures in common? And did this Byzantine past remain so powerful that it would
lead them to develop differently from the other cities of Italy, especially those of
non-Byzantine tradition? These answers, I suggest, are that:

a. The common Byzantine (or late Roman) past did indeed provide some very
strong elements of continuity, especially in social and ideological terms
(such as names, titles, definition of status), and in religious and artistic terms.
Such continuity applied to all three cities, but not uniformly or equally. For
example, the awareness of Roman traditional names and titles was excep-
tionally strong in Rome and Venice, while Ravenna gradually incorporated
a much stronger intake of Frankish and other northern European elements
as a result of a greater mix of population through immigration and marriage
from the Italian centre. The city ultimately became incorporated into the
Regnum Italicum in 892.
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Introduction 7

b. While this common tradition was maintained in the mentalités, the economic,
legal, political, and diplomatic evidence suggests that Rome and Ravenna
maintained their Byzantine tradition in terms of law, urban administration,
political institutions, and land division, while Venice, despite its officially
belonging to the Eastern Roman Empire throughout this period, was, in
practice, almost fully aligned with the administrative framework, political
ruling style, economic instruments such as coinage and notarial style, and
even legal elements of the Lombard then Frankish tradition of its Italian
background.
c. One could thus argue that, independently of their Byzantine/late Roman
tradition still strong in these three cities in intellectual and social terms, in
practice their functioning was different, and varied from the most bound
up with this past in Rome to the less bound up in practice—as well as, up to
a point, in ideological terms—in Venice and in Ravenna. The influence of
their already long association with the Lombard kingdom in everyday life,
and later with that of the Carolingians, made Venice and Ravenna increasingly
similar to other Italian cities, while Rome remained more distant from them.
I shall argue that this was not the result of the papal presence there, as much
as of a truly overwhelming perception, through institutions, language, and
physical landscape, of the past of the city. Moreover, this past was continually
reinvented by its aristocracies as an inheritance, not of Byzantine Italy, but
of ancient imperial Rome.

The Source Material

To search for answers, I shall be relying on the use of evidence attached to several
disciplines, which will help explain the interaction between imperial ideology,
presence, and influence and the creative response of the city elites in the three cities.
The core interest of this book is that of the functioning of the elites in each city,
from the evidence of their written activities and contracts, the topography of power,
as well as the cultural, artistic, and religious manifestations, and the impact of ritual
in the time and space of the city as a reflection of power and self-representation.
The evidence for this comes from the written sources, the ever-expanding field of
urban archaeology, and the reading of art, material culture, and ritual.
The ideological shifts are visible through the way in which both contemporary
and later commentators contributed, through their narratives, to creating the
city’s past. These narratives did not only recall the past, but indirectly constructed
the future. This constructed future would include the growing consciousness of
the city’s own identity, largely arising from of the narrative of its past. The first
body of evidence available—the written sources—will therefore lead me to look
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8 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

in great detail at the narrative material, for the story it tells, but also and just as
importantly for its implied and indirect suggestions. The documents, which are
relatively rich by early medieval standards, especially for Rome and Ravenna,
are a major source of the information to be obtained for the lifestyle of the elites,
their origins, wealth, power in the city, literacy, and self-awareness. The second
body of evidence is that of material culture. Archaeology is crucial for identifying
the places of memory, the topographies of power and authority, and the social/
ethnic manifestations of the city elites and its other inhabitants, notably through
the acceptance or rejection of ritual forms of consensus. Thirdly, art and architec-
ture, through location and iconography, need to be used to read ideological,
political, and theological forms of social consensus, such as display and ritual.
The tools used to put together the conclusions suggested in this book have therefore
included many disciplines within the three major fields mentioned: in­ter­pret­ation
of the stories told, diplomatics and palaeography, excavation reports leading to
the interpretation of instruments of power and influence in the landscape, mani-
festations of status in architecture, iconography and display objects, accounts of
places and objects of memory, anthroponymy and toponyms, language choices as
well as artistic decorative choices, and the growing study of ritual as a key element
in past as much as in present societies.
The editing of much of the source material began with large collections started
already from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries by ecclesiastics or learned
aristocrats with an interest in the history of their city, such as Cardinal Baronius
and Antonio Muratori, or Flaminio Corner or Count Fantuzzi in Venice and
Ravenna respectively. Such work continued in the nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries with men like Fedele for Roman documents (many in the Società Romana
di Storia Patria), Cessi then Lanfranchi for Venetian documents, and various
editors in Ravenna, whose partial editions have now been replaced by the monu-
mental edition of Ravennate charters by Benericetti. At the same time, German
scholars concerned with the grand narrative of Italian history, especially in rela-
tion to imperial rule from the Carolingians onwards, were producing their own
scholarly editions of narrative sources, hagiography, letters, legal and normative
documents in the Monumenta Germaniae Historica collection. Italian his­tor­ians
in turn began the large collection of the Fonti per la Storia d’Italia. The sources
available for the three cities studied here are narrative (histories, annals, hagiog-
raphy, literature); diplomatic (charters and other documents, law cases, letters);
those pertaining to material culture (archaeology, numismatics, epigraphy); and
art historical. Let me take them in turn.

Narrative Sources

In the first instance, we are fortunate in having a series of city-specific narratives,

which range from the Liber Pontificalis and Benedict of Soracte’s Chronicle for
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Introduction 9

Rome to Andrea Agnellus for Ravenna and John the Deacon for Venice.1 These
three cities are, in fact, better served for local narratives than any other northern
Italian city at this time. Our best narrative sources are thus individual histories of
the cities, and the less-explored vein of hagiographies. For Rome more spe­cif­ic­al­ly,
the types of sources are: pilgrimage itineraries; detailed accounts of the cele­bra­tions
of the liturgical year in the city through processions; and the polemical literature
found in texts such as the Invectiva in Romam pro Formoso papa and the Libellus
de imperatoria potestate in urbe Roma.2 Though covering different p ­ eriods, and in
some cases having to be treated very carefully for periods preceding the author’s
lifetime, they are nevertheless all invaluable as sources for the perception by
contemporaries of both current events and memory of the past. Rome’s classical
buildings are also the focus of detailed accounts from the eighth century onwards,
with a particular flowering after 1100; such later accounts at least allow us to see
what continuities in interest in the classical past there must have been.
Of equally great importance are the narrative sources from outside Italy, espe-
cially Frankish Carolingian in the late eighth and ninth centuries, and German in
the tenth. Although Frankish sources usually only contain the most clichéd accounts
of Italy, a great interest in Rome north of the Alps at least means that some writers
have more detailed accounts of that city and its events. Narratives were either written
by individual authors, such as Einhard, the Astronomer, Thegan, Notker, Thietmar,
Regino, Liutprand, Flodoard, or by anonymous (and not so anonymous) authors
of annals, the most important in our case being the Royal Frankish Annals, the
Annals of St Bertin, and the Annals of Fulda.3 Last but not least, occasional
Byzantine sources also give information on aspects of the history of the three cities,
in particular the work of Theophanes, and of Constantine Porphyrogenitus.4
A thorough discussion of the difficulties in relation to most of these narrative
sources cannot be carried out here. Some relate to the natural bias of the author,
or to his attempt to mould the hero of his story according to the great figures of
the past, as do Einhard or Liutprand for Charlemagne and Otto I, or the author
of the Gesta Berengarii for Berengar I. Equally, much of the discussion in terms
of political sides, such as the support of the Annals of St Bertin (and of its main
author, Hincmar) for western Francia and for Charles the Bald, as opposed to that
of the Annals of Fulda for the eastern Frankish side and Louis the German, has
been superlatively presented in the modern editions of the documents.5 My main
purpose here is to look more closely at the narrative sources which present us
with very specific technical problems, especially in terms of authorship, beyond
the ordinary issues of a writer’s partiality.

1 LP; BenSor; Agnellus, LP; JnD. 2 Gesta Berengarii; LiP.

3 Einhard; Astronomer; Thegan; Notker; Thietmar; Regino; Liutprand; Flodoard; ARF; ASB; AF.
4 C. Mango et al., eds., The chronicle of Theophanes Confessor: Byzantine and Near Eastern history,
A.D. 284–813 (Oxford, 1997); Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De administrando imperii, ed.
G. Moravcsik, Eng. tr. R. J. H. Jenkins (Budapest, 1949).
5 ASB (ed. Nelson) and AF (ed. Reuter) in their respective Introductions.
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10 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

On that score, my main three narrative sources all present us with specific
problems in terms of reliability, which have been discussed at length over the
decades. Without going into all the specifics of these debates, I shall emphasize
those problems which apply most directly to my own approach. First and fore-
most is the Roman Liber Pontificalis. With a considerable body of work discussing
its dates, authorship, and stance,6 I propose to highlight the two main problems
that I need to take into account when dealing with the material. The dating of
the Liber is not essential in this debate since it is generally accepted by scholars
that, by the time that I begin to use it, in the 720/30s, it was already a contemporary
document, written within the Lateran environment, more or less con­tem­por­an­
eous­ly or little after the pope whose life it tells, and often passed on between the
two main offices of the papal bureaucracy, the scrinium and the vestiarius, to fill in
respectively the information about local expenditure and the various restorations
and gifts to Roman churches, and that concerning the more ‘political’ aspects of
the pontificate. This overall understanding of the source is generally uncontrover-
sial. But the issue of the evolution of the authorship is; as is also the treatment of
the political issues of some of the most difficult pontificates—two points which
are, naturally, not independent of one another.
The issue of authorship is of concern to me in two ways. The first is the change
that we perceive from what is alleged to have been the anonymity of the produc-
tion of the papal offices up to the time of Pope Nicholas I (858–67) and the move
towards the writing of the Liber by some of the more famous authors of the second
half of ninth-century Rome (Anastasius Bibliothecarius and John Immonides
having been claimed among them—though it is now almost certain that the for-
mer needs to be discarded).7 The fact that the Liber was at first the product of
the Lateran clergy does not mean, of course, that it was in any way ‘objective’ or
‘neutral’—it is sufficient to observe the way in which it deals with the popes of the
second half of the eighth century, especially Pope Hadrian I (772–95), or with
Pope Eugenius (824–7), to realize this. In the first instance, the necessity of
explaining the move away from Byzantine rule from Pope Zacharias (741–52)

6 For the main discussions on the date and authorship of the LP, see Duchesne’s edition;
R. McKitterick, ‘The papacy and Byzantium in the seventh- and early eight-century sections of the
Liber Pontificalis’, PBSR 84 (2016), pp. 241–73; R. McKitterick, ‘The Seventh- and Early Eighth-century
Sections of the Liber Pontificalis’, in Santa Maria Antiqua: The Sistine Chapel of the Early Middle Ages,
ed. G. Bordi, J. Osborne, and E. Rubery (New York, 2016); K. Herbers, ‘Agir et écrire les actes des
papes du IXe siècle et le “Liber pontificalis” ’, and ‘Das Ende des alten “Liber pontificalis” (886)—
Beobachtungen zur Vita Stephanus V’, in Liber, Gesta, histoire: écrire l’histoire des éveques et les papes de
l’Antiquité au XXI siècle. Actes du Congrès organise par le Centre d’etudes medievales d’Auxerre (25–7 juin
2007), ed. F. Bougard and M. Sor (Turnhout, 2009), pp. 119–22 and 141–5; F. Bougard, ‘Composition,
diffusion et reception des parties tardives du ‘Liber pontificalis’ (VIII–IX siècles)’, in ibid., pp. 132–52.
7 A. Lapôtre, De Anastasio Bibliothecario sedis apostolicae (Paris, 1885); G. Arnaldi, ‘Come naque
l’attribuzione ad Anastasio del “Liber pontificalis” ’, BISI 75 (1963), pp. 321–43; Bougard, ‘Composition,
diffusion et reception’. See also F. Bougard, ‘Nicola I, santo’, in Enciclopedia dei papi, 3 vols (Rome,
2000), I, pp. 1–12.
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Introduction 11

onwards, while not antagonizing the Byzantine emperors before the Frankish
alliance was at its strongest, gives rise to equivocation, obfuscation, the telescoping
of some events to blur the chronology, and occasionally the actual omission of
uncomfortable ones. Two examples of such a way of writing will be sufficient. The
first concerns the crisis with the Emperor Leo III over taxation, which was turned
into a much more effective crisis over iconoclasm when soliciting Frankish help.
As we shall see later, it has been argued that, in reality, the issue of the imposition
of iconoclasm in Italy only began to be a real issue twenty or thirty years later, but
was made to appear one of heresy both in the papal cor­res­pond­ence with the
Franks and in the Liber, to make the appeal more effective to the Frankish
devotion to St Peter.8 Recently, Costambeys has argued that there were in fact
competing narratives available at first (of which we know from copies in much
later and sometimes distant sources) and that it was precisely Pope Hadrian I who
managed and streamlined the account, as part of his campaign of pacification
of Rome.9 Another example concerns the almost inexistent biog­raphy of Pope
Eugenius, one of the shortest in the Liber at this time, even though he was a very
significant figure, but one clearly detested by the clergy for his perceived submis-
sion to the Carolingian emperor.10 As if this was not sufficient, occasional events,
such as Louis II’s coronation as emperor in Rome in 850 by Pope Leo IV (847–55),
were completely written out of the story.11 To this needs to be added the com-
monplace habit of the Liber to glide over the almost inevitable fighting between
factions at every papal election, or its habit of taking credit for events which,
according to other sources, were not under papal control. One such was the claim
that Pope Leo IV asked for money from the Emperor Lothar I to build a wall to
defend Rome from the Saracens, while a capitulary of Lothar I implies quite clearly
that he ordered the pope to fortify the city with a wall to that end.12 It is not
necessarily the case that the other source was completely to be relied on, but the
issue of trust to be had in one or the other comes necessarily to the fore.
The change in authorship of the Liber from the anonymity of the offices to that
of someone who was much more of a mouthpiece for the popes themselves, even
if not necessarily one of the main intellectuals in the city, has been offered as an
explanation for the gradual tailing off of the Liber after its official end with Pope
Stephen V (885–91)—the genre of episcopal acta apparently no longer suited to

8 For the most recent summary see V. Prigent, ‘Les empereurs isauriens et la confiscation des pat-
rimoines pontificaux d’Italie du Sud’, MEFREM 116 (2004), pp. 557–94.
9 M. Costambeys, ‘The textual authority of the Liber Pontificalis: Pope Hadrian and the Life of
Stephen III’, Communication Leeds IMC 8/7/2015.
10 LP I. 1001, and see Davis, LPC9, pp. 36–7.
11 ASB 850; Davis, LPC9, p. 102. See also Carmina de Ludovico II imperatore, ed. L. Traube, MGH
Poetae 6, pp. 404–5.
12 LP I. 105 ch.69; Lothar’s capitulary containing the order in MGH Cap. II, 66/3–67/2 and tr. in
C. Azzara and P. Moro, eds., I Capitolari italici. Storia e diritto della dominazione carolingia in Italia
(Rome, 1998), no. 33 ch.7.
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12 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

the times in Rome. From my point of view, therein lies the second main problem
of the Liber, namely its absence (except in the form of short notices added later in
the twelfth century by Cardinal Pandulf and Pierre Guillaume) of any real ma­ter­
ial for the tenth century. This means that, during a crucial period in terms of
their relations with the aristocratic elite of Rome at the end of the ninth century,
from Pope John VIII (872–82) and Pope Formosus (891–6) onwards, until the
end of my period of choice, c.1000, there is little papal documentation except for
the occasional letter or bull. The tenth century, which saw the height of aristo-
cratic rule over the city in ways which make it crucial for the history of the city,
does not, unfortunately, have any other major narrative source, reliable or other-
wise, except for those from outside the city, like Benedict of Soracte. This is, of
course, significant in terms of who controlled the writing of history in Rome, but
also a serious difficulty for the historian, whose narrative material comes exclu-
sively from outside the city, mostly from the German emperors’ courts.
As I showed previously in the case of both Byzantine and Frankish sources, the
tale they tell could be quite different from that of the Liber. One such example is
the information given by the Annals of St Bertin on the important pontificate of
Eugenius, and on such events as Louis II’s coronation in Rome in 850—completely
absent from the Liber itself. Other examples of material from northern European
sources whose use is essential are those of writers who help us reconstruct the
history of Rome in the tenth century, for which we have no other local evidence—
such as, for example, Thietmar of Merseburg, Liutprand of Cremona, and Flodoard
of Rheims for the Ottonian presence there. A few other cases are those of material
written by northern Europeans with little sympathy for Rome and the Romans,
men whose stories are often highly dubious if not unlikely, such as Notker, but
whose views are nevertheless revealing of contemporary views and attitudes
towards Rome. Also occasionally uncertain are writers like Benedict of Soracte,
with decisive views on the decadence of the spirit of ancient Rome, and not infre-
quently misinformed about events there, or mixing them up and conflating various
ones, such as the alleged conspiracy by his family against Alberic.13
Other contemporary Italian sources are more useful from the point of view of
the information they provide in the form of collected documents, which is the
case of the later Chronicon Farfense associated with Gregory of Catino, and espe-
cially of the two main charter registers of Farfa and Subiaco, essential for us to
be able to follow much of the movement of property, owned or leased in Rome, to
and from the two monasteries, by or to Romans.14 Occasional references by
Andrew of Bergamo and Erchempert reveal links with other Italian players on the

13 BenSor, pp. 171–2.

14 G. Zucchetti, ed., Liber Largitorius vel notaries monasterii Pharphensis, 2 vols, (Rome, 1913–32);
RF; RS.
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Introduction 13

political stage,15 as indeed do mentions of Roman and papal problems in the

works of the two major chroniclers of Ravenna and Venice, Agnellus and John the
Deacon, to whom I shall return below. It is from Agnellus that we hear the other
side of the story of the Archbishop of Ravenna Sergius, shown to have been a sup-
porter of Ravenna autonomy, while the Liber Pontificalis shows him only as con-
demned for his unusual lay status when he became archbishop;16 and our best
account of the rebellion and condemnation of Crescentius II by Otto III comes
to us not from Rome but from John the Deacon in Venice.17 Also from outside
Rome come another set of texts, best described as pamphlets concerned with
putt­ing forward views on Roman events. They may be near contemporary, though
the dates and places of writing are not as yet entirely agreed upon. The first is
known as the Libellus de imperatoria potestate in urbe Roma, and has been placed
variously at the end of the ninth century, under Pope Formosus, in the 900s, and
as late as the mid-tenth century. It has been argued, convincingly to my mind,
to have been an expression of the imperial perceptions and views of the Spoletan
emperors or their supporters; if so accepted, then the date of writing would
most likely be the late ninth or very early tenth century, before the accession of
Berengar I to the imperial title after 915.18 The other text, the Invectiva in Romam
pro Formoso papa, clearly follows the death and condemnation of Pope Formosus
by Stephen VI (896–7), defending him despite the alleged irregularity of his
translation from one see to another. I will return in Chapter 2 to the Formosian
controversy, and will argue that it was a major political issue, thus explaining its
continuation long after Formosus’ death, and the existence of a Formosian litera-
ture, with which were also associated the two writers Auxilius and Eugenius
Vulgarius.19 Both writers were well attuned to the Roman situation, as we know
from their correspondence with the Theophylacts and Pope Sergius III (904–11),
and it has been argued that the place of writing was Naples. Though not written in

15 For example, Erchemperto, Piccola Storia dei Longobardi di Benevento/Ystoriola Longobardorum

Beneventum degentium, ed. and tr. L. A. Berto (Naples, 2013); Andrea of Bergamo, in Italian
Carolingian Historical and Poetic Texts, ed. and tr. L. A. Berto (Pisa, 2016), pp. 66–97.
16 Agnellus, LP, ch.157; LP I, 96 ch. 19. 17 JnD IV. 44.
18 LiP, see W. Wattenbach, Deutschlands Geschichtsquellen im Mittelalter, ed. H. Löwe (Weimar,
1963), pp. 425–6, who places it in the first decade of the tenth century, as does its editor Zucchetti;
P. E. Schramm, Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio (Darmstadt, 1929—4th edn, 1984), pp. 64–6, and P. Delogu,
‘I Romani e l’impero’, in Three Empires, three cities: Identity, material culture and legitimacy in Venice,
Ravenna and Rome, ed. V. West-Harling (Oxford, 2015), pp. 191–225 at p. 224; the earlier date (and
the Spoletan connection) is preferred by L. Lapôtre, Etudes sur la Papauté au IXe siècle, 2 vols (repr.
Turin, 1978), I, pp. 171–202, and G. Arnaldi, Natale 875: Politica, Ecclesiologia, Cultura del Papato
Altomedievale (Rome, 1990), pp. 38–40, as well as L. Capo, ‘Iura regni et consuetudines illius: l’impero
carolingio a Roma’, in Honos alit artes. Studi per il settantesimo compleanno di Mario Ascheri, ed.
P. Maffei and G. M. Varanini, Reti Medievali 3 (2014), pp. 181–8, while C. Wickham, Medieval Rome:
Stability and Crisis of a City, 900–1150 (Oxford, 2015), p. 377 n. 168, does not believe in the Spoletan
connection, but agrees to a relatively early date of c.900.
19 Gesta Berengarii: Auxilius und Vulgarius. Quellen und Forschungen zur Geschichte des Papstthums
im Anfange des zehnten Jahrhunderts, ed. E. Dümmler (Leipzig, 1866), pp. 71–4; Invectiva in Romam,
pp. 137–54.
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14 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Rome itself, these texts are crucial since, their own agenda notwithstanding, they
are revealing of the views of at least part of the secular Roman aristocracy.
We know that, during the second half of the ninth century, there lived in
Rome two of the main intellectual figures of the Italian Middle Ages, Anastasius
Bibliothecarius and John Immonides. Anastasius, from a family of Roman aristo-
crats with characteristic career patterns (his uncle was Arsenius Bishop of Orté
and the layman Eleutherius was his cousin—possibly brother—in positions of
great influence around the popes). Eleutherius was eventually executed for crimes
against Pope Hadrian II (867–72). Anastasius was himself exceedingly controver-
sial; he was several times excommunicated for abandoning his pastoral post in
Rome and subsequently for attempting to set himself up as pope, unsuccessfully.20
He was, however, uncontested as a scholar, knowledgeable in both Latin and
Greek, appointed librarian of the papal administration, and several times ambas-
sador speaking for the pope and the Western Church, especially at the Eighth
Ecumenical Council in Constantinople in 869/70, whose acts he translated into
Latin. He was regarded as the mouthpiece for Western orthodoxy, and a contribu-
tor to the final abandonment of Byzantine iconoclasm at that council. But he was
also and above all a defender and spokesman for the Western emperor whom he
served, Louis II first and then Charles the Bald, to whose image as the philosopher-
king he contributed most.21 It was to him that several of his hagiographical texts
were dedicated, the Passions of Demetrius of Thessaloniki and of Dionysius
(Denis) of Paris.22 He was also the author of a famous letter sent by the Emperor
Louis II to the Emperor Michael III, which contributed greatly to defining the
understanding of the imperial idea and role of the two empires, Western and
Byzantine—I will return to this later on.23 Some of Anastasius’ main production,
apart from the summing-up and translation of the acts of the council, was in the
form of hagiography. This he shared with his contemporary John Immonides,
who has now been accepted as the main individual author of the Liber Pontificalis
in the second half of the ninth century, especially of the lives of Nicholas and

20 There is considerable material on Anastasius, of which the most relevant here are: Lapôtre, De
Anastasio; G. Arnaldi, ‘Anastasio Bibliotecario’, DBI 3 (1961), pp. 23–37; P. Devos, ‘Anastase le
Bibliothécaire. Sa contribution à la correspondance pontificale. La date de sa mort’, Byzantion 32
(1962), pp. 97–115; G. Laehr, ‘Die Briefe und Prologe des Bibliothekars Anastasius’, Neues Archiv
der Gesellschaft für ältere deutsche Geschichtskunde 47 (1928), pp. 416–68; C. Leonardi, ‘Anastasio
Bibliotecario e le tradizione del greco nella Roma altomedievale’, in The Sacred Nectar of the Greeks: the
study of Greek in the West in the Early Middle Ages, ed. M. W. Herren and S. A. Brown (London, 1988),
pp. 277–9; B. Neil, ed., Seventh-Century Popes and Martyrs: The Political Hagiography of Anastasius
Bibliothecarius (Turnhout, 2006); and C. Leonardi, ‘Anastasio Bibliotecario e l’ottavo concilio ecumen-
ico’, Studi Medievali 3/1 (1967), pp. 153–62, who gives an edition of part of the proceedings.
21 G. Arnaldi, ‘Il re filosofo (e Anastasio Bibliotecario)’, in his Natale 875, pp. 87–106; see
N. Staubach, Rex Christianus. Hofkultur und Herrschaftspropaganda im Reich Karks des Kahlen
(Cologne, 1993).
22 Neil, Seventh-Century Popes and Martyrs, pp. 58–9.
23 G. Arnaldi, ‘Impero d’Occidente e Impero d’Oriente nella lettera di Ludovico II a Basilio I’, La
Cultura 1 (1963), pp. 404–24; see also the older E. Perels, Papst Nicholas I und Anastasius
Bibliothecarius. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Papsttums im neunten Jahrhundert (Berlin, 1920).
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Introduction 15

Hadrian II.24 John’s best-known work was his life of Gregory the Great: he began
it by pointing out how the best-known and best-loved pope outside Italy, who had
had his biography written several times, notably in England, had no such life or
cult in Rome itself, which was shameful.25 But his main purpose, indirectly, was
to write up Gregory as a model pope, just as he would then try to present Nicholas
as being a new Gregory the Great in his own time. Both Anastasius and
Immonides were Greek speakers, and contributed to a revival in interest in the
Eastern Empire, at the time when the latter was itself once again attempting to
renew closer links with the papacy.26 This did not mean that they did so at the
expense of the Western emperors or Carolingian cultural models, as Anastasius’
work shows. But Immonides was also focusing on the Western world with his
interest in Gregory and his demonstration in Pope Nicholas’s life of a papal figure
focusing on the Carolingian world. In addition, his other main work, the Cena
Cypriani,27 was in fact an adaptation in Rome of an alleged classical text, but one
actually produced at the court of Charles the Bald.
The texts mentioned are, naturally, rich in information on cultural, intellectual,
theological, and ideological issues in Rome. But they are also useful for other
kinds of information, for example when Immonides gives us a description of
what could still be seen in Gregory the Great’s monastery of SS Andrea e Gregorio
in Clivo Scauro on the Celio, notably the pictures of the founder’s parents—infor-
mation otherwise lost since Roman architecture has changed so much since.28
Hagiography, whenever available, is naturally invaluable as a source for Rome,
though there is little of it concerning Rome itself and produced in Rome at this
point. Occasionally foreign hagiographical texts can give us insights, as does the
Vita of Bernward of Hildesheim describing the synod held in the monastery of
Santa Maria in Pallara in 1001 in the presence of Otto III and Pope Silvester.29

24 Arnaldi, ‘Come naque l’attribuzione ad Anastasio’, pp. 321–43; Bougard, ‘Composition, diffusion
et reception’.
25 Vita Gregorii, in PL, 75, cols 59–242, and Vita Gregorii 1. papae (B. H. L. 3641–2)/Iohannes
Hymmonides diaconus Romanus (Florence, 2004), 4. 85; P. Chiesa, ‘Giovanni Diacono (Giovanni
Immonide)’, DBI (1961), pp. 25–37.
26 Leonardi, ‘Anastasio’; Arnaldi,‘Anastasio’; Arnaldi, ‘Giovanni Immonide e la cultura a Roma al
tempo di Giovanni VIII’, BISI 68 (1956), pp. 33–83; however, for Anastasius’ perception of Greek as
something that was definitely the ‘propria lingua’, see also R. Forrai, ‘The Sacred Nectar of the Deceitful
Greeks. Perceptions of Greekness in Ninth Century Rome’, in Knotenpunkt Byzanz. Wissenformen und
kulturelle Wechselbeziehungen, ed. A. Speer and P. Steinkrüger (Berlin: Miscellanea Medievalia 36,
2012), pp. 71–84. On the renewal of Byzantine links, see T. S. Brown, ‘The Background of Byzantine
Relations with Italy in the Ninth Century: Legacies, Attachments and Antagonisms’, in Byzantium and
the West, c. 850-c. 1200. Proceedings of the XVIII Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies, Oxford 30
March–1 April 1984, ed. J. D. Howard-Johnston, Byzantinische Forschungen 13 (1988), pp. 27–46.
27 John the Deacon, Versiculi di Cena Cypriani, ed. K. Strecker, in MGH Poetae, 4/2, pp. 857–900;
see Arnaldi, ‘Il re filosofo (e Anastasio Bibliotecario)’.
28 Vita Gregorii. See C. Leonardi, ‘L’agiografia romana nel secolo IX’, in Hagiographie, cultures et
sociétés IVe–XII siècle (Paris, 1981), pp. 471–90; I. Toesca, ‘Antichi affreschi a S. Andrea al Celio’,
Paragone. Arte 23 (1972), pp. 10–23.
29 ‘Vita Bernwardi’, MGH SS IV, ch. 22.
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16 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

What Rome lacked in hagiography, however, it made up for with two major
sources of information: the pilgrimage itineraries and the liturgical texts. Pilgrimage
itineraries had a long tradition, and several were produced, notably in the seventh
and eighth centuries, most of these having survived only in northern European
manuscripts (the Notitia Ecclesiarum Urbis Romae also known as the Catalogue
Salisburgense, the De Locis Sanctis, the list inserted by William of Malmesbury in
his work in the twelfth century).30 The latest of them is the so-called Itinerary of
Einsiedeln, found in a manuscript in the abbey of that name in Switzerland, and
much discussed in terms of its composition. Current views are still at odds over
this, some placing its origin in the Frankish area, more spe­cif­ic­al­ly at Fulda, while
its more recent editor argues, convincingly to my mind, for the Lateran.31 The
Itinerary of Einsiedeln is of particular interest because it lists not only churches
and relics but also all classical monuments that visitors to Rome could still see
and identify through statuary and attached inscriptions. As such, and especially if
we accept its Roman composition, it is a valuable source for the perception that
both the Romans and especially the papal environment had of what Rome meant,
and what was valued in it.
The itineraries present us with Rome as seen by pilgrims as well as by the
Romans. The description of the stational liturgy found in the ordines which set out
the detail of processions and liturgical celebrations throughout the year reflects
the most specifically Roman events in the life of the city.32 The stational liturgy, of
late antique tradition and, as such, only found elsewhere in Constantinople (the
New Rome), was at the core of Roman life, as I will argue in Chapter 5. Around it
were brought together all social groups in the city. It was essential to reflect and
reinforce the social and political consensus and the unity of the city around its
bishop. But it also served to make visible the hierarchies and categories which
made up the city, in their proper place and role, during ordinary festivals through-
out the year, and at the time of exceptional events, such as the adventus (triumphal
entry) of a ruler into the city. The ordines give us our best insight both into the
everyday life of the Roman community, its perception of itself and its components,
and the self-perception of its elites as reflected in the order of processions and
actions. They also allow us to see the community of the city functioning in nor-
mal times and circumstances, while we may otherwise only imagine it to be full of
strife and disharmony on the basis of the conflicts and conspiracies described in
the Liber Pontificalis at the time of papal elections, for example.
The Roman Liber Pontificalis was written by contemporaries, anonymous or
known, in our period, and reflected the views of the papal court. By contrast, the

30 VZ II, pp. 67–99, 101–31, 133–53.

31 VZ II, pp. 155–207; the most recent edition IE; for a discussion see also Chapter 5, notes 45
and 50.
32 M. Andrieu, ed., Les Ordines romani du Haut Moyen Age, 2 vols (Louvain, 1971).
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Introduction 17

Liber Pontificalis of Ravenna, my second main narrative source, also organized as

a series of episcopal acta—a common form of record in the early medieval period
in many dioceses—is the work of one author, with very much his own views,
not always favourable to the archbishops of Ravenna.33 Agnellus’ Liber Pontificalis
was very probably modelled on the Roman one, though Agnellus himself never
acknowledged this. It presents us with several problems. The most obvious con-
cerns the story of the archbishops before the time of Agnellus, who wrote roughly
between the 830s and the mid-840s. For the period before the mid-eighth century,
the issues are of lesser import from my point of view, though they all have been
discussed at length by the various editors of the texts over the years. The main
issue to keep in mind is, of course, Agnellus’ fierce anti-Roman (or rather anti-
papal) stance, reflecting the views of the Church of Ravenna itself during the
period of its autonomy from Rome (called autocephaly). After the loss of the auto-
cephaly in the earlier part of the eighth century, Ravenna never forgot this, and
even into the tenth century many of its archbishops would still be found arguing
against papal control over the city. We can interpret Agnellus as an almost contem-
porary source for the later eighth and earlier ninth century, and trace his views
to both his local pride when decrying all who despoiled or harmed Ravenna, or to
his anti-Romanism. This latter can be sensed in his not mentioning the issue of
iconoclasm, because this was one area in which the archbishop was, by definition,
supporting the pope; or his writing a fiercely negative account of Archbishop
George, who was in fact the papal envoy to Francia at the time of the Battle of
Fontenoy.34 In that sense, being able to compare Agnellus’ account with the Roman
Liber Pontificalis may be of advantage, for example in the telling of the quarrel
between Pope Stephen III (768–72) and Archbishop Sergius of Ravenna, an
opponent of the papacy called to Rome and excommunicated, which Agnellus
argues was a purely political move,35 or on the issue of Archbishop George’s politics.
But this only holds for as long as they run in tandem. Unfortunately, Agnellus’
account stops in the mid-ninth century, and we have no later contemporary nar-
rative for the history of Ravenna other than hagiography and letters. It is on these
two, brought together and examined in several key papers by Savigni,36 that one

33 The main modern discussions of Agnellus are by his editors C. Nauerth, ed., Agnellus von
Ravenna: Liber Pontificalis: Bischofsbuch (Freiburg, 1996), and D. Mauskopf Deliyannis, ed., The book
of pontiffs of the church of Ravenna (Washington DC, 2004); see also the discussions in C. Nauerth,
Agnellus von Ravenna. Untersuchungen zur archäologischen Methode des ravennatischen Chronisten
(Munich, 1974), J. Martinez Pizarro, Writing Ravenna: The ‘Liber Pontificalis’ of Andreas Agnellus (Ann
Arbor, 1995), and G. Cortesi, ‘Andrea Agnello e il «Liber Pontificalis Ecclesiae Ravennatis»’, CARB 28
(1981), pp. 31–76.
34 D. Mauskopf Deliyannis, ‘Agnellus of Ravenna and Iconoclasm: Theology and Politics in a 9th
century context’, Speculum 71/3 (1996), pp. 559–76; ASB 841.
35 LP I. 96, cs 19–24; Agnellus, LP, ch.157.
36 R. Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna. Dalla caduta dell’Esarcato alla fine del secolo X’, in SR II. 2, pp. 331–68;
R. Savigni, ‘Sacerdozio e regno in età post-carolingia: l’episcopato di Giovanni X, Arcivescovo di
Ravenna (905–914) e papa (914–928)’, Rivista di Storia della Chiesa in Italia 46 (1992), pp. 2–29.
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18 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

has to rely to tease out the history, even up to the somewhat uncertain archiepiscopal
succession, and to estimate the relations of the city and its elite with the popes,
the emperors, and the kings of Italy—and the change within those elites. We have
only a few indirect mentions of the liturgy of Ravenna and hence only an inkling
that it included some differences with that of Rome and kept some Eastern tradi-
tions that the popes and the Carolingians wished to see disappear. But we have a
few hagiographical sources, which are important in terms of their strong political
significance. Through them, the Church of Ravenna attempted to explain and
justify its autonomy, first in the seventh century on the basis of its apostolic foun-
dation by St Apollinarius as a dis­ciple of St Peter, then in the tenth with the writing
of the lives of its early bishops. These included genuine figures, such as Probus,
but also, more creatively, some perhaps not quite real ones, such as Barbatianus,
deliberately attempting to organize a cult around their newly translated relics.37
My third principal city-based narrative is that of the Venetian writer known as
John the Deacon. The Historia Veneticorum38 attributed to him presents its own
problems of authorship, though here, as with the Roman Liber Pontificalis, these
mostly relate to the first book. It has been shown that this was, in effect, a com­pil­
ation of material taken from several other writers, including Bede and Paul the
Deacon. The issue is not relevant for the later period: there seems to be little doubt
that he was the author of the other three books, which deal with events from 717
onwards until his own lifetime in the late tenth and early eleventh century. John
is, therefore, reporting well enough on the events concerning Venice—but that
is not to say that his report is in any way unbiased. John’s bias is less evident in
direct omissions, but very clear in his reinterpretation of the early history of
Venice, which he moulds to serve his very definite purpose (and possibly that of
his master and patron, Doge Peter II Orseolo, whose secretary he was). This pur-
pose is dual. In the first instance, he attempts to make clear that Venice developed

37 On these texts the best account is now in M. Verhoeven, The Early Christian Monuments of
Ravenna (Turnhout, 2011), pp. 56–93; for Barbatianus, see also E. Schoolman, Rediscovering Sainthood
in Italy: Hagiography and the Late Antique Past in Medieval Ravenna (New York, 2016).
38 JnD. On the problems of interpretation of John, see G. B. Monticolo, ‘I manoscritti e le fonti della
cronaca di Giovanni Diacono’, BISI 9 (1890), pp. 37–328, and G. B. Monticolo , La cronaca del diacono
Giovanni e la storia politica di Venezia sino al 1009 (Pistoia, 1892). S. Gasparri, ‘Venezia fra i secoli
VIII e IX. Una riflessione sulle fonti’, in Studi veneti offerti a G. Cozzi, ed. G. Benzoni et al. (Venice,
1992), pp. 3–18; S. Gasparri, ‘Anno 713. La leggenda di Paulicio e le origini di Venezia’, in Venezia.
I giorni della storia, ed. by U. Israel (Rome, 2011), pp. 27–45, and S. Gasparri, ‘The First Dukes and the
Origins of Venice’, in S. Gasparri and S. Gelichi, eds., Venice and Its Neighbors from the 8th to the 11th
Century Through Renovation and Continuity (Leiden, 2018), pp. 5–26; C. Negri di Montenegro, ‘Note
sulla “Venetiarum Historia” ’, Bizantinistica, s. II, 2 (2000), pp. 345–59; and B. Rosada, ‘Il ‘Chronicon
Venetum’ di Giovanni Diacono’, Ateneo Veneto 28 (1990), pp. 79–94. For an in-depth analysis of
John’s work and his presentation of Venice, see L. A. Berto, ‘La “Venetia” tra Franchi e Bizantini.
Considerazioni sulle fonti’, Studi Veneziani n. s. 38 (1999), pp. 189–202; L. A. Berto, ‘La storia degli
altri. Oriente ed Occidente nella “Istoria Veneticorum” di Giovanni Diacono’, Archivio Veneto 155
(2000), series V, pp. 5–20; L. A. Berto, ‘La guerra e la violenza nella “Istoria Veneticorum” di Giovanni
Diacono’, Studi Veneziani n. s. 42 (2001), pp. 15–41; L. A. Berto, The Political and Social Vocabulary of
John the Deacon’s ‘Istoria Veneticorum’ (Turnhout, 2013).
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Introduction 19

as an independent entity, without external pressure, to attain the greatness that

it already had by the tenth century. Byzantine control over it is almost unmen-
tioned: we can only guess at it when mention is being made of early changes of
power from dukes to magistri militum and back, unlikely to have been because, as
John claims, ‘the Venetians tired of [them] and wanted something else’, but
rather because autonomous attempts failed and the Byzantines regained control.
Similarly, mentions are made occasionally of Byzantine envoys in the city, such as
the patricius Theodosius, as though this were a courtesy visit, not one for a whole
year, teaching the Venetians how to build warships, as a result of which the
Byzantine emperor, says John, asked the Venetians to help fight the Saracens in
southern Italy—not, of course, that he ordered them to do so. This parallels the
views put forward by John about the Lombard kings, then the Carolingians, once
again gliding over the obligation of the Venetians—in the treaty of peace with the
Emperor Lothar I (the Pactum Lotharii) in 840 (renewed in 841)—to send troops
to help the Carolingian ruler in the south. John’s ‘interpretation’ continues
throughout the book, and we will see that much can be debated about his presen-
tation of the events preceding and during the rule of his hero Peter II. But beyond
these specific elements lies an even more crucial factor, emerging from the narra-
tive told by John. He is the author of the core foundation myth of Venice, that of
its independence from everyone, but, even more importantly, that of its unique-
ness, its difference from everybody else in both eastern and western contexts, its
original and unusual status, which made the city deserving of its greatness. And
this was to be a story which would become the fundamental building block of the
whole subsequent history of the Venetian state.
Around John, a few other narratives allow us glimpses of the history of Venice,
some earlier and some later. Earlier ones, and near contemporary with the events
themselves, are the Carmen de Aquilegia numquam restauranda, dated by Gasparri
to between 817 and 840, and the Translatio S. Marci, dated by its most recent
editor, Colombi, to the ninth century.39 The first recounts the visit and request
of Venetian envoys to the emperors Louis the Pious and Lothar to rescind their
agreement to the papal synod of 827, which had agreed to demote the Church of
Grado from its rank as a patriarchate (it being effectively the archdiocese of
Venice) in favour of the Church of Aquileia (which claimed to be the rightful
diocese, but was under Carolingian control). The second represented, in a sense,
the result of the failure of the plea, which had led the Venetians to set up their
own Church, on the basis of their obtaining the relics of the Evangelist Mark from
Alexandria. The Translatio relates events which John the Deacon would also relate

39 Carmen de Aquilegia numquam restauranda, ed. E. Dümmler, MGH Poetae 2 (Berlin, 1884), pp.
150–3; see S. Gasparri, ‘The formation of an early medieval community: Venice between provincial
and urban identity’, in West-Harling, Three Empires, pp. 35–50 at pp. 40–1; E. Colombi, ed.,
‘Translatio S. Marci Evangelistae Venetias [BHL 5283–5284]’, Hagiographica 17 (2010), pp. 73–129.
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20 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

later, as being the turning point in the history of the city and its rise. In Chapter 3
I will look more closely at how the two accounts differ, and why this difference is
indicative of the way in which John’s narrative came to be the key text for the
formation of Venetian identity. Nevertheless, as Berto has argued, there is, through-
out the early Venetian historiography, a not-unusual but very strongly enhanced
use of phenomena such as miracles, visions, prophecies, and supernatural occur-
rences, whose purpose is to highlight and reinforce the cre­ation of the memory of
early Venice according to this specific aim of promoting its uniqueness as part of
its identity.40
Of the later Venetian sources, the first is the text known as the Origo Civitatum
Italiae Seu Venetiarum, with the Chronicon Altinate and the Chronicon Gradense.
The edition by Cessi suggests that it was made up of three layers, written at differ-
ent times from the eleventh century onwards, though one such layer incorporates
an original ninth-century text, which could thus be used to identify specific fam­
ilies, church foundations, and episcopal lists.41 I will use this text, with some
caution, partly because it is likely that it can indeed reflect the memory of, for
example, the associations of a family with a church and relics; but mostly because
it can be used very usefully to understand the Venetians’ perceptions of their early
history, and their definition of themselves in association with specific areas of
origin or settlement. It is for that reason that we find some of these associations
later reiterated in sources like the thirteenth-century history of the city by Doge
Andrea Dandolo, and by even later descriptive and topographical material, for
example in the list of churches of Venice by Flaminio Corner.42
Some information about Venetian affairs can also be found, usually as an aside
for matters of trade, diplomacy, and so on, in sources outside Venice, whether
in the Liber Pontificalis or in Agnellus, but also in northern annals, such as the
Royal Frankish Annals for the attack on Venice by Pepin, king of Italy and son of
Charlemagne, and the follow-up to it until the treaty of Aachen with the Byzantine
Empire. One such piece of information, of potentially great significance had the
Venetians not managed to scotch the rumours to that effect, was that of an alleged
translation of the relics of St Mark to Reichenau, mentioned in two Reichenau
hagiographical texts as well as depicted in a wall painting43; how this was achieved

40 L. A. Berto, ‘«As an angel revealed to her»: miracles, visions, predictions and supernatural
phenomena and the politics of memory in Early Medieval Venice’, Mediterranean Studies 23 (2015),
pp. 1–26.
41 R. Cessi, ed., Origo Civitatum Italiae Seu Venetiatum (Chronicon Altinate et Chronicon Gradense)
(Rome: FSI 73, 1933).
42 Andreae Danduli ducis Venetiarum Chronica per extensum descripta, aa. 46–1280 d.C, ed.
E. Pastorello, 9 vols in 7 (Bologna: 1938–58); F. Corner, Ecclesiae Venetae antiquis documentis nunc
etiam primus editis illustratae ac in decades distributae (Venice, 1749), repr. as Notizie storiche delle
chiese e monasteri di Venezia e di Torcello (Bologna, 1990).
43 R. Zettler, ‘La traslazione di san Marco a Venezia e a Reichenau’, in S. Marco: Aspetti storici e
agiografici. Atti del Convegno internazionale di studi veneziani, 26–29 aprile 1994, ed. A. Niero (Venice,
1996), pp. 689–709; now F. Veronese, ‘In Venetiarum partibus reliquias adportatas. Reichenau e la
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Introduction 21

will be discussed in Chapter 3. Frankish sources were not alone in giving mentions
to Venice; Byzantine sources also did so, though rarely. Most notable in that
respect is the written account of the Byzantine provinces provided by the Emperor
Constantine Porphyrogenitus in his De administrando imperii, in which he men-
tions Torcello as an emporion mega.44 Much discussion of this has taken place,
with suggestions that he may have been right in his estimation, which is a fact
now completely obliterated by the success of Venice, in whose interest it was to
conceal the importance of the rival Torcello. Both Berto, in an important article,
and more generally Crouzet-Pavan have looked closely at this, Berto concluding
that the Byzantine narrative was likely to have been more accurate than other
contemporary ones in some respects, such as the events under Charlemagne and
the role of Torcello.45
Before I approach my other main type of written sources, the documents, I need
to mention briefly an in-between category: the letters. These are numerous for the
period, sometimes illuminating other narratives, especially regarding the papacy,
sometimes contradicting them. Papal letters, especially those exchanged with
the Byzantine and Frankish emperors, often come under the category of political
relations of the papacy, rather than of the history of Rome. In that respect, the
most important collection for my purpose is the Codex Carolinus, which includes
letters received by the Frankish rulers, from Charles Martel to Charlemagne, and
are an essential part in allowing us to understand the intentions of the popes and
their presentation of the case for a Frankish alliance as it developed over time.46
But we also have occasional examples of letters which mention by-the-by details
of such features as the papal appeals to the Doge Ursus to defend Ravenna; the
conflicts between the Doge Ursus and the patriarch of Grado about the appoint-
ment of Dominic as bishop of Olivolo c.875, in which papal intervention was
attempted; the letter of Pope Leo IV ordering the Archbishop of Ravenna Romanus
to protect his deputies in Ravenna, the Dukes John and Desiderius, in 876;47 and

costruzione di una rappresentazione agiografica delle Venetie (IX–X secolo)’, in The Age of Affirmation.
Venice, the Adriatic and the Hinterland between the 9th and 10th Centuries, ed. S. Gasparri and
S. Gelichi (Turnhout, 2017), pp. 215–61 and F. Veronese, ‘Saint Marc entre Venise et Reichenau: les
reliques de l’evangeliste comme objet et enjeu de competition (IX–X siecle)’, in Compétition et sacré au
haut Moyen Âge: entre médiation et exclusion, ed. P. Depreux, F. Bougard, and R. Le Jan (Turnhout,
2015), pp. 295–312. For the painting see J.-M. Sansterre, ‘Vénération et utilisation apotropaïque
de l’image à Reichenau vers la fin du Xe siècle’, Revue Belge de Philosophie et d’Histoire 73 (1995),
pp. 281–95.

44 Constantine Porphyrogenitus, De administrando imperii, pp. 118–19.

45 Berto, ‘La “Venetia” tra Franchi e Bizantini’; E. Crouzet-Pavan, La mort lente de Torcello: histoire
d’une cité disparue (Paris, 1995).
46 CC.
47 MGH Ep. III, no 702; G. Monticolo, ‘Le spedizioni di Liutprando nell’Esarcato e la lettera di
Gregorio III al Doge Orso’, ASRSP 15 (1892), pp. 321–63; Epistolae selectae Leonis IV, in MGH Ep.
V, no. 8.
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22 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

many others of particular use when no other narrative sources are available, as is
the case for tenth-century Ravenna.

Documentary Sources

We have at our disposal what is, by early medieval standards, a considerable body
of diplomatic sources. At the royal and imperial level, the Carolingian capitularies
for Italy, the numerous diplomas to monasteries from the Lombard kings to the
Ottonian emperors through the Carolingians, and the placita from the Lombards
to the Ottonians; both those for the Regnum Italiae, and outside it in all three cities,
were published as part of the nineteenth- and twentieth-century great collections
of sources, like the Fonti per la Storia d’Italia and the Monumenta Germaniae
Historica. The exceptional series of private charters of the archbishopric of Ravenna,
providing information about people as well as monastic houses, with names, status,
titles, and family groupings, previously only available through an eighteenth
century edition and several partial ones, has recently been published in a scholarly
new edition by Benericetti.48 Venetian documents from some of the great monas-
teries such as SS Ilario e Benedetto, S. Lorenzo, S. Giorgio, and S. Michele of
Brondolo have also been published recently.49 Venetian documents were known
from a long-standing unique typescript catalogue and part-edition by Lanfranchi,
and a two-volume edition of a surviving corpus of documents from the earliest
to the eleventh century was published by Cessi in the mid-twentieth century, and
has been used ever since in its reprinted version.50 This has now been supple-
mented by the online edition of those documents, divided into atti notarili and
atti diplomatici, made by the Centro Interuniversitario per la Storia e l’Archeologia
dell’Alto Medioevo (SAAME).51 Most of the documents are themselves medieval
transcripts of the original documents, which have nearly all disappeared, many
no doubt in the numerous fires which plagued Venice throughout the Middle
Ages. One of the first of these fires, of particular relevance to me, is that of the
ducal chancery, destroyed when the fire was deliberately set to the Doge’s Palace
in 976; this may explain the dearth of documents preceding that date. The relative
scarcity of Venetian documents in the early period poses an interesting question
as to the amount of government and private notarial business actually carried out,

48 Benericetti C8/9; X/1; X/2; X/3; X/4.

49 L. Lanfranchi and B. Strina, eds., SS. Ilario e Benedetto e S. Gregorio (Venice, 1965); F. Gaeta, ed.,
S. Lorenzo (Venice, 1959); L. Lanfranchi, ed., S. Giorgio Maggiore, 2 vols, II: Documenti 982–1159
(Venice, 1968); B. Lanfranchi Strina, ed., SS. Trinità e S. Michele Arcangelo di Brondolo, II: Documenti
800–1189 (Venice, 1981).
50 CVL; Cessi I and Cessi II.
51 The main sources for the history of Venice are now edited online in Documenti veneziani by
A. Pazienza, on the SAAME website at http://saame.it/fonte/documenti-veneziani/ (2015).
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Introduction 23

since it is not possible to establish whether this is due to limit­ed activity or to

historical accident of survival.
The most significant body of documents that we have for Rome during the
period was mostly published from the late nineteenth century onwards, many
by Fedele, in individual volumes or self-standing papers in the Società Romana di
Storia Patria. Key bodies of charters are those of the archives of the great monastic
houses of S. Silvestro in Capite, SS Ciriaco e Nicola in Via Lata, SS Andrea e
Gregorio in Clivo Scauro, SS Cosma e Damiano in Mica Aurea, S. Maria in Campus
Martius, SS Alessio e Bonifacio, S. Prassede, S. Agnese, and of the diaconia of
S. Maria Nova.52 Wickham has provided a complete analysis of their origins,
association with Roman monasteries, and importance in understanding the social
organization, wealth, and topographical development of Rome, especially in the
tenth century.53 Since his own work has been, by choice, one specifically focusing
on the documentation of Rome, he has provided us with a thorough grounding in
the understanding of these documents, but also of the constraints under which
we have to work in terms of survival of the documentation in time and space.
I shall not go over the material again, but reiterate the importance of these charters
and judicial documents for my own purpose too, which is to gain information not
only for such key issues as the extent and nature of economic power and social
control in the city and the surrounding area, but also to understand the religious
and ideological perceptions of the city by its inhabitants, the topographical and
architectural developments, and, last but certainly not least, comparisons with the
archival documentation of the other two cities. The interest I have from this angle
would be that of confronting patterns of naming, cultural and historical self-
awareness of the actors of the documents of their titles and status, legal affiliations,
but also comparisons of plans of their houses, location of their properties in the
city or outside it, and property of churches and monasteries.

Material Culture

As a general category, material culture encompasses archaeology, but also essential

areas of research not specific to, but essential for, the early medieval historian of
Italy: epigraphy and numismatics. These two areas occupied the interests and
skills of some of the older scholars of this period, from the collections of inscrip-
tions and coins published in the nineteenth century, best known among them

52 V. Federici, ed., ‘Regesto del monastero di S. Silvestro de Capite’, ASRSP 22 (1899), pp. 213–300;
SMVL; SSAG; SSCD; E. Carusi, ed., Cartario di S. Maria in Campo Marzio: 986–1199, 2 vols (Rome:
Misc. Società Romana di Storia Patria 17, 1948); SSAB; P. Fedele, ed., ‘Tabularium S. Praxedis’, ASRSP
27 (1904); I. I. Lori Sanfilippo, ed., ‘Le più antiche carte del monastero di S. Agnese sulla Via
Nomentana’, in Bullettino dell’Archivio paleografico italiano n.s. 2–3 (1956–7); SMN.
53 Wickham, Medieval Rome, chs. 1, 3, and 4.
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24 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

being that of Roman Christian inscriptions by De Rossi, and of Venetian coins

by Papadopoli Aldobrandini.54 Various new items have been discovered since, or
indeed looked at with other perspectives in mind, and newer editions brought out
as a result of the possibilities of using new scientific approaches. Epigraphy in
Rome has been enriched by the editions of the CISAM of Spoleto, and in Venice,
where there had as yet not been a proper collection of all the materials from the
region, a new edition is about to be published.55 Numismatic knowledge in Italy
has been much enhanced by the studies of Arslan and Rovelli, with the cata­loguing
and interpreting of recently discovered hoards, including those of Arab coins in
Venice, the growing interest in Carolingian mints in Italy, and the recent discov-
eries of coin repositories in the Crypta Balbi excavations, which help greatly with
our knowledge of the use of money in early medieval Rome.56
The excavations at the Crypta Balbi, begun in the early 1990s and published
around 2000, have been part of the hugely important renewal of archaeology in
Rome, focusing this time on the early medieval period rather than either ‘classical’
or ‘Christian’ Rome, as had previously been the case for centuries.57 The interest
in the period is not entirely new, though early work in the area had been seen
as merely an adjunct to work on classical Rome in its later phases, or as part of a
panorama of the whole of medieval Rome. Not until Krautheimer began his
monumental life’s work on Rome was there a genuine interest in the city between
the fourth and the eleventh centuries, and it is largely because of him that s­ cholars
began to focus on Byzantine and Carolingian Rome.58 Much work was carried
out in the 1970s and 1980s, partly still on churches, in the tradition of Christian
archaeology, with major key aspects remaining the interest in the church of
S. Maria Antiqua—to which I will return below when briefly discussing work on
the artistic material. But some work also began in earnest on understanding the
development of early medieval Rome in terms of its population and occupation
patterns, topographies of power, and economic, social, and defensive models,
with Hubert, Marazzi, and Delogu in particular looking at both the city and
Lazio itself to understand the links between the two which allowed the city to

54 G. B. De Rossi, Inscriptiones Christianae Urbis Romae (Rome, 1857–88); G. B. De Rossi and

A. Silvagni, Inscriptiones Christianae Urbis Romae Nova Series. 8 vols (Rome, 1922–83); N. Papadopoli
Aldobrandini, ed., Le monete di Venezia (Venice, 1893).
55 G. M. Annoscia, ed., Lazio—Roma. Rioni V—VI—VII—VIII (Spoleto, 2017); F. De Rubeis ed.,
Inscriptiones Medii Aevi Italiae, saec. VI–XII: Venezia (Venice, in press).
56 There are numerous publications by E. A. Arslan, of which a major one is Repertorio dei ritro-
vamenti di moneta altomedievale in Italia: 489–1002 (Spoleto, 2005); and likewise by A. Rovelli, with
several papers published together in the volume Coinage and coin use in medieval Italy (Basingstoke,
2012).
57 M. S. Arena et al., eds., Roma dall’Antichità al Medioevo. Archeologia e storia nel Museo Nazionale
Romano nella Crypta Balbi (Rome, 2001), with articles by Delogu, Manacorda, and Sagui in particular,
is the main reference work for the Crypta Balbi excavation.
58 CB.
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Introduction 25

function.59 From the 1990s, such work has developed exponentially, as a result of
a large number of new excavations in the centre of Rome, with the possibility of
exploring the area of the Crypta Balbi and Largo Argentina, then the Colosseum,
the Porticus of Octavia around S. Angelo in Pescheria, and, last but by no means
least, the area of the imperial Fora. Foremost among the archaeologists who
worked in central Rome have been Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani with their
teams in the area of Argentina and the Fori Imperiali.60 The latest excavation,
which has helped considerably with our views of the industry and crafts economy
of early medieval Rome, is that in Piazza Madonna di Loreto, an area continuing
that of the Forum of Trajan towards the old Via Lata (the piazza is now more or
less part of the Piazza Venezia zone).61 With the Crypta Balbi and the current area
of the Via Botteghe Oscure, we can begin to understand better how the area of the
Circus Maximus/Septa Iulia functioned in terms of economic transformations of
the city. With that of the Porticus of Octavia and the foot of the Aventine, such
understanding has been extended to the most commercial zone of the city by the
Tiber. Work on the Palatine and then on the imperial Fora gradually enabled us
better to understand the pattern of occupation, especially at the high end of the
social scale, of the aristocratic housing, and its attempt to associate itself with the
prestige of imperial Rome; and the discovery of the two ninth-century houses in
the Forum of Nerva gave the best impression so far of high-end housing at the
time of Carolingian rule (Plates 1 and 2).62 By extending this to seeing how these
houses and others may have been supplied through metal­work, ceramics, glass,
textiles, and other goods for which there are traces of production so close to the

59 E. Hubert, Espace urbain et habitat à Rome du Xe siècle à la fin du XIIIe siècle (Rome: Coll. ERF 135,
1990); F. Marazzi, ‘Roma, il Lazio, il Mediterraneo: relazioni fra economia e politica dal VII al IX secolo’,
in La storia economica di Roma nell’alto medievo alla luce dei recenti scavi archeologici, ed. L. Paroli and
P. Delogu (Florence, 1993), pp. 267–85. See also Marazzi’s earlier work, ‘Da suburbium a territorium: il
rapporto tra Roma e il suo hinterland nel passaggio dall’antichità al medioevo’, Roma nell’Alto Medioevo
(27 aprile—1 maggio 2000), Settimane 48 (Spoleto, 2001), pp. 715–55; F. Marazzi, I ‘Patrimonia Sanctae
Romanae Ecclesiae’ nel Lazio (secoli IV–X). Strutture amministrative e prassi gestionale (dal IV agli inizi del
X secolo) (Rome, 1998), pp. 1–334; and F. Marazzi, ‘I patrimoni della chiesa romana e l’amministrazione
papale fra tarda antichità e alto medioevo’, in Roma medievale. Aggiornamenti, ed. P. Delogu, (Florence,
1998), pp. 33–50. For Delogu’s essential work, in addition to the above, see also Chapter 4 note 386.
60 R. Meneghini and R. Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’altomedioevo (Rome, 2004); R. Meneghini
and R. Santangeli Valenzani, I Fori imperiali (Rome, 2007); R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Tra la Porticus
Minucia e il Calcarario—L’Area Sacra di Largo Argentina nell’Altomedioevo’, Archeologia Medievale 21
(1994), pp. 57–98; D. Manciolo and Santangeli Valenzani, eds., L’area sacra di Largo Argentina (Rome,
1997). See also, for a general discussion of this archaeological programme, C. Wickham, ‘Early
Medieval Archeology in Italy: the last twenty years’, Archeologia Medievale 26 (1999), pp. 7–20, and
again in C. Wickham et al., ‘An assessment of Italian medieval Archeology’, Quaderni Storici 36 (2001),
pp. 295–301.
61 A. Molinari, R. Santangeli Valenzani, and L. Spera, eds., L’archeologia della produzione a Roma
(secoli V–XV) (Bari: Coll. ERF 516, 2015).
62 A. Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo. Archeologia e topografia (secoli VI–XIII) (Rome, 1996),
pp. 46–77; A. Augenti, ‘Il potere e la memoria. Il Palatino tra IV e VIII secolo’, MEFREM 111 (1999),
pp. 197–207, and A. Augenti, ‘Continuity and Discontinuity of a Seat of Power: the Palatine Hill from
the fifth to the tenth century’, in Early Medieval Rome and the Christian West, ed. J. M. H. Smith
(Leiden, 2000), pp. 45–53; Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, I Fori imperiali.
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26 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Forum of Trajan, it is possible to gain a better idea of the size, nature, and custom
of Roman industry at this point. Naturally, meanwhile, archaeological work has
continued in the more traditional areas of interest in Rome, especially that of
churches, as well as on the development of the Leonine City, its walls, visitors’
infrastructure associated with the pilgrimage to Rome, lodgings, food provision
and aqueducts, and its defence.
The vastly expanding field of urban archaeology of the early Middle Ages can
also be seen in Ravenna. Here too most work in the early twentieth century
focused on the area where the palace of Theodoric was supposed to have been,
though there is still some lack of clarity as to whether this was also the main late
antique imperial palace. Excavations had been mainly focused on this area, and
on some of the Roman domus, while gradually work has extended to areas of special
interest to early medievalists, notably the important domus of the Traversari in
the tenth century. Important work has been carried out around Ravenna too,
especially on the site of the city of Classe, until at least the eighth century the port
of Ravenna, and the leader of the work there, Augenti, has focused on examining
how Classe functioned as part of the network of ports and emporia around
Europe.63 The main individual excavation in Classe remains that on the site of the
monastery of S. Severo, one of the most important in Ravenna in the ninth and
tenth centuries, and a political centre for the Ottonian emperors.64
Before looking at the archaeological work carried out in Venice, it is essential
to mention a key site situated between Ravenna and Venice, which saw its com-
mercial peak between the eighth and the tenth century: Comacchio. The port there
was, from the start, the main rival to Venice, through its highly successful trade in
salt, then fish, between the Adriatic and the inland areas along the Po valley. The
site of Comacchio has been excavated by Gelichi, who has drawn attention to its
importance, but also to the great similarities between its and the early Venetian
economy.65 He has explained how the rivalry between the two cities, fundamen-
tally very similar in their nature and growth, eventually played out in favour of
Venice, for both political reasons (as Byzantine headquarters) and economic ones
(a more aggressive ‘foreign’ policy, early commercial interests in the East, and
possibly the presence of a major unifying saint used to rally the city). This is the
reason why, from a position of equal opportunities, Venice won and became the
later success it was, while Comacchio declined and became a small provincial city.
Venice also had a tradition of archaeology of churches, most famous being
the excavations at Torcello, begun in the 1960s through an Italian–Polish

63 A. Augenti, Città e porti dall’Antichità al Medioevo (Rome, 2010).

64 The most accessible summary of the Classe excavations is in A. Augenti, ed., La basilica, il
monastero di San Severo in Classe: la storia, gli scavi (Ravenna, 2007) (for his other papers, see below
note 90 and Chapter 4, note 290).
65 S. Gelichi, ed., Comacchio e il suo territorio tra la tarda antichità e l’Alto Medioevo (Ferrara, 2007).
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Introduction 27

col­lab­or­ation, revisited by that team later, and now revived by a new team.66
Archaeological work in Venice has always been easier in the islands than in the
city itself, and much of this has been done, and is still done now, for example at
Jesolo. Some work has been carried out in the city, much of it as emergency exca-
vations when restorations were set up. Originally most of that work has been
in and around Piazza San Marco and the basilica, notably in the crypt. Other
occasional sites have yielded information over the years, for example the hoard of
coins at S. Tomà, and the tokens of trade in Cannaregio, the latter found during
the excavations at Ca’ Vendramin.67 These have given rise to an important debate
in the 2000s, led by Ammermann and Gelichi, who supported the view that the
island of Rialto was already a commercial hub, focusing on an axis extending
from Castello (Olivolo) and the cathedral towards Cannaregio, in the seventh and
eighth centuries; it was only later, according to them, that the centre of Venice
shifted south towards the Grand Canal, following the move by the Particiaci of
the political centre from Malamocco to Rialto with the building of the Doge’s
Palace and the basilica of St Mark.68 This, as we shall see, goes rather against the
impression which John the Deacon attempts to give in terms of the development
of the city. John is quite adept at deflecting attention from what he wants to avoid
saying, so it is important to weigh the evidence of these two views, to see whether
one or the other is more reliable in terms of the early history of the city. This is all
the more important since a recent excavation at Dogaletto di Mira near Fusina
has reopened and widened the issue. Here, the discovery of ninth-century post-
holes which appear to argue for the presence there of a fairly large wooden city
have led the archaeologists to argue that this was the original location of the city
of Malamocco, not the later island. If this can be confirmed and defended, our
views would once again have to shift. In the first instance, it would support the
argument of a very close early involvement of the Venetians with the Lombard
kingdom, since this location would be suitable as an opening onto the sea of the
economies of the mainland, notably of Padua. Secondly, it would suggest that,
contrary to Ammermann’s argument, it was indeed the Grand Canal, as a con­tinu­
ation of the mouth of the Brenta into the sea, which would have been the most
suitable candidate as the political and commercial centre of Venice by the early

66 See Chapter 4 note 417; a new excavation has just begun, Torcello Abitata: Archeologia e
Communità, as part of the project INTEREG Adrion, under the direction of D. Calaon, whom I thank
for his information and insights. Partial results have already been published in D. Calaon, E. Zendri,
and G. Biscontin, eds., Torcello scavata. Patrimonio condiviso. 2: Lo scavo (Basaldella di Campoformido,
2014), esp. pp. 209–44.
67 V. Gobbo, ‘Lo scavo d’emergenza nel giardino occidentale di Ca’ Vendramin Calergi’, in
L. Fozzatti, ed., Ca’ Vendramin Calergi. Archeologia urbana lungo il Canal Grande di Venezia (Venice,
2005), pp. 41–58; S. Gelichi, ‘La storia di una nuova città attraverso l’archeologia: Venezia nell’alto
medioevo’, in West-Harling, Three Empires, pp. 51–97.
68 A. J. Ammerman, ‘Venice before the Grand Canal’, Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome
48 (2003), pp. 141–58, and A. J. Ammerman and C. E. McClennen, eds., Venice Before San Marco
(Colgate, 2001).
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28 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

ninth century. The Dogaletto di Mira excavation has not yet been fully published,
and one awaits it impatiently. This excavation was partly a result of the recent
work carried out on the site of the monastery of S. Ilario.69

Art and Architecture

Significantly, the excavations at S. Ilario near Venice have also allowed traditional
views on artistic influences to be rethought, when it was argued that a figure in
one of its few remaining floor mosaics represented an animal found only to the
east of the Mediterranean, more specifically Iran.70 This, as has been suggested,
could reflect contemporary knowledge of such an animal on account of trade
links between Venice and the old Persian world, and the import of artefacts from
that area to Venice; though it could perhaps also be just a copy of a late antique
model from a local mosaic or wall painting. The continued reuse of late antique
artistic models and techniques remained at the centre of medieval art in Rome.
Until the eighth century, some of this tradition continued to be not just visible but
constantly reproduced, notably in the great basilicas with their mosaics and fres-
coes, as well as traditional Roman architectural features. Contemporary sixth-,
seventh-, and eighth-century features from the eastern Mediterranean (Syria,
Palestine) and Byzantine adaptations of late antique art were increasingly seen in
Rome in the form of icons, enamel, metalwork, and textiles, as these were imported
into the city. The influence of their iconography can be seen in such themes as, for
example, the Anastasis or the Crucifixion with the long loincloth (colobium), in
S. Maria Antiqua.71 The debate regarding Byzantine influence in Roman art, and
the impact or otherwise of iconoclasm, have all been discussed by art historians;
I will return to this in Chapter 4. But Byzantine art was, in many ways, a reworking
of early Christian or late antique art. Its continuation, then revival, was a feature
of art in Rome, during the period of Byzantine rule certainly, but also, in a different
and more openly antiquarian way, after Frankish influence came to the fore.

69 C. Moinè, E. Corrò, and S. Primon, eds., Paesaggi artificiali a Venezia: archeologia e geologia nelle
terre del monastero di Sant’Ilario tra alto medioevo ed età moderna (Florence, 2017), esp. pp. 59–66
and 203–9.
70 S. Riccioni, ‘I mosaici altomedievali di Venezia e il monastero di S. Ilario. Orditi CHECK
“venetico-carolingi” di una koinè alto Adriatica’, in Gasparri, Age of Affirmation, pp. 277–322 at
pp. 306–11.
71 The body of work on S. Maria Antiqua is considerable. The most recent is the volume J. Osborne,
J. Rasmus Brandt, and G. Morganti, eds., Santa Maria Antiqua al Foro Romano cento anni dopo (Rome,
2004), with a bibliography of earlier work. For more general discussions of the ‘Byzantine’ influence
on Roman art, see R. Krautheimer, Rome: Profile of a City 312–1308, (Princeton, 1980, 3rd edn 2000);
R. Krautheimer, Early Christian and Byzantine Architecture, 4th edn (Harmondsworth, 1986);
R. Krautheimer, Three Christian Capitals. Topography and Politics (Berkeley, 1983). A more recent
general study is T. Magnusson, The Urban Transformation of Medieval Rome 312–1420, Suecoromana
7 (Stockholm, 2004).
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Introduction 29

Nobody, since Krautheimer, has denied or indeed underestimated the influence

of Carolingian art and architecture in Rome, and the city’s transformation
through papal input into its restoration and embellishment, much of it funded by
Charlemagne’s gifts. Several long-standing traditions can be identified in the
overwhelming body of study about medieval art in Rome. Of relevance to me have
been the discussions around the impact of the art of the Byzantine period, espe-
cially in relation to the importance of icons, and of the iconography of S. Maria
Antiqua, now benefiting from the end of a long period of excavation, restoration,
and study, brought together in one important volume of work published in 2004.
Most of the art history of Rome has naturally been focused on its churches, since
little else has survived, except for elements of reused sculpture. Though few and
far between, these sculptures have nevertheless proved very important for the
study of some of the architecture of the Lateran Palace and piazza in particular.
Work on these and on the palace, already carried out since the early twentieth
century, has intensified with Herklotz and Pietrangeli, and has taken some new
directions.72 While there had been a definite interest, notably by Krautheimer, in
the whole issue of papal and Carolingian ideological representations in Rome,
and more particularly in the Lateran, this trend has been expanded and further
debated recently to reflect on the significance of the ideologies and topographies
of power of Carolingian Rome.73 Those themes have been at the centre of recent
work on early medieval art in Rome, notably with the important body of work by
Luchterhandt. Art historians have been increasingly aware of, and have insisted
on, the impact of Frankish ideas, iconography, and building techniques in the city.
The impact extends from the traditionally known imperial and papal ideology of
the Lateran triclinium of Pope Leo III (795–816) or S. Suzanna, to theological
points being made in the churches built or restored by Popes Leo III and Paschal I
(817–24), such as SS Nereo e Achilleo and, of course, S. Prassede, for which the
seminal work by Goodson has launched further questioning and debate.74

72 I. Herklotz, ‘Der Campus Lateranensis im Mittelalter’, Römisches Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte

(1985), pp. 1–43, and I. Herklotz, Gli eredi di Costantino. Il papato, il Laterano e la propaganda visiva
del XII secolo (Rome, 2000); C. Pietrangeli, ed., Il Palazzo Apostolico Lateranense (Florence, 1991).
73 See, for example, M. Luchterhandt, ‘Päpstlicher Palastbau und höfisches Zeremoniell unter Leo
III’, in 799. Kunst und Kultur der Karolingerzeit. Karl der Grosse und Papst Leo III. in Paderborn, III,
Beitrage zum Katalog der Ausstellung, ed. C. Stiegemann and M. Wemhoff (Mainz, 1999), pp. 109–22;
M. Luchterhandt, ‘Vom Haus des Bischofs zum Locus Sanctus: Der Laternapalast im kulturellen
Gedächtnis des römischen Mittelalters’, in The Emperor’s house. Palaces from Augustus to the Age of
Absolutism, ed. M. Featherstone et al. (Berlin, 2015), pp. 73–92; see also Chapter 4, pp. 5–7 and
Chapter 6, pp. 47–48.
74 For the triclinium and Sta Susanna, see C. Davis-Weyer, ‘Das Apsismosaik Leos III in S. Susanna’,
Zeitschrift fur Kunstgeschichte 28 (1965), pp. 177–94, and for SS Nereo e Achilleo, see G. Curzi, ‘La
decorazione musiva della basilica dei Ss. Nereo e Achilleo in Roma: materiali ed ipotesi’, Arte
Medievale, s. II, 7, 2 (1993), pp. 21–46; C. Davis-Weyer, ‘A IX century mosaic and its restorers: the tri-
umphal arch of Ss. Nereo e Achilleo in Rome’, Abstracts of papers delivered in art history sessions
(1977), p. 21; U. Utro, ‘Una “falsa testimonianza”: il dipinto della Biblioteca Vaticana e il mosaico
absidale perduto dei Ss. Nereo e Achilleo’, in Atti del IX Colloquio Carolingi e Ottoni dell’Associazione
Italiana per lo Studio e la Conservazione del Mosaico, Aosta 2003, ed. C. Angelelli (Ravenna, 2004),
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30 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

In Chapter 4 I will show how the focus of much recent research for this period has
resulted in a clear demonstration of just how im­port­ant Frankish influence was—
by men who thought they were doing no more than restoring the glory of ancient
Rome—in the artistic life of the city. It can be seen through new images and
iconography, and a new liturgical architecture, with the multiplication of crypts,
and through building techniques in church restoration. It was also responding to
the arrival of new artistic models and styles, manuscripts like the S. Paolo Bible,
the Chair of St Peter, or the vast increase in the use of metalwork (especially silver)
in the great Roman basilicas. This last is, in fact, probably the single most important
manifestation of the Carolingian impact on the city itself. It contributed, directly
through increased economic resources and indirectly through its revival of early
Christian motifs and ideas, to the reshaping of the city, or at any rate of its churches
and the Lateran—contrary to the very modest impact that the Franks had on the
city in any other way (administrative, political, social, ethnic).
For much of the ninth-century art and architecture in the city, we were highly
dependent on our interpretation of the key written sources describing buildings
no longer in existence. Previously, work such as Geertman’s on the catalogue of
Leo III’s restorations has been crucial, and this has been studied anew by Bauer
in more recent years.75 Similarly, both scholars of the liturgy and art historians
have contributed to recreating the physical and visual environment of the great
ba­sil­
icas, including their mosaics, wall paintings, metalwork, sculpture, and
stonework, from the written evidence of pilgrims, from the rich documentation
of the later Middle Ages, and from the sixteenth-century copies made of art, espe-
cially for old St Peter’s, which was destroyed to build the new one.76 It is only on
their account that we have some inkling of any work done in Rome in the very
late ninth century (Pope Formosus’ finishing of the papal portraits in St Peter’s,
and carrying out some major work on the frescoes of the nave at St Peter’s, includ-
ing additions to the Christological cycle); and in the tenth century, with the res­
tor­ation of the Lateran basilica, including Pope John XII’s (955–64) new chapel in

pp. 507–18; R. Wisskirchen, ‘Leo III und die Mosaikprogramme von S. Apollinare in Classe in Ravenna
und SS. Nereo ed Achilleo in Rom’, Jahrbuch fur Antike und Christentum 34 (1991), pp. 139–51; and,
above all, D. Giunta, ‘I mosaici dell’arco absidale della basilica dei SS Nereo ed Achilleo e l’eresia adozi-
onista del VIII secolo’, in Roma e l’età carolingia. Atti delle giornate di studio 3–8 maggio 1976 (Rome:
Istituto di Storia dell’Arte dell’Università di Roma, 1976), pp. 195–200; for Sta Prassede, see
C. Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal I: Papal Power, Urban Renovation, Church Rebuilding and Relic
Translation, 817–824 (Cambridge, 2010), and Chapter 4, note 209.

75 H. Geertman, More Veterum. Il Liber Pontificalis e gli edifici ecclesiastici di Roma nella tarda
antichità e nell’alto medioevo (Groningen, 1975), and H. Geertman, ‘Nota sul Liber Pontificalis come
fonte archeologica’, in “Qvaeritvr Inventvs Colitvr”. Miscellanea in onore di Padre Umberto Fasola,
2 vols (Vatican City, 1989), pp. 347–61; D. Bellardini and P. Delogu, ‘Liber Pontificalis e altre fonti: la
topografia di Roma nell’VIII secolo’, in Il Liber Pontificalis e la storia materiale. Atti del Colloquio inter-
nazionale, ed. H. Geertman (Rome: Medelingen van het Nederlands Instituut te Rome 60–61, 2002),
pp. 205–23; F. A. Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt Rom im Frühmittelalter (Wiesbaden, 2004).
76 G. Grimaldi, ‘Descrizione della basilica antica di S. Pietro in Vaticano’, in Codice Barberini latino
2733, ed. R. Niggl (Vatican City, 1972).
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Introduction 31

the atrium leading to the church.77 Ottonian artistic influence in the city was
almost non-existent, and the tenth century is generally a relative blank so far as
artistic production is concerned—though it was, of course, happening, as we
know from the palaces and monasteries built by Alberic for example—with some
rare exceptions, such as the frescoes of S. Maria in Pallara and S. Maria in Via
Lata.78 We are aware of new and revived monastic foundations, of old aristocratic
houses on the Aventine, and of new ones being built, for example on the Palatine,
of which we know almost nothing at present in terms of architecture or decoration.
It would be extremely desirable to be able to have such excavations—though dif-
ficult since much is now buried under later buildings—perhaps through attempts
to review and fine-tune any evidence left by older archaeologists whose work on
the Palatine, Aventine, and Via Lata area effectively destroyed the traces of early
medieval buildings in order to reach the Roman layers. Whether it will ever be
possible to do so remains to be seen.
Ravenna is both similar to and different from Rome. Similar in that it too had a
Roman past, with an inherited body of churches, palaces, and domus, with mosa-
ics, decoration, and architectural features belonging to the late antique period.
Different, however, in that this heritage dated at most from the fifth century, when
the Roman Empire had already become Christian, and thus its art and architecture
were not of temples and pagan decoration but of Christian iconography and rep-
resentations. Ravenna did not have Rome’s problem of dealing with a large body
of pagan architecture to be reused or demolished, but only that of expanding this
body with new churches, restoring what had been ravaged by time or, in some
cases, needed to bring new adaptations to a rival religious material culture put in
place by the Arian ecclesiastical hierarchy before its defeat by the seventh century.
Ravenna did not need to build up an ideology in mosaic because this was already
present. Its art, studied for decades and written up by art historians, only began to
acquire new features as a result of its closer Carolingian links. It was as a result of
these that it remodelled itself, with the addition of crypts in its churches, new
campanili, and sometimes even including Carolingian artefacts, like the ciborium
of St Eleucadius at S. Apollinare in Classe.79 The integration of the non-Byzantine

77 BenSor, p. 156, and Invectiva in Romam, p. 139; for the portraits, see G. B. Ladner, Die
Papstbildnisse des Altertums und des Mittelalters, 3 vols (Vatican City, 1970–84), Papstbildnisse I. 56.
For John XII’s chapel see, for example, F. Pomarici, ‘Medioevo. Architettura’, in San Giovanni in
Laterano, ed. C. Pietrangeli (Florence, 1990), pp. 62–3; this chapel was used as a sacristy and included
frescoes of the pope dressing for a procession.
78 M. L. Marchiori, ‘Art And Reform In Tenth-Century Rome—The Paintings of S. Maria In
Pallara’, PhD thesis, Queen’s University, Kingston (Ontario), 2007; see also her paper ‘Medieval Wall
painting in the church of Sta Maria in Pallara, Rome: the use of objective dating criteria’, PBSR 77
(2005), pp. 225–55.
79 Overall surveys of the early Christian art of Ravenna are, for example, F. Deichmann, Ravenna:
Hauptstadt des spätantiken Abendlandes, 3 vols (Wiesbaden, 1969–89); Verhoeven, The Early Christian
Monuments; and C. Jäggi, Ravenna, Kunst und Kultur einer spätantiken Residenzstadt (Regensburg,
2016). For the ciborium, see C. Rizzardi, ‘Il ciborio di Sant’Eleucadio in Sant’Apollinare in Classe nella
cultura artistica carolingia’, in OCNUS 1 (1993), pp. 161–7 and Chapter 4, note 438.
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32 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

traditional artistic language, while becoming more important in the city, reflected
this gradual integration in the Italian kingdom and sphere of influence. Nowhere
is this more evident than in the architecture and sculpture of the pievi of the
archdiocese (such as S. Giovanni del Tò in Brisighella, closely associated with the
Church of Ravenna), of which some have survived almost unchanged and are
thus eloquent witnesses to the probable extension of this mix across the Romagna.
One needs to highlight very strongly the family resemblance of Venetian art to
its sources in the old exarchal area, which did in effect extend from the Exarchate
to the other side of the Adriatic in Istria. This has been traditionally called by
various, not entirely suitable, names: ‘exarchal’ art, ‘deutero-Byzantine’ art, and so
on. The main element to retain from it are the similarities that we find throughout
our period in the art of the Adriatic rim, which extend from late antique motifs to
Lombard and Carolingian inspiration, and which created a specific style recog-
nizable across the Adriatic arc. Already mined through the twentieth century by
art historians, this strand has nevertheless been recently much enhanced by the
development of ‘Adriatic studies’, an area of interest not only in terms of its artistic
unity but also in its overall similarities through political and commercial interests
as well as anthroponymic, social, and legal traditions. This line of work has been
one of the most vibrant in recent years, and has been of considerable interest
for historians of both Venice and Ravenna, who have attempted to demonstrate
throughout their work how one needed to move away from the dichotomy
Venice–Byzantium in particular, and to place the history of these cities much
more firmly in the framework of the Italian kingdom. In Chapter 4 I shall examine
in detail the common elements of this Adriatic culture, which can be seen in the
adoption of such elements as Carolingian-style crypts, westworks, decorative sculp-
tural elements, and iconographical motifs in both cities. As already mentioned,
these define much of the artistic renewal which we saw taking place in Rome also
from the late eighth century onwards.

Historiography and Current Research

A detailed discussion of the main debate on the history of Rome itself, with the
long tradition of the Catholic, Protestant, and pro-communal stances of the last
150 years, has been presented by Wickham in his recent history of medieval
Rome in the central Middle Ages.80 His contention, with which I fully agree, is
that almost from the medieval period itself and certainly until the last fifty years
or so, Rome has always been studied as ‘the papal city’, and its history identified
with the history of the papacy. This was a reflection of the historians’ interest, but

80 Wickham, Medieval Rome.

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Introduction 33

fundamentally also an imitation of the sources themselves. Like Wickham, I too

am less interested in the history of the papacy in its European or universalist
context than very specifically in what one can recognize as the history of the city
of Rome itself and, by implication, of the pope only in so far as he acted as either
bishop or ruler of the city. Again like Wickham, I shall therefore make much use
of the documentary sources, especially the charters and legal documents reflect-
ing land transactions in and around the city. However, the main focus of my book,
unlike his, is not the economic and social transformations of the city, but more
specifically the cultural and ideological ones, notably the evolution of the topog-
raphy, art, anthroponymy, law, and writing—all topics covered there in part, but
forming the main focus of this book, in particular for the purposes of comparing
the evolution in Rome with that in Ravenna and Venice. I too am looking at
‘Rome in Italy’, but as part of the tradition of Byzantine rule in Italy.
Various issues have been partially examined in the last thirty years, though not
from the point of view put forward in this book. The essential research directions
which have been pursued have traditionally been the following.
a. The first, and oldest, has been the history of Rome itself, from the point of
view of the imperial, then late antique, then papal, city. The towering names asso-
ciated with this work were, from both the German tradition and the Italian, those
associated with the colossal general histories of the city or of the papacy. They
generally came at it from several ideological viewpoints, above all that of high-
lighting the ascent of papal power in the Middle Ages.81 More recently, studies on
early medieval Rome in terms of its historical development have focused on spe-
cific aspects of ideology, resources, and liturgy.82 This latter is a bridge towards
the second research tradition regarding Rome, that of the study of topography
and of the physical development of the city. With a very long heritage of ‘Christian
archaeology’ behind it, this kind of work has gradually evolved from an interest
in the ‘ruins of classical Rome’ in the eighteenth century, to works on the cemeter-
ies, inscriptions, and churches of Christian Rome in the nineteenth and twentieth

81 German: H. Grisar, Geschichte Roms und der Päpste im Mittelalter (Freiburg, 1901); F. Gregorovius,
Geschichte der Stadt Rom im Mittelalter, ed. W. Kampf, 7 vols (repr. Darmstadt, 1978); E. Caspar,
Geschichte des Papsttums von den Anfängen bis zur Höhe der Weltherrschaft (Tübingen, 1933). See, for
example, A. Esch, ‘La scuola storica tedesca e la storia di Roma nel Medio Evo dal Gregorovius al Kehr’,
in Archivi e archivistica a Roma dopo l’Unità: genesi storica, ordinamenti, interrelazioni. Atti del con-
vegno (Roma, 12–14 marzo 1990) (Rome, 1994), pp. 69–84. Italian: O. Bertolini, Roma di fronte a
Bisanzio e ai Longobardi (Bologna, 1941); P. Brezzi, Roma e l’impero medioevale (Bologna, 1947).
82 G. Arnaldi, Le origini dello stato della Chiesa (Turin, 1987); T. F. X. Noble, The Republic of St.
Peter: The Birth of the Papal State, 680–825 (Philadelphia, 1984); P. Toubert, Les structures du Latium
médiéval: le Latium méridional et la Sabine du IXe siècle à la fin du XIIe siècle (Rome: BEFAR 221,
1973); F. Marazzi, see above, n. 59; Delogu, ed., Roma medievale. Aggiornamenti, pp. 33–50; S. De
Blaauw, Cultus et Decor: liturgia nella Roma tardoantica e medievale, 2 vols (Vatican City, 1994);
V. Saxer, ‘L’utilisation par la liturgie de l’espace urbain et suburbain: l’exemple de Rome dans l’Antiquité
et au haut Moyen Age’, in Actes du XI Congrès d’archéologie chrétienne II (Rome, 1989), pp. 936–1033;
J. F. Baldovin, The urban character of Christian worship: the origins, development, and meaning of sta-
tional liturgy (Vatican City, 1987).
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34 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

centuries. The foremost names in that respect are those of De Rossi and Duchesne,
then of Krautheimer, Paroli, and Pani Ermini.83 Attention has now shifted to a
slightly different area, thanks partly to the Italian legislation which came into
force in the 1990s, and to the intense work of urban restructuring of the historic
centre of Rome. Both have favoured a great archaeological surge. These excava-
tions have been crucial in providing a long-awaited image of early medieval Rome
in terms of the evolution of settlement, social and economic activities, and a bet-
ter understanding of the physical activities and life in the city.84 Such studies,
complementing the work of historians of the stational liturgy and of in-depth
work on the churches, monasteries, charitable institutions, infrastructure of walls,
aqueducts, roads, and aristocratic houses, have enabled us, for the first time, to
have a better spatial idea of how early medieval Rome looked. In addition, it has
enabled us to examine how the city gradually moved from the spaces and monu-
ments of its classical past to those secular as well as religious ones of the tenth
century.85 Such understanding becomes key when set side by side with that of
another Roman city with a heavy monumental and ideological past—Ravenna.
The comparison is essential in order to highlight their respective evolution and
their respective understanding of their past, which is the purpose of the present
work. Before leaving Rome, I will only add a word about a third venerable trad­
ition of study, that of the art of the early medieval city. A considerable body of
work has accumulated over the centuries in that area.86 Current art historical
interest has focused more on the close relation between art and ideology at this
period, particularly in relation to the Lateran Palace and churches with specific
ideological programmes such as S. Susanna or S. Prassede.87 Here also, that work

83 G. B. De Rossi, Roma sotterranea Cristiana, 3 vols (Rome: 1864–77); L. Duchesne (e.g. in his
commentary on the Liber Pontificalis, and his papers such as Scripta minora. Études de topographie
romaine et de géographie ecclésiastique, (Rome: Coll. EFR 13, 1973); CB; L. Paroli and L. Vendittelli,
eds., Roma dall’antichità al medioevo II. Contesti tardoantichi e altomedievali (Milan, 2004); Paroli and
Delogu, La storia economica di Roma; L. Pani Ermini, ed., Christiana Loca. Lo spazio cristiano nella
Roma del primo millennio (Rome, 2000), and L. Pani Ermini, ‘Forma Urbis: lo spazio urbano tra VI e
IX secolo’, in Roma nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 48, pp. 288–97.
84 The main names in the field are Santangeli Valenzani and Meneghini, Delogu, Manacorda,
Sagui, and Spera: see above notes 57, 59–60 and Chapter 4, pp. 19–22; For Delogu’s important work,
see above, notes 59, 75, and 82; M. Serlorenzi and L. Saguì, eds., ‘Roma, piazza Venezia. L’indagine
archeologica per la realizzazione della metropolitana. Le fasi medievali e moderne’, Archeologia medi­
evale 35 (2008), pp. 175–198.
85 See Chapters 3 and 4.
86 G. Matthiae, Pittura romana del medioevo, 2 vols (Rome, 1965–6, repr. with ‘Aggiornamento sci-
entifico’ by M. Andaloro, 1987–8); G. Matthiae, Mosaici medievali di Roma (Rome, 1962); J. Wilpert,
Die römischen Mosaiken und Malereien der kirchlichen Bauten vom IV. zum XIII. Jahrhundert
(Fribourg, 1916, ed. rev. W. N. Schumacher, 1976); M. Andaloro and S. Romano, eds., Arte e iconogra-
fia a Roma dal Tardoantico alla fine del Medioevo (Milan, 2002), and M. Andaloro and S. Romano, La
Pittura medievale a Roma, 312–1431. Corpus e atlante, 5 vols (Milan, 2006), esp. vols II and III; for
Nordhagen see Chapter 4, note 7.
87 See, for example, M. Luchterhandt, ‘Il sovrano sotto l’immagine. Icone nei cerimoniali di
acclamazione a Roma e a Bisanzio?’, in Text, Bild und Ritual in der Mittelalterlichen Gesellshcaft (8–11.
Jh.), ed. P. Carmassi and C. Winterer (Florence, 2014), pp. 45–7; Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal I;
and papers in Chapter 4 notes 209 and 367.
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Introduction 35

will be of considerable use for comparative purposes, especially with the art of
Venice, which uses similar targeted ideological aims.
b. A second body of work, other than that on Rome, has been that on Byzantine
Italy before 750, on Carolingian Italy, and on tenth-century Ottonian Italy. Here,
with a few exceptions of historians of Byzantine Italy, there has been relatively
little interest in the subject before the 1980s—just as there was for the history of
early medieval Italy as an overall topic, outside the scope of individual cities.88
Essential outlines of the history and the end of Byzantine power, of social and
economic structures, and cultural shifts in northern and central Byzantine zones
of influence have now been produced.89 That work has focused sometimes on
Ravenna, and historians have brought together new archaeological results from
the city and from the excavations at S. Severo in Classe, in order understand how
Ravenna developed across these centuries as part of the history of the Romagna,
the archiepiscopal dominion, and its interest in its past as an imperial capital.90 In
the case of Ravenna, the interest has continued into the Carolingian and Ottonian
periods, with some results of current research presented in a monumental series
of volumes entitled the Storia di Ravenna.91
c. While this may seem to continue the strong Italian tradition of individual
histories of cities, with an overwhelming local civic interest, it is worth noting
that the general editor of the volume just mentioned, Carile, wrote as much on
the history of Venice as on that of Ravenna, and that another major scholar of

88 L. M. Hartmann, Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der byzantinischen Verwaltung in ltalien, 540–750

(Leipzig, 1889); C. Diehl, Études sur l’administration byzantine dans l’exarchat de Ravenne (568–751)
(Paris, 1888, repr. 1958); A. Guillou, Régionalisme et indépendance dans l’empire byzantin au VIIe
siècle. L’exemple de l’Exarchat et de la Pentapole d’Italie (Rome, 1969); see also B. Bavant, ‘Le duché
byzantin de Rome: origine, durée et extension géographique’, MEFREM 91 (1979), pp. 41–88.
89 T. S. Brown, ‘Byzantine Italy, c. 680–876’, in The New Cambridge Medieval History. Volume 2,
c.700–c.900, ed. R. McKitterick (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 320–48; T. S. Brown, Gentlemen and Officers.
Imperial Administration and Aristocratic Power in Byzantine Italy, A.D. 554–800 (Rome, 1984);
G. Cavallo et al., I Bizantini in Italia (Milan, 1982); S. Cosentino, Storia dell’Italia Bizantina (VI–XI
secolo) da Giustiniano ai Normanni (Bologna, 2008); G. Ravegnani, I Bizantini in Italia (Bologna, 2004)
and G. Ravegnani, Gli Esarchi d’Italia (Rome, 2011).
90 Works of Augenti, for example: A. Augenti, ‘Archeologia e topografia a Ravenna: Il Palazzo di
Teodorico e la Moneta Aurea’, Archeologia Medievale 32 (2005), pp. 7–32; Palatia. Palazzi imperiali tra
Ravenna e Bisanzio (Ravenna, 2002); ‘Ravenna e Classe: archeologia di due città tra la tarda Antichità
e l’alto Medioevo’, in Le città italiane tra la tarda antichità e l’alto medioevo, ed. A. Augenti (Florence,
2006), pp. 190–6; and the most accessible summary of the Classe excavations in Augenti, La basilica, il
monastero di San Severo in Classe (for other papers, see Chapter 4 note 35). For Cirelli: E. Cirelli,
Ravenna: archeologia di una città (Florence, 2008), and ‘Ravenna—Rise of a Late Antique capital’, in
Debating Urbanism Within and Beyond the Walls A.D. 300–700, ed. D. Sami and G. Speed (Leicester,
2010), pp. 245–6; and for various reports of the S. Severo excavation, see Chapter 3, note 301. For
Novara, see P. Novara, “Ad Religionis Claustrum Construendum”: Monasteri nel medioevo ravennate,
storia e archeologia (Ravenna, 2003); ‘Per una ricostruzione del paesaggio urbano di Ravenna medi­evale:
appunti sull’edilizia di culto nei secoli VII–XI’, in Colligite Fragmenta. Studi in onore di Monsignor
F. Lanzoni (1863–1929), ed. R. Benericetti (Bologna, 2007), pp. 133–81; and L’edilizia di culto raven-
nate dei secoli 5.-11.: fonti e ricerche (Ravenna, 2008).
91 SR I, II.1, III.1 and IV.
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36 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Ravenna, Augenti, also worked on Rome.92 Here is an indication of the fact that
the new generations of Italian scholars have since the 1980s, in some cases under
the influence of foreign archaeological input, been much more prepared to look
at early Italian history from a translocal and regional point of view. The shift can
also be seen in the even more traditionally city-centric historiography of Venice.
Used for centuries to being a centre of attention in its own right, based on the
extraordinary success and longevity of its predominance, Venice had almost as
many scholars interested in its long history, its state, art, and culture. For cen­tur­ies,
the myth of Venice has included two core themes: its unique status among
Western cities, and its close association with Byzantium, due to its place as the
‘gate between East and West’. These tropes, begun precisely in our period with
John the Deacon, were at the very centre of the historiography of Venice for men
such as Pertusi, and the encyclopaedic Cessi, whose writings became the litmus
test for any perception of Venetian history.93 It is here that current work has
become essential, work which, under the influence of Ortalli, Gasparri, Gelichi,
and Castagnetti94 at first, then of an even younger generation,95 has shifted the
emphasis considerably. It has done so by exploding some of the old myths,
through demonstrating the extent of Venice’s early medieval involvement with its
Italian and Adriatic background, and the parallel developments of its ninth- and
tenth-century history, especially in economic terms, with the Italian terraferma

92 To give a few examples, we have, for A. Carile, ‘La formazione del ducato veneziano’, in Le Origini
di Venezia, ed. A. Carile (Bologna, 1978); ‘Il ducato venetico fra ecumene bizantina e società locale’, in
La Venetia: dall’Antichità all’Alto Medioevo (Rome, 1988), pp. 89–109, as well as ‘La società ravennate
dall’Esarcato agli Ottoni’, in SR II.2 (edited by him), pp. 380–8; ‘Continuità e mutamento nei ceti
dirigenti dell’Esarcato fra VII e IX secolo’, Atti e memorie della Deputazione di storia patria per le
Marche: Istituzioni e società nell’alto medioevo marchigiano 86 (1981), pp. 115–45. For Augenti, see his
work on Rome in Il Palatino nel Medioevo; ‘Il potere e la memoria’ and ‘Continuity and Discontinuity’;
‘I ceti dirigenti romani nelle fonti archeologiche (secoli VIII–XII)’, in La nobiltà romana nel Medioevo,
ed. S. Carocci (Rome: Coll. EFR 359, 2006), pp. 71–96; but also his work on Ravenna, see Chapter 2
note 1, Chapter 3, note 4, and ‘Ravenna e Classe’, pp. 190–6.
93 A. Pertusi, ‘Quedam Regalia Insignia: Ricerche sulle insegne del potere ducale a Venezia durante
il medioevo’, Studi Veneziani 7 (1965), pp. 3–121; A. Pertusi, ‘L’impero bizantino e l’evolvere dei suoi
interessi nell’Alto Adriatico’, in Storia della civiltà veneziana I: Dalle origini al secolo di Marco Polo, ed.
V. Branca (Florence, 1979), pp. 51–71. R. Cessi, Venezia Ducale II: L’età eroica (Padua, 1929, anastatic
repr. Venezia 1940), pp. 107–44; R. Cessi, ‘Politica, economia, religione’, in Storia di Venezia II: Dalle
origini del Ducato alla IV Crociata (Venice, 1958), pp. 82–229; R. Cessi, ‘Venezia e il Regno italico
nell’alto medioevo’, Archivio Veneto 75 (1964), pp. 9–19.
94 G. Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato e la “Civitas Rivoalti”: Tra Carolingi, Bizantini e Sassoni’, in SV, pp. 341–438;
G. Ortalli, Petrus I Orseolo und seine Zeit. Anmerkungen zur Geschichte der Beziehung zwischen Venedig
und dem ottonischen Reich (Venice, 1990); G. Ortalli, ‘Quando il Doge diventa santo. Fede e politica
nell’esperienza di Pietro I Orseolo’, Studi Veneziani, n.s. 41 (2001), pp. 15–48; Gasparri and Gelichi,
eds., Age of Affirmation; S. Gelichi, ‘Venezia tra archeologia e storia: la costruzione di un’identità
urbana’, in Augenti, Le città italiane, pp. 151–83 and S. Gelichi, ‘La storia di una nuova città’, pp. 51–89.
For Castagnetti see, for example, La società veneziana nel medioevo. I. Dai tribuni ai giudici, and idem,
La società veneziana nel medioevo. II. Le famiglie ducali dei Candiano, Orseolo, e Menio e la famiglia
comitale vicentino-padovana di Vitale Ugo Candiano (secoli X–XI), 2 vols (Verona, 1992–3), and
‘Insediamenti e populi’ and ‘Famiglie e affermazione politica’, in SV, pp. 585–7 and 613–44.
95 A. Berto, ‘Pietro IV Candiano, un doge deposto perché era troppo virtuoso o perché era troppo
autoritario?’, Studi Veneziani 40 (2000), pp. 162–8; F. Borri’s papers on the Adriatic space; Moine,
S. Ilario.
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Introduction 37

and other port cities like Ravenna and Comacchio. Moreover, historians as well as
art historians have shown convincingly how close were the links between Venice
and Carolingian Italy, a trend already visible among the contributors to the monu­
men­tal Storia di Venezia published in the early 1990s, and very much at the fore-
front of several volumes of conference papers given over the years at the Seminari
del Centro interuniversitario per la Storia e l’Archeologia dell’ Alto Medioevo,
directed by Gasparri.
d. There are now far more studies, which see the developments of early medi­
eval Italy not simply in their own autonomous terms, but within the wider scope
of the whole of western Europe. So far, outstanding work has been produced from
that perspective on Lombard Italy, with a huge impulse given to the period in the
last ten years in particular. Byzantine Italy (leaving aside the south) too has had
some syntheses put together. A great deal of interest is now present in the study of
Carolingian Italy—though not always outside the actual kingdom of Italy, which
was the case of my three cities until Ravenna in the tenth century became in
practice a part of it.96 Carolingian Italy, especially Rome, has been the focus of
attention of several British, as well as German, scholars concerned with both
texts and art, and recent work has been published on such topics as St Peter’s,
Carolingian cultural and liturgical links with Rome, and Carolingian art and
ideol­ogy.97 Finally, a traditional German fascination with the Empire has been at
the root of an early interest in Ottonian Italy, both in Rome and in Ravenna, and
remains alive in recent German scholarship.98 Such an interest in the earlier history
of the ‘Holy Roman Empire’ has always had a heavy focus on imperial ideol­ogy.
But the interest has also had great importance for historians, in so far as much
of it was focused on the editing of source material, especially of documents such
as charters, diplomas, and papal sources.

Presentation: the Structure of the Book

I have adopted in this book an approach in tiers, which I should like to describe
as resembling a form of theatrical performance. The Introduction and the first

96 SV.
97 West-Harling, Three Empires; Gasparri and Gelichi, eds., Age of Affirmation; and Gasparri and
Gelichi, Venice and its Neighbors. Carolingian ideology in relation to the renovatio imperii and the
views on Rome is one of the longest-standing historiographical topics, with such works as N. Christie,
‘Charlemagne and the Renewal of Rome’, in Charlemagne: Empire and society, ed. J. Story (Manchester,
2005), pp. 167–82; P. C. Claussen, ‘Renovatio Romae’, in Rom im hohen Mittelalter, ed. B. Schimmelpfennig
and L. Schmugge (Sigmaringen, 1992), pp. 87–125; J. L. Nelson, ‘Translating Images of Authority: The
Christian Roman Emperors in the Carolingian World’, in Images of Authority. Papers presented to
Joyce M. Reynolds on Occasion of her 70th birthday, ed. M. M. MacKenzie and C. Roueché (Cambridge,
1989), pp. 194–203, and S. Patzold, ‘Consensus—Concordia—Unitas. Überlegungen zu einem politisch-
religiösen Ideal der Karolingerzeit’, in “Exemplaris Imago”: Ideale in Mittelalter und Früher Neuzeit, ed.
N. Staubach (Frankfurt am Main, 2012), pp. 31–56.
98 See Chapters 4, notes 29 and 32 and 6, notes 72 and 132.
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38 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

chapter, A Tale of Three Cities: History and Histories, give a brief history of the
context of early medieval Italy following the main narratives of the sources, while
questioning and challenging these on the basis of their drawbacks—these chapters
provide the overture. The second and third chapters, The Actors: the Elites and the
Populus, first in Rome, then in Ravenna and Venice, focus on the people who make
this history, the actors on the stage, from the elites to those of the rest of the popu-
lation about whom we have some information. The chapters’ object is to identify
and define them, by name, social and economic status, self-representation, and role
in the life of their city. The fourth chapter, The Stage: Places of Power, Instruments
of Control, focuses precisely on the various elements which allow these people to
be involved in the life of the city: the topography of worldly power (palaces and
residences), then that of spiritual power (churches and monasteries); the mani-
festations of this power through specific means (art, charity, liturgy, control of
relics); and the instruments through which this power is exercised (titles, coinage,
and symbols). This survey of the static ‘props’ on the stage of the city is completed
by the fifth chapter, Exercising Power in the City: the Public Space, which looks at
the play in its dynamics, the action or plot as it were. Here I wish to look at the
areas defined as ‘public space’, at who controls it (the Church, aristocratic elites),
how they each exercise this control through display and processions, for example,
and lastly how the public space can be used to reflect and promote consensus or, on
the contrary, to manifest discontent and rebellion through violence. The comparison
between my three cities is completed in my final Chapter 6, Memory and the
Construction of City Identity, where I hope to evidence precisely how similar and/
or different the three cities are in their use of their Roman/Byzantine heritage,
and how this eventually determines (or does not determine) their present and
future medieval development within the Italian urban scene by the time of the
rise of the communes and future city states.
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1
A Tale of Three Cities
History and Histories

A Short History of Italy from Late Antiquity

(Fourth Century) to 750

In the first three decades of the fourth century two transitions occurred, of so
radical a nature as to change entirely the history of Europe.1 The Roman Emperor
Constantine converted to Christianity, thus starting a process which would even-
tually see Christianity become the new state religion of the Roman Empire. At the
same time, he also moved the capital of that Empire from Rome in Italy (Old Rome)
to Constantinople in Asia Minor (New Rome), for political, military, and ideological
reasons. At the end of the fourth century, another two crucial changes consoli-
dated the first: the Emperor Theodosius in an edict in 391 not only confirmed
Christianity as the official religion of the Roman state, but also closed down the
temples of the traditional Roman pagan religion and confiscated their wealth to
give it to the Church. He was the last emperor to rule over a unified Roman
Empire. After him, this was divided into a western part and an eastern part, the
first centred on Italy and ruled from various imperial cities like Milan, Ravenna,
and Trier, while the eastern half had the imperial capital in Constantinople. From
then on, the western half, increasingly under attack from a variety of what used to
be called the ‘Barbarians’ (Germanic peoples such as the Goths, Vandals, Alamans,
Burgundians, Franks, and Saxons), was gradually split into smaller individual
units ruled by Germanic kings from the late fifth century onwards (Ostrogoths in
Italy; Visigoths in Spain; Burgundians, Alamans, and Bavarians in the areas of the
Rhone and southern Germany; Franks in northern Europe). Rome itself was

1 For the most recent general and accessible surveys of the early Middle Ages in English see, for
example, R. Collins, Early medieval Europe, 300–1000, 3rd edn (Basingstoke, 2010); P. Fouracre, ed.,
The new Cambridge medieval history. Volume 1, c.500–c.700 (Cambridge, 2005); R. McKitterick,
ed., The new Cambridge medieval history. Volume 2 (Cambridge, 1995); and T. Reuter, ed., The new
Cambridge medieval history. Volume 3, c.900–c.1024 (Cambridge, 1999); R. McKitterick, The early
Middle Ages: Europe 400–1000 (Oxford, 2001).

Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000: Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present, and the Construction of City Identity.
Veronica West-Harling, Oxford University Press (2020). © Veronica West-Harling.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754206.001.0001
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40 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

attacked and sacked by the Goths of Alaric in 410, and the last Western Roman
emperor was deposed in 476.
The fourth century and its changes are now defined by historians as being the
beginning of the period known as late antiquity, which extends, broadly speaking,
until the seventh century in the West. These three centuries are fundamental to
the evolution and development of western Europe as we know it. This applied
not only in political terms, but also in terms of the social, cultural, religious, and
economic changes. All these began to define ‘Europe’ as no longer a part of a
Mediterranean-wide cohesive group of polities (a koinè) but, increasingly, as part
of a dual western Latin civilization, in contrast to an eastern Greek one. This lat-
ter, which we call Byzantine (though it defined itself as ‘Roman’ up to the time of
its disappearance in the fifteenth century), was to have one more attempt at reuni-
fying the whole Roman Empire in the sixth century. When the Gothic kingdom
of Theodoric (493–526) and his heirs in Italy, with its capital in Ravenna, became
weakened by internal succession crises, the then Emperor Justinian (527–65)
attempted a reconquest of the West, at first successfully bringing back into the
Empire parts of North Africa and southern Spain, as well as officially, after a long,
costly, and extremely damaging war against the Goths (535–52/53), ‘reconquering’
Italy. He planned to restore its traditional structures of government and society—
though these had already all but disappeared during the protracted years of wars
and economic devastation—and his official government manifesto, known as the
Pragmatic Sanction of 554, was a blueprint for the restoration of ‘Roman
civilization’ as it was still functioning in the eastern part of the Empire. The result
of these wars was the re-establishment of imperial power in Italy, though Justinian
did not return to Rome but instead set up his Italian capital in Ravenna. There he
expanded the city, built new prestigious churches, and helped restore the imperial
palace of the Emperor Valentinian and of King Theodoric. Whether he would
have succeeded in thus reviving Roman culture in the long run is a moot point. In
reality, both the Ostrogothic period and the Gothic Wars themselves had changed
Italy beyond recognition.
Less than twenty years after the end of the Gothic Wars and the Justinianic
reconquest, a new group of Germanic peoples—the Longobards or Lombards—
entered Italy and settled there, fighting and often defeating the local defence, taking
over land, and establishing their own rulers, laws, and institutions. After gradually
moving towards the south of Italy, and despite some resistance from the local
Roman population, the Lombards established a series of duchies in the north
from Friuli to Milan, and in the south around Benevento and Spoleto. The north-
ern duchies were gradually amalgamated into a kingdom with the capital at Pavia,
while the southern ones were always inclined to keep as much independence from
the king as possible. The Lombard kingdom continued to expand and to conquer
more territory from the Byzantines, until by the mid-eighth century they were
effectively in control of the whole of the peninsula in the north and centre, with
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 41

the exception of two key areas remaining in Byzantine hands. The first was the
area around Ravenna, called the Exarchate, which Justinian had established as the
capital of his restored empire in Italy (to which were added the areas of five cities—
Rimini, Pesaro, Fano, Senigallia, and Ancona—known as the Pentapolis). This zone,
centred on the capital Ravenna, comprised mostly today’s region of Romagna
(significantly so called), extending into the Marches towards Forli and Ancona,
and north as far as Venice. Its limit was more or less the Via Flaminia, a corridor
of land alongside that main Roman road, effectively linking Rome and Ravenna.
The second area was Rome, the papal city. Rome, subject to the deputy
Byzantine ruler in Ravenna, the exarch, was itself a duchy, under the authority of
a Byzantine duke. The seventh and even more the eighth century, broadly speak-
ing, saw a constant attempt by the Lombard kings to expand through military
dominion into ‘Roman’ (Byzantine) territory, attempts which were mostly suc-
cessful in view of the relative lack of funds and support to fight them from the
emperors in Constantinople. Meanwhile, one area over which the Lombards had
no official political control was the Venetian lagoon. This area did not exist at first
as a city, but rather as a zone of marshy islands, to which the inhabitants of some
of the cities on the mainland had moved gradually when Roman cities like Altino,
Concordia, Cittanova Eracleia, and Jesolo had suffered from repeated warfare.
The Roman province of Venetia increasingly shifted its centre of gravity towards
the islands from the sixth century onwards. After developing economically on the
strength of its trade in salt, it began to look further towards the eastern Adriatic
and the Mediterranean, all the way to Constantinople, for its expanding trading
capabilities.2

The Period 750 to 1000

This was the story at the time when this book starts.3 For nearly 200 years the
Byzantine Empire had fought the Lombard kingdom, and gradually lost ground,
except in the south of Italy, where it still remained in control at the end of the

2 For the most accessible histories of Italy in English, see C. Wickham, Early Medieval Italy: Central
Power and Local Society 400–1000 (Ann Arbor, 1989), and C. La Rocca, Italy in the Early Middle Ages
(476–1000) (Oxford: Short Oxford History of Italy, 2002).
3 This narrative is based on the most important and/or more recent textbooks and studies on early
medieval Italy: P. Cammarosano, Storia dell’Italia medievale dal VI al XI secolo (Bari, 2001), and
P. Cammarosano, Nobili e re. L’Italia politica dell’alto medioevo (Bari, 1998, new edn 2009); La Rocca,
Italy in the Early Middle Ages; S. Gasparri, Italia Longobarda. Il regno, I Franchi, Il Papato, 2nd edn
(Bari, 2016); and Fouracre, ed., The New Cambridge Medieval History I, with bibliography. On Byzantine
Italy see the classic Hartmann, Untersuchungen zur Geschichte; Diehl, Études sur l’administration byzan-
tine; and Bavant, ‘Le duché byzantin de Rome’, pp. 41–88 at 64–78 on the dukes of Rome, and 81–8 on
Lombard pressure in Rome in the eighth century; and the most valuable recent work by Brown,
‘Byzantine Italy’, pp. 320–48; Brown, Gentlemen and Officers; Cavallo et al., I Bizantini in Italia;
Cosentino, Storia dell’Italia Bizantina; Ravegnani, I Bizantini in Italia, and Ravegnani, Gli Esarchi
d’Italia, pp. 81–123 esp. 87–97.
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42 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

eighth century. The Exarchate of Ravenna itself was about to be lost to the
Lombards (751). The duchy of Rome, which belonged to it, was in danger of being
encircled by Lombard forces from the kingdom of Pavia, which, had its expan-
sionist kings been successful in completely controlling the dukes of Spoleto and
Benevento, would have effectively cut off Rome and turned it into an island within
a Lombard Kingdom of Italy. Between the setting up of the Lombard kingdom
in Pavia at the end of the sixth century, and 750, we have already moved from
the history of Italy to a history of two Italies—the Lombard and the Byzantine.
From 750 onwards, we need to start looking at multiple histories, increasingly
requiring study from the specific perspective of some of the key players—
popes; Lombard, Carolingian, and Italian kings; Ottonian emperors—but also
that of key influential cities, the first and foremost being, naturally, Rome. (See
Maps 1, 2, and 3.)

4. Kings and emperors

Last Lombard Kings
Liutprand (712–44)
Hildeprand (735–44)
Ratchis (744–9, 756–7)
Aistulf (749–56)
Desiderius (757–74)
Adelchis (759–74)
Frankish Kings then Emperors (E)
Charlemagne (774–814, E800)
Pippin (781–810)
Bernard (812–17)
Louis the Pious (E813–40)
Lothar (817–55, E824)
Louis II (840–75, E850)
Charles the Bald (875–7, E875)
Carloman (877–9)
Charles the Fat (879–87, E881)
Berengar I (888–924, E915)
Guy (889–95, E891)
Lambert (891–8, E892)
Arnulf (894–6, E896)
Louis III (900–5, E905)
Rudolf (922–6)
Hugh (926–47)
Lothar (931–50)
Berengar II} (950–62)
Adalbert
Ottorian Emperors
Otto I (962–73)
Otto II (973–83)
Otto III (983–1002)
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Doges Emperors/Kings of Italy Popes Archbishops of Ravenna

715
Paulicius Gregory II Felix (709–725)
720 (697–717) (715–741)
725

Marcellus
(717-727)

730 Ursus (727–738)

735 John V (726–744)

Gregory III
740
(731–741)

745
Zacharias
Deusdedit (744–756) (741–752)
750

Sergius (748–769)
755
Stephen II (752–757)
Galla Gallo (756)

760 Dominic Monegarius Paul I (757–767)

(756–765)
765
Maurice Galbaio (765
–787) Stephen III (767–772)
Leo I (770–778)
Charlemagne (768–814)
King and Emperor with
Pepin King of Italy
780 (775–811) Hadrian I (772–795) John VI (778–785)

785
Gratiosus (786–789)
790 John & Maurice II

795 Galbaius (787–802)

Valerius (789–810)
800 Leo III (795–816)

805 Obelerius (802–811)

Beatus (808–811)
810

Agnellus Particiaco Martin(810–818)

815 Louis the Pious,
(811–827)
Emperor (814–840) Stephen IV (816–817)
820 Paschal I (817–824)
Lothar, Petronax (818–837)
825 Eugenius II (824–827)
King of Italy
Justinian Particiaco (818–855) Valentine (827)
830 (827–829)
Gregory IV (827–844)
John Particiaco
835 (829–836)

840 George (837–846)

845 Sergius II (844–847)

Lothar Emperor
Deusdedit (847–850)
Peter Tradonico (840–855)
850 Leo IV (847–855)
(836–864)
John VIII (850–878)
855
Louis II, Benedict III (855–858)
860 King (855–875)
NicholasI(858–867)
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Peter Tradonico (836–864) Nicholas I (858–

John VII (850–878)
Louis II, 867)
King (855–875),
Ursus I Particiaco/Badoer
(864–881) Emperor (863–875) Hadrian II (867–872)
Romanus (878–888)
John VIII (872–882)
Charles the Bald Emperor
(875–879)

Charles the Fat, Marinus I (882–884)

John I Badoer Emperor (880–888)
(881–888) Hadrian III (884–885)
Peter I Candiano (887) Stephen V (885–891)
Berengar I King
(888–891) 1st reign Dominic (889–898)
Guy of Spoleto, Emperor Formosus (891–896)
(891–894)
Peter Tribuno Lambert of Boniface VI (896)
(888–912) Spoleto, Emperor
Stephen VI (896–897)
(894–896)
Arnulf, Emperor Romanus (897)
(896–899) Theodore II (897)
Louis III, King (899–905), John IX (898–900)
Emperor (901–905) Benedict IV (900–903)

Leo V (903)
John VIII Cailo (898–
Sergius III (904–911) 904)
Berengar I,
King (905–922), Anastasius III (911–
Emperor (915–924), 913) John IX (904–914)
2nd reign Landus (913–914)

John X (914–928) Constantine (914–927)

Ursus II Badoer
(912–932) Hugh of Arles, Leo VI (928)
King (926–947)
Stephen VIII (929–
931) Peter IV (927–971)
Peter II Candiano
(932–939) John XI (931–935)
Leo VII (936–939)
Peter Badoer (939–942) Stephen VIII (939–942)
Marinus II (942–946)

Peter III Candiano

Lothar II, King (947–950)
(942–959) Agapitus II (946–955)
Berengar II,
King (950–961)
JohnXII (955–963)
Leo VIII (963–965)
Otto I, King (961–962)
Peter IV Candiano Benedict V (964)
(959–976) Otto I, Emperor
(962–973)
John XIII (965–972)
Honestus (971–983)
Benedict VI (973–974)
Otto II Emperor (973–
Peter I Orseolo (976– 983) Benedict VII (974–983)
978)
Vitale Candiano (978–
979)

Tribuno Memmo John XIV (983–984)

(979–991) John X of Besate
John XV (985–996) (983–998)
Otto III (regency 983–
996, Emperor 996–
1002)
Peter II Orseolo Gregory V (996–999)
(991–1008) Gerbert of Aurillac (998–
999)
Silvester II (999–1003) Leo II (999–1001)
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 45

FRANKISH KINGDOM Dra

ve
Trento
FRIULI
Milan Cividale
Brescia Grado Sav
Venezia a
Pavia Po Verona
Turin
Bobbio
Genoa Bologna Ravenna
EXARCHATE OF
RAVENNA
Pisa PENTAPOLIS
Ligurian
SEa
Spoleto DUCHY OF A d r i a t i c
SPOLETO Sea
CORSICA
Rome
DUCHY OF
ROME Bari
Capua Benevento
Naples DUCHY OF BENEVENTO
SARDINIA DUCHY OF NAPLES
Amalfi Otranto

Ty r r henian
Sea
CALABRIA
Mediterranean Palermo Ionian
Sea Sea
SICILY

0 100 mi
NORTH AFRICA Lombard kingdom
Byzantine Empire 0 150 km

Map 1 Italy in 750

Rome

The Lombard Crises and the End of Byzantine Rule

By the seventh century Rome was already focusing on its place within the
Western Latin Church and political world, despite the papacy’s avowed attach-
ment, ideologically and politically, to the Roman Empire of the East. However,
the political expansion of the Lombard kingdom to the edges of Roman terri-
tory, and the perceived lack of military and defensive support from
Constantinople to help defend Italy, partly because it was itself militarily
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46 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Bressanone
Carin
Bolzano zia
Chiavenna
Belluno Cividale
Trento
Aosta
Como Bergamo Aquileia
Treviso
MILANO Vicenza Trieste
Ivrea Brescia Grado
Vercelli Novara Verona
Padova Venezia
Susa PAVIA Cremona Mantova
Torino Veglia
Asti
Saluzzo Cherso
Alba Parma Reggio E. Pola
Acqui Modena Pomposia
Genova Canossa Bologna Ravenna
Savona S. Apollinare
Albenga in Glasse
Bobbio Rimini Zara
Luni Pistoia
Lucca Firenze Pesaro
Urbino Fano
Nizza Senigallia
Pisa Vallombrosa Ancona Spalato
La Garde Freinet Volterra Siena Brazza
Arezzo
Perugia Camarino Fermo

Elba Grosseto Chiusi Ascoli P. Curzola

Spoleto Ragusa
Mariana Pescara
Viterbo Rieti
Chieti
Farfa Termoll
Aiactio Civitavecchia
ROMA Vieste
Larino
Ostia M. S. Angelo
Montecassino Manfredonia
Duchy Lucera Barletta
Terracina
of Benevento Bari
Capua Monopoli
Porrto Torres Benevento Venosa
Cuma
Salerno Matera Brindisi
i
ol

Potenza
ap

alfi
N

Graco Taranto Otranto

Am

Policastro
Rossano

Cagliari
Crotone

Tropea Squillace

Lipari Stilo
Messina
PALERMO
Trapani Reggio C.
Taormina
Carolingian Empire Marsala
Mazura
Lombard duchy
duky Caltanisetia
Catania
Girgenti
Arabs Siracusa
Ragusa
Byzantines
0 100 200 km.

Map 2 Italy in 800

stretched on its eastern frontier with Persian wars and the rise of Islam, put
considerable strain on relations with the Empire. This was compounded by the
major theological conflict opposing the pope to the imperial ‘heresy’ of icono-
clasm. Throughout most of the eighth century, that is from the reign of Pope
Gregory II to that of Pope Hadrian, between 715 and 795, the papacy had to
fight on two different but related fronts: on the one hand the Lombard expan-
sion, gradually covering more and more of the peninsula, and on the other the
issue of allegiance to the Eastern Roman Empire. (See Map 4 for a map of early
medieval Rome.)
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 47

Swabia Bavaria
Burgundy

Carinthia
March of Hungary
King dom of Verona
Verona
Lombardy
Venice
Genova

Un
Romagna

de
Croatia

rV
en
Pisa

eti
Tuscany Zara

an
co
Spalato

nt
ro
Duchy of

l
Corsica
Spoleto
Papal
States
Principality
Rome of Benevento
Principality
of Capua
Sardinia
Duchy Principality
of Amalfe
Amalfi of Salerno re
pi
m
eE
in
nt
za
By

Italy Sicily
1000 Syracuse

Map 3 Italy in 1000

Pope Gregory II’s reign (715–31) was a key moment in the change of policies in
Italy, and most subsequent changes and alliances can only be understood in the
light of his Byzantine and Lombard dealings with the Emperor Leo III and his
deputies in Italy, and with the Lombard King Liutprand.4 After Gregory became

4 On early medieval Rome, see Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, Pts VI–VIII; Brezzi, Roma e
l’impero; P. Llewellyn, Rome in the Dark Ages (London, 1971); P. Delogu, ‘La storia’, in Arena et al.,
Crypta Balbi, pp. 13–19; Krautheimer, Profile of a City, pp. 106–8; L. Homo, Rome médiévale (476–1420).
Histoire, civilisation, vestiges (Paris, 1934); F. Marazzi, ‘Aristocrazia e società (secoli VI–XI)’, in Storia di
Roma dall’antichità ad oggi II. Il medioevo, ed. A. Vauchez, 2 vols (Bari, 2001), or the French version,
‘Aristocratie et société (VIe –IXe siècles)’, in Rome au Moyen Âge, ed. A. Vauchez (Paris, 2010); L. Gatto,
Storia di Roma nel Medioevo (Roma, 1999); and Wickham, Medieval Rome. On the early medieval
papacy, other than the great classics mentioned in the Introduction, see the more recent J. Richards,
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Map 4 Early Medieval Rome

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a tale of three cities: history and histories 49

pope in 715, the Emperor Anastasius, already fighting the Muslim expansion near
Alexandria, was deposed. When the Muslims attacked Constantinople, they were
defeated by the head of the army, later crowned emperor as Leo III. Traditionally,
the historiography has explained the bad relations between pope and emperor in
terms of Leo’s iconoclast policies, which he was said to have attempted to impose
in Italy against the papacy’s and the Italians’ will. In reality there was at first in the
720s no confiscation but only a transfer of the Italian tax-collecting, for which the
popes had been responsible and which was now returned to the imperial fisc,
according to the law, though jurisdiction over Sicily and Calabria was removed
from the pope to that of the Patriarch of Constantinople. The papal response was
opposition, and only at that point were the southern Italian lands indeed confis-
cated, probably around the 740s.5 Current views on the subject are that much of
this papal explanation was really a post-facto justification for the pro-Western
views of Popes Stephen III and Hadrian I, who chose to place the tension with
Constantinople as far back as was deemed possible, in order to explain the origin
of their pro-Frankish policies. We know that Pope Gregory II’s opposition to the
Emperor Leo III began before any of the iconoclastic decrees, which have now
been established to date from rather later than originally thought, probably not

The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages, 476–752 (London, 1979), pp. 162–232; R. Collins,
Keepers of the Keys of Heaven: A History of the Papacy (New York, 2009); H. Zimmermann, Das
Papsttum im Mittelalter: eine Papstgeschichte im Spiegel der Historiographie: mit einem Verzeichnis der
Päpste vom 4. bis zum 15. Jahrhundert (Stuttgart, 1981); S. Weinfurter, ed., Päpstliche Herrschaft im
Mittelalter. Funktions-Weisen-Strategien- Darstellungsformen (Düsseldorf, 2012); B. Schimelpfennig,
The Papacy, (New York, 1992), tr. from the German; C. Franconi, Storia dei papi e del papato, 3 vols
(Rome, 1969–70); K. A. Fink, Chiesa e papato nel Medioevo (Bologna, 1988); C. Azzara, Il papato nel
Medioevo (Bologna, 2006); K. Herbers, Geschichte des Papsttums im Mittelalter (Darmstadt, 2012). On
the Patrimonium, see L. Duchesne, I primi tempi dello stato pontificio (repr., Spoleto, 2010), pp. 1–122;
Arnaldi, Le origini; P. Partner, The Lands of St Peter: The Papal State in the Middle Ages and the Early
Renaissance (Berkeley, 1972); and Noble, The Republic of St. Peter.

5 On the events of Gregory II’s pontificate see LP I. 91; and the traditional interpretations, for example
in M. V. Anastos, ‘Leon III’s Edict against the Images in the Year 726–727 and the Italo-Byzantine
Relations between 726 and 730’, Byzantinische Forschungen 3 (1968), pp. 5–41, and J. Gouillard, ‘Aux
origines de l’iconoclasme: le témoignage de Grégoire II?’, Travaux et mémoires 3 (1968), pp. 243–307.
For the confiscations, the most recent view is that of Prigent, ‘Les empereurs isauriens’, pp. 557–94; see
also S. Scholz, ‘Das Papsttum, Roms wirtschaftliche Lage und die Enteignung der päpstlichen
Patrimonien in der Mitte des 8. Jahrhundert’, in Weinfurter, ed., Päpstliche Herrschaft, pp. 11–25.
Traditional historiography explained Gregory II’s stance by stating that the pope refused to pay
increased taxes to Constantinople in 722–3, on the grounds that the money was needed in Italy to deal
with the Lombard threat, and that the imperial reaction was to reduce the economic wealth of the
papacy, by confiscating its Sicilian, Illyrian, and Calabrian territories. Prigent’s recent analysis suggests
that the Emperor Leo III did not increase taxes as much as attempt to carry out an administrative
reform throughout the Empire to retake control of taxes and jurisdictions by having them given
directly to the imperial fisc, as opposed to using an intermediary, such as the popes in Italy. Since
Prigent suggests that this began in the 740s, and not during the papacy of Gregory II, he also argued
that the real confiscation of Sicily and Calabria took place at that moment, rather than in the 720s to
730s, and had little to do with iconoclasm but much more with the papal acceptance of the usurping
Emperor Artavasdus by Gregory III, being, as it were, a kind of punishment for Gregory III’s wrong
choice, and also for the papacy’s attempts to regain imperial territories in the north, such as the
Exarchate of Ravenna, for itself.
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50 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

much before 740; and that the Roman spin on this, as summarized by Pope
Hadrian I in his letter to Charlemagne (dated to between 785 and 794), mixed
together the issues of confiscation of the papal patrimony in the south of Italy
by the Eastern emperors, and iconoclasm, to whip up indignation and support
from the Franks.6
In the Italian political arena, more and more of the territory of the Exarchate of
Ravenna and the Pentapolis, the last areas other than Rome in central Italy which
were still under Byzantine authority, was taken over by ambitious Lombard kings
in Pavia. Byzantine imperial response to the Lombard attacks on the Exarchate
and Rome, against which the popes were constantly asking for imperial help, was
complex. The Emperor Leo III and his successors had claimed to wish to raise
taxes in Italy for its defence. Faced with the pope’s and the Italians’ refusal to obey,
notably once it became clear that they would not accept the implementation of
iconoclasm in Italy, the emperors made several attempts—through both direct
envoys and orders given to the Byzantine duke in Rome, then to the exarch in
Ravenna—to remove Gregory II. Several such plots would be foiled by the Romans.7
The armies of the Exarchate, the Pentapolis and the Venetiae rose against the
imperial order to kill Pope Gregory II, rebelled against the Exarch Paul, and
elected their own dukes. The local aristocracy represented by the armies or mili-
tiae of Rome, Ravenna, and other cities of the Byzantine-controlled areas decided
to obey their local leaders and no longer the exarch, especially in Rome, where
the army made common cause with the Lombards from the southern duchies and
from the city itself.8 Later imperial plots against Gregory II also failed, including the
most dangerous of these, which saw the alliance of the patricius Eutychius, previ-
ously the exarch and now imperial envoy to Naples (at a moment when Ravenna
appeared not to be safe any more as the exarchal capital), and of the Lombard
King Liutprand, worried about the increasing independence of the Lombard dukes
of Spoleto and Benevento—whose interests corresponded increasingly with
those of the papacy and who thus supported and protected it against their own
king in Pavia.9 The papal alliance with the Duke of Spoleto Trasamund led
to King Liutprand’s own alliance with the Byzantines, in a bid to isolate both

6 CC no. 94, but equally confusingly by the lumping together of the various events by Theophanes,
see his Chronographia, in Mango et al., The chronicle of Theophanes Confessor.
7 For Gregory II’s letters to Leo III, see H. Grotz, ‘Beobachtungen zu den zwei Briefen Papst Gregor II.
an Kaiser Leo III.’, Archivum historiae pontificiae 18 (1980), pp. 9–40, and H. Grotz, ‘Weitere
Beobachtungen zu den zwei Briefen Papst Gregor II. an Kaiser Leo III.’, Archivum historiae pontificiae
24 (1986), pp. 365–75; now F. Marazzi, ‘Il conflitto fra Leone III Isaurico e il papato fra il 725 e il 733,
e il definitivo inizio del medioevo a Roma: un’ipotesi in discussione’, PBSR 59 (1991), pp. 231–57.
However, L. Brubaker, Inventing Byzantine iconoclasm (Bristol, 2012), pp. 32–55, has argued that it
was not Leo III who promoted such decrees, but Constantine V in 750.
8 See Chapter 2.
9 Nevertheless, there was an official reconciliation between the parties in Rome in 728; see
J. T. Hallenbeck, ‘The Roman-Byzantine Reconciliation of 728: Genesis and Significance’, Byzantinische
Zeitschrift 74 (1981), pp. 29–41.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 51

popes and Lombard dukes, and also to the cautious support of Liutprand for
Byzantine attempts to remove Pope Gregory II, who thus had to contend with
both Liutprand’s direct attempts at conquering either imperial land or land
belonging to the Church of Rome,10 as well as with the Lombard king’s alliance
with the Byzantines. At the same time as he was dealing with Liutprand, the
Byzantine envoys, and the south-Italian dukes, the pope was also attempting to
hold back the armies of Rome and Ravenna, who wanted to crown a new emperor
in Italy. This went very much against the pope’s wish not to break relations
with Constantinople, because he could see an Italian situation developing that
would allow for even more chaos, which would have worked in favour of the
Lombard kings if there was no longer an apparent imperial affiliation. This would
indeed prove to be the case, and the surrender of many cities in imperial territory
to the Lombards was a good indication of a correct assessment on the papacy’s
part that openly giving up imperial authority would lead to the Lombard con-
quest of imperial lands. The difficulties with the emperor continued under Popes
Gregory III (731–41) and Zacharias (741–52), and eventually, as mentioned earlier,
the southern parts of Italy were confiscated fiscally from the pope in the 740s. Faced
with the economic challenge of being deprived of its wealthiest sources of income
for the support of Rome, Pope Zacharias began to reorganize some of the papal
territories around Rome in the Campania into new-style estates called domuscultae,
many specifically assigned to particular areas of the city’s charitable system.
The Lombard kingdom may have been at the root of the political problem
about control of Italy; nevertheless, until 751 the papacy and the Exarchate and
Pentapolis were still under Byzantine rule. Defending Italy from the Lombards by
increasing the taxes taken from it had been the original plan of Emperor Leo III,
opposed by Pope Gregory II, who wished to keep the money in Italy for that same
purpose. The problem of the Lombard expansion and, in the second half of the
eighth century, that of Byzantine iconoclasm would continue to be at the core of
the reign of the next pope, Gregory III.11 Relations between him and the two
iconoclastic Emperors Leo III and Constantine V would be at their worst. The
result was the convocation of a Roman council which produced an anti-iconoclast
decree, sent to Constantinople with the principal functionary of the Roman
Church, the defensor. He was imprisoned, threatened, had the texts taken from
him by force, and was sent back, a pattern repeated several times with several
sets of papal envoys. Pope Gregory III, meantime, continued worrying about

10 Liutprand had conquered the Cottian Alps, which were part of the patrimony of the Church of
Rome; Cumae, which was part of the fisc, i.e. imperial land; Narni and various other castra in the
Emilia and the Pentapolis, lost by the Exarch Paul; and Sutri, later recovered by the papacy through
both payment to, and a part gift by, Liutprand to St Peter, see LP I, 91, chs. 7, 13, and 21.
11 LP I, 92; see also Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 423–62; Marazzi, ‘Il conflitto’,
pp. 231–57; and, more generally, J. T. Hallenbeck, Pavia and Rome: The Lombard monarchy and the
papacy in the eighth century (Philadelphia: Tr. of the American Philosophical Society 72/4, 1972).
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52 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Liutprand’s advances towards the Roman Campania and his attack on Ravenna in
738, which was only just defeated thanks to the successful papal request to Doge
Ursus of Venice to come to the aid of the respublica.12 Perhaps at the suggestion of
the Anglo-Saxon Bishop Boniface, present in Rome at this point, Gregory III for
the first time sent a letter to the Franks, specifically to the Mayor of the Palace
Charles Martel, requesting help against the Lombards. Though not acted upon by
the Franks at this point, it would be the beginning of the complete transformation
of papal and Italian policies for the next few centuries. Liutprand blockaded
Rome, and again attacked Ravenna, which called on the pope for help; he in turn
again approached the doge, but this time help was not forthcoming. Liutprand’s
successors, the Kings Rachis then Aistulf, took control of Ravenna from 750. The
conflict between the papacy over Ravenna, by now between Pope Stephen II
(752–7) and the new Lombard King Aistulf, became even more acute when
Aistulf succeeded in installing a faithful supporter as the new duke of Benevento,
thus effectively closing in on Rome even more thoroughly. Having once again vainly
appealed to Constantinople for help, Pope Stephen II, after travelling to Pavia to
plead with Aistulf, continued his journey across the Alps to Francia. There, on
14 April 754, having crowned Charles Martel’s son Pepin III King of the Franks at
Quierzy, and having anointed his sons, Stephen II received Pepin’s assurance of
Frankish protection for the Patrimony of St Peter.13
The next part of the story has been discussed and commented upon more than
almost any part of the history of early medieval Europe, being correctly perceived
as one of the key moments in its history, when Rome gradually detached itself
from its long-standing commitment to the Eastern Empire, to gravitate into the
orbit of the Frankish kings in the second half of the eighth century. Here I will
simply attempt a summary of the practical developments leading to the end of the
Lombard kingdom and Frankish control over Italy.14 Pepin’s alliance with the

12 MGH Ep. III, no 702. See Monticolo, ‘Le spedizioni di Liutprando’, pp. 321–63 for a detailed, if
rather old-fashioned, description of the circumstances and events. On the concept of respublica and
the debate associated to it, see Noble, Republic of St. Peter.
13 LP I, 93 ch. 27; ARF 753; see also the narrative, later and less reliable, of BenSor, pp. 69–80.
14 The following narrative is put together from sources listed in n. 1, with the addition of:
A. Albertoni, L’Italia carolingia (Rome, 1997); C. Bertelli and G. P. Brogiolo, eds., Il futuro dei
Longobardi. L’Italia e la costruzione dell’Europa di Carlo Magno (Milan, 2000); O. Bertolini, ‘Il problema
delle origini del potere temporale dei papi nei suoi presupposti teoretici iniziali: il concetto di “restitu-
tio” nelle prime cessioni territoriali (756–757) alla Chiesa di Roma’, in Miscellanea Pio Paschini (Rome,
1948), pp. 609–71, repr. in Scritti scelti di storia medievale II, ed. E. Banti (Livorno, 1968), pp. 487–547;
P. Delogu, ‘Lombard and Carolingian Italy’, in McKitterick, ed., The new Cambridge medieval history.
Volume 2; S. Gasparri, ‘Il regno e la legge. Longobardi, Romani e Franchi nello sviluppo dell’ordinamento
pubblico (secoli VI-X)’, La Cultura 28 (1990), pp. 243–66; H. Jedin, Il Primo Medio Evo: progressivo
distacco da Bisanzio, l’epoca carolingia, gli Ottoni e la riforma gregoriana (Milan, 1978); G. Tamassia,
Longobardi, Franchi e Chiesa Romana fino ai tempi di re Liutprando (Bologna, 1888); G. Fischer,
Königtum, Adel und Kirche im Königreich Italien (774–875) (Bonn, 1965); P. Verzone, Da Bisanzio a
Carlomagno (Milan, 1868); Krautheimer, Profile of a City, pp. 109–20 and 142–5. See also G. Arnaldi,
‘Il papato e l’ideologia del potere imperiale’, in Nascita dell’Europa ed Europa carolingia, Settimane 27
(1981), pp. 341–407; Marazzi, ‘Il conflitto’, pp. 231–57; O. Bertolini, ‘Sergio Arcivescovo di Ravenna
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 14/04/20, SPi

a tale of three cities: history and histories 53

papacy allowed the Frankish king to legitimize his palace coup of 751, which was
to replace the Merovingian royal dynasty in Francia with the family of Pepin. The
openly claimed support of the papacy for the deposition of the last Merovingian
king, as famously narrated in the form of the question asked by Pepin’s missi of
Pope Zacharias whether it was better for a king with no power to reign rather
than to be replaced by the man holding real power,15 and the anointing of Pepin
and his family, have long been seen by historians as the quid pro quo by the popes
to gain Frankish help against the expanding Lombard kingdom. The agreement
of Quierzy was that the Frankish king would ‘restore’ the lands conquered by
the Lombards, though, significantly, not to the Empire to which they technically
belonged, but to the papacy, or rather to the Patrimony of St Peter—a move clearly
seen by all parties as a step towards endowing the papacy with the power to
defend itself against the Lombards, and to create a political and economic power
of its own. This was the plan in the first instance, when there was no deliberate
attempt to remove the Lombard kings from Italy, only to contain them within the
limits of the pre-Liutprandian kingdom. The next episodes, during which Pepin,
and ultimately Charlemagne, made the Lombard kingdom disappear and replaced
it in 774 by Charles’s own assumption of the Lombard crown, need only be
sketched here, since it too has had reams of paper dedicated to it.
After Pepin’s descent into Italy and his defeat of the Lombard King Aistulf in
755, and the latter’s broken promise to return Ravenna and the other cities con-
quered by the Lombards, Aistulf attempted an attack on Rome itself, prompting
another papal appeal to Pepin,16 who came to Italy once again and won a second
victory over Aistulf.17 During his time in Italy, Pepin met the Byzantine envoy
of the Emperor Constantine V in Pavia, who requested of him the restitution of
Ravenna and the Exarchate to the Empire; by refusing to do so on the grounds
that this was the property of St Peter and the Roman Church and would therefore
be returned to St Peter and the papacy, Pepin reiterated the pact with the papacy
with another written donation. When Pope Paul (757–67), Stephen II’s brother

(744–769) e i papi del suo tempo’, Studi Romagnoli 1 (1950), pp. 43–87; S. Gasparri, ‘Il passaggio dai
Longobardi ai Carolingi’, in Brogiolo, Il futuro dei Longobardi, pp. 25–43; S. Gasparri, Prima delle
nazioni. Popoli, etnie e regni fra Antichita e Medioevo (Rome, 1997), pp. 161–229; W. Pohl, ‘Das
Papsttum und die Langobarden’, in Der Dynastiewechsel von 751, ed. M. Becher and J. Jarnut (Münster,
2004), pp. 145–62; F. Hartmann, Hadrian I. (772–795) Frühmittelalterliches Papsttum und die Lösung
Roms vom byzantinischen Kaiser (Stuttgart, 2006).

15 The point is made with some insistence in several Frankish sources, from ARF 749, the Clausula
de unctione Pippini regis, MGH SS XV, 1, the Continuator of Fredegar, ed. and tr. M. Wallace-Hadrill,
The fourth book of the Chronicle of Fredegar: with its continuations (London, 1963), p. 33, and even by
Einhard, who claims that ‘Pepin was constituted king . . . by the authority of the Roman pope’, thus
clearly expressing a Carolingian-driven policy in their choice of ideological allegiance.
16 ARF 755, LP I. 95, BenSor, pp. 81–95; see also J. T. Hallenbeck, ‘Rome under attack: an estimation
of King Aistulf ’s motives for the Lombard siege of 756’, Mediaeval Studies 40 (1978), pp. 33–54.
17 ARF 756; BenSor, pp. 79–90; see Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 547–698.
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54 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

and successor, died, his succession was disputed and provoked a major upheaval
in Rome, leading to a power struggle between parties and the involvement of the
Lombard King Desiderius, who now became the power broker in Roman politics.18
Faced with this threat, the new Pope Hadrian I made another appeal for help to
Charles, who came to Rome for the first time in 774 and finally defeated Desiderius,
taking the crown of the Lombard kingdom for himself in Pavia that year.19 This
was followed by cautious Byzantine contacts with Charlemagne: in 786–7 when
Charles was in Rome to settle the affairs of Italy and to confer with the emperor’s
emissaries about a settlement, there were discussions with the Byzantine ambas-
sadors about the possibility of a marriage of Charles’s daughter to the heir to the
Eastern throne, but these were not successful.20 The next act of the story saw
another marriage proposal—between Charlemagne himself and the Empress Irene
in 802–3, but in the meantime Irene was deposed and Nicephorus became the
new emperor.21 This led to an attempt by Charlemagne through his son Pepin to
conquer Venice, of which more below.

The Franks in Rome and Carolingian Rule to 888

The story of the Frankish implantation and of Carolingian Italy has also been
recounted numerous times.22 I need only trace its key moments. Charles’s first
visit to Rome in 774, during the siege of Pavia, followed by his return to Pavia and
his coronation as King of the Lombards, and the exile of Desiderius’ son Adelchi
to Constantinople, were followed by several other visits to Rome—in 781 when
Charles’s sons Pepin and Louis were anointed kings by the pope, and in 786 and
787.23 Charles spent the winter in Rome organizing the affairs of both the city of
Rome and the papacy, then returned to Francia via Ravenna, where he also
organized the removal of most of the marbles and columns of the old imperial
and exarchal palace for the refurbishment of his new palace at Aachen.24 In 796

18 See Chapter 2. 19 ARF 773; BenSor, pp. 89–95.

20 ARF 786, 787, and 788. 21 ARF 802–3.
22 P. Classen, ‘Karl der Große, das Papsttum und Byzanz: die Begründung des karolingischen
Kaisertums’, in Karl Der Große. Lebenswerk und Nachleben, ed. H. Beumann (Düsseldorf, 1965),
pp. 537–608 and P. Classen, ‘Italien zwischen Byzanz und das Frankenreich’, in Nascita dell’Europa,
Settimane 27, pp. 919–67, both on the Frankish narrative, as well as H. Mordek, ‘Rom, Byzanz und die
Franken im 8. Jahrhundert. Zur Überlieferung und kirchenpolitischen Bedeutung der Synodus Romana
Papst Gregors III. vom Jahre 732 (mit Edition)’, in Person und Gemeinschaft im Mittelalter. Karl
Schmid zum fünfundsechzigsten Geburtstag, ed. G. Althoff, D. Geuenich, and O. G. Oexle (Sigmaringen,
1988), pp. 123–56; S. Gasparri, ‘The Fall of the Lombard kingdom: facts, memory and propaganda’, in
774. Ipotesi su una transizione, ed. S. Gasparri (Turnhout, 2008), pp. 41–66, on the perception of
events from the Lombard side.
23 ARF on these visits to sort out Italian affairs; BenSor, pp. 95–102, esp. 93. On the first visit, see
O. Engels, ‘Zum Rombesuch Karls des Großen im Jahre 774’, Jahrbuch für fränkische Landesforschung
52 (1992), pp. 15–24.
24 See Chapter 5.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 55

Pope Hadrian died and his successor, Pope Leo III, sent emissaries to Charles to
‘deliver to him the key to the tomb of St Peter and the banner of city of Rome’
and asking ‘the king to send one of his magnates to Rome, who would receive the
submission of the Roman people and their oath of fealty’25. Pope Leo III was
seriously challenged by the Roman aristocracy in 799,26 to the extent of being
deposed, and he fled to Charlemagne, who sent him back to Rome together with
his own envoys charged with investigating the charges against him, while prepar-
ing to go there himself as soon as possible. This he did, and the only too famous
account of the Annales Regnum Francorum tells the story of this visit, and of his
eventual coronation as emperor in 800.27
This was to be his last trip to Rome, and the next Carolingian emperor, his son
Louis the Pious, despite having to intervene again in response to a crisis which
saw Pope Leo III accused by the Romans, did not actually go to Rome and was
crowned at Rheims by the new Pope Stephen IV.28 He did, however, set down the
bases of the constitutional relationship between the Carolingian Empire and the
popes, in the diploma known as the Ludovicianum of 817. In it, apart from con-
firming and expanding the territorial possessions of the papacy in Italy, he accepted
the non-interference of the emperors in either papal elections or the government
of Rome, with the proviso that the elected pope would, before consecration,
send envoys to inform the emperor and reassure him as to the legitimacy of the
election.29 The last but not least of the clauses of the Ludovicianum was the auton-
omy of the Patrimony of St Peter in terms of justice and administration, while the
emperor, in the form of his missi in Rome, would not intervene in these areas
unless called in to do so by the pope.30 The election would have to be announced
by his envoys to the emperor, however, an arrangement which was almost

25 ARF 796, BenSor, pp. 103–8; LiP 195–7. 26 See Chapter 2.

27 ARF 800 and 801; LP I, 98; BenSor, pp. 93, 116; There is a full literature on the rebellion of 799, of
which one could cite W. Mohr, ‘Karl der Große, Leo III. und der römische Aufstand von 799’,
Archivum latinitatis medii aevi 30 (1960), pp. 39–98; O. Hagender, ‘Das crimen maiestatis, der Prozeß
gegen die Attentäter Papst Leos III. und die Kaiserkrönung Karls des Grossen’, in Aus Kirche und
Reich. Studien zu Theologie, Politik und Recht im Mittelalter. Festschrift für Friedrich Kempf zu seinem
75. Geburtstag, ed. H. Mordek (Sigmaringen, 1983); M. Becher, ‘Karl der Grosse und Papst Leo III.
Die Ereignisse der Jahre 799 und 800 aus der Sicht der Zeitgenossen’, in 799. Kunst und Kultur der
Karolingerzeit. Karl der Grosse und Papst Leo III. in Paderborn, III, Beitrage zum Katalog der Ausstellung,
ed. C. Stiegemann and M. Wemhoff (Mainz, 1999), pp. 22–36, and M. Becher, ‘Die Kaiserkrönung im
Jahr 800. Eine Streitfrage zwischen Karl dem Grossen und Papst Leo III’, Rheinische Viiertaljahrsblätter
66 (2002), pp. 1–38; J. Jarnut, ‘799 und die Folgen’, Westfälische Zeitschrift 150 (2000), pp. 191–209;
and R. Schieffer, ‘Das Attentat auf Papst Leo III’, in Am Vorabend der Kaiserkrönung. Das Epos ‘Karolus
Magnus et Leo papa’ und der Papstbesuch in Paderborn 799, ed. P. Godman, J. Jarnut, and P. Johanek
(Berlin, 2001), pp. 75–85.
28 On Louis and the crisis with Leo III, as well as his coronation, see Astronomer II, 25/1 and
26/2–3, Thegan 16–17; ARF 816, BenSor, pp. 128–36; more generally the biography of Louis by
E. Boshof, Ludwig der Fromme (Darmstadt, 1996).
29 ARF 817; LP I. 99, tr. Davis, pp. 231–3.
30 On the Ludovicianum, see ed. in MGH Cap. I. no. 172; Davis, LPC8, pp. 231–3; see discussions in
A. Hahn, ‘Das Hludowicianum’, Archiv fur Diplomatik 21 (1975), pp. 15–135, and Noble, Republic of St
Peter, pp. 299–308.
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56 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

i­ mmediately put under strain by the election of Pope Stephen IV’s successor, Pope
Paschal, who sent an apologetic letter to Louis after his consecration without the
agreement of the emperor, using the well-worn cliché that the election had been
forced upon him, and reiterating the agreement.31 More trouble erupted, how-
ever, as a result of another Roman plot: clearly weary of these seemingly perennial
Roman conflicts, Lothar I, crowned emperor by his father at Aachen in 817 and
put in charge of Italy, promulgated in 824 a new act, the Constitutio romana, in
agreement with the new Pope Eugenius II.32 According to its terms, the emperors
still did not claim to control or even influence papal elections, which were freely
carried out by the people and clergy of the city. But this had to be done in the
presence of the Frankish imperial missi, thus ensuring a peaceful and lawful
result. When Pope Gregory IV was elected in 827, his consecration was delayed
until the emperor had been informed of the election and had given his consent to the
choice of the clergy and people.33 Meanwhile the Emperor Lothar was permanently
put in charge of Italian affairs.34 In addition, Frankish sources claim that it
‘was . . . decreed according to ancient custom, that there be sent from the emperor’s
side those who, in the exercise of judicial authority, would execute justice for all
the people and would weigh with equal balance at a time when it would seem fit-
ting to the emperor’.35 Lothar’s rule was subject to several conflicts among men
with power in Rome, notably between the Lateran party favouring the Franks and
those opposed to them; the conflict became most acute later on when, Lothar
being ill, his troops were said to have ravaged the city and attacked St Peter’s.36
Pope Gregory IV became involved in Lothar’s and his brothers’ quarrel with
their father, and he travelled to Francia to try and reconcile them but failed to
do so, faced as he was with increasing hostility, and perceived as a supporter of
Lothar’s ‘unity’ party.37 After Louis’s death in 840, Lothar remained the only
emperor, but when Pope Gregory IV died in 844 and his successor, Pope Sergius
II (844–7), was consecrated without waiting for Lothar’s confirmation, the
emperor sent his son Louis II to punish the Romans by ravaging papal territories,
and to ensure again that elections would not be carried out without the presence
of an imperial representative.38 In 850 Louis II was crowned emperor by Pope

31 ARF 817. 32 ARF 817 and 824. 33 Astronomer II. 41/2; ARF 827.
34 One of his most popular actions was his restoration of land said to have been confiscated by
previous popes, meaning especially Paschal I, unjustly, from Roman potentes, and returned by the
emperor to them; see ARF 824; Astronomer, II.38; see also Chapter 2. On Lothar’s increasing interest
and rule in Italy, see J. Jarnut, ‘Ludwig der Fromme, Lothar I und das Regnum Italiae’, in Charlemagne’s
Heir: new perspectives on the reign of Louis the Pious (814–840), ed. R. Collins and P. Godman (Oxford,
1990), pp. 349–62; and the papers in Lothar I. Kaiser und Mönch in Prüm. Zum 1150. Jahr seines Todes,
ed. R. Nolden (Niederprüm).
35 Astronomer, II.38; we have no Roman confirmation of this view. 36 Astronomer III. 55/2.
37 Nithard, ch. 4; ASB 833. 38 ASB 844, LP I. 104, ch. 8.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 57

Leo IV.39 In 851, responding to the increasingly frequent Saracen attacks on

Rome, the Emperor Lothar either ordered or supported the fortifying of St Peter’s
and of the city of Rome.40 The attacks continued, and in 853 the emperor’s help
was again requested.41 Pope Hadrian II continued to hold the balance of power, at
least on the diplomatic front, by playing a key role in the political negotiations
between the Emperor Louis II, his brother King Lothar II, and his uncles Kings
Charles the Bald and Louis the German. Emperor Louis II feared that the pope
was plotting to send envoys to Francia to ensure that Charles the Bald would suc-
ceed him as ruler of the Italian kingdom and the Empire,42 and indeed Charles
the Bald tried to make his way to Italy in 871, when false news of Louis II’s death
reached him.43 The new pope, John VIII, played an important part in helping
Louis II disentangle himself from a forced oath of allegiance to Duke Adelchi of
Benevento when Louis had been his prisoner, and renewed Louis II’s imperial
coronation in 872 in Rome.44 After Louis II’s death in 875, his widow, Angilberga,
attempted to negotiate with Louis the German’s son Carloman to become the new
emperor, but her party was ultimately unsuccessful.45 The pope’s choice, whether
through bribery as several sources assert, or on account of his support of the
papacy throughout the Lothar II conflict, was to crown Charles the Bald emperor
in 875 in Rome.46 After Charles the Bald’s death in 877 on his return from Rome
to Francia, the Italian nobility was divided between the supporters of Carloman
and those of Charles the Bald’s son. John VIII supported the latter, but was
forced to leave Rome by two of the principal Italian princes—Lambert, son of
Duke Guy of Spoleto, and the Marquess Adalbert, acting for Carloman.47 After a
few more changes of fortune and the death of Carloman, his brother Charles the
Fat was crowned emperor in 881, the last direct Carolingian emperor.48 When
Charles the Fat died in 888, this was the end of Carolingian rule in Italy.

39 ASB 850; Davis, LPC9, pp. 102, 137–89; F. Bougard, ‘La cour et le gouvernement de Louis II,
840–875’, in La royauté et les élites dans l’Europe carolingienne (du début du IXe aux environs de 920),
ed. R. Le Jan (Lille, 1998), pp. 249–67, especially relevant for the formation of Louis II’s court and the
gradual influx in it of second-generation Frankish men with exclusive Italian interests.
40 ASB 851. The Liber Pontificalis claimed it as a papal initiative, LP I, 105 ch. 69, but so did the
Emperor Lothar in his capitulary Pro Edificatione Novae Romae; see MGH Cap. 2. 65 and 2.66.30–2.67.2,
7–8 and no. 203.2; in the absence of other evidence, it is impossible to be certain about who thought
of it first, and the inscriptions on the Civitas Leoniana itself claim, in one case, that it had been built
by Leo, and in another by Leo and Lothar. I will return to this in Chapter 4, where I will argue more
forcibly in favour of Lothar.
41 ASB 853. 42 ASB 865, 868, 869, 870; AF 869. 43 ASB 871.
44 ASB 971–873; Regino 872; Erchempert, Historia ch. 34; Andrea of Bergamo, Historia, ch. 16.
45 ASB 872, AF 875, Flodoard III.26. On her political role, see F. Bougard, ‘Engelberga, imperatrice’,
in DBI, Rome 1993, pp. 668–76.
46 ASB 877, AF 875, Regino 875, 877, BenSor, p. 150; LIP, pp. 206–9; ‘Annales Augienses’, in MGH
SS I, 875–6, 881–99. See W. A. Eckhardt, ‘Das Protokoll von Ravenna 877 über die Kaiserkrönung
Karls des Kahlen’, Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters 32 (1967), pp. 295–311.
47 ASB 877–8, AF 878, BenSor, pp. 150–5; ‘Annals of Weingarten’, in MGH SS I, 875, 879, 888, 896.
48 ASB 880, Regino 881.
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58 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

A key narrative thread, as we can see, was the constant intervention of the
Carolingian emperors from Charlemagne onwards in the affairs of Rome, mostly
at the time of papal elections, and during the conflicts between popes such as
Leo III or Paschal and various factions of the Roman aristocracy plotting to
remove them. The unrest caused led to the increasing involvement of the imperial
missi and sometimes of the emperor himself, and to attempts to legislate, in the
Ludovicianum first, then in the Constitutio Romana, allegedly to regulate the
worst excesses of papal elections and plots, in reality often to ensure the election
of pro-Carolingian popes. The relation between the papacy and the Carolingians
had been in the first instance one of mutual dependency, with the former gaining
help against the Lombards, while the latter gained the legitimacy needed for a
new dynasty to set itself up properly on the throne.49 By the time of Charlemagne,
it became more clearly one of deference of the papacy towards imperial power,
and this was evident in the relationship which developed between Charlemagne
and Pope Leo III, as we saw earlier with both his election announcement and the
oath of the Romans,50 the pope thereby accepting some kind of overlordship of
Charlemagne, who had been awarded the title of patricius Romanorum, over the
city. Charlemagne’s first reception in Rome was that of a ruler:

Leo [came] to meet him with the Romans, twelve miles from the city, with
humility and respect. The pope return[ed] ahead of him to Rome, next day he
sen[t] the banners of city of Rome to meet him and order[ed] crowds of towns
people and pilgrims to line the streets and acclaim Charlemagne on arrival. The
pope receive[d] him on the steps of St Peter’s.51

After the coronation in 800, Leo knelt in obeisance to Charlemagne—a fact

not mentioned in the Liber Pontificalis but only in the Royal Frankish Annals.
Pope Leo III’s reign shows ample evidence of various interventions in papal affairs
by Charlemagne’s missi—of which we are only aware from Leo’s complaints in
his letters in the Codex Carolinus.52 Thinking himself powerful enough after
Charlemagne’s death, Leo III punished by execution in 815 those who had

49 F. Bougard, ‘ “Petitor et medius”: le role de la papauté dans les relations internationales de

Grégoire le Grand à Jean VIII’, in Le relazioni internazionali, Settimane 53 (2010), pp. 299–339 has
shown how at first it was very much the Franks who were in charge in this relationship, choosing
when to intervene if it was to their advantage, while the popes had to balance very finely justifying
their request for help in relation to Constantinople. This was partly why the papacy came to highlight
more and more its link with the devotion to St Peter. See also I. Deug-Su, Cultura e ideologia nella
prima età carolingia (Rome, 1984).
50 ARF 796. 51 ARF 800.
52 MGH Ep. III, pp. 87–104; Leo III’s only resistance was on the matter of the insertion of the
Filioque in the Creed, on account of the Greeks’ opposition to this Frankish custom; see B. Capelle, ‘Le
pape Léon III et le filioque’, in 1054–1954, L’église et les églises. Neuf siècles de douloureuse séparation
entre l’Orient et l’Occident. Études et travaux sur l’unité chrétienne offerts à Dom Lambert Beaudouin’
(Chevetogne, 1954).
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 59

c­ onspired against him in 799; despite his somewhat shocked response to this,
Louis the Pious, after protesting, had no choice but to let it go. This may neverthe-
less have prompted Louis to try and resolve the problem of the perennial Roman
internal conflicts through the Ludovicianum, implemented by Pope Paschal. The
pope confirmed Louis the Pious’s promulgation of the Ordinatio Imperii of 817,
the political settlement of the Western Empire on his eldest son Lothar, with
authority over his brothers, who were to control the other two parts of the Empire.
Pope Paschal also sent legates to the marriage of Lothar and Ermengard in 822,
and in 823 he crowned Lothar emperor in Rome.53 But 823 was a problem year
for Paschal, as a plot against him had Louis the Pious send Lothar to Rome to
verify the accusations. Once again the pope was on trial and once again, as with
Leo III, the issue revolved around who had the authority to judge the pope.
Paschal did exactly as Leo III had done and took an oath to establish his inno-
cence, so that Louis could do nothing but accept this. But the plot itself is of great
interest: it was to do with the murders of Theodore, the chief of notaries, and his
son-in-law, the nomenclator Leo, who had been killed in the Lateran because ‘they
had always been loyal to Lothar’. It was said that this had been done on the orders
or with the advice of Pope Paschal, who denied the latter accusation but never-
theless defended the murderers with great vigour because they belonged to the
familia of St Peter, while he condemned the dead as guilty of lese-majesty, and
said that they had been justly slain.54 One of Lothar’s most significant acts, as a
result of seeing his father’s impotence to deal with the problem, was the setting up
of the Constitutio Romana in 824.55 This new agreement, which strengthened
Carolingian control over Rome, would in fact be signed by Paschal’s successor,
Pope Eugenius (824–7)—whom the Liber Pontificalis so detested.
Eugenius played a much more important role than his life in the Liber
Pontificalis suggests, as we know from Frankish sources. It has been sometimes
asserted that the height of papal submission to the Carolingian emperor was
under Eugenius, whose biography in the Liber Pontificalis is very curt, and delib-
erately does not allow us to sense this subjection.56 The details of the Constitutio
Romana amount to little change in terms of the relations between the papacy and
the Franks, allowing the former complete control over the Patrimony, but impos-
ing imperial intervention either if the pope needed help or, and this is a crucial
addendum, if his subjects could not find redress from him: in such a case, they
were entitled to appeal directly to the emperor. Another issue mentioned was that
of the oaths of the Romans to the emperor: interpretations here vary, from those
who see it as indicative of greater Carolingian control, to those who try very hard

53 ARF 817, 823. M. Marrocchi, ‘Lotario I, Imperatore, Re D’Italia’, in DBI 66, pp. 171–176.
54 AFR 823; Astronomer II. 37/1; Thegan, ch. 30.
55 The Constitutio Romana is ed. in MGH Cap. I. no. 161. See Noble, Republic of St Peter,
pp. 308–22.
56 Davis, LPC9, pp. 31–8.
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60 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

to show its limitations through the fact that obedience to the emperor was in fact
‘reserved’, which is to say, came only after that to the pope.57 As is so often the
case, one can see in these arrangements only as much give and take as the partici-
pants were willing or able to engage in. Eugenius was not completely cowed, as
shown by his defence of the 787 council decisions about iconoclasm against both
the Byzantine Emperor Michael I and Louis the Pious.58
Eugenius’s successor, Gregory IV (828–44), showed the Constitutio Romana
in working order, as the papal ordination was delayed until the imperial envoy
arrived in Rome to check its legitimacy and take the oath of the Romans to the
emperor.59 The rebellion of Louis the Pious’s sons led Pope Gregory IV to inter-
vene in the hope of reconciling the parties, but in Francia he was seen as being
on Lothar’s side in his support of the Ordinatio Imperii and was rejected as a
mediator. When Lothar failed in his bid in 840, then at Fontenoy in 842, the pope,
who had tried to intervene—and, moreover, had as his envoy the Archbishop of
Ravenna, George, who had his own agenda—was compromised too.60 Pope
Sergius II, when he succeeded Gregory IV, had also had a contested election, not
having waited for the presence of the imperial missus, so Lothar, furious at the
flouting of the Constitutio Romana, sent his son Louis II and an army of Franks to
Rome—an army which devastated all in its way from Bologna to Rome.61 Louis
left for Pavia, and a relieved ‘senate’ and people of Rome with their families saw
his departure and that of his army as a deliverance from plague and tyranny.62
As Pope Sergius II became increasingly ill and unstable, his brother Benedict
gained more influence, and claimed to hold from the emperor the ‘primacy and
lordship’ or the ‘monarchy at Rome’, notably taking away the properties of various
churches ‘with imperial permission and instruction’.63 This rather unclear con-
cept has been discussed and questioned, and it has been suggested that this
primacy or monarchy was in fact based on Lothar having made Benedict an
imperial deputy.64
On the death of Sergius II, his elected successor, Pope Leo IV, again did not
wait for the imperial presence before he was consecrated, using the excuse of the

57 Noble, Republic of St Peter, p. 318.

58 Davis, LPC9, p. 37. The latter had been asked by Michael to be an intermediary between himself
and the pope on the issue of the veneration of icons, which Louis did by sending a letter to the pope to
that effect. But Eugenius refused to sign it. A reformer like Louis, Eugenius also convoked a reforming
synod in 826: his legislation against simony, concerning the required qualifications of bishops and
priests, monastic observance, and lay conduct, also took in an acceptance of the Frankish practice that
a proprietor who built a church was allowed to retain control over it—all canons renewed in the council
of Pope Leo IV in 853; J. D. Mansi, Sacrorum conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio, 10 vols,
(Florence, 1765; repr. Graz ,1960), XIV, 999–1009 and 1009–16.
59 In 829 the imperial envoy sat in judgement in a trial opposing the Church of Rome and the
abbey of Farfa (in imperial territory) regarding property rights, and decided in favour of Farfa see
ARF 827; Astronomer II. 41/2; BenSor p. 144.
60 Astronomer III. 48/1. 61 LP I. 104 cs 8–12. 62 LP I. 104 ch. 18.
63 LP I. 104 chs. 40–1. 64 Davis, LPC9, pp. 73–4.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 61

need for a proper authority in Rome to face the Saracen attacks. He did, however,
promptly apologize to Lothar65 and demonstrated his loyalty, for example through
the gold panels which he set up at St Peter’s, representing Christ, St Peter, St Paul,
and St Andrew, with Leo IV and his ‘spiritual son the Lord Emperor Lothar’.66 The
Liber Pontificalis, which sets him out as a pope who took great care of the city
of Rome under Saracen attack, notably by building the famous wall with which
his name is associated, claims that the building of the wall was done after asking
Lothar for help, which the emperor allegedly provided by immediately sending
him money. Lothar’s capitulary tells a different story, suggesting that it was Lothar
who ordered the pope to bring together the people of Rome and, with the
resources which he, Lothar, provided, to attend to the restoration of the walls.67 It
is difficult to decide which source to trust; but at the very least the discrepancy
underlines the efforts made by the Liber Pontificalis to avoid giving the impression
of Carolingian control over the city, often by simply obliterating events to that
effect, for example the papal coronation of Lothar’s son Louis II as emperor in
850.68 Louis II’s involvement in Roman affairs remained strong. By this stage, we
have already heard of two serious conflicts involving divided loyalties in Rome.
The first had been the murder of Theodore, the chief of notaries and his son-
in-law the nomenclator Leo, with Pope Paschal defending their killers.69 The second
once again dealt with the issue of alleged disloyalty in the affair of two high-
ranking military officers, Gratian and Daniel, the first accused of spying for the
Franks by the second, thus bringing to light a plot to restore Byzantine government
in the city; on that occasion, Louis II asked for the ‘guilty’ man, that is his spy
Gratian, to be pardoned by the pope, which was clearly an order.70
The succession of Benedict III (855–8) seemed straightforward, and Benedict
sent envoys to the Emperor Louis II with the decree, but things immediately
became more complicated. The emperor obviously favoured Anastasius, the pre-
viously excommunicated priest who had left Rome but was a staunch imperial
supporter. A plot, partly organized by Bishop Arsenius of Orté, whose aim was to
put Anastasius, Arsenius’s nephew, on the papal throne, had been organized while
Benedict’s envoys, Arsenius and two others, were on their way to announce the
election to the emperor. The imperial missus arrived in Rome and in effect forced
another election, but Benedict was elected anew, and thus made it impossible for
the emperor to contest the validity of the first election, though the new pope had
to accept being ‘supervised’ by two bishops faithful to the emperor, one of whom

65 LP I. 105 ch. 8: ‘the Romans ke[pt] their loyalty and honour to the [emperor] after God, through
and in all things.’
66 LP I. 105 ch. 33.
67 LP I. 105 ch. 69; Lothar’s capitulary containing the order is edited in MGH. Cap. II, 66/3–67/2
and translated in Azzara e Moro, I Capitolari italici, no. 33 ch. 7.
68 ASB 850; for a more detailed view of the strengthening of Frankish influence in Rome, see
S. Scholz, Politik—Selbstverständnis—Selbstdarstellung (Stuttgart, 2006), pp. 157–62.
69 AFR 823; Astronomer II. 37/1; Thegan, ch. 30. 70 See Chapter 2.
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62 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

was Arsenius.71 In 853 Louis II was present when a synod of sixty-seven bishops
was convoked, which confirmed the pastoral reforms first set out in Eugenius II’s
synod. In 858 Louis II was again in Rome, and just as he had left it, Benedict III
died. Anxious to ensure the succession of a favourable candidate, Louis immedi-
ately turned round and went back to Rome, where he was actually present during
the election. The imperial-backed party attempted to install its own candidate,
Anastasius, as the new pope, but having failed to do so because Anastasius was
too compromised, Louis II agreed to the choice of Nicholas I (858–67), who was
elected in his presence and who called him his ‘spiritual and dearest son’.72
Louis II no doubt influenced the election, even though, understandably, the
Liber Pontificalis does not say so; but the Annals of St Bertin do—Nicholas
succeeded ‘more through the presence and favour of King Louis [i.e. Emperor
Louis II] and his magnates than through election by clergy’.73 At the very least, the
imperial party ensured that Anastasius, the main supporter of imperial ideology,
was reinstated and back in favour.
However, after the election Louis would be in for a shock, for Nicholas was
certainly not a subservient deputy of the emperor. It was precisely under his reign
that the scales of advantage would be reversed, and the papacy, which under
Popes Leo III and then Eugenius had seen its highest level of control by the
Carolingians, would reach the apex of its power in relation to the Franks during
the whole of the ninth century. The story of this relationship during the second
half of the ninth century is one in which, unlike during the previous 100 years, it
would be the pope who intervened in Frankish royal affairs, and papal legates
would be deeply involved in establishing papal authority over local bishops. The
main example of this, discussed at great length in the Liber Pontificalis, the Annals
of St Bertin, and the Annals of Fulda, and especially by Regino, is that of the
divorce of Lothar II.74 Detailed studies of this have been made, both in terms of
its political importance and of its theological and pastoral significance as one of
the cornerstones of the theology of Christian marriage gradually put in place by
the Church in the Middle Ages, but this is not my concern here.75 I will give a
brief summary of the affair as an example of papal involvement in Frankish pol-
itics, but my interest lies especially in the consequences of this involvement on
Louis II, Lothar II’s brother, and Louis II’s involvement with the city of Rome.
Lothar II, second son of the Emperor Lothar I and brother of the Emperor Louis II,
and himself King of Lotharingia, had been married to Theutberga, the sister of
Marquess Hubert of Provence. He repudiated her, on the grounds both of her

71 LP I. 106, cs 6–20. 72 LP I. 107 chs. 5–10. 73 ASB 856.

74 See LP I. 107 cs 44–50; ASB 860–9; AF 865–70; Regino 864–70.
75 K. Heidecker, The divorce of Lothar II: Christian marriage and political power in the Carolingian
world (Ithaca, 2010). For Hincmar’s role in this and his treatise relating to the affair, see R. Stone and
C. West, eds. and tr., The divorce of King Lothar and Queen Theutberga. Hincmar of Rheims’s “De
Divortio” (Manchester, 2016).
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 63

alleged adultery, incest, and sodomy, and of his previous marriage to his concubine
Waldrada, with whom he had a son. In 862 a synod met at Aachen, which granted
him the divorce, and acknowledged his marriage to Waldrada, and this was sub-
sequently confirmed by another synod at Metz in 863. Pope Nicholas, apprised
of this, sent his legates to ascertain the facts. Whether bribed, as claimed, or just
because they understood political pragmatism, they accepted Lothar II’s claim that
he had done nothing but accept his bishops’ ruling, and asked the two bishops
who had presided, Archbishops Theutgaud of Metz and Gunther of Cologne, to
go to Rome to discuss the matter further with the pope. They did so, bringing
with them the acts of the synods of Aachen and Metz. At a Roman synod in 863
Pope Nicholas condemned and anathematized all participants at these synods,
deposed and excommunicated the two archbishops, and condemned Lothar II in
a famous letter which he then sent to all clergy and other elites.76 Theutgaud and
Gunther went to the Emperor Louis II at Benevento to complain ‘that they had
been deposed unjustly, and that an insult had been done to the emperor himself
and to the whole Holy Church since it was unheard of, and could not be read
about anywhere, that any metropolitan could be demoted without the knowledge
of the ruler or without other metropolitans being present’,77 and to ask for the
judgement to be reversed by the emperor. Louis II tried to argue with Nicholas,
even going to Rome together with the Empress Angilberga for that purpose,78
but, faced with his refusal, he withdrew, and the two archbishops returned to
Francia, from where they travelled twice again to Rome to obtain their reinstate-
ment, before dying without having achieved this. In 865, after the papal legate
Bishop Arsenius of Orté came to Francia,79 Lothar II accepted the papal sentence,
took back Theutberga and sent Waldrada for absolution to Rome with Arsenius, a
journey she began but did not complete.80 This lasted only until Arsenius had left,
after which Lothar II reinstated Waldrada and once again accused Theutberga,
who fled and took refuge with Charles the Bald. While praising Charles, Nicholas
continued to fight with letters sent to both Charles and Lothar II, confirming his
judgements and excommunicating Waldrada in 866, while giving Lothar II an
ultimatum to leave her within a year or risk excommunication himself.81
Eventually Lothar II went to Rome in 869, where he was at first snubbed by the
new pope, Hadrian II: Lothar went to St Peter’s but no cleric came to meet him,
and he had to go on his own, with only his personal retinue, to the tomb of St
Peter. From there he went to the upper floor of a house near St Peter’s to find

76 Nicholas’s letters in MGH Ep. VI nos 18–21 and 53; Regino II, ann. 865–9. AF 863 says that
‘writings of both sides’ can be found ‘in several places in Germany’.
77 Regino 865. 78 ASB 864. 79 Regino 866. 80 Regino 866; ASB 865.
81 Regino 866; Arsenius’ letter to the bishops of Gaul and Germany: Epistolae ad divortium Lotharii
II regis pertinentes, no. 11; Nicholas’s letter of 867 to Charles the Bald to press him not to support
Lothar II but to help Theutberga is no. 48, and the letter of 866 to the bishops of Italy, Germany,
Neustria, and Gaul, no. 42; Nicholas’s other relevant letters are nos 45 and 46, of 867.
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64 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

lodgings—implying that he was not received in the Frankish ‘palace’ at St Peter’s,

which would be an exceptional insult—but he found that the place ‘had not even
been cleaned out with a brush’. He thought that Mass was bound to be sung for
him next day, Sunday (he had come to St Peter’s on a Saturday), but he could not
get the pope to do this.82 This account was flatly contradicted by Regino’s chronicle,
which claimed that Lothar II had been welcomed by Pope Hadrian II and offered
Communion, with a challenge to accept it if he knew himself to be free from
his association with Waldrada; both he and many of his followers accepted.83
Nevertheless, the Annals of St Bertin continue the narrative by admitting that, ‘On
the Tuesday [following the Sunday snub at St Peter’s, Lothar] entered Rome and
had lunch with the pope in the Lateran Palace: after giving him gifts in vessels of
gold and silver, he got the pope to agree to bestow on him a cloak, a palm and a
rod, which he duly did. Lothar and his followers interpreted these gifts as follows:
with the cloak, Lothar was being reinvested with Waldrada; with the palm, Lothar
showed himself the victor in what he had begun; and with the rod, he would beat
down the bishops who resisted his will.’84 The author of the Annals of St Bertin
(at this stage, Hincmar of Rheims), is clearly implying that, partly as a result of
bribery, the pope had accepted giving some sign of authority to Lothar II, which
he and his men had interpreted as an acceptance of the divorce. It is indeed very
likely that, unlike the intransigent Nicholas, Hadrian II did in fact confirm the
divorce,85 in the face of what was clearly very strong opposition to the papal inter-
vention of the past few years both from Lothar II’s followers, as he could tell from
the willingness of so many to perjure themselves to support him even at the risk of
incurring the wrath of St Peter, and from many Frankish bishops. But, crucially,
Lothar II died on his return journey, and the problem died with him.
A key element in papal success was the emperor-making role of the pope. The
first emperor to be crowned by the pope alone had been Louis II, and it had been
a difficult case from the start. Pope Sergius II and the Romans refused to have
Louis share the imperial title with his father, and they also refused to swear an
oath to him on such grounds, since he was seen to be only King of the Lombards,
and they would only swear the oath of allegiance to the emperor (Lothar). Louis
was crowned emperor by Pope Leo IV in 850, and again later to demonstrate
the fact that he had been absolved from perjury after his forced oath to Adalgisus
of Benevento when he had been his prisoner. But his overwhelming interest and
thus presence in southern Italy, combined with the presence on the pontifical
throne of Pope Nicholas, who used every opportunity presented to him to be
an arbiter in Carolingian affairs, meant that the papacy ended up in a position
in which, on the death of Louis II without male heirs, Pope John VIII became in

82 ASB 869. 83 Regino 869. 84 ASB 869. 85 ASB 869–870.

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a tale of three cities: history and histories 65

effect the emperor-maker. He had to choose between Carloman—the candidate

of Louis II’s widow, Angilberga, and of Louis II’s uncle Louis the German, King of
Germany—and Charles the Bald, King of Francia. He chose the second, and thus
in 875 Charles,

on the invitation of Pope John . . . arrived at Rome. There . . . he was received by

the pope with great ceremony in the church of St. Peter, and in 876 on Christmas
Day, after making an offering of many precious gifts to St. Peter, he was anointed
and crowned emperor and was accorded the title of emperor of the Romans . . .

or, as Regino would have it, ‘bought the name of emperor from John . . . for a huge
price’.86 With the period between Pope Nicholas I and Pope John VIII we reach
what may seem to have been the apex of political control of the papacy over
Carolingian affairs; John’s key role in his ultimately successful support of the
western Frankish dynasty with Charles the Bald, over Angilberga’s support of
the candidate of the eastern Frankish successor of Louis the German, Carloman,
made him the ultimate emperor-making authority.87 However, John VIII’s
triumph did not last. After Charles the Bald’s death, Angilberga’s party, led in 878
by Lambert, son of Guy, ‘entered Rome with a large army, and, after placing John,
the Roman pontiff, under guard, forced the leading men of the Romans to affirm
their allegiance to Carloman with an oath’.88 Eventually Carloman’s successor,
Charles III (the Fat), was crowned in 881, also by John VIII.89 He was the last
direct Carolingian emperor.

The Regnum Italiae, Aristocratic Rule in Rome, and the Ottonians

By the time of Charlemagne and Louis the Pious, and until Charles the Fat’s death
in 888, Rome was both the capital of the newly created papal state and the coron-
ation place of the Carolingian emperors, seen as the true heirs of Constantine.

86 ASB 875–6; Regino 877; John VIII’s letter in MGH Ep. V, ‘Iohannis VIII. papae epistolae passim
collectae no. 6’. Among other things, he also gave some valuable gifts to the Church of Rome: one was
the so-called Bible of Charles the Bald, one of the most profoundly influential manuscripts of the
second phase of the Carolingian Renaissance in Roman art, and a famous artefact known as the Chair
of St Peter, both closely associated with the ideology of Carolingian and papal power (see Chapters 4
and 5); mostly C. Frugoni, ‘L’ideologia del potere imperiale nella “Cattedra di S. Pietro” ’, BISI 86
(1977), pp. 67–181, and Arnaldi, Natale 875, pp. 115–28.
87 For John VIII’s importance, see Chapter 2, pp. 78 and 85. D. Arnold, Johannes VIII.: päpstliche
Herrschaft in den karolingischen Teilreichen am Ende des 9. Jahrhunderts (Frankfurt, 2005); Marazzi,
‘Giovanni VIII (papa)’, in Dizionario Enciclopedico del Medioevo II, ed. A. Vauchez and C. Leonardi,
3 vols (Rome, 1999), p. 821; also A. Lapôtre, L’Europe et le Saint-Siège à l’époque carolingienne: Première
Partie: Le Pape Jean VIII (872–882) (Paris, 1895), and Arnaldi, Natale 875.
88 AF 878. 89 Regino 881.
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66 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Already by the 890s and even more so in the first half of the tenth century, the
papacy, diminished by the absence of Carolingian support, found itself in a difficult
position, with powerful groups within the Roman nobility attempting to control
parts of the Patrimony of St Peter, to keep control of papal elections, and to govern
the city. This struggle involved alternately the heirs of the House of the Dukes of
Spoleto, the family of Marquess Berengar of Friuli, and several other indirect
Carolingian descendants.90 But the struggle also involved the rise to power of local
noble families, the Theophylacts and Alberic, then the Crescentii.91 Finally, it was
further complicated in the second half of the tenth century by the involvement of
the Ottonians, the first ‘German’ emperors to attempt to control Italy in a conflict
that was to carry on through most of the medieval period.92
This summary of the kingdom of Italy and its rulers, and of the imperial presence
of the Ottonians, is meant to serve as a canvas on which one can graft the story of
the city of Rome. Rome was at the forefront of the fight for the kingdom of Italy,
especially for the imperial title. From the time of Kings Aistulf and Desiderius,

90 Among the classic narratives on the tenth century are: V. Fumagalli, Il Regno Italico (Turin,
1978); G. Falco, ‘L’Italia e la restaurazione delle potestà universali’, in I problemi comuni dell’Europa
post-carolingia, Settimane 2 (1955), pp. 54–65; G. Falco, ‘La crisi dell’autorità e lo sforzo della ricostru-
zione in Italia’, in ibid., pp. 39–65; G. Fasoli, I Re d’Italia (Florence, 1949); G. Fasoli, ‘Re, imperatori e
sudditi nell’Italia del x secolo’, Studi medievali 3/4 (1963); Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 86–176;
P. Delogu, ‘Vescovi, conti e sovrani nella crisi del regno italico’, Annali della Scuola speciale per archi-
visti e bibliotecari. Università di Roma 8 (1968). See also, more recently, Cammarosano, Nobili e re;
Cammarosano, ‘Società e politica nel Regnum Italiae tra X e XI secolo’, in I Magistri commacini. Mito e
realtà del medioevo lombardo (Spoleto, 2009), pp. 275–90; G. Tabacco, ‘Regno, impero e aristocrazie
nell’Italia carolingia’, in Il Secolo di Ferro, Settimane 38 (1991), pp. 248–9, and G. Tabacco, ‘L’avvento
dei Carolingi nel regno dei Longobardi’, in Il regno dei Longobardi in Italia. Archeologia, società e
istituzioni, ed. S. Gasparri (Spoleto, 2004), pp. 443–79; and F. Bougard, ‘Le royaume d’Italie (jusqu’aux
Ottons), entre l’Empire et les réalités locales’, in De la Mer du Nord à la Méditerranée. Francia Media,
une région au cœur de l’Europe, ed. M. Gaillard, M. Margue, et al. (Luxembourg, 2011), pp. 487–510.
91 G. Arnaldi, ‘Papa Formoso e gli imperatori della casa di Spoleto’, Annali della Facoltà di Lettere e
Filosofia di Napoli 1 (1951); G. Buzzi, ‘Ricerche per la storia di Ravenna e di Roma dall’850 al 1118’,
ASRSP 38 (1915); C. Cecchelli, ‘Note sulle famiglie romane fra il IX e il XII secolo’, ASRSP 58 (1935);
P. Fedele, ‘Ricerche per la storia di Roma e del papato nel secolo X’, ASRSP 32 and 34 (1910–11);
W. Kölmel, ‘Beiträge zur Verfassungsgeschichte Roms im 10. Jahrhundert’, Historisches Jahrbuch 55
(1935); Savigni, ‘Sacerdozio e regno’, pp. 2–29.
92 Among the main classic studies on the Ottonians are: Schramm, Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio;
R. Morghen, ‘Ottone III “Romanorum Imperator Servus Apostolorum” ’, in I problemi comuni
dell’Europa post-carolingia, pp. 13–35; K. J. Leyser, Medieval Germany and its Neighbours 900–1250
(London, 1982); H. Beumann, Die Ottonen (Stuttgart, 1987). More recent are T. Reuter, Germany in
the Early Middle Ages, c.800–1056 (London, 1991); K. Görich, Otto III. Romanus Saxonicus et Italicus.
Kaiserliche Rompolitik und Sächsische Historiographie (Sigmaringen, 2001); H. Keller, Die Ottonen
(Munich, 2006); H. Keller and G. Althoff, Die Zeit der späten Karolinger und der Ottonen. Krisen und
Konsolidierungen 888–1024 (Stuttgart, 2008); J. Laudage, Otto der Grosse, 912–973. Eine Biographie
(Regensburg, 2001). On the Ottonians in Italy, E. Duprè-Theseider, ‘Ottone I e l’Italia’, in Renovatio
Imperii. Atti delle giornate internazionali di studi per il millenario (Ravenna, 4–5 novembre 1961)
(Faenza, 1963), pp. 97–145; M. Uhlirz, ‘Die italienische Kirchenpolitik der Ottonen’, Mitteilungen des
Osterreichishen Instituts fur Geschichtsforschung 48 (1934); M. Uhlirz, ‘Otto III’, in Jahrbücher des
deutschen Reiches unter Otto II und Otto III (Berlin, 1954); R. Pauler, Das Regnum Italiae im
Ottonischer Zeit. Markgrafen, Grafen und Bischöfe als politische Kräfte (Tübingen, 1982); and A. Vasina,
‘Ravenna e la “Renovatio Imperii Ottoniana”, in Ravenna da capitale imperiale a capitale esarcale. Atti
del XVII Congresso internazionale di studio sull’alto Medioevo, Ravenna, 6–12 giugno 2004, 2 vols.
(Spoleto, 2005), pp. 135–54.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 67

who both attacked it, to the infighting following the deposition of Pope Leo III
and Charlemagne’s intervention to restore him, through various plots and coun-
terplots, Louis II’s punishment against the Romans’ refusal to obey the rules of the
Ludovicianum and the Constitutio Romana with regard to the presence of imper-
ial missi at the election of popes, the attack on St Peter’s by Louis II’s troops, by
Berengar and Adalbert, and finally by Otto I then Otto III, the city, or rather St
Peter’s, suffered various imperial attempts to influence policy.
In 888 Italy was divided between the parties of two major political figures—
Guy I, Duke of Spoleto, and Berengar, Marquess of Friuli—the latter claiming
descent from the Carolingians as the son of Gisela, daughter of Louis the Pious.93
Having eventually defeated Berengar in 889, Guy was crowned emperor by Pope
Formosus in 891, and his son Lambert in 892, and Guy held the title until his
death in 894.94 Even though he had crowned Guy and Lambert, Formosus became
increasingly worried about the impact of having the imperial title and kingship of
Italy in the hands of the dynasty of Spoleto, who were the immediate and often
aggressive neighbours of the papacy in central Italy, and he thus reverted to the
more traditional papal policies of looking for a protector further away, preferably
one with some Carolingian association. The only one available was Arnulf of
Carinthia, illegitimate son of the Carolingian King of Germany, Carloman, whom
Formosus invited to come to Italy to be crowned emperor in 896.95 Arnulf had to
lay siege to the city, held by Guy’s widow, Angiltruda, who closed the city gates
and barred the entrance to St Peter’s.96 Formosus’ policies, unpopular with one
half of the Italian and Roman aristocracy, could be seriously challenged, in that
his election was open to criticism and abuse by his enemies on the grounds of his
uncanonical translation from one see to another. This issue of canon law, officially
insuperable, had in fact often been ignored whenever convenient, but could be
used to support factional violence in Rome if the elites chose to use it for that
purpose, which they did in this instance. This rift among the political elite would
translate into a fierce contest played out in terms of canon law, and the ideological
battle produced, among other things, a corpus of pro-Formosian and anti-
Formosian writings of invective.97 The most lurid element of the contest would be
the famous ‘Synod of the Corpse’ held by Formosus’ successor but one, Pope

93 On Berengar’s Carolingian descent from Gisela, and his contest with Guy, see ‘Gesta Berengarii
Imperatoris’, pp. 80–185, and also the Introduction by Dümmler, pp. 13–55.
94 AF 888, 890; Regino 888; BenSor, pp. 150–614; L. Schiaparelli, ed., I Diplomi di Guido e Lamberto
(Rome, 1910). For the Spoletan emperors and their support in Ravenna, see Arnaldi, ‘Papa Formoso’,
pp. 85–104; Marazzi, ‘Formoso (papa)’; and Savigni, ‘Giovanni IX da Tossignano, Archivescovo di
Ravenna (Papa Giovanni X) e i suoi rapporti con la corte ducale spoletana’, Ravennatensia 22 (2007),
pp. 226–32, explaining the political background to this alliance.
95 AF 893, 895, 896; Regino 896; Annales S. Gallenses 3rd cont., MGH. SRG, a. 896.
96 AF 896, Regino 896.
97 For the Formosian controversy and the literature of invective see the texts edited in Dümmler:
Auxilius und Vulgarius, pp. 71–4; Invectiva, pp. 137–54; Arnaldi, ‘Papa Formoso’, p. 102, and the bibli-
ography in J.-M., Sansterre, ‘Formoso’, DBI 49 (1997) and J. M. Sansterre, Formoso, in Enciclopedia dei
papi, 2 (2000), pp. 41–7.
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68 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Stephen VI (896–7).98 Because it was grafted on to issues of ideology and political

factionalism, however, the contest did not die with Formosus and the cessation of
to issue of the technicality of his election, but continued to evolve into support for
the opposing Roman factions in their political choices into the 910s.
After his coronation in 896, Arnulf left Italy and died, and Lambert remained
in charge for another two years until his early death in 898, when Berengar, who
had taken refuge with Arnulf in 888, returned to Italy and embarked on a two-
year struggle to take it from another contender with Carolingian connections,
Louis of Provence, who had been called on by part of the Italian aristocracy.99
After numerous skirmishes between the two, Louis was crowned and Berengar
expelled from Rome in 901, but the latter returned again in 905 and this time he
in turn expelled Louis and had him blinded, eventually gaining the kingdom and
imperial title in 915.100 He was the last emperor in Italy before Otto I in 962.
Ultimately, however, the emperors—even the last Italian one, Berengar I, despite
the pomp of his coronation in Rome—had reached the point of no importance
for the city, whose real ruler was Theophylact. An important part of Berengar’s
reign was spent fighting new attackers in the country, the Hungarians in the north
and especially the Saracens in southern Italy and Rome, until his death in 924.101
In 915 a large alliance of central and southern Italian powers from Rome, Naples,
Capua, Gaeta, and the Byzantine provinces, with Pope John X (914–28), expelled
the Saracens from the Garigliano valley. The alliance of 915 had been set up by
Pope John X, the former Archbishop of Ravenna, John IX.102 He had been called
to Rome by part of the Roman aristocracy, led by the vestararius Theophylact, the
effective ruler of the city.103

98 For the ‘Synod of the Corpse’, see AF 896; Annals of Lorsch, ed. G. H. Pertz, MGH SS I. a. 896;
Liutprand, Antapodosis, I. 30. There is more literature on the causes and events associated with Pope
Formosus; see, for example, L. Gatto, ‘La Condanna di un cadavere. Riflessioni sull’incredibile storia di
Papa Formoso’, Studi Romani 72 (2004), pp. 379–406; M. E. Moore, ‘The Attack on Pope Formosus: Papal
History in an Age of Resentment (857–897)’ in Ecclesia et Violentia: Violence against the Church and
Violence within the Church in the Middle Ages, ed. R. Kotecki and J. Maciejewski (Cambridge, 2014),
pp. 184–208, who argues that it was a characteristic sign of the new political structures of rivalry in the
‘feudal’ social order; M. E. Moore, ‘The Body of Pope Formosus,’ in Millenium 9 (2012), pp. 277–97;
M. L. Heckmann, ‘Der Fall Formosus. Ungerechtfertigte Anklage gegen einen Toten, Leichenfrevel oder
inszenierte Entheiligung der Sakralen?’, in Weinfurter, ed., Päpstliche Herrschaft, pp. 223–38; and the
­earlier O. Pop, La défense du pape Formose (Paris, 1933); and P. Devos, ‘Le mystérieux épisode final de la
«Vita Gregorii» de Jean Diacre. Formose et sa fuite de Rome’, Analecta Bollandiana 82 (1964), pp. 355–81.
99 AF 888; Regino 888; Annales S. Gallenses 3rd cont. 895–902. Louis of Provence was the son of
Boso, who had been the husband of Louis II’s daughter Ermengard.
100 Regino, 898, 905. 101 AF 900, Liutprand, Antapodosis II.13, JnD III. 37.
102 BenSor, pp. 157–8; Hugh of Farfa, Destructio Farfensis, pp. 31–2. Brezzi, Roma e l’impero,
pp. 105–8; Toubert, Les structures, pp. 311–12, 970–3. For Garigliano, see G. Vehse, ‘Das Bündnis gegen
die Sarazenen’, QFIAB 19 (1927), pp. 181–204, who edits the 915 text at pp. 202–4; P. Fedele, ‘La batt-
aglia del Garigliano dell’anno 915 ed i monumenti che la ricordano’, ASRSP 12 (1899), pp. 181–211;
T. Venni, ‘Giovanni X’, ASRP 59 (1936), pp. 1–136, at pp. 36–53. On this and the following, see Wickham,
Medieval Rome, pp. 22–3.
103 Toubert, Les structures, pp. 963–74; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 97–109; F. Marazzi, ‘Teofilatto
(senatore romano)’ and ‘Teodora la Vecchia e Teodora la Giovane’, both in Dizionario Enciclopedico
del Medioevo III, pp. 1897 and 1890.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 69

The family of Theophylact and his wife, Theodora, remained in control of the
city after Theophylact’s death, first through the government of their daughter
Marozia, senatrix Romanorum, who ruled the city after her father’s death until
932 (including deposing Pope John X when he and his brother tried to oppose
her), then through her son Alberic. Having famously rejected his mother’s third
marriage to the King of Italy, Hugh, in Rome, and rebelled against him,104 Alberic
disposed of his mother by sending her to a nunnery, and ruled as princeps atque
omnium Romanorum senator from 932, though he himself later married Hugh’s
daughter Alda. He was succeeded in 954 by his son Octavian, who later became
Pope John XII (956–64).105
On Berengar’s death in 924, the contest for the throne of Italy had set Rudolf,
King of Burgundy, against Hugh of Arles, King of Provence, until 933; eventually
Rudolf renounced his claim and Hugh remained king after 933, followed by his
son Lothar after 947 until his death in 950.106 Rudolf had officially renounced
the crown of Italy, partly in exchange for concessions from Hugh north of the
Alps and partly with the payoff of having his daughter Adelheid marry Hugh’s
son Lothar. After Lothar’s death, Adelheid was made a prisoner by Berengar’s
grandson Berengar II, who now took the crown. During the lifetime of Alberic,
after Hugh’s failure, no external power again attempted to control the city. After
Alberic’s death, his son Octavian, later Pope John XII, was under pressure from
Berengar II, who was trying to take over the crown of Italy, notably by making
Adelheid, the widow of the dead King Lothar, marry his son Adalbert. Adelheid,
held prisoner by Berengar II, called Otto I, King of Germany, to her assistance,
and Otto came to Italy, first of all to free, and later to marry, her—legitimizing his
own aspirations by associating himself with the widow of the previous king. On
his return to Germany in 950 or 952, Berengar II, his wife Willa, and their son
Adalbert accompanied Otto, became his vassals, and received back from him the
kingdom of Italy on those terms. Pope John XII crowned Otto emperor in 962,107

104 Liutprand, Antapodosis III.45; more generally, BenSor; Flodoard, chs. 11C, 15A, 15E, 18C, 27F,
28B and D.
105 T. Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Marozia’, DBI 78 (2008), and L. Gatto, ‘Marozia, patrizia e senatrice’,
Roma. Ieri, oggi, domani 9/85 (1996), pp. 62–5; on Alberic see A. von Sickel, ‘Alberich II und der
Kirchenstaat’, MIÖG 33 (1902); G. Arnaldi, ‘Alberico di Roma’, DBI I (1960), pp. 646–56; Toubert, Les
structures, pp. 974–98; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 113–25; C. Wickham, ‘The Romans according to
their malign custom: Rome in Italy in the late ninth and tenth centuries’, in Smith, Early Medieval
Rome, pp. 151–67; and Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 23–7, 190–7.
106 Most of the following narrative follows the Continuator of Regino’s Chronicle, Regino, 951–2,
960–7.
107 G. Isabella, ‘Eine problematische Kaiserkrönung. Die Darstellung des Verhältnisses zwischen
Otto I. und Johannes XII. in den Berichten über die Kaiserkrönung in zeitgenössischen italienischen
und deutschen Quellen’, in Der ‘Zug über die Berge’ während des Mittelaltes. Neue Perspektiven der
Erforschung mittelalterlicher Romzüge, ed. C. Jörg and C. Dartmann (Wiesbaden, 2014); W. Maleczek,
‘Otto I. und Johannes XII. Überlegungen zur Kaiserkrönung von 962’, in Mediaevalia Augiensia.
Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, ed. J. Petersohn, (Stuttgart, 2001), pp. 151–203; Berengar
II, see P. Delogu, ‘Berengario II’, in DBI 9, Rome, 1967, pp. 26–35.
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70 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

but subsequently, faced with the heavy presence of the emperor in Rome, he
changed sides and allied himself with Berengar II. Berengar and Adalbert rallied
men and troops, and John XII supported them in their fight against Otto I, who
abandoned his siege of Berengar’s fortress at S. Leo to go to Rome, where, in 963,
he brought together a synod which deposed Pope John XII, who fled the city.
Otto I descended on Rome and led the Romans to demand the deposition of John
XII and his replacement by a more accommodating pope, the protoscriniarius
Leo.108 The Romans, under pressure from Otto, elected him as Pope Leo VIII,
while Berengar and Willa, defeated, were exiled to Bavaria, where they died.
Further trouble followed, and in 964 a Roman plot against Otto I was discovered,
whose leaders were severely punished by him. Part of the plot had consisted in
the recall by the Romans of the exiled Pope John XII and the ejection of Pope Leo
VIII, who took refuge with Otto I.
When John XII died, the Romans, instead of recalling Leo VIII, proceeded to
elect another pope, the deacon Benedict. Otto I attacked Rome again in 964,
restored Leo VIII, and deposed Benedict, taking the latter back with him to
Germany, where he lived as a prisoner in Hamburg and died in 966. Meanwhile,
Adalbert, Berengar II’s son, again rebelled against Otto I, whose army defeated
him in 965. After Pope Leo VIII’s death, John, Bishop of Narni, was elected as Pope
John XIII but was chased away by the elite of Rome, including the Prefect of the
City, and held prisoner in Campania. The conspiracy against John XIII had been
led by the elite of Rome, with the Prefect of the City at its head. Once again Otto I
descended on Rome, the Prefect of the City fled, Otto had the thirteen ringleaders
hanged, and restored Pope John XIII to his see in 966, after which both left Rome
for Ravenna, where a major synod took place in 967.109 They were joined there by
the emperor’s son Otto II, and both Ottos eventually came to Rome, where Otto
II was crowned. While in Ravenna, an embassy from the Byzantine Emperor
Nicephorus Phokas had been received and another returned to Constantinople
with a request for an imperial bride for Otto II; Princess Theophano arrived and
was married to Otto II in 972. But as soon as Otto I left Rome, after the triumphal
coronation of his son Otto II there in 972, the Roman aristocracy, headed by
Crescentius I, rebelled against the successor of Pope John XIII, Benedict VI,
deposed and imprisoned, and later murdered, him, and elected the deacon Franco
as Pope Boniface VII (974–84/5).110
It is not possible to know how Alberic had succeeded in having his son
Octavian gain the allegiance of the Roman aristocracy so as to be made Pope John

108 On the events around John XII and the call to Otto, see BenSor, pp. 174–6, 175–87; Flodoard,
Annals, ann. 951, 952, 962, 965 (chs. 32F, 33H, 34B, 36H, 44B, 47E); Annales Sang. maiores in MGH.
SS I, 973–83; see Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 127–30.
109 BenSor, pp.185–6; LP, II, p. 252; see Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 137–48; Toubert, Les structures,
pp. 998–1021 and 1024–38; Cammarosano, Nobili e re, pp. 310–21.
110 On this, see Chapter 2.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 71

XII by them after the princeps’ death. It is possible that neither Alberic nor his
entourage believed that Octavian could truly manage to rule the city as his father
had done, as a secular prince, and that the choice of making him pope was a lesser
evil. Bringing in Otto in the first place may have seemed inevitable to both John
XII and the Roman elite, faced as they were with Adalbert’s attack on the city—or
it may have been John XII’s choice, which had not had the approval of the elites.
Changing sides again later would bring Otto I back to Rome and force John XII’s
deposition, as well as the election of the protoscriniarius Leo. Despite the efforts
made by Liutprand of Cremona, supporter and chronicler of Otto I, to assure us
of their enthusiasm, it may be that Leo had the support of the Lateran officials (of
whom he was one), but not necessarily that of the secular elite of the city, if we are
to judge on the evidence of their switch to John XII, whom they welcomed back
and possibly made reconcile with Otto I.111 Eventually, when he died, they refused
to recognize Leo VIII as pope, and elected a new one, Benedict V. Of course the
Roman aristocracy was quite good at switching sides according to convenience
and may indeed have supported Leo against John XII at first, then changed its
allegiance—but it would not do to be too reliant on Liutprand’s account, whose
whole purpose is to show how great Otto I was.
Otto II’s main engagement with Italy was his attempt to take control of the south,
a failed attempt which, after his adventurous capture and escape near Taranto, led
to his return to Rome and subsequent death, even as he was said to be in the pro-
cess of blockading Venice to try and gain control of it in 983.112 In Rome, papal
rivals Benedict VII and Boniface VII were also fighting each other; a decade later,
Otto III decided to replace a Roman pope with his own cousin Bruno who, under
the name of Gregory V, became the first German pope. Otto II having died when
his son was so young, the Empire was ruled by the two Empresses Adelheid and
Theophano, his grandmother and mother, and Otto III was crowned emperor in
Rome only in 996. At this point the effective ruler of the city was Crescentius II.
The Ottonian strategy of imposing Gregory V, a German, as pope, was followed
by the mounting opposition of the Romans to the Ottonians. Otto III’s handling
of the events of 998, which culminated in the execution of Crescentius II, was to
be the spark which ignited the fuse. In 980 Crescentius II, omnium Romanorum
senator, and his brother, the patricius John, were in control of the city. Crescentius
II was still in charge in the 990s, when Otto III invaded the city, besieged and took
Castel Sant’Angelo, and eventually beheaded him in 998, after having ritually muti-
lated and humiliated the pope that he had set up, John XVI (996–8), Otto’s very
own old tutor, John Philagathos.113 After this, Otto III himself was effectively

111 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, cs 15, 19–20.

112 On these events see Thietmar, Bk II, chs. 5, 13, 28, 35; Bk III, chs. 13–14, 20–5; Bk IV, chs. 27–8,
30, 32, 47; Annales Sang. maiores, 983. Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 168–70.
113 Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 25–7, Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 127–40; and Chapter 2.
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72 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

thrown out of Rome, which he had wanted to revive as his imperial capital and
settle in. Crescentius II’s son John Crescentius gained an even stronger position as
Rome’s ruler for a decade or so up to his death in 1012.114 On Otto III’s death in
1001, the Italian aristocracy once again chose to elect as their king a successor of
Berengar, Marquess Arduin of Ivrea, who was then defeated by the new Emperor
Henry II.115
Behind every later conflict, papal deposition, return, and assassination, there
runs a line of opposition between the Roman elite and the Ottonians: Otto I and
Leo VIII versus the Roman elite and Benedict V (deposed and exiled by Otto I);
Otto I and Benedict VI versus Crescentius I and Boniface VII (the conspirators
were hanged by Otto and Boniface VI exiled); Otto I and Benedict VII, then John
XIV, versus the returned Boniface VII (probably killed); Otto III and John XV
(985–6) versus Crescentius, who deposed him, thus leading to Otto’s appoint-
ment of Gregory V (996–9). The final and most famous conflict was that led by
Crescentius II’s rebellion against Otto III, the deposition of Gregory V and his
replacement by Crescentius’s and the Roman party’s candidate Bishop John
Philagathos as John XVI, and the bloody repression of the conspiracy with the
taking of Castel Sant’Angelo by Otto III, the killing of Crescentius, and the ritual
mutilation and humiliation of John XVI.116
There seems, if one looks at this series of grim tales, no doubt that the Ottonian
presence in Rome was rarely well accepted by the Roman elites, and that it often
acted as a catalyst for opposition, despite the apparent acceptance of Otto I at the
beginning and the apparent consensus of alliance around him shown by the list of
signatories of the first official placitum, through which Liutprand attempted to
highlight the concord around the emperor. Such concord did not last long, how-
ever. Wisely, Otto I was mostly away from the city, only returning when needed to
regain control of it after a conspiracy. Otto II was mostly interested in southern
Italy and the fight against Saracen control of it. Otto III created huge problems
for himself and the city when he became emphatic about turning Rome into his
effective capital and took up residence there, at the heart of the city on the
Aventine, planning to revive the Palatine centre of power as opposed to doing
what the Carolingians and the first Ottos had done—essentially staying out of the
city, at St Peter’s. When in 996 Otto III chose his relative Gregory V as pope, and
in 998, when he killed his Roman opponents and sought to rule from Rome itself,
the Romans revolted and drove him out.

114 T. Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Giovanni di Crescenzio’, DBI 56 (2001).

115 Thietmar, Bk 5, ch. 24.
116 Thietmar II. 28 and 35; IV. 27 and 30; LP II. 137, 138, 141, 142; JnD IV. 44; BenSor, p. 178; see
H. Zimmermann, ‘Parteiungen und Papstwahlen in Rom zur Zeit Kaiser Ottos der Grossen’, Römische
Historische Mitteilungen 8–9 (1964–6), pp. 29–66; see Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 998–1021 and
1024–38; G. Andenna, ‘Ottone III, Roma e il Papato’, in Ottone III e Romualdo di Ravenna: Impero,
Monasteri e Santi Asceti. Atti del XXIV Convegno di Studi Avellaniti (Verona, 2003), pp. 11–30; and
Scholz, Politik, pp. 268–390.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 73

Otto III presents us with a complex problem in relation to his perceived sense
of his imperial self. We have a great deal of material to use for this purpose,
whether in his official documents such as diplomas, in his seals, and in the vast
literary material referring to him, especially Liutprand and Thietmar. Otto’s idea
of his status was shaped by three factors: his joint imperial heritage from his
German father and grandfather and his Byzantine mother; his Italian staff of
scribes and chancellors; and his ideological programme of renovatio imperii romani.
At first he used the titles of Otto I and Otto II; later, he acquired from his mother
and her Byzantine connections a taste for using manners and dispensing titles
that he thought appropriate to enhancing his status, such as those of imperiali
palatii magister, as in his 999 diploma for Farfa concerning SS Cosma e Damiano
in Mica Aurea,117 comes palatii, prefect of the sea and patricius. Other such titles
were even more obviously based on Byzantine ones, for example the protospatarius,
logotheta and archilogotheta, and protovestiarius.118 He organized his life in Rome
on what he thought was an imperial model, planning to restore the palace on the
Palatine and live there, and introducing the custom of the emperor eating at a
semicircular high table alone, separate from his courtiers, an innovation which
Thietmar implies was not popular.119 One of the most significant changes he intro-
duced was to the imperial seal, at first using the traditional Western model of
wax, which he then changed to the Byzantine imperial lead style.120 This was pre-
sumably done under the influence of his Italian staff, which also extended to the
titles in his diplomas. After the coronation of Otto II together with his father,
both emperors were placed on an equal level, on the traditional Italian model of
kings like Hugh/Lothar, Berengar II/Adalbert, as we see in the diploma of 972 for
S. Apollinare in Classe.121 The archchancellor for Italy, Bishop Hugh of Parma,
was the first to use the title ‘imperator Romanorum’ after the coronation of Otto
III. He was an example of a new trend which then continued with a French scribe,

117 RF no. 437; see also MGH D OIII no. 340.

118 On all these see P. E. Schramm, Kaiser, Könige und Päpste, 4 vols (Stuttgart, 1968), pp. 284–97.
119 Thietmar III. 47. On Otto III’s views of himself and his status, see L. Halphen, ‘La cour d’Otton
III à Rome’, MEFREM 25 (1905), pp. 349–63; E. R. Labande, ‘ “Mirabilia mundi”: Essai sur la person-
nalite d’Otton III’, Cahiers d’Études Médiévales 6 (1963), pp. 297–313 and 455–76; P. E. Schramm,
‘Kaiser Otto III, seine Persönlichkeit und sein “Byzantinischer” Hofstaat’, in Kaiser, Könige und Päpste,
4 vols. (Stuttgart, 1968), III, pp. 277–97; more recently, Görich, Otto III, and G. Althoff, Otto III
(Pennsylvania, 2003).
120 H. Keller, Ottonische Königsherrschaft (Darmstadt, 2002), pp. 131–83, and H. Keller, ‘Oddo
Imperator Romanorum. L’idea imperiale di Ottone III alla luce dei suoi sigilli e delle sue bolle’, in Italia
and Germania: Liber Amicorum Arnold Esch, ed. H. Keller, W. Paravicini, and W. Schieder (Tübingen,
2001), pp. 163–89; W. Huschner, ‘Influenze reciproche fra nord e sud delle Alpi nei diplomi ottoniani
(962–1002)’, in Le Alpi porta d’Europa: scritture, uomini, idee da Giustiniano al Barbarossa. Atti del
convegno internazionale di studio dell’Associazione Italiana dei Paleografi e Diplomatisti, Cividale del
Friuli (5—7 ottobre 2006), ed. C. Scalon and L. Pani (Spoleto, 2009), pp. 39–55. On Otto’s imagery,
including in his first imperial bull, see G. B. Ladner, L’immagine dell’imperatore Ottone III (Rome,
1988), Fig. 20.
121 Biblioteca Classense, Archivio Storico Comunale, Pergamene no. 2, 25 May 972, ed. in DOI 410,
pp. 558–9.
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74 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

probably the chancellor Heribert, whose influence seems to have been considerable.
It is at this point that Otto’s new title became tercius Otto Romanorum imperator
augustus, and after 1000 Otto tercius servus Jesu Christi et Romanorum imperator
augustus secundum voluntatem Dei salvatoris nostrisque liberatoris (enhancing his
status as king as well as apostle and prophet), which corresponds with the major
change in the seal legend Renovatio imperii Romanorum.122 Otto III’s attempt at a
renovatio imperii romani proved doomed,123 and no amount of probably genuine
grief at seeing his ideals rejected by those he called mei Romani, for whose love he
had abandoned his Saxons and Germans and adopted them as sons, could change
their views.124 But, as Wickham has pointed out, ‘had Otto ever succeeded in get-
ting his hands on the landed wealth of the Roman churches, which was immense,
he would have had a resource that could have rivalled his other major economic
power-bases, Saxony and the central Po plain: that was not stupid, and the
Romans when they drove him out may have been aware of it’.125 Otto III’s
ambitions could only clash with the entrenched political power and land base of
the foremost elite families of the city, the Crescentii and Tuscolani.126 What is
certainly true is that no one did more than the Ottonians, especially Otto III, to
rally round against them and to crystallize the creation of a self-identity of the
Roman elites in opposition to them, leading to an increasingly impossible actual
presence in Rome, and thus, by default, to a stronger presence in a substitute
Rome, Ravenna.

Ravenna

Ravenna, meanwhile, imperial capital, or at any rate sedes regia of the late Roman
Western Empire, had become the real capital of the Byzantine Empire in ‘recon-
quered’ Italy by the mid-sixth century, and the de facto centre of the adminis-
tration of Byzantine Italy and seat of the exarch, the Eastern emperor’s deputy.
At the same time, it was also, and increasingly during the eighth century, the
see of the second most powerful episcopal authority in Italy, the archbishop of
Ravenna, who for a time had claimed the right to independence (autocephaly)
from the papacy.

122 See an example of this titulature in MGH. DOIII 389; Keller, Ottonische Königsherrschaft, p. 48
n. 43.
123 See esp. Schramm, Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio, pp. 87–187; Görich, Otto III, pp. 35–45, 58–9,
72–7, 89–90, 97–111,127–187; Althoff, Otto III.
124 This famous passage is in the ‘Vita Bernwardi’, ch. 25.
125 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 26. 126 See Chapter 2.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 75

The Autocephaly Conflict and its Afterlife

By the seventh century, the Church of Ravenna had developed a close relationship
with that of Constantinople, and above all had shown itself a firm supporter of
Roman orthodoxy during the so-called Schism of the Three Chapters, when the
patriarchs of Aquileia and Milan had embraced the latter.127 The bishops of
Ravenna had demonstrated a positive engagement with the emperor, especially
once the exarch’s seat was settled in the city, making it the capital of Byzantine
rule in Italy, while Rome, like the rest of the Exarchate, only had a duke subject to
the exarch.
In ecclesiastical terms, however, the situation of Ravenna was anomalous:
while the bishop of Ravenna was the metropolitan bishop for the dioceses of the
province of Emilia, he himself remained a suffragan of the pope—in other words,
he had jurisdiction over other bishoprics but was himself subject to Rome. He
had to have his election confirmed in Rome and be consecrated by the pope; he
had to take part in Roman synods and keep Roman feast days, while decisions
taken in synods in Emilia, over which he presided, were not technically applicable
in Ravenna itself.128 This unusual situation had already posed a problem under
the Emperor Justinian in the sixth century, but he had used it to his advantage
against Rome: in 546 Justinian had appointed his own man, Maximian of Pola, to
the throne of Ravenna, and had given him the pallium, the insignia of archiepis-
copal rank.129 This was a kind of super-promotion directly from the emperor,
with authority over Emilia but also over the technically schismatic Churches of
Aquileia and Milan, and it allowed Maximian to use the title of archbishop.
Whether Maximian was the first bishop of Ravenna to have been granted the pal-
lium is uncertain, but subsequently the archbishops of Ravenna effectively depu-
tized for the emperor or the pope. As Ravenna saw it, the pope was no longer the
metropolitan with jurisdictional authority over the Church of Ravenna, but only
the Western patriarch, as he was for all Western sees. Ravenna was no longer sub-
ject to Rome but could match its ecclesiastical status to its political role as capital
of the Western Empire, of the subsequent Gothic kingdom, and then as the seat
of the Exarchate. This was all the more justified in Ravenna’s eyes since, not only
was it part of the Byzantine tradition that the religious and political functions of
a city should correspond in their importance, but also because Ravenna’s large

127 C. M. Chazelles and C. Cubitt, The crisis of the Oikoumene: the Three Chapters and the failed
quest for unity in the sixth-century Mediterranean (Turnhout, 2007).
128 A. Simonini, Autocefalia ed Esarcato in Italia (Ravenna, 1969), pp. 54–6; T. S. Brown, ‘The
Church of Ravenna and the imperial administration in the seventh century’, EHR 370 (1979), pp. 1–28
at 7–8; generally, P. Luther, Rom und Ravenna bis zum 9. Jahrhundert. Ein Beitrag zur Papstgeschichte
(Berlin, 1980).
129 Agnellus, LP, p. 326; LP I, pp. 297–9; Simonini, Autocefalia, pp. 56–60.
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76 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

ecclesiastical possessions in land and economic resources all over the Pentapolis,
Umbria, Istria, and above all Sicily, made its patrimony almost equal to the patri-
mony of the Church of Rome.130 Of greater relevance to this rise in the authority
of Ravenna, however, was probably the fact that it was increasingly cut off from
Rome by the expansion of the Lombard kingdom, and on frequent occasions the
need arose for powers to be delegated to the archbishops to deal with the situation
in the Exarchate locally.131 By the end of the seventh century, when the popes had
to request imperial approval for their election from the exarch through their
intermediary, the archbishops of Ravenna, this could not but make the latter feel
even more aware of their power. All this was going some way towards the idea of
autocephaly: like the other five patriarchates—Rome, Constantinople, Jerusalem,
Alexandria, and Antioch—Ravenna too would accept Rome’s spiritual pre-eminence
among them, but not be subject to its jurisdiction.
The achievement of the autocephaly of Ravenna was the result of the Emperor
Constans II’s reign, and his stay in Italy from 660 to 668. It was led by the strong
personality of Archbishop Maurus (642–71).132 Constans II tried to use the
Church of Ravenna as an imperial Church at the service of the emperor in the
West, corresponding to the Church of Constantinople in the East, through privil-
eges, gifts, and rights, in exchange for full support for imperial policies. Ravenna,
on the other hand, tried to use its traditional support for the emperor and his
exarch as a way of ensuring its own autonomy from Rome. Maurus obtained from
the Emperor Constans II a decree guaranteeing the autonomy of Ravenna vis-
à-vis the papacy, and made Pope Vitalian officially recognize the right of the arch-
bishops of Ravenna to that title. This had been in use in the city for a long time
but had never previously been accepted by the popes, who regarded its use in
Ravenna as abusive. The result of this long campaign was Constans II’s privilege
of autocephaly to the Church of Ravenna, which established that the archbishop
would be free of any interference from others, and in no way subject to the

130 Simonini, Autocefalia, p. 61; G. Fasoli, ‘Il patrimonio della chiesa ravennate’, in SR II.1, pp.
389–400; Brown, ‘The Church of Ravenna’, pp. 6, 9, 11–14; G. Vespignani, La ‘Romania italiana’
dall’Esarcato al ‘Patrimonium’ (Spoleto, 2001), pp. 51–4; A. Andreolli, ‘Il potere signorile tra VIII e X
secolo’, in SR II.1, pp. 311–19; A. Vasina, ‘Possessi ecclesiastici ravennati nella Pentapoli durante il
medioevo’, Studi Romagnoli 18 (1967), pp. 333–67, and A. Vasina, ‘La Pentapoli nell’alto Medioevo.
Note in margine all’edizione (1985) del Codice Bavaro’, in Miscellanea di studi marchigiani in onore di
Federico Allievi, ed. C. G. Paci (Assisi, 1987), pp. 713–37; G. Rabotti et al., eds., Breviarium Ecclesiae
Ravennatis (Codice Bavaro), secoli 7.–10 (Rome: FSI 110, 1985), and now Codice Bavaro. Codex
Traditionum Ecclesiae Ravennatis, ed. E. Baldetti and A. Polverari (Ancona, 1981; 2nd edn, Ancona,
1983); see also C. Curradi, ‘ “Codice Bavaro” e pergamene ravennati sul riminese’, Studi romagnoli 34
(1983), pp. 205–24; for the Istrian possessions, see also A. Torre, ‘Notizie sui rapporti fra Ravenna e
l’Istria nel Medio-Evo’, Annuario 1926–7 del R. Liceo Scientifico Alfredo Oriani di Ravenna, pp. 17–18.
131 Brown, ‘The Church of Ravenna’, p. 11.
132 J. Ferluga, ‘L’Esarcato’, in SR II.1, pp. 351–78 at 364–6; Simonini, Autocefalia, pp. 82–7; G. Orioli,
‘L’autocefalia della Chiesa ravennate’, Bollettino della Badia greca di Grottaferrata n.s. 30 (1976), pp.
10–19; D. Mauskopf Deliyannis, Ravenna in Late Antiquity (Oxford, 2010), p. 283; Guillou,
Régionalisme et indépendance, pp. 167–9, 206–7.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 77

‘Roman patriarch’ but would remain forever autocephalous. The archbishop would
be consecrated by his own suffragans, and would have the right to the imperial
pallium.133 The privilege gave a great deal to Ravenna, but it was also, in a way,
an imperial triumph, which associated the archbishops of the exarchal capital
more closely with the Empire, and prevented the association of both the Church
of Ravenna and the exarchs with the popes in Rome. Being the beneficiary of such
a privilege was not uncommon in the East, where other metropolitan churches
also had it. In a western context, however, which saw increasing centralization on
Rome, the new situation of Ravenna seemed to the popes highly unusual, and
they took it very badly.134
In 668, after the assassination of Constans II, the new emperor, Constantine IV,
was much less inclined to support Ravenna, and more interested in peace with
the pope.135 He secured this with the Sixth Ecumenical Council in 680/1, con-
demning Monothelitism and supporting the supremacy of Rome.136 The autoceph-
aly of Ravenna was slow to disappear but it had already moved in that direction
by the time of the Lateran council of 680, which was the preliminary Western
meeting before the council in Constantinople. Archbishop Theodore of Ravenna,
who had succeeded Reparatus in 677, and had been consecrated in Ravenna,
was invited to Rome.137 Once there, he agreed to give up unconditionally any claim
to autocephaly.138 Though Ravenna gained the primacy of honour in the West
after Rome, nevertheless for the next 200 years, in the memory of the Ravenna
clergy, Maurus remained the archbishop who ‘had refused to subject his see to
that of Rome’.139

Anti-Roman and Anti-papal Policies of the Church

of Ravenna under the Carolingians

A further attempt to revive the independent status of the Church of Ravenna may
have been made by Archbishop Felix (711–24), but he gave way, and before his
death he accepted that the cause of autocephaly was a lost one.140 The popes,
however, may have found this hard to believe: certainly they remained very

133 The privilege is edited by O. Holder Egger in Agnellus, LP, pp. 350–1.
134 Brown, ‘The Church of Ravenna’, pp. 12–13; T. S. Brown, ‘Justinian II and Ravenna’, Byzantino-
slavica 56 (1995), p. 31; LP I, 348; Simonini, Autocefalia, pp. 87–95.
135 Simonini, Autocefalia, pp. 102–9. 136 LP I, pp. 350–4 and 360.
137 Agnellus, LP, pp. 359–60; Simonini, Autocefalia, pp. 109–13.
138 Agnellus, LP, pp. 355–60: ‘cum pervenisset Romam, subiugavit se suamque ecclesiam sub Romano
pontifice’.
139 Agnellus, LP p. 354: ‘non sub Romana se subiugavit sede’; Simonini, Autocefalia, pp. 113–15; on
the later perception of the period of independence from Rome, see Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 331–68
and Savigni, ‘ “Memoria Urbis”: l’immagine di Ravenna nella storiografia di età carolingio-ottoniana’, in
Ravenna da capitale imperiale, pp. 648–50.
140 Simonini, Autocefalia, pp. 123–32.
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78 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

anxious as late as the mid-eighth century about a possible revival of the issue. Even
after its resolution and the reintegration of the Church of Ravenna into commu-
nion with Rome, the city retained its opposition to Rome on the grounds of the
alleged equal primacy of the two sees. Opposition to Roman jurisdiction went on
throughout the eighth century, and continued to inform the attitudes and policies
of the Church of Ravenna well after 751 and the theoretical incorporation of
Ravenna into the papal patrimony under the Carolingians. The awareness of the
past status of autocephaly meant that the archbishops were even less prepared
to accept the principle of Roman supremacy as defined from Pope Stephen II
onwards, since this would have also meant accepting political subjugation to the
papacy. The archbishops of Ravenna remained faithful to the principle of political
hegemony of the Empire and, by implication, of the foremost place of Ravenna as
the city of the emperors and exarchs. Though not one of direct apostolic founda-
tion like Rome, it was seen by them as equal to it, on account of its place in the
imperial hierarchy, as well as of its large patrimony competing with Rome’s—
especially since Ravenna kept its Sicilian and Istrian possessions—and up to the
tenth century the archbishops of Ravenna received rents in Byzantine nomismata
from Sicily as part of their income.141 Both Rome’s and Ravenna’s purpose was to
create a power and lordship strong enough to resist the Lombard expansion and,
at first, the Frankish one. In addition, however, the objective of the archbishop of
Ravenna was to create an autonomous political and administrative entity just as
the popes had done in the old Byzantine duchy of Rome, and to use it a basis for the
renewal of autocephalic aspirations. While Rome completed its own severance
from the Eastern Empire, even at the risk of becoming part of the Frankish sphere
of influence, Ravenna at first remained ambiguous, and certainly cautious of taking
this step, until the 820s.142
The alliance between Pope Stephen II and Pepin opened up a new phase in the
antagonism between Rome and Ravenna, especially as King Aistulf had attempted
to position himself as the heir of the exarch in Ravenna. He appeared to accept
the Exarchate as an autonomous political space, most famously by establishing
himself in the old exarchal palace, symbolically placing his chlamys on the high
altar of the Ursiana basilica,143 and using clothing and attributes associated with
the basileus in his Lombard coinage, thus enhancing the symbolic and ideological
role of Ravenna.144 Archbishop Sergius (748–69) refused to give back the province
of Ravenna to Pope Stephen II after the Frankish victory of 756, and to provide
‘restitution’ of the Exarchate to the papacy, as had been stipulated at Quierzy, and
later in the Treaty of Pavia. The Archbishop’s resistance in this respect may have

141 For details of the patrimony and wealth, see Chapter 2.

142 S. Cosentino, ‘Potere e autorità nell’Esarcato in età post-bizantina’, in L’héritage byzantin en
Italie (VIII e–XII e siècle), II, Les cadres juridiques et sociaux et les institutions publiques, ed. J.-M. Martin,
A. Peters-Custot, and V. Prigent (Rome: Coll. EFR 461, 2012), pp. 279–95.
143 Agnellus, LP, ch. 155. 144 Cosentino, ‘Potere e autorità’, pp. 279–95.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 79

been more than just an anti-Roman attitude, if we are to believe the evidence
from the Chronicle of Otranto about the events of 750.145 The Chronicle is late,
and often highly unreliable, but it claims quite unequivocally that the last exarch,
Eutychius, had actually handed over control over the Exarchate to Aistulf. This
could fit in perfectly with Constantinople’s attempts to undermine the new alli-
ance of popes and Franks, in the hope that it would prove to be just another of the
many expedient forms of agreement with the Lombards, to be revoked later, when
the Byzantines would have recovered power. If so, Ravenna was not ‘conquered’
by the Lombards militarily, as the papal narrative implied in an attempt to con-
ceal what would be a major political blow, but had been given to them by the
imperial deputy, which the Archbishop followed, and Aistulf had every right to
behave as its ruler. If things did happen like this, there is clearly no way that they
could have happened without the archbishop of Ravenna’s awareness and consent.
Agnellus seems to imply the existence of such an agreement at a time of common
interest and of joint effort by the Byzantines and the Lombard kings against Rome
and the Franks. The agreement had to cease perforce in 756 after Aistulf ’s second
defeat. Unsurprisingly, Archbishop Sergius was called to Rome, tried, and found
guilty of irregularities associated with his election to the episcopate as a layman,
and imprisoned there under Pope Stephen II. He was only freed by Pope Stephen
II’s brother and successor, Paul, and sent back to Ravenna in 758/9, having appar-
ently consented to regard his function as one delegated by the pope, in other
words, to be subject to the see of Rome.
After Archbishop Sergius’s death in 769, Roman authority was even more
strongly opposed by the imperial supporters in the city and the Exarchate, espe-
cially in Rimini, whose ruler Duke Maurice was the foremost representative of
the military aristocracy traditionally associated with Byzantium. It was he who
imposed the choice of the scriniarius Michael as the new archbishop of Ravenna,
even though Michael was also a layman. Though supported by both Byzantines
and Lombards, and by the clergy of Ravenna, as part of their anti-Roman and
anti-Frankish campaign, Michael was nevertheless pushed out, and the arch-
deacon Leo was elected in his place, at the insistence of the pope, who had asked
the Frankish ambassadors of Charles to put pressure on the clergy of Ravenna.146
Like a good Ravennate, though, Leo (770–8) was hardly a faithful servant of the
papacy, his best-known act of defiance being that of having the papal primicerius
Paul Afiarta executed in 772, against the apparent wishes of Pope Stephen III, who
had sent his previous adviser to Ravenna only so that he could to be shipped on to
Constantinople. Archbishop Leo had control of Ravenna as well as the territories
of Faenza, Forlimpopoli, Forli, Cesena, Comacchio, Ferrara, Imola, and Bologna,

145 Cosentino, ‘Potere e autorità’, p. 289; U. Westerbergh, ed., Chronicon Salernitanum, 2

(Stockholm, 1956), p. 4.
146 LP I, 96, cs 25–6. Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 331–68.
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80 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

and had no hesitation in stopping any attempts by papal personnel to interfere in

them.147 Not only was he the first to use the title servus servorum Dei et Italiae
exarchus to define himself, but he openly attempted to use Charlemagne to sup-
port the autonomistic move.148 Charlemagne appeared to agree with this attitude,
to the point of conflict with Pope Hadrian I about the issue, though this did
not prevent Hadrian from passing on Charlemagne’s order to the archbishop to
enforce the decree of expulsion of Venetian merchants and landowners from the
territory of the Exarchate when Charlemagne wanted to use this weapon against
the Byzantines in his attempted conquest of Venice.149
When Aistulf conquered it, Ravenna accepted Lombard control to keep away
from Rome and the Franks. Later it supported Charlemagne, so as not to become
subject to the pope.150 Broadly speaking, with only one major exception, Ravenna
was pro-imperial—regardless of which empire it was. The exception had been
the crisis of iconoclasm, which had led the archbishops to support Rome and
not Constantinople, and thus to countenance the intervention of the exercitus of
Ravenna to defend the pope against Emperor Justinian II’s kidnapping attempt
of Pope Sergius I (687–701); but this occurred at a time when Ravenna itself was
locked in a bitter fight with the Byzantine Emperor Justin II, troubles which came
to a head with the detention and rough treatment of the scribe Johannicius, to
whom Agnellus, his descendant, dedicates many pages.151 Ravenna’s policy was
almost constantly determined by anti-Romanism, but also by its awareness of its
imperial past, which in its eyes meant that it had to support some form of imperial
rule, whichever it was, as long as it could still hope to be, if not its Western capital,
at the very least an imperial city. With the identity of the city so closely predicated
on its imperial past, the decision-making of the present meant that Ravenna was
always on the side of the emperors. The capital of the Exarchate needed the pro-
tection of the Eastern Empire, which it asked for through successive popes, who
responded twice with requests of help from Venice, and after 751 with repeated
attempts to regain Ravenna from the Lombards.152 After 751, when the exarch
was eliminated, Ravenna (the city and its province) was first held by Aistulf him-
self, who then had to abandon it to the Franks. They granted it, as requested by

147 Fasoli, ‘Il patrimonio’, pp. 394–9, and Vasina, A., ‘Possessi ecclesiastici ravennati’, pp. 333–67
esp. Appendix pp. 355–67, for a detailed list of the patrimony.
148 Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, p. 684; P. Classen, ‘Italien zwischen Byzantium und das
Frankenreich’, Nascita dell’Europa, Settimane 27, pp. 919–67 esp. 938.
149 Letter from Hadrian I to Charlemagne in 774–5, CC no. 49.
150 For a good summary on the Carolingians and Ravenna, see Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 331–
53, and Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 6–38; more specifically for Charlemagne, see J. Nelson, ‘Charlemagne and
Ravenna’, in Ravenna: its role in earlier medieval change and exchange, ed. J. Herrin and J. Nelson
(London, 2016), pp. 239–52.
151 LP I. 86; Agnellus, LP, cs 137–42; see L. M. Hartmann, ‘Johannicius of Ravenna’, in Festschrift
Theodor Gomperz dagebracht zum 70 Geburtstage am 29 März 1902 von Schülern, Freunden, Kollegen,
ed. P. Hölder (Vienna, 1902), pp. 319–23.
152 Chapter 3, note 122.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 81

the popes and accepted by Pepin, to the Patrimony of St Peter. While in theory
this should have resolved the problem of the old Exarchate and the Pentapolis, the
archbishops of Ravenna did not accept the subjection. They had, from the sixth
century onwards, seen themselves as the emperor’s civil servants in parallel with
the exarchs, and had acted as such when the exarch was absent from Ravenna or
had not yet been appointed. After 751 they saw themselves as the heirs of the
exarchs, and defined themselves so from Archbishop Leo onwards, purporting
to be the effective civil rulers as well as the spiritual ones. In addition, the arch-
bishops had always been aware of the importance of Ravenna as an imperial
capital in the late antique period, then under the Goths and Theodoric, and finally
as the capital of the Exarchate, and they were also keen to keep alive the memory
of the half-century or so after 668 when the Church of Ravenna had been granted
the privilege of autocephaly by Constans II. They always aspired to a return to
these times of autonomy from the papacy, and Brown has shown how this mani-
fested itself in a combination of pride in the past and xenophobia against every-
body outside the city.153 The Church of Ravenna wanted to create a principality
of the same kind as the papal state, and resisted strenuously any attempts by the
popes to make it become part of the latter. Therefore, the two key factors in the
policies of the Church and the archbishops of Ravenna were, first, to achieve
autonomy from Rome, and, secondly, to maintain and revive the grandeur and
glory of the past of Ravenna—the second perceived as the reason for the first.
They were thus led, almost by default, to try and achieve their aim by alliances
with whichever king of Italy or Western emperor after 800 would appear to favour
their ambitions. They did so from the time of Charlemagne, who supported this
alliance when the papacy became too demanding, until Otto III, who was person-
ally attached to Ravenna and who sometimes, though not necessarily by choice,
used it as an imperial capital rather than Rome, which proved to be far more dif-
ficult to control. The policies of the archbishops were usually supported by the
clergy of Ravenna, sometimes at odds with one another, but almost always united
in their anti-Roman attitude. Agnellus, a representative of the clergy, gives us a
good idea of this anti-Romanism, which was part and parcel of the city’s identity
among the representatives of the aristocratic elites, such as the main families of
the Duchi, Sergii, and Romualdi, whose members often formed the core of the
clergy, and most of the time the family of the archbishops themselves. Ravenna
continued to support the Carolingians throughout, because they were the emperors,
and because the Carolingians made good use of Ravenna’s desire to fight the
papacy whenever possible. The Carolingians contributed to maintaining the pres-
tige of the city and of the archbishops through repeated imperial visits. Having
the emperor visit and stay in Ravenna, especially if the pope was also present, and

153 T. S. Brown, ‘The Interplay between Roman and Byzantine traditions’, in Bisanzio, Roma e
l’Italia nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 34 (1988), pp. 127–60.
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82 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

even more so if a major imperial council-cum-papal synod were also taking place,
was an important manifestation of the prestige of the archbishops. Pepin stayed in
Ravenna as well as Pavia, and in 793 Louis the Pious went to help his brother and
spent Christmas there.154 Charlemagne visited the city at least four times, and
Archbishop Leo flattered him by minting coins and dating documents with his
name, and as rex Francorum et Langobardorum et patricius Romanorum.155 The
archbishop did not lose by this, since we saw earlier how he claimed to hold his
power as an exarch not from the pope but from Charles, first as patricius in place
of the exarch, then as emperor—secular power which would therefore be, by def-
inition, superior to the secular power of the pope.
At the same time, Archbishop Leo, while using Charlemagne’s authority to
boost up his own, remained prudent in dealing with the Eastern emperor. At the
beginning of the ninth century, Byzantine power seemed once again on the rise,
and with it the imperial interest in Italy, and no archbishop would have been
foolish enough to discard the possibility of a return of Eastern imperial influence,
especially in a city with a remaining Byzantine past within living memory. In
807 the peace treaty between Pepin, King of Italy, and the Byzantine Emperor
Nicephorus was signed in Ravenna, which did not stop Pepin from mobilizing
an army against Venice and being effectively stopped by its fleet, supported by
the arrival of the Byzantine fleet, in the Adriatic. Some of Ravenna’s aristocracy
fought on the side of Pepin, who was said to have set up a kind of ‘capital’ in
Ravenna, perhaps as a sign of independence from his father—it is not impossible
to imagine that this would have been precisely Pepin’s attraction for the Ravenna
aristocracy.156 But there was no guarantee that the strategy would work, and even
less guarantee in 810 that Byzantine power in Italy was over. Thus, throughout the
first quarter of the ninth century, until Archbishop George’s wholehearted support
for the Emperor Lothar I, the archbishops of Ravenna cautiously worked with both
Eastern and Western emperors; their opposition was to the popes. Charlemagne
did not treat Ravenna as harshly as some popes might have wished, and left the
archbishops more or less in control of Emilia, Romagna, and the northern Marches,
in exchange for which the archbishops gave their support to the Carolingians.
Moreover, he acknowledged Ravenna as the foremost city after Rome and Pavia.
The archbishops’ attitude towards either empire was predicated on the notion of
collaboration between imperial political power and bishops, which was common

154 Rubeus, Historiarum Ravennatum libri decem V, pp. 234 and 236; Astronomer I. 6/1.
155 Agnellus, LP, ch. 160, on Charles’s visit in 787, and ch. 165 on that in 801; also CC 81, p. 614;
ARF 800, 801, and 804; see Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, p. 684, and Classen, ‘Italien zwischen
Byzantium’, pp. 919–67 esp. 938. On the title of patricius romanorum, see J. Déer, ‘Zum Patricius-
Romanorum–Titel Karls des Großen’, Archivum historiae pontificiae 3 (1965), pp. 31–86, and
W. Ohnsorge, ‘Der Patricius-Titel Karls des Großen’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 54 (1960), pp. 28–52.
156 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 341.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 83

to the ideology of empire of both Byzantines and Carolingians, but very different
from that implied by the rise of papal ideas of Petrine power.
The archbishops also tried to use the opportunities provided by ‘foreign affairs’,
that is the involvement of the Carolingians, and later of the kings of Italy and the
Ottonians, to maintain their profile as major players in Italian affairs. This could
be either through their presence in Rome at major councils, as in 868 at Pope
Hadrian II’s synod anathematizing Anastasius, when John of Ravenna was present,
together with six bishops ‘pertaining’ to him,157 or, increasingly, through major
assemblies being held in Ravenna in the presence of the emperor.158 At Easter
864, then again in 873, Louis II was in Ravenna with the Empress Angilberga for
a general assembly.159 Charles the Bald came with Pope John VIII in 877,160 and
Charles the Fat after his proclamation as king was in Ravenna in 880 and again in
882, also in the presence of the pope. Lambert was crowned emperor there in 892
by Pope Formosus, possibly at his own request since Ravenna supported the House
of Spoleto at a time when Archbishop Dominic Ublatella had opened the city to
its ruler.161 Perhaps the one emperor who was seen most often in the city was
Lothar, the first who was in effect in charge of Italy.162 At the same time, however,
Ravenna was thoroughly despoiled by the Carolingians in one way or another.
I have already mentioned Charlemagne’s removal of the palace treasures and
probably the symbolic centrepiece of the city, the so-called Regisole statue, in 801.
He attempted to make amends in his will when he gave alms and gifts to twenty-one
metropolitan cities, including Ravenna, as well as three tables—two of silver, of
which one with a picture of Constantinople—as a gift to Rome, the third with a
picture of Rome as a gift to Ravenna.163 Other losses to the Carolingians were
Archbishop Martin’s bribe to Charlemagne’s missus with a table full of silver treas-
ures, which had been a bequest of Archbishop Valerius to the Church of Ravenna,
or Archbishop George’s loss of the treasures of the Ravennate Church to Charles
the Bald at Fontenoy.
In 819 Archbishop Petronax had the privileges of the Church of Ravenna con-
firmed by a bull of Pope Paschal I, notably in terms of jurisdiction over monas-
teries and military exemption. By this stage, the ranking of the see of Ravenna
as second only to the papacy was being increasingly challenged by Aquileia.164

157 ASB 868. 158 Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum, XVII, 297–8.

159 ASB, AF, Regino 864, 871.
160 CC 59, pp. 53–4, and W. A. Eckhardt, ‘Das Protokoll von Ravenna 877 über die Kaiserkrönung
Karls des Kahlen’, Deutsches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters 32 (1967), pp. 295–311; and
S. MacLean, ‘Legislation and Politics in Late Carolingian Italy: the Ravenna Constitutions’, Early
Medieval Europe 18 (2010), pp. 394–416.
161 F. Kehr, ed., Italia Pontificia V: Aemilia sive provincia Ravennas (Berlin, 1911), pp. 48–9; see
Arnaldi, ‘Papa Formoso’, pp. 85–104; Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 37–61; and Savigni, ‘Giovanni IX da
Tossignano’, on the links between Ravenna and the kings of Italy.
162 T. S. Brown, ‘Louis the Pious and the Papacy’, in Godman and Collins, eds., Charlemagne’s Heir,
pp. 301, 304–5.
163 Einhard III.26. 164 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 343.
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84 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Ravenna’s problem was the fact that, failing to have a strong enough hagiographical
tradition of apostolic foundation, the Church of Ravenna relied for its metro-
politan privileges on its past status and present wealth, that of an ecclesiastical
patrimony (ius sancti Apollinaris) which it defended against both aristocratic
encroachment and the Roman ius sancti Petri.165 To highlight the importance of
the spiritual strength of Ravenna, Archbishop Petronax translated the body of
Maximian (the first archbishop as such, and the first who had attempted to turn
Ravenna into a rival of Rome by procuring the relics of St Andrew, though he
had to give them back to Constantinople in the end) to a worthier burial place.
Archbishop George returned to a more rabidly anti-Roman line, to the extent of
mortgaging the treasures of the Church in order to gain favour with the Emperor
Lothar, first by spending large sums of money on the occasion of the baptism of
Lothar’s daughter Rotruda, then when he went to support Lothar in his fight with
his brothers in Francia.166 Despite Agnellus’ hatred of him, and his anti-Roman
stance, technically George was in fact the pope’s envoy, supposed to work towards
promoting a peaceful agreement between Louis the Pious’s sons.167 George was
loathed by his clergy, who refused even to come to his funeral, because he had lost
so many of the riches of the Ravennate Church (and even the original diploma of
autocephaly), which he had taken with him to gain imperial favour, in the messy
outcome of the Battle of Fontenoy.168 His adventure was regarded with dismay,
but that was because he threw in his lot too forcibly with one party—not even a
clear winner—rather than because his policy was different from the traditional
anti-Roman one of the archbishops.
Both his immediate successor, John VIII (850–78), and his next one, Romanus
(878–88/9), refused to go to Rome for consecration. John VIII did eventually go
in 853, and was present at a synod that same year. John was the brother of Duke
Gregory of Ravenna, and was accused of heresy by Pope Nicholas I,169 as well as
of usurpation of the property of the Roman Church through forcing the papal
vestararius to countersign this abuse and of refusing to accept papal primacy.
Archbishop John VIII tried to make the Emperor Louis II intervene in his favour,
but when, after his Beneventan defeat in 861, Louis II was crowned again in Rome
in 872, he pressed Archbishop John VIII to accept reconciliation with the pope
and to swear a new oath of obedience to the papacy.170 Nicholas I imposed a
whole set of restrictions on archiepiscopal rule,171 as well as the presence of papal
administrators in Ravenna. John VIII’s period of communion with Rome did not

165 See Chapter 6. 166 Agnellus, LP, chs. 173, 175.

167 AB, 841; Agnellus, LP, chs. 173, 175. 168 Agnellus, LP, cs 173, 175.
169 LP I, 107, cs 21–35, and Davis, notes 39–68, on the related issues and bibliography. Also Savigni,
‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 344–50; and see Chapter 3, p. 5.
170 For a detailed study of the clash between John VIII and Pope Nicholas, see Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’,
pp. 1–16. For Louis II’s second coronation, see ASB 872.
171 LP I, 107, chs. 31–5.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 85

last long, however, and in 863 both he and his brother Duke Gregory supported
Photius’ schism, and also Lothar II in his divorce difficulties with Popes Nicholas
I and Hadrian II.172 Archbishop John VIII supported the party of the Emperor
Louis II’s widow, Angilberga, and of Lambert of Spoleto as emperor, against the
pope’s candidate, Charles the Bald, in 875. Meanwhile, in Ravenna itself attacks
were made against the houses of fideles of the popes, presumably his representa-
tives, Dukes John and Deusdedit.173 In 877 a synod was convoked in Ravenna
by the successful Charles the Bald, to sort out Italian affairs in general, including
the case of the Church of Ravenna, where there were too many jurisdictions and
consuetudines which needed reforming to bring them in line with Carolingian
notions of episcopal power.174
In 878 Archbishop John VIII died, and Romanus was elected to succeed him.
While the first request by the pope to the new archbishop was the restitution to
them of the lands of the papal representatives John and Desiderius, Romanus had
the former judged and declared guilty of incest, and his properties confiscated.175
Romanus also refused to go to Rome when summoned at the synod of 879 and
was excommunicated. In 880 Charles the Fat had been proclaimed King of Italy
in Ravenna, and later crowned emperor in Rome in 881. That year, Romanus
helped Alberic of Spoleto to take power in Ravenna and, according to the pope,
oppressed various nobiles cives, who complained to the pope. Romanus pursued
his policy of patrimonial accumulation and, after Charles the Fat’s death in 888,
gave his support to Berengar of Friuli against the imperial claim of Guy III of
Spoleto. Under the next archbishop, Dominic Ublatella, the city was occupied by
the Spoletans, and once again became the centre of the kingdom of Italy under the
House of Spoleto: the archbishop supported the imperial coronation of Lambert
of Spoleto by Pope Formosus in 892 in Ravenna.176

Reconciliation with Rome and the Ottonian Alliance

It was only in the tenth century, when the papacy could not really make its claims
felt, and partly as a result of Archbishop John IX (904/5–14) becoming Pope John
X in 914 (until 928) and uniting Italy against the Saracens in the successful enter-
prise at Garigliano in 915, that relations between Ravenna and Rome improved.
Pope John X had had good relations with his predecessor, Pope Sergius III, and

172 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 348.

173 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 350 and Chapter 3, p. 7.
174 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 350–1. 175 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 350.
176 On the fighting between the pro-and anti-Formosian parties and the subsequent conflicts
between the Spoletans and Arnulf ’s supporters, see Savigni, ‘Sacerdozio e regno’, pp. 1–4, and Arnaldi,
‘Papa Formoso’, pp. 85–104; Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 21–46; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 84–103; and
Savigni, ‘Giovanni IX da Tossignano’, pp. 215–46.
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86 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

later with the dominant political family of Theophylact in Rome, and with the
Emperor Berengar I.177 John was one of the few archbishops not to belong to the
usual families of the Ravenna aristocracy, being issued from an emerging class
of milites associated with Berengar—a fact which may well have made him more
acceptable to the Roman aristocracy.178 After Berengar’s death, Ravenna became
less involved in Italian politics, more or less ignoring King Hugh of Arles and
becoming increasingly inward-looking around its aristocracy. After the death of
Archbishop John IX’s successor, the next Archbishop Peter IV was again a rare
example in Ravenna of an outsider, who tried to move away from the tight rela-
tionship between archbishops and Ravennate aristocracy so closely dependent
on each other through its network of emphyteutic leases of Church land.179 In
948 Peter IV received a bull from Pope Agapitus II confirming the rights of the
Church of Ravenna ecclesia beati Apollenaris, filia . . . Romanae ecclesiae, as a
metropolitan Church, at a time when this seemed seriously threatened by its
apparent decline.180 This may also explain the attempt to relaunch the cult of St
Apollinarius, whose relics were translated around 965, as well as the production
of the Life of St Probus—a renewal of the hagiographical production which may
have corresponded with a revival of self-awareness of Ravenna’s past, as we will
see in the Chapter 6. In 952 Peter IV was present at the ceremony of submission
of Berengar II and Adalbert to Otto I, and he would later continue to support
Otto I.181 All three Ottos were there frequently.182 Otto I was in Ravenna at least
seven times, in fact every year after 967 at least once.183 While officially in a dona-
tion in 962 Otto confirmed the grant of the old Exarchate to the pope; in reality it
was granted, with Ravenna, to be under the rule of the Empress Adelheid, until
999 when Otto III granted it in those same terms to Gerbert.184 As mentioned
earlier, in 962 Archbishop Peter was one of those who crowned Otto I in Rome,
and he supported Otto against Berengar II at the battle of Montefeltro. In 963 the
archbishop was present at the Roman synod which deposed Pope John XII and
elected Leo VIII under pressure from Otto. The new emperor’s plan was to revive

177 Together with Pope Sergius III, John IX attempted to regain some of the Church of Ravenna’s
lost Istrian patrimony, and several letters from the archbishop of Ravenna to the pope, with their
response and the papal letter to the archbishop of Pola requesting his help, are extant, and edited by
S. Löwenfeld, ‘Acht Briefe aus der Zeit König Berengars’, ‘Il rotolo epigrafico del Principe Antonio Pio
di Savoia’, ed. Ceriani, A. and Porro, G., Archivio storico lombardo 11 (1884), pp. 1–34; commented on
by Savigni, ‘Sacerdozio e regno’, pp. 6–7 and 22–3.
178 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 357–8.
179 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 357–8; and see Chapter 3.
180 Agapitus II, Bull of 921, ed. 181 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 358.
182 An excellent account of the visits and their business is in Vasina, ‘Ravenna e la “Renovatio
Imperii” ’, pp. 135–54 esp. 143–52. I discussed in Chapter 3 the often repeated statement that they built
a palace there.
183 In 963, 967, 968, 969, 970–1, 972 twice, see Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, and more generally
C. Brühl, Fodrum, Gistum, Servitium Regis, 2 vols (Cologne, 1968) I, pp. 118–26.
184 H. Zimmermann, ‘Nella tradizione di città capitale: presenza germanica e società locale dall’età
sassone a quella sveva’, in SR III, pp. 113–14.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 87

the Carolingian model of power, especially through control of the ecclesiastical

hierarchy, but also with strong support for it, notably with granting and confirm-
ing immunities to those who supported his programme of reform, defence, and
anti-localist power.185 Ravenna was not only an almost obligatory stop on the way
to and from Rome; it was also a city which had preserved strong walls and a good
transport network, a city still prosperous thanks to both the rural wealth brought
into it by the archbishops’ control of the rural economy and drainage, and the still
existing commercial strength, not yet completely destroyed by Venetian competi-
tion at this stage.186 The Ottonians held imperial councils there—altogether four
throughout the period—thus replacing Rome.187 In 965 Otto I was in Ravenna
and in 967 a synod took place in his presence and that of Pope John XIII, while
Otto II joined his father and Adelheid there, renewing the traditional grant of the
Carolingians. This document, known as the Ottonianum, did in fact reproduce
almost entirely the Ludovicianum,188 though in practice the empress kept the
rights and revenues of Ravenna during her lifetime. This major imperial assembly
included the great and the good of the Empire, with over sixty bishops, some of
them German.189 Two of the most important decisions taken in 967 were the cre-
ation of a new archdiocese at Magdeburg, and the proposal of missionary activ-
ity in the East to Christianize the Hungarians and the Poles. Byzantine marriage
plans for Otto I’s son were also discussed—a marriage which took place in 972.
Otto I had rewarded the fidelity of the archbishops by giving them several
diplomas confirming properties and rights to the Church of Ravenna and to
several important monasteries; these are now lost. That given by both Otto I
and Otto II to S. Apollinare in Classe, as well as that to S. Maria in Cereseo, have
survived.190 Attempts were made to reform S. Apollinare in Classe by the abbots
of Cluny Maiolus and Odilo, on the Roman model, which did not entirely succeed,
though they did better at S. Apollinare Nuovo.191
Otto II also came to Ravenna at least twice in 980/1, once with the Empress
Theophano and a young Otto III, and they stayed at the abbey of S. Maria in
Cereseo or Celeseo, where an imperial diploma requested by Theophano was given

185 Vasina, ‘Ravenna e la “Renovatio Imperii” ’, pp. 141–42.

186 T. S. Brown, ‘Culture and society in Ottonian Ravenna: imperial renewal or new beginnings?’, in
Herrin and Nelson, Ravenna, pp. 335–344 esp. 340–342.
187 A. Simonini, La chiesa ravennate. Splendore e tramonto di una metropoli (Faenza, 1964), pp.
209–16, 228–38.
188 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 358. For the Ottonianum see Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 139–40,
and edited in MGH. DOI, no. 235; F. Corsara, ‘Un millenario: Esarcato e Pentapoli nell’«Ottonianum»’,
in Studi in onore di E. Betti (Milan, 1962), IV, pp. 775–9; Brown, ‘Culture and Society’, in Herrin and
Nelson, Ravenna, pp. 335–44 esp. 339.
189 Regino Cont. 967, Rather of Verona in his letters 32 and 33, in F. Weigle, ed., Die Briefe des
Bishofs Rather von Verona, MGH.: Die Briefe der deutschen Kaiserzeit I (Weimar, 1949), pp. 182–3; see
Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 65–6. The council in Benericetti X/2, no. 128; see Zimmermann, ‘Nella tradizione
di città capitale’, p. 110; and Vasina, ‘Ravenna e la “Renovatio Imperii” ’, pp. 147–8.
190 MGH., DOI no. 410; DOII no. 242.
191 Vasina, ‘Ravenna e la “Renovatio Imperii” ’, p. 148.
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88 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

to the abbess Benedicta, confirming the abbey’s possessions. In 981/2, during the
emperor’s ill-fated south Italian campaign, Archbishop Honestus was with Otto
II. In 983, the new archbishop, appointed by the emperor, was John XIV, a mem-
ber of the imperial chancery’s entourage, who in 983 crowned Otto III emperor
at Aachen. Theophano herself only came to Ravenna again once, in 990, when a
grant to Farfa was made by her at the request of Archbishop John XIV. Otto III
was in Ravenna four times in 995/6: he appointed his uncle Bruno of Toul to
become Pope Gregory V there. In 998 he insisted on receiving Doge Peter Orseolo
II’s son and his fleet there, and he returned again in 999 and 1001.192 He also
granted diplomas in Ravenna, returning several rights and properties of the Church
usurped by some laymen such as Counts Lambert and the Guidi and their
families.193 Such attempts had already taken place previously, when the newly rising
Counts Guidi, through their local connections in the form of the deacon of
Ravenna Rainerius, had rebelled against Archbishop Peter IV, had taken the castle
of Mogliana and imprisoned the archbishop in it, until in 967 Otto I and the
council had condemned Rainerius and returned the properties to the Church of
Ravenna. Such episodes show the attempts made by some of the local aristocracy
around Ravenna to seize some of its possessions, as well as the response of the
emperor supporting the archbishops. Otto III continued the pattern of conces-
sions to the Church of Ravenna with various diplomas in 995/6, two in 999 to
Archbishop Leo, and four in 1001, while these were further ratified by papal bulls
from Gregory V to Archbishop John XII in 997 and to Gerbert in 998.194
Tensions between Rome and Ravenna had become less evident in the tenth
century, partly because of Ravenna’s powerful archbishops, as we saw earlier; one
became pope himself. The tenth-century archbishops thus had far fewer problems
with the papacy than their predecessors, because the papacy itself was, on the
whole, fairly submissive towards the Ottonian emperors, who were Ravenna’s
main interlocutors in the second half of the tenth century. The increasing instability
and hostility to the Ottonians in Rome, together with the longevity (fifty-six years
in all) of the reigns of the two archbishops Peter IV and his successor Honestus,
made Ravenna a safe alternative to Rome. The Ottonians used Ravenna exten-
sively, and strongly supported its rights, by granting or reinforcing its jurisdiction
over dioceses, monasteries, and whole territories.195 They also, when necessary,

192 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 358–60; Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 61–77; G. Orioli, ‘Ottone III,
Adalberto e Romualdo’, in Alle origini di Sant’Adalberto, ed. P. Novara (Ravenna, 2000), pp. 43–50;
Zimmermann, ‘Nella tradizione di città capitale’, pp. 108–15.
193 MGH. DOIII no. 330; see also G. Fasoli, ‘Il dominio territoriale degli arcivescovi di Ravenna fra
l’VIII e l’’XI secolo’, in Il potere temporale dei vescovi in Italia e in Germania nel Medioevo, ed.
C. G. Mor and H. Schmidinger (Bologna, 1979), pp. 87–140, 119–20 and 123–4.
194 See Vasina, ‘Ravenna e la “Renovatio Imperii” ’, p. 152, nn. 59 and 61.
195 Vasina, ‘Ravenna e la “Renovatio Imperii” ’, p. 152. Among them the dioceses of Cervia,
Montefeltro, and Reggio Emilia, the great monasteries of S. Ellero in Galeata, Rimini, Montefeltro, and
Pomposa, and the grant of the immunities of the Church with the delegation to the archbishops of a
whole series of various rights of public government over both the old exarchal territories, and the
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 89

turned Ravenna into a centre for the government of Italy, as Otto III had to do
more and more in view of his troubles in Rome. Thus, for example, a diploma
confirming imperial protection of the monastery of S. Zaccaria in Venice, granted
to its abbess Petronia in 998, was issued in Ravenna.196 Ravenna had hoped that
the Ottonian rulers would make it once again an imperial capital. While it is true
that it did occasionally play such a part, this was only through being one of the
cities which they used in this way, since the Ottonian style of rulership was essen-
tially an itinerant one, and the ‘capital’ was where the emperor was. Nevertheless,
through his removal of the appointments of the archbishops by the local elite, to
put in his new men, from Gerbert onwards mostly northerners, Otto III created
some unhappiness and opposition to himself in the city, but he also laid the
groundwork for the creation of a new style of archiepiscopal function, one that
would turn the archbishops into great imperial vassals. At this point Ravenna was
as close at it had been since the sixth century to having seemingly achieved its
twin aims of practical autonomy from the papacy and of a return to its longed-for
status and glory as an imperial capital. Whether, if Otto III had lived and succeeded
in making Rome his ‘capital’ as he dreamed, Ravenna would still have played the
important role it did in the second half of the tenth century is a moot question. It
was the difficulties which the three emperors had with Rome which, in the end,
gave it the advantage and promoted its success.

Venice

The Doges of Venice

Paulicius (697–717) Ursus I Particiaco/Badoer (864–881)

?Marcellus (?717–727) John I Badoer (881–888)
Ursus (727–738) Peter I Candiano (887)
Deusdedit (742, 744–756) Peter Tribuno (888–912)
Galla Gallo (756) Ursus II Badoer (912–932)
Dominic Monegarius (756–765) Peter II Candiano (932–939)
Maurice Galbaius (765–787) Peter Badoer (939–942)
John & Maurice II Galbaius (787–802) Peter III Candiano (942–959)
Obelerius (802–811) Peter IV Candiano (959–976)
Beatus (808–811) Peter I Orseolo (976–978)
Agnellus Particiaco (811–827) Vitale Candiano (978–979)
Justinian Particiaco (827–829) Tribuno Memmo (979–991)
John Particiaco (829–836) Peter II Orseolo (991–1008)
Peter Tradonico (836–864)

control of new counties, such as those of Cesena, Cervia, Decimano, Traversara, Immola, Comacchio,
and from 999 Sarsia, Forlì, and Forlimpopoli.

196 Diploma ed. in MGH. DOIII no. 272.

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90 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

During the eighth century Venice was still mainly known as a province, or an
assemblage of territories and islands, in relation to the patriarchate of Grado, and
as the area of authority of a dux (or, under his Byzantine title, the ypatos).197
John the Deacon’s narrative associates the first known duke, Paulicius, with the
period of the Emperor Maurice and King Liutprand. The narrative, which would
become the foundation myth of the Venetian Republic, tells how, at that point,
the Venetici, together with their bishops and patriarch at Grado, decided that
it would be more ‘honourable’ to be governed by a duke than by tribunes.198 This
is clearly a one-sided interpretation of the political situation of a Byzantine terri-
tory, deliberately ignoring its complete hierarchy of exarch and below him of
dukes and magistri militum, and only mentioning the most local level of the
administration, that of the tribunes. It is generally thought that Paulicius was
in fact none other than the Lombard duke of Treviso, and that Venice was acting
in a way which had become fairly common within Byzantine Italy, when the
‘people’, meaning essentially the exercitus or militiae of various cities, began to dis-
play autonomistic tendencies, as they did in both Rome and Ravenna. Choosing
Paulicius (a Greek version of the common Lombard name Paul) for the Venetians
would have been a form of rebellion against the Empire, though nowhere near as
radical as the version proposed by John the Deacon, who deliberately wiped out
of his narrative the Byzantine background and therefore the subjection of Venice
to the Empire, putting forward an idea of some kind of free choice by the Venetians
of their ruler. John’s is the first and, of course, decisive voice in creating the myth
of Venetian independence from the start—a situation inconceivable in practice,
but clearly already part of its foundation narrative by the eleventh century. I dis-
cussed in the Introduction the problems associated with the Historia Veneticorum,
and especially the doubts raised by historians as to the authorship of the early part
of it, in which this story occurs. Whether the story was written by the eleventh-
century writer known as John, either copying older sources like Paul the Deacon,
or by someone else, the fact remains that it is completely consistent with the view
of Venice that the eleventh-century author ‘John’ puts forward throughout the
last two books of the Historia: a writing-out of any external constraints and an

197 The standard older narratives concerning the early history of Venice are: Cessi, Venezia Ducale
II, pp. 107–44; ibid., ‘Politica, economia, religione’, pp. 82–229; Cessi, ‘Venezia e il Regno italico’, pp.
9–19; Carile, ‘La formazione’; Carile, ‘Il ducato venetico’, pp. 89–109; Pertusi, ‘L’impero bizantino’, pp.
51–71; D. M. Nicol, Byzantium and Venice (Cambridge, 1988), pp. 1–67; Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, pp. 725–
90; Ortalli, ‘Venezia dalle origini a Pietro II Orseolo’, in Storia d’Italia II: Longobardi e Bizantini, ed.
P. Delogu et al. (Milan, 1980), pp. 341–438; and S. Gasparri, ‘Venezia fra l’Italia bizantina e il regno
italico: la civitas e l’assemblea’, in Venezia. Itinerari per la storia della città, ed. S. Gasparri, G. Levi, and
P. Moro (Bologna, 1997), with, in the same volume, P. Moro, ‘Venezia e l’Occidente nell’alto medioevo.
Dal confine longobardo al pactum lotariano’. G. Rösch, Venedig und das Reich: Handels- und verkehr-
spolitische Beziehungen in der deutschen Kaiserzeit (Tübingen, 1982), is the most recent study focusing
on economic aspects of the period.
198 JnD II.2; Gasparri has made it clear how much of a parallel we have here with the Lombard
dukes’ choice in Paul the Deacon’s narrative; see Gasparri, ‘Anno 713’, pp. 27–45.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 91

emphasis on freedom from interference in the political life of Venice. Most striking
is to see how much Venice’s first ‘independent’ move was already based on what
would become its standard later policies, which was to play one party off against
another, in this instance by using Lombard power against the Byzantines.
A more even-handed narrative might be one which combines the early history
of the city on the basis of information from Paul the Deacon, the Liber Pontificalis,
the Translatio S. Marci, the Carmen de Nuova Aquilegia, and the Origo De Gentis,199
as well as John’s history. It would then run something like this. At some point, the
Venetians were no longer happy to be governed by tribunes, which is to say by the
Byzantine administration, either as part of the general disaffection for Byzantine
rule in Italy during the iconoclastic period, or because Lombard power grew too
strong and was preferable, or could not be resisted. Having chosen to live under
the authority of the Lombard Duke of Treviso Paul (Paulicius), they made him
their duke at Cittanova Eracleia, a Byzantine ‘new town’ originally founded in 639
to replace the destroyed Oderzo, to which the magister militum himself had
moved. Paulicius died there while he led military operations, after having ruled
for twenty years—according to the Origo, a victim of the first case of infighting
between various centres in the lagoon, which were already challenging each other
for supremacy. It seems possible that Cittanova, the original ‘capital’ of the duchy
on the mainland, and geographically closer to the kingdom of the Lombards, sup-
ported him.
The Venetians signed a peace-cum-trade treaty with the Lombard King
Liutprand in 715, the first document which in effect tells us what land the duchy
encompassed, and where its borders were. It also shows the importance of trade
with the Lombard kingdom, as well as what it consisted of: salt and fish to the ports
of Parma, Mantua, and Cremona, and the right to levy taxes, for which Venetian
merchants gave a tribute of two ounces of pepper to Liutprand—an obvious indi-
cation of Venetian eastern trade being already active. From then on relations with
the Lombards were so good that no change in them occurred until the Franks
conquered the kingdom. Cittanova declined and the capital of the duchy was
moved to Malamocco.200 What seems to me absolutely essential to underline is

199 See the Introduction for a detailed examination of these texts.

200 This has always been situated by historians and archaeologists on the island on which the cur-
rent Malamocco is. A new and, if confirmed, potentially revolutionary theory, based exclusively but
convincingly on the archaeological evidence of current excavations by D. Calaon, suggests that this
traditional view is right for a later date, but not for the origins of that city. Based on the idea that it has
not been possible to ‘find’ the old Malamocco where it was always presumed to have been, because of
the mental picture of a ‘city’ as we have it, but that a lagoon city at the time would have been, like
Venice itself, made completely of wood, Calaon has looked for it elsewhere, and has found evidence of
wood posts on a large scale, suggesting the existence of such an urban centre, subsequently destroyed,
on the terraferma at Dogaletto di Mira (now on the edge of Porto Marghera). If he is right in his
identification, this would suggest an even closer, and plausible, association of ‘Venice’ at its beginnings
with an area controlled by the Lombards—which would seem to explain better why the transfer of the
capital from Cittanova in 742 was made there, which is to say to another city on the south-western,
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92 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

the fact that, before the consolidation of Venice as a city with its focal centre at
Rialto in the age of the Particiaco doges in the 810s to 830s, ‘Venice’ was a collec-
tion of centres of power—of which Rialto was not yet one—with the most import-
ant (almost separate) one being Torcello in the northern lagoon, and presumably
Malamocco in the south.
In the formation of the economic and political power of Venice (as we call it
today), there was a long period when the Venetians were the inhabitants of the
islands of the lagoon, and the centre of power in the lagoon changed with the
various families who became the heads of the Byzantine Venetia. This centre was
constantly shifting at first. Settlements like Cittanova, Altino, then Torcello and
Malamocco had powerful aristocratic families, whose power had been originally
obtained as Byzantine tribunes. At first land-based, some were also landholders on
the islands, as was the magister militum Maurice who, with the permission of
the Exarch Isaac, founded a church in Torcello, whose foundation inscription
survives.201 Some then moved towards the islands—to the northern lagoon islands
such as Torcello, then to the southern lagoon centres such as Malamocco. Such a
move was not so as to ‘flee from the Lombards’ (let alone Attila), as the traditional
school textbooks have it—since the Lombards were allies through treaties—but
probably because the Venetians were increasingly involved in trade, and the sea
was the means of trading in the early Middle Ages, especially if one found oneself
in such an optimal position as being an Adriatic port both at the mouth of the river
trade with major Italian cities and part of the Byzantine Empire, with the eastern
trade ready to expand. Torcello, which Constantine Porphyrogenitos called a
mega emporion, remained for a long time a Byzantine castrum, which probably
continued to trade towards the north-east and up to Bavaria and Carinthia, in
parallel with Rialto, but much less visible to us on account of John the Deacon
and subsequent historiography focusing on Rialto and obliterating Torcello.202
In addition, Torcello would suffer from a deliberate choice by the doges to sup-
port the expansion of Rialto specifically away from the northern lagoon and its
rivers such as the Sile (Altino, Jesolo), towards the area of Mestre. There two of
the great ninth-century monasteries were founded or relocated—Brondolo and

but still land-, side of the lagoon. This in turn would add weight to the important work and conclu-
sions of Gasparri and Gelichi on the importance of the early connections of the city with its ‘retroterra’
in the Lombard world. I am very grateful to Diego Calaon for sharing this material with me prior to
publication.

201 On the Torcello inscription, see V. Lazzarini, ‘Un’iscrizione torcellana del secolo VII: nota’,
AIVSLA 73 (1913–14), pp. 387–97, and A. Pertusi, ‘L’iscrizione torcellana dei tempi di Eraclio’,
Bollettino dell’Istituto di storia della società e dello Stato 4 (1962), pp. 9–38.
202 Constantine Porphyrogenitos, De administratione imperii; e.g. see G. Bellavitis and
G. Romanelli, Venezia. La città nella storia d’Italia, 2nd edn (Rome, 1995), p. 23; Crouzet-Pavan, La
mort lente de Torcello; and H. Kretschmayr, ‘Die Beschreibung der venezianischer Inseln bei
Konstantin Porphyrogenitus’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 13 (1904), pp. 482–506.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 93

S. Ilario—and the land granted to endow them, as well as S. Zaccaria and later
S. Giorgio, was found.
When Pope Gregory II in 727 told the provinces and cities of Byzantine Italy to
elect their own dukes in place of the Byzantine magistrates, the Venetians elected
Ursus I, who was killed in 738, after which the government reverted to a succession
of magistri militum—a move which I will discuss at greater length in Chapter 3.
One of these was Deusdedit, Ursus I’s son, and from then on we only hear of dukes
(doges) as leaders of the Venetiae. Deusdedit was followed in 756 by Dominic
Monegario, whose origin is unknown. After his death, the Venetians in 764/5
elected a new duke, belonging to a family from Cittanova, Maurice Galbaio, followed
by his son John and grandson Maurice. The election was held at Malamocco,
which would imply that, by that stage, the latter had become the main centre of
power in the lagoon area.
In 568, as a result of warfare, the main north-eastern Italian archiepiscopal see
of the Venetia Julia had been transferred by the Patriarch of Aquileia Paulinus
further north up the Adriatic coast to the semi-island of Grado. In the back-
ground, the Schism of the Three Chapters, which had started in the sixth century
as a result of attempts to reconcile some form of Monophysitism with Catholic
Christianity, continued to run, and the patriarchs of Aquileia, who had claimed to
maintain the see there, were supporters of it. As a result, two different patriarchs
were now elected: one at Grado, increasingly only exercising jurisdiction over the
people living on the coast, in Istria, and in the Venetian Lagoon, and one at
Aquileia, which had jurisdiction over the Italian mainland. When, as a result of the
schism being officially resolved in 698, the patriarch of what was now called Old
Aquileia was reconciled with the pope, the patriarch of Grado-Aquileia refused to
relinquish his see, and a long-lasting dispute over the authority of the two patri-
archs ensued until 1027, when by papal decree Aquileia acquired supremacy over
Grado-New Aquileia. Attempts were made on several occasions, unsuccessfully, to
demote or to get rid of Grado, the most famous being that at the papal council of
827, but it nevertheless became a very pale image of itself after losing jurisdiction
over Istria after the Carolingian conquest, and as a result of the rise of Venice.
By the time of the Frankish conquest of Italy in 774, Doge Maurice was broadly
speaking not favourable to a Frankish rapprochement, while the patriarch of Grado,
John, effectively the archbishop for the Venetiae, who saw much of his north Italian
and Istrian property and rights taken over by Charlemagne, was. After the Frankish
conquest of Istria in the 780s, Istrian bishops tried to leave the jurisdiction of
Grado, encouraged, according to John the Deacon, by the patriarch of Aquileia.
According to the Liber Pontificalis, Pope Stephen III asked them to return to the
jurisdiction of Grado, nostra romanorum privincia et exarchatum ravennatis.203
Patriarch John was a victim of the doges’ determination to stop this Carolingian

203 Cessi I. 30–5.

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94 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

rapprochement, and was eventually killed by a fleet led by Maurice II, son of
Doge John Galbaio, an act which provoked outrage but which ended up by being
counterproductive, since the patriarch was succeeded by a member of his family,
Fortunatus, who was even more strongly pro-Carolingian. Fortunatus was deter-
mined to preserve the rights of Grado against encroachments by both Aquileia
and the doges. He went to Francia in 803 to ask Charlemagne to put a stop to the
demands of Aquileia, and to acknowledge the rights of Grado in Istria, says John—
or he may have been ordered there by Charlemagne.204 Fortunatus did not see
Grado as the ‘see of Venice’, associated with its rise, but was fighting for its larger
authority, encompassing the north Adriatic. The doges, on the other hand, were
concerned with having a bishop for Venice. The result was that the doge effectively
created a new diocese at Olivolo, near the castrum and original site of Byzantine
authority, in order to have his bishop in the heart of the duchy. And his bishop it
was. After the death of the first one, Obeliebatus, Doge John effectively appointed
the new Bishop Christopher, of Greek origin, seen by Patriarch Fortunatus as
opposed to his pro-Frankish policies, and not accepted by him.
When leaving Grado for the court of Charlemagne, Fortunatus had drawn the
opposing faction among Venetian maiores to the Galbaio doges, John and his son
Maurice II, to Treviso. Most of these tribunes, including one Obelerius, were ‘prod-
ded by some left in Venice’ to elect Obelerius as doge, leading to John’s and Maurice
II’s flight. John the Deacon may have once again done his utmost to make it appear
that foreign powers did not dictate the policies of free-spirited Venice, but it not
impossible that exile was in fact imposed on the two Galbaios by the Franks, or at
the very least by Obelerius.205 Obelerius himself returned to Venice as the new
doge, apparently with Frankish support.
Soon thereafter, Pepin and his Frankish armies were advancing on Venice, and
John the Deacon specifies that this was the first time that the traditional alliance
between the Venetians and the ‘Lombards’, that is the Italian kingdom, in place
since Duke Paulicius, was broken.206 This is the story as recounted by the Royal
Frankish Annals. In 806 ‘Willerius’, that is Obelerius, and Beatus, Dukes of Venice,
together with Paul Duke of Zara and Donatus Bishop of Zara as ambassadors
of the Dalmatians, came to Charlemagne with gifts, and he ‘settle[d] the affairs
of Dalmatia’; as we saw earlier, this meant conquering it, including possibly by
ordering the doges to attack it. Charlemagne gained Pope Leo III’s consent to the
new arrangement, but immediately after the Byzantine emperor sent a fleet under
the admiral Nicetas to reconquer Dalmatia. In 807 Nicetas stayed in Venice
with the Greek fleet, made peace with King Pepin in August, and returned to
Constantinople, though the Byzantine fleet later returned to Venice and Dalmatia
in 808 under the command of Paul, governor of Cephalonia, and remained there

204 JnD II. 24. 205 Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 781 n. 16. 206 JnD II. 27.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 95

all winter. Paul, ordered to negotiate a final peace between Franks and Greeks
with Pepin, was prevented in this by Obelerius and Beatus’ ‘treachery’, who
ambushed him and drove him away, claim the Royal Frankish Annals. Furious at
the doges’ apparent volte-face, in 810 Pepin ordered an attack on Venice by land
and sea. The Venetian ‘victory’ at Albiola was thus gained, claimed the Franks,
because of the doges acting secretly against the Franks; this may have been true,
if we assume that they may have called in the Byzantine emperor’s fleet.207 After
Pepin’s death in July, Charlemagne made peace with Nicephorus in October and
returned Venice to him, while Obelerius, deprived of his office because of his
‘treachery’, was ‘ordered to be returned to his lord in Constantinople’. At any rate
the treaty of Aachen was signed in 812, Charlemagne accepted the continuation
of Byzantine rule over Venice, and the Venetians elected a new doge, Agnellus
Particiaco. The treaty was ratified in 814 by Louis the Pious, though in 821
Patriarch Fortunatus of Grado was accused by Louis the Pious of supporting the
rebel Dalmatian prince, Ljudovit. Fortunatus, ordered to appear at the palace in
Aachen, at first set out to obey the order, then turned round and fled to Zara, and
from there to Constantinople.208 Eventually the envoys of the new Emperor
Michael brought Fortunatus back to Rouen in Francia and, reports the Annalist,
‘said nothing good about [him]’. Louis sent him to Rome to be investigated by the
pope, with the result we know of at the synod of Mantua in 827, when Grado was
demoted to a ‘village’ and the patriarchate was reunified under the authority of
Aquileia.209 Louis the Pious took a limited part in the political and ideological
play between Western and Eastern Empires: his interests were limited in that
regard. His only contact with Constantinopolitan embassies and politics was in
839, when an embassy sent by the Emperor Theophilus was received at Ingelheim,
whose purpose was to ‘confirm the treaty of peace and perpetual friendship and
love between the two emperors and their subjects’.210
Most of the contacts and settlements between the Byzantines and Charlemagne
in Italy were of a diplomatic kind, and negotiations were carried out to settle mat-
ters of control and official titles. The only exception was Venice. Here, for the first
and only time, the two powers met on the ground militarily against each other, on
account of the perceived importance of the ever more successful trade and military
role of the city, and its extending control over the Adriatic. In 785 Charlemagne
had ordered Pope Hadrian I to expel Venetian merchants from Ravenna and the
Pentapolis and have their goods confiscated, and the pope obeyed:211 a fact indir-
ectly showing how important Venetian trade was already perceived to be at this
stage, since interfering with it was a weapon of war. Both powers thought it essential
to benefit from the rising power of its fleet, and eventually came to an agreement
which, in effect, would allow for Byzantine use of it, while the Carolingians,

207 JnD II. 27. 208 ARF 806–8, 810–11, 814, 817, 821.
209 ARF 824, and see Chapters 1 and 4. 210 ASB 839. 211 Cessi I. 36; CC no. 49.
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96 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

specifically Lothar I, would create a negotiated settlement which was to be of

mutual benefit to both the Carolingian Empire in Italy and Venice itself. For the
first time, Venice was a powerful incentive for both empires to clash in the first
place, and to begin to collaborate later to their mutual benefit in southern Italy.
It was after 811 that the decision was made to move the seat of the duchy from
Malamocco to Rivoalto (Rialto). Olivolo, later known as Castello, had been the
centre of the Byzantine administration, as we now believe, with the evidence of
archaeological finds of Byzantine seals, coins, and epigraphy.212 By the end of the
eighth century, Cittanova had been eclipsed by Malamocco when Obelerius and
Beatus became doges. The final and most important move of the seat of the duchy
from Malamocco was a deliberate shift corresponding to the new political order.
It may have been partly due to the will of the new dynasty to move away from
Obelerius’ and Beatus’ apparent Frankish association, at least in the way John the
Deacon presents it. While the reasons for the shift of power from Cittanova (not
on the sea) to Malamocco may relate to a strengthening of the maritime interests
of Venice, the move from Malamocco to Rialto was more complex. Who took the
essential decision? According to John the Deacon, it was, of course, the ‘Venetians’
who did so before choosing a new doge. It seems far more likely that it was in fact
Agnellus Particiaco who made the change. Particiaco moved the ducal centre of
power from Malamocco to settle it in Rialto—not in Olivolo. He effectively cre-
ated a new focus around his new palace and chapel, in a deliberate attempt to
create a power base, certainly for the Particiaci, and by extension for the expand-
ing Venetian power.213 On the basis of the study of early church foundations—a
model contested by some scholars—as well as of recent archaeological excavations
in Cannaregio at Ca’ Vendramin, it appears that, already in the eighth century,
Rialto was fairly populated and prosperous.214 The castrum in Olivolo was the
official seat of Byzantine authority and, from about 775, it had the new cathedral
and bishop. However, the Particiaci chose a new site, possibly with Byzantine
agreement or acceptance, in order to streamline ducal power with a perceived
Byzantine centre or, from the Byzantine side, possibly to keep some control over

212 Arslan, Repertorio, pp. 157–9; on Byzantine coins, and especially on those found in Castello,
see S. Tuzzato, ‘Le strutture lignee altomedievali a Olivolo (S. Pietro di Castello—Venezia), in Studi
di Archeologia della X Regio in ricordo di M. Tombolani (Rome, 1994), cols 479–86. On seals and
inscriptions, see I. Rugo, ed., Le iscrizioni dei secoli VI–VII–VIII esistenti in Italia II: Venezia e Istria
(Cittadella: Bertoncello, 1975), e.g. no. 7, p. 20 (a Greek monogram on a lead seal from Torcello) and
no. 9, p. 21 (a Greek marble inscription in Murano), and W. Dorigo, ‘Bolle plumbee bizantine nella
Venezia esarcale’, in Studi in memoria di Giuseppe Bovini, Biblioteca di Felix Ravenna, 6 (Ravenna,
1990) pp. 223–35. These signs of Byzantine political presence have been discussed by Gelichi in
‘Venezia tra archeologia e storia’, pp. 151–83 at 169–73, and ‘La storia di una nuova città’, pp. 51–89 at
74–89. The evidence of church foundations has been discussed by both historians and archaeologists;
see Chapter 3.
213 JnD, II. 29. Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 734; W. Dorigo, Venezia romanica. La formazione della città
medioevale fino all’età gotica, 2 vols (Venice, 2005), I, pp. 14–23 and W. Dorigo, Venezia origini.
Fondamenti, ipotesi, metodi (Milan, 1983), pp. 531–79; Bellavitis and Romanelli, Venezia, pp. 17–18.
214 For the evidence of churches and of the Cannaregio excavations, see Chapters 4 and 5.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 97

this rising local dynasty. There is no doubt that the combination of Rialto and
Olivolo would become the nucleus of a new city in political, military, administrative,
and spiritual terms. As became evident after Albiola—when the Frankish fleet
was cunningly led by the Venetians to enter the lagoon, too shallow for their ships,
rather than draw the fight to the mainland, or indeed at sea in the Adriatic—the
situation of Rialto, in the middle of the lagoon, was a much better defensive site
than smaller northern or southern islands, and this no doubt would have added
to its attraction. (See Map 5.)
After Louis the Pious’s death, relations with the Carolingians centred around
the treaty signed between the Doge Peter Tradonico and Lothar I as King of Italy
in 840, then consolidated in 841 when Lothar became emperor, known as the
Pactum Lotharii.215 Venice gained numerous advantages: specified frontiers of the
duchy from Cavarzere in the south to Grado in the north, and terms of reciprocal
trade, legal and diplomatic arrangements, such as clauses regulating the recipro-
cal return and punishment of fugitives, and compensation according to Lombard

The Venetian Duchy, 700–1000 (after E. Crouzet Pavan)

N
Concordia
Pi
av

Liv
e

0 20 km
en
za

Treviso
Sil
e

Caorle
Altino Jesolo
Ammiana
Verona Cittanova Torcello
Eracleia Murano
nta Rialto S. Erasmo
Bre VENISE S. Nicolò
Padua
Malamocco MER
A DR IAT IQU E

Pellestrina

Chioggia
Brondolo

Cavarzere Adige

Map 5 The Duchy of Venice

215 R. Cessi, ‘Il “pactum Lotharii” del 840’, AIVSLA 99 (1940), pp. 1110–49; see A. Pazienza, ‘Venice
beyond Venice. Commercial Agreements and Pacta from the Origins to Pietro II Orseolo’, in Gasparri
and Gelichi, eds., Age of Affirmation, pp. 147–76 esp. 149–58.
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98 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

and Carolingian law.216 Of great significance were the considerable latitude allowed
to Carolingian authorities to intervene in the affairs of Venice by sending missi, and
the ability of the emperors to call a muster of Venetian ships to defend the Italian
coastline.217 Most of the subsequent involvement of the Carolingian emperors
and Venice stemmed from this agreement, renewed with each change of ruler.
If the first clause was never exercised, as far as we know, the second was in oper-
ation under Lothar who, as part of the alliance with the Byzantine emperor, in
850 ordered Doge Tradonico to send a fleet to Taranto, to help both emperors,
himself, and his Byzantine counterpart fight the Saracens. The victory of Louis II’s
army was helped by this fleet.218 The visit in 856 by Louis II and the Empress
Angilberga to Brondolo, among the ceremonial and forging of spiritual kinship
when Louis became godfather to the doge’s son, also included confirmation of the
Pactum as well as a further request for help from the emperor to the doge against
Saracen attacks; this would be the first-ever visit of an emperor to the city.219
Venetian help was countered by the Italian kings’ and emperors’ firm engagement
to allow free passage, protection, and control over their estates to the Venetians
travelling or living in the Empire. The Pactum was renewed by most Carolingian
emperors until Charles III the Fat in 887 and, with few variations, was then
renewed again by Berengar I in 888, by Guy in 891, by Rudolf in 925, and by Hugh
in 927, before its next major rephrasing in 967 in Rome by Otto I.220 The obvious
inference is that the doges made certain, at every change of regime within the
Regnum, to obtain confirmation of the privileges acquired. The only two missing
documents are those which should have existed for Hugh’s successors, Lothar II
and Berengar II, at their respective accessions to the throne of Italy in 947 and
950. The reasons for the interruption of such a canny tradition lies in the events of
the reign of Peter III Candiano. He became doge in 942 but then had to contend
with his son Peter’s rebellion, the latter’s exile by the will of the Venetian people,
and his refuge at the court of Berengar II.221 When Berengar II came to fight Otto,
however, the younger Peter chose Otto, and subsequently, when he returned to
Venice to be elected doge after his father’s death in 959, the traditional confirm-
ation of privileges took place in 967.
After his election in 811, Agnellus too co-opted his sons Justinian and John as
doges, and they eventually followed him as rulers. The reign of Doge Justinian on

216 Pactum Lotharii, ed. and commentaries in Cessi I. 55–6. See, for example, Cessi, ‘Il “pactum
Lotharii” ’, pp. 1110–49, and Pazienza, ‘Venice beyond Venice’, pp. 147–76 esp. 149–56.
217 A good example of this is the phrasing of the capitulary of Lothar in 847; see MG Legum II:
Cap., no. 203, pp. 65–8, ch. 12 at p. 65, and Azzara and Moro, I Capitolari italici, pp. 151–62, at ch. 12.
218 JnD II. 57. 219 JnD II. 57.
220 Schiaparelli, ed., I Diplomi di Guido e Lamberto, 888, 891, 925, 927, 953; see Cessi II, nos 16, 21,
22, 32, 33, and 37, and DV nos 17, 19, 20, 21, 22, and 13; see also R. Cessi, ‘Pacta veneta’, Ateneo Veneto
3 (1928), pp. 118–84, and R. Cessi, ‘Pacta veneta 2: Dal “Pactum Lotharii” al “Foedus Octonis” ’, Ateneo
Veneto 5 (1929), pp. 1–77, repr. in R. Cessi, Le origini del ducato veneziano (Venice, 1951).
221 JnD IV. 9.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 99

his own (827–9) saw the first Byzantine imperial appeal for the Venetian fleet to
go to Sicily to fight the rising Saracen threat. The expedition was a failure, and the
Venetian fleet could not hold in front of the Saracens, but the request in itself
shows that Venetia was already acknowledged as a naval power. It also saw the first
attempts to arrange a peace with Slav (Narentani) pirates on the opposing side of
the Adriatic, a problem which Venice would have to face almost constantly into the
tenth century. This would be ultimately resolved by the Venetians, as they so often
did with other commercial problems, for example the demolishing of economic
rival fleets and traders in the North Adriatic (Comacchio, Ravenna, the cities of
Istria and Dalmatia), by attempts to buy them off for as long as possible, until they
felt that they had sufficient military naval power to wipe out this competition.
Fortunatus at Grado had pursued his pro-Carolingian policies, to such an extent
that the doge and the Venetians, who strongly resented this, eventually threw him
out again, making John, abbot of S. Servolo, the new patriarch. Fortunatus, we
recall, went to Francia to ask Louis the Pious for help, but Louis sent him to the
pope, asking the latter to judge him. Interestingly, this information reached us
through the Annales Regnum Francorum; John the Deacon passes over this show
of dependency of the patriarch of Grado on the emperor and the pope by saying
only that Fortunatus died in Francia.222 Fortunatus’ appeal to the pope may or
may not have been partly responsible for the meeting of a papal and imperial
synod at Mantua in 827. This later infamous synod demoted the see of Grado from
patriarchate to the rank of ‘parish’, and gave authority to the Patriarch of Aquileia
over Grado and Venice. Such a blow could not be accepted by Venice, which would
have become subject to Carolingian Aquileia. The Carmen de Nuova Aquilegia,
seemingly written by a Venetian at the time when Louis the Pious and Lothar were
joint emperors (817 to 840), perhaps soon after 827, is a clear example of pleading
to the two emperors to rescind this decision.223 By a coincidence so fortunate as
to raise eyebrows, in the following year 828 two Venetian merchants brought back
from Alexandria the body of the Apostle and Evangelist Mark, who, they assured
their reception committee, had himself expressed the desire to be taken to Venice
to be honoured there. Doge Justinian, claimed the text of the ninth-century
Translatio S. Marci, was at first ready to punish the two merchants for trading in
Saracen lands—expressly forbidden in the Pactum Lotharii—but was persuaded
to change his views when told, first of all, that they had fully obeyed the interdiction
to do so but had, through no fault of their own, been shipwrecked in Alexandria
and secondly, when the two merchants threatened him by suggesting that they
would take their relics elsewhere. One would have to suspend disbelief at the
thought that this extraordinary coup had been, if not directly orchestrated by

222 ARF 824; JnD II. 34.

223 Dümmler, ed., Carmen de Aquilegia, pp. 150–3; see Gasparri, ‘The formation of an early medi-
eval community, pp. 35–50 at p. 40.
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100 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Doge Justinian, at the very least seized upon with great promptness.224 The relics
were received with great veneration by the doge and the people of Venice when
they arrived there and, significantly, not sent on to Grado, but kept in the palace
chapel. This led to the subsequent building of a new chapel in the new ducal
palace to house the relics, as instructed by Doge Justinian in his will. This chapel
would later be turned into the basilica of St Mark by his brother and successor,
Doge John Particiaco, who, according to the author of the Translatio, had been to
Jerusalem during the time of his exile in Constantinople, and thus built the chapel
on the model of the Anastasis.225 At any rate, it was at the core of the new rising
glory of Venice: from now on, Grado no longer mattered—Venice had its own
Venetian saint and Venetian Church.
In 836, after John’s deposition as doge, the Venetians elected Peter Tradonico. He
too attempted to fight the pirates without success, and was asked by the Byzantines
to help them against the Saracens in the south. The request was sent, together
with the granting of the title of spatarius to Tradonico, via the Byzantine patricius
Theodosius, who spent a whole year in Venice.226 Tradonico sent six ships to
Taranto, which again failed to contain the Saracen danger and, on the contrary, led
the latter to mount a campaign up the Adriatic as far as Venice, requesting a tribute
and destroying the Venetian ships returning from southern Italy. John the Deacon
claims that up to 12,000 Venetians may have died during this campaign—clearly a
vastly exaggerated figure: nevertheless, it was clearly perceived as a major loss,
and had equally clearly been not simply a matter of helping the Byzantines but
also of containing the danger to Venice’s trade in the Adriatic. It is significant that
both Byzantines and Carolingians should have requisitioned the Venetian fleet,
showing that even after a naval defeat its reputation was already so high as to make
naval combat without it impossible—while the Venetians were happy to ally them-
selves with whoever fought the Saracens and pirates.227 This is why, when after
the disaster of Taranto the Emperor Lothar mounted another expedition against
the Saracens in the south in 850, as part of the terms of the Pactum Lotharii, he
asked Tradonico again to send some ships,228 better and larger than before; and
together, under the command of Lothar’s son Louis II, they defeated the Saracens
ensconced in Benevento.
Tradonico’s successor, the new Doge Ursus I, granted by the Byzantine emperor
the higher dignity of protospatarius, was one of the key figures in early Venetian
history. His role in the history of the city was considerable on several fronts. First
and foremost, he was instrumental in establishing the position of Venice as a
leading naval power in the West. He did so first through a major victory over the

224 Colombi, ‘Translatio S. Marci’, pp. 73–129 at 112–29. 225 Ibid., pp. 128–9.
226 JnD II. 50 and n. 116, Bk II, pp. 238–9, with bibliography.
227 JnD II. 50; Thietmar, III.21. On the Venetian fleet, see C. Beltrame, ‘On the origin of ship con-
struction in Venice’, in Gasparri and Gelichi, eds., Age of Affirmation, pp. 129–46.
228 MGH Cap. II. ch. 12, no. 203, p. 67; Azzara and Moro, I Capitolari italici, ch. 12, p. 155.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 101

Saracens, defeated by the Emperor Louis II with the help of the Venetian fleet.
The Saracens were also defeated as they attacked Grado, and deflected by Venice
in their destructive efforts by being gently guided towards attacking Venice’s trad-
itional enemy, Comacchio, instead—which they sacked in 875.229 Finally, Ursus
and his son and co-ruler, John, were victorious with thirty ships over Venice’s
other traditional enemy, the Slavs, in Istria.230 Ursus’ other major success was in
his reorganization of the Venetian Church.231 Most importantly in terms of urban
development, he pursued a policy of reinforcing the economic role of Rialto as
well as expanding it, with the draining of the swamps and the new settlement in
Dorsoduro,232 the first major expansion of the city since the move to Rialto.
When he died in 881, Ursus was succeeded by his son John II, who continued
the policy of expansion and consolidation of the economic power of Venice, notably
with another serious attempt to subjugate its rival Comacchio. He tried to place
Comacchio under the control of Venice by offering the pope a large price to buy it
from papal control, since, as a former exarchal city, it was by now technically part
of the papal Patrimonium. There are conflicting reports about the affair: John the
Deacon claims that the pope (Hadrian III) accepted at first, then reneged on the
agreement, while the Liber Pontificalis claims that this was never an option. It is
possible that Pope Hadrian III, when approached, had said yes, while in 886 his
successor, Stephen V, claimed this not to have been so.233 When Doge John sent
his brother Badoer to Rome to organize the transition, the latter was ambushed
and mortally wounded by the duke of Comacchio and, on his return to Venice, he
died of his wounds.234 Whether his death was a convenient pretext, or a genuine
act of revenge from grief, the doge attacked Comacchio in revenge and subjected
it, notably by appointing iudices from Venice to govern it.
The reign of the next doge, Peter Tribuno, coincided with a troubled period in
the history of the Regnum Italiae, following the death of Charles the Fat in 888.
Hungarian attacks throughout Italy coincided with the trials and tribulations of
the reigns of the Emperors Arnulf then Berengar. Unlike the Regnum, argues John
the Deacon, Venice actually had a relatively stable time, notably due to having a
decisive and effective ruler. Indeed, Tribuno inflicted defeat on the Hungarian
attackers of Venice, an achievement contrasted by John the Deacon with the fail-
ure of Berengar to do the same throughout Italy, where the imperial response
was to buy off the invaders.235 The whole lagoon suffered greatly at this point,
with repeated attacks on Cittanova, Jesolo, and Chioggia, and the most significant

229 JnD III, 5–7 and 12. 230 JnD III.14.

231 See Chapter 4. 232 JnD III. 27; see Chapter 5.
233 JnD III.28; from the papal side, see the letter of Pope Stephen V to Doge John in 886, ed. in
MGH Ep., VIII no. 385. If Hadrian III did indeed accept, at least in principle, this definitely suggests
that the papacy had accepted the idea that the Carolingian donation of Venetia to the Patrimony of St
Peter was perceived to be only effective on paper and not on the ground; which may be exactly why his
successor refused to acknowledge it.
234 JnD III.28; see Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 756. 235 JnD III. 37.
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102 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

centre to be almost completely destroyed during these attacks was the monastery
of S. Stefano of Altino, later rebuilt by the doges. Officially to contain the risk
of attacks on Rialto, the doge built a wall extending along the Grand Canal to
S. Maria Zobenigo (now Giglio), and set up a chain across the canal stretching
from the church of S. Gregorio in Dorsoduro to the castellum.236
Tribuno was succeeded by another Ursus Particiaco, then by Peter II Candiano,
who used the excuse of the capture of some Venetians by the duke of Comacchio
to send an army to burn it down and bring many of its inhabitants to Venice as
subjects, thus putting an end for good to the rival, if already weakened, commer-
cial power of Comacchio in the 930s. Similarly, he blockaded Istria, a move which
ended with the treaty of Capodistria in 932,237 by which it, together with another
eight Istrian cities, committed itself to defending Venice in the Adriatic, as well as
paying an annual tribute of one hundred amphorae of wine. These two victories
by the Venetian fleet not only effectively defeated Comacchio and the main Istrian
cities but led the latter to accept Venetian intervention in, and control of, their
affairs. When he died in 939, Peter II was succeeded by the son of Ursus Particiaco,
Ursus II, who in turn on his death, in 942, was succeeded by the son of Peter II
Candiano, Peter III. There is no evidence to establish whether we are already
beginning to see here the patterns of late-tenth-century Venetian rule, with the
most powerful families exercising power in turn, but this is quite likely—in
Chapter 3 I will examine this form of ‘balance of power’ in greater detail. The epic
story of his successor, Peter IV, needs attention in its own right and I will focus on
it in Chapter 3, up to and including the gruesome assassination plot of the
Venetians against him in 976.238
Otto I had had relatively little interest in Venice, and it was only with Otto II
that the city came to be at the forefront of Ottonian interests, as it would then
remain, even more consistently, with Otto III. The attention was, in a way, begun
from the Venetian side, when the future Peter IV Candiano was exiled to the
Regnum and went to join the following of Berengar II, on whose side he fought
first and who allowed him to take a first revenge on the Venetian fleet.239 Peter IV
then switched his support to Otto I, and was rewarded by being allowed to marry
Adelheid’s niece Waldrada, and to gain large amounts of land in the Regnum. We
are told that Otto II’s allegedly appalled response at Peter IV’s murder, and the
flight of his son Vitalis to the Ottonian court, led ultimately to the imperial block-
ade of Venice in 983—a story which may once again be subject to interpretation.240

236 JnD III. 39; Dorigo, Venezia origini, p. 539, on the meaning of the word castellum and of the
chain; and see the discussion in Chapter 5, p. 44.
237 Cessi II. 35 and DV no. 11. 238 JnD IV, 12–13. 239 See Chapter 3.
240 JnDn, IV, 21 and 26; W. Giese, ‘Venedig-Politik und Imperium-Idee bei den Ottonen’, in
Herrschaft. Kirche, Kultur. Beiträge zur Geschichte des Mittelalters. Festschrift für F. Prinz zu seinem 65.
Geburtstag, ed. G. Jenel (Stuttgart: Monographien zur Geschichte des Mittelalters 37, 1993), pp. 224–7.
See Chapter 3 on the nuances needed here.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 103

After the assassination of Peter IV, John the Deacon claims that Otto II refused to
renew the Pactum as usual with the new Doge Tribuno Memmo because of the
Candiano murder (unlikely ten years later!) and only relented in the end before
going off on his south Italian campaign, for which he needed Venetian help.241 But
he then embarked on a military campaign against Venice, first of all by promoting
an edict against Venetian trade in the Empire, and forbidding any imperial subjects
to communicate with Venetians, as well as spying on food provision and besieging
the city to famish its inhabitants.242 As the well-known narrative goes, the city may
well have done just that if Otto had not left for the south and died, and the peace
treaty was renewed in 983 under the influence of the two Empresses Adelheid and
Theophano.243
One of the authors of the coup against Peter IV, possibly its leader, was Peter I
Orseolo, subsequently elected as the new doge.244 His first efforts were directed at
reconciliation with the Ottonians and the aristocracy of the Regnum, by settling
the matter of Peter IV’s widow Waldrada’s wealth and dowry in such a way that no
revenge would be forthcoming.245 Another major effort was directed at rebuild-
ing the ducal palace and the basilica of St Mark, for which Peter I Orseolo had the
original Pala d’Oro commissioned in Constantinople. He eventually fled Venice
to become a monk at Cuxá in 978, and was followed by Tribuno Memmo, himself
deposed in 991 after a long but by no means successful reign. Memmo was made
to become a monk at S. Zaccaria by the ‘people’, who elected Peter I’s son, Peter II
Orseolo, to become the new doge in 991. John the Deacon’s hero, whom he served
throughout his rule, Peter II proved himself a master at gathering together in con-
sensus a large number of the aristocratic families, notably by allowing them a
share of civil and ecclesiastical power, and sufficient autonomy. This consensus
was most certainly strongly supported by the doge’s personal charisma, his suc-
cessful balancing of power between the Ottonians and Byzantium, his successes
in external military operations such as the conquest of lstria, Dalmatia, and the
victory of the Venetian fleet in delivering Bari from its Muslim ruler. It was made
manifest by the large number of signatories to the 998 oath, taken by all important
Venetian families, to refrain from provoking rebellions and fights in the palace,
and the doge’s stature and prestige were clearly stated, not only through his
­imperial alliances but also through the display of his power within the urban
­fabric of Venice.

241 JnD IV. 21.

242 These two contradictory actions are what has led Chiara Provesi to suggest that the initiative for
the attack came not from Otto himself but from the family group of Adelheid—a possible interpretation,
but one which tries to make sense of Otto II’s sometimes rather erratic behaviour in Italian affairs; see
C. Provesi, ‘Le due mogli di Pietro IV Candiano (959–976): le donne e i loro gruppi parentali nella
Venezia del X secolo’, Reti Medievali Rivista 16.2 (2015), pp. 21–51.
243 Cessi II.64 and DV no. 33.
244 JnD IV, 14; Pier Damiani, Vita Beati Romualdi, ed. G. Tabacco (Rome: FSI 94, 1957), pp. 22–3.
245 Cessi II. 54 and DV no. 20.
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104 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

The most pressing of Peter’s duties was to normalize what had been an excep-
tionally strained relationship with the Ottonians after the failed blockade of the
city. He became very close to the young Otto III, and their relationship, based on
mutual friendship, became consolidated through spiritual kinship, with Peter’s
eldest son, also named Peter, being sent to Verona, where he was rechristened Otto
and made the emperor’s godson.246 Otto supported Venice’s policies of expansion,
for example by granting through the edict of 996 safe passage and exemption of
taxes to Venetians everywhere in the Empire, and by settling the long-standing
dispute of Venice with the bishop of Belluno in the kingdom of Italy over the
latter’s usurpation of Venetian territory around Cittanova.247 The doge blockaded
Belluno, withdrawing the export of Venetian salt, until it gave in, and Venice gained
from Otto a privilege guaranteeing its rights in the area. Otto also supported
Venice’s conquest of Dalmatia, but expected to gain in return Venice’s support for
his own expansion and Christianization policies in southern and central Europe,
which he was especially keen to pursue in Hungary, and for which Venice was
meant to play the role of bridgehead.
After the crisis of Otto II’s failed conquest of Venice, and the pacification
attempts of the two empresses, Otto III’s enthusiastic friendship with Doge Peter
II Orseolo opened the way to what would be, according to John the Deacon, a
honeymoon period for the emperor and the doge. This would be shown in a most
spectacular way by Otto III’s extremely unorthodox incognito trip to Venice in
1001.248 The visit was arranged by John the Deacon himself, at Otto’s request, in
secrecy, though it is possible, and to my mind likely, that the secrecy was requested
not by Otto but by Doge Peter. This may have been for two reasons, jointly or
separately. First, one must not forget the fate of the last doge to have openly
thrown in his lot with the Ottonians, Peter IV Candiano, well within living memory.
Secondly, Peter II was always very careful openly to balance out his obedience to
the Ottonian emperors with that to the Byzantine emperors, and it is possible
that an actual high-profile Ottonian visit to Venice, even though officially set up
by Otto for the purpose of worshipping at the shrine of St Mark, would have been
received with fear by, and opposition from, the people of Venice. As it was arranged,
Otto, who was in Ravenna, claimed to wish to go on a spiritual retreat to Pomposa
for the three days before Easter, with only a few trusted retainers. Once there, he
disappeared into his quarters for three days, but in fact made his way secretly
to Venice, where he was first led to S. Servolo, an island by then inhabited by a

246 JnD IV, 34.

247 Otto’s 996 diploma, ed. in MGH DOIII, no. 172; for the Belluno case see JnD IV. 33; Cessi II. 74
and 86.
248 JnD IV, 55–8; on this famous trip, see Uhlirz, ‘Die Italienische Kirchenpolitik’, pp. 201–321;
Uhlirz, ‘Rechtsfragen in den Urkunden Kaiser Ottos III’, in I problemi comuni dell’Europa post-carolingia,
pp. 239–41; N. D’Acunto, ‘Ottone III e il Regnum Italiae’, in Ottone III e Romualdo di Ravenna, pp.
45–84; and Althoff, Otto III, pp. 110–12. L.A. Berto, La visita segreta di Ottone III, in L.A. Berto, La
guerra, la violenza, gli altri e la frontiera nella «Venetia» altomedievale, Pisa 2016, pp. 75–81.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 105

very small number of monks left over when the main monastery had moved to
S. Ilario. From there, Otto was brought in at night to S. Zaccaria and then smuggled
into the ducal palace, where he spent a day before going back, equally surrepti-
tiously, to Pomposa. It was only three days later that both rulers made the visit
public, with the Ottonian court allegedly astounded, while the Venetians, accord-
ing to John the Deacon, praised the doge’s wisdom and acts.249 Of course John,
who was behind the whole set-up, would claim that his compatriots were happy
about it; if they were not, we are not told, and in any case it was too late by then,
and they had to make the best of it, reassured that at least the doge had not con-
ceded anything of importance. We are told about the mutual gifts that the two
exchanged,250 but we do not know how satisfied Otto was with the result of the
visit, and whether he had achieved his goal, whatever it was, since we do not know
anything about the discussions which took place during the night and the day
that Otto spent in the city. Otto, despite his youth and idealism, was no fool, and
he was aware that, much as he valued and respected Doge Peter, he had to make
sure of the doge’s obedience every now and then. This is probably the reason why,
in 996, Otto had asked Peter II for his godson, the young Otto, to be sent to him in
Ferrara. Young Otto arrived with a complement of Venetian ships, and he and the
emperor went on a sort of royal progress all the way to Ravenna, presumably to
make a public display of Venice’s allegiance, after which the young man was sent
back to his father, the doge, with numerous and rich gifts. It is possible that, after
the secret trip to Venice, Otto may have received no more than an assurance of
Venice’s support, but it is also likely that Otto may have believed this to be only
the beginning, and that he would have time to pursue this line later on—he did
not expect to die later that year at the age of 22!
Yet another possible reason for the secrecy of the visit would have been the fact
that, however powerful and successful Venice may have become, it was still offi-
cially under the control of the Byzantine emperor, at this time a particularly
successful and powerful one himself, Basil II. Again, without prescience it would
not have been possible at that moment to predict that the Byzantine revival of the
tenth century would be of relatively short duration, and that Constantinople would
not reclaim stronger control over its dependencies. An open and triumphal visit
by the Western emperor, on that count too, would have been unwise. And Peter II
was anything but an unwise politician. In parallel with his rapprochement with
Otto III, he was pursuing a similar policy towards Constantinople. With the chrys-
obull of 992, he gained immense trade privileges in the imperial capital.251 Like
all doges, he sent his son to Constantinople to have his election confirmed and
receive the usual titles, honours, and gifts. Meanwhile, after Otto III’s death a

249 JnD IV, 60. 250 JnD IV, 59 and 62; see also Chapter 3.
251 Cessi II. 68; see M. Pozza and G. Ravegnani, eds., I trattati con Bisanzio, 992–1198 (Venice,
1993), pp. 21–5.
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106 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

large fleet was put together, possibly at the request, but more likely with the
agreement, of Constantinople, to attempt to dislodge the Muslims from Bari in
southern Italy—a Venetian fleet which gained a notable victory and achieved its
goal in 1003. Basil II invited Doge Peter’s son John to Constantinople and offered
him an imperial princess from the Argyros family, a niece of the emperors, as a
wife. He gained high honours there, notably the title of patricius, received a palace
to live in with his new wife, Maria, and on the Emperor Basil’s return from his
victorious campaign among the Bulgarians,252 he received yet more honours and
was sent back to Venice in 1004 with his pregnant bride, where he arrived to be
greeted by a rapturous reception and three days of street feasting and celebrations.
Rather significantly, while this open manifestation of Byzantine alliance was going
on, the new Western Emperor Henry repeatedly requested that the doge send his
son to him in Verona, to receive some form of homage from Venice, which Peter II
did after some hesitation, possibly because of the events in Constantinople. Thus,
for example, no representative of the doge was mentioned as having been present
at Henry’s coronation in Milan in 1014. The Byzantine honeymoon did not last
very long, partly through fate, since the virulent plague which struck Venice in
1006 killed John, his wife Maria, and their son, significantly christened Basil.253
One needs to recall the limitations of John as a chronicler of these events, and
his desire to present the best possible view of Peter II, and therefore keep an eagle
eye open for any inkling of possible difficulties between the two, the Western
emperors and the doges—the display of submission by Peter II’s son at Ravenna
being an example of Otto III keeping a close eye on this ally. Otto III’s secret visit
in 1001 was supposed to draw Venice closer into the imperial orbit, one assumes,
though it is possible that the young emperor did not gain much except expres-
sions of friendship and gifts at this stage, rather than a more committed policy in
whatever enterprise for which he may have wanted to use Venice. While John the
Deacon is eloquent about Peter II’s diplomatic skill in his imperial associations,
he also mentions events more directly relevant to the everyday life of Venice.
Examples are Peter II’s role in freeing the Venetians from the tribute they were
paying to the Croatian Serbs, and his clever use of the appeal for help made to
him by the Dalmatians of Zara against the Croatians, effectively to embark on a
campaign of conquest of Dalmatia, marked by a triumphant progress of the
Venetian fleet under his authority along the Adriatic coast, and earning him the
title of Dalmaticorum dux.254 But Peter II’s conciliatory style was, explains John
the Deacon, not the result of weakness. He was not prepared to gain peace at
all costs and, when necessary, would bring the might of the Venetian fleet to the
defence or the interests of the ‘patria’, as he did with the blockade of Belluno, the

252 C. Holmes, Basil II and the Governance of the Empire (976–1025) (Oxford, 2005).
253 JnD IV, 73. 254 JnD IV, 65.
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a tale of three cities: history and histories 107

Dalmatian campaign, and the victory at Bari. Coupled with his skill at uniting the
great families to the extent of gaining their agreement to abandon fighting in the
city, his major role in rebuilding the ducal palace and the basilica, and his gener-
osity in giving away his great wealth to the Venetians, the rule of Peter II much
surpassed his predecessors, even his saintly father, claims John the Deacon. After
the death of his son John and his family, it was the Venetians who made Peter II’s
son Otto a co-ruler. Having organized his succession minutely between his five
surviving sons—Otto set to succeed him, Ursus and Vitalis respectively Bishop
of Torcello and Archbishop of Grado, Henry (presumably too young to count, but
suggestively named after the emperor), and maybe another, Dominic—and his four
daughters—three nuns and one married to the ‘king of the Slavs’—Peter II died in
office in 1008, thus bringing to an end the first golden age of the city, according to
its chronicler.
Final considerations. The Ottonians’ interest in Italy did not focus exclusively
on Rome. Otto I was convinced of the need to control it, which for him meant
to control the papacy, in order to restore the Empire as it had been under
Charlemagne. But his interest was in a policy which would allow him to influence
the popes and to impress the Byzantine emperor. Otto II also regarded Rome as
an indispensable part of the Empire, though his interest was more in the recon-
quest of the whole of Italy, for which he sacrificed much—including his own
life—but without success. Both tried to use local aristocracies and bishops to
manoeuvre, especially in Rome and Ravenna, and Otto II tried to benefit from
internal conflicts in Venice to gain control of it and its navy. Otto III, whose ideals
were the most ‘imperialistic’ in the medieval sense of dreaming of a rebuilt Roman
Empire with a capital in Rome, on the classical model, was the least successful on
this score, and the least able to control the city—he spent the time he had to be
away from it in Ravenna. But he was not so naïve as not to realize the value of
Venice for its wealth and its geographical position, hence his attempts to gain the
doge to his cause. As outsiders, the Ottonians, by definition, needed alliances and
support from the elite of these cities, and courted it in numerous ways, including
through attempts to control their rulers (bishops and doge) and their aristocracies.
This was one side of the story: the elites of the cities in turn were also trying to use
the emperors, as they had done with the Byzantines and the Carolingians, to
ensure their own political role and success.
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2
The Actors
the Elites and the Populus, I: Rome

Introduction: the Society of Byzantine Italy

All three cities have in common the existence of an elite, whose roots lie in the
military aristocracy of the tribunes, sometimes described as the Byzantine Greek
military class which settled in Italy during and after the Gothic Wars. The work of
Diehl, Guillou, Rasi, Carile, and now Brown and Cosentino has, broadly speaking
and with variations, suggested the following scenario. The imported top layer of
the Byzantine Greek army transformed its political dominance into an economic
one, through buying land from impoverished local landowners and gradually
intermarrying with the local Italian population.1 They also became assimilated
into the local communities through the acquisition of titles and patronage of the
Church. By the eighth century, the merging of these two groups, the eastern mili-
tary elite and the local Italian landowners, had produced a cohesive political and
social city elite in Byzantine cities. The role of this elite was military resistance to
the Lombards in the first instance. Under the authority of the exarch of Ravenna
and his deputies the dukes, such as that of Rome, and their own counts and trib-
unes, a merger of military and judicial power became the norm. Traditionally, the
Byzantine government had favoured local autonomy in government by involving
local notables of mid and high rank in its military hierarchy (which, effectively,
rapidly absorbed the civilian hierarchy), so as to make their interests coincide

1 The following summary is based largely on the work of Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio,
pp. 203–5, 298–322; T. S. Brown, notably Gentlemen and Officers, ‘Byzantine Italy’, ‘Social Structure
and the Hierarchy of Officialdom in Byzantine Italy, 554–800’, PhD thesis (University of Nottingham,
1975), and especially ‘The Aristocracy of Ravenna from Justinian to Charlemagne’, CARB 33, 1986,
pp. 135–49 at pp. 137–40; Carile, ‘La società ravennate’, pp. 380–8; Carile, ‘Continuità e mutamento’,
pp. 115–45 at pp. 121–2, 130–2, 139–45, and Carile, ‘Terre militari, funzioni e titoli bizantini nel
Breviarium’, in Ricerche e studi sul ‘Breviarium Ecclesiae Ravennatis’ (Codice Bavaro), ed. A. Vasina
(Rome, 1985): Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo, pp. 81–94. S. Cosentino, ‘Antroponimia,
politica e società nell’Esarcato in età bizantina e post-bizantina’, in Martin, Peters-Custot, and Prigent,
L’héritage byzantin en Italie, II, pp. 173–84; Martin, Peters-Custot, and Prigent, ‘Il ceto dei “viri honesti”
(oi aidesimoi andres) nell’Italia tardo antica e bizantina’, Bizantinistica ser. 2/1 (1999), pp. 14–50;
Cammarosano, Nobili e re, pp. 3–74; Cosentino, Storia dell’Italia bizantina, pp. 82–4, 135–41, 150–3,
237–45; and on some older work, principally Diehl, Études sur l’administration byzantine; P. Rasi,
Exercitus italicus e milizie cittadine nell’Alto Medioevo (Padova, 1937), pp. 50–61 and 147–55; and
A. Guillou, ‘Esarcato e Pentapoli, regione psicologica dell’Italia bizantina’, Studi Romagnoli 18 (1967),
pp. 297–319, as well as his Régionalisme et indépendance.

Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000: Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present, and the Construction of City Identity.
Veronica West-Harling, Oxford University Press (2020). © Veronica West-Harling.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754206.001.0001
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 109

with those of the imperial administration. The top level of the army, dukes, and
tribunes held official charges from the emperor in Constantinople. The dukes in
particular, who directed the military administration including tax collection
(annona militaris), and the tribunes, who collected the taxes, both had ample
opportunities to annex public taxes, together with various other public rights, to
their private patrimony. This de facto privatization of public functions and rev­enues
strengthened the transition from Byzantine administration to local clientele
networks. At first, easterners dominated this group, but when military reinforce-
ments from Constantinople and the East were no longer forthcoming, from the
time of the Emperor Heraclius onwards at the beginning of the seventh century
the army commanders settled in Italy. They became Latinized, very rarely bilin-
gual (as we know from the example of a rare case of a Greek-speaking ancestor of
Agnellus in Ravenna)2 but with a distinctive identity. The army, the exercitus, was
recruited locally, some members being from civilian families who thus hoped,
through joining a powerful army, to regain some of their traditional wealth,
power, and status. Such families, called possessores or viri (h)onesti, still had some
economic power, but had become politically subordinate, though they still made
grants to the Church and took part in episcopal elections. Carile suggests that the
new elite used what had remained of the state apparatus, and that the military
commanders took this over, in the form of offices which procured them political
authority, judicial privileges, and prestigious dignities, as well as public rights and
revenues. They used traditional titles and public rights to pay the fisc a lump sum
in land tax, perhaps rather below the level of their income, and they used dignities
obtained through payment at court or on account of their office to gain authority
over a population used to being dominated by prefects and consuls, titles trad­
ition­al­ly belonging to the old senatorial aristocracy. Thus dukes, magistri militum,
and tribunes were able to set up relations of clientele with the local personnel,
creating a military-judicial-ecclesiastical establishment with local roots and
property.3 This elite was often grouped into local units known as numeri, or militiae.
A grant of 758 to the monastery of S. Erasmo on the Celio in Rome mentions the
numero militus seu banda servata; rather more strangely, a grant of 994 by members
of the de Imiza family to the neighbouring monastery of SS Andrea e Gregorio in
Clivo Scauro also cites the publicum numero milito seu bando, in what is likely to
have been a literal copy of an earlier document in an antiquarian style, or simply a
notarial formulary.4
The above scenario has been nuanced, at least in part, though not disproved,
through suggestions that, broadly speaking, the change was not due so much to a

2 Agnellus, LP, ch. 120.

3 The most interesting recent analysis of the evolution of the charges and roles of the dukes and
magistri militum in Byzantine Italy is by F. Borri, ‘Duces e magistri militum nell’Italia esarcale (VI–VIII
secolo)’, Reti Medievali 6/2 (2005).
4 RS no. 111; SSAG II. 130.
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110 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

massive import of Greek or eastern military personnel as to the gradual change in

vocabulary, which made the local aristocracy begin to use Byzantine military
titles or keep their lands, which became thus assimilated within the Byzantine
hierarchy. While it is not possible to work out the size of the immigration and the
ratio in relation to what could have been simply a transformation of the existing
local powers, what seems certain is that incoming groups and local elites became
effectively merged into a new local elite.
Despite this obvious militarization of society in the Exarchate, there was no
complete disappearance of the civilian status among the elites. Eighth-century
documents from the Exarchate show that, of the seven grants and seventy leases
still extant, five grants and twenty-five leases were for the military elite and ten
for the clergy, with the remaining associated with civilian landowners or lower
military-level lessees of land.5 Cosentino argues that the eighth century saw a
decline in the viri honesti—though it is once again possible that the change
shows less a decline of the category as a change of terminology—in favour of
optimates and milites, and, among the optimates, in the highest levels of dux,
tribune, and magister militum: 40 per cent of the land of the Exarchate was in the
hands of army men. The group of the viri honesti gradually changed into some-
thing else, but it did not completely disappear. Most importantly, there was never
a complete militarization of society, except in very special circumstances, such as
the need to defend the city, as was the case in Rome, and in Ravenna in 735.6 The
qualifiers of vir honestus or femina honesta are still to be found in Rome in the
eighth century (Basilius, Calis, Constantina, Sergia, Theodosia),7 and in Ravenna
in the tenth century.
After the end of Byzantine rule in the mid-eighth century, the aristocracy of
Ravenna gradually turned into the great noble families dominating the city and
its environs into the eleventh century. The landed wealth and power of members
of these great families made them either remain wealthy through land leased
from the Church through emphyteutic contracts and owning houses and monas-
teries in the city, or led them to take the path of an ecclesiastical career in the
archbishop’s court, many subsequently becoming new archbishops and ecclesias-
tical grandees, or both.8 In Rome, the same elite of the army under the authority

5 Cosentino, ‘Viri honesti’, pp. 43–4. 6 Agnellus, LP, ch. 153.

7 Cosentino, ‘Viri honesti’, Appendix, pp. 44–8. Chris Wickham has recorded about forty examples
of these qualifiers in Roman documents over the period from the mid-eighth to the end of the tenth
century; I should like to thank him for allowing me to use his database of charters, which has been of
great value to this work.
8 See, for example, Brown, ‘The Aristocracy of Ravenna’, pp. 144–8; Carile, ‘La società ravennate’
pp. 395–8; and the articles in A. Vasina et al. eds., Ricerche e studi sul ‘Breviarium ecclesiae Ravennatis’
(Codice Bavaro) (Rome, 1985), esp. B. Andreolli, ‘Le enfiteusi e i livelli del “Breviarium” ’, pp. 163–77,
and A. Carile,‘Terre militari, funzioni e titoli bizantini nel ‘Breviarium’, pp. 81–93; Andreolli, ‘Il potere
signorile’, pp. 311–9; and Vespignani, La Romania, pp. 51–4.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 111

of the Byzantine duke saw its secular administrative or political career path
cancelled by the end of Byzantine power in the city. Only one alternative military
and secular career path opened up, that of service in the growing administra-
tion of the papal bureaucracy and court, with opportunities for power lying in
the influence of various families during papal elections, and the possibility of
dom­in­at­ing papal policy in the background in order to gain control of the city
of Rome.9 On occasion, players from the old Lombard duchies also gained a
hold in Rome, most evidently in the case of Alberic I when he married into the
Theophylact family in the early tenth century, though Alberic was a Frank, who
had taken the duchy of Spoleto away from its last Lombard duke. Frankish aris-
tocracies put in place by the Frankish kings from Charlemagne, and especially
from Louis the Pious and Lothar, onwards, as missi and counts, later gained
power through local marriages. They became key players in the old Lombard
kingdom and, by extension, from Emilia into the Romagna, sometimes finding
a place among the aristocracy dominating Ravenna—though to a much lesser
extent in Rome.10 Other than the usual Latin and a few Greek names due to their
common nature or the element of fashion, there was very little change in terms of
anthroponymy in Byzantine Italy until the ninth century, when, in the area of
the old Exarchate at any rate, we see a considerable rise in Germanic names, from
2 per cent in the seventh century to 50 per cent at the end of the tenth century.11
The same, though to a lesser extent, applies to Rome, where Germanic names in
documents between 900 and 1050 constitute a total of 20 per cent of the known
ones, but where concomitantly Greek names come down from 25 to 12 per cent.12
In Venice, a similar structure of dukes and tribunes eventually coalesced into a
new class, with a mixed source of wealth in land in the terraferma, and money
gained through the Adriatic trade, and produced the plethora of aristocratic
families which would be so active in the fierce fighting for power in the city from
the late eighth century onwards.13

9 Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 4–10.

10 A. Castagnetti, ‘Immigranti nordici, potere politico e rapporti con la società longobarda’, in
Kommunikation und Mobilität im Mittelalter, ed. S. de Rachewiltz and J. Riedman (Sigmaringen,
1995), pp. 38–60, tr. C. Belloni, Comunicazione e mobilità nel medioevo, (Bologna, 1997), pp. 47–107;
Gasparri, Italia longobarda, pp. 130–9; Cammarosano, Nobili e re, pp. 111–229; and, most recently,
E. Schoolman, ‘Nobility, aristocracy and status in early medieval Ravenna’, in Herrin and Nelson,
Ravenna, pp. 211–328.
11 Cosentino, ‘Antroponimia’, pp. 173–6; see below.
12 T. Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘La società romana nei secoli IX–XII e i rapporti patrimoniali fra
coniugi. Alla ricerca di un retaggio bizantino’, in Martin, Peters-Custot, and Prigent, L’héritage byzan-
tin en Italie, II, pp. 75–100 at p. 79.
13 Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, and Castagnetti, ‘Famiglie e affermazione politica’, both in SV; Castagnetti, La
società veneziana nel medioevo I and II; R. Cessi, ‘Le origini del patriziato veneziano’, in his Le origini
del ducato veneziano, pp. 323–39.
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112 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

The Roman Aristocracy

The Roman aristocracy from the mid-sixth century onwards was no longer
identical to the late antique senatorial families, which had been either in steady
decline after Justinian’s reconquest of Italy or remained in office and power, but
no longer in Rome. Aristocrats had essentially abandoned their western estates
and roots, to move to the East and Constantinople, where some of them were still
part of the new senate.14 From the late sixth century onwards the newly estab-
lished aristocracy was made up of the Greek and eastern officials of the army and
the imperial administrators sent to Italy. The exarchs in Ravenna and their
deputies (such as the dukes of Rome) were now part of this non-senatorial, or
even ex-senatorial, local elite. They represented the emperor in Constantinople
and were, therefore, the supreme civil authority in Rome too. At their head was
the duke, representative of the exarch in Ravenna, and until the second half of
the eighth century both exarchs and dukes were sent to Italy directly from
Constantinople, being functionaries of the imperial palace there.
The secular administration of Rome still used some of the old titles and func-
tions, but these gradually lapsed, so that, for example, the last mention of a Prefect
of the City, with the title of vir gloriosus, is of John under Gregory the Great in
599, before the title reappears, in a one-off mention about a John, brother of
Pope Stephen III, in 772.15 The senate was last mentioned in 593 by Gregory
the Great, to lament its demise, before a long period of disappearance from the
sources, only to reappear again, but with a different meaning, referring to the
primates of the city, in the letter sent in 759/60 by omnis senatus atque universa
populi generalitas a Deo servatae Romanae urbis, to Pepin.16 Words such as
senate and senator were used mostly by Frankish writers like Regino, and the
author of the Annals of Fulda. The former mentioned that in 872 ‘The Roman
senate declared . . . Adalgis to be a tyrant’ and that in 881 ‘Charles [the Fat] coming
to Rome, was . . . received . . . by the Roman senate’; the latter stated that in 896
‘the whole of the senate of the Romans came to receive the king . . . ’ and that

14 Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 191–8, 203–5; for an excellent summary of the history of
the aristocracy in Rome before our period, see Marazzi, ‘Aristocrazia e società’, pp. 41–70, or
‘Aristocratie et société’, pp. 89–125.
15 Gregory, Register IX, 117 and 118, in D. Norberg, S. Gregorii Magni Registrum epistularum,
CCSL 140 (Turnhout, 1982); Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 200–3; Brown, Gentlemen and
Officers, pp. 4–37; LP I. 97 ch. 13, for Pope Stephen III’s brother.
16 CC 13. The most reliable works on the Roman senate in the early Middle Ages are G. Arnaldi,
‘Rinascita, fine, reincarnazione e successive metamorfosi del senato romano (secoli V–XII)’, ASRSP
105 (1982), pp. 5–56 and G. Arnaldi, ‘Il Senato in Roma altomedievale’, in G. Arnaldi, Il Senato nella
storia II, Il Senato nel medioevo e nella prima età moderna (Rome, 1997), pp. 95–101; O. Bertolini,
‘Appunti per la storia del senato di Roma durante il periodo bizantino’, Annali della Scuola Normale
Sup. di Pisa 20 (1951), pp. 231–61; and, most recently, P. Burgarella, ‘Il Senato’, in Roma nell’Alto
Medioevo, Settimane 48 (2001), pp. 121–75.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 113

‘Constantine and Stephen, were great among the senators’.17 It is generally assumed
that these were antiquarian literary expressions from writers north of the Alps,
who used their classical knowledge to define thus the leading aristocratic figures
in the city—though the terms are also sometimes found in the Liber Pontificalis,18
possibly through Frankish influence.
The passage of time, together with the Lombard advance into central and
southern Italy, which led to an increasing isolation of the Greek army personnel,
had two fundamental effects. The first was to speed up the integration of the military
elites with the local population, who gained land and put down roots, to the extent
that the new generations no longer had any overwhelming devotion to the emperor
in Constantinople. He seemed too far away and apparently too unconcerned with
the defence of Italy against the Lombards, which had to be increasingly a matter
for the local exercitus of Rome, made up in part of descendants of original Greek
settlers now mixed with the local population.19 This is reflected at the highest
level, with the vir illustris Platon, appointed to the highest level of a court career
in imperial service on the Palatine, and entrusted with the cura palatii Urbis
Romae—his son would be Pope John VII (705–7)20. To this population was added
the Lombard migration from Campania, Sabina, and Tuscia, that is from the
duchies of Spoleto and Benevento, which throughout the eighth century saw their
interests increasingly correspond to those of the papacy, against the Lombard
kingdom and its king.21 We note the presence of these ‘Lombards’ in Rome from
their alliance with the Romans of the city in their defence of the popes.22 The
defence of the papacy was often led by the schola of the Lombards. Lombard
names associated with the papacy, such as the chamberlain Paul Afiarta, are not
uncommonly found among papal administrators, men representative of the trad­
ition of Lombard notariate, and referring to themselves as iudices in the Lombard
style. The presence of a Lombard element in the city is evident, and one must
avoid generalizations about the conflict between Romans and Lombards in Rome
as a reflection of ethnic differences.
The second development, also due to the needs of the defence of Italy, would
be to increase the importance of the military government, which took on civil,
judicial, and administrative functions, to the extent of leaving in place only one

17 Regino 872, 881; AF 896.

18 The Life of Pope Hadrian in 779–80, LP I, 97 ch. 69, has the first mention of the ‘Senate’ since
Gregory I.
19 Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 298–303, 318–24; Brown, Gentlemen and Officers,
pp. 82–108; Cosentino, Storia dell’Italia bizantina, pp. 66–71, 77–103; Bavant, Le duché byzantin de
Rome, pp. 41–88; Cammarosano, Nobili e re, pp. 48–96; T. Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘La Militia a Roma.
Il Formarsi di una nuova aristocrazia (secoli VII–VIII)’, in Martin, Peters-Custot, and Prigent,
L’héritage byzantin en Italie, II, pp. 559–83.
20 LP I, 88. 21 Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 85–6.
22 LP I, 91 ch. 19; J. T. Hallenbeck, ‘The Lombard party in eighth-century Rome: a case of mistaken
identity’, Studi medievali 15 (1974).
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114 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

real elite, that of the armies, in charge of governing Byzantine Italy and thus Rome.
But these two developments ultimately had a major impact on Roman policies.
The new military elite became less concerned with defending the emperor, exarch,
and duke, and Byzantine Italy, than their local leader, who was present and
involved in the defence and running of the city—the bishop of Rome. This shift is
increasingly visible throughout the seventh century, much enhanced by the reli-
gious conflict of Monothelitism, then in the eighth century as a result of the
much-hated combination of imperial tax rises and iconoclasm.23 Gradually, this
new elite of notables of the city—the militia of Rome, possessors of land around
Rome, founders or principal donors of monasteries and churches, and protectors
of diaconiae—24 became the city’s primates. Many had titles still imperial in origin,
such as Zacharias cartularius et magister censuum Urbis Romae25, and especially
the frequent consul et dux. But throughout the eighth century these titles became
associated with the papal administration and slid from one into the other, to be
used for papal functionaries of the Lateran. This was especially true of the primic-
erius, the best example being that of the last official Duke of Rome, Theodotus, a
member of the same aristocratic family as Pope Hadrian I. He was known as
primicerius et dux, and was a founder and patron of the diaconia of S. Angelo in
Pescheria in 755 and a patron of the diaconia of S. Maria Antiqua.26
By the start of the eighth century, Rome still had an existing group of person-
nel associated with the Byzantine duchy.27 Officially, it was ruled over by the duke,
the appointee of the exarch of Italy, responsible for defence and imperial tax
collection. In the first instance, there had been no conflict of interests, since the
pope, as bishop of Rome, like all bishops in the East Roman world, was also
responsible for the maintenance of the urban fabric of the city,28 which had
become a large part of the papacy’s role from Gregory the Great onwards. Officially,
Rome was an imperial city like any other, governed by an imperial administrator,
even though it may have exercised a spiritual primacy due to its links to St Peter.

23 Noble, Republic of St Peter, pp. 15–60; Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 231–41.
24 On the diaconiae see Chapter 4. 25 RS no. 55.
26 LP I, 97 c.1–2; see Davis, LPC8, note 3. On Theodotus, S. Angelo, I. Lori Sanfilippo, ‘Un “luoco
famoso” nel medioevo, una chiesa oggi poco nota. Notizie extravaganti su S. Angelo in Pescheria
(VI–XX secolo)’, ASRSP 117 (1994), pp. 231–68, at 232–4, and the inscription at S. Angelo in Pescheria. On
his connection with, and his portrait in, S. Maria Antiqua, see W. Grüneisen, ‘I ritratti di papa Zaccaria
e di Teodoto primicerio nella chiesa di S. Maria Antiqua’, ASRSP 30 (1907); S. Lucey, ‘Art and Socio-
Cultural Identity in Early Medieval Rome: The Patrons of Santa Maria Antiqua,’ in Roma Felix:
Formation and Relections of Medieval Rome, ed. É. Ó Carragain and C. Neuman de Vegvar (Aldershot,
2007), pp. 139–58, and G. Bordi, ‘Laïcs, nobles et parvenus dans la peinture murale. Rome du VIIIe
au XIIe siècle’, in Les cahiers de Saint-Michel De Cuxa, 47, 2016: La peinture murale à l’époque romane.
Actes des XLVIIes Journées romanes de Cuxa 6–11 juillet 2015, pp. 37–44; and now M. Andaloro,
G. Bordi, and G. Morganti, eds., Santa Maria Antiqua tra Roma e Bisanzio (Milan, 2016), and
Osborne, Rasmus Brandt, and Morganti, eds., Santa Maria Antiqua. The identification between the
two is not completely secure and has been challenged.
27 Brown, ‘The Aristocracy of Ravenna’, pp. 42–69, 77–108.
28 Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 191–4, 200–30.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 115

But Byzantine Italy was not a society like any other Byzantine one. From the
moment of the Lombard invasion and the need to defend it continually from
their encroachment, its secular and military elite had gradually become more and
more closely identified with one another, to the extent that the militarization of
government and of the ruling elites had become complete.29 Increasingly, there-
fore, for Rome at any rate, it was not the slightly hazy duke who commanded the
loyalty of the people, but the pope.30 Towards the end of the Roman duchy, with
the abandonment of any effectual government by the Byzantines, the Roman
elites no longer saw any political and social career openings within the imperial
administration, but only within the remit of the papacy. Military, then aristo-
cratic, power, no longer able to channel its interests into secular honours, increas-
ingly moved its allegiance to the only remaining and real conduit of power—the
Church—meaning effectively a Lateran career, which had become the only one
open to the elites.31 These ruling families of the eighth to the early eleventh centuries
were those which traditionally provided the palatine judges, and other members
of the Lateran government, and they also provided, through their offspring (also
educated in the Lateran and destined to the ec­cle­si­as­tic­al hierarchy), the priest
and deacons of the city, and often the future popes. They were not a closed elite,
and new families of other Lateran bureaucrats, or families with rising landed
wealth and power in Lazio, could be, and were, in­corp­or­ated into it. Some of
these men, who later made up the entourage of Theophylact, Alberic, and the
Crescentii in the tenth century—men (and women) whose economic base seems
to have been mostly emphyteutic leases of Church lands32—would later call them-
selves by titles defining their political status outside Rome itself, like Ingebald
comes Sabinae. But in the city in the ninth and tenth centuries, they often used the
generic consul et dux, which was not a title denoting office, but one of status. They
were called primates Romae or optimates in both Roman and Frankish sources,
and later Ottonian ones, such as Liutprand in his account of Otto I’s takeover of
Rome in 963.33
Between the mid-eighth and the end of tenth century there were three hier­
arch­ies in Rome.34 The first was the military hierarchy, associated with the papal
militia, whose leader was the superista or magister militum. Sometimes there was
more than one, as the Liber Pontificalis makes clear in its account of the contested
papal election of 855, when Mercurius, Gregory, and Christopher all had this
title.35 Other senior military figures sometimes appear, such as Cesarius (son of

29 Brown, Gentlemen and Officers, pp. 82–108; Noble, Republic of St. Peter, pp. 5–9.
30 Noble, Republic of St. Peter, pp. 235–56.
31 Noble, Republic of St. Peter, p. 254; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 20–3.
32 Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 20–8, 186–220. 33 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, chs. 8–9.
34 Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 186–9.
35 LP I, 106, chs. 6 and 9. Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 614–21; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero,
pp. 4–5, 8–10; Noble, Republic of St. Peter, pp. 234–5, 248–9; P. Toubert, ‘Scrinium et palatium: la
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116 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Sergius magister militum), ordinatus super exercitum in 849.36 A hierarchy of rank

applied, as we can see in the case brought in 855 by Daniel magister equitum
against Gratian, eminentissimus magistro militum et Romani palatii (or Romanae
urbis) superista, obviously his superior, in front of the Emperor Lothar, for plot-
ting against the ‘Franks’.37 Under Pope Zacharias, we see an enhancement of the
role of superista, now the head of the papal army. This Roman militia, whose
importance we saw, for example, during the conflict between Duke Trasamund of
Spoleto and King Liutprand in 740, when this army, under the direction of the
pope, was the determining factor in the success of Liutprand and the exile of
Trasamund. What we cannot tell is whether this army really was under the com-
mand of the pope rather than of the Duke of Rome Stephen. The Liber Pontificalis
tells us it was the former, by saying that Duke Stephen was ‘left to rule’ when the
pope went to Terni, and that the pope ‘urged’ the army; but the Liber Pontificalis
would diminish the role of the Byzantine duke by saying this—maybe he was not
‘left to rule’ as a deputy but was still in control, and it was he who still commanded
the army. Clearly, however, the latter was already obeying the popes when they
had to choose between them and the representative of Byzantine authority. There
were probably other secular and/or military titles below that level, though mostly
we have no information about them: men, often called nobiles, whose career path
was one of the two major ones open to the lay aristocracy of the city, at any rate
until Theophylact then Alberic became the main military, as well as political,
leaders in the tenth century.38
The second major hierarchy open to the secular aristocracy was that of the
palatine judges. They were the primicerius, secundicerius, primus defensor, nomen-
clator, arcarius, saccellarius, and protoscriniarius.39 Although the judges had a
judicial role in the assemblies or placita, their functions were in fact much
broader. They constituted the secular arm of the papal administration in terms of
chancery, notariate, treasury, administration of papal lands, and papal charity. In
documentary sources, we see them as grantors, grantees, lessees, and of course
witnesses, to charters and leases. Over the period 750 to 1000, we have at least
fourteen mentions of the primicerius, nine of the secundicerius, nine of the arcarius,

formation de la bureaucratie romano-pontificale aux VIIe–IXe siècles, in Roma nell’alto medioevo,

Settimane 48 (2001), pp. 436–40; and Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 186–8.

36 LP I. 105, ch. 50. 37 LP I. 105, chs. 110–12 and 106, ch. 11.
38 Though we still find two examples of superista under Alberic, and Otto III briefly revived the
office of magister militiae superistae, SMVL, no. 1; RS, no. 155; SSAG, no. 124.
39 L. Halphen, Études sur l’administration de Rome au Moyen Age, 751–1252 (Paris, 1907), pp. 37–48,
and 89–146 for a list of office holders (updated in Toubert, Les structures, pp. 1349–53); O. Bertolini,
‘Le origini del potere temporale e del dominio temporale dei papi’, in I problemi dell’Occidente nel
secolo VIII, Settimane 20 (1973), pp. 237–8; Richards, The Popes and the Papacy, pp. 269–80; Toubert,
‘Scrinium et Palatium’, pp. 57–119, and Toubert, Les Structures, I, pp. 440–55; Noble, Republic of
St. Peter, pp. 212–41.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 117

four of the nomenclator, one of the sacellarius, and seven of the protoscriniarius.
The vestararius, a separate office, essentially financial, did sometimes also in­corp­
or­ate an overruling authority over the other judges, and was, in effect, increasingly
restricted to the top political leaders in the city.40 From the eighth century onwards,
the vestararius and the superista had been the major players in the Roman Church,
for example the superista Gratian and Pepin vestararius. At the next level down
was the primicerius. Under Pope Stephen II (752–7), after the pope had left Rome
for Pavia with ‘some of the sacerdotes and the chiefs of the militia’, he was finally
allowed to leave Pavia for Francia with the primicerius Ambrose and other Lateran
officers, such as the regionaries Leo and Christopher, probably notari defensores,
almost certainly all laymen.41 The primicerius, formerly consiliarius, Christopher
was one of the most important men in the mid-eighth century, succeeding
Theodotus as primicerius sometime between 756 and 764/6 until his death in 771,
and effectively making and unmaking alliances and popes.42 These men were the
heads of the aristocratic parties in Rome, as we will see through their impact on
Roman policies in the eighth century, with Christopher and his son Sergius, the
vestararius George de Aventino and his father-in-law Gregory the nomenclator, and
in the ninth century with Gratian, then the brothers Anastasius and Eleutherius.
In the tenth century, the two key functions held by the Roman aristocracy were
still the vestararius and superista, exemplified in the first case by Theophylact
vestararius and his wife Theodora vestararissa.43 The vestararius title appears
again for the husband of Theophylact’s granddaughter Marozia II senatrix,
another Theophylact.44 Lands in Lazio were attached to the office, which made its
holder rich as well as just powerful.45 Being a vestararius, or a superista/magister
militum, seems to have been the highest position a lay aristocrat could attain in
the hierarchy of the city. The first Theophylact had cumulated the titles of vestara-
rius and magister militum, but these became increasingly rare over the course of
the tenth century, being gradually replaced by the office of Prefect of the City
revived by Alberic. This was maintained by the Ottonians, to become the main
figure at the head of the city administration, replacing both vestararius and super-
ista, by the end of the century.
A few more domestic roles were also known, specific to the papal administra-
tion at the level below those mentioned above: the scriniarius, cubicularius,

40 RS, nn. 155, 126, 118; SMVL, n. 10A; Manaresi, Placiti, no. 254. In 985 (RF n. 402), a document is
dated by John vestararius.
41 LP I. 94, ch. 23. 42 In 764–6 he was still only cartularius; see CC 36.
43 See, for example, RS no. 87 (857), no. 6 (884): Pipinus vestararius; inscription on pavement of
Santa Maria Maggiore c.900, ed. in A. Mai, Scriptorum veterum nova collection e Vaticanis codicibus
edita V (Rome, 1831), p. 215, and RF no. 82 (927), for Theophylact, then RS no. 118 (966) for a
Stephanus, and no. 79 (976) for a John.
44 RS no. 155 (942).
45 For the lands of the office (identified as ius vestararii), see C. Wickham, ‘Iuris cui existens’, ASRSP
131 (2008), p. 10.
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118 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

mansionarius, and claviger, for example. Most of these roles were part of the specific
papal bureaucracy, out of which came the people who would eventually become
the future popes. In the tenth century, many were still married, even to the level
of the priesthood, not just members of the minor orders below the sub­deaconate.46
Among the rising families of the second half of the tenth century were several
who had been part of the papal administration, or their sons, such as John de
Primicerius and his son Leo, or Leo Protoscriniarius. Nevertheless, the tendency
to enforce clerical celibacy was clearly making great strides in the tenth century
and, as a result, we have a greater number of avowed concubinage in the sources,
as opposed to openly acknowledged married clergy.
These two essentially secular hierarchies (though palatine judges could be dea-
cons, and even sometimes bishops),47 were completed by a third: the ecclesiastical
hierarchy of the priests of the city’s tituli and great basilicas, the deacons of the
diaconiae, and the bishops of the sees around Rome.48 To these should be added a
handful of ecclesiastical offices in the bureaucracy, notably the bibliothecarius,
who was often a bishop.49 The path to power through ecclesiastical office was
often taken by one of the sons from a major aristocratic family, even as another
would follow that to the more secular office, as was the case of the family of Pope
Hadrian I from 772. His uncle Theodotus had been dux of Rome and then primic-
erius. Of the two nephews of Bishop Arsenius of Orté, one was the bibliothecarius
Anastasius, who did not succeed in his bid for the papacy in 855, and the other
was the military figure Eleutherius, who, having murdered the wife and daughter
of Pope Hadrian II (867–72) in 868, was in turn executed by the Emperor Louis
II’s judges.50 There was no opposition, or indeed sometimes distinction, between
ecclesiastical and secular hierarchies within the government of Rome in terms of
their structure, only in terms of individual office holders. Secular and ec­cle­si­as­
tic­al elites were intertwined, and they collaborated in terms of ceremonial, gov-
ernment, and justice, and also fighting when necessary, starting with the mil­itia
defending the papacy from the Byzantine plots of the eighth century, to the
attempts by Otto III to control the city in 998.51 When they divided into factions,

46 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 188; also, for married clergy, see Chapter 4 and T. Di Carpegna
Falconieri, Il clero di Roma nel medioevo (Rome, 2002), pp. 37–48, 86–96, and T. Di Carpegna
Falconieri , ‘Il matrimonio e il concubinato presso il clero romano (secc. 8–12)’, Studi storici 41 (2000),
pp. 943–71 at pp. 943–60.
47 Halphen, Études, p. 116, for two arcarii who were bishops in 879–96.
48 These would later become the three components of the college of cardinals; see M. Andrieu,
‘L’origine du titre cardinal dans l’église romaine’, in Miscellanea Giovanni Mercati (Vatican City, 1946),
V, pp. 113–44.
49 Di Carpegna Falconieri, Il clero di Roma, pp. 103–36.
50 For Hadrian I’s family, LP I. 97, chs. 1–2; the most recent work on Hadrian I is the biography by
Hartmann, Hadrian I, pp. 37–76, though not superseding D. S. Sefton, The Pontificate of Hadrian I
(772–95). Papal Theory and Political Reality in the Reign of Charlemagne (Ann Arbor, 1975). For
Arsenius’s nephews, Duchesne, I primi tempi, pp. 98–108; for the Eleutherius affair, ASB 868.
51 Various Byzantine plots against the papacy were foiled by the Romans, and by a conjunction of
Romans and Lombards from the Lombard duchies of Spoleto and Benevento, united in their
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 119

these were often along family rather than career lines, as in the 876 trial in Rome
of Pope John VIII’s opponents;52 and they were often heavily involved in the elec-
tion of popes, who most of the time were their relatives.

Aristocratic Families from 750 to 900

Between 750 and the end of the ninth century, we know of few specific families of
the Roman aristocracy, and then often because they are mentioned in connection
with the papacy. The best known is the family of the two brothers Stephen II and
Paul, based in the Via Lata area, where they founded and organized the monastery
variously known as SS Silvestro e Dionisio or SS Silvestro e Stefano in their family
home. Others are the family of Pope Hadrian I and his uncle, the primicerius
Theodotus, that of Pope Hadrian II, which had included another two popes previ-
ously, and the very rich father of Pope Stephen V.53 For the other families involved
in city politics through their association with the papacy, we have very few examples
of their economic activity, such as grants or disputes, before 900.54 Any inkling
we have of their existence is through their posts and political role. Such were the
primicerius Christopher and his son Sergius in the 740–50s, the superistae Gratian
and Daniel at the time of the Emperor Lothar, and, though slightly different in
terms of background, Toto of Nepi, the dux whose power base was obviously in
Lazio but who had a house in Rome, and who became involved in Roman politics
through the coup which installed his brother Constantine II as pope.55 Toto was
clearly not alone, and had allies—some presumably relatives—in the city.
Of the eighteen Roman popes of the eighth and ninth centuries, ten clearly
belonged to the Roman aristocracy (Stephen II, Paul, Hadrian I, Stephen IV,
Eugene, Valentine, Gregory IV, Sergius II, Hadrian II, and Stephen V), while Leo
IV and Nicholas I appear to have been from the elite of the Lateran bureaucracy
(itself, of course, aristocratic).56 Only four popes were not specifically defined as
‘noble’: Leo III, Paschal I, Benedict III, and Marinus.57 Popes of the Byzantine

de­ter­min­ation to protect Gregory II; subsequently the armies of the Exarchate, the Pentapolis and the
Venetiae rose against the imperial order to kill Pope Gregory II, rebelled against the exarch Paul, and
elected their own dukes. Later imperial plots against Gregory also failed.

52 Letter of John VIII ed. in MGH Ep. IV/9; see Arnaldi, Natale 875, pp. 5–6 and 20–8; Wickham,
Medieval Rome, p. 189.
53 LP I. 95 ch. 5.
54 SSC no. 2 (844: grant by Pope Sergius II to S. Silvestro), and C. Carbonetti Vendittelli ed., ‘Le più
antiche carte del convento di S. Sisto in Roma (905–1300)’, Codice Diplomatico di Roma e della regione
romana 4 (Rome, 1987), no. 1 (905: grant by Pope Sergius III to S. Maria in Tempuli).
55 For a detailed study of their role, see below.
56 On Leo IV, see K. Herbers, Leo IV. und das Papsttum in der Mitte des 9. Jahrhunderts (Stuttgart,
1996), pp. 95–104.
57 LP I. 94, 95, 97, 99, 101, 102, 103, 104, 108, 112; 105, 107; 98, 100, 106, 110. We have a strong
inkling, however, that Paschal I’s family area of power was on the Esquiline; see M. Luchterhandt,
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120 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

period, and this applies up to the mid-eighth century, were not necessarily of very
high status—indeed, when one is, such as John VII, son of one of the Byzantine
Palace officials, the Liber Pontificalis specifically makes that point, implying that
this was not the norm.58 The fact is understandable since, while the popes as
­bishops of the city of Rome, like bishops throughout the Roman Empire, were
supposed to look after the city’s practical life (infrastructure, food provision,
water supply), they were not expected to be different from bishops elsewhere in
the Empire, and to exercise any special political power, which was the prerogative
of the imperial administration. Thus some may have had aristocratic origins, like
Gregory I and John VII, but this was, in practice, of relatively little importance
for the job, even if Gregory I’s wealth and administrative experience as Prefect of
the City before becoming pope had been of great help. From the moment that
the Eastern Empire began to diminish in importance in Rome, throughout the
period of gradual detachment from it in the first half of the eighth century, and
throughout the conflict with the Lombards until 774 and the strengthening of the
Frankish association, the Roman aristocracy came to perceive that, increasingly,
power in Rome had to be achieved through control of the papacy. While in some
cases we only know of the aristocratic origin of a pope from the location of the
family home, for example around the Via Lata and SS Apostoli—the later
S. Silvestro (Stephen II and Paul)—in other cases, and increasingly so with time,
the noble origins of the pope’s family are spelled out in detail. The Liber Pontificalis
increasingly mentions the ‘noble ancestry, born to influential Roman parents’
(Hadrian I), the ‘noble ancestry and distinguished family’ (Stephen IV), and
highlights that the pope was ‘born of aristocratic and godly parents’ (Valentine),
‘of noteworthy birth’ (Gregory IV), had an ‘illustrious mother, noble ancestors,
high birth, parents’ nobility’ (Sergius II), and ‘noble parents’ (Stephen V).59 It is
precisely among the three popes not defined as noble that we find the pope who
would see the most notable plot against him, Leo III. Similarly, the challengers at
contested papal elections, Theophylact in 757 and John in 844, were very clearly
identified as being, if not popular candidates, at the very least supported by the
plebs. Only one, Constantine II, brother of Toto of Nepi and a layman, was from a
major aristocratic family of the Campania.60

‘Papst Paschalis I. (817–824), S. Prassede und die Reliquiare des Lateran: zum Umgang mit Geschichte
im päpstlichen Stiftungswesen des Frühmittelalters’, in Zugänge zu Archäologie, Bauforschung und
Kunstgeschichte. Festschrift Uwe Lobbedey, ed. M. Liedmann and V. Smit (Regensburg, 2017), p. 387;
and K. G. Beuckers, ‘Stifterbild und Stifterstatus. Bemerkungen zu den Darstellungen Papst Paschalis I
(817–24) in Rom und ihren Vorbildern’, in Form und Stil. Festschrift für Günther Binding zum 65, ed.
S. Lieb (Darmstadt, 2001).

58 LP I. John VII. 59 LP I. 95, 95, 97.1, 99.1, 102.1, 103.2, 104.1–2, 112.1.
60 LP II. 95.1–2 (Theophylact); 104.5 (John); for the events of Pope Stephen III and Constantine’s
succession, see LP I. 96, chs. 3–4; LP II.134: Leo VIII (963–5), 137: Benedict VI (972–4) and 141: John
XV (985–96).
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 121

One manifestation of this aristocratic elite was the identifying of the family
with specific churches, topographically within their area of control, sometimes
becoming associated with a particular titulus held by members of the family who
had become priests.61 In the ninth century, aristocratic families began to focus on
‘their’ churches, some the tituli which they usually controlled. These, however,
were still traditionally community churches, and the papal scope in terms of pro-
motion of their own family was perforce somewhat limited. For that reason, they
often preferred to be patrons of diaconiae, or favour a titulus by setting up a mon-
astery attached to it, as did Paschal I at S. Prassede and S. Cecilia, so that the
monks could supply the prayer ad memoriam for the founder. S. Prassede rapidly
became the most sumptuous of titular churches, copying and adding elements of
St Peter’s itself (an annular crypt, a presbyterium with columns above the crypt,
the large use of spolia from antiquity, especially marbles). S. Prassede is the best
example demonstrating the break with the old hierarchy of ranking of basilicas
and tituli, since here a titulus became almost as prestigious and beautified as one
of the great basilicas of the city. It is the perfect example of the new-style church
with its mix of the cult of relics with the memory of a founder/refounder, and the
intercession for their family. The more modest restoration of Gregory IV at
S. Marco (Plate 3), his ‘family’ titulus, were surpassed considerably by those of
Sergius II at SS Silvestro e Martino, with once again a translation of relics on a
grand scale, and the addition of a crypt and a monastery; and with Leo IV at the
SS Quattro Coronati. Such behaviour had become normal in the ninth century,
with noble popes’ interest in the salvation of their own family, which was as
important to them as the historical awareness of the Roman Christian past.
Most of the secular papal functionaries were also arguably part of the Roman
aristocracy, if one is to judge by the location of their homes: the Via Lata, the
Clivus Argentarius, Sub Capitolio (Regio VIII), or the Gallina Albas region
(Quirinal).62 As most popes eventually came from this social elite too, they were
closely related to the secular papal functionaries, even though they themselves
had followed an ecclesiastical career, usually through the diaconate and the
priesthood.
Despite their sometimes diverse origins, most popes were similar in one
respect: their education.63 It has been argued that the acceptance of aristocratic
popes by the papal administration was made possible by the fact that they had
been nurtured and educated in the Lateran, by the Lateran clergy and administration.
This would not only make them acceptable to the clergy of the papal court but in
fact provide a suitable grooming and similarity of outlook, which would ensure a

61 M. Luchterhandt, ‘Rinascita a Roma, nell’ltalia carolingia e meridionale’, in Storia dell’Architettura

ltaliana: Da Costantino a Carlo Magno, II, ed. S. De Blaauw (Milan, 2010), pp. 322–73.
62 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 47–8, 188; 100, 215.
63 Noble, Republic of St Peter, pp. 206, 209.
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122 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

continuing tradition. With the exception of the unknown (Syrian, Greek) and the
unsaid (Eugene, Gregory IV, John VIII, and Hadrian III), and, of course, of the
layman Constantine II, future popes were often taken on from their homes as
children by the current pope, sometimes from among their relatives, and brought
to the patriarchium to be trained in letters, music, and general administration,
almost as though there was an unspoken agreement to choose the most flexible
and possibly the most intelligent child of these great families, to prepare them for
their possible future role. This may have been the case for the future Pope Hadrian
I, clearly the candidate of the military aristocracy, but educated in the Lateran,
and thus agreed upon by its bureaucracy. He may well have been planning to con-
tinue the tradition, since he appointed his nephew Paschal as the new primicerius,
reinforcing the family group’s hold over the papacy. However, the Lateran admin-
istration had many non-aristocratic members too, and sometimes they were
among the contenders at contested elections, such as the archdeacon Theophylact
in 757 and the deacon John in 844.
The best overview that one can have to gain an idea of the aristocratic elite at
the end of the ninth century comes from the list of names recorded at the trial of
the opponents of John VIII (872–82) in 876.64 It included the nomenclator
Gregory and the secundicerius Stephen, sons of Theophylact nomenclator (pos­sibly
the ancestors of Theophylact vestararius, the early tenth-century ruler of the city);
the magister militum and vestararius George, son of the primicerius Gregory, who
had married Pope Benedict III’s niece first, and then Gregory nomenclator’s daugh-
ter; Sergius magister militum son of Theodore magister militum, who had married
Pope Nicholas I’s niece; and Gregory nomenclator’s other daughter Costantina,
who had married in succession the sons of Pipin vestararius and of Gregory magis­
ter militum.65 This mix shows the close connection between the different layers of
the aristocracy, combining the military leaders and the Lateran officials (the magis­
ter militum and vestararius George—part of the military elite—was the son of the
primicerius Gregory, who had married Pope Benedict III’s niece—in both cases the
secular Lateran elite) as much as between members of the same elite group among
the Lateran functionaries (the nomenclator Gregory and the secundicerius Stephen,
sons of Theophylact nomenclator). One can also infer the importance of a rela-
tively small group of elite members around the pope, one where intermarriage was
frequent, as we will see continue in the tenth century.
Did the Carolingian period see any Frankish migration and settlement in
Rome in the second half of the eighth and in the ninth centuries? We know of the
presence of imperial envoys, of which we hear at times of particular crisis, but
who were present in some cases as permanent envoys (missi). There seems no
evidence however, according to Bougard, of any settlement of major aristocratic

64 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 189; Arnold, Johannes VIII, p. 181.

65 See above, n. 49, and Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 78–9.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 123

families in Rome,66 in the way we know they settled in the kingdom of Italy, for
example in Tuscany or in Friuli.67 There seems to have been no Carolingian
migration into Roman aristocratic society, except for temporary political reasons,
even as there was considerable influence of the Carolingians in terms of ideology,
art, and church architecture in the city. But this, as I plan to show in the following
chapters, is part of Frankish influence, not in the city of Rome itself but on the
papacy itself, St Peter’s, and the relics of the city. The Franks confused the city of
Rome with the Vatican, where the imperial palace of the Carolingians was, and
presumably the residence of the missi as well as of the emperor.68 Rome as a city
did not interest them to the same extent, and thus they did not penetrate Roman
society and its elites, with which they were often in conflict. On the contrary, we
have more than one example of a rather hostile perception by chroniclers of
Roman society. In a letter written in 799, Alcuin suggests that Rome was ‘in the
grip of fratricidal strife and incessantly poisoned by feuds, so that [Charlemagne]
ha[d] had to leave [his] pleasant home in Germany to check this ruinous infection’,
while Notker claims that it ‘had always been the constant habit of inhabitants of
Rome to oppose and be the constant enemies of every pope of any influence’.69
The resources of the Roman aristocracy came from land held from the papacy
or the great abbeys on long leases, especially Subiaco and Farfa, in the Roman
Campania and the Sabina.70 This began after the papacy first of all built up its
land base in a considerable way in order to cope with the confiscation of its
Sicilian holdings in the mid-eighth century. It continued with the creation of the
Patrimonium of St Peter in the second half of the eighth century, as a result of
Pepin’s ‘Donation’, after the Carolingian repossessions. In the first case, the land
had been sometimes turned into the domuscultae, which had expanded especially
under Hadrian I. Under Pope Zacharias (741–52), the domuscultae had been
created to offset the loss of income from the papal properties in Sicily and the
south of Italy, to be used either to provide poor relief and food distribution in

66 F. Bougard, ‘Les Francs à Venise, Ravenne et Rome: un facteur d’identité urbaine?’, in West-
Harling, Three Empires, pp. 227–47 at 237–47; Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Società romana’, pp. 75–7.
67 Castagnetti, ‘Immigranti nordici’, pp. 47–107; Albertoni, L’Italia carolingia, pp. 88–95;
Cammarosano, Nobili e re, pp. 176–85; E. Hlawitschka, Franken, Alemannen, Bayern und Burgunder
im Oberitalien 774–962: Zum Verständnis der frankischen Königsherrschaft In Italien (Freiburg, 1960),
pp. 23–93.
68 See Chapters 4, 5, and 6.
69 Alcuin, p. 114; Notker, I. 26. See P. Liverani, ‘St Peter’s and the city of Rome between Late
Antiquity and the early Middle Ages,’ in Old Saint Peter’s, ed. McKitterick, pp. 21–34, and
T. F. X. Noble, ‘Rome and the Romans in the medieval mind: empathy and antipathy’, in Studies on
Medieval Empathies, ed. K. F. Morrison and R. M. Bell (Turnhout, 2013), pp. 291–315; see also
Chapter 6.
70 On the economic changes in the city from the eighth century onwards, see especially P. Delogu,
‘Introduction’, pp. 22–5, and Marazzi, ‘Roma, il Lazio, il Mediterraneo’, pp. 267–85 in Paroli and
Delogu, La storia economica di Roma. See also Marazzi’s earlier work on ‘Da suburbium a territorium’;
Marazzi, Patrimonia Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae, pp. 1–334; and Marazzi, ‘I patrimoni della chiesa
romana’, pp. 33–50. See also Wickham, Medieval Rome, passim.
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124 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Rome or, possibly, as Noble has suggested, to settle and fund an army, the militia
Petri, to be used as a papal military force.71 The domuscultae had been originally
run directly by the popes, and not leased to the Roman or local aristocracy, and if
indeed the men working on them were used by the popes as a militia, this would
explain why the Roman aristocracy claimed that the papacy had ‘usurped’ these
lands unlawfully, without offering proper compensation, as was the case in 823.
That year a rebellion seems to have contributed to the plot against Pope Paschal I,
among men who may have been tenants of lands which had been, they alleged,
confiscated by the papacy without fair compensation, for the creation of the
domuscultae.72 Essential to the complaints was the fact that land given to St Peter
was inalienable, as is made clear in grants such as those of the nobleman
Theodore, when he gave an estate on the Tiburtina which became a domusculta,
or by Anna, widow of the former primicerius Agatho.73 The complaints of papal
expropriation and abuses continued under Popes Leo III and Pachal I, thus lead-
ing to the direct actions of Emperor Lothar. These men were bitterly recounting
injustices carried out by ‘several popes in the past’, they said, and they claimed to
have become directly involved in what might have been the rebellion against the
pope on that account. Certainly it led them to appeal to the Emperor Louis the
Pious for the return of these properties. He sent his son Lothar to Rome, and the
latter was appealed to with

serious charges . . . against the Roman pontiffs and judges. It was discovered that
the estates of many had been unjustly confiscated, either by the ignorance or
idleness of certain pontiffs, and also by the blind and rapacious greed of the
judges. Therefore, by restoring what things had been wrongfully taken away,
Lothair caused great joy for the Roman people.74

The Royal Frankish Annals show that there was obviously a strong feeling about
this issue, by saying that ‘Lothar [when] in Rome’ ordered the affairs of the Roman
people, which ‘for a long time had been confused due to the wickedness of several
popes’. As a result of his intervention, ‘all who had been injured by the loss of their
fortune were marvellously consoled by the return of their possessions’, brought
about by Lothar’s appearance on the scene.75
Most of this papal land, as well as that of the great abbeys, which were also
major landowners in the city,76 was leased to the local aristocracy in the form of
emphyteutic leases. Some papal posts, in particular that of vestararius, carried

71 Noble, Republic of St Peter, p. 248. 72 Astronomer, II. 38. 73 LP I. 93, chs. 25–6.
74 Astronomer, II. 38. 75 ARF 824.
76 Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 207–8; on the properties of Subiaco and Farfa in Rome, see I. Lori
Sanfilippo, ‘I possessi romani di Farfa, Montecassino e Subiaco – secoli IX–XII’, ASRSP 103 (1980),
pp. 13–39.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 125

with them grants of considerable papal land, which greatly contributed to the
wealth, and thus the political power, of their holders. Some land was exchanged
between aristocratic post holders, for example under Hadrian I one Leoninus
consul et dux, later a monk, exchanged an estate with one bequeathed by a count
Peter to Agnes, widow of the former scriniarius Agatho, and to Theodota, widow
of the former praefectorius Dominic.77 Also leased out by the papacy, to whom all
the ex-imperial land in the city had been offered as part of the ‘restitutio’ by Pepin,
were houses and property in Rome, including churches, and sometimes parts of
what had been the public spaces of the city, now derelict, for example in the
im­per­ial Fora, on the Palatine, in the Colosseum, and in the Campus Martius.78

Aristocratic Families in the Tenth Century

Because of its past and rising importance in a European context under the
Carolingians, Rome had a more varied and complex urban government than
other cities, which allowed for more room at the top of the political pile. This
meant that there was a sufficiently large group of powerful men with access to
power in Rome and its countryside to satisfy the needs of most important fam­ilies
in the city, so that they did not need to expand or compete outside it in Italy itself.
A study of the main individual figures and of the Roman nobility is essential. But
since considerable work has already been done on it and a definitive analysis
recently provided by Wickham, I will only summarize his conclusions and simply
highlight a few key elements.79
By the tenth century, no longer supported by the Franks, the papacy lost influ-
ence in the city, where elite groups now took over: Theophylact, Alberic, and the
Crescentii, with other families forming part of their entourage such as the de
Imiza and Benedict Campaninus.80 The two principal forms of power of such

77 LP I. 97 ch. 63.
78 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 34–59, 71–2, 157–88, 201–11;
R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘L’insediamento aristocratico a Roma nel IX–X secolo’, in Rome des quartiers:
des vici aux rioni, ed. M. Royo et al. (Paris, 2008), pp. 229–393; R. Santangeli Valenzani, 2004, ‘Abitare
a Roma nell’alto medioevo’, in Paroli and Vendittelli eds., Roma dall’antichità all’alto medioevo II,
pp. 41–59.
79 Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 181–212.
80 The main traditional studies are: Cecchelli, ‘Note sulle famiglie romane’, pp. 69–95; Fedele,
‘Ricerche’, pp. 177–247, 393–423, and 75–115; O. Gerstenberg, Die politische Entwicklung des römis-
chen Adels im 10. und 11. Jahrhundert (Berlin, 1933), and O. Gerstenberg, ‘Studien zur Geschichte des
römischen Adels im Ausgang des 10. Jahrhunderts’, Historische Vierteljahrschrift 31 (1937), pp. 1–26;
Kölmel, ‘Beiträge zur Verfassungsgeschichte Roms’, pp. 521–46; Kölmel, ‘Rom und der Kirchenstaat
im 10. und 11. Jahrhundert bis an die Anfänge der Reform’, Abhandlungen zur mittleren und neueren
Geschichte 78 (1935); Sickel, ‘Alberich II’; more recent are C. Wickham, ‘Nobiltà romana e nobiltà
italiana prima del Mille: parallelismi e contrasti’, in Carocci, La nobiltà romana nel Medioevo, pp. 5–14,
at 5–9, 14; Carocci, ‘The Romans according to their malign custom’, pp. 151–67; Carocci, ‘The chan­
ging composition of early elites’, in Théorie et pratiques des élites au Haut Moyen Âge, ed. F. Bougard,
R. Le Jan, et al., (Turnhout, 2012); Carocci, Medieval Rome, pp. 190–204. For some im­port­ant families
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126 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

families, other than their land and property holdings, included firstly control, and
sometimes reform, of Roman monasteries, of which more will be said in
Chapter 4. The second consisted in controlling the papacy itself, both through
filling in the posts in the Lateran papal administration and, whenever possible,
through the election of candidates acceptable to the elite as popes—hence the
name given by some historians to this period in the history of the papacy until
1049, the ‘Adelspapsttum’.81
The early tenth-century popes had at first followed the same model as their
ninth-century predecessors. At the highest level, there were links between the
family of Theophylact and probably Pope Sergius III, possibly associated with
Marozia.82 In the next generation, the most distinguished pope by birth was, of
course, Octavian, Alberic’s son, later John XII, while John XIII may have been a
relative of Crescentius a Caballo Marmoreo.83 These very high-placed popes, with
their foothold within the higher echelons of the Roman and Lazio rulers and con-
nections, were, in a way, the landmark ones, with a large number of minor figures
in between throughout the tenth century, whose role seems to have been to pro-
vide compromise candidates at the worst times of clashes for power in the city.
Many of them reigned for less than a year or two,84 either because they were stop-
gaps or because they were quickly deposed by a rival party, such as Popes Leo V
and Christopher, or Benedict V and John XV. Some of those who reigned for
longer, unless they were members of the main Roman aristocratic families
(Theophylacts including Alberic, Crescentii), might do so as long as they accepted
secular rule, as did Pope Stephen VIII (932–42) under Alberic.85 Perhaps con-
trary to the traditional view of the ‘epoca di ferro’, which saw the tenth century as

see K. Görich, ‘Die de Imiza’, QFIAB 74 (1994), pp. 1–41; Toubert, Les Structures, for the de Primicerius,
p. 1224, and de Meliosus, p. 964; G. Bossi, ‘I Crescenzi’, Dissertazioni della Pontificia Accademia
romana di archeologia ser. 2, 12 (1915), pp. 49–126, F. Marazzi, ‘Crescenzi’, in Dizionario Enciclopedico
del Medioevo I, pp. 501–2.

81 Halphen, Études, pp. 16–27, 147–56; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 11–15; Toubert, Les Structures,
pp. 963–1038. An older but useful work is Zimmermann, ‘Parteiungen und Papstwahlen’, pp. 29–88,
and Fedele, ‘Ricerche’.
82 For the letter of Archbishop John VIII of Ravenna to Theophylact and Eugenius Vulgarius’
poem, see Löwenfeld in ‘Il rotolo epigrafico’ and MGH Poet. IV.1, pp. 412–44 at 422–5; the scurrilous
accusations of Liutprand against Theodora and her alleged involvement with Pope John X, as put
forward by Liutprand, Antapodosis, II. 48, in his deliberate attempt to tarnish the reputation of the
Theophylact family, ancestors of John XII, have long been rejected. On a discussion of this see C. La
Rocca, ‘Liutprando da Cremona e il paradigma femminile di dissoluzione dei Carolingi’, in C. La
Rocca, ed., Agire da Donna. Modelli e pratiche di rappresentazione(secoli VI–X) Atti del convegno
(Padova, 18–19 febbraio 2005) (Turnhout, 2007), pp. 291–307, and P. Buc, ‘Italian hussies and
German matrons: Liutprand of Cremona on dynastic legitimacy’, Frühmittelalterliche Studien 29
(1995), pp. 27–41.
83 LP II. 136 and Duchesne, Liber Pontificalis, II, pp. 252–4.
84 Boniface VI (896), Romanus (897), Theodore (897), Leo V (903), Christopher (903–4), Benedict
V (964); Stephen VI (896–7); John IX (898–900), Anastasius III (911–13), Landus (913–14), Leo VI
(928–9), Stephen VII (929–31), Leo VI (963–5), Benedict VI (972–4), John XIV (983–4).
85 LP II. 130.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 127

a nadir for the papacy, totally under the control of the Roman aristocracy, it might
be more accurate to say that there was indeed a struggle to control the papacy,
though the major element of it was between the popes associated with Alberic’s
family or the Crescentii, and the Ottonian emperors. The struggle was not sim-
ply one of control over the papacy, but also, especially in the case of Alberic, an
attempt to reduce the influence of the popes to what Alberic probably saw as its
rightful remit, that of ministering to the Church of Rome rather than, on the
Carolingian model that it had increasingly adopted, being a political power con-
trolling areas of the remit of the prince.86 To that extent, Alberic made a con-
scious effort to revive an idea of the Roman republican or imperial period as
reinterpreted from classical sources, with the reuse of the word senate, the titles
of consul and senator, princeps or Prefect of the City, and thus attempted to restore
the perceived greatness of ancient Rome. This stance also led him to want to
restore the separation between secular and ecclesiastical government on a pre-
Constantinian model. Both his son and the Crescentii would thus have been
understandably opposed to the Ottonian idea of a papacy subjected to the
em­perors, with its power indebted to, and part of, the imperial power, notably
when it came to papal appointments.
When Theophylact became the foremost Roman aristocrat and effective ruler
of the city around 900, he did so as superista and vestararius.87 He was probably
descended from the ninth-century nomenclator Theophylact, who had been the
father of the nomenclator Gregory and related to George de Aventino, both of
whom had to flee Rome with Formosus when accused by Pope John VIII in 876.
The family began its ascent, from being a iudex, as Theophylact was described in
the placitum held by Louis III in Rome in 901, to the increasingly elevated titles
he would hold after the advent to the pontifical throne of Pope Sergius III.88
Theodora vestararissa, as his wife was known, was as highly esteemed as her hus-
band, and addressed with the greatest respect, for example by the future Pope
John X when still archbishop of Ravenna in a letter in 906.89 Their daughter
Marozia in effect maintained the family rule over the city between 925 and 932
(though she had no formal title as such except that of senatrix).90 She first mar-
ried Alberic of Spoleto. The latter had been one of Emperor Guy’s men, who came

86 V. West-Harling, ‘The Roman past in the consciousness of the Roman elites in the ninth and
tenth centuries’, in Transformation of Romanness, ed. W. Pohl and C. Gantner (Berlin, 2017).
87 For Theophylact and his family, see Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 967–74; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero,
pp. 97–109; Marazzi, ‘Teofilatto’ and ‘Teodora la Vecchia e Teodora la Giovane’; Fedele, ‘Ricerche’,
pp. 205–22 and 408–12; and Gerstenberg, Die politische Entwicklung, pp. 13–15.
88 L. Schiaparelli, ed., ‘I diplomi di Ludovico III’, BISI 29 (1908), p. 140; Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 205–6,
207–9.
89 Löwenfeld, ‘Acht Briefe aus der Zeit Konig Berengars’, p. 513, and Epistola Eugenio ad Theodoram,
in MGH Poet. IV, I. p. 419; see Savigni, ‘Sacerdozio e regno’, p. 14.
90 For Marozia, her husbands and political career, see Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 215–18; Gerstenberg,
Die politische Entwicklung, pp. 18–20; and Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Marozia’, pp. 681–5.
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128 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

to Italy from Francia with the emperor, and on the death of the Duke of Spoleto
Guy, became the new ruler of the duchy in 897. After the death of the Emperor
Lambert, Alberic of Spoleto, who had become one of the most powerful magnates
in Italy, married Theophylact’s daughter and heiress, and effectively helped the
anti-Formosian Pope Sergius III to gain his see in Rome. Sergius had been elected
pope, but not consecrated, after a considerable struggle which involved several
popes as political representatives of the Roman aristocracy at the end of the ninth
century. After John VIII’s murder in 882, perhaps on account of his ill treatment
of men such as the vestararius George, John VIII’s opponents had chosen a pope
who supported the Spoletine party in Rome, and ultimately Guy’s imperial cor­on­
ation in 891, Pope Formosus.91 Formosus’ shift of alliances to Arnulf led to the
end of the Spoletan ascendancy after the Emperor Lambert’s death, and the siege
of Rome by Arnulf against Angiltruda and the Spoletan party. After Formosus’
death in 896, various short-lived figures became popes, until the election in 898
of Sergius III by the anti-Formosian party, against the parallel election by the
Formosians of John IX. A further period of convulsions followed for seven years,
which the non-consecrated Sergius III spent in exile. When he returned to Rome,
it was with the help of the Spoletans—the ‘Franks’—in the form of Alberic of Spoleto,
supporting his wife’s family.92 Fedele argued that the family of Theophylact truly
began to control the city on account of being closely connected to Pope Sergius
III, who quite evidently was grateful to them for Alberic of Spoleto’s help. It was
he who began the series of grand titles given to Theophylact, then to his daughter,
as consul and senator. Alberic of Spoleto’s wife, Marozia, had at least six children,
one being her son Alberic. On his father’s death, Alberic’s mother married her
second husband, then her third, King Hugh of Italy. When perhaps her ambition
to become queen of Italy, and possibly empress, led her to accept matrimony with
King Hugh, who expected to control the city as a result of this marriage, she was
sidelined by her son Alberic, who then became ruler of Rome from 932 until his
death in 954.93 (See Table 2.1.)
Having rejected this political attempt at control by Hugh, Alberic took power—
according to Liutprand of Cremona, by the choice of the Romans who had
deserted Hugh. In reality, Hugh had no rights to rule over Rome, which was tech-
nically part of the papal state.94 Alberic’s title in the first instance was the same as
that of his grandfather Theophylact, senator omnium Romanorum, while later he
used that of patricius, which, it has been argued, had been awarded to him by the

91 For the succession of Formosus, AF cont. maior 885; Invectiva in Romam, in ‘Gesta Berengarii’,
p. 139; Flodoard, Hist. Eccl. Rem., IV.1; Dümmler, Auxilius and Vulgarius, Aux. n. 4 and Vulg.
CXIV—see Mabillon, Anales Veter. IV, p. 610. See Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 191–8.
92 Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 200–206; Gerstenberg, Die politische Entwicklung, pp. 12–3.
93 On Alberic, see Sickel, ‘Alberich II’; Arnaldi, ‘Alberico’, pp. 646–56; Toubert, Les Structures,
pp. 974–98; Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 218–22; Gerstenberg, Die politische Entwicklung, pp. 20–1 and esp.
24–46.
94 Liutprand, Antapodosis, III.45; also BenSor p. 166.
Table 2.1 Genealogy of the Theophylact/Alberic family

Teofilatto
Teodora
Vestararius (c. 900
Vestararissa
-d.c. 920)
(d.c. 920)
Senator Romanorum
–

Marozia
1. Alberico 3. Ugo di Provenza Re Teodora II
Teofilatto Senatrix Romanorum ? (Rapporto 2. Guido di Giovanni
2 bambini morti (Spoleto e D’ltalia (926–947) Senatrix
(d. prima del padre) (tre matrimoni + un sconosciuto) Toscana (Crescenzio)
Camerino) d.c. 920 Figlia Alda
figlio illegittimo)

Teodora III Marozia II Stefania Senatrix

Crescenzio I De
Senatrix Senatrix sposata con
Teodora (d. 985)
Giovanni sposata con Teofilatto Benedetto conte di
Giovanni (Papa Alberico Princeps sposato con Sergia
Costantino Sergio (Ep. Nepi) Berta Berta Duca di Napoli II Vestararius Sabina
Giovanni XI) (d. 954)

Giovanni Crescenzio (figlio di Giovanni Di

Gregorio di Tuscolo (figlio di Theoderanda, Crescenzio II
Crescenzio
Sposato con Maria Theoderanda, prima prima moglie di Senator (d. 998)
Patricius
? Ottaviano moglie di Benedetto) Benedetto)
(Papa Giovanni XII)

Alberico Papa Benedetto Giovanni Rogata

Papa Giovanni XIX Marozia Patricius Senatrix (sposata
Conte di Tuscolo VIII
(d. 1012) con Ottaviano)
– –

d.: morta DISCENDENZA:

c: circa Papa Benedetto IX Crescenzi -
Ottaviani
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130 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Byzantine emperor when Alberic was attempting to set up a matrimonial alliance

with Byzantium.95 He then began to use the title of princeps, revived by him for
himself, with a different meaning from such Carolingian titles as used by, for
example, Louis III in 901. It did not refer to a leading member of the court but
was modelled in part on the title and role of Augustus, the primus inter pares
among senators, the cuncto senatus as defined in a 958 placitum.96 The titles of the
Theophylact family were a mix of the old and new: senator/senatrix had a long
Roman past, with discontinuities, but gloriosissimus had been previously only
used by Carolingian emperors in northern Italy and by the dukes of Benevento.97
Neither Theophylact nor Alberic were consistent about their titles: like the other
members of the aristocracy who used a variety of overall terms to define them-
selves (primores, primates, optimates, illustrissimi, the ‘senate’), they too used their
titles interchangeably,98 though theirs were of a higher ranking. Most importantly,
they were taking up a range of past images and titles without settling for any one
on a permanent basis, and used them according to need and context, in order to
create their own form of legitimacy of power.
The main other classical title revived probably by Alberic was Prefect of the
City, though we do not have clear evidence of it until 993, when it first reappears
officially with the Crescentii, to remain firmly in place thereafter.99 Such titles
were then very much part of the planned Renovatio of Otto III, who put together
a package comprising Roman ones such as a prefectus navalis Gregory, and
Byzantine as well as Frankish ones such as comes palatii or comes sacri palatii.100
If Byzantine, such titles might have been suggested to him by his mother
Theophano’s memories, but they were far more likely to have been copied from
the administration of the papal court, itself modelled on that of the imperial

95 On the title, which appears on coinage as PACUS, see the F. Labruzzi, ‘Di una moneta di
Alberico principe e senatore dei romani’, ASRSP 35 (1912), and F. Gregorovius, ‘Die Münze Alberichs’,
Münchner Sitzungsberichte, Hist. kl. (Munich, 1885), pp. 34, 41; Labruzzi argued that once the pros-
pect of this alliance fell through because neither party needed it any more—Constantinople had
hoped to gain help in southern Italy while Alberic had hoped to have help in getting rid of Hugh,
which he had achieved by himself—Alberic no longer needed the title and shifted to that of princeps.
Against this interpretation and the view that the title of patricius signified in fact ‘patricius domini
apostolici’, see Toubert, Les Structures, p. 1018, n. 2. On Alberic’s coinage, see G. Fusconi, Gli
Antiquiores romani: le monete coniate dalla zecca di Roma da Adriano 1. (772–795) a Benedetto 7.
(975–983) (Pavia, 2012).
96 The 901 placitum lists the major officials of the kingdom of Italy present at the court of Louis III,
including possibly Theophylact, and after the list of bishops, dukes, and counts come the ‘ceteri[]que
princip[es]’, ed. in Manaresi, Placiti, no. 111; for the 958 placitum see RS no. 20. Alberic’s princely title
may have also been partly inspired by the principalities of southern Italy (Benevento, Capua, Salerno);
see, most recently, Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 24.
97 For examples see Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 24 n. 63. See also Di Carpegna Falconieri,
‘Società romana’, p. 79.
98 Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 964–7.
99 RS no. 78; see, for example, the court case of Farfa in 998 in RF no. 426.
100 RF no. 437, used for example by John, Romanus the imperial missus, Alberic and Gregorius
imperialis palatii magistri and Gerard imperialis militiae magister in 998 and 999.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 131

palace of Constantinople, and titles such as Benedict dativus sacris palatii in 961,
or John claviger sacris palatii in 964, could easily be turned into the comes or
vestararius sacris palatii.101
The striking fact remains that Alberic does not seem to have openly tried to
impose a change in style of government from that of his grandfather and his
mother. The rule of Theophylact had been based on the consensus of the aristoc-
racy, both in the city and in Lazio, where he had succeeded in pacifying the area
by getting rid of both Saracens and local banditry.102 His power had derived from
his holding the two highest positions of power in Rome, that of vestararius, which
gave him the management of papal estates, and that of magister militum, which
gave him control of the army. Neither he nor his daughter or grandson Alberic
brought in institutional changes, as opposed to ensuring a dynastic takeover of
the traditional forms of authority without attempting to replace it, and ruling
over the papal territories. Alberic eventually made peace with King Hugh, who
was in Rome in 941, married Hugh’s daughter Alda, and after Hugh’s defeat in 945
expanded his policy of control of the Sabina. From then on the rector of the
Sabina was his deputy, and he also attempted to gain control over the duchy of
Spoleto.103 Alberic seemed to have no ambitions beyond ruling Rome and the
Lazio—except for his other form of control of Sabina through the reform of
Farfa—and his power did not extend beyond the Apennines. Most of his policy
can be perceived, though rather dimly, from his few government acts, such as the
revival of the Prefecture of the City, and above all his monastic reform.104 The
sense one gains both from a study of the land documents from Rome, increas-
ingly numerous in the second half of the tenth century, and from the absence of
government-style official documents is that, with Alberic, office holders as such
became less numerous and less important than they had been in the ninth-century
papal administration. The key political figures were rarely recorded as office hold-
ers in the city, though they were so in the Sabina, for example: in Rome, they
seemed to act by virtue of, or rather were perceived as, holding enough authority
to self-style themselves as illustris or eminentissimus, consul, dux, and so on. Some
were the sons of previous office holders: John de Primicerius or Peter de Berta de
Vestararius are examples. But they did not seem to feel the need to fit within the
categories of the ninth-century Roman or papal administration: it has been
argued that Alberic made no change in the structures of the papal state; he just

101 SSAG no. 125 (Benedict); RS no. 71 (John).

102 Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 967–74.
103 Gerstenberg, Die politische Entwicklung, pp. 30–1, 34–6, 38–9.
104 The prefecture did not replace the office of vestararius straightaway, and under Otto III both
titles appear simultaneously describing two different men; however, the prefect gradually became
the highest official in the city, processing at the back of papal processions through the city, while both
the vestararius and the superista disappeared; see Halphen, Études, pp. 16–27, 147–56; Toubert, Les
structures, pp. 1208–9.
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132 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

used its offices to put his friends in them.105 Alberic’s personal authority, just like
that of Theophylact, meant that in the city, and in the southern part of Lazio too,
where the family had no properties and power, it was even more dependent on
the consensus of the local aristocracy of the small cities, which the princeps
entrusted to local men whom he then gathered around him in his personal ret­inue,
like Benedict Campaninus.106 Just as Alberic did not fit his title into a trad­ition­al
mould, he did not create or press for official roles for the men who served him
either, relying on personal allegiance rather than a hierarchy of government and
institutions. As seen from the limited number of ‘government’ acts, or from his
uncertain titulature, even as he was attempting to revive a Roman system of gov-
ernment, Alberic, or perhaps his contemporaries’ views of Romanness, either did
not include a Roman sense of a purely secular hierarchy, public posts, and legisla-
tion, or found it impossible to impose such a form of government.107 Only in the
Sabina itself and the Tiburtinum, where the family had most of its land and power,
were his policies more interventionist. This was especially so in relation to the abbey
of Farfa, where he did have a more ‘direct’ involvement, with his attempt to reform
it for spiritual purposes, but also to split its extraordinary landed power across the
Roman Sabina and the Reatine Sabina belonging to the kingdom of Italy, to in­corp­
or­ate Farfa more closely into the Patrimonium, and to place his men at its head.108
But Alberic’s understanding of his rule seems to have included his control over the
papacy. While he ruled, the pope did not do anything without his say-so, as was
said about Pope Marinus II, while Pope Leo VII’s three papal privileges to Subiaco
were given at Alberic’s request, and as part of the princeps’ monastic reform.109 At
the same time, Alberic did not extend this control to purely ecclesiastical affairs, as
we can see from Pope Agapitus’ II (946–55) involvement in the quarrels of the
Church of Rheims, in which the princeps had no interest.110
The understandable fascination with the rule of Alberic has led to a variety of
interpretations of it, among which one could mention the view that it was a re-
establishment of a government in the modern sense, with its administration,
functionaries, justice, and placiti, or, on the contrary, that it was an attempt to
create nothing less than a territorial principality like any other in Italy, which
would have succeeded had it not been for the fact that Rome had a pope.111
Toubert insisted on how much Alberic ruled as part of a noble elite which sup-
ported him, but he too agreed that Alberic’s aim, in his attempts at his ‘Roman

105 Wickham, Medieval Rome, has made the point that of the seven ninth-century private documents
with lay male actors, five feature an official (or, once, his son), a strikingly high proportion even if
based on a small sample; Gerstenberg, Die politische Entwicklung, p. 38.
106 Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 978–84. 107 See below, Chapter 6.
108 Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 986–90; see also Chapter 5.
109 LP II. 130; BenSor, p. 167; RS nos 16, 17, 24.
110 Flodoard, Hist.Eccl.Rem., ann. 947–50, chs. 29–31.
111 Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 990–8. On the titles see also F. Bocchi, ‘Sul titolo di “consul” in età
altomedievale’, Atti dell’Accademia delle scienze dell’Istituto di Bologna 64 (1975–6), pp. 17–36
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 133

restoration’, was, above all, to make the government of Rome one which would
return to a more ‘secular’ state, in the tradition of both Roman–Byzantine and
southern Italian Lombard rule. That he did not ultimately succeed was because, as
Toubert and Wickham agreed, by that stage it had become impossible to imagine
the government of Rome as a double act between a ‘prince’ and the pope—a fact
which the Crescentii did not quite understand, unlike the Tuscolani, who did,
and took over the papacy.
In the absence of properly speaking government acts, one of the few ways of
working out who were the important men that Alberic relied on among the
Roman nobility is to examine their titles. In the remaining charters and judicial
documents dated to between 750 and 1000, the most common title was that of
consul et dux, which appears in over thirty documents, with several people being
so described in each, for example up to six in 924 and five in 936.112 This title thus
extends from being a qualifier of moderate to high status, when it defines so many
people in one document, to one increasingly more limited to the highest status,
when referring to the top primates like John de Primicerius, Ildebrand and
Stephen de Imiza, and Berardus son of Farulf in 996 and 1000, especially when
associated with the qualifying eminentissimus vir, as for John de Primicerius,
Berardus, and Gratianus in 956 and 968.113 The title was, of course, also used for
the vestararius Theophylact and for Gregory, for example in 927 and 987,114
though the former had far more elevated ones. The use of separate titles, that is
either consul or dux without the combination, seems, interestingly, to have been
common only at the highest level, with dux alone used in twelve documents when
referring to Theophylact II and Demetrius de Meliosus in 961 or Berardus in 987,
but also in several cases more specifically to the most powerful men around
Rome, for example Ingebald rector of Sabina in 939.115 Likewise, while the title of
consul was fairly generously used in the ninth century, it became more restricted
in the tenth, when it too was associated with Theophylact in 963, John and
Crescentius II, sons of Crescentius, in 988, and Demetrius de Meliosus in 997—
altogether used in only eight documents in the tenth century.116 It could sometimes
be associated with another title, for example that of magister censi Urbis Romae in
850 and tabellio Urbis Romae in 927,117 at which point it was still at a lower level

112 RS nos 24 and 43.

113 Consul et dux: SSAG no. 4 (John de Primicerius), no. 151 (Stephen de Imiza), and SMVL no. 24
and 24A (Berardus); eminentissimus vir: SSAB no. 2 (John de Primicerius), RS nos 38 and 52
(Gratianus). See also the older L. Halphen, ‘Note sur les consuls et les ducs de Rome du VIII au XIII
siècle’, MEFREM 26 (1906), pp. 67–77, at 67–71.
114 See epigraph in Mai, n. 43 above, and SSAB no. 2.
115 SSAG no. 125 (Theophylact and Demetrius); Fedele, ‘Tabularium S. Praxedis’, no.1 (Berardus);
RF no. 372 (Ingebald).
116 RS no. 123 (Theophylact), Regesta Hon. III, pp. cxx–cxxi (John and Crescentius II), RS no. 143
(Demetrius).
117 RS nos 31 and 62.
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134 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

of importance compared to those of Theophylact consul, and later Crescentius

consul et senator, and it was part of the grand titles used by Otto III for his Roman
renovatio.118 Another title, that of comes, was used by one Rainerius in 993, and
before him in 958 by Imilga gloriosa comitissa, and also by Stefania, Alberic’s
cousin, senatrix in her own right as a Theophylact descendant, but also comitissa
in 987 on account of her marriage to Count Benedict. Out of the eight documents
in which this title appears, it refers, for example, to Stefania in her capacity as wife
of Benedict comes of Sabina in 987, and in the case of Crescentius II in 987 it is
used in a charter in which he deals with the inhabitants of Terracina as their
senior, with a more openly seignorial vocabulary than he would use as a Roman
senator in the city.119 Clearly, there was an inflation but also a conflation of titles
meant to be reminiscent of the Roman tradition in the later ninth and early tenth
centuries, but there appears to have been a change across the tenth century, with a
more hierarchical and restrictive application as time went on. This ‘specialization’
first of all separated the dux and, at a lower level, the comes, titles used sometimes
for city aristocrats but increasingly for the dominant figures of the papal ter­ri­tor­
ies, such as Ingebald of Sabina, Stephen of Ariccia or John of Albano, Rainerius
and Benedict—men who were not in fact part of the papal government of the city.
The consuls, on the other hand, were the aristocracy whose power was city-based,
and associated with papal posts, such as Theophylact as vestararius, John de
Primicerius and, for Alberic and Crescentius, with the highest titles of senator and
illustrissimus.120 The title of senator, and the definition as illustrissimus, which
had gradually disappeared after the eighth century, was revived as the highest one
by Alberic, also as part of his revival of classical Rome, and was presumably meant
to apply to the top men governing Rome—to himself in 937, 938, and 945 as
omnium Romanorum senator. It was assumed later on by others, who saw themselves
in this light: Gregorius Romanorum senator in 986, and Crescentius in 989 as
omnium Romanorum senator.121 When the Theophylact–Alberic family reappeared
in documents, the senatorial title was not limited to them, but also used extensively
by the women of the family: the daughters of Theodora II and Theophylact’s
granddaughters, Marozia II, senatrix omnium Romanorum in 959, senatrix in 961
and 962, and her sister Stefania in 987, mostly also qualified as illustrissima.122
Marozia II and Stefania used the title senatrix, which was effectively reserved for
them, their sister Teodora III, and later also as senator to Gregory son of Marozia

118 RF no. 437; on Otto’s revived titles, see Chapter 4.

119 CVL 12632, pp. 313–17 (Crescentius); SSCD no. 93A (Imilga gloriosa comitissa widow of
Rainerius comes); RS no. 78 (Rainerius); SSAB no. 3 (Stefania).
120 RS no. 155; H. Zimmermann, ed., Papsturkunden 896–1046, 3 vols (Vienna, 1985–9), for
Subiaco no. 85; CVL 12632, pp. 313–17.
121 Zimmermann, Papsturkunden, for Subiaco nos 77 and 85; RS no. 155 (Alberic); SMCM no. 1
(Gregory); CVL 12632, pp. 313–17 (Crescentius).
122 RS nos 64, 124, 109 (Marozia); SSAB no. 3 (Stefania).
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 135

II (the first Tuscolano), until Crescentius II took it in 988. The descendants of

Theophylact, then the Tuscolani, were thus perceived as Rome’s super-elite family
throughout the whole of our period, and no other family matched that status
except the Crescentii for perhaps twenty-five years. After Alberic’s death, the use
of such titles as illustrissimus et clarissimus vir, consul, senator, and eminentissi-
mus remained for a while, but gradually disappeared towards the second decade
of the eleventh century, illustris alone remaining as a generic form of reference to
top aristocratic families, for example for John de Meliosus in 1007.123
So who were these topmost families in Rome below the level of the
Theophylact–Alberic group? Other members of the Roman aristocratic elite can
be identified from two sets of documents: land transactions in which they were
involved as actors or witnesses, and two major assemblies in 942 and in 963,
which enumerate the potentes of the city. The placitum of 942 concerning Subiaco
is the only official public document surviving from the rulership of Alberic, and it
provides a list of the main figures at his court.124 A few later public documents
also remain, such as court cases from 966 and 981.125 Many of the same aristocratic
figures appear regularly in most of these documents. If one looks at tenth-century
Roman documents as a whole, one finds a large number of urban notables, bear-
ing fairly common names and generic titles such as consul et dux, nobilis vir, and
so on, who were not visible in the social and political landscape more than once,
and therefore remain anonymous.126 On the other hand, ‘official’ documents,
such as the 942 placitum, and events such as the granting of the Tiber island to the
revived monastery of SS Alessio e Bonifazio in 987 seem to imply that there was a
small number of really important families at the heart of the government of the
city.127 Around these were a number of family members who acted as their clientela,
notably witnessing documents, and sometimes themselves holding ecclesiastical
or secular offices. The latter are less well documented, unless their sons did not
hold office but still alluded to it, as with John de Primicerius, or in 981 Peter de
Berta de Vesterarius.128
The placitum of 942 concerned a dispute between the monastery of Subiaco
and four inhabitants of Tivoli, and was heard in curte principi Alberici beside the
church of SS Apostoli in the centre of Rome. Apart from five palatine judges—
and they are identified first with their titles as papal officials—the other members
of this ‘court’ were Benedict Campaninus, Caloleus (or Kaloleus), the dux George
de Cannapara, Theophylact vestararius, the superista John, Demetrius de Meliosus
(de Umiliosum), Gregory de Aventino, Benedict de Miccina, Count Balduin, a
Crescentius, a dux Hadrian, one Franco, and a few more primates not otherwise

123 SMVL no. 27. 124 RS no. 155. 125 RS, n. 118; SMVL, n. 10A.
126 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 194. 127 RS no. 155; SSAB, nos 2–3.
128 SMVL, n. 10A.
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136 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

known.129 Theophylact was the husband of Alberic’s cousin Marozia II senatrix.

The core of his lands were near Albano and, since he was probably the same
Theophylact named in the two grants of 961 and 963 to the monastery of SS
Pietro e Martino sub Aventinu, he would have been a kind of equivalent of Benedict
Campaninus to Alberic’s son, Pope John XII.130 Caloleus is attested in 963 as own-
ing land outside Tivoli and, more significantly, has been argued, on good grounds,
to have been the developer of the Forum of Trajan and the creator of an urban
quarter there, around the eponymous Campus Carleonis.131 George de Cannapara
(an area of the Forum below the Palatine) is not otherwise known, but a Peter de
Canaparia, likely to have been his son, was present at the 963 synod and the
court case of 966. Count Balduin is recorded in the documents of 961 and 963.132
Whether Gregory de Aventino was a descendant of John VIII’s opponent of over
fifty years before is not known, though his Aventine address probably makes
him an aristocrat. Whether Benedict de Miccina was an early de Imiza, as may
be the otherwise unknown Crescentius, is not clear. Among the papal court
functionaries, Leo, whose father had been the protoscriniarius John, active in
917–20, himself protoscriniarius, would become Pope Leo VIII in 963–5.133
George the secundicerius would become abbot of Subiaco in 964 until 971–3.134
But among the major aristocrats who were not papal officials and took part in
the placitum, the two most famous individual figures were Benedict Campaninus
and Demetrius de Meliosus.
Benedict Campaninus was from Campania, where he held lands, as he did in the
Tiburtino and the Sutrino, and he owned (or acquired) property in Rome in
Trastevere. He seems to have been Alberic’s right-hand man, sent by him on
an embassy to Constantinople. He was the founder of the important Trastevere
monastery of SS Cosma e Damiano, probably in the 940s, as well as a donor of
land to Subiaco in 952.135 To that extent, he followed the practice of Alberic and
his female cousins. He is twice found presiding over court cases. In 943, described
as eminentissimus vir et gloriosus dux, he held a formal case in his own house
(domus) in Rome; as eminentissimus consul et dux, he presided over a court case
in Alatri in Campania, with officials and notables from both Rome and Alatri.136

129 RS, n. 155. 130 Gerstenberg, Die politische Entwicklung, p. 37.

131 RS, no. 118 (Peter de Cannapara); RS, no. 93 (Caloleus). On both, and the latter’s possible
involvement in the rezoning of the Forum of Trajan, see Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma
nell’alto medioevo, pp. 168–70 and 186; Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, ‘I Fori Imperiali’, in
Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 37–8.
132 RS, no. 123. 133 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, c.16; Halphen, Études, pp. 140–2.
134 Ibid, pp. 110–11 (George the secundicerius; as abbot of Subiaco, see RS nos. 71, 26, 130–1, 166,
149, 142, 25, 67, 69, 200, 118, 46, 201, 88, 142, 127, 58, 186). See also Gerstenberg, Die politische
Entwicklung, pp. 36–8, on a detailed study of the placitum, and Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 190–1.
135 For the founding of the monastery in Trastevere, probably between 936 and 948, RF III, p. 152,
and SSCD I, pp. 11–38; for Subiaco, RS no. 110.
136 RS no. 35; the Alatri case is ed. in G. Falco, ‘Studi sulla storia del Lazio nel medioevo’, Misc. della
Società Romana di Storia Patria 24 (1988), pp. 415–16.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 137

He had ‘a substantial slice of delegated authority from Prince Alberic, which he

could—probably at the latter’s request—exercise anywhere. Benedict’s de facto
role was thus very similar to that exercised earlier by the vestararius and later by
the urban prefect, as the main secular representative of the ruler’. As Wickham
pointed out, it was ‘significant that Alberic did not see it as necessary to give him
a formal office. He was simply a high-ranking and rich aristocrat who came into the
city and gained sufficient Königsnähe (Fürstennähe) to be politically prominent.’137
Demetrius de Meliosus, nobilis vir and eminentissimus, also held no specific office,
although he was termed eminentissimus consul et dux in 946.138 He was one of
John XII’s envoys to Otto I, and among the Roman optimates at the synod of 963
Liutprand called him the illustrior.139 He may have been one of a dynasty which
had a Demetrius arcarius in 926 and maybe superista before 921, perhaps his
grandfather.140 Certainly his son, John excellentissimus vir, leased the castle and
lagoons of Fogliano from Subiaco in 977; and in 987 John, now like his father
eminentissimus consulus [sic] et dux, together with two nobilissime sisters (mar-
ried to a nobilis vir and a consul et dux), gave an island in the Tiber to the monas-
tery of SS Bonifazio e Alessio.141
The assembly of 963 dealt with the deposition of Pope John XII and the elec-
tion of Otto I’s candidate as the new pope. It was described by Liutprand, whose
concern was to make Otto’s rule in Rome seem to be as consensual as possible,
and who enumerates the top political leaders of the city to that end.142 The other
primates Romanae civitatis, especially in 963, include several names who are evi-
dently part of a longer-lasting dynasty.143 John de Miccina and Stephen de Imiza
were the sons of Ildebrand consul et dux and of his wife Imiza/Miccina, part of the
important de Imiza family. John was dux of Albano before becoming a monk
before 976, and his probable son Gregory was Rome’s last-known vestararius—
though, in Ottonian renovatio fashion, he is called vestararius sacrii palatii—in
999.144 Stephen had no known offices either, and nor did his children, but they are
attested into the 1010s, as consules et duces and viri illustrissimi, closely associated
with SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro, as donors and lessees; Stephen was
buried there.145 They held land in the city (between the Aventine and the Palatine,
and on the Quirinal) and in the Agro romano, and one of his executors was

137 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 192.

138 RS nos 110, 122, 52, 51; E. Stevenson, ‘Documenti dell’archivio della cattedrale di Velletri’,
ASRSP 12 (1889), n. 1 (a. 946).
139 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, chs. 6, 9.
140 Zimmermann, Papsturkunden: I. no. 57 (Subiaco), or RS, n. 51; SMVL, no. 1.
141 RS no. 51; SSAB no. 2. 142 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, ch. 9.
143 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, ch. 9.
144 RS no. 79 and RF no. 437. He also appears at the placita of 981 and 983. On the family, see
Görich, ‘Die de Imiza’; one correction to the genealogy is in Santangeli Valenzani, ‘L’insediamento
aristocratico’, p. 242n.
145 SSAG, no. 4.
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138 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

John de Primicerius.146 He was probably the son of Ursus primicerius (fl. 932)147
but not an office holder himself. A consul et dux, like others in the city, he too was
a major figure in the two court cases of 966 and 983, as well as the executor of
Stephen de Imiza’s will, together with the arcarius, three abbots of city monasteries,
and a comes palatii.148 His son Leo illustris is also mentioned in the de Imiza will,
and in the placita of 981 and 983 under Pope Benedict VII.149 Also present there
were Peter de Vestararius and Azzo de Abbo.150 These families, and a few others
with which they also intermarried at least up to 1000, were very closely associated
with the traditional governing structures of the city. Another such, Crescentius a
Caballo marmoreo, present at the 963 synod, had some links with the aristocratic
family of the Crescentii, which seems to have been on the ascendant after the end
of Alberic’s rule.
The period 963–1012, sometimes called Crescentian, has had long studies
devoted to it, to the genealogy of the Crescentii family and their interrelation,
notably along the lines of its descent or otherwise from the Theophylacts.151 Here,
I should like to refer to these studies, while concentrating on the Crescentii only
in relation to their role in the history of the city and, when applicable, the
Ottonian Empire. Crescentius I de Teodora (d.984), illustrissimus vir (or consul et
dux), with his wife the illustrissima femina Sergia, was an important political
actor in the 970s, but no ‘ruler’ or office holder. He was involved in the deposition
and murder of Pope Benedict VI in 974, and he became a monk at S. Bonifazio
before his death in 984.152 Of his two sons, John was patricius in 986, and he may
have been involved in the election of Pope John XIV in 985, while Crescentius II
is first recorded as omnium Romanorum senator in ‘my’ Terracina in 988, which
he claims to rule by papal and imperial concession. He took control of Rome in
the early 990s.153 Crescentius II was the father of the patricius John Crescentius,
who also ruled the city, from c.1002 to 1012, and of Rogata senatrix, who married
the count of Sabina and began the family of the Crescentii Ottaviani of Sabina in
the eleventh century. He was killed in 998 by Otto III.154 Pope John XIII’s (965–72)
nephew Benedict married the nobilis Teoderanda, daughter of a Benedict who

146 See, for example, the salt pans in Pedica Vetere, from Subiaco, RS nos 67, 69, 70–1; for the will
and all his goods, see SSAG no. 151 and 4.
147 Both held lands in the same sector of the territory of Albano, at Zizinni; see S. Silvestro, no. 3,
and RS no. 137. See Toubert, Les Structures, p. 1224n and Halphen, Études, p. 96; Wickham, Medieval
Rome, p. 194 n. 35.
148 RS, nn. 118, 185; SMVL, n. 10A; SSAB, n. 4; SSAG no. 4. 149 SSAG no. 4.
150 Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, p. 155.
151 For the Teophylact descent theory, see Bossi, ‘I Crescenzi’, pp. 65–9; Kölmel, ‘Rom und der
Kirchenstaat’, pp. 28–9, 167; Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 1016, 1027, 1085–7; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero,
pp. 149–70; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 197–204; F. Lazzari, ‘I Teofilatti nel necrologio del XI del
monastero dei SS Ciriaco e Nicola in via Lata’, Annali del Lazio Meridionale: Storia e Storiografia 28
(2014), pp. 7–19, all with attempts at establishing a genealogy of the family into the eleventh century.
152 Epitaph in LP II, p. 256; photograph in Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, facing p. 160.
153 CVL 12632, pp. 313–17; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, p. 161. 154 Thietmar, chs. 30–1.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 139

became count of Sabina, and they had two sons, also called John and Crescentius.
Benedict was a supporter of Crescentius II, and had trouble from the regime of
Otto III; his sons were supporters of the patricius John Crescentius after 1002 and
were still counts of Sabina.155 However, one must be aware of the fact that, though
the Crescentii, as we now know, were one of the important families in the city, for
most of the period until the 990 at least they were not perceived to be of greater
stature than had been the de Imiza, the de Primicerius, the de Meliosi, and espe-
cially Benedict Campaninus, around the middle of the century.
Only one of the men promoted by Alberic, Benedict Campaninus, did not
prod­uce a dynasty to follow him. The others—like Alberic’s heirs, the Tuscolani;
the heirs of Demetrius de Meliosus; the de Imiza; John de Primicerius’ heirs; and,
of course, the Crescentii—remained prominent throughout the second half of the
century and the beginning of the eleventh.156 All but the latter had been made
powerful and rich by the princeps. His family, though finishing in direct line with
the death of his son Pope John XII, preserved both its political dominance and its
status, including through titles which came to be increasingly reserved for them
and their female relatives, especially that of senator/senatrix. Such titles included
excellentissimus (Alberic’s cousins and their heirs, the Tuscolani, Demetrius
de Melioso); glorios(issim)us (Theophylact, Alberic, Benedict Campaninus,
Crescentius II); eminentissimus (Benedictus, Demetrius and his son, Theophylact
vestararius husband of Marozia II); and finally illustris(simus).157 Illustris, often
applied to women too, was the most glamorous of all, since it harked back to the
late Roman Empire, where it had been used only of the highest-ranking members
of the Senate. Before 1000, it is used nearly forty times in surviving documents, in
half of the cases for the family of Theophylact and Alberic, the de Imiza, the de
Primicerius, and the Crescentii, the rest for others of similar rank. It seems likely
that, while some of these families had been ‘made’ by Alberic, others may have
also been the heirs of a ninth-, if not an eighth-, century hierarchy of potentes,
which remained in power into the 1100s. The Tuscolani were at the top of this
hierarchy in the later tenth century, and despite Otto III’s short blow to the
Crescentii, both they and the Tuscolani remained the foremost families on the
political scene in the city: Crescentius II’s son John was the Prefect of the City
until his death in 1012, and Otto’s newly titled prefectus navalis was Gregory, son

155 Ugo di Farfa, Exceptio relationum, in U. Balzani, ed., Chronicon Farfense (Rome, 1903), pp. 62–5;
p. 67 (Palestrina); LP, II, p. 335 (a. 1059); G. Bossi, ‘I Crescenzi di Sabina, Stefaniani e Ottaviani (dal
1012 al 1106)’, ASRSP 41 (1918), pp. 114–28; Benedict VI: LP, II, p. 255; Annales Beneventani, s.a. 975
(p. 176); Herimanni Augiensis chronicon, s.a. 974 (p. 116); C. Romeo, ‘Crescenzio de Theodora’, DBI 30
(1984), pp. 657–9.
156 Görich, ‘Die de Imiza’; Toubert, Les Structures, p. 1224 n.
157 Gloriosus: SSAG no. 125; SCD, no. 93A; CVL 12632, pp. 313–17; SSAB, no. 1; Zimmermann,
Papsturkunden, I, no. 424; RF, nos 616, 658, 1270; eminentissimus: RS nos 115, 97, 123, 52, 114; SSAG
no. 125; SMVL, no. 24A; RF no. 637.
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140 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

of Alberic’s cousin Marozia II, a Tuscolano. ‘The same families stayed dominant.
Real shifts did not come before the 1020s,’158 a move matched in economic terms.

Wealth

What form did the wealth of the main aristocratic families take in the tenth
century? Its extent and form can be seen from the number of remaining grants
and leases, to and from monasteries, the papacy, and occasionally other aristo-
cratic families. After the end of Byzantine control in Rome, the Church of
Rome—the Patrimony of St Peter—had had all lands previously owned by the
imperial fisc in Italy ‘restored’ by the Carolingians. In practice, it owned the whole
of Rome’s urban area and Lazio, and leased much of it back to the great aristo-
cratic families in the city. Some of this land had been in turn granted to the great
monastic foundations, both in and outside the city itself. If one looks at the main
families of the tenth century as described above, notably those of Theophylact
and Alberic, and the Crescentii, in terms of their land grants to Roman monaster-
ies, with some unusual exceptions (such as S. Maria Maggiore, to which
Theophylact and Theodora made a grant for the souls of their two deceased chil-
dren, Sergia and Boniface, around c.900),159 we can associate them above all with
the great Roman monasteries of SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro, SS Cosma
e Damiano in Mica Aurea, SS Ciriaco e Nicola in Via Lata, and SS Bonifazio e
Alessio, as well as very frequently to Subiaco and to its Roman house of S. Erasmo
on the Coelio. Alberic asked the pope to make several grants to Subiaco in 938,
and his family was associated with SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro through
a major grant in 945.160 The Crescentii’s connections were also with SS Andrea e
Gregorio in Clivo Scauro (980), SS Cosma e Damiano in 985, and finally SS
Bonifazio e Alessio (where Crescentius I was buried) in 987 and 1002.161 Other
important families’ associations with Roman monasteries are those of the de
Imiza with S. Maria in Cyro (965) and, above all, with SS Andrea e Gregorio in

158 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 198. For the 993 text, RS no. 78. For the titles, see esp. Schramm,
Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio, pp. 112–15 and Schramm, Kaiser, Könige und Päpste, pp. 284–97; the main
text, in Manaresi, Placiti, no. 254 (999), shows Gregory of Tuscolum as prefectus navalis, Gregory
Miccino (probably a de Imiza) as vestararius, and Alberic de Gregorius (son of one or the other, very
probably the former) as imperialis palatii magister. The only unknown, perhaps new, figure is Gerard
imperialis militiae magister, whom Otto also made count of the Sabina (Toubert, Les Structures, pp.
1026–7). John the Urban Prefect continued in his office as well; Halphen, Études, pp. 147–8. For Otto’s
relations with the Roman aristocracy, see, apart from Schramm, Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio, pp.
87–187, Görich, Otto III, pp. 250–6; Görich, ‘Die de Imiza’, pp. 29–38; Toubert, Les Structures, pp.
1202–29; and D. A.Warner, ‘Ideals and Action in the Reign of Otto III’, Journal of Medieval History 25
(1999), pp. 1–18.
159 Ed. in Mai, Scriptorum veterum, p. 215.
160 Zimmermann, Papsturkunden for Subiaco nos 72, 77; SSAG no. 68.
161 SSAG no. 77; SSCD no. 10; SSAB nos 2 and 1.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 141

Clivo Scauro in 975, 991, and 994, while the de Primicerius in 978 granted property
in Ariccia to SS Ciriaco e Nicola and to SS Bonifazio e Alessio in 987, and the de
Meliosus to Subiaco in 979 and 987.162 Such grants were usually of land, salt pans,
fishing rights, mills, and other rights on the roads outside Rome, especially the
Porta Metronia, the Portuense, and the Appia, and of land in Lazio in general,
especially in the ter­ri­tor­ies of Tivoli, Nepi, and Sutri, which is where most of our
documentation comes from, in the form of extensive cartularies from Subiaco
and Farfa in the Sabina. But some also granted property in Rome itself: Alberic’s
family, for example, giving property on the Janiculum to SS Andrea e Gregorio in
Clivo Scauro in 945; John son of Demetrius de Meliosus giving land, vineyards,
and fishing rights on the Tiber island, as well as the church of S. Salvatore (later
S. Bartolomeo in Isola), all surrounded by the family lands, to SS Bonifazio e
Alessio in 987; Benedict Campaninus granting land for the foundation of the new
monastery of SS Cosma e Damiano in the 930s; and Ildebrand and Stephen de
Imiza giving a large part of the western Palatine to SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo
Scauro in 965.163 These families were closely associated, and probably also related,
though we are not always aware of such alliances, apart from such well-known
ones as that of Theoderanda, daughter of Gratianus dux and rector of Sabina, wife
of Ingebald also dux (939), Stefania senatrix granddaughter of Theophylact and
wife of Benedict comes of Sabina (987), Marozia senatrix married to Gregory of
Tusculum, or Constantia, daughter of Stephen de Imiza, wife of the dux John
(991).164 However, as Wickham has shown, it is inconceivable that, within such a
relatively small pool of families of the ‘old aristocracy’ of Rome, there would not
have been a strong case of endogamy, and certainly the evidence of their mutual
witnessing of documents points to such close links, especially in the case of the de
Imiza, de Primicerius, and de Meliosus. The other side of the coin from such grants
was the frequency of emphyteutic leases of Church land which these same fam­
ilies received, as we see in Subiaco leases to John de Primicerius and to John son of
Demetrius de Meliosus, and by SS Cosma e Damiano to Crescentius, and SS
Andrea e Gregorio to the de Imiza. Many were granted by these major monaster-
ies, though there are occasional grants to other monasteries such as S. Bibiana to
Theophylact (981) or SS Maria e Nicola in Aqua Salvia to Crescentius II and his
brother (992).165 The leases were sometimes for land specifically for the building
of castles, such as that by SS Andrea e Gregorio to the de Imiza outside the Porta
Appia (994) or by Subiaco to John de Meliosus at the northern end of the Pontine
marshes, or for clearances.166

162 RS no. 69; SSAG no. 151, 4, 130; SMVL nos 7–9; SSAB no. 2; RS no. 125 and SSAB no. 4.
163 SSAG no. 68; SSAB no. 2; RF no. 439; SSAG no. 6.
164 RF no. 372; SSAB no. 3; RS no. 109; SSAG nos 128–9.
165 Liberiano no. 1; G. Gullotta, ed., ‘Un antico ed unico documento sul monastero di S. Maria e
S. Nicola in “Aqua Salvia” ’, ASRSP 66, pp. 185–95.
166 SSAG no. 130 (‘ad castellum noviter edificandum’).
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142 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Transactions were, of course, not only carried out with monastic houses, but
also with the pope, various bishops, or among aristocratic families themselves,
whether as sales or leases. Already in 857 Pepin vestararius leased land to the
subdeacon regionarius Romanus, while a certain Peter sold a house in Rome to
the Emperor Louis II for a huge sum (868).167 Sales were recorded by the three
daughters of Leo, prior of the schola confessionis basilicae S. Paolo, to Theophylact,
also of the schola confessionis, and Theodore, both with their wives, in 927.168
Another sale was from the nobilis vir John to Anastasius nobilis vir, in this
instance of land that previously belonged to Marozia II, wife of Theophylact vesta-
rarius (949); and another by John Paganus and Benedict de Crescentius to various
priests (984) around Lake Verranus.169 Similarly, Pope John XIII granted the city
of Palestrina to Stefania senatrix in 970, and Leo Bishop of Velletri in 946 granted
an emphyteutic lease of a hill to Demetrius de Meliosus to build a castle, but also
to clear the land for a village and attract people there.170
Wickham has attempted to produce the nearest thing to a tax (or rather,
wealth) return for some of these top aristocratic families, reconstructing it from
their grants, leases, occasional will, and whatever other documentation is avail­able.
The best estimate is that for the de Imiza, where he has reached the conclusion
that, at its height, between lands, a house, a church and a Tiber mill in Rome, and
estates or part-estates, castles, vineyards, and a lake in Tuscia and the Campania,
the family probably had a minimum of twelve castles and twelve other estates,
‘enough to live well on, and to support numerous military dependants, and as a
result to be a serious player in the city, as the de Imiza family dem­on­strably
was’.171 Similarly, the de Tusculum family may have controlled a block of land of
about 100 square kilometres around Tusculum, again enough for a ‘regional-level
military presence’.172 If this is all they had, and there is little evidence of much
property outside this area for the main family in the city, this would appear to be
the outside limit (both geographically and economically) of the top layer of
Roman wealth. While this wealth was spread out beyond Lazio and into central
Italy, these families nevertheless were not individually as wealthy as many other
Italian aristocratic families, for example in Tuscany or Emilia, and they did not
focus on building up more power and resources outside the city—their political
strategy was one focused on gaining, and on keeping, power in the city. Even
when the possibility arose for Roman aristocratic families to gain not just land
but also public resources and rights in Lazio, as was the case when Alberic’s
cousin Stefania senatrix was granted a three-generation lease of the city of
Palestrina by Pope John XIII in 970, and thus to expand their local power through

167 RS no. 87. 168 RS no. 62. 169 RS nos 126 and 144.
170 Zimmermann, Papsturkunden I, no. 205; Stevenson, ‘Velletri’, no. 1.
171 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 206; see Görich, ‘Die de Imiza’, pp. 19–27.
172 V. Beolchini, Tusculum II (Rome, 2006), pp. 59–68, 78–82; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 206–7.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 143

the building of castles and seigniorial rights, such power was held on to, but the
families wielding it still lived in Rome.173 ‘Only political losers left the city, and
even then for as short a time as possible.’174
The families mentioned above were the aristocracy of the aristocracy of Rome:
the Theophylact/Alberic families, the Crescentii, the de Imiza, de Primicerius or
de Meliosus. But they were only the top layer, emerging from a larger number of
families, not necessarily ruling ones, but with a power and land base around the
city—men like Berardus dux and his wife Boniza, Boso eminentissimus consul et
dux and his wife Ursa, Rainerius comes and his wife Imilga, Balduinus comes and
his wife Sassa, Gratianus dux and his wife Theodora, and Ingebaldus dux and rec-
tor of Sabina and his wife Theoderanda. They too both granted land to monaster-
ies or leased from them, though in most cases the grants were made by the wives.
Berardus and Boniza leased from S. Maria in Capitolio a house and land ouside
Porta S. Lorenzo (987), and Boniza granted land to SS Cosma e Damiano (983);
Balduin and Sassa granted land to SS Pietro e Martino sub Aventinu (961); and
Ingebald and his wife granted to Farfa the castellum of Bocchigniano (939).175 But
couples also made separate transactions, as did Rainerius leasing land belonging
originally to SS Ciriaco e Nicola (992), while Imelga granted land in the Sutrino
to SS Cosma e Damiano (993); and Gratianus gave land outside Porta Maggiore
to Subiaco (973), while Theodora gave land outside Porta Portuense to SS Cosma
e Damiano (968).176 At a level below, a variety of men and women described as,
variously, consul et dux, nobilis or nobilissimi/ae viri/feminae, or even only onesti,
also made grants, leased land from monasteries, and sold land to them and to
other laymen like them. One Rosa twice gave and sold land to Subiaco in 953 and
967, giving land again to SS Andrea e Gregorio in 984 and selling to SS Ciriaco e
Nicola in 988177; note how these grants were all made to the aristocratic monastic
houses with special links to the main families of the city. Two women called Agata
and Maria aka Rosa did the same in 991 and 994 to SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo
Scauro,178 while various women with the names of Theodora, Stefania, Maroza,
and Constantia, all extremely common names, also made grants to monasteries.179
Similarly, laymen leased land from them and sold to each other, some in Rome,
though most outside it, in some cases in the expectation of gaining a foothold in

173 Toubert, Les structures, pp. 303–54 and passim. 174 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 206.
175 Fedele, ‘Tabularium S. Praxedis’; SSCD no. 9; SSAG no. 125; RF no. 372.
176 SMVL no. 22; SSCD nos 9, 13; RS nos 52, 226.
177 RS nos 42, 65; SSAG no. 2; SMLV no. 16. 178 SSAG nos 79 and 172.
179 While these names were indeed part of the common stock most frequently used for women in
Rome in the tenth century, especially Marozia (a diminutive of Maria, as in the Virgin Mary), there is
nevertheless a certain tendency to reserve them, though certainly not exclusively, to women of the top
elite families, perhaps as part of their use by the Theophylact/Alberic family; see on this T. Di
Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Appunti sull’onomastica femminile a Roma nel medioevo’, in L’onomastica di
Roma. Ventotto secoli di nomi (Roma, 2009), pp. 261–8 at p. 267 and bibliography.
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144 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the city, as clearly dis the Theodora known as Dulcissa (969).180 Among the
­grantors, lessees, and sellers, we also find a number of papal functionaries and
their wives, as well as nuns and monks.181 More striking are people such as the
subdeacon Franco and a Theodora honesta femina, who is clearly his wife though
not named as such, and the other grantor with him, Peter clericus and his wife, in
989; while Mercus the archpriest and his wife received a lease in 919.182 Many
other clergy, priests, nuns such as Anastasia before 986, and a Maroza diacona in
963 granted or received property.183
What general strands can be singled out with regard to the aristocracy of Rome
during the period 750–1000, and to what extent does this elite represent a form of
continuity, or not, with its late antique and Byzantine past? As we have seen, after
the sixth century there was no longer any trace of the traditional Roman sen­at­or­
ial aristocracy in Rome. This had been replaced by the new military elite of
Greek and eastern origin which, once settled there, mixed with the local elites,
and created a new group of power with a military as well as civilian functions of
government—a fact characteristic of Byzantine rule in Italy, when so much of the
‘governing’ meant fighting against the Lombard expansion. It is necessary, though,
to keep in mind that we cannot always identify people with Greek names or
Byzantine titles as immigrants, and that it is likely that some of these were in fact
just the existing population which adapted by taking on the onomastic and
administrative traditions of the Byzantine occupants. However, the difference
from the rest of Byzantine Italy is that, while in places like Ravenna the structures
of the regime remained in place, Byzantine government in Rome, once the duke
was no longer active, just disappeared, with the men of power turning to papal
government instead, just as the pope was becoming the undisputed ruler of the
city both in a secular and a religious capacity. Once the Franks intervened and
gave the pope as the representative of St Peter the fiscal patrimony which they
gained for him in Italy through the promissio of Quierzy and its subsequent
re­issues, papal power and wealth rose sharply, as did, in parallel, the status of the
popes and their social background. The alliance between Franks and popes, both
before and after the end of the Lombard kingdom in 774, did not signify that the
secular power of the Roman aristocracy disappeared, only that it became sub-
sumed into that of the Lateran Palace. Military, administrative, and judicial power
was exercised by the Roman elites, but they did so through the medium of papal

180 A. G. Luciani, ed., ‘La donazione di una nobildonna romana del X secolo’, ASRSP 121 (1998),
pp. 47–54.
181 Thus we have Hadrian scriniarius and his wife Maria, an illustrissima (943), Benedict mansion-
arius and his wife Rosa (967), and Leo arcarius and his wife Theodora, also an illustrissima (984), RS
nos 35, 42, 81.
182 L. Schiaparelli, ed., ‘Le carte antiche dell’archivio capitolare di S. Pietro in Vaticano’, ASRSP 24
(1901), pp. 395–496, no. 5; RS no. 112.
183 SSCD no. 11; RS no. 123.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 145

service, including for the purpose of defence (against the Byzantines, the
Lombards, the Franks, the Saracens).
The main aristocratic families were often based in certain areas of the city,
directly at the edge of the old imperial public space (the Via Lata, the foot of the
Capitoline Hill, the imperial Fora, the Quirinal). We saw how this elite was
increasingly the provider of men to the papal see (an unusual phenomenon dur-
ing the period of Byzantine rule, with the rare exception of a few popes like
Gregory the Great)—a fully understandable development in view of the enhanced
status, political role, and wealth of the papacy in the ninth century under the
Carolingians. An interesting fact is that, despite this Carolingian interest in Rome,
which we will see later in the new architecture and religious life of the city, there
was in fact hardly any Frankish migration into the city (a little more on the edges
in the Sabina), certainly compared with the extent of such migration in what had
been Lombard Italy, and even the Exarchate of Ravenna.
The situation in Rome changed considerably in the tenth century, and here one
must distinguish between the first and the second half of the century. Carolingian
support for the papacy ended with the end of the dynasty itself, and the Roman
aristocracy issued from the families previously associated with the Lateran ser-
vice detached themselves from it, just as the popes themselves lost control over
the city. First and foremost among these was the family of the vestararius
Theophylact and his successors, his daughter Marozia and his grandson Alberic.
Just as the popes lost power, so also the attraction for the post diminished among
the elite, and few major families now tried to gain the papal see. The pope, as
Alberic wanted it, had gone back to being the spiritual ruler of the city, while the
princeps Alberic was its secular master. Alberic’s strong rule both kept Italian
struggles for power by kings and emperors out of Rome, and kept the pope to his
ecclesiastical role. The means that he used to control the city were of several
kinds. One was his monastic reform, through which he could both have the moral
authority as a spiritual Christian leader and the means to use the reformed mon-
asteries as strongholds for the men and families he gathered around him in terms
of authority and wealth. Another was his control over the topography of Rome,
through the areas he favoured, and where the city elite followed him. He rein-
forced the aristocratic settlement of major families through reviving or rebuilding
some key areas of the ancient Roman imperial tradition, such as the Via Lata,
where his own palace was, the rezoning of part of the Forum of Trajan by one
of his close allies Caleolus or Caloleus, and the Aventine, where his family’s
monastic foundation was Yet another means was his style of government:
some historians have argued that this was (in the mould of the post-Carolingian
era of dissolution of central governments) one of seignorial control over his
­‘vassals’—an argument with which I cannot agree, on the grounds that his choice of
government through a few faithful men and their families, which he promoted to
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146 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

power and wealth, kept close to him and, tied to his authority, resembled far more
the pattern of the Roman clientela. These men, like Benedict Campaninus, the
de Meliosus, the early de Imiza, or Caleolus, did in most cases continue to be
in charge into the second half of the century, and several became even more
powerful, on the same level as the family which has for so long been seen as
dominating the political landscape of Rome in the second half of the tenth
­century—the Crescentii.
The debate has been ongoing for a long time as to whether the Crescentii were
related to, or descended from, the Theophylacts—a debate not immediately relevant
in this instance, and one on which I am content to follow Wickham’s conclusions.
Having spent much time unpicking the family relations, he has concluded that
it is probable that they were not related, and that in any case, there were so
many people and family groups called Crescentii that it would be impossible to
relate them to each other, let alone to the family of Alberic. If one accepts that
the Crescentii did not really gain power in Rome until the 970s and that, earlier
on, many of the men in charge were the same as those who had served Alberic,
including in the sources of their wealth through leases of papal and monastic
lands, agricultural development, and power over groups of clients in Rome
itself, one could argue that the structures and resources of the Roman aristoc-
racy changed little until the end of Tuscolani control in the mid-eleventh cen-
tury. They lived in the same places and used the same titles, though we see over
the century an increasing hierarchy of these titles, from the earlier in­dis­crim­in­
ate use of attractive-sounding ones like consul et dux, magnificus, illustris, and
so on, to a greater specialization: gradually only the top families (the Theophylacts,
Alberic, then the Crescentii) are called senator/senatrix, consul Romanorum, or
clarissimus/a.
Nevertheless, a crucial change did happen in the second half of the century,
that is after the death of Alberic and of his son Pope John XII. The princeps had
been able to keep the disruptive external forces fighting for power in Italy, from
King Hugh to Berengar II and Adalbert, from getting their hands on Rome. The
men he left behind, even the most devoted to him, beginning with his son, would
not be able to do so. The aristocratic elite, including the Crescentii, may have
wished to continue his type of rule—and the Crescentii in the 980s and 990s were
certainly trying to—but by that stage, and from the 960s, it was the Ottonian
emperors who were powerful competitors for control in Rome, and over the pap-
acy itself. The execution of Crescentius II in 998 did not destroy the family, and
his son John of Tusculum ruled over the city as prefect into the eleventh century,
while Otto III was booted out. But this was to be the prelude to far more savage
power struggles between aristocratic families and German appointed popes dur-
ing the following half-century, eventually culminating in the crisis of the ecclesi-
astical reform of Gregory VII.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 147

The Popes

The Men

The Popes from 715 to 1000:

715–731: Gregory II 741–752: Zacharias

731–741: Gregory III
752–757: Stephen II 898–900: John IX
757–767: Paul I 900–903: Benedict IV
767–772: Stephen III 903: Leo V
772–795: Hadrian I 904–911: Sergius III
795–816: Leo III 911–913: Anastasius III
816–817: Stephen IV 913–914: Landus
817–827: Paschal I 914–928: John X
824–827: Eugenius II 928: Leo VI
827: Valentine 929–931: Stephen VII
827–844: Gregory IV 931–935: John XI
844–847: Sergius II 936–939: Leo VII
847–855: Leo IV 939–942: StephenVIII
855–858: Benedict III 942–946: Marinus II
858–867: Nicholas I 946–955: Agapitus II
867–872: Hadrian II 955–963: John XII
872–882: John VIII 963–965: Leo VIII
882–884: Marinus I 964: Benedict V
884–885: Hadrian III 965–972: John XIII
885–591: Stephen V 973–974: Benedict VI
891–896: Formosus 974–983: Benedict
896: Boniface VI 983–984: VII John
896–897: Stephen VI 985–996: XIV John
897: Romanus 996–999: XV Gregory
897: Theodore II 999–1003: V Silvester
II

In view of the already indicated link between the papacy and the aristocracy of
Rome from the second half of the eighth century, it may seem inopportune to
look at the popes themselves in a separate section, since I argued very strongly
that most of them came in fact from that very group of aristocrats, and that not a
few of their actions were aimed precisely at maintaining the influence of their
own family in the city through their placing a family member on the papal throne.
My proposed division does, however, have some meaning in that the section
devoted to the aristocracy included the popes when they acted as members of
these important families, whereas this section looks at the popes in the light of
their activity qua popes. This could be their involvement in political, theological,
and ecclesiastical matters, control over the city in terms of defence, building work
and a charitable role, along with international involvement—all matters where
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148 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

they acted as representatives of their episcopal function and, occasionally though

not very often, in ways which did not necessarily favour the aristocratic group
which they represented.
For the eighth and ninth centuries, we are looking at twenty-two popes from
Gregory II (715–31) onwards, until 891; of these only four were not Romans.
Significantly, however, of the latter three were pre-772, that is to say more or less
before the end the Lombard kingdom. They are a Syrian, a Greek, and a Sicilian,
and, at end of ninth century, one from Gallese, north of Rome. What this means
is that, prior to the Carolingian conquest, in a still leftover Byzantine setting when
the popes were more specifically involved in looking after both the spiritual
welfare of the people, theological issues, and the urban organization of the city,
they were more cosmopolitan, as well as apparently of a lesser social standing,
than after the end of Byzantine Italy. With the involvement of the Carolingians,
both their political power and their social background became, in parallel, more
elevated and much more definitely associated with the city of Rome.184 Sometimes
popes may themselves have been from families not that long settled in Rome,
since their fathers had names which may have been originally Lombard or Greek,
such as Leo IV (Raduald), John VIII (Gundus), and Leo III (Atzupius)185—this in
addition to the more traditional late antique names such as Leontius, Sergius, or
Theodore, by then common throughout Roman Italy.
The list of tenth-century popes should really start with Formosus (891–6) and
the crisis associated with his papacy and that of his immediate successors, notably
Stephen VI (896–7). From then on, and until the election of Gerbert of Aurillac as
Pope Silvester II in 999, there were thirty-one popes altogether, of whom
twenty-three were Romans,186 and four from further afield than Lazio and the
Sabina.187 The Roman background was overwhelmingly key once again, and, more
specifically, the as­so­ci­ation with families of papal functionaries already in place:
Leo VI was the son of the primicerius Christopher, Leo VIII of the protoscriniarius
John, John XI of Pope Sergius III, John XII famously of Alberic himself; and several
popes were also sons of priests (Stephen VI, Romanus, John XV) and bishops
(Boniface VI, John XIII).188 If one is to judge by their names, it is clear that by the
tenth century the mix of Roman and Greek (Hadrian, Christopher, Sergius, Leo) and

184 LP I. 92: Gregory III (731–41, Syrian), 93: Zacharias (741–52, Greek), 96: Stephen III (768–72,
Sicilian), 110: Marinus (882/3–4, from Gallese, though hardly far from Rome!). On the background of
the popes up to Zacharias, see Richards, The Popes and the Papacy, pp. 267–75.
185 LP I. 98: Leo III (795–816), 105: Leo IV (847–55), 109: John VIII (872–82).
186 LP II, 116: Romanus (897, from Gallese), 118: John IX (898–900, from Tibur), 120: Leo V (903,
from Ardea).
187 John X from Bologna via Ravenna; John XIV from Pavia; Gregory V, who was a German; and
John XVI Philagathos, a Greek who had become bishop of Piacenza after having been Otto III’s
teacher; see LP II. 125, 140, and 142: John X (911–28), John XIV (983–4), Gregory V (996–9), and
John XVI (997–8).
188 LP II. 126, 134, 128, 133, 115, 116, 141, 114, and 136.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 149

Lombard and Frankish (Teudemundus, Ildibrand) names in the city was complete
and, we can assume, no longer in any way indicative of any ethnic background.
From Gregory II onwards, the role of the papacy as the main political authority
in Rome, whether on account of the Byzantines, negotiating with the Lombards
and the Carolingians, the kings of Italy and the Italian emperors, and eventually
the Roman princes and the Ottonians, understandably led to a growing concern
on the part of the Roman aristocracy to control it. The times when this became
most obvious were, in the first place, after the death of the current pope, and
through negotiations for the election of the new pontiff. For those who failed in
their attempt to install their candidate, there was always the possibility of attempt-
ing to depose the elected pope. Conflict in Roman politics essentially took these
two forms: contested elections, and plots against the existing pope.

The Struggle to Control the Papacy: Contested Elections

Since 687 when, on the death of Pope Conon, there was a double election to the
papacy,189 there had been no such documented challenges during papal elections
until 757. This is a significant date since it would be the election of the first pope
after the end of imperial rule in the Exarchate, and after the new political alliance
between the pope and the Franks came into play in 754, with Pope Stephen II’s
coronation of Pepin and the Quierzy alliance. The opposing candidate during this
election, following the death of Stephen II, was the archdeacon Theophylact.190
Attempts have been made to see this as a challenge from a popular candidate to
an aristocratic pope like Stephen II, but this seems unlikely: both candidates
appear to have had some support from both nobles and clergy, and Theophylact
was also a Lateran bureaucrat. I would see it rather as a challenge from a party
more inclined to a Byzantine rapprochement, or at the very least one which may
have objected to a radical break with the imperial past in favour of the new
Frankish alliance. This could be an indication that the cessation of imperial rule
in Italy, and especially the all-out pro-Frankish policies of Stephen II and his
family, were not accepted by all parts of the Roman ruling elite, though it could
also just be a case of another family thinking that it was now their turn to hold the
papal throne.191 In view of how recent the break with Byzantium was, it is difficult
to work out whether, in this instance, the challenge was one linked to family
power in the city, or whether there were still elements of imperial loyalty that

189 LP I. 86. 190 LP I. 95, chs. 1–2.

191 Cosentino, ‘Potere e autorità’, pp. 285–7; Marazzi, ‘Aristocrazia e Società’, pp. 47–9—even
though the argument is used partly in relation to the Constitutum Constantini. I would not go so far as
to agree with J. T. Hallenbeck, ‘The Election of Pope Hadrian I’, Church History 37 (1968), pp. 2612–70
at p. 267, who claims that the election of Theophylact was an attempt by the Byzantines to elect a
Greek pope; I cannot see how he can justify this assertion on the basis of LP I. 95, chs. 1–2.
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150 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

came into play—or indeed both together. Stephen’s brother Paul remained elected
in the end, and the challenge failed.
The death of Pope Paul caused another contested election. The aristocracy,
gradually realizing that power in the city was now to be held through the papacy,
wanted to have their own candidate, not one of the clerical hierarchy. The candi-
date officially elected was Stephen III, one of the non-‘Roman’ popes—being
originally from Sicily, having come to Rome as a child, and being brought up in
the Lateran by the Lateran clergy—in other words, an immigrant who owed
every­thing to this Lateran clergy. The candidate of the aristocratic party was
Constantine, the brother of Count Toto of Nepi in the Campania, and Toto forced
through the election of his brother as Pope Constantine II.192 Because of its com-
plex ramifications, which extended long after the election itself and into a com-
plex power struggle in Rome, I shall return to this double election below, when
examining the involvement of the primicerius Christopher and his son, the sacel-
larius Sergius, the Lombard King Desiderius, and finally the chamberlain Paul
Afiarta, in a conflict which lasted through the reign of Stephen III and into that of
his successor, Hadrian I.193 The latter may have appeared as a compromise candi-
date on Stephen III’s death, being a noble who had been brought up by his uncle
Theodotus, formerly the duke of Rome, later the primicerius.194 One could there-
fore see Hadrian’s contested election as being another concerned with issues of
political choices and alliances, involving the conflicting interests of Byzantines,
Franks, and Lombards. Another challenge, to the aristocratic but Carolingian-
backed Pope Eugenius, may also have been partly focused on the issue of external
alliances, on account of Eugenius’ being perceived as a Carolingian lackey.195
In 844, on the death of Pope Gregory IV, another aristocrat, Sergius II, was
elected.196 He too had been brought up within the papal environment, in the
Schola Cantorum then in the Lateran, but his challenger was the candidate of the
plebs, the deacon John, supported by the ‘rabble’. The election challenge was,
un­usual­ly, acknowledged by the Liber Pontificalis, rather at variance with its nor-
mal attempt to skim over such difficulties on the grounds that the Holy Spirit
always led to a choice with one voice of the people. Moreover, it is described in
terms which give away the fact that in many cases there were such disputes, which
the Liber otherwise avoids mentioning. In this instance, after the ‘dignitaries and

192 LP I. 96, chs. 3–6; see also J. T. HallenbecK, ‘Pope Stephen III: why was he elected?’, Archivum
Historiae Pontificiae 12 (1974), pp. 287–99.
193 See below Chapter 2, pp. 63–68.
194 This has been the most common understanding of the situation; see L. Duchesne, Beginnings of
the Temporal Sovereignty of the Popes (London, 1907), p. 87. Against this, Hallenbeck, ‘The Election’,
suggests that Hadrian I’s was not an election but a proper coup, led not by the opposition to the pol­
icies of Paul I but solely by a deliberate anti-Lombard stance, which led to the freeing of Afiarta’s
en­emies very soon after the election. The absence of the mention of such a coup in the LP is seen as an
argument ab silentio confirming this fact ( p. 268), but I do not find this convincing.
195 ARF 824; see Davis, LPC9, pp. 31–2. 196 LP I. 104, chs. 4–6.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 151

leaders of the city of Rome and all the church people, as usually then happens . . . all
acclaimed different candidates’, the deacon John forced his way into the Lateran,
but the ‘princes of the Roman citizens were indignant’, elected Sergius, and
expelled John. Though no doubt the latter was also a member of the papal court,
clearly the social issue here was paramount, with the Liber Pontificalis making it
clear that the noble party was the one that defeated John—and further de­legit­im­
iz­ing John by associating him thus with the ‘rabble’.
Another ninth-century contested election was that of Pope Benedict III in 855,
and here again the Liber Pontificalis had no choice but to expand into an elaborate
smear campaign against a very serious contender indeed. After the election, but
before the consecration, the papal envoys had to send notice of it to the Frankish
emperor.197 They were waylaid by Arsenius, Bishop of Orté, one of the great
Roman aristocrats, who had been working towards placing his own kinsman,
Anastasius, on the papal throne, and appears to have successfully wooed the
ambassadors to that effect. The plot designed to achieve this was carried out with
their help, and consisted in tricking the people of Rome to go out to meet the
imperial envoys at the Milvian Bridge, as was customary, while in the meantime,
with no opposition on the ground, Anastasius and his supporters went to seize
the Lateran. It was only after negotiations with Benedict III’s envoys that the con-
flict was resolved and he was finally consecrated. The struggle would continue
with the election following the death of Pope Nicholas, that of Hadrian II, whose
involvement with Anastasius’ family was another of the key elements of aristo-
cratic trouble.198 The author of the Liber Pontificalis again found it difficult to
keep up the usual pretence of an election by the ‘unanimous assembly of senate
and people’ since, immediately after, he admits that the ‘dignitaries were as usual
divided into two factions’, with the ‘tyranny of fractious men . . . raging more freely
than usual between one pontiff ’s death and his replacement’; in this instance, they
all agreed on Hadrian II as a compromise candidate.199 One is therefore led to
question how large the party favouring Hadrian’s accession really was. This may
throw a different light on the reasons for Hadrian’s refusal in the previous two
elections (of Benedict III and Nicholas) to accept the pontifical throne when
offered it by one of the parties: it may have had less to do with simple modesty
than with the awareness of just how limited his support was. It must also be
recalled that Hadrian II’s family had already produced two popes; the second of
these, Sergius II, not a particularly successful or popular one,200 which may have
been another reason for opposition to him. A third reason may have been the fact
that the Roman aristocracy baulked at creating what might seem to be a priv­il­
eged association between one family and the papacy, just as the Venetian aristoc-
racy fought so hard to prevent any one family becoming associated with the top

197 LP I. 106, chs. 6–20. 198 See Chapter 1. 199 LP I. 108, ch. 4. 200 LP I. 104.
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152 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

level of power. Hadrian II’s reign, whether for these reasons or not, was beset by
conflicts with the rest of the Roman nobility.
Leaving aside the Formosian crisis, on the understanding that the opposition
to Formosus did not manifest itself during the papal election itself but after he
became pope, the first election clash of the tenth century was that of Pope
Theodore II’s successor, John IX, who had to contend with the parallel election by
the anti-Formosians of Sergius III, as we will see below.201
Another conflictual papal election was that of Pope John X, said to have been a
consanguineus of Marozia.202 John had been an archdeacon of the Church of
Bologna, and had been invited by the primates Romae urbis to become pope, with
some disregard for canonical niceties,203 since he had previously been elected
archbishop of Ravenna and occupied the post for some years. His opponents were
fierce in accusing him on this score. There are certainly proven links between him
and the family of Theophylact through their correspondence, though not in the
defamatory way mentioned by Liutprand in relation to him and Theophylact’s
highly regarded wife, Theodora. There is certainly evidence that John X’s brother
Peter was marchio of Spoleto, came to Rome to help his brother the pope, and was
subsequently killed by the Romans in the Lateran in 928, accused of helping the
Hungarian raiders, allegedly with the agreement of Guy of Spoleto and Marozia,
who then imprisoned and killed John X.204
The next few elections were relatively uneventful—by then, the popes were
clearly far less able to exercise any authority in the city when facing Alberic’s
power. As a result, the position was far less desirable and fought over, just as had
been the case at the height of Byzantine rule, and for the same reasons. This
applied until the election of Pope John XII (Alberic’s son Octavian), conducted by
the Roman courtiers of Alberic, at his request, and placing him on the papal
throne in 955.205 Regarded by his own contemporaries as a somewhat worldly
person, John XII first called Otto I to help against the attacks of Berengar II on
Rome, then changed alliances and had to flee a year later on Otto I’s arrival in
Rome. John XII was deposed in 963, and Otto I imposed his candidate, the proto-
scriniarius Leo, as the new pope, under the name Leo VIII (963–5).206 John XII’s
brief return and his reconciliation with the Emperor Otto was followed by a
council and Pope Leo VIII’s exile. But on John XII’s death in 964, the Romans
chose a new pope, Benedict V, despite Leo VIII being still alive and officially
pope. This in turn led to Otto’s furious deposition of Benedict V that same year,

201 LP II. 118.

202 LP II. 125; The scandalmongering Liutprand—whose purpose was to discredit the Theophylacts
but whose chronology was totally confused and thus unlikely—claimed him to have been Marozia’s
and Pope Sergius III’s son. This son could have been John XI.
203 For John X, see above, Chapter 1; also Liutprand, Antapodosis I, chs. 47–52 and III. ch. 43.
204 BenSor, p. 159. 205 LP II. 133; on John XII, see below.
206 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, ch. 6.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 153

and his exile to Germany, where he would die in Hamburg shortly after.207
Liutprand’s spin on the crisis was that the Romans had, allegedly, ‘all, clerics and
laymen, in agreement and with one will’, asked Otto I to ‘give them a better pope’
in Leo VIII; this can at the very least be challenged in view of the fact that the
same Liutprand later tells us how, after John XII’s death, omnes Romani a minimo
usque ad maximum, una concordia et uno consensus atque spontantea voluntate
elected Leo VIII’s opponent, Benedict V.208 One must assume that there was
strong opposition to the idea that the pope would not be chosen by the Romans
themselves but be imposed by the emperor. After both Leo VIII’s and Benedict
V’s deaths, Otto I accepted his mistake, and the election of John XIII, previously
bishop of Narni.209 Here, in other words, is another example, perhaps deliberately
glossed over, of yet another see translation, despite the considerable trouble
previously caused by such moves with Formosus. It gives us another intimation
that the real issues of the Formosian schism were not principally to do with a
canon law technicality but with political issues not openly discussed, as we shall
now see.

The Struggle to Control the Papacy: Conflicts,

Riots, and Depositions

Throughout the eighth century, from Gregory II (715–31) onwards, the papacy
struggled to resist the extension of the Lombard kingdom as well as financial and
theological pressure from Constantinople and, through its alliance with the
Franks, to remove both these two factors of danger from its orbit. However, the
popes were not doing this on their own; they were part of one or several leading
groups in the city, and they were involved in the conflicts taking place between
these groups. In the first instance, until the effective end of the Exarchate in 751,
most of the fighting which took place was between the exarch and his representa-
tive, the duke of Rome, that is the remaining imperial power, and the Roman
militia, the people who mattered in the city, and who were increasingly support-
ing the papacy.
After Emperor Leo III’s revision of the receipt of taxes from Italy, followed by
Pope Gregory II’s refusal to obey (and the eventual removal of the Sicilian and
south Italian patrimony of the Church of Rome),210 a whole series of plots would

207 LP II. 134, 13; on these events see Thietmar, chs. 28, 35; Regino, Chronicon: Cont 961–7; BenSor,
pp. 179–81.
208 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, ch. 15.
209 LP II. 136. It was thought by some historians that he was related to the Crescentii, a view now
superseded; Cecchelli, ‘Famiglie romane’, pp. 79–97; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 142–3; Wickham,
Medieval Rome, p. 201.
210 Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 429–30; also Marazzi, ‘Il conflitto’, pp. 231–57; Noble,
Republic of St Peter, pp. 210–40.
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154 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

be set up by the emperor and his envoys, supported by the Exarch Paul, sent to
Italy specifically to order the pope to pay the extra taxes and, if he still refused, to
eliminate him.211 The Duke of Rome Martinus officially consented to the first plot
without actually openly supporting it, and the three imperial representatives sent
to kill the pope failed, were themselves killed, and their leader made a monk.
A new duke replaced Martinus, and the Exarch Paul tried again, sending men
from Ravenna to Rome to execute the orders. The Romans heard of this and rose,
jointly with the Lombards from Spoleto and Benevento, to defend the pope. As a
result of the imperial mandate to implement iconoclasm in Italy, the armies of the
Pentapolis and the Venetiae also rose against the exarch, defending the pope, who
now told the Italians to elect their own dukes.212 Several more attempts to kill the
pope followed, all foiled by the Romans, including that by the emperor’s envoy,
the patricius Eutychius, a previous exarch. Eutychius’ envoy to Rome was found
out, and swore to defend the pope and anathematize Eutychius, who then made
another attempt to fulfil his mission by sending large gifts to the dukes of Spoleto
and Benevento and to King Liutprand in order to obtain help. Both the chief men
of Rome and the ‘Lombards’ together swore an oath to die defending the pope.
It seems rather improbable that the imperial envoys and plotters would have been
so repeatedly incompetent as to be unable to carry out a simple assassination plot,
unless one assumes that either the Romans were especially vigilant and prepared
to keep constant surveillance around the pope, or that the envoys themselves
were rather half-hearted in their attempts, and prepared to confess all. This indi-
cates very clearly how strong the Italian alliance around the papacy was—much
stronger than a perhaps somewhat uninformed Byzantine emperor would have
expected. Moreover, while at first the regrouping around the pope is said to have
been that of the Roman army itself, increasingly—and especially after the attempt
at enforcing the iconoclastic decrees and the papal resistance to these—the armies
of the whole Exarchate, especially of Ravenna, as well as those of the Lombard
rulers of the southern duchies, all rallied around the papacy. Their reasons may
have been different, the Lombard duchies being engaged in an attempt to gain
greater independence from the Lombard king in Pavia and using the papal card
to that end, while the people of the Exarchate were actually planning to remove
themselves from imperial authority in Constantinople by electing their own
emperor. However, the end result was a joint effort at protecting the papacy, in
which even King Liutprand took part.213 After a final attempt by Eutychius to
implement his mandate by offering Liutprand the help of the imperial armies to
subdue the dukes of Spoleto and Benevento, against his support to gain access

211 For the details of the Byzantine-led plots, see LP I. 91 (Gregory II), 92 (Gregory III); see Noble,
Republic of St Peter, pp. 442–3, 447–50.
212 LP I. 91, chs. 17–18; see Noble, Republic of St. Peter, p. 30.
213 Paul the Deacon’s Historia Langobardorum, ed. Chiesa, chs. 49 and 55; Noble, Republic of St.
Peter, pp. 36–7; Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 447–50.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 155

to Rome, Liutprand arrived in Rome, where he was persuaded by Gregory III

(731–41) that this move would be inexpedient. One needs to read between the
lines of the Liber Pontificalis and beyond the account of Liutprand’s repentance
to see how this may have been a negotiated settlement to allow the exarch into
Rome, while preventing the Italians from choosing a rival emperor in the
usurper Petasius. This move was prevented by the Roman militia at the pope’s
command, who refused to push for open rebellion and treason against the
emperor.214 By now the pope saw the Roman army as his, and not the emperor’s,
and himself as its only master.
The next conflict, complex and already well studied, nevertheless needs a
brief summary, given its considerable importance in the developments of that
half-century in Rome. It was precipitated on the death of Pope Paul by a repre-
sentative of the aristocracy who came to the city to his palace, together with an
‘army of peasants from Tuscia’ led by Duke Toto of Nepi.215 He came with his
three brothers, having possibly made an agreement with the chief Lateran offi-
cial, the primicerius Christopher, and his son, the sacellarius Sergius, to elect a
candidate agreeable to both. Toto, however, changed his mind and had his brother
Constantine elected as the new pope, rushed through the different degrees of the
clerical status, and then consecrated pope by the bishop of Porto. Christopher
and Sergius fled to King Desiderius, and in the teeth of their well-known trad­
ition­al hostility to the Lombards they asked him for help to remove Constantine
II who, meantime, appears to have been accepted by the majority of both aristoc-
racy and clergy in the city. He certainly ruled unchallenged for a whole year,
effecting numerous ordinations. Christopher and Sergius, supported by men
from the duchy of Spoleto, attacked Rome in 768. Sergius, together with the
Lombard priest Waldipert, an envoy of Liutprand, entered Rome though, signifi-
cantly, they remained close to the walls ‘for fear of the Roman people’, from which
we might deduce that the Romans—perhaps meaning the aristocracy of the city
led by Toto’s supporters, were defending Pope Constantine II and his family. Toto
was killed and Constantine II was deposed. Waldipert, presumably fulfilling his
secret mission, led the Romans to elect the priest Philip, favourable to the
Lombard king, as the new pope, without Christopher’s and Sergius’ know­ledge.
Philip was accepted as the new pope, since he was taken to the Lateran, where the
customary banquet took place with the Church’s top men and the chief officers of
the militia. This unexpected and obviously much unwelcome development went
against what Christopher and Sergius had planned, and the primicerius swore not
to enter Rome again until Philip had been expelled from the papal see—a bluff
which worked since the clergy, together with ‘some of the Romans’, sent Philip

214 LP I. 91, ch. 22.

215 LP I. 96, chs. 3–22 and 27–32, has the narrative about Toto and Constantine, and Christopher
and Desiderius; see Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 622–60.
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156 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

back to his monastery. Christopher’s candidate, Stephen III, was elected as the
new pope, Constantine II imprisoned and, to ensure that his removal was not
countermanded by the ‘Lateran Franks’,216 Christopher sent Sergius to Kings
Charles and Carloman, requesting that some Frankish bishops expert in canon
law should be sent to Rome for a council to deal with Constantine. In 769 this
council not only confirmed Constantine II’s deposition but decided that in future
papal elections should be strictly restricted to the clergy of Rome, to avoid a repe­
ti­tion of the election of a layman.217 Meanwhile, having helped Christopher
against Toto and Constantine, and having failed to have a more supportive pope
after Philip’s removal, King Desiderius turned against Christopher and moved on
to a new alliance with the chamberlain Paul, known as Afiarta.218 Paul Afiarta
tried to help Desiderius but, when Christopher and Sergius found out, they shut
the city gates and mobilized the citizenry against the ‘Lombards’. Desiderius
arrived in Rome and met the pope at St Peter’s, while Afiarta tried to get the
Romans to rise against Christopher and Sergius. Having succeeded in uniting
Desiderius and Stephen III against them, Christopher and Sergius were sent off to
a monastery, which they refused to accept; Afiarta had them imprisoned.219
Constantine II’s election was an obvious attempt by at least part of the lay aris-
tocracy to regain some control over the papacy from the large number of clerical
officials appointed by Pope Paul. Christopher, the leader of this clerical party, may
have hoped that Toto would accept the election of a new pope in the regular man-
ner, but Toto changed his mind, either from fear of being swamped by the clerical
pressure group, or under pressure from other nobles, who all saw that for the lay
military aristocracy to control Rome, they had to control the papacy. For the
clerical ‘party’, Christopher and Sergius were heroes who saved the papacy from
Pope Constantine II, a layman elected against the traditions of the Roman
Church. But they could only get rid of Constantine by appealing to the Lombard
King Desiderius, who himself had an interest in gaining a pope more favourable
to Lombard interests, in the hope that he would eventually succeed in what was
probably his own plan to expand and control a Lombard Italy with Rome as its
centre. Thus Christopher’s appeal, the killing of Toto, a Roman, and the de­pos­
ition of Constantine II, another Roman and a pope clearly accepted as such with

216 A significant name, which confirms the importance of the ‘Lombards’ in Rome, as has already
been discussed in relation to the issue of population mix and people of Lombard descent in the city,
and is here confirmed by the weight of the ‘Lombards’ within the Lateran itself.
217 LP I. 96, ch. 20. 218 LP I. 96, chs. 28–32 and 97, chs. 4–17 on Afiarta.
219 A very good summary of this long crisis is in Davis, LPC8, ‘Introductory Notes to the Lives of
Paul and Stephen III’, pp. 77–9 and 85–7. See Noble, Republic of St Peter, pp. 112–30; O. Bertolini,
‘La caduta del primicerio Cristoforo (771) nelle versioni dei contemporanei e le correnti antilongo-
barde e filolongobarde in Roma alla fine del pontificato di Stefano III (771–771)’, in Banti, ed.,
Scritti scelti di storia medievale II, pp. 615–67, and Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 622–74;
Duchesne, I primi tempi, pp. 51–63; D. H. Miller, ‘Papal-Lombard relations during the pontificate of
Pope Paul I: the attainment of an equilibrium of power in Italy, 756–67’, Catholic Historical Review 4
(1973), pp. 44–54.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 157

wide-ranging support for over a year, were carried out by the Lombards, a source
of great embarrassment for the writer of the Liber Pontificalis.220 This explains the
minimizing of the ‘Lateran Lombards’’ role. It is clear that Waldipert was working
for Desiderius in having Philip elected, with the agreement of the Church as well
as the Roman army. Christopher had to gamble on being influential enough to
make the Romans depose Philip, whom they had just elected, and to elect in his
place his, Christopher’s, candidate, Stephen III. As we may recall, Stephen III was
from a non-Roman family, having come from Sicily as a boy and having been
educated in the Lateran, thus effectively owing his career to the Lateran hierarchy.
Christopher’s ambition was to be the effective power behind the papal throne,
with a rather weak and submissive pope. This may have been his reason for hav-
ing turned to the Lombards in the first place, in spite of his known hostility to
them, and to have agreed with Desiderius to have a pro-Lombard pope elected,
which Waldipert was sent to Rome to ensure. Presumably Christopher reneged
on this agreement once in control, in order to keep his own influence in Rome,
after having triumphed over the Roman aristocracy. The convocation of a council
with Frankish envoys was a way to legitimize Pope Constantine II’s deposition
and Stephen III’s election in the eyes of the Franks. Desiderius had to accept the
reversal of fortune, though his response was an attempt to have his candidate
elected as archbishop of Ravenna.221 More importantly, however, Lombard and
Frankish policies had now changed, leading to an alliance between the two kings
Charles and Desiderius. Stephen III may well have feared that this would leave
the papacy isolated, while he no doubt also found Christopher’s domination in
Rome difficult to bear.222 As a result, Stephen’s alliance with Desiderius through
the latter’s agent, Paul Afiarta, in 771 meant that Stephen III now left Christopher
and Sergius, to the anger of Desiderius, who had been used by them. Stephen
meanwhile seemed to have exchanged submission to Christopher to that to
Afiarta, while becoming an ally of Desiderius, who was not being any more forward
in returning the lands claimed by the papacy under the Quierzy agreement.
The apparent conflict of these years has generally been described as reflecting
the papacy’s traditional conflict with the Lombards and alliance with the Franks.
However, behind these issues of external polices and alliances, I should like to
concentrate on the internal rivalries. Who was Toto, an aristocrat with a power
base in both Campania and a house with armed men in Rome? Were the
‘Campanians’, peasants according to the Liber Pontificalis, following Toto because

220 Davis, LPC8, pp. 86–7; see now R. McKitterick, ‘The damnatio memoriae of Pope Constantine II
(767–768)’, in Italy and Medieval Europe, ed. R. Balzaretti and P. Skinner (Oxford, 2018), pp. 231–49.
221 LP I. 96, chs. 25–6; Agnellus’s account of this event is missing from the MS, so we have no
knowledge of the Ravennate views on this.
222 Hallenbeck, ‘The Lombard party’, pp. 951–66; Hallenbeck, Pavia and Rome; Hallenbeck, ‘Pope
Stephen III: why was he elected?’, Archivum Historiae Pontificiae 12 (1974), pp. 287–99; Hallenbeck,
‘Paul Afiarta and the papacy: an analysis of politics in eighth-century Rome’, Archivum Historiae
Pontificiae 12 (1974), pp. 22–54.
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158 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

they followed their lord, or because, like him, they were noble landowners who
had cause to resent the increasing hold of the papacy as lordship on their land?
Constantine II, though demonized by the Liber Pontificalis, was clearly accepted
as pope by nearly all in Rome, including the chiefs of both Church and aristocracy.
On the other hand, Christopher, whose son was the next high official in the clerical
sphere, and whose kinsman Gratiosus, originally chartularius and later made
duke (the old Byzantine title of Empire by now given to a high official at the
pontifical court), appears to have tried to create a ‘continuity of power for the
clerical party, not dependent on the person of the current pope.’223 His success
seemed complete when he removed Constantine II with official Frankish ­support—
and one could note that the appeal to the Franks for bishops ‘versed in the
canons’ to judge according to canon law seems somewhat disingenuous coming
from the Lateran. We are asked to believe that the Franks, well before the
Carolingian reforms, promoted by them as ‘Roman’, had developed better know­
ledge of canon law than the Roman clerical elite—which seems rather unlikely,
to say the least. In reality, Christopher’s party evidently wanted to have the
Franks openly in charge of setting up his major triumph, made manifest in the
decrees of a council which ruled that the clergy alone could elect the pope, and
not the ‘­people’, that is the aristocracy. This ruling, to which I will return in dis-
cussions of the Ludovicianum, would have been Christopher’s ultimate aim,
ef­fect­ive­ly meaning that the aristocracy could only rule Rome if its members
passed through the Church first—something which would become in practice
quite frequent, with the choice of having one child of a noble family taken on by
the papal court to be educated.
At this point, it may seem legitimate to ask whether, as the Liber Pontificalis
implies, the Romans were happy to accept anyone chosen as pope once this had
been done—were they as volatile and fickle as the above events suggest? Why
does one gain such a sense from the Liber Pontificalis? It could well be that it
deliberately lumped together ‘the Romans’, in reality clashing groups which the
Liber chooses to ignore, which is precisely why the plots and counterplots arose in
the first place. Could it also be that, while the Liber Pontificalis by definition
makes the political and social elite of Rome exclusively focused on the papal con-
trol of the city, a secular source, had it existed, might have perhaps shown the
aristocratic elite as less exclusively concerned about the policies of the Lateran
and the person of the pope, as long as it controlled papal policies up to a point?
Even as men like Hadrian I, Paschal, Leo IV, Nicholas, and John VIII were clearly
key players, and dominated the city, the aristocratic element (to which many
belonged anyway) may not have seen the papacy as the one and only player in
urban policies, in the way that it would become after the eleventh-century reform.

223 Davis, LPC8, p. 98 fn 59; Noble, Republic of St. Peter, pp. 117–18.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 159

The subsequent confrontation was, in some ways, a continuation of the previous

one, the protagonist being Paul Afiarta, the mastermind behind the ascent to the
throne of Pope Stephen III in the first instance, and of Pope Hadrian I after 771.
Afiarta’s rise began under Stephen III after, together, they successfully elim­in­ated
Christopher and Sergius.224 In the last years of the Lombard kingdom, Desiderius
was still confident enough of his plans concerning Italy to refuse to return various
conquered lands, and further to continue to conquer other areas of the old
Exarchate. As a result of Archbishop Leo of Ravenna’s appeal to the pope, who
sent envoys to Desiderius requesting the return of these possessions, Desiderius’
response was to offer to do so only if Pope Stephen III came to meet him in Pavia.
This was perceived to be a move geared towards forcing the pope to crown
Carloman (Charles’s brother and co-ruler) and his sons king of the Franks, in
order to detach the papacy from its strongest Frankish supporter, Charles.225
Pope Hadrian I, sending Afiarta as ambassador to Pavia, asked Archbishop Leo to
find a pretext to detain him in Ravenna while he, through initiating an inquiry
into the circumstances of the suspicious death of the sacellarius Sergius, could
find a way of ridding himself of his adviser.226 As expected, the inquiry revealed
Afiarta’s involvement, through his henchmen who claimed to have, on his orders,
handed Sergius over to ‘the Campanians’, who had killed him.227 The acts of the
trial were sent off to Archbishop Leo, who then handed Afiarta to the consularis
of Ravenna; allegedly without papal knowledge, the secular authorities in
Ravenna tried and condemned him.228 Hadrian had ordered Archbishop Leo to
send Afiarta in exile to Constantinople, and had sent a request for mercy for
Afiarta to the Emperors Constantine and Leo.229 Archbishop Leo, however,
appears to have been quicker than the pope’s envoys and to have ordered the con-
sularis to execute Afiarta, despite the papal mission, whose avowed purpose was
to ensure that no harm would come to him before being exiled.230 The account
that we have of this whole episode is very murky: this lack of clarity concerns not
only Archbishop Leo’s actions in relation to the papacy, but also, and even more
puzzling, in relation to Desiderius, Afiarta’s ‘boss’, in view of the archbishops of
Ravenna’s rather supportive attitude vis-à-vis the Lombards after 751. One would
therefore have to assume two possible reasons for Leo’s actions. One would be the
not necessarily visible struggle, in this case, of several parties in Ravenna (pro-
Lombard, anti-Roman, pro-Byzantine, and more likely just the choices of individ-
ual families), or, equally possibly, one could imagine this gesture as part of Leo’s
attempt to curry favour with the Franks.
Several key points arise out of this narrative. One is the enmeshing of the
political events in Rome with the Campanian men at the service of the Romans,

224 Hallenbeck, ‘Paul Afiarta’, pp. 22–54. 225 LP I. 97, chs. 8–9.
226 LP I. 97, ch. 9; see Noble, Republic of St. Peter, p. 130. 227 LP I. 97, chs. 10–12.
228 LP I. 97, chs. 14–15. 229 LP I. 97, ch. 15. 230 LP I. 97, chs. 16–17.
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160 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

and the rootedness of the great Roman families ruling the city as papal officials in
Lazio, where they had land and power, which was the other side of the coin
from their power in the city.231 Another point is the interweaving of the policies
of the ex-Byzantine cities, with Rome and Ravenna forming one axis. A third is
the fact that, Frankish alliance against the Lombards notwithstanding, and with
estrangement from Byzantium increasingly clear, traditional political attitudes
of sending exiles to the emperor in Constantinople remained firm both in Rome
and in Ravenna.
Another key aspect of Roman politics is the realization of just how close
Desiderius seems to have been to achieving his ambition of a Lombard kingdom
with Rome at its centre. Desiderius’ use of diplomacy, whether through his nearly
realized attempt at having a pliable pope like Philip, and then at having Afiarta as
the power behind the throne, was one way of achieving his goal. His use of the
Franks against the pope, first through the matrimonial alliance of his daughter
with Charles, then with the lightly disguised attempt to entice the pope to Pavia
to exert pressure on him to crown Carloman as a rival and counterpower to
Charles, shows him using the same methods of divide and rule as had the popes
when calling on the Franks. Afiarta was clearly his skilled man on the inside, who
helped him almost achieve his goal. But though loathed as a spy for Desiderius,
Afiarta was in fact chamberlain and superista, and a Lateran official, if obviously a
Lombard, from Rome. Once again, despite the Liber Pontificalis’s lumping together
the ‘Lombards’ as the king’s men and enemies of Rome, it is essential to realize
that the Lombards in Rome were not a ‘faction’ or a fifth column but full members
of the city’s elite, and a real force.232 Since there was no way of knowing then that
the Lombard kingdom would disappear within a few years, a Rome as part of the
Lombard Italian world was a perfectly conceivable future scenario.
The final plot of the eighth century was that against Pope Leo III (795–816),
which began during the Laetania Maior gathering. When the pope was riding in
the vicinity of S. Lorenzo in Lucina, the primicerius Paschal, Pope Hadrian I’s
nephew, together with the sacellarius and other ‘wicked Christians’, ambushed
him.233 The 799 conspiracy was, to some extent, parallel to that by Toto in 767/8.
Its head was Paschal, leading what may have been the family group of Hadrian I’s
relatives.234 The place chosen for the attack, close to S. Silvestro, was the family
home of Popes Stephen II and Paul, converted into a monastery served by Greek
monks. Evidently the conspirators made their move during the procession

231 Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 51–7; Wickham, ‘Historical and Topographical Notes on Early
Mediaeval South Etruria’, PBSR 46 (1978), pp. 132–79, and PBSR 47 (1979), pp. 66–95; Toubert, Les
Structures, pp. 960–1024; Marazzi, ‘Aristocratie et société’, pp. 104, 121–2.
232 Hallenbeck, ‘The Lombard party’, pp. 951–66.
233 LP I. 98, ch. 11; they treacherously pretended that they could not wear the vestments associated
with their ecclesiastical function in order to be able to be secretly armed; and Davis, LPC8 on the fact
that more and more of the Lateran high clergy dressed like lay aristocrats.
234 Theophanes, a. 6289, in Mango et al., The chronicle of Theophanes Confessor.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 161

without having to worry about the crowd turning against them: since they clearly
did not have to flee, it could be assumed that the crowd at least supported them,
except for Leo’s immediate entourage. This would reinforce the view that, not
only was the family of the previous pope popular, but also that Leo III was not, a
point clearly suggested by Leo’s flight.235 Significantly, the later ceremony to
depose Leo III also took place at S. Silvestro,236 and the second attempt to muti-
late him was either at S. Silvestro or at S. Erasmo—both served by Greek monks,
most of whom were refugees from iconoclasm in the Byzantine Empire—and had
been supported by both Popes Stephen II and Paul.237 Leo was dragged away,
imprisoned at S. Erasmo, from where he was delivered in secret, brought to St
Peter’s, whence he was removed by the duke of Spoleto.238 If this was an aristo-
cratic plot against men who had taken against Leo III, perhaps on account of his
intensifying the Carolingian presence in Rome, it might explain why, among
those who rallied around the pope and who went to find him in Spoleto, were
‘various bishops, priests, leading men from the cities and Roman clerics’, with no
mention being made of ‘chief men’ or of the militia. The Liber Pontificalis is usu-
ally very precise in its vocabulary when attempting to express consensus of the
populus in the city, and the absence of a mention of the secular elite is probably
significant of the opposition to Leo by this elite, who, according to the Liber, had
set up the plot against him in the first place.
Together with his supporters, Leo III went to Charles in Francia, while the
plotters lay charges against him. Charles sent him back to Rome, together with
several missi, deputized to sit in judgement and question the primicerius Paschal
and the other conspirators.239 The Liber Pontificalis insists heavily, if not exceed-
ingly, on the unity of the city of Rome in support of Leo III, who was welcomed at
the Milvian Bridge with great honour by the ‘leading members of the clergy, all
the clergy, the chief men, the senate, the whole militia and the entire Roman
­people, nuns and deaconesses, noble matrons and all the women, the four scholae
of the foreigners’.240 Shortly thereafter Charles himself came to Rome and pre-
sided over a council of the ‘clergy and nobility of the Franks and the senate of the
Romans’, set up as a tribunal to judge the accusations or, as the Liber Pontificalis
has it, to ‘clear . . . the pontiff’.241 The council provided a way out by claiming that
it could not sit in judgement on the pope, so Pope Leo III offered to take an oath
to clear himself. The plotters were brought to Charles and, again ‘with noble

235 ARF, 797; see Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 31–2, 41–2, and Noble, Republic of St Peter, pp. 198–9.
236 LP I. 98 ch. 11; see also Leo III Ep X, 63 and Alcuin 179 (MGH Ep 2, 297).
237 LP I. 96, ch. 23.
238 It may be no coincidence that the most active secular opponent to Leo III was an aristocrat
from Campania, Maurus of Nepi, who might have been of the same family of Toto, both counts of
Nepi, and also a supporter of the family of Hadrian, who had extensive properties near there.
239 LP I. 98, chs. 11–22, ARF 797–800.
240 LP I. 98, ch. 19. 241 LP I. 98, ch. 21; Notker, I. 26.
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162 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Franks and Romans in attendance’, they accused each other and were eventually
sent into exile by Charles, who was then crowned emperor by Leo III at Christmas
800.242 Some of them would be brought back after Charles’s death, and the leaders
executed by Leo III, while the others, of which there must have been quite a few,
were redeemed and brought back from Francia by Leo’s successor, Stephen IV.243
Their number confirms the importance of the rebellion of 799, naturally under-
emphasized by the Liber Pontificalis. It also confirms that the judgement on Leo
III had been an expedient one, without there being a clear statement of ex­on­er­
ation from the accusations against him, which some Frankish sources imply were
justified.244 The bad blood and the involvement of a large part of the Roman
aristocracy—and its reasons, at least in part, for the plot—are not entirely clear
in the Liber or in contemporary Frankish sources. They may be clearer in another
Frankish source, the Astronomer’s Life of Louis the Pious, which, though thirty
or forty years later, might well have been based on Frankish knowledge that was
not spelled out earlier by Frankish contemporaries for political reasons. The
Astronomer tells us that ‘some powerful Romans had entered into a vicious con-
spiracy against Leo’, who ‘had adjudged them to be taken away and tried by
deadly torture’. Louis found it hard to believe that a pope could judge so harshly,
so he sent King Bernard of Italy to investigate. He went to Rome and ‘sent a
report that the rumour was correct’, and also that some of these men had
attempted to ‘steal all the farms which they call estates and which had been
recently established by the apostolic man, as well as those things which they
alleged were robbed of them contrary to law, since no judge had rendered
decision’.245 The Liber Pontificalis biography itself, placing strong emphasis on
Leo’s gifts and restorations of churches, and skimming over the political op­pos­
ition to him and the plot, makes one suspect that contemporaries may well have
known the accusations to have been true. Moreover, the Liber Pontificalis had no
choice but to acknowledge the extent to which it was only Frankish intervention
that had allowed Leo to continue as pope—it mentions at least three times the
importance and parity of the Romans and the Franks as judges of Leo III. Hence,
as we will see later, the spin it put on the coronation was also a way of minimiz-
ing the extent to which it was by way of a repayment of the debt owed to Charles,
and to avoid the risk of making the papacy appear to be subordinate to the
Frankish emperors.246
Leo III’s successor was Stephen IV (816–17), another noble pope, with a family
which would produce two more popes later on—Sergius II in 844 and Hadrian II
in 867. Stephen began the process of sorting out with Louis the Pious the exact
nature of the relationship between emperor and pope and the extent of the papal

242 LP I. 98, ch. 23; ARF 801; on Charlemagne’s coronation and Leo III, see Chapter 5.
243 LP I. 99, ch. 2. 244 Davis, LPC8 pp. 173–4. 245 Astronomer, II. 25/1 and 25/3.
246 See Chapter 5.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 163

territories in the Ludovicianum.247 His early death meant that it was really his
successor, Pope Paschal, who would complete the task, not without being himself
the object of another conspiracy. Another pope not described as noble, but issued
from a priestly family (with a father who may have been a bishop), Paschal had
a number of enemies among the Roman nobility, who, by now, according to
the terms of the Ludovicianum, could in theory appeal to the emperor against the
pope if they could claim to be persecuted men in Italy. The Emperor Louis the
Pious sent Lothar to Rome to sit in judgement; the Libellus de imperatoria potes-
tate claims, perhaps as a result of its own pro-imperial ideological choices, but not
necessarily wrongly, that ‘all greater men of the city had become adherents of the
emperor’.248 The main problem seems to have been once again the perception by
the nobility of an unjust seizure of their land and of depredations by papal offi-
cials, seen by then as part of their control of the domuscultae.249 Moreover,
Paschal greatly favoured the clergy, whose stipend he increased, possibly more
than any of his predecessors had done, and his main supporters were also the
clergy. The crisis reached its climax in 823, when the primicerius Theodore and
the nomenclator Leo were blinded and decapitated in the Lateran, together with
several others, allegedly on the pope’s order, a fact brought to the knowledge of
Louis the Pious and described by the Annales Regnum Francorum as being the
result of their loyalty to Lothar.250 While Paschal claimed not to have been behind
this action, carried out according to him by members of St Peter’s familia,251 the
clergy obviously felt that some Lateran officials were more loyal to the Carolingians
than to the pope. Louis the Pious sent envoys to Rome, but these were faced with
the same problem as those of 799, and Paschal used the same means of disculpat-
ing himself as Leo III had done—an oath of innocence.252 The immediate result
was that, on Paschal’s death, the election of his successor was again contested. It
has been thought traditionally that while the clergy seemed to have elected a suc-
cessor from among Paschal’s party,253 the pope who won, Eugenius (824–7), had
been chosen with the agreement of the Carolingian missus. Pope Eugenius’ life in
the Liber Pontificalis is very short, and effectively glides over his pontificate, which
had a great impact but went in the opposite direction from that which would have

247 The Ludovicianum is edited in MGH Cap. 1, 172, pp. 352–5; discussions in Hahn, ‘Das
Hludowicianum’, pp. 15–135; Noble, Republic of St. Peter, pp. 300–8; summary of main features in
English in Davis, LPC8, pp. 232–3.
248 LiP, pp. 197–8.
249 See above and Noble, Republic of St Peter, pp. 247–8, 308–22; also the depredations recorded in
the Constitutio Romana as reasons justifying the passing of this act itself in 824; see Constitutio
Romana ed. in MGH Cap. 1, 323, no. 161, chs. 2 and 6.
250 ARF 823; Astronomer II. 37/1; BenSor, p. 137; see Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 45–8.
251 ARF 823; Astronomer II. 38.
252 Thegan, ch. 30; ARF 823; see also Agobard’s letter 15.4 in MGH Ep III, 225, and the Life of Wala
in MGH Ep. II.17.
253 Duchesne, Liber Pontificalis; ARF 824; Thegan, ch. 30; see the discussion in Davis, LPC9, pp. 31–2.
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164 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

pleased the compilers of the Lateran.254 Presumably of noble origin, and certainly
elected by the laity as well as by the clergy, Eugenius’ major achievement was the
convoking of a synod in 826, to promote reforms along Carolingian lines.255 Most
of the information on the pontificate comes from Frankish sources, which men-
tion that, firstly, Eugenius obtained the pardon of all the Roman iudices or officials
held captive in Francia, who returned from exile and whose property was returned
to them by Lothar after having been unjustly confiscated by papal officials.256 As a
result of the difficult conflict of 823, Louis issued another document which would
provide the basis for the relations between the Carolingian em­perors and the
papacy, the Constitutio Romana of 824.257 This would in effect turn the papacy
into a more subservient institution, by making the Franks not just defend papal
elections from non-clerical outside interference, as the Ludovicianum had done,
but also and more importantly by attempting to remove it from internal Roman
infighting. The next pontificates seem to have been placed very much under
Frankish influence (papal oath to the emperor, imperial missi present at the
election), and it was only with the wars of Louis’s sons and after Pope Gregory
IV’s rule that the papacy began to find ways of removing itself somewhat from
Carolingian influence and retaking control for itself.258
The same purpose, to minimize the impact of Frankish power in Rome, seems
to have been at the core of the writer of the life of Leo IV, notably after what were
perceived to have been the imperial-dominated pontificates of Popes Eugenius,
Gregory IV, and Sergius II (844–7). The issue was especially acute as a result of the
difficult pontificate of Sergius II, with its associated loss of prestige for the papacy.
The pope had become increasingly ill and unstable, and was said to be under the
control of his brother Benedict, who exercised effective power in the city.259 The
Liber Pontificalis’s hostility towards Sergius, and especially towards his brother,
clearly one of the great aristocrats, was fuelled by Benedict’s claim to rule over
Rome on the grounds of having such power given to him by the Franks and the
emperor, who had given him this monarchia. Benedict seems to have attempted to
set up a form of secular power in the city, building and rebuilding the walls and
other buildings, in the process taking away the properties of various churches
‘with imperial permission and instruction’, and selling ecclesiastical offices,
including episcopal sees. Obviously, he was highly criticized for this by the Liber,
as was also his claim that he had received the ‘primacy’ and ‘lordship at Rome’.
Was Benedict an imperial deputy, dealing with an ad hoc difficult situation on
account of the pope’s incapacity, or was he a proto-Alberic, who made a first attempt
at setting up a secular government in the city? It may also be no coincidence that

254 Davis, LPC9.

255 MGH Concilia 2, pp. 552–83, and Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum, XIV. 999.
256 LP I. 101, ch. 3. 257 Noble, Republic of St. Peter, pp. 313–22.
258 See Chapter 5. 259 LP I. 104, chs. 40–3.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 165

these are the years which saw the serious beginning of Saracen attacks on the city,
and thus both the military aristocracy and the other inhabitants of the city may
have felt that the pope was not the best person to lead its defence—hence the
interest in a man whose main activity seems to have been that of rebuilding walls
and defences.
The slant on events, both in Pope Sergius II’s successor Pope Leo IV’s life and
in successive ones, is especially important because from this point on the Liber
Pontificalis seems to have ceased to be written by the more lowly clerical members
of the Lateran, and instead to become much more the mouthpiece of the popes
themselves.260 This becomes all the more significant for Leo IV when one hears
about the main conflict during his reign. According to the magister militum
Daniel, the magister militum and ‘outstanding superista and counsellor’ Gratian
was saying things that showed him to be disloyal to the Franks, notably that the
Romans should call on the Greeks, make peace with them, and expel the Franks
from Rome.261 A worried Lothar went to Rome and called together a synod of all
the Roman dignitaries and noble Franks. Daniel accused Gratian of treason,
Gratian refuted the accusation and, perceiving it to have been ‘made by envy’,
claims the Liber Pontificalis, the ‘clement emperor’, while appearing to give way
and have Daniel ‘given to Gratian’ to be tried ‘according to Roman law as had
been laid down by the emperors of old’ (presumably meaning according to the
Roman law of defamation), in reality asked Gratian ‘with humble supplication’ to
give him back Daniel, whom he then pardoned.262
The tale first of all implies that the possibility of a turnaround of the papacy
towards the Byzantines was sufficiently plausible for Lothar to rush to Rome to
check it out. By the mid-ninth century, in the middle of the troubles of Lothar’s
reign, Rome may have rethought its alliances, especially in the light of possible
alliances with the Greeks in the south of Italy to fight the Saracens. Secondly, not
only was the accusation serious and plausible enough, but it implied disloyalty
not just on the part of some papal officials but also the support of the pope him-
self. The very language of the Liber Pontificalis, significant since it was now writ-
ten by people on the same level as the pope, may well confirm that the revival in
Greek interest was not completely fabricated—witness the rising use of a vocabu-
lary typical of the Byzantine court, such as the ‘sacred palace’ for the patriarchate,
that is the Lateran, and the ‘holy people’, meaning the clergy.263 Thirdly, even
though the text of the Liber Pontificalis attempts to suggest the victory of Pope
Leo IV, for example through the highlighting of Lothar’s humility, the evidence of
the narrated events suggests otherwise. Evidence of imperial involvement and of
papal uneasy collaboration shines through the council at which the pope has to
defend himself. It is brought to the fore by the building of the Leonine City and its

260 See the Introduction. 261 LP I. 105, c.110.

262 LP I. 104, chs. 110–12. 263 See, for example, LP I. 105, ch. 16.
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166 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

wall, which the Liber Pontificalis claims to have been instigated by Leo IV, said to
have requested funds from Lothar, who immediately complied, but which,
Frankish sources tell us, was in fact ordered by Lothar as a response to the Saracen
attacks. Confirmation can be seen in the omission by the Liber Pontificalis of such
an essential fact during Leo IV’s reign as the anointing of Louis II as emperor in
850. All suggest a very different picture, and behind the emperor’s humble request
to Gratian there is no doubt that we can hear a disguised order, which is a way of
allowing the emperor to pardon Daniel, his own spy, whom he clearly needed
because he did not trust Leo IV, and because he wanted to ensure than anyone
who heard other rumours would not be afraid of whistle-blowing.
The apparent revival in interest in the Greek world seems to have continued
under the rule of Popes Benedict III, Nicholas, and Hadrian II, as seen in the
papal concern for the Photian schism, the renewal of embassies to Constantinople
after what had been an absence of many years,264 and the problems associated
with jurisdiction over the newly converted Bulgarian peoples.265 This may seem
strange in view of the fact that Popes Nicholas and Hadrian II were both elected,
in the foemer’s case with direct involvement of the Emperor Louis II, present in
Rome and very much involved in pushing his candidate, while the latter, a com-
promise candidate who was chosen twice before accepting the post, was perceived
to be a thorough supporter of the Western emperor.266 Hadrian II was from a
family which had already produced two popes previously—Stephen IV and
Sergius II—and therefore also the Benedict brother of Sergius II, who had claimed
to hold the ‘monarchy’ in Rome.
The relationship between Pope Hadrian II and the most famous Roman of the
second half of the ninth century, Anastasius, was seriously undermined after the
election by an episode which may be due to personal factors as a result of the
actions of a rogue member of Anastasius’ family, or to a political challenge at a
local level—we will never know since the Liber Pontificalis skirts around it com-
pletely, and the Frankish sources are obscure.267 Hadrian II was not a young man
when elected, and he had a wife and daughter, the latter about to be married to an
unknown nobleman. Before this could happen, Eleutherius, Bishop Arsenius of
Orté’s nephew, and thus Anastasius’ brother, kidnapped and raped her. Was the
crime political, for example an attempt to create an alliance between two noble
families, which had gone sour because Hadrian II’s family had changed its mind?
Was it a personal act of violence? Whatever it may have been, from then on the

264 For a brief discussion of the Photian schism and the embassies to Constantinople, see
F. Dvornik, The Photian Schism (Cambridge, 1948), and F. Dvornik, ‘Photius, Nicholas I and Hadrian
II’, Byzantinoslavica 34 (1973), pp. 33–50.
265 F. Dvornik, Les Slaves, Byzance et Rome au IXe siècle (Paris, 1926), pp. 184–95 and 196–281; see
Chapter 6, p. 49.
266 On Anastasius’ support of the Empire, see the Introduction.
267 LP, ASB 868; for a summary of the plot, see Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 65–7.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 167

family of Arsenius and Anastasius could not but be involved. The former ran
away to the Emperor Louis II in Benevento, where he ultimately died, and, at
Hadrian II’s request, Louis II sent his envoys to judge Eleutherius, who killed the
two women he held prisoner, after which Louis’s judges executed Eleutherius.
This left the problem of Anastasius, who had been back in favour with Hadrian II
after having had his excommunication removed, and who was still much in
im­per­ial favour. Hadrian II convoked a synod which renewed the excommunica-
tion but, whether at the Emperor Louis’s demand or not, Anastasius was re­instated
within a year, to become the papal librarian and Louis’s envoy to Constantinople,
where he played an important role at the Ecumenical Council as a defender of
papal and imperial interests.268 Hadrian II’s life was not free of other violence in
the city, with the attack on Rome by Lambert of Spoleto, and the ‘tyranny of his
men’, who, we are told, rampaged, pillaged, and raped girls of the nobility.269 The
author of this pope’s biography, possibly John Immonides, may well have wanted
to concentrate on Hadrian II’s dealings with the East and Bulgaria, perhaps precisely
to avoid discussion of the Roman events involving Eleutherius, since this writer
in the Liber clearly favoured Anastasius.
The original Liber Pontificalis, after a few scarce entries for the next three popes
and a half-finished life of Stephen V, stops here. We know of Pope John VIII’s
clashes with at least one family of primates of the Roman aristocracy from his
letters.270 The most important was that of the vestararius George de Aventino, and
his father-in-law Gregory the nomenclator, both suspected by John VIII of being
too supportive of the Franks, and both having had to flee to Francia, to be recalled
by John VIII’s successor, Marinus—only to be, in the case of George, blinded by
Pope Hadrian III (884–5).271 Gregory, ex-missus and apocrisary, and superista,
was killed at St Peter’s by a ‘colleague’.272 George had already fled Rome with
Bishop Formosus in 876,273 and it was the plot against John VIII and Formosus’
return to the fore that were going to prompt the next major conflict of the papacy.
At the very end of the ninth century, the papacy entered a phase of major diffi-
culties associated with the row over the choice of Bishop Formosus as pope.274 In
reality the ‘Formosian crisis’ had begun at the time of Pope Nicholas, when
Formosus, as bishop of Porto, had been sent by Pope Nicholas, together with Paul
Bishop of Populonia, as a missionary to convert the King of the Bulgarians, Boris,
to Christianity.275 His mission was so successful that Boris, by then baptized with
the name of Michael, asked the pope for Formosus to be the archbishop of the

268 LP I. 108, chs. 38–60. 269 LP I. 108, ch. 20.

270 The letter recounting this meeting is no. 7 in MGH Ep. V; the best discussion of it is in
Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 189–90.
271 LP II.111.
272 LP II. 111; see Duchesne, Liber Pontificalis II, p. 225 (‘called by the Romans superista’).
273 Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 71–3.
274 For the Formosian episode, see the Introduction.
275 LP I. 107, chs. 68–74.
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168 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

new Bulgarian Church. His request was refused by Nicholas on the grounds that
Formosus was already a bishop at home. Translation from one see to another was
regarded as a major impediment, and rarely, though occasionally, implemented,
unless it could be explained away very elaborately, as Pope Stephen VI was to do
subsequently. Faced with the papal refusal, Boris turned to Constantinople for his
religious allegiance, thus losing the Roman Church a valuable new political alli-
ance, while the conflict of words and influence continued between Rome and
Constantinople.276 Ultimately, after Stephen V’s death, Formosus was elected
pope, reigning for five years—years which were to be crucial for the political situ-
ation in Italy, for which he became, in effect, the arbiter.277 Being used by oppos-
ing political factions led to his irregular position as someone who, although
already a bishop in another see, became pope, which was foregrounded and used
against him by his opponents, who regarded him as pro-Frankish. After his death,
his successor but one, Pope Stephen VI, pursued the revenge of his party against
Formosus by disinterring his corpse and, at the infamous ‘Council of the Corpse’
in 897, officially condemning him, deposing him post mortem, and having his
body thrown into the Tiber.278 The story was reported with great distaste by both
contemporaries and later writers, above all by Liutprand, probably not unaware
that Stephen VI himself, who had been ordained bishop of Anagni by Formosus,
had decided to annul all of Formosus’ numerous episcopal ordinations, including
his own, in order to be able officially to become pope. It shows very clearly how
the pope, caught between several political adversaries, was at risk of becoming
vulnerable to whatever weapons could be brought forward against him. But
Formosus had many supporters in Rome, and Stephen VI’s reign was mostly
mentioned, significantly in a medieval symbolic context of divine punishment, as
that in which the Lateran basilica collapsed. It ended with him being deposed in a
riot, imprisoned, and strangled, according to Liutprand.279 His successors, perhaps
chosen as representatives of the Formosian side, were Pope Romanus in 897,280
and his second successor, Theodore II.281 After the latter’s death, though, John IX

276 LP I. 108, chs. 61–4.

277 LP II. 113; Liuprand, Antapodosis I, chs. 28–9; P. Fedele, ‘Per la storia di Roma e del papato’,
ASRSP 33 (1910), pp. 177–247, and ASRSP 34 (1911), pp. 75–115, at pp. 185–6; Arnaldi, ‘Papa
Formoso’, pp. 85–104; Schimelpfennig, The Papacy, ch. 4; Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 185–98; see Chapter 1,
p. 34 for the full story.
278 LP II. 115; on this famous story, see, for example, AF 896; ‘Invectiva’, ed. Dümmler, pp. 137–54
at 139; Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum. XVIII, 224; Liutprand, Antapodosis I, ch. 30; and Chapter 1,
note 98, for the literature. For the issue of translation from one see to another, see now S. Scholz,
Transmigration und Translation. Studien zum Bistumswechsel der Bischöfe von der Spätantike bis zum
hohen Mittelalter (Cologne: Kölner Historische Abhandlungen 37, 1992), and, in English, C. Leyser,
‘Episcopal Office in the Italy of Liudprand of Cremona, c.890–c.970’, English Historical Review 125
(2010), pp. 795–817.
279 Liutprand, Antapodosis I, ch. 30.
280 LP II. 116 for Romanus; it may be worth noting that he, too, was from Gallese, like Pope
Marinus before him, who had also been a friend of Formosus; see below on suburbicary bishops.
281 LP II. 117; Liutprand, Antapodosis I, ch. 31; Ann. Sangall. in MGH SS I. 53.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 169

had to contend with an alternative candidate, representing the anti-Formosian

party. The fighting between the Formosian and anti-Formosian parties in the city
continued, the latter electing Sergius III, routed out by the Formosians around
John IX. At the synod he called in Ravenna in 898, John IX confirmed Formosus’
appointments, and burned the acts of Stephen VI’s synod in the presence of the
Emperor Lambert and the archbishop of Ravenna,282 while Sergius III fled to
Francia, where he remained in exile until 904. Sergius III was effectively pulling
the strings behind Roman politics from afar, notably by making his two succes-
sors get rid of each other.283 John IX’s second successor, Pope Leo V, was, perhaps
significantly, one of the short-lived, non-urban popes, deposed and imprisoned
by the priest Christopher, allegedly on the orders of Sergius III. Without waiting
for Sergius III to return, Christopher then had himself elected pope, reigned for
seven months, and on Sergius’ return, with the help of the Franks and the
‘ma­chin­ations of some Romans’,284 he was in turn deposed, forced into a monas-
tery, and possibly poisoned.285 This story suggests that the con­tinu­ation of the
Formosian quarrel had moved on from the terms of the original issue: the legality
or otherwise of the translation of a bishop from one see to another—an issue
which had died with Formosus himself but was now used by the two parties call-
ing themselves Formosian and anti-Formosian, fighting each other in the city.
Sergius III and his two successors ruled until 911, when the new pope was Pope
John X (911–28), the ex-Archbishop of Ravenna John IX, who would stabilize the
papacy for seventeen years. His prestige as the moral leader in the victory over
the Saracens at Garigliano made him the last powerful figure to hold the papacy
until after the princeps Alberic’s death. The election of Alberic’s son John XII and
the intervention of Otto I in Roman politics with the appointment of his own
candidate, Leo VIII against John XII, meant that a new conflict opened between
the strict adherents of a pope who was a member of the Roman clergy (John XII)
and those who manipulated the system through speeding up a lay aristocrat’s
clerical career so as to make him papabile, as was the case with Otto I’s candidate
in 963, the protoscriniarius Leo. These most revealing of alliances and party pol­it­
ics from the 960s onwards are of considerable interest for our understanding of
Roman society, and they have been studied in detail by Sickel, Fedele, Kölmel,
and more recently by Zimmermann and Wickham.286 Sickel’s core argument
about Alberic’s power is that, like Theophylact’s, it was fundamentally and

282 LP II. 118; on the synod of Ravenna see Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 349–50, and J. Duhr,
‘Le concile de Ravenne en 898. La rehabilitation du pape Formose’, Recherches de Sciences Religieuses
22 (1932).
283 LP, II. 122; Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 102–3.
284 LP II. 122 (Sergius III); 119 (Benedict IV); 120 (Leo V); 121 (Christopher).
285 LP II. 120, 121.
286 Sickel, ‘Alberich II’, pp. 50–126; Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 75–115, 177–245, 393–423; Kölmel,
‘Beiträge zur Verfassungsgeschichte Roms, pp. 521–46; Kölmel, ‘Rom und der Kirchenstaat’;
Zimmermann, ‘Parteiungen und Papstwahlen’, pp. 29–88; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 194–5.
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170 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

deliberately not a constitutional one but was based on an individual rule of

Rome—possible precisely because it limited itself to the city.287 Kölmel’s focus was
on the rejection of his dynastic rule by the Roman aristocratic families after
Alberic’s death, families such as the rising Crescentii, who used German help to
remove this power base; as they themselves became increasingly powerful, this
could only lead to conflict with the Ottonian emperors.288 Falco also underlined
the fact that, towards the end of the century, with the increasing closeness between
the papacy and the Ottonians, it became impossible for Roman families to keep
power over the city to themselves, as Alberic had done, because Rome had become
too important on the European scene, just as it had been under the first
Carolingians—an argument partly endorsed by Wickham.289 The most per­tin­ent
microstudy of the families and their involvement with control over the papacy in
this context remains Zimmermann’s book, which looks in minute detail at the
choices and swings of alliances during the papacy of John XII, curtailed by Leo
VIII, John XIII, and up to Boniface VII. I will rapidly summarize these.
Conflicts remained once a pope had managed to get elected and stay in post;
and they became the rule after the election of Pope John XII. Such a conflict was
the plot to get rid of John XII, Alberic’s son Octavian, whom the primates around
Prince Alberic had accepted electing as pope at Alberic’s request on his deathbed,
and did so in 955.290 We remember how, after John XII’s flight from the city when
Otto I arrived, the people of Rome allegedly asked Otto to give the ‘mother church
a worthy and pious rector’, and were directed by him to choose Leo VIII.291 The
election was said to have been carried out by ‘the clergy and laymen’ and the uni-
versis populus. Liutprand’s account of the unanimous choice is ambiguously
described as a choice by the plebs romana, but is clearly contradicted by Benedict
of Soracte, who talks about the opposing factions.292 Leo was obviously Otto’s
appointee, though he had previously been part of John XII’s embassy to Otto with
Demetrius de Meliosus. While a member of the Lateran bureaucracy as a proto-
scriniarius, he was nevertheless a layman who, like Pope Constantine II two cen-
turies earlier, had to be rushed through the clerical degrees in order to be
consecrated. But he turned against John XII at the deposition council in November
963. Who then supported John XII and welcomed him back as pope at the council
of February 964 against Leo VIII, and subsequently, when John XII died later that

287 Sickel, ‘Alberich II’, pp. 91–126 esp. 105–9.

288 Kölmel, ‘Beiträge zur Verfassungsgeschichte Roms, pp. 521–46.
289 Falco, ‘La crisi dell’autorità’ and ‘L’Italia e la restaurazione’, both in I problemi comuni dell’Europa
post-carolingia, pp. 39–51 and 52–65. One could also make the point that, leaving aside Falco, who
wrote after World War II, and Wickham, we have in the core bibliography three Germans to one
Italian, and their work was mostly concentrated in the pre-war period—perhaps not a coincidence in
the political climate of the first thirty years of the twentieth century. On the Ottonians in Rome, see
the essential work by Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 1001–15.
290 Flodoard, Annals, 36H. 291 LP II. 134.
292 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, chs. 15, 19–20; Adalbert, in MGH SSRG 50, p. 173; BenSor, p. 178;
see Zimmermann, ‘Parteiungen und Papstwahlen’, pp. 29–66.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 171

year, elected Benedict V as pope instead of calling back Leo VIII, whom they
had thrown out? Zimmermann’s convincing argument is that, whatever John
XII’s faults, as far as the Roman clergy was concerned, he was at least a cleric,
as opposed to Leo, a layman effectively appointed by another layman,
Otto I. Moreover, it is not inconceivable that, with all the bad press which has
blighted his name, John XII was in fact, like his father, part of a reforming move-
ment supported by the clergy.293 The two councils of 963 and 964 are revealing
when one looks at their members. The first—the deposition council of John XII,
and election of Leo VIII—was crammed full of German clergy, Roman aristo-
crats, and Lateran functionaries, such as Leo himself. That of 964 also had the
Roman aristocrats, who were instrumental in making the pope, though Liutprand
carefully avoids mentioning them, but no German clergy, and a large number of
Italian and Lazio bishops, the clerical party. In 964 John XII had the support of at
least two-thirds of the council, including that of the Bishop of Narni John, the
future Pope John XIII. The candidate elected after his death was Benedict V, pre-
viously a deacon or subdeacon and reputed to have been a learned man, perhaps
in the hope that his reputation would reconcile Otto to him as a compromise can-
didate. In this they failed and once Otto returned to Rome, he promptly deposed
and exiled Benedict V.294
The next crisis followed during the reign of John XII’s successor, Pope John
XIII,295 who had been bishop of Narni, brought up in the Lateran and the papal
librarian—once again a bishop changing see against the rules of canon law. The
fact that nobody used this against him, as they had done with Formosus, shows
very well to what extent the earlier clash of the Formosians and anti-Formosians
had been in fact a matter of rival political parties and not of canon law, which was
used as a pretext. While John XIII’s association with the family group of Alberic
through his connection with Stefania II senatrix has now been discarded, he did
have links with the Crescentii (if one defines this family in a very loose manner),
through his nephew Benedict, who had married Theoderanda, the daughter of
Crescentius a Caballo Marmoreo.296 John XIII was elected in 965, perhaps a com-
promise candidate between the Romans and Otto I.297 If so, he was not successful
on that score. He had to flee after only ten weeks, faced with a rebellion by Count
Rotfred and twelve decarcones—the first time a hierarchy of Roman local power
below that of the primates is mentioned. He would not be able to return for a year,
until Otto came back and crushed the rebellion and hanged its leaders, while
Crescentius I eventually killed the fleeing Rotfred. But who did Rotfred and his

293 Zimmermann, ‘Parteiungen und Papstwahlen’, pp. 64–6.

294 LP II. 135; Thietmar, II. 28; Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, chs. 22–23. See Zimmermann,
‘Parteiungen und Papstwahlen’, pp. 35–70.
295 LP II. 136; Thietmar, II. 35.
296 See above. n. 83. On his family background, see Zimmermann, ‘Parteiungen und Papstwahlen’,
pp. 67–73.
297 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, chs. 9 and 15.
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172 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

party represent? According to Zimmermann, these men: Count Rotfred of

Campania, the vestararius Stephen, the Urban Prefect Peter, and the decarcones,
who were the leaders of the regional militiae of the city, were opponents of the
family of Alberic and John XII, and as a result also of John XIII. They were those
same men who, in 963, had supported Leo VIII—the top layer of the laymen in
the papal administration, and military leaders on their way up. The allegiances
were not, I believe, to do with a pro-German party and a nationalist Roman
party—at least not essentially so—but between the Roman maiores supported by
Otto, who were against the clerical party of John XII and John XIII, and their
families related to Alberic and later the Crescentii.298
John XIII’s successor, Pope Benedict VI (972–4), who, astonishingly, had been
elected without problems, was then arrested and imprisoned in a coup in 974 by
Crescentius I de Theodora consul et dux (father of John II and Crescentius II illus-
trissimi viri), who would later become a monk at SS Bonifazio e Alessio.299 The
Liber Pontificalis tells us that ‘the Romans and Crescentius’ seized Benedict VI,
and that they chose as his successor Boniface VII (974–84/5), the deacon Franco,
whom the Liber Pontificalis names with the pun of Malefacius.300 Otto sent his
missus to Rome to restore Benedict VI, but he arrived too late, after the im­prisoned
pope had been killed in Castel Sant’Angelo by one of Boniface VII’s priests; Otto’s
missus, with ‘some Romans’, retook Castel Sant’Angelo and deposed Boniface VII,
who fled to Constantinople.301 Reading between the lines, one could therefore
assume that Benedict VI was a choice sanctioned by Otto; hence the Crescentii
opposition to him. The deacon Franco, a cleric clearly not part of the imperial
party, as most seem to have been when Leo VIII was elected, threw in his lot with
the Crescentii and, significantly, when exiled did not flee to the Franks but to the
Greeks, in traditional fashion. Boniface VII was evidently not agreeable to the
Lateran party—witness his bad reputation in the Liber Pontificalis. Benedict VII,
his successor, was again ‘appointed’ with the emperor’s favour, but on his death
Boniface VII returned from Constantinople and, presumably with his party’s
help, imprisoned and killed Benedict VII’s successor, John XIV (983–4), and was
in turn himself killed by the Roman people.302
The new Pope John XV (985–96) reigned for over ten years, but was eventually
forced to leave the city by the Crescentii, and called on Otto III to invite him to
Rome.303 Once there, the Ottonian Emperor had his own pope—Bruno, related to
him—installed as Gregory V (996–9), but pardoned the Crescentius who had
been behind the plot.304 The century would see one more papal crisis. Gregory V,

298 Zimmermann, ‘Parteiungen und Papstwahlen’, pp. 72–80.

299 LP II. 137. Crescentius became a monk; for his epitaph at SS Alessio e Bonifazio, see above
note 151.
300 LP II. 137–8. 301 LP II. 138.
302 LP II. 140. 303 LP II. 141. 304 LP II. 142; Thietmar, IV. 27, 30.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 173

a victim of Crescentius II’s rebellion against Otto III, had to leave Rome, and the
Roman party elected the Greek tutor of Otto III and friend of Theophano, by
then bishop of Piacenza, John Philagathos, as Pope John XVI in 997.305 Absolutely
furious at what he perceived to be his ex-tutor’s betrayal, Otto III descended on
Rome, took back Castel Sant’Angelo, and killed the man behind the plot,
Crescentius II, in 998.306 He also exacted ferocious revenge on Philagathos,
deposing him in 998 and recalling Gregory V.307

Conclusions

If one examines carefully the eighth- and ninth-century contested papal elections
and conflicts, one notes that the clashes around papal elections were linked to
internal issues of Roman politics and society. When the papacy was strongly
embroiled in external issues, especially imperial ones, the conflicts were played
out in terms of external factors, either because these were a means by which
in­tern­al tensions were channelled, or as a way for the internal tensions to use
external actors as a conduit for Roman politics. This was most evident when the
popes in the eighth century began to emerge from the established Byzantine rule
in the duchy of Rome and the Exarchate of Italy, as the uncontested leaders of the
opposition to Eastern imperial rule, as well as to the Lombards’ attempts to
expand their control in central Italy and over Rome. It has been traditionally said
that the clashes were ideologically based, for example between parties which were
pro-Frankish, pro-Lombard, pro-imperial or pro-Byzantine, and that these
clashes found their way into internal politics which were therefore used to play
out major external conflicts.308 What the above narrative suggests above all is the
way in which the eighth-century plots against the papacy show a strengthening of
the Roman grouping of the elites around the papacy and against Byzantine com-
mand, a refocusing of the elite from Byzantine imperial power in the city to that
exercised through the papal court.309
In the latter part of the eighth and the first half of the ninth century, the
­balance of power changed once again, in favour of the new Western imperial
control. After defeating the opposition of parts of the Roman elite, made manifest
during the reigns of Leo III and Paschal I,310 the emperors became increasingly

305 LP II. 142; see W. Huschner, ‘Giovanni XVI, antipapa’, Enciclopedia dei papi II, (Rome, 2000).
306 Thietmar, IV. 30, 32; JnD IV. 44. 307 Thietmar, IV. 30.
308 This long historiographical tradition includes many distinguished historians, such as
F. Gregorovius, History of the city of Rome in the middle ages, 2nd edn, rev. and tr. (London, 1900).
309 Noble, Republic of St. Peter, pp. 34–5.
310 For Paschal I, Verardi has argued that this went as far as to have the LP effectively responding to
Roman unspoken accusations of subjection by presenting the pope as a pendant to Louis the Pious as
a merciful ruler; see A. A. Verardi, ‘Spunti di rflessione e appunti intorno alla biografia di Pasquale
I (817–824) nel Liber Pontificalis romano’, Summa 9 (2017), pp. 102–20.
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174 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

interventionist and effective in successfully controlling papal elections. Sometimes

they did so through supporting one candidate more or less openly, as in the case
of Nicholas I, in the hope that he in turn would contribute to Carolingian support
in Rome, but also because they saw their duty as one implying protection of the
Church, to minimize disturbances and plots. While Carolingian rulers were suf-
ficiently powerful to have their rule respected, until the end of Louis II’s reign
and even against opposition from some powerful Roman figures, the frequency
of such plots and disturbances was somewhat reduced. This was further helped
by the choice of powerful personalities as popes too, such as Leo IV and
Nicholas I. But with the latter, and his successor, Hadrian II, just as Carolingian
imperial power fragmented, it was the popes who gained the upper hand and,
ultimately, with John VIII, became the emperor-making power. Significantly,
though, in terms of local power in the city, they once again faced major op­pos­
ition, as in the case of Hadrian II and the family of Arsenius of Orté, Anastasius
and Eleutherius, with the latter’s violent actions in the city, and that of John VIII,
ultimately removed from power by a powerful group of the Roman aristocracy. In
the first case, the Emperor Louis II was still powerful enough to have Eleutherius
executed for his crimes; in the second, the aristocratic faction triumphed and
John VIII was eliminated. It could thus be argued that very rarely was papal con-
trol of the city and its elite really effective, unless there was an emperor behind it
to guarantee peaceful and uncontested elections and a quiet papal reign. This was
a point obviously clear to Louis the Pious and Lothar I when they issued the
Ludovicianum and the Constitutio Romana.
Two examples from the end of the ninth century provide good case studies of
not dissimilar careers but with different paths and ends: those of Anastasius and
Formosus. Both of them were major clerical players who lived down several
career failures, and whose ups and downs were closely related to their involve-
ment with the imperial power outside the remit of Roman politics. One,
Anastasius, failed in his goal to become pope; the other, Formosus, did not.
Anastasius was a great scholar from one of the foremost aristocratic families, with
an uncle who was for a long time the most powerful bishop next to the pope
(Arsenius of Orté, papal legate to Francia, diplomat and at the top of the papal
government elite) and a brother who was a powerful Roman aristocrat, if appar-
ently a violent and rather depraved one (Eleutherius). Anastasius was thus the
product of both secular power and wealth and a Church education of a very high
standard—the fact that he spoke Greek was perhaps less essential as a mani­fest­
ation of this than was his theological and philosophical training, as shown in his
works. With such a background and the beginnings of a career which, as a priest
holding a prestigious Roman titulus, would have made him a prime candidate for
the papacy, he not only never achieved this but was excommunicated several
times for a most basic failure in terms of an ecclesiastical career, that of abandon-
ing his post for several years at a time. His appears to be the case of a maverick
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 175

scholar, more interested in the excitement of intellectual debate and travel, who
may have believed that such qualities and services to the papacy as a diplomacy of
rapprochement with the Greek world, the defence of papal interests at the
Ecumenical Council, and acting as adviser to a self-styled philosopher-king such
as Charles the Bald purported to be and sought to be presented would counteract
the effect of his move away from the standard expected Lateran career in the city.
Whether he was as determined to become pope as was his uncle to make him
pope may be debatable. Nevertheless, it is clear that he attempted it, through a
trick which discredited him even further, and failed. Though he seemed to fulfil
the conditions of aristocratic background, Lateran education, and clerical career
in Rome—and he had been reinstated after his excommunication to the extent of
being the papal envoy to the council in Constantinople, as well as papal librarian
(the latter a post usually held by a bishop but, one assumes, given to him on
account of his acknowledged exceptional learning)—he did not become pope.
Was it his lack of obedience to ecclesiastical discipline that kept him out? Or the
failure of his family to have sufficient influence in Rome?
What then explained the ultimate success of Formosus, Bishop of Porto, in
becoming pope? We do not know his family, but he too evidently had had a
Lateran career, reaching the episcopate and, presumably seen as someone with
great gifts, was sent by Pope Nicholas to effect the conversion of the Bulgarians—
which he achieved. Formosus was also a skilled diplomat, though he chose to
support the wrong party and had to flee, together with several other major elite
figures, only to return after the death of John VIII, to be elected pope in 891.
However, despite his ill-advised political choice at one point and the fierce fight-
ing resulting from his translation from one see to another (a pretext for the two
opposing trends of support for the House of Spoleto and for the ‘German’
Emperor Arnulf), Formosus was, and always remained, part of the hierarchy and
played by the rules of the Church of Rome. Anastasius had not, and did not,
become pope.
There is no doubt that opposition parties existed in the city and were obviously
very much at the forefront of the Formosian crisis. We might see here two parallel
phenomena. One is the conflict between Roman aristocratic families freed from
the constraints placed on them by Alberic’s rule, and using the emperor to secure
their position. This would be less a case of accepting the existence of an imperial
party in the city as the fact that Otto I and Otto II, when around and through
popes favourable to them, would have allowed less vocal parts of the aristocracy
in the city to raise their voices. The second phenomenon could be the beginnings
of the malaise of the Roman clergy faced with imperial control over the papacy,
possibly preferring the ecclesiastical heir of Alberic to an imperial lay candidate.
In addition, it is possible to imagine that, to some extent, the traditional argu-
ments which highlighted the Italian versus German op­pos­ition, as Kölmel did,
may have some grain of truth in them: the Romans, however much some may
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176 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

have disliked John XII, may have liked the idea of German rule even less, espe-
cially in the form of an unleashing of foreign soldiers on the city. There is no
doubt that opposition parties existed in the city. These were obviously visible dur-
ing the Formosian crisis. Similarly, when Sergius III came back from exile among
the ‘Franks’ in 904, having had his henchman Christopher depose and imprison
the pope, his return was achieved through the ‘machinations of some Romans’,
obviously the anti-Formosians, that is to say the family of Theophylact with the
support of Alberic of Spoleto.311 The opposition gradually shifted and ceased to
call itself ‘Formosian’ any more, but the political gist of pro-imperial and anti-
imperial and pro-Roman parties remained, and gradually shifted to become the
pro-Crescentians and the anti-Crescentians. These are the terms through which
the opposition would position itself in the second half of the tenth century and
after Crescentius II’s death in 998, and only then as anti-Ottonian.
The Formosian conflict and, to contemporaries, its most unpalatable events,
have been outlined here in order to show to what extent electoral politics had
taken a new turn after Alberic’s death. The papacy as seen by him was responsible
for the Church in the city, while he took on the role of secular ruler. But after his
death this situation changed. His son could not control the political scene in the
same way, not necessarily because he was weak and corrupt, as Liutprand sug-
gests, but possibly because the Italian situation itself had changed. Berengar II
and his son were circling around Rome once Alberic was no longer present, and
John XII felt obliged to call on Otto I to intervene. From then on, the fight for the
papacy became much fiercer. Under Alberic, the pope’s political role had been
much diminished, practically returning to what it had been under Byzantine rule
(or even less), and almost certainly not by coincidence, Alberic used the title
patricius, which, in the context of Byzantine Italy, had been effectively reserved
for the ruler of Rome, even without a portfolio—as it had previously been to the
exarch and to Charlemagne.312 After the princeps’ death, with no other political
structure in place in Rome, once again the leading families came to wage war for
control of the city through control of the papacy. In some cases, when it was
expedient to use the Ottonians to help in this struggle, several families did so,
especially at first in order to diminish the power of Alberic’s family and his
­cousins. In that sense, too, one could argue that Alberic’s power, far from suc-
ceeding in creating a government for the city independently of himself, had only
been able to keep other political vultures away from Rome because of his personal
forcefulness, but it disintegrated in the aftermath of his and John XII’s death. It
had become impossible to keep Rome closed in on itself when faced with the
ambitions of every ruler around it to gain control of the city and the papacy.
When looking at the bigger picture of the second half of the tenth century in

311 Dümmler, Auxilius and Vulgarius, MGH. Poetae lat. IV pp. 422–5.
312 Sickel, ‘Alberich II’, pp. 110–12.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 177

Rome, the overall conclusion drawn from the above convulsions is that the impact
of the Ottonian policies in Rome was limited, when compared to the impact of
the Roman consciousness of the various families involved in the attempt to con-
trol the papacy and the city—as we shall see in Chapter 6.

The Populus

One fundamental issue in early medieval history is that of establishing to what

extent, if at all, the populus as it appears in the sources is different from the elites,
and whether the word in fact refers to anyone other than the elites, the group
about which we have the most information. If one attempts some form of def­in­
ition, one of the few ways in which one could grasp the views of contemporaries
is to examine their own terms, and those whom they may be trying to include in
their definitions. For Rome, the best start is, as usual, the Liber Pontificalis, in
spite of its deliberate choice of skimming over difficult and multiple elections, and
generally of making the point about the unity of the Romans around the pope.
In the previous section, I tried to unpick the various factions at election times
and behind plots in the city. After Toto of Nepi’s arrival in Rome with his army of
‘peasants from Tuscia’, then his defeat and death, his brothers took refuge in the
Lateran basilica, whence they were ejected by the ‘judges and the Roman militia’,
who then elected Philip and took him to the Lateran, where the ‘Church top men
and chief officers of the militia’ banqueted with him.313 After the election of the
deacon John, who had won ‘some naïve and rustic folk’ and a ‘group of rioters and
rebels’, the ‘princes of the Roman citizens’ were indignant and elected Sergius II,
expelled John, and all the ‘sacerdotes, dignitaries and leading men, and all the
Church’s people’ were happy.314 These seem to have been rare examples of apparent
social and economic divisions as we might define them now. Usually, choices
were made not on the basis of social and economic status but on political factions
and family support. For the election of Pope Paul, the ‘people of Rome’ were
divided between the partisans of Theophylact, archdeacon of Stephen II, who
elected him at his house, while the majority of ‘judges and people’, the ‘stronger
and mightier side’ according to the Liber Pontificalis, chose Paul at the Lateran.315
Pope Paschal was elected by ‘all the sacerdotes and dignitaries and all the clergy,
also the leaders of the Roman people’—by which we assume that some of the
nobility supported him, though he had many enemies among them, those of the
‘greater men of the city [who had] become adherents of the emperor’.316 The biog-
rapher of Pope Nicholas talked about the ‘senate’ and the nobility of Rome who
‘sheltered’ the pope when he stayed with the emperor, for which one could read

313 LP I. 96, chs. 3, 9, 10. 314 LP I. 104, chs. 4–7. 315 LP I. 95, chs. 1, 2.
316 LP I. 100, chs. 3; LIP, pp. 197–8.
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178 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

‘protect him since he was practically elected by the emperor’s men in his presence
in Rome’, and may therefore not have been very popular for it.317 There seems
little doubt, on the basis of the study of papal elections in the second half of the
tenth century in my previous section, that the choices were almost entirely dic-
tated by family allegiance and, on occasion, when the emperors used this, by what
may have appeared to be a pro-imperial party—in fact often just a proxy choice of
alliances.
During the second half of the eighth century, the Liber Pontificalis seems to
use, for preference, the word militia, or army, of the Roman people as its most
inclusive term for the whole citizenry, and it does so very much in the context of
the fight against the Lombards at the end of Byzantine rule. ‘The chief men in
Rome took an oath to defend the pope,’ Gregory II, and ultimately both ‘Romans’
and ‘Lombards’ took an oath to die defending him.318 When Pope Zacharias set
up his alliance with the duke of Spoleto, Trasamund, against Liutprand, the Duke
of Rome, Stephen and the Roman army refused to hand over Trasamund to
Liutprand; they ‘mustered the common army of the Roman duchy’ to go with
Trasamund to Spoleto, and the people then joined him ‘in fear of the Roman
army’s size’.319 When Trasamund reneged on his agreement and the pope had to
ally himself with Liutprand against him, the pope ‘urged the Roman army to
come out and help the king [Liutprand]’.320 When the pope, on the emperor’s
order, then went to Ravenna to negotiate with Aistulf, some of the chiefs of the
militia accompanied him.321 Later, another twist of papal policy led to Stephen II
helping Desiderius become the new King of the Lombards, against Rachis, with
the pope arranging for ‘many armies of the Romans’ to be on standby.322
Responding to Desiderius’ attack on Rome, Christopher mustered the people of
Tuscia, Campania, and Perugia, shut the gates of the city, and had all the people
under arms in their own city’s defence.323 When Desiderius threatened Rome
again, this time bringing on the arrival of Charles, the latter was welcomed by the
judges sent by the pope 30 miles from the city, and later, at the first mile, by the
scholae of the militiae together with their patroni. Throughout his visit, around
Rome or at the discussions, Charles was accompanied by the ‘judges both of the
clergy and the militia’.324
After the arrival of the Franks, however, we find the term militia and the mar-
tial connotations of the people of Rome increasingly less often. The elites are now
described mostly as the ‘senate and people of Rome’, as in the letter written to
Pepin by Pope Paul to ask for his help, a letter addressed to him in the name of the
above.325 Leo III, on his return from Francia, was welcomed by the ‘leading mem-
bers of the clergy, all the clergy, the chief men, the senate, the whole militia and

317 LP I. 107, chs. 3, 8, 10. 318 LP I. 91, chs. 16, 19. 319 LP I. 93, ch. 3.
320 LP I. 93, ch. 5. 321 LP I. 94, ch. 19. 322 LP I. 94, ch. 50.
323 LP I. 96, chs. 14, 29–32. 324 LP I. 97, chs. 35–7, 40. 325 CC 13.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 179

the Roman people, nuns and deaconesses, noble matrons and all the women, the
four scholae of foreigners’—which is, so far, the most inclusive definition of
the populus of Rome in the Liber for our period.326 At the council assembled at
St Peter’s to judge him were present the ‘clergy and nobility of the Franks and the
senate of the Romans’; in this instance, there was apparently a deliberate choice of
separating, whether ethnically or politically, or both, the Frankish ‘nobility’ from
the Roman ‘senate’, even though in practice they were both the elite.327 The term
senate seems to have begun its renewed fortune, very specifically for the Roman
aristocracy. In Pope Valentine’s biography, expressions such as the ‘senate of the
Romans’, ‘the magnificent assembly of the Romans’, and ‘the holy people and the
senate and people of Rome’ reoccur—he was one of the first popes especially keen
on antiquarian views of the glory of Rome, but he was also contemporary with
the Carolingian writers’ fascination with, and use of, this vocabulary.328 On his
death, the Romans attempted to recognize the Holy Spirit in their choice of a new
pope, but also to choose ‘one under whose teaching and rule the whole nobility of
the senators could lawfully live’.329 The word’s fortune continued under Louis II,
crowned King of the Lombards with all the Frankish nobles and the distinguished
Romans in St Peter’s, who took up residence in Rome for a year, at the end of
which he left the city to return to Pavia, leaving a ‘relieved senate and people of
Rome with their wives and children’, who allegedly saw his departure as a deliver-
ance similar to that from plague and tyranny.330 Benedict III was elected by the
‘clergy of this God-protected Roman see and all the dignitaries and the whole
senate and people’, and the biographer of Nicholas also talked about the ‘senate’
and the nobility of Rome.
We can clearly see an evolution here. We start in the early eighth century with
the Byzantine imperial definition of the elites, which arose on account of the mili-
tarization of society in the Exarchate of Ravenna and the duchies of Rome and
Venice, a society defined as the exercitus of dukes, tribunes, and militiae. By the
ninth century the definitions of the elites of Rome under the Carolingians become
those of ‘judges’ (the Lombard tradition assimilated into the society of Carolingian
Italy) and above all the senate (the late antique tradition with its antiquarian con-
notations). The latter then continues into the tenth century. However, in addition
to what appears to have been a Carolingian, then Ottonian, fascination with the
notion of the senate and senators, the Liber Pontificalis also uses another two terms
which may reflect more accurately what the Romans themselves saw as the social
language inherited from their past—consul and citizen. Gregory III was elected
by the ‘council of bishops and clergy, noble consuls and the rest of the Christian
people’;331 and the Romans who had ejected Christopher and Sergius elected
Stephen III with all ‘sacerdotes, chief clergy, militia’s chief officers, army and

326 LP I. 98, chs. 2, 19. 327 LP I. 98, ch. 21. 328 LP I. 102, chs. 5–8.
329 LP I. 103, ch. 4. 330 LP I. 104, chs. 9–10, 18. 331 LP I. 92, chs. 1, 3.
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180 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

­ onourable citizens and the whole assembly of the Roman people from the greatest
h
to the least’.332 We saw earlier how important the title of consul would become
in the tenth century from Theophylact and Alberic onwards, often together
with either dux or senator—the revival or continuity of the word shows it to
have been one that the Romans themselves prized when defining their own
identity as Roman aristocrats. Just as significant of the mark of the late antique,
then Byzantine, vocabulary in Italy was the use of the definition of citizen, which
is practically the main word used throughout by Agnellus to define the people of
Ravenna. I would suggest that, while northern antiquarian writers like Regino
liked to play with, and probably led, some Roman writers to highlight words like
senators and senate, in practice the more common words used by the Romans
themselves were not those of some Roman republican golden past, but those used
in late antiquity and still after the Byzantine reconquest. These continued in
every­day usage throughout the Byzantine cities of Italy: consul, dux, then iudex
and tribune for the elite; citizens as well as viri honesti for the more extended
social group of the city above the level of the plebs. These are the key words found
in the everyday vocabulary of the Roman charters. These are the people who form
the populus.
To return therefore to the first question of this section—to what extent is the
populus the ‘people’, that is everybody, and not just the elites? Not infrequently,
we come across sentences which define the people who welcomed Leo III back to
Rome—and my use of ‘people’ in this section is a direct translation of the Liber’s
usage of populus. Stephen II was elected by ‘God’s whole people’, and subsequently,
to defend Rome from Aistulf, he set up a procession and litany of the ‘whole
Roman assembly’, marching through the city with the icon of the Acheropoita;
the point of a penitential procession of this kind was precisely that of bringing
together all the people in the city to implore God’s mercy, otherwise the act would
not be effective.333 Gregory III was elected by the ‘whole assembly of Romans,
bishops, glorious dignitaries of all the Romans and all the people of the widespread
city’; Stephen III by ‘the whole assembly of the Roman people from the greatest to
the least’; and Benedict II by the ‘clergy of this God-protected Roman see and all
the dignitaries and the whole senate and people’—a further distinction being
made between the senate and the people—and the ‘plebs and the assembly of the
people’.334 The author of Hadrian II’s life repeats endlessly the harmonious agree-
ment of ‘the city of Rome’s citizens . . . poor and rich alike, both of the order of the
clergy and the whole crowd of people of every age, occupation and sex’, the ‘dignitar-
ies and the compliant people’, the ‘faithful laity’.335 Most significant perhaps is the
entry for Benedict III’s election: afterwards he dispensed money at St Peter’s, as
was customary, with the specification that he gave ‘gold to the clergy and the lead-

332 LP I. 96, ch. 11. 333 LP I. 94, chs. 1, 11.

334 LP I. 105, ch. 111; 106, ch. 4. 335 LP I. 108, chs. 4–7.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 181

ing men of Rome, and to the people a small amount of silver’.336 To my mind this
suggests the existence of a real entity called the populus, which did not include
solely the elite but also the rest of the Roman citizenry as actual members of the
political life of the city. It could, of course, be argued that the Liber Pontificalis is
not necessarily the best source for our understanding of the vocabulary used by
the Romans to define themselves, since it was written either by the Lateran clergy
or by men close to the popes. It is assumed that these men were more inclined to
use antiquarian or ideologically charged words, sometimes suggested to them by
foreign Frankish fashions, and perhaps not always reflecting what the man on the
Tiber barge would have used. On the whole, even though it may be the case that
the papal primicerius of the notaries did not descend into the marketplace to listen
to the current vocabulary, some of it would have been at least recognizable enough
to other Romans in terms of definitions, for example for rioters. In order to add to
the precision as much as possible, it is advisable to check more day-to-day material,
such as documents and inscriptions, which is how we know about the use of the
previously mentioned tribunes, viri honesti or honestae feminae—once again, not
republican or imperial Roman, but Late Antique/Byzantine, def­in­itions, just as we
often find them in Ravenna.
This book is not the place for a detailed study of the Roman people—which has
been partially done by Wickham for the tenth century—but only for an attempt at
a short presentation of them, in a way which can allow for subsequent comparison
with similar information given by sources in Ravenna and Venice, for the purpose
of observing to what extent their composition, role, and inherited past could be
seen to be running along parallel lines of development, or not.

The Urban Clergy

The earlier part of this chapter dealt with the papal administration in the form of
aristocratic laymen in positions of power and, occasionally, of clergy at the highest
level, whose involvement in the events of Rome has been noticeable. Foremost
among these, we have encountered the bishops of the Patrimony of St Peter,
whether involved in actual political conflicts, such as Arsenius of Orté; as future
popes (Formosus of Porto, John of Narni); as participants in major transactions,
such as Bishop Sergius of Nepi or the bishop of Velletri with de Meliosus; and
generally as papal envoys, ambassadors, and deputies. The account of the 963
council gives a list of the suburbicarian bishops, most of whom were present
around the emperor.337 Following them, in the same text, is also a list of the rest of

336 LP I. 106, ch. 34.

337 The bishops of Albano, Ostia, Porto, Palestrina, Sabina, Velletri, Nepi, Tusculum/Tivoli, Sutri,
Silva Candida, Civita Castellana, Narni, Rieti, Alatri, Terracina, Blera, Gabi, Tarquinia, Ceri, Orte,
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182 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the clergy of the city, above all the priests of the various tituli of the city, clerics in
charitable and administrative roles, as well as functionaries of the papal chancery,
notaries, the master of the papal choir, archivists, acolytes, and other parish
priests and chaplains. Di Carpegna has studied these categories in detail, and my
only concern here is to highlight his overall argument about the increasing sep­ar­
ation felt between a papacy which moved decidedly towards a role at a European
level, focusing on the Western Church and its government in the grand scheme of
things, and the government of the Church of Rome in the city itself.338 To that
extent, there was a gradual streamlining of the major posts in the Church, which
came to be associated with the major dioceses, tituli, and deaconries, and later iden-
tified as the cardinal bishops, cardinal priests, and cardinal deacons. Increasingly,
these would become appointments made by the popes of important people, many
foreign, who had no connection with the city, usually leaving the local clergy to
look after the people of Rome. This trend was as yet only adumbrated in the tenth
century, and would properly begin at the end, with a stronger imperial influence
on the papacy, becoming the normal situation in the Church of Rome from the
eleventh-century Reform of the Church. But the differentiation was gradually
becoming more marked between the higher level of reforming clergy and the
lower level of local clergy still very traditional in its attitudes, many still married.
Among these were, for example, the archpriest Mercus in 919, Leo the prior
scholae confessionis of S. Paolo in 927, the cleric Peter, and his friend the deacon
Franco in 989.
An important category of clergy were the scriniarii of the papal scrinium, ori­
gin­al­ly part of the personnel whose role was to produce the official acts of the
papacy, such as privileges and letters. It has been noted that, for the period of the
ninth and tenth centuries, the much increased documentary production in
Rome was provided by two categories of men: the scriniarii Sanctae Romanae
Ecclesiae on the one hand, and the tabelliones Urbis Romae on the other, with a
long period during which a few notaries sometimes qualified themselves as
both.339 The ori­gin­al function of the papal scribes from the scrinium was that of
writing official and public acts for the popes. But, as so often in Rome from the
ninth century onwards, papal officials began to take over the notariate of the city
from the tabelliones, the lay public notaries of the Roman tradition, for every kind
of written act, including private documents. It was precisely between the late

Oriolo, Ferentino, Norba, Veroli, Gallese, Faletri, Anagni, and Trevi are cited at the synod of 963; see
Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, ch. 9, though technically only the first ten are the suburbicarian.

338 Di Carpegna Falconieri, Il clero di Roma, passim.

339 C. Carbonetti Vendittelli, ‘Tabellioni e scriniari a Roma tra IX e XI secolo’, ASRSP 102 (1979),
pp. 77–155; Petrucci, A., and Romeo, C., 1992, ‘Il testo negato: scrivere a Roma tra X e XI secolo’, in
‘Scriptores in urbibus’. Alfabetismo e cultura scritta nell’Italia altomedievale, ed. Petrucci, A., and
Romeo, C. (Bologna, 1992), pp. 127–42.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 183

ninth and the eleventh century that this move began, and the schola of the
tabelliones, with its rules and traditions, was in retreat.
One final category of interest is that of the monastic clergy. I am placing them
here deliberately, in that they are lay actors involved in urban life through con-
tracts of sale, lease, and purchase of land and other possessions, rather than in
their spiritual capacity.340 There is a marked difference between monks and nuns
in this instance. Mention is made of the monks’ involvement in supplying relics to
visitors, as well as being part of the urban landscape of monasteries in charge of
the liturgy of major basilicas, but otherwise they were rarely mentioned in urban
events. This may seem self-evident, and it does indeed confirm in practice what
we know about the fact that until the tenth century most Roman monasteries
were served by monks of the Greek tradition, or at any rate not by Benedictine
ones, and were mostly withdrawn from the world of urban politics. One exception
is worth mentioning: the involvement of Greek monks, appearing as supporting
factions around one or another pope. This was the case for the monks welcomed
by Pope Paul in his monastery at S. Silvestro, and also those at S. Erasmo, both
sets being involved in the incarceration of Pope Leo III during the coup of 799.
It could be that these monks, supporters of the family of Stephen II and Paul, and
later of Hadrian, were opposed to the non-aristocratic Leo, and contributed to his
imprisonment for that reason.341 By the tenth century, numerous grants to mon-
asteries such as SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro involved the abbots and
priors of monasteries, some monks of Subiaco or Farfa, or their Roman subsidiaries,
from which most surviving charters came. Once Alberic’s reform was underway
and a new set of foundations and reforming of monasteries came about, the
change of personnel involved led to a greater visibility of both the new houses and
their abbots, for example at SS Alessio e Bonifazio. Such prestige was further
enhanced by some famous Roman aristocrats becoming themselves monks, such
as Benedict Campaninus and Crescentius I.
Nuns, however, were far more visible as individuals, precisely on account of
their importance as actors and agents of power due to their association with the
main aristocratic families in the city. This made them visible in various charters,
unlike individual monks. There is quite a lot of documentary evidence of indi-
vidual nuns. We have, in 905, Eufemia, abbess of S. Maria outside S. Paolo; in
950 Eufrosina, abbess of S. Blasio of Nepi, together with the nuns Eupraxia and
Maria, both literate and witnessing a document in Greek; in 981 abbess Eufrosina

340 See Chapter 4.

341 On Greek monks in Rome in general, see J.-M. Sansterre, Les moines grecs et orientaux a Rome
aux epoques byzantine et carolingienne (milieu du VIe s.-fin du IXe s.), 2e serie, t. 66/1 (Brussels, 1983);
on S. Silvestro and Leontes, see Federici, ‘S. Silvestro de Capite’, pp. 213–300 at pp. 217–19, and on the
foundation charter by Pope Paul, p. 255; see also LP I. 95 ch. 5; on S. Erasmo, see J. Camobreco, ‘Il
monastero di S. Erasmo sul Celio’, ASRSP 28 (1905), pp. 265–300 at p. 279. On Roman monks and
monasteries and the Greek monks’ support for the papacy, see Chapter 5.
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184 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

of S. Bibiana; in 986 another abbess Eufrosina and her nuns Amiza and Theoderanda,
and an Anna, abbess of S. Gregorio in Campus Martius, and her nuns Constanza
and Maroza in 986. Also in 986, we have a nun Anastasia, daughter of ‘Kalopetro
the Greek’; and finally, in 987, there is the first appearance of Sergia, the powerful
abbess of SS Ciriaco e Nicola.342 All these women transacted business, for their
monasteries of course, but also in some cases giving grants, leasing land, and
being witnesses individually, as well as carrying out high-profile political and reli-
gious transactions involving relics and family memory at the highest social level.

The Merchants, Artisans, and Other Wealth-creators

If the issue of how to define the populus is a difficult one in a generic way, it
becomes even more problematic to find specific categories of it in early medieval
Rome in this period. The military category is one that we have already encoun-
tered in the form of the militia, the ‘Roman army’, and other similar definitions.
They are also mentioned in the form of armed groups from around the city,
whether the militiae of the cities attacked by the Saracens and protected by Pope
Gregory IV when he built ‘Gregoriopolis’, reinforcing the defences of Ostia, or
the armed peasants-soldiers of the domuscultae.343 The other categories, such as
the ‘peasants of Tuscia’, the ‘poor’, the pilgrims, the sick, and other receivers of the
Church’s charitable institutions, are mostly generically described. So are the groups
within the ‘people’ of Rome when in procession, and when receiving popes or
emperors. The Liber Pontificalis classifies them in the theological/ecclesiological
categories of laity as defined by Gregory the Great, according to their religious/
secular and marital status: laymen versus clergy, clergy versus monks, married
women versus virgins, Romans versus pilgrims, foreigners according to their
scholae, and so on.344
Attempts have been made to study the Roman population—whose number
itself has been guessed at, somewhere in between Krautheimer’s 35,000,
Santangeli’s 20,000–30,000, and Wickham’s 25,000—according to modern economic
categories.345 Historians and archaeologists have been teasing out of surviving
texts and archaeological material the merchants, artisans (ropemakers, builders,
lime-burners, carpenters, and potters), millers, or fishermen.346 At the same time,

342 Zimmermann, Papsturkunden, I no. 23; SMVL 4; Liberiano 1; SMCM 1; SSCD 11; SMVL 14.
343 LP I. 103, ch. 38. 344 See Chapter 3.
345 Krautheimer, Profile of a City, p. 62; Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medio-
evo, pp. 21–4; Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 112.
346 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 25–7; Arena et al., Crypta
Balbi, especially the papers by R. Meneghini and R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘La trasformazione del tes-
suto urbano tra V e IX secolo’, pp. 20–33; L. Saguì, ‘Roma e il Mediterraneo: la circolazione delle
merci’, pp. 62–8; and M. Ricci, ‘La produzione di merci di lusso e di prestigio a Roma da Giustiniano a
Carlomagno’, pp. 79–87 at 79–81. More recently, see the volume Molinari, Santangeli Valenzani, and
Spera, eds., L’archeologia della produzione, especially the papers by L. Vendittelli and M. Ricci, ‘L’isolato
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 185

partly for the benefit of visiting elite pilgrims, but also for that of the local elite,
increasing demand for better and more attractive consumer goods arose. Such
demand, especially in terms of ceramic, glass, and metal objects, prompted an
expansion (if still very modest) of the industry in the city, as we can see from the
objects found in the Crypta Balbi and other excavations, notably with the charac-
teristic forumware—implying by definition a greater number of potters and
glaziers, just as the hugely expanded building work of the popes in the ninth
century has to imply more lime-burners, masons, and builders.347 (Plate 4)
But the economic structures of Rome differed from other cities in size rather than
in nature. Specific urban economic areas have been pinpointed in Rome, such as
the newly developing Leonine City, with its growing number of service providers
engaged in supplying and servicing the ever-increasing pilgrim and visiting
population in the city; the main commercial and industrial areas along the Tiber
and the port next to the area of Greek settlement at the foot of the Aventine; and
the central area of the old Campus Martius.348 The increasing visibility of both
artisan and merchant groups has been studied over time by Delogu, Augenti, and
Wickham. The archaeological evidence of ceramics of the forumware type found
in the Crypta Balbi has been recently confirmed by the excavations in the Piazza
Madonna di Loreto in Rome.349 The archaeological reports and syntheses which
have been recently published have discussed pottery production and circulation,
the complex organization of the construction industry for the purposes of quarry­
ing, with newly found lime kilns and building sites, and also the prime material
for epigraphy and plastering. Evidence of metallurgy, glassmaking, and the

della Crypta Balbi’, pp. 127–42, R. Meneghini, ‘Fori Imperiali. Testimonianze di attività produttive
medievali’, pp. 143–52, L. Saguì and B. Lepri, ‘La produzione del vetro a Roma: continuità e disconti-
nuità fra tardo antico e alto Medioevo’, pp. 225–42, V. La Salvia, ‘Impianti metallurgici tardoantichi ed
altomedievali a Roma. Alcune riflessioni tecnologiche e storico-economiche a partire dai recenti
rinvenimenti archeologici a Piazza della Madonna di Loreto’, pp. 253–79, G. Rascaglia and J. Russo,
‘La ceramica medievale di Roma: organizzazione produttiva e mercati (VIII–XV secolo)’, pp. 279–308,
D. Esposito, ‘Tecniche murarie ed organizzazione dei cantieri, secoli VIII–XV: alcuni indicatori’,
pp. 345–54, and I. Baldini Lippolis, ‘Gioielli e oggetti in metallo prezioso’, pp. 411–27.

347 Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 524–8, and Ricci, ‘La produzione di merci di lusso’, pp. 86–7; see
also the earlier Krautheimer, Profile of a City, pp. 250–88, and now also Augenti, ‘I ceti dirigenti
romani’, pp. 71–96 esp. 83–96; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 111–18 and 137–54.
348 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, p. 48 and Santangeli ‘L’insediamento
aristocratico’, pp. 229–393 at p. 230 for the Forum of Cesar; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 137–54
(though mostly with evidence from the eleventh century onwards) for the Leonine City; and
Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, for the Emporio and the Campus
Martius, pp. 194–205; idem, ‘Tra la Porticus Minucia e il Calcarario’, pp. 57–98; idem, ‘Abitare a Roma’
in Paroli and Vendittelli eds., Roma dall’antichità all’alto medioevo II, pp. 41–59; and E. Zanini,
‘L’insediamento altomedievale nell’area di Largo Argentina’, in Atti del Convegno Internazionale La
Storia dell’Alto Medioevo italiano (VI-X secolo) alla luce dell’archeologia, Siena 2–6 dicembre 1992, eds
R. Francovich, G. Noyé (Florence, 1994), pp. 640–50.
349 P. Delogu ‘Solium imperii—urbs ecclesiae. Roma fra la tarda antichità e l’alto medioevo’, in Sedes
regiae (ann. 400–800), ed. G. Ripoll (Barcelona, 2000), pp. 98–100; D. Romei, ‘Produzione e circolazione
dei manufatti ceramici a Roma nell’alto medioevo’, in Paroli and Vendittelli, eds., Roma dall’antichità
all’alto medioevo II, pp. 278–311; Vendittelli and Ricci, ‘L’isolato della Crypta Balbi’, and Rascaglia and
Russo, ‘La ceramica medievale di Roma’, pp. 279–308 and 127–42.
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186 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

manufacturing of rope and textiles has revealed or confirmed a successful industrial

activity, mostly located in the area extending from the imperial Fora to the
Campus Martius, in the areas of greatest population dens­ity, as witnessed by food
consumption and burials.350
In Rome two areas were effectively the economic motors of the city: the
Leonine City and the Campus Martius. The Leonine City flourished on account
of the vastly expanding services needed for pilgrims—I will return to this in
Chapter 5, with the development of the hospitality and services industry—and
through the great development of artisan activity, focused more and more within
the City.351 This was at the root of the new, or not-so-new but growing, industries,
supported and encouraged by the popes in the Borgo, and thus of the demographic
and economic development of the Borgo itself. The other centre of development
was probably also, at least in part, supported by the pilgrimage traffic. The Campus
Martius, especially the area of transit towards the Vatican from S. Marco along
the Via Sacra towards the Tiber, was also becoming wealthy as an industrial and
commercial zone. The late tenth-/early eleventh-century protracted court case
between Farfa and S. Eustachio gives a good indication of the area.352 Farfa had
only one house in Rome, a monastery situated in the middle of the Terme

350 Meneghini, ‘Fori Imperiali’, pp. 143–52; see R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Calcare ed altre tracce di
cantiere, cave e smontaggi sistematici degli edifici antichi’, pp. 335–54; C. Carletti, ‘Produzione epigra-
fica tra tarda Antichità ed alto Medioevo. Discontinuità e tradizione’, pp. 362–6; F. Guidobaldi and
A. Guiglia, ‘I rivestimenti pavimentali e parietali a Roma fino al IX secolo: le dinamiche delle scelte
decorative e della produzione’, pp. 386–8; La Salvia, ‘Impianti metallurgici’, pp. 253–79; Saguì and
Lepri, ‘La produzione del vetro a Roma’, pp. 225–42; and also J. De Grossi Mazzorin, ‘Lo sfruttamento
degli animali domestici a Roma e nel Lazio nel Medioevo’, pp. 309–24; L. Pescucci, F. Porreca, and
P. Catalano, ‘Vivere e lavorare al centro di Roma in età medievale: il contributo dell’antropologia fisica’,
pp. 325–34, all in Molinari, Santangeli Valenzani and Spera, eds., L’archeologia della produzione, and
also ‘Introduzione’, pp. 28–30.
351 P. Delogu, ‘Oro e argento in Roma tra il VII e il IX secolo’, in Cultura e società nell’Italia mediev-
ale. Studi per Paolo Brezzi (Rome: Istituto storico italiano per il Medioevo, 1988); P. Delogu,
‘L’importazione di tessuti preziosi e sistema economico romano nel IX secolo’, in Delogu, ed., Roma
medievale. Aggiornamenti, pp. 123–42; these issues are also dealt with in Saguì, ‘Roma e il
Mediterraneo’, pp. 62–8, and Ricci, ‘La produzione di merci di lusso’, pp. 79–81, esp. 86–87, both in
Arena et al., Crypta Balbi; see also Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 137–41.
352 RF, no. 428, and F. Fiore Cavaliere, ‘Le terme alessandrine nei secoli X e XI, I Crescenzi e “la
Cella Farfae” ’, Rivista dell’Istituto Nazionale d’Archeologia e Storia dell’Arte, ser. 3 (1978), pp. 119–45 at
127–35; Delogu, ‘La storia’, pp. 13–9; Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, ‘La trasformazione del tes-
suto urbano’, pp. 20–33 esp. 20–1, and A. Rovelli, ‘La circolazione monetaria a Roma nell’altomedioevo:
un riesame alla luce dei recenti dati archeologici’, pp. 88–91, all in Arena et al., Crypta Balbi. For the
Campo Marzio, see also Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 201–5;
D. Manacorda, ‘Trasformazioni dell’abitato nel Campo Marzio: l’area della “Porticus Minucia” ’, in
Paroli and Delogu, La storia economica di Roma, pp. 42–8; D. Manacorda and E. Zanini, ‘The first
millennium A.D. in Rome: from the Porticus Minucia to the via delle Botteghe Oscure’, in The birth of
Europe. Archaeology and social development in the first millennium A.D., ed. K. Randsborg (Rome,
1989), pp. 25–32; and Hubert, Espace urbain, pp. 74–5. The centrality of occupation and economic
expansion of the Campus Martius has been disputed by R. Coates Stephens, ‘Housing in Early
Medieval Rome, 500–1000 AD’, PBSR 64 (1994), pp. 239–59, but his reservations seem now difficult to
uphold, in view of new archaeological evidence brought forward in Molinari, Santangeli Valenzani,
and Spera, eds., L’archeologia della produzione. See also R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Struttura economica
e ruoli sociali a Roma nell’alto medioevo: una lettura archeologica’, in J. R. Brandt, O. Steen, S. Sande,
and L. Hodne eds, Rome ad 300–800: Power and Symbol—Image and Reality (Rome, 2003).
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 187

Alessandrine, which was disputed with S. Eustachio in 998. The original cella
Farfae was situated in the Campus Martius in the middle of land owned by the
Crescentii in this area of transit to the Vatican, including Castel Sant’Angelo, and a
privilege of 998 of Otto III mentioned three churches and a monastic building.353
The contested properties were S. Maria and S. Benedetto, built in the Terme
Alessandrine, with their land and gardens. Their bounds were between the cur-
tis and cripta of one Lambert, son of Aldo, the criptae of the heirs of Ingebald
and Azo, and those of Theophylact the Neapolitan, the garden of the heirs of
Bonizo and of the monastery of S. Andrea of Soracte. What we see here is that
the Terme Alessandrine, like so many areas in tenth-century Rome, were easy
to convert, either into defensive units, or by enclosing parts for private use,
possibly creating new through roads but preserving wells. The character of the
area was basically that of a mix of people living side by side—lords, tenants,
monks, and craftsmen. The latter gradually extended in the old Campus
Martius towards S. Marco, where part of the old Porticus Minucia and Theatre
of Balbus had been cut through by a new road with the significantly commer-
cial (though certainly later) name of Botteghe Oscure, and archaeological
excavations have shown traces of industries like lime-burning around the
monastery of S. Lorenzo in Pallacinis.354
The people involved in keeping the city fed and clothed—merchants and artisans,
the viri honesti or cives, together with the poor who were fed by the Church’s
charitable structures—constituted the other members of the urban populus. Together
with the elite and the clergy, they were brought together in the processional liturgy
of the city, and popular meetings such as the festivals and the games, which will
be discussed in Chapter 5. Their main function within the life of the city was at
election time, and to provide welcome and acclamations to popes, kings, and
emperors. In this context they were part of the whole group of the laymen, and
contributed to city events at the same time as the aristocratic elite. But by the
tenth century, when a larger number of charters become available, we begin to see
the group more specifically mentioned in its component parts, defined through
their trade. Some are only witnesses, like Stephen the smith, John nephew of John
the cook, and Gregory the weaver, in two documents from SS Andrea e Gregorio
in Clivo Scauro in 980 and 981; or are only mentioned as neighbours of the parties
involved in the grant, as is Stephen the miller in 976.355 Others, however, who
define themselves as honesti viri, are among the grantors or sellers of property to
Roman monasteries: Leo the tailor and his wife, Ada of Sutri, in 958; Leo the

353 Previously seen as the object of a contest between what was thought to have been the ‘Roman’
versus the ‘German’ party which Farfa supported in Rome.
354 L. Saguì, ‘Roma, i centri privilegiati e la lunga durata della Tarda Antichità: dati archeologici del
deposito del VII secolo nell’Esedra della Crypta Balbi’, Archeologia medievale 29 (2002), pp. 7–42; see
also Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Tra la Porticus Minucia e il Calcarario’, pp. 57–98.
355 SSAG nos 77 and 79; RS no. 128.
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188 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

soap-maker with grants to several churches including SS Ciriaco e Nicola in 989;

and Gregory the shoemaker to S. Erasmo on the Celio in 974.356

Conclusions

Several of the issues discussed here have been previously debated by Marazzi, and
I share many of his conclusions.357 Beginning with the political marginalization,
if not elimination, of the last senatorial families by the time of Gregory the Great
after the Byzantine reconquest, we have a period of the fully functioning imperial
administration of the Byzantine state which, despite the decline of city institu-
tions, continued to see itself as responsible for the government of Rome. The
gradual takeover of civil government by the military administration, at first led by
foreign-appointed commanders from Constantinople and Ravenna, created a
new local elite, which took upon itself the functions of tax-collecting, minting,
notariate, and justice. These functions became increasingly limited to some fam­
ilies, and sometimes became hereditary, thus creating a new group in Roman
society, involved in government and military roles. At first perceiving themselves
as imperial delegates, they evolved into a new privileged class, called the ‘army of
the city of Rome’, according to the formula used by the Liber Diurnus. The crisis
between the Emperor Leo III and Pope Gregory II on fiscal matters, then icono-
clasm, followed by the support given by the ‘Roman army’ to the exarch for the
repression of the rebellion in Tuscia which tried to set up an Italian emperor,
implied that, at this stage, papal involvement in the organization of military
ex­ped­itions in Italy was already taken for granted. This fact was corroborated by
the later role of the papacy in political and military negotiations with Duke
Trasamund of Spoleto, and the repairs to part of the walls of Rome and
Civitavecchia with papal resources. Increasingly weaker against the Lombards,
the Exarchate lost control of Rome, and the papacy substituted its resources for
the purposes of defence, then coinage, and finally all secular affairs, during the
period of gradual rapprochement with the Franks from the start of Gregory III’s
reign in 731 to the end of Stephen II’s in 757. That this should have happened like
was because, like in other Byzantine cities such as Ravenna and Naples, there was
a consensus of the lay aristocracy to allow it to happen, that is to allow the bishop
to represent the city—especially in Rome, where the ‘papacy identified itself with
the aristocratic class’.358
After Stephen II, with one exception, the popes for the next two centuries were
Romans. This is important because it shows how the great families in the city

356 SSCD no. 6; SMVL no. 17; RS no. 66. 357 Marazzi, ‘Aristocratie et société’, pp. 91–125.
358 Arnaldi, Le origini, p. 127.
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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 189

understood that they needed to control the papacy in order to control power.
To that end, they were happy to make some family members enter the clergy as
a form of political investment. The first family which functioned in this way was
that of Popes Stephen II and Paul. Pope Hadrian I was a perfect representative
of this aristocratic milieu, with his uncle Theodotus consul et dux then primice-
rius, and another two family members involved at the top level of the Lateran
administration—Paschal at its head, and Campolo as treasurer of the Church. In
the following century another three popes from the same family would follow—
Stephen IV, Sergius II, and Hadrian II—and the same would be true of the chal-
lengers, such as Anastasius Bibliothecarius, nephew of Bishop Arsenius of Orté.
In both Sergius II’s and Anastasius’ cases, their brothers Benedict and Eleutherius
were the most important secular figures in the administration of the city.
Increasingly, therefore, as the popes took over the public charges and the Byzantine
civil administration, this was concentrated in the hands of the aristocratic families
which had come to pre-eminence in the Byzantine period in the army and the
administration of the city, had been granted fiscal land, and later increased their
wealth with emphyteutic leases from the popes. Throughout the ninth century
these men acquired a growing class awareness, and continued to use Byzantine
imperial titles such as dux, consul, magister militum, or tribune, though gradually
the titles lost their original meaning in a military context and became signs of
status, rather than illustrations of the exercise of specific functions. These func-
tions were now taken over by the papal administration. That is not to say that these
men were clerics: they were laymen who controlled justice (iudices, defensores),
coinage, the chancery (notaries), and, last but not least, the exercitus, the army of
the city. They exercised their rule through new titles (superista, vestararius, pal­at­
ine judges). But they did so from a new set of headquarters, which were the same
as those of the episcopal administration—the Lateran Palace.
Naturally the identification of the two groups of the elite—the aristocracy and
the Lateran clerical bureaucracy—did not always go smoothly. The rebellion of
Toto of Nepi, after the death of Pope Paul I, with the choice of Pope Constantine
II, and the rebellion against Pope Leo III, partly fuelled by the family of his prede-
cessor, Pope Hadrian I, are examples of conflicts between the two. The second
rebellion was even more patently such a conflict, since not only was Pope Leo III
apparently not an aristocrat, but also, perhaps on that account, he had worked
hard at strengthening the power of the Lateran bureaucracy as a support for his
rule. Nevertheless, these are also conflicts between rival aristocratic families try-
ing to control the papacy. In Marazzi’s view, they were also expressing a struggle
between the aristocracy of the city itself and that of Lazio, between Rome and the
‘periphery’, of whom Toto of Nepi, for example, was a representative. Here I differ
from his interpretation, since Toto had a house and clearly a familia of followers
in Rome, and would need, to my mind, to be regarded as a Roman aristocrat with
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190 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

power and property in Nepi. Possession of land and houses in the city and around
it, as owners or lessees of papal lands, is precisely what makes the aristocracy of
the city powerful, and gives it its prestige.
But the participation of the aristocracy in the political life of Rome in the ninth
century went through control of the papacy—at this point, there was no political
alternative on offer to that of the secular power of the papacy. The aristocracy’s
assumption of the title of senators was, like the use of the word senate, an alterna-
tive name to that of primates, proceres, and primores. It was the papacy, perhaps
under Carolingian influence, that used the term in the first place, as a generic
classical reference for the ‘men of status’ in the city, and the aristocracy were
happy to allow this to go forward as part of the consensus of cohabitation. When
the consensus worked, as it did under Hadrian I, who represented a culmination
of the converging interests of the Roman aristocracy and the popes, things ran
smoothly. When it broke, and popes like Leo III and perhaps Paschal I tried to
reinforce the power of the clerical services in the Lateran against them, the opti-
mates, or at the very least those who did not belong to the families favoured in
this reshuffle, rebelled and were harshly punished if the popes had the ear of the
Carolingian ruler, as was the case in 799, 815, and 823. Later in the ninth century,
when challenges to papal authority appeared as a result of political and military
events, they were described by the Liber Pontificalis as being the devil’s work, as
was the case with the rule of Benedict, brother of Pope Sergius II, a pope whom
the majority of the Roman aristocracy detested but preferred to his challenger at
the time of his election.
With Nicholas I, Hadrian II, and John VIII, the papacy had found itself in the
strongest position it had ever had, and had become the arbiter of European pol­it­
ical affairs. But after the end of Carolingian rule in Rome, it was at the mercy of
the various political forces fighting for control of Italy, especially between 882 and
914, when it took part in the power struggle between the House of Spoleto and
the Roman aristocracy. The situation was resolved only when the two were
merged in the power of Alberic. Earlier, the optimates of the city were happy to be
associated in name with the senate as a venerable institution of the Roman past,
as was Theophylact, who progressed from palatine judge and vestararius to magis­
ter militum at the time of Pope Sergius III, and from gloriosissimus dux in 906 to
senator Romanorum from 915 onwards. He still had no constitutional role as
such, and ruled with the support of the aristocracy, as ‘garant de la cohésion de
cette derniere’,359 in order to ensure the survival of the city, which was at risk. His
grandson Alberic tried to build on Theophylact’s power, through his titles of
sen­ator and princeps, with a court and a palace, and to establish a rule modelled in
part on that of the southern principalities, the Byzantine models of Naples and

359 Toubert, Les Structures, p. 969.

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the actors: elites and populus, i: rome 191

Amalfi, and the memory of the Roman principate of Augustus. Such a rule, which
he planned to be dynastic and to be passed on to his son, included control over
the bishop (albeit that of Rome) and the monasteries. Alberic enhanced the cohe-
sion of the aristocratic group through whose consensus he governed, by helping
their rooting in Lazio, especially in the territories of Tivoli and the Sabina, and
their alliance with the families in the area. He also supported the attraction of the
power and wealth of the great monasteries of Subiaco and Farfa into the orbit of
Rome. The princeps succeeded in maintaining this consensus of the aristocracy,
including towards the succession of his son, and in reviving a latent interest in the
Roman political past among his peers, through his vocabulary of power, titula-
ture, and secular control over the papacy—but not for long enough. On his death-
bed, he seems to have decided either that his son could not carry out the weight of
this power, or that papal power had gone too far in its prestige and European
success for it to be possible to break its hold over Rome; he must have thought
that the papacy was still the strongest legitimizing institution in Rome, and there-
fore that his son needed to be at the head of it. He was right in so far as his son
thought he had to call in the King of Germany, Otto, to help the city resist the
attack of Adalbert, thus setting in motion the regaining of imperial control over
Rome. But even without the emperor’s presence, the consequence of Alberic’s
death without the creation of an institutional framework for local power in the
city meant that the aristocratic consensus which had been the strength of his
government was gradually broken. One family, not necessarily the wealthiest
compared to the de Imiza or de Meliosus—the Crescentii—eventually emerged at
the top for a while, but did not succeed in maintaining control over the papacy,
now much more closely supervised by the Ottonians.
One could thus argue that the disintegration of the Carolingian order, and the
retreat of the role of the papacy in the government of the city as a result of it,
allowed Alberic and the Roman aristocracy to reinvent themselves with new
symbols based on the Roman past, such as the titles they used (senator, consul,
patricius), and the revived charges (Prefect of the City). While content to be
imperial delegates in the seventh and early eighth century, and to control the
papacy through the means of military and secular charges within the Lateran in
the ninth century, the Roman aristocracy—which had never been augmented
with Frankish elements despite the Carolingians’ occasional presence in Rome—
gained a much stronger class awareness and identity through this revived as­so­ci­
ation with the Roman republican and imperial past in the tenth century.
In Rome, aristocratic power tended to belong to certain families and their fol-
lowers at particular times, and to do so in succession, more or less one family group
at a time, with relatively little urban warfare. A similar model, with one family
dominating the city for a while, then another, seems to have also been the most
common form of urban political framework in Ravenna, though there we do
occasionally encounter greater friction between leading families. In both cases,
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192 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the situation was very different from Venice, where the period up to 1000 saw a
pretty constant struggle between leading families for ducal power, often in the
form of extreme urban violence. Before attempting to understand whether these
are phenomena specific to cities of post-Byzantine Italy or not, and whether an
awareness of the ruling elite of a common Roman and/or Byzantine imperial past
was part of the urban consciousness of the inhabitants of these cities, I need to
examine the societies of Ravenna and Venice in turn.
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3
The Actors
the Elites and the Populus, II:
Ravenna and Venice

Ravenna

Aristocracy and Church from the Eighth to the

End of the Ninth Century

The cessation of the exarchal government based in Ravenna and the takeover by
the Franks after 751 had allowed the archbishops of Ravenna to emerge as the
foremost figures in the ex-Exarchate and the Pentapolis, and they replaced and
took over the role of the exarch. Originally, the wealth of the Church of Ravenna
had been relatively modest, until the great imperial grants of the sixth century.
From then on it gained a large patrimony, stretching across Romagna from the
Veneto, the edges of Emilia from the Ferrarese to the Bolognese, and from the
Pentapolis to the Marches and Umbria, as well as property in Istria, Sicily, and
Calabria. In addition, it had control over the huge land endowments of the great
Ravennate monasteries, such as S. Apollinare in Classe, S. Giovanni Evangelista,
and S. Vitale, as well as the rights of a metropolitan bishop over the bishops of
Emilia and Romagna.1 The style of management of this vast patrimony, in terms
of its structures and practices, maintained the illusion of a late antique and im­per­
ial presence. An illustration of this economic model in action was the large
quantity of Byzantine gold coins (nomismata) still in circulation in the Exarchate
after 750, income which the archbishop of Ravenna obtained from the rents in his
Sicilian provinces. In addition, although there was no longer any direct state

1 The properties and powers of the archbishops of Ravenna and their function as exarchs is a well-
studied topic; see, for example, Andreolli, ‘Il potere signorile’, pp. 311–19; Fasoli, ‘Il dominio territori-
ale’, pp. 87–140; Fasoli, ‘Il patrimonio della Chiesa ravennate’, pp. 389–400; Cosentino, ‘Potere e
autorità’, pp. 277–93, and Cosentino, ‘Ricchezza e investimento della chiesa di Ravenna tra la tarda
antichità e l’alto medioevo’ in From one sea to another, ed. S. Gelichi and R. Hodges (Turnhout, 2012),
pp. 417–39; Rabotti et al., Breviarium Ecclesiae Ravennatis; Carile, ‘La società ravennate’, pp. 395–404;
and Vespignani, La Romania, pp. 51–4.

Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000: Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present, and the Construction of City Identity.
Veronica West-Harling, Oxford University Press (2020). © Veronica West-Harling.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754206.001.0001
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194 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

tax­ation, the indirect taxation on trade, and the tolls, remained active. Their revenues
went mostly to the archbishop, who held the largest amount of land.2 The archi­
epis­co­pal bureaucracy maintained a well-controlled system of management of
Church property. This was especially important after the eighth century, when
less and less of the economic prosperity of Ravenna came from the sea, as we can
see from the relative decline of its port of Classe, and therefore far more value was
placed on income from the land.3
The aristocratic elite had had close links with the Church from the sixth century
onwards, and had been rewarded with large tracts of ex-imperial land, held on
lease from the archbishop. Some of this ex-fiscal land had been acquired by the
Church, and transferred to it in a way that had been technically illegal (military
land and castles especially could in theory not be alienated by the state, especially
not to the Church). Other lands, formerly the property of the Arian Church, had
been given to it directly. All of these were conflated into the ecclesiastical patri-
mony.4 Such an evolution can be guessed at from the change of ownership of par-
ticular properties, for example of fourteen fundi held in emphyteusis by tenants
from the archbishop.5 Technically, therefore, the archbishop was still treating this
as imperial land, at least to begin with, on the grounds that he was representing
the exarch. In reality, of course, the archbishop would continue to hold that land
even after the theoretical restitution of the Exarchate to the Patrimony of St Peter,
and even as Ravenna would eventually become part of the Regnum of Italy in the
990s. Thus control of the land of the ex-Exarchate and the Pentapolis was, in
effect, exercised by the archbishops of Ravenna, together with the aristocracy,
who both owed their political power and wealth to the previous, Byzantine,
regime.6 Even though the territory of the ecclesiastical province and the core of
the patrimony of the Church of Ravenna did not exactly correspond, the ambi-
tion was to bring as much of them together as possible within the limits of the old
Exarchate. Several archbishops tried, at various times, to expand the area of the
patrimony of the Church of Ravenna, which did not extend west of Bologna
originally, as far as the actual limits of the archdiocese, which included the dio-
ceses of Emilia (Parma, Modena, Piacenza, Ferrara) as well as those of Adria,
Comacchio, Imola, Faenza, Forli, Forlimpopoli, Sarsina, Cesena, Cervia from 948

2 Cosentino, ‘Potere e autorità’, p. 293.

3 Andreolli, ‘Il potere signorile’, pp. 315–6; On Classe as an important port up to the eighth century,
see A. Augenti, Classe: indagini sul potenziale archeologico di una città scomparsa (Bologna, 2011); and
idem, Città e porti, pp. 43–50.
4 Carile, ‘Continuità e mutamento’, pp. 115–45 at p. 142; Schoolman, ‘Nobility’, pp. 219–24.
5 Andreolli, ‘Il potere signorile’, pp. 311–19; and Carile, ‘Continuità e mutamento’, p. 140.
6 Cosentino, ‘Potere e autorità’, p. 293.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 195

onwards, and Montefeltro from 997/8, while Rimini would only become part of it
in modern times.7
The Church did not manage this vast patrimony directly but leased it out to
the aristocracy, in a way which benefited both. Just as they did in Rome with the
land around the city, here also the top layers of the elite gained a strong eco-
nomic base, through control and use of vast fundi, which had passed into the
hands of the Church after 751. These could be added to their patrimonial land,
as well as property in Ravenna and other cities, at the cost of a nominal pen-
sion, for three generations. The archbishops, through these almost grace-and-
favour political gestures, obtained a legal right to the allegiance and support of
the most powerful local families of dukes, tribunes, and vicarii. These, in turn,
would then act as an armed clientele, sometimes called on to have a military
activity, though often this may have been no more than the control of roads and
fortified centres.8
The ninth and tenth centuries saw a major consolidation of the ecclesiastical
patrimony of the Church of Ravenna, including judicial rights and immunities,
and increasingly the archbishops also acquired from the Carolingians rights of
justice, which had been originally granted to the imperial missi. The second half
of the tenth century saw further consolidation of archiepiscopal power, and a
series of papal bulls and imperial grants gave the archbishops rights over the
inhabitants of counties like Montefeltro, Cesena, Cervia, Imola, Comacchio, and
Ferrara, tolls and minting privileges, and the confirmation of rights, for example
in Istria. Archbishops like Peter IV and Honestus had not only the rights of the
lower but also of the higher justice, just below those of the imperial missi. Such
rights were granted to them by the Ottonians, who routinely used ecclesiastical
and monastic power, and the power of the top local families, for the purpose of
government.9 This would constitute the basis of the future power of the arch­
bishops from the eleventh century onwards, together with new concepts of vas-
salage; from Gerbert onwards a seignorial vocabulary is gradually introduced
into the documents. At the same time, because of the increasing Frankish and
German associations of the archbishops, we begin to see a distancing of the arch­
bishops from the local aristocratic families.

7 ‘Il dominio territoriale’, pp. 397–8; G. Rabotti, ‘Dai vertici dei poteri medioevali: Ravenna e la sua
Chiesa fra diritto e politica dal X al XIII secolo’, in SR III, pp. 129–68 at 129–35.
8 Cosentino, ‘Potere e autorità’, p. 293; Andreolli, ‘Le enfiteusi e i livelli’, pp. 163–8.
9 Rabotti, ‘Dai vertici dei poteri medioevali’, pp. 129–41.
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196 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

The Elites in Romagna and the Archbishop of Ravenna

in the Ninth and Tenth centuries

The Archbishops of Ravenna, mid-7° c. to c. 1000:

Maurus (642–671) George (837–846)

Reparatus (671–677) Deusdedit (847–850)
Theodore (677–691) John VII (850–878)
Damian (692–708) Romanus (878–888)
Felix (709–725) Dominic (889–898)
John V (726–744) John VIII Cailo (898–904)
Sergius (748–769) John IX (904–914)
Leo I (770–778) Costantine (914–927)
John VI (778–785) Peter IV (927–971)
Gratiosus (786–789) Honestus (971–983)
Valerius (789–810) John X of Besate (983–998)
Martin (810–818) Gerbert of Aurillac (998–999)
Petronax (818–837) Leo II (999–1001)

The Aristocracy of the Old Exarchate: ‘Old’ or ‘New’?

As Carile has shown, in the middle of the eighth century the idea of ‘public
service’, or ‘service of the state’, remained a real political concept.10 After 751, the
social and political elite in Ravenna continued to perpetuate Byzantine forms of
government through local appropriation of rights, resources, and titles. The exar-
chal administrative framework, and its bureaucratic tradition, remained in place
after 751, with the archbishop claiming to exercise the political, judicial, and even
military functions previously exercised by the exarch. The rising profile of the
Exarchate aristocracy took place mostly during the reign of Louis II, when Ravenna
once again saw its role in politics expand, notably under Archbishop John VIII,
brother of the dux Gregory, both belonging to the ruling Duchi family and both,
like most members of this family, generally anti-papal in their stance of autonomy
for Ravenna. Even the Photian schism was used by the archbishops to enhance their
authority, through their support of the Patriarch Photius against Pope Nicholas I,
thus leading to the excommunication of John VIII by the pope for heresy.
In Ravenna, as in Rome, the ecclesiastical administration was an outlet for the
old elite to maintain an area of political action.11 But archiepiscopal power, while

10 Carile, ‘Continuità e mutamento’, p. 122; on the continuation of the idea of ‘public service’, see
Arnaldi, ‘Le origini’, pp. 127–39, and W. Kölmel, ‘Die kaiserliche Herrschaft im Gebiet von Ravenna
(Exarchatus und Pentapolis) vor dem Investiturstreit (10–11. Jhr)’, Historisches Jahrbuch 88 (1968),
pp. 257–99.
11 Brown, ‘The aristocracy of Ravenna’, p. 146; Brown, ‘The Interplay’, pp. 127–60, which expands the
argument already developed in his ‘Romanitas e campanilismo: Agnellus of Ravenna’s view of the past’,
in The Inheritance of Historiography 350–900, ed. C. Holdsworth and T. P. Wiseman (Exeter, 1986), pp.
107–14, that the society of Ravenna in the eighth and ninth centuries suffered a period of introversion
on its past glory and of xenophobia against everybody else—Greeks, Francs, Lombards, and Rome.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 197

by far the most important in Ravenna, was not the only one. The ruling elite never
became totally associated with the archiepiscopal palace, as it did in Rome with
the Lateran and papal administration.12 The position of the aristocracy was main-
tained through the preservation of many of the offices and municipal structures,
allowing for a secular aristocracy with strong links to the clergy to maintain its
titles of dux and magister militum, and real military and political power. Most
archbishops succeeded in rallying most of the elite to them and their rule:
Archbishop Sergius is an early example of this elite becoming integrated into the
Church of Ravenna, and identifying with it.13
Though this was untimately the archbishops’ ambition, and they often succeeded
in attaining their objective, nevertheless, in theory at least, the old Exarchate had
been ‘given back’ to the papacy in 754. Numerous popes tried, and a few succeeded
to a certain extent, to establish the skeleton of a papal government in the city,
until the effective incorporation of Ravenna and the Romagna into the kingdom
of Italy at the end of the ninth century with Guy and Lambert of Spoleto. But in
parallel with the archiepiscopal Curia, we also have a continuous presence in the
city of an urban Curia, the old secular administration. The latter was taken over
and run by the popes for a while, through a papal vestararius in charge of finance,
a duke in charge of the army, and a papal missus in charge of judiciary appeals.
We encounter such people very occasionally, mostly when they were challenged
or dismissed—implying that, on the whole, the system did function. While
Buzzi’s description of it makes it sound perhaps rather too well ordered and
stratified, the fact remains that there seems to have been, in Ravenna, a fairly
effective secular form of city government in place during the whole ­period.14
One of the few sources of information that we have about this papal administra-
tion was indirectly through the hostile perception of archbishops like John VIII
and Romanus.15 Thus, for example, one of John VIII’s first acts was to remove
papal supporters from public offices, and to have their properties confiscated
and attached to the episcopal mensa, even at the cost of pressure on, and/or
bribes of, the papal vestararius Hilary to make him countersign the archbishop’s
orders.16 The sacking in 876 of the houses of the two dukes, John and Deusdedit,
who represented the pope, and the confiscation of their property, was one such
action; on another occasion, an appeal was made to the papal missus in the case
of a senator whose wife was accused of adultery, a case judged in Ravenna but a
judgement challenged by Pope John VIII, who wrote to the archbishop asking
him to have it reopened.17 After Ravenna was effectively incorporated into the

12 Cosentino, ‘Potere e autorità’, p. 294. 13 Agnellus, LP ch. 154.

14 G. Buzzi, ‘La curia arcivescovile e la Curia cittadina di Ravenna dall’ 850 all 1118 (Studio diplo-
matico preparatorio dell’edizione delle carte ravennati)’, BISI 35 (1915), pp. 52–60.
15 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 7–25; Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 344–9.
16 Epistolae selectae Leonis IV, in MGH Ep. V, no. 8.
17 Epp. 281, 286 in MGH Ep. IV.
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198 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

kingdom of Italy under Lambert, the deputies in question were more and more
often replaced by imperial missi, such as the Tedbald imperial vassus, who
received an emphyteutic lease from the archbishop in 977; but the actual adminis-
tration was still carried out by the same aristocratic groups of dukes and consuls.18
There are two examples left of court cases involving them. One is the placitum of
973, held in the presence of the Archbishop Honorius, to judge the competing
claims of Counts Peter and Lambert of Modena and the bishop of Parma, where
the list of Ravennate judges includes the Dukes Peter and Paul Traversari, Henri
son of Duke Romuald, and a few other iudices sacri palatii.19 The other is the
placitum of Bertinoro in 994/5, presided over by the Duke and Count Lambert, to
judge the case between deacon Paul Traversari and the abbot of S. Tommaso fuori
Porta S. Lorenzo.20

Titles and Social Status

The elites’ self-awareness of their past was expressed through titles, which
remained jealously guarded by them up to the end of the tenth century as sym-
bols of power because of their association with the imperial past. Byzantine pal-
ace rank titles (ypatos, spatarius, protospatarius) became increasingly rare in Italy
after the ninth century, unless they were gifted by the Byzantine emperors to
­people they had an interest in obliging, like the doges of Venice. Such titles,
though officially non-transferable, were therefore increasingly sold, showing the
desire of the local aristocracy to differentiate itself and deliberately to preserve the
continuity with the past, an ‘enduring attachment to traditional criteria of sta-
tus’.21 They served, moreover, to create a form of self-identity, different from that
of the Lombard or Frankish elites, through the elites’ self-definition as consul,
illustrissimus, clarissimus, and so on.22 Another element of this self-awareness
comes to the fore in the other late antique tradition of associating status with living
in the city.23 This explains the cohesiveness of this elite, for example in uniting
behind Archbishop Sergius’ resistance to Pope Stephen II, and behind Archbishops

18 Benericetti X/2, no. 197; Buzzi, ‘La curia’, pp. 53–5. Buzzi thinks that here we have the evidence of
the reappearance of the senate, but I rather think that the word was in fact one used mostly by Pope
John VIII in his letters, and we know that he had a strongly antiquarian interest, which was obvious in
his correspondence concerning Rome and its senate.
19 Benericetti X/2, no. 177.
20 Benericetti X/3, no. 265; see G. Rabotti, ‘Il placito di Bertinoro del secolo decimo’, Studi
Romagnoli 47 (1996), pp. 9–30.
21 Brown, ‘The aristocracy of Ravenna’, p. 146.
22 Carile, ‘Continuità e mutamento’, pp. 136–7; see the older G. Bonolis, I titoli di nobiltà nell’Italia
bizantina (Florence, 1905), and V. Franchini, ‘Il titolo di “consul” in Ravenna a traverso l’alto
Medioevo’, Bullettino della Società dei filologi romani (1908), pp. 11–32.
23 Brown, ‘The aristocracy of Ravenna’, p. 146; A. Augenti, ‘Immaginare una comunità, costruire
una tradizione. Aristocrazie e paesaggio sociale a Ravenna tra V e X secolo’, in Archeologia e società tra
Tardo Antico e Alto Medioevo, ed. G. P. Brogiolo and A. Chavarria Arnau (Mantua, 2007), pp. 193–204
esp. 200–1.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 199

John VIII and Romanus.24 Brown, taking up the reflections of Fumagalli, who
had already noticed the lower agricultural renders owed by the coloni in Romagna,
compared with those in Lombard Italy, wondered how this might have affected
the aristocracy of the Exarchate; he asked the crucial question whether this means
that the aristocracy of Ravenna could retain wealth and power through other
means than exploitation of the land, for example through the remains of public
authority, which might allow it to obtain some taxes and services, and to control
justice.25 To what extent did the maintenance of titles by the elite actually reflect
the existence of the kind of power presupposed by such titles, and to what extent
were these titles just a status symbol?
This issue has been discussed at length by historians. Some, like Diehl, believed
that titles were increasingly used in a hereditary manner as part of family memory,
without any actual office being involved any more; Carile, Vespignani, and Brown
rejected this theory, giving examples of people not using an actual title unless
they also held such an office or, as in Rome, defining themselves as a ‘descendant’
of whoever last held the title, as did men like John ex genere ducis, son of John
consul and pater civitatis in 965, and his own son, the cleric John de pater civitatis
in 983.26 This was the case for function titles (not Byzantine palace titles like spa-
tarius, which could only be acquired in Constantinople, through large financial
payments, or through imperial nomination), especially those for dukes and trib-
unes, obtained through personal connections, politics, and possession of land. In
short, it was necessary to have a career to have functions and titles. Titles such as
dukes, magistri militum, and tribunes, Carile and Brown argued, not only continued
to exist after 751 but also continued to match specific functions, in a way different
from what we saw in the case of the Roman title of dux, for example. The titles
evolved to keep pace with the actual power, reflecting a system which still had
some basis in real life, rather than only in an idealized past. Thus the leases and
grants given by the Church of Ravenna to the elite seem to have concentrated
increasingly in the hands of top officials, and to have been less and less frequently

24 Agnellus, LP, chs. 157–8; Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 7–27; Vespignani, La Romania, pp. 64–76, and
the lists of titles in Appendix 2, pp. 148–81 (comes: pp. 148–56; dux: pp. 157–69; magister militum:
pp. 170–3; consul: pp. 174–8; nobiles viri: pp. 179–81).
25 Brown, ‘The aristocracy of Ravenna’, p. 147. See also V. Fumagalli, ‘Coloni e signori nell’Italia
superiore dall’VIII al X secolo’, Studi medievali, 3rd ser. 10 (1969), pp. 423–46; V. Fumagalli, ‘La tipologia
dei contratti d’affitto con coltivatori al confine tra Langobardia e Romania (secoli IX–X)’, Studi romag-
noli 25 (1974), pp. 205–14, and V. Fumagalli, ‘Langobardia’ e ‘Romània’: l’occupazione del suolo nella
Pentapoli altomedievale, in Ricerche e studi sul ‘Breviarium Ecclesiae Ravennatis’ (Codice Bavaro),
Rome (1985) (Istituto storico italiano per il Medioevo, Studi storici, 148–9), pp. 95–107, then
M. Montanari, ‘Campagne e contadini nell’Italia Bizantina (Esarcato e Pentapoli)’, MEFREM 101
(1989), pp. 597–607, and now also N. Mancassola, L’azienda curtense tra Langobardia e Romania:
rapporti di lavoro e patti colonici dall’età carolingia al Mille (Bologna, 2008).
26 Diehl, Études sur l’administration byzantine, pp. 300–3; Brown, ‘The aristocracy of Ravenna’,
p. 146; Carile, ‘Continuità e mutamento’, pp. 125–7; for the pater civitatis and the genealogy of this
family see Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, p. 109; John in 965 in Benericetti X/2, no. 119, and for John the priest in 981,
Benericetti X/3, no. 222.
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200 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

given to the other, lower, grades of the military hierarchy, such as the bandofori or
draconarii, from the ninth century onwards. The duke, the magister militum, and
the tribune were de facto the only grades of the exercitus with functions of local
government (defence and justice in particular) associated with a territory, the
province, and the city.27 Clearly the dismantling of the campaign army after 751
had worked in favour of the its upper layers, who profited from their local pre-
eminence at a time of change to entrench themselves into the locality, and to take
over the rights of the lower levels of the army, even those of the tribunes. This
seems to have happened at least a century before the trend became visible in
Venice, for example: there, tribunes were still at the height of the aristocratic tree
until well into the ninth century. It is true that there too they were already men-
tioned with some nostalgia, for example by the notables in the placitum of Risano
in the early ninth century, in which tribunes claim to recall a past golden age
under Byzantine rule, when representatives of the Byzantine imperial govern-
ment were allegedly keeping to the tax rates which they were allowed to collect,
and did not abuse the rights of hospitality due to them by law, as did Frankish
counts.28 In Ravenna we note a decline in the power of the tribunes, whose
emphyteutic leases and grants changed hands increasingly in the ninth and tenth
centuries, shifting to the ducal families and the families of the magisti militum.29
Tribunicial titles, as we shall see also in Venice, became increasingly rare in the
tenth century, though they still appeared occasionally, with a witness defined as
John the tribune in 904–14, and a nun Maria, daughter of a Paul consul and
widow of a Peter consul and tribune, in 949. In both cases, these may be a rather
old-fashioned way of defining oneself socially, especially for an elderly widowed
nun.30 But, once again, as in the situation of Rome with respect to the cities of
Lazio, which preserved the old fashions a lot longer, here too we find that, if
the title tended to disappear in Ravenna itself, it did not do so in other cities of
the old Exarchate and the Pentapolis. The Codice Bavaro mentions properties in the
territories of Rimini, Senigallia, Osimo, Iesi, Gubbio, Perugia, Fossombrone,
Urbino, and Montefeltro. In Rimini alone, apart from the Dukes Andrew, Julian,
Martin, and Ursus, the documentation includes four magistri militum (Vitalis,
Verus, Mauricius and Peter), one consul, and no less than thirteen people called

27 Carile, ‘Continuità e mutamento’, pp. 127–9, and Carile, ‘Terre militari’, pp. 84–92.
28 Manaresi, Placiti, I no. 17; on Risano see, from a vast literature, R. Udina, ‘Il placito di Risano.
Istituzioni giuridiche e sociali dell’Istria durante il dominio bizantino’, Archeografo triestino, s. III, 17
(1932), pp. 1–84; A. Petranovié, A. Margetié, ‘Il Placito di Risano’, Atti del Centro di ricerche storiche di
Rovigno 14 (1983–4), pp. 55–70; L. Margetié, ‘Quelques aspects du Plaid de Risana’, Revue des études
byzantines 46 (1988), pp. 125–34; H. Krahwinkler, . . . In Loco Qui Dicitur Riziano . . . Die Versammlung
in Rižana/Risano bei Koper/Capodistria im Jahre 804 (Koper, 2004); and now F. Borri, ‘Neighbors and
Relatives: The Plea of Rižana as a Source for Northern Adriatic Elites’, Mediterranean Studies 17
(2008), pp. 1–26.
29 Carile, ‘Continuità e mutamento’, pp. 132–4.
30 Benericetti X/1, no. 25; Benericetti X/4, no. 286.
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 14/04/20, SPi

the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 201

tribunes. All are married to women with traditional late Roman names such
Formosa, Sergia, Christoduli, Agnella, Petronia, Anna, Theodochia, Ioanna, or
Benigna, and for many the rents on their leases are specified in gold tremisses.31
While Rimini and, to a certain extent, Senigallia in Romagna are cities of consid-
erable social level and wealth, all other areas, which are equally part of the patrimony
of the Church of Ravenna, have a large majority of leases to coloni—lower down
the scale—and also a much higher percentage of Lombard and Frankish names,
as well as Lombard functions attached to them, men like Radegisus gastaldus and
Ermenaldus genera [sic] Francorum.32
Magistri militum continued to keep their prestige throughout, and we have
already encountered the family of Rodoald and his brother Andrew several times,
either as witnesses or as participants in economic exchanges, as well as one or
several Leos, one the husband of Rodelinda (933), and one the father of Ardeverga
(958).33 We have also encountered several counts, notably Tetbald (960), Tetgrim
and his son, relatives of deacon Rainerius (963), some not necessarily associated
with Ravenna itself but with the lands of the archbishop, such as Arardus (968),
Uvarino (972), and Lambert and his two sons Lambert and Hucbald in 988.34
Many of the magistri militum not only had property but were important members
of the elite, and intermarried with the dukes. Probably the best-known example is
that of Deusdedit dux and magister militum, who, with his brother John, was the
papal representative in the city in 879.35 They were the sons of Leo magister militum.
Deusdedit had married Maria, daughter of the dux Paul Traversari, thus becom-
ing part of the family of the Duchi Traversari.36 The title was obviously attached
to a military function, since Desiderius was the leader of the army of Ravenna,
which he led against the Comacchiese when they rebelled against the pope. His
brother John was the papal emissary to the Marquess Berengar of Friuli. Another
Traversari woman, Roiza, the sister of Dukes Peter and Paul, also married a
magister militum Peter, and another Peter later on married the daughter of a magister
militum Rodoaldus; these were seriously important men, at the summit of the
tree among the aristocratic families with real government power in the city.37 We

31 Rabotti et al., Breviarium Ecclesiae Ravennatis, nos 16–18, 20–2, 26–9, 32–4, 36, 39, 41–3, 45–6,
48, 63, 70–1, 76–9. The leases in the territory of Senigallia include one late magister militum
Eleutherius and one tribune Anastasius; those for Osimo and Iesi have the occasional count, such as
Teutbald and his wife Richelda, and a fair number of clergy, those for Gubbio a Petronacius soldier of
numerus, a vir magnificus, and a Valeria nobilissima, while in Fossombrone we have one tribune, and
in Montefeltro Honestus dux and his wife Rodelinda ducarissa; see ibid., nos 80, 95, 114, 169–70,
174, 177, 183.
32 Ibid., nos 135, 124.
33 Benericetti X/1, no. 76; Benericetti X/2, nos 123, 166, 173, 176, 177, 178; Benericetti X/3, nos 201,
221; Benericetti X/4, no. 311; Benericetti X/1, nos 42 and 95.
34 Benericetti X/2, nos 102, 109, 140, and 168; Benericetti X/3, no. 241.
35 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 26–9 and 107.
36 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, p. 26, and M. Betti, ‘Pro Causa Deusdedit: A Marriage on Trial in Late-
Carolingian Ravenna’, Early Medieval Europe 23 (2015), pp. 457–77.
37 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, p. 102.
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202 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

will encounter other magistri militum across the documentation, both in the city
itself and in the other exarchal cities, which suggests that the original meaning of
the title, reserved for a lower rank in the army during the exarchal period, grad­
ual­ly came to be associated with the highest-ranking function in the city, that of
the dukes. Often the title seems to have been used in tandem with dux, perhaps to
denote a more specifically military side of that function.
The top title remained the traditional one of dux. It was not used simply to
define the holder of the title itself, but also to denote filiation, or even just family
association.38 The references to ducal families are frequent in the political climate
of the tenth century, with their supporting or otherwise the archbishop or the
pope, or indeed the imperial power, through their presence at important public
meetings. At the placitum of 967, Archbishop Peter’s appeal to the emperor against
Rainerius was witnessed by the Duke Paul Traversari; a dispute in 973, between
the brothers Peter and Lambert against the bishop of Parma, had both representa-
tives of the Traversari and of the Sergi Romualdi present.39 The dukes did not see
their power diminish. It has been generally assumed that the original family with
which the name was first associated was so dominant that at first the title was
interchangeable with the family which came to hold the title, the Duchi. Buzzi’s
work remains key to the study of the intricate families issued from, and bearing
the name of, Duchi, later separating into several branches of the ‘Duchi’ parentela.
If one does seriously contend, as current historians of Ravenna do, that here in
the ex-exarchate titles still corresponded with an actual function, then it becomes
rather suspicious to have all these Duchi, with subsequent names attached, which
would seem to imply that this was their name rather than the status associated
with their function as dux. On the other hand, it is quite obvious that sources,
especially in the tenth century, often use the form Duchi, at first alone, then as an
apparent surname. There is no way of being definite about whether, in the minds
of the notaries, the Duchi appellation was one of function, or whether at some
point it slipped into being used as a surname. I would suggest that we are dealing
with one family which was in effect holding what was left of the secular power in
the city (especially for its defence) in the early ninth century, whose first known
member was a Gregory II, dux in 834. He was the father of Martin, dux and comes
(d. before 896), who married Ingelrada (d. before 903), the couple who fathered the
deacon Peter (896–903), another Ingelrada—who was to marry in 943 a Teutgrim,
producing the deacon Rainerius (943–67)—and one Guy.40 Guy was the father of

38 Examples in Benericetti X/1, no. 26, 67–8; Benericetti X/2, no. 115, 119, 144; Benericetti X/4, no.
309; Benericetti X/2, no. 170. Benericetti VIII/IX nos 16, 18; Benericetti X/1, nos 19, 20, 90; Benericetti
X/2, nos 119, 178, 128, 144, 188, 192; Benericetti X/3, no. 265; Benericetti X/4, nos 271, 308, 343;
Benericetti X/2, nos 156, 159, 160, 170, 176, 174; Benericetti X/3, no. 255; Benericetti X/2, no. 161;
Benericetti X/4, no. 345; Vespignani, La Romania, Appendix 1 Table 2, pp. 157–69; see also Schoolman,
‘Nobility’, pp. 229–38.
39 Benericetti X/2, nos 177, 127.
40 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 1–111, and esp. the genealogical tables on pp. 93–9 and 106–7.
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 14/04/20, SPi

the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 203

Teutgrim II and a third Ingelrada/Ingiza, from whom would eventually come the
family of the Guidi Counts of Romagna.41 But more or less contemporaneously
with these Duchi, we have another dux, Sergius I (838–93), the originator of the
Sergi branch of what are called the Duchi Sergi. From here on Buzzi’s and
Benericetti’s genealogies differ, though they agree on the basic facts that this
branch of the family produced, apart from Sergia abbess of S. Maria in Cereseo
between 928 and 978, another two children, called Sergius and Romuald V. At
this point the descendants of these two sons become known respectively as the
Duchi Sergi and the Duchi Romualdi, one of the above Sergius’ sons being later
Romuald the saint—technically Romuald VI.42 (See Table 3.1.)
The large number of the Duchi mentioned in our sources seems to suggest that
they could not all have been effective posts in a political and military sense. One
must recall, however, that our sources from the 840s onwards are almost exclu-
sively charters, and later on placiti, and that they mention a large number of
­people who are part of the same families as above, called dux, ducarissa, and so
on, without specifying where they lived. It is thus likely that a few at least may
have in fact held these titles and functions in other cities in the Romagna, the cit-
ies which occur in our documentation in relation to archiepiscopal leases—for
example Forli or Senigallia. There had once been a contested archiepiscopal elec-
tion, when the opponent to the elected Archbishop Leo had been a man imposed
by a dux Maurice of Rimini. Possibly having so many people described as dux
does not imply that the title no longer related to a real function and was just hon-
orific, but that the titles referred to the men of the elite of all cities of the Exarchate,
and not of Ravenna alone.
The other family from the late ninth century onwards were the up-and-coming
Duchi called Traversari or de Traversara.43 Its first appearance (though they may
have been an earlier family of tribunes) is with two brothers Paul and Peter—
names not common in any of the previous family groups. Only Peter continued
the Traversari line, with another set of sons called Peter and Paul, as well a Maria
and a Roiza. This Peter, in turn, was succeeded by his son, another Paul dux, while

41 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, p. 93; see also C. Curradi, ‘I conti Guidi nel secolo X’, Studi Romagnoli 28 (1977),
pp. 17–64; R. Rinaldi, ‘Le origini dei Guidi nelle terre di Romagna (secoli IX–X)’, in Formazione e
strutture dei ceti dominanti nel medioevo. Marchesi conti e visconti nel regno Italico (secc. IX—XII)
(Rome, 1996), pp. 211–20 and R. Rinaldi, ‘Esplorare le origini: note sulla nascita e l’affermazione delle
stirpe comitale’, in La lunga storia di una stirpe comitale: I conti Guidi tra Romagna e Toscana, ed.
E. Canaccini (Rome, 2009), pp. 19–46; Vespignani, La Romania, pp. 55–60; Schoolman, ‘Nobility’,
pp. 233–6.
42 In addition to Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, on the Duchi Romualdi, see R. Benericetti, ‘Componenti crono-
logiche e topografiche dalle carte di Ravenna per una vita di San Romualdo’, Studi Romagnoli 59 (2008),
pp. 483–99, at 486–90. One of Sergius’ sons was Romuald the saint, another a John archdeacon and
abbot (951–78). Romuald V also had three sons, one the archdeacon Sergius (966–1017), another bear-
ing the revealing Ottonian/Salian name of Henry, and a third, Romuald VII. This latter in turn had
several sons also called Martin, John and Romuald VIII, the latter father of Adalbert, consul in 997.
43 Vespignani, La Romania, pp. 60–4, and Appendix 1 for the prosopography of the Traversari.
Table 3.1 Genealogy of the Duchi Sergi
Duchi Duchi Sergi
Gregory II (fl. 834)
Sergius I (838-893)
∞ Aldesinda

Martin († before 896) John X Romuald IV Gregory (George)

∞ Ingelrada († before 903) Archbishop (c. 893) dativus (850–855)
(850–878) John (855)
Deacon Peter Ingelrada
(896–903) (c. 948 ∞ Teutgrim) Sergia abbess Sergius II (fl. 947) ∞ ? Romuald V
S. Maria in
Celeseo
Guy m. Deacon Rainerius (942–951)
∞ Richilda (943–967) Sergius Romuald VII Herry
(943–964) Adalbert Sergius III John I archdeacon ∞ Anna (951) (973–1014)
(964–983) (955–983) (947–973) (966–978)
∞ Maria
Romuald VI(St)
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Teugrim Ingelrada qv Ingizam Martin John Romuald

c. 965 ∞ Arardus Count of Imola Sergius Adalbert John II (c. 951) (c. 951) VIII
(982–1036) notary ∞ Rosa ∞ Giseltruda (951)
Adalbert
Leontius Sergius V John consul
Guy Count of Imola Sergius IV (969–978) archedeacon (997)
∞ 1036 Imelda ∞ Bertha and
abbott (951–978)

John III Liutfred

(fl. 973) ∞ Gualtrada

Lucius Romuald IX
(fl. 1016) (fl. 1014)
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 14/04/20, SPi

the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 205

his brother Paul was succeeded by his son Peter dux, and this line continued with
a rather tedious repetition of these two names, until the beginning of the eleventh
century, as shown below (Table 3.2). The main feature that one needs to highlight
with regard to the family is that, unlike the branches of the Duchi, Sergi,
Romualdi, and Honesti, the Dukes John and Deusdedit, later associated with the
Traversari through Deusdedit’s marriage, were the papal representatives in
Ravenna, and suffered for it through confiscation of their property and the trial of
Deusdedit for incest. It is the only time that we have some evidence of a family
group being supporters of the popes in Ravenna, though this may well be due to
their being originally just the sons of an ordinary magister militum who, on the
pope’s order, took on the role of military leader for the officially papal govern-
ment of the Exarchate. There is no other evidence to support the idea that the
Traversari were specifically part of some kind of ‘papal party’ in Ravenna, as
opposed to the other Duchi. There is, however, evidence of a number of members
of the family with high positions within the Church, just as there is for the other
Duchi. There is also evidence of the opposition of the one foreign archbishop,
Peter IV, to the power of the Duchi, which he attempted to curtail through confis-
cation of their leases.
To these two core families must be added a set of subgroups, associated through
marriage, such as those mentioned in our charters as the Duchi Deusdedit and
the Duchi Honesti, in some cases linked to less prestigious fam­ilies of magistri
militum. Such marriages were especially frequent for daughters of the Traversari.44
Last but not least, we encounter quite a few other people styled dux or ducarissa,
often with names generally associated with the above families, though it is rather
difficult to place them in the genealogies established by Buzzi. For example, a
Rodelinda ducarissa was the wife of Honestus dux (905–14), and a dux Leo and
his wife, the ducarissa Rotruda, appear in 917, 921, 924, and 928,45 while the nun
Maria dudum ducarissa was the widow of Duke Deusdedit (942),46 and
Archbishop Honestus was a member of the Duchi Honesti at the end of the tenth
century.
These rather confusing genealogies, partly because of the reuse of the same
names in successive generations, are nevertheless revealing of the fact that this
relatively small number of people, all called dux, were the movers and shakers in
the city throughout the ninth and tenth centuries—all members of something like
three or four branches of a ruling elite, related through intermarriage, and pass-
ing around large amounts of wealth and political power. I would suggest that,
originally, we have one family at the top of the hierarchy, known generically as the

44 Maria and Roiza, daughters of Duke Paul, married respectively Constantine dativus in 947 and
Peter, a magister militum, while his great grandson, another Paul (990–1016), married Roiza, the
daughter of the magister militum Rodoald.
45 Benericetti X/1, nos 15, 27, 34, 36, 38, 41.
46 Benericetti X/1, no. 36; Benericetti X/4, no. 280.
Table 3.2 Genealogy of the Traversara (after Buzzi)

PAULUS DUX (2) PETRUS Dux et index (1)

(896)

MARIA (2) PAULUS (2) MARIA (3) PAULUS TRAVERSARIA (3)

(947) (947)

ROIZA PETRUS DUX (5) PAULUS DUX (4) MARIA (3)

con Petrus Mag. mil. (968) (950) con Constantinus dativus
(947)
PAULUS DUX (5)
PAULUS Diac. (4) PETERUS DUX (6)
con Formosa q. v. Rocia
(950) (988)
(1001)

PETRUS DUX PAULUS Diac. (8) DEUSDEDIT DUX (7) IOHANNES

ADALASIA (7)
et iudex (7) (983) (971–1014) q. v. Hubertus
(964)
(971–1001) Dux (7)
(964–1014)
DEUSDEDIT (10)
PETRUS (9) PAULUS (9) (1014–1017) PETRUS (10)
(990) (990) (1014)
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PETRUS (II)
PAULUS (II)
con Roiza figlia di
con Fannia
Rodaldo Mag. mii.
(990–1023)
(990–1016)

PAULUS (12) INGELRADA (13) HUBERTUS (12)

(1003–1030) con Ugo di Aquabelli (1003)
(1023)
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 207

Duchi (‘the dukes’). When they began to expand through marriage and absorb
other families, these either took on the prestige title and added it to their own
name, which then became a branch of the family of the dukes, or the power and
influence expanded to go round the various branches, all of which were in turn or
jointly ruling members of the city. This may explain the fact that the sources, by
the later ninth century, use the name Duchi plus that of the family branch as a
kind of surname, and no longer just as a title. Nevertheless, this does not mean
that the function represented by the title has disappeared: as we saw earlier, the
two brothers John and Deusdedit were, respectively, the papal deputy in the city
and the military leader who led the battle against Comacchio.47 A handful of
families with various subgroups were really at the apex of the government of the
city (and of its wealth), even though some groups may have waned while others
waxed, for example the Traversari. Thus Sergius I (838–93) had been an im­port­
ant figure involved with the archbishops in both placiti of 838 and 859,48 while
Martin and Ingelrada had considerable influence and property throughout the
whole of Romagna and even Emilia. The two brothers John (future Archbishop
John VIII) and Gregory (also sometimes called George) dativus and dux (850–5)
were also brothers of the dux Romuald IV; St Romuald (Romuald VI), both before
and after his conversion, played a considerable political role, first as a trendy
young man learning his craft with his father through witnessing grants (such as
that of Peter of Bertinoro to S. Apollinare Nuovo), and with his cousins and other
family members at the major court case between two Bolognese and the bishop of
Parma in 973.49 After his conversion and his ruling of, and/or founding of, vari-
ous monastic houses as abbot (in turn Classe, Pereo, Pomposa), then his exile to
Parenzo in Istria, his trips to Rome and his last foundation at Valleluce, his direct
influence on the policies of Otto III in particular, and his closeness to Otto’s court
circles made him a key player in the society of the late tenth century.50 (Plate 5).
The rising Carolingian elite, who could look with some envy on the great patri-
monies of the old exarchal aristocracy, was keen on their honorific titles, with
their ancient Roman flavour, and wished, if possible, to use them for their own
social status. This is why we see Guandilo calling himself consul in 896, and
Ingeltruda and Ermengarda clarissimae feminae in 955 and 957.51 However, these
self-given titles seem to have been associated with the slightly lower levels rather
than the most prestigious ones, such as dux or magister militum, which remained

47 Benericetti X/2, no. 178. 48 Benericetti 8/9, no. 11.

49 For Romuald’s life, see Benericetti, ‘Componenti cronologiche, pp. 489–90.
50 As well as R. Benericetti, ‘San Romualdo e la fondazione del monastero di S. Alberto al Pereo
presso Ravenna’, Benedictina 57 (2010), pp. 71–89, see the papers in Ottone III e Romualdo di Ravenna,
esp. U. Longo, ‘La conversione di Romualdo di Ravenna come manifesto programmatico della riforma
eremitica’, pp. 216–36.
51 Benericetti VIII–IX, n. 51; see also Adam, son of a Milteo ex genere Francorum, inlustris vir;
Eldabertus clarissimus in 911, Benericetti X/1, nos 15, 19, 20, 80, 90; Gisla, honesta femina (960), the hon-
esti viri Atto, Adelgauso and Gislerio (968), Adelbertus consul (967), Benericetti X/2, nos 104, 144, 132.
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208 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the preserve of the old exarchal families. In mixed marriages, the exarchal titles
were kept by members of these families; for example, though the dux Martin
sometimes styled himself Martinus comes, the Countess Ingelrada, his widow (in
901, 909 and 910), as well as her daughter Ingelrada, wife of Count Teutgrim
(942), each styled herself ducarissa,52 as did Rotruda (924), wife of Leo dux,53 and
the nun Maria, widow of Duke Deusdedit (942).54 There are too few examples for
us to be able to ascertain a pattern, since we have here (especially in the first case)
a countess in her own right, from an extremely prestigious Carolingian family,
who keeps her title, and only once, in 883, uses the title of duchess, as a wife of
Duke Martin.55 On the other hand, Duke Martin did use his title as count in
several charters in 893, 901, 903, and 910.56 Rotruda, a lady with a non-traditional
Roman name who married a duke Leo, clearly took on the status of her husband.
On the evidence available, one can only guess that, although it was on the whole
more prestigious—in the case of alliances between people of Roman origin and
those of Frankish/Lombard ones—to adopt names and titles of the Roman style,
this trend was nevertheless checked by the fact that, as a rule, a man or woman
would take on the title and status of the higher-ranking spouse. Each ‘ethnic’
group kept its titles at the highest level within its social status, which shows that,
in the ninth century at least, Roman titles retained their institutional and prestige
value, and were perceived to relate to some kind of public power devolved by the
emperor. In general, the Frankish aristocracy did not use these high-level titles, as
one might have expected if there had been only a snobbery element in them, pos-
sibly because they thought that this might imply some authority derived from an
imperial power seen as a rival to that of the Carolingians. But examples of snob-
bery did occur, leading a couple with non-traditional Roman names—Lambert
son of Count Smidonus and his wife Adelberga—when receiving from Archbishop
Honorius a standard lease normally paid for in denarii in 981, to want it recorded
in Byzantine aurei.57
Another interesting mix is the combined use of titles, from the frequent early
description of honestus vir/honesta femina to clarissimus/a and, increasingly, consul.
The honestus term tends to diminish in frequency from the late eighth and ninth
century, when it was very common, but there are still examples of it in the tenth.58

52 Benericetti X/1, nos 2, 15, 17, and 49.

53 Benericetti VIII–IX, no. 36; Benericetti X/1, nos 36 (a. 924), 27, 34.
54 Benericetti X/1, no. 36; Benericetti X/4, no. 280.
55 Benericetti VIII/IX, no. 35; here she makes a grant with the consent of her husband; but, as a
widow, she is always called countess, perhaps as a form of her own patrimonial title, once her husband
is no longer around for her to depend on his involvement.
56 Benericetti VIII/IX, no. 47; Benericetti X/1, nos. 3, 15, and 17.
57 Benericetti X/3 no. 219.
58 Cosentino, ‘Viri honesti’, pp. 42–50. In 948, four witnesses to a sale, all with Roman names like
Leo and Dominic, called themselves viri honesti; in 954 Martin honestus puer, son of Dominic negoci-
ator, was the archbishop’s lessee; in 963 once again we have five viri honesti as witnesses; in 966 a lease
from the bishop of Ferrara also had eight viri honesti as witnesses; and at the very end of the century,
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 209

What we tend to see most, as in Rome, is an increasingly frequent use of the term
clarissimus/a or consul, almost as an equivalent of the not uncommon nobilis vir/
nobilissima femina, especially in combination. This may be a clarissimus et negociator,
as was Venerius, a participant in a transaction in 943 (though he was married to a
Clementia clarissima and may have used the title as a mani­fest­ation of social
aspiration), but more frequently when witnesses to a transaction, sometimes in
large numbers: five in 950/1, seven in 960, three in 995, for example.59 In the same
vein we have, again as in Rome, the common combination of clarissimus et
tabellio,60 and the even more common consul et tabellio, among witnesses.61 This
may be a way of highlighting the status of merchants and no­tar­ies, not only
through the way they define themselves but also by association with the partici-
pants of the document, who are of a higher rank and for whom the above are
often witnesses, or in some cases for whom they wrote the document. Such titles,
clarissimi and consuls, self-awarded or socially accepted, are found among a var­
iety of people, recipients or grantors, and are increasingly applied to the negocia-
tores, tabelliones, but also to some artisans at the top of the social scale, such as
calligares or fabri. This is in striking contrast to Rome, where we do not find clar-
issimi at merchant level, magnificus being the highest recorded title at this end of
the scale. But these men were still very clearly demarcated from the top ‘function’
titles—tribunes, magistri militum, counts, and dukes.

Anthroponymy
To what extent was the aristocracy between 751 and the end of the eighth century
a continuation of the Byzantine elites? A strong element of continuity has been
argued, despite Agnellus’ complaints about the nouveau riche and parvenus in his
rant about social mobility which, according to him, will contribute to the end of
the world because ‘slaves will marry with the daughters of their masters and the lowly
with the nobility, and they will bring forth sons and daughters, and judges will be
born from this defilement, and they will overthrow the earth’.62 The anthroponyms
in our sources, for example in the Codice Bavaro, show no evidence of large
Lombard or Frankish immigration into the old Exarchate, except on its edges
with Emilia, before the late ninth–early tenth centuries.
A significant marker for the aristocracy of both Ravenna itself and the
Romagna can be found in the type of names and their evolution, an area of work

in 993, we still find a Teuza honesta femina as a lessee of Church land; see Benericetti X/1 nos 58 and
79; Benericetti X/2, nos 111 and 121; Benericetti X/3, no. 257.

59 Benericetti X/1 no. 50; Benericetti X/4, no. 332; Benericetti X/2, nos 102, 104; Benericetti X/4, nos
298, 355.
60 Benericetti X/3, no. 239.
61 Benericetti X/1, no. 88; Benericetti X/2, nos 156, 183, 184, the latter two referring to Grimoald,
who insists on it; see Buzzi, ‘La curia’; Benericetti X/2, no. 188.
62 Agnellus, LP, ch. 166.
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210 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

first explored by Lazard, then developed with great success by Carile, and now by
Cosentino, for Ravenna.63 This was made possible by the large body of documen-
tation, charters as well as narrative sources, from the early papyri edited by
Tjäder to the charters of the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries in the edition by
Benericetti.64 The overall impression is that Latin names, with the addition of
those of the Greek tradition (which does not actually mean Greek but most likely
having come into use through family descent or fashion), remained in place to a
considerable extent until the ninth century in the Exarchate.
Nevertheless, just as we see a greater permeability of the Roman tradition to
the social changes of the Regnum Italiae, we also see, from the 830s, an increasing
number of Germanic names, rising from about 2 per cent of the total in the seventh
century to 50 per cent at the end of the tenth century65—a far greater change than
we saw in Rome. This change comes about on account of the original Romano-
exarchal elite increasingly allying itself with the Carolingian aristocracy of the
Regnum. The most famous example remains that of the dux Martin, of the Duchi
family of Ravenna, who sometime between 870 and 889 married the Countess
Ingelrada.66 Martin’s father was the dux Gregory, a man at the apex of Ravennate
society, and his uncle was Archbishop John VIII. The Countess Ingelrada, on the
other hand, was the daughter of a top magnate of the Frankish aristocracy, the
comes palatii and signifer Hucpold, possibly himself the son of Count Hucbold of
Verona in the first decades of the ninth century.67 Dux Gregory had married one
Aldesinda, perhaps a Lombard or Frankish aristocratic lady, sister of another dux
Martin and of one Peter; on the basis of these three children’s names, we might
suppose that Aldesinda’s father may have been a member of the exarchal aristoc-
racy who had himself married a Lombard or Frankish woman, who gave her
daughter the same name as herself.68 Returning to Martin and Ingelrada, their
daughter, also called Ingelrada, married Tetgrim, of the family of the Guidi of
Mogliana, in 925, and their son, a deacon in the Church of Ravenna called Peter,
was given a large grant by her, perhaps to oil the wheels of ascent to the archiepis-
copal chair.69 Martin and Ingelrada came to have, between them, a large patrimony
extending over the Ferrarese, the Comacchiese, the Ravennate, the Riminese, the

63 S. Lazard, ‘Studio onomastico del Breviarium’, in Vasina et al. eds., Ricerche e Studi, pp. 33–62;
Cosentino, ‘Antroponimia’, pp. 173–84 and S. Lazard, ‘Viri honesti’, pp. 19–50. Most recently, a detailed
prosopographical study by W. Haubrichs, ‘The early medieval naming-world of Ravenna, eastern
Romagna and the Pentapolis’, in Herrin and Nelson, Ravenna, pp. 253–95, gives an account of the
gradual entry and consolidation of Frankish names in the Exarchate.
64 J.-O. Tjäder, Die nichtliterarischen lateinischen Papyri Italiens aus der Zeit 445–700 (Naples,
1956); Benericetti VIII/IX, X/1, X/2, X/3, and X/4.
65 Cosentino, ‘Antroponimia’, p. 179; Schoolman, ‘Nobility’, pp. 224–30.
66 Rinaldi, ‘Le origini dei Guidi’, pp. 211–40.
67 Ibid., p. 217; on Hucbold, see Hlawitschka, Franken und Alemannen, no. 94, pp. 204–6.
68 Ibid., p. 223. This may be the Valbesinda who, around 850, was granted the lease of land previ-
ously held by a Constantine, son of Eleutherius tribune of Rimini; see Benericetti VIII/IX, no. 14.
69 Rinaldi, ‘Le origini dei Guidi’, pp. 227–9; the grant is extant see Benericetti VIII/IX, no. 54.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 211

Faentino, and the Forlivese, and one of the best documented land disputes concerns
the castle of Modigliana, given by Ingelrada to her son Peter (and thus entering
the patrimony of the Church of Ravenna), a grant challenged by the other heirs
in the family.70 However, this family, at the apex of the social elite of the Exarchate,
was by no means alone in this trend of ‘mixed’ marriages.
As Cosentino has suggested, by the ninth and especially the tenth century the
average proportion of Roman and Frankish/Lombard names was about half and
half. The mix occurred at both a high-ranking and low-ranking social level, that is
among the dukes, counts, magistri militum, as well as merchants, artisans, and
coloni on the land. It is possible that the proportion of mixed names at the upper
end of the scale is larger, but this is not certain since we probably just have more
evidence for people at that level in our documents, than lower down the scale.
In the ninth century, we have a few examples of such mixed names within a family,
like the John Muguscola married to Seniverga in 870.71 For the tenth century,
however, examples of ‘mixed marriages’ abound, not all due to the greater avail­abil­
ity of charter material. In 933 Leo magister militum was married to Rodelinda.72
Adam inlustris vir, of Frankish descent, brother of Engelbaldus, was the husband
of a Maria (909),73 and in 943 Severus aka Sigicus, a nobilis vir, was married to
Rodelinda aka Rotja, both having both Roman names as well as Lombard or
Frankish ones, with the order showing him to have had originally a ‘Roman’ name
and her a ‘Germanic’ one; their attitude is quite characteristic of the perception of
this mix.74
There were two patterns of mixed marriages, possibly for different reasons. The
first was that of a woman with a Roman name marrying a man with a Lombard/
Frankish one, possibly a way for Frankish/Lombard men to marry ‘up’ into the
‘old’ Roman aristocracy as a means of social acceptance. This might have been the
case for Adalo Acius ex genere alamannorum and his wife, Anna clarissima (948).75
Rodoaldus magister militum and his wife, Maria aka Marocia (978), on the other
hand, were already very much part of the upper social and political sphere—he
possibly the son of a mixed marriage, with a father also called Rodoald and a
brother Andrew.76 The other pattern, that of men of the old Roman aristocracy
marrying wives with Lombard/Frankish names, was another form of integration,
perhaps comparable to the phenomenon of the eighteenth- and nineteenth-century
British aristocracy with a title, but not many financial resources, marrying

70 Rinaldi, ‘Le origini dei Guidi’, p. 223; Curradi, ‘I conti Guidi’, pp. 29–51; Schoolman, ‘Nobility’,
pp. 230–6.
71 Benericetti VIII/IX, nos 25 and 30. For a few other examples see Rabotti et al., Breviarium
Ecclesiae Ravennatis, nos 125, 135, 139, 183.
72 Benericetti X/1, no. 42. 73 Benericetti X/1, no. 16.
74 Benericetti X/1, no. 51; the context suggests that, despite the nobilis vir title, they may have been
negociatores like almost all their witnesses, which adds to the force of the argument of social
aspiration.
75 Benericetti X/1, no. 59. 76 Benericetti X/4 nos 285 and 311.
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212 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

American heiresses. Examples of such tenth-century marriages are those of Leo,

son of duke Ursus, and his wife, Odeldruda (950), and of Cristoduli consul and
his wife, Sinigilda (958/9).77 Significantly, the children of these marriages often
ended up with names of both origins.78 Broadly speaking, therefore, the names do
not change ethnicity in that each group kept some link with their original ethnic
background, unless they used their original name and added another belonging
to the other ethnic group, such as Maria aka Rodelinda, Marina aka Adelberga,
John aka Ermenfred, or Severus aka Sigizo, whose son was called Rudolf.79 This
seems to have been a common phenomenon already seen in Italy before the days
of the Exarchate and the Lombards, under the Goths.80
It is difficult, without a much further advanced study of the anthroponymy, to
ascertain whether there was a tendency for non-Roman people to ‘up’ their name
to a Roman nickname, or the other way round. One has to be exceedingly careful
with the study of names, so as not to assume that every person with a ‘Roman’
name is a ‘native’, as it were, and every person with a Frankish name, an ‘immigrant’.
The hardest line to take is that nobody can tell whether someone is a Lombard or
a Frank, unless they specifically say so by defining themselves as being ‘ex genere
Langobardorum’ or ‘ex genere Francorum’. While this may be a rather extreme
view, and I agree that we may hesitate to define people with fairly widespread
names like Ermengrada or Adalbert as Lombards or Franks, nevertheless I would
suggest that it seems rather more likely, in Italy, to expect less unusual names,
such as Ardeverga, Liutfred, or Gottfred, to have belonged to people who were at
least second-, if not first-, generation, imports from the Regnum Italiae. Some
people were clearly keen to preserve the memory of their roots, in some cases for
legal purposes, and highlighted the law by which they lived, such as Milteo and
his son Adam nobilis vir (909), Esmidus nobilis vir and his son Tetbaldus (967,
979), and Vualingus, son of Tedmarus (981), all ex genere Francorum,81 Adalo
Acius ex genere Alamannorum, and the brothers Adelbert, Amelric, and Lambert
ex genere Langobardorum (969).82 But they did not hesitate to mix a non-Roman
name with a Roman-style title. Rodoald magister militum, son of Rodoald, who may
also have called himself consul and appeared in that guise as father to Lambert

77 Benericetti X/1 nos 27, 34, 36, 41; Benericetti X/2, no. 95; Benericetti X/4, no. 287.
78 Such as Ardeverga, daughter of the late Leo magister militum (958), with a presumably non-
Roman mother (the Rodelinda of 933?), Benericetti X/2, no. 95; Benericetti X/2, no. 120; several sons
of dukes, such as Liutfred, son of Sergius dux and Giseltruda (972), Benericetti X/2, no. 170, Amelricus,
son of John dux (968, 978), Benericetti X/1, no. 144, and Benericetti X/2, no. 309; also Benericetti X/3,
no. 343. In some cases. several children have combined names, such as the brothers Rodoaldus and
Andreas, both magistri militum (977), Benericetti X/3, no. 201; the siblings Teuza, Peter, and Gisulf,
born of a Roman-named father and a non-Roman-named mother who adopted a Roman name (977),
Benericetti X/3, no. 203, and Benericetti X/3, no. 203; and the other way round, the two sons of a
Petronia and presumably a non-Roman father, Odelricus (984), Benericetti X/4, no. 342.
79 Benericetti X/2, no. 142; Benericetti X/3, nos 202, 250, and 271.
80 Cosentino, ‘Antroponimia’, p. 184.
81 Benericetti X/1, no. 15; Benericetti X/2, no. 133; Benericetti X/3, nos 211 and 221.
82 Benericetti X/1, no. 58; Benericetti X/2, no. 146.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 213

(972, 978, 981), is a classic example, as are Adalbert consul (967), and the Grimoald
son of John, one of the notaries (tabelliones) who always described himself as con-
sul et tabellio.83 Women with non-Roman names sometimes called themselves
clarissima, as did Ingeltruda, wife of Peter de Giso (955), Elberta (956/7), and
Ragiburga (958)—the latter two both wives to men called Atto (possibly the same
man from the context)—and Adelberga, wife of Gottfred (993), the latter an espe-
cially interesting example since both spouses have non-Roman names.84 Here we
find again a phenomenon already seen in Rome, though less commonly than in
Ravenna: a mixture, for example, of the type Arnulf, consul et dux in 929, or
Ildebrandus, consul in 967, and above all, of course, of the princeps Alberic himself,
son of a Frankish father and a Roman mother from the most illustrious Roman
aristocracy, who called her eldest son after his father and gave all her other children
except one (Berta) typically Roman names like John and Constantine.85

Wealth
Most of our archive material involves the granting of emphyteutic leases by the
archbishops, most frequently to the aristocratic families in the city, typically to
Duke Leo in 950, Dukes Deusdedit and Paul jointly in 964, or to Peter Taversari
nobilis vir, son of Duke Paul, in 974/5 of lands, one of which was a hill on which a
castle had already been built and the tower was being completed.86 This form of
lease continued, during the exarchal period, to be both a major source of wealth
for the Church of Ravenna, through hefty entry fines, and a way of attaching
members of these families, often related to the archbishop and his clergy anyway,
to the interests of the Ravennate Church. Benericetti edited 57 eighth- and ninth-
century transactions, and just over 350 tenth-century ones, including both the
documentation of the archiepiscopal mensa and the documents of individual
monasteries.87 Emphyteutic leases are by far the most numerous of these docu­ments,
covering the whole territory of the Church of Ravenna, granted by the arch­
bishops or the monasteries to the aristocratic elite, many of them family mem-
bers. Above were some examples of archiepiscopal leases, to which one could
add others, given by the main monasteries: in 951 abbess Sergia of S. Maria in

83 Benericetti X/2, nos 166, 173; Benericetti X/3, no. 221; Benericetti X/4, no. 311 and 340;
Benericetti X/2, nos 132, 148, 183.
84 Benericetti X/1 no. 80; Benericetti X/2, no. 93 and 94; Benericetti X/4, no. 255.
85 RS nos 40 and 74.
86 Benericetti X/1, nos 67–8; Benericetti X/2, nos 115, 188.
87 Benericetti VIII/IX, X/1, X/2, X/3 cover the archiepiscopal mensa, Benericetti X/4 the monastic
archives of S. Andrea Maggiore, S. Vitale, and S. Apollinare in Classe. This edition aims to publish all
Ravennate charters, though it is useful to consult previous partial publications, from the earliest one
by M. Fantuzzi, ed., Monumenti ravennati de’ secoli di mezzo (Venice, 1801); G. Muzzioli, ed., Le carte
del monastero di S. Andrea Maggiore di Ravenna. 1. 896–1000 (Rome, 1961, repr. 1987); V. Federici
and G. Buzzi, eds., Regesto della chiesa di Ravenna. Le carte dell’archivio estense, 2 vols (Rome, 1911
and 1931); V. Federici, ed., Regesto di Sant’Apollinare Nuovo (Rome, 1907); and Vespignani, La
Romania, which is an edition of the Codex Parisinus (BNP, N.A.L. 2573).
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214 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Cereseo granted one to Duke Romuald and John clarissimus, just as previously
in 942 the widow of Duke Deusdedit, now a nun at the abbey, had granted prop-
erty to the abbess, her consanguinea; in 955 Ingeltruda clarissima gained a prop-
erty from the abbot of S. Giorgio John, son of Duke John.88 Other properties were
granted to slightly less august men and women: in 909 the archbishop gave a lease
to Adam nobilissimus vir and his wife, who was a clarissima, and another in 954 to
Marinus aka Bonizo, capitularius of the schola negociatorum.89 Both he and fellow
bishops were giving leases to members of both the clergy of Ravenna and of the
Exarchate and the Pentapolis, a well-known example being that of 969 to the
deacons and clergy of Ravenna.90 Many are witnessed by people of the same
class—other nobilissimi, clarissimi, consuls and so on—who are also sometimes
pressed into action by members of the lesser elites, especially the mercantile one,
adding prestige and enhancing the validity of the document. The property
involved is sometimes just ordinary land in one fundus or several fundi, and
sometimes houses in Ravenna and elsewhere (for example Rimini), churches,
monasteries or pievi in Romagna. Finally, some of the transactions are land
exchanges, such as the sale by Ermengarda aka Erminza, wife of Henry son of
Duke Romuald, to the nobilis vir Racco in 957.91
Another way of highlighting the high status of the emphyteutic leases was their
actual presentation, and the way in which, in terms of diplomatics, they were
different from the standard livello leases of the Church of Ravenna, lower down
the social scale, to its numerous coloni. The two categories of leases, the emphy-
teutic and the ordinary livello, tend to be different in their production, with the
first, mostly for land or houses destined to higher social groups, almost always
having a date based on the regnal year of the king or emperor, and pope, while the
second rarely does so, except for the documents issued by monasteries. The dating
does not relate to a choice made by particular archbishops; it is general for all,
thus suggesting an element of special high-ranking association (and a strong for-
mulary). There are few emphyteutic leases which do not have the imperial and
papal dating,92 while only about twenty livello contracts have them, out of dozens.93
This seems to be often for some specific reason, such as the recipient being a
high-ranking person. It is generally rare to have livello leases for high-ranking

88 Benericetti X/4 nos 288, 281; Benericetti X/1, no. 80. S. Giorgio near the Porta Artemidoris was
the family monastery of the Duchi.
89 Benericetti X/1, nos 16, 78. 90 Benericetti X/2, no. 144.
91 Benericetti X/1, no. 90.
92 Examples are: one by Archbishop Constantine in 927 (Benericetti X/1, no. 37); several from
Archbishop Peter to Severus aka Sigico nobilis vir and his wife, Rodelinda aka Rotja, in 943 (Benericetti
X/1, no. 51), to Maria nacioni sclavorum and her daughter Domenica in 944 (Benericetti X/1, no. 52),
to Maria widow and her daughters in 947 (Benericetti X/1, no. 57), to Count John aka Bonizo in 953
(Benericetti X/1, no. 73), to Martin in 949 or 964 (Benericetti X/2, no. 117), and one in 970–1
(Benericetti X/2, no. 154); one from Archbishop Honestus to Gislerius, son of Gislerius nobilis vir, in
971–83 (Benericetti X/4, no. 231).
93 Benericetti X/1–4, nos 4, 17, 30–32, 45, 53, 59, 63, 91, 110, 127, 147, 155, 157, 202, 208, 216, 251, 271.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 215

people, though it happens sometimes. Thus we have one from Duke Martin and
Archbishop John in 870 and 872; one in 910 to Mamnus clarissimus and his wife,
Tauda, from Countess Ingelrada, widow of Count Martin; one in 971 from
Archbishop Honestus to various not particularly distinguished people, though
they include a John and Martin de Romualdo; and one for a garden in Ravenna to
another unknown, from Duke John, son of Sergius; all of which could explain the
more elegant form of the lease.94

Church Personnel

The Archbishops, their Families, and their Urban Policies

Only the last seven of the bishops whose lives were written up by Agnellus in his
Liber Pontificalis are relevant here. They are Sergius (748–69), Leo I (770–8),
John VI (778–85), Gratiosus (786–9), Valerius (789–810), Petronax (718–37),
and the last and incomplete life, that of George (837–46). It is not as easy, there-
fore, to gain an idea of the archbishops’ background as it is for the popes. Of the
seven whose biographies Agnellus wrote, we only know that Sergius, a layman,
called a consul, and married, was obviously a Ravenna aristocrat; his successor,
Leo, was also a Ravenna man; Gratiosus, Charlemagne’s host, had been abbot of
S. Apollinare; and his own successor, Martin, possibly a non-native of Ravenna—
as one might deduce from the marvelling of the Ravennate at his girth when they
first saw him—had been abbot of S. Martino, and then archdeacon.95 For the suc-
cessors of George our information comes from documents rather than narratives,
and illustrates the close connection of the archbishops with the ruling ducal fam­
ilies. Archbishop Deusdedit (847–50), a ducal family name, was succeeded by
John VIII (850–78), the brother of Duke Gregory; possibly Romanus (878–88),
certainly Honestus (971–83), were members of the Duchi.96 But the Church per-
sonnel of the archbishops and the heads of many monasteries in Ravenna were
also drawn from prominent aristocratic families, and had close ties with the secu-
lar administration.97 Peter, son of Duke Martin and the Countess Ingelrada, was a
deacon to whom some property was left by his mother, later going to the Church
of Ravenna.98 Deacon Rainerius, who led the rebellion against Archbishop Peter
IV (927–71), was doing so on behalf of his family, the Duchi, from whom Peter
IV was attempting to recover nearly half a century of unpaid arrears on the leases

94 Benericetti VIII/IX; 17 Benericetti X/1, no. 17; Benericetti X/2, no. 155; Benericetti X/4, no. 284.
95 Agnellus, LP, chs. 154, 160, 164, 167.
96 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 6–7 and n. 2 (Buzzi erroneously has John VIII as John X), pp. 25 and 68;
Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 358; Andreolli, ‘Il potere signorile’, pp. 316–18.
97 Brown, ‘The aristocracy of Ravenna’, pp. 140–1. 98 Benericetti VIII/IX, no. 3.
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216 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

of the Duchi family.99 This rebellion, it must be noted, took place against the only
archbishop who was expressly said not to have been a native of Ravenna: he came
from Bologna. He was deliberately trying to undermine, or at the very least limit,
the power of this alliance of local aristocracy and archbishop, and he chose to do
so by depriving the Duchi of their main emphyteutic lease in 963. Rainerius was
the son of Count Tetgrim and his wife, Ingelrada, the grandson of the dux Martin,
and related to the Guidi. Rainerius attacked the archiepiscopal palace, removed
the treasure and archives, and sacked it, before imprisoning the archbishop in the
castle of Modigliana, where he was later himself imprisoned.100 But he had man-
aged to burn much of the archive of the Church, and it has been suggested that
the compilation of the Codice Bavaro was carried out at least in part to restore
some sort of official list of the properties of the Church of Ravenna.101 After Peter
IV’s liberation and Rainerius’ flight, he was condemned in absentia, and his prop-
erties were confiscated at the placitum of 967 by Otto I, and granted to Archbishop
Peter. The Duchi nevertheless came back, and Peter IV was succeeded by
Honestus, another member of the family.102 From the Duchi came both John and
George, archdeacons and camerarii, and the notary Sergius I (964–72), son of
Duke Adalbert and brother of Duke John II; from the Duchi Sergi came John,
archdeacon and camerarius; one of Duke Romuald V’s sons was an archdeacon
Sergius; the archdeacon Peter belonged to the Traversari; and the archdeacon and
primicerius George and the archdeacons Constantine and Deusdedit were magis-
tri militum.103
Several of the above, members of the aristocratic families in power as dukes,
were not only part of the higher echelons of the Church of Ravenna; they also
ruled over the most prestigious monasteries. The deacon John, son of Duke John,
was successively abbot of S. Eufemia, SS Angelo e Severino ad orologium, then of
S. Stefano in fundamentum (Regis) (appointed to this post by Archbishop
Honestus), and finally of SS Sergio e Bacco.104 Sergius I, notary and camerarius,
son of Duke Adalbert of the Sergi, but also abbot of S. Giorgio, gave an emphyteu-
tic lease to Duke Deusdedit and his wife for one half, and to Duke Paul and his
wife for the other half in 964, and in 972, called this time archdeacon, granted
another lease.105 A Romuald, deacon and abbot, in 980 consented to a pactum
between the bishop of Ferrara and a Leo serving the monastery of SS Mercuriale e
Grato, belonging to the Romualdi.106 The abbesses Sergia and her successor at

99 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 62–7; Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 357; Andreolli, ‘Il potere signorile’,
pp. 316–18; Vespignani, La Romania, pp. 55–6.
100 Manaresi, Placiti, II.1, no. 155. 101 Rabotti et al., Breviarium Ecclesiae Ravennatis, p. l.
102 Manaresi, Placiti, II.1, no. 155. 103 Buzzi, ‘La curia’, p. 13.
104 Benericetti VIII/IX no. 81; Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, p. 199.
105 Benericetti X/1 nos 115 and 161; Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 198–201.
106 Benericetti X/3, no. 217; Buzzi, ‘La curia’, pp. 39–40. Quite a few other members of the archi­epis­
co­pal Curia were in charge of monasteries: for example, the notary Gerard I (976–1024), son of the
dativus Gerard and nephew of the Duke Faroald, also of the Duchi, was abbot of S. Maria in
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 217

S. Maria in Cereseo, Benedicta, who welcomed the Empress Theophano and the
child Otto III in 967 at the abbey, were Sergi.107 In 942 Maria celeste Dei dedicata,
a nun but dudum ducarissa and widow of Duke Deusdedit, daughter of the dati-
vus Constantine and of Maria Traversari, gave to Sergia, the abbess of S. Maria in
Cereseo, her consanguinea, various lands and a pieve.108 In 951 Sergia gave an
emphyteutic lease to her nephews, the children of her two brothers, of land in the
Faentino; later this would be given back to the monastery by her great-nephew,
together with other land granted in 957 by Marina, widow of the dativus Andrew.109
Such transactions occurred also at the lower level of aristocratic women who had
taken the veil as nuns. The nun Lucia, daughter of the consul Paul, aunt of the
Dukes and magistri militum John and Deusdedit, and widow of Arimodus, had
given some land to the Countess Ingelrada in 889; and Perpetua, daughter of the
consul George, also granted land in her own name, despite already being a nun
for ten years.110 I will return in Chapter 4 to the close association of the various
dukes in Ravenna with specific monastic houses, of which S. Giorgio was one,
which clearly had close links with the Sergi, the Deusdedit, and probably also
the Traversari, if the Duke Paul mentioned in 972 was indeed a member of this
family—which often used Paul as one of its family names.111
As in Rome, the most difficult moments for the archbishops were at election
time, and in cases of opposition to specific policies during their career. Elections
were, mostly, fairly peaceful, and frequently the late archbishop was succeeded by
a deacon or the archdeacon of the Church of Ravenna. Archbishop Leo I (770–8)
had been a deacon of Sergius, and was in turn eventually succeeded by the arch­
deacon Martin (810–18).112 But Sergius, a layman, had not been unanimously
elected: Agnellus tells us that the priests were not ‘united in spirit’ and rent by
jealousy and altercations, which may explain his later difficulties with them. These
difficulties may well have been due to his apparently high-handed attitude when,
faced with the opposition of the clergy, presumably those who had opposed his
election, he chose to ignore them and consecrated new priests and deacons.113
But Sergius was the candidate of the military aristocracy, of whom he was one,
and the Ravenna clergy had similar views, as we see expressed so soon after in
Rome with respect to Pope Constantine II, also a layman. We recall how his
appointment led the primicerius Christopher and his son to run to the Lombards
and eventually to have Constantine II removed, with legislation brought in to

Xenodochio, and the notary Honestus IV (982), son of Andrew, brother of Radoald magistri militum,
and related to both the Duchi Deusdedit and Traversari, was abbot of SS Marco e Marcellino in Classe;
Buzzi, ‘La curia’, pp. 42–3.

107 Benericetti X/4 no. 280. 108 Benericetti X/4 no. 281.
109 Benericetti X/4, nos 288 and 292; Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 198–9. 110 Ibid., pp. 195 and 7–9.
111 See Chapter 3. 112 Agnellus, LP chs. 158 and 167. 113 Agnellus, LP ch. 154.
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218 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

avoid a repetition of a layman’s election to the pontificate.114 Not coincidentally,

when defending himself in front of the synod which accused him on those
grounds, Pope Constantine II used precisely the example of Archbishop Sergius
of Ravenna to demonstrate that such a choice had been previously accepted.115
Sergius’ successor, Leo, also had to face the challenge of an opponent: after
Archbishop Sergius’ death, the pro-Byzantine and the pro-Lombard parties clashed,
with Duke Maurice of Rimini, the head of the pro-Byzantines, rejecting Leo and
having his own candidate, the scriniarius Michael, another layman, elected.116
Eventually, with the help of the Franks, Leo was consecrated a year after his elec-
tion in 770. Later elections in Ravenna were, however, on the whole less often
contested than they usually were in Rome, and it was only that of John IX (later
Pope John X) which was challenged by the archdeacon Theobald in early 907, but
the latter only remained in post for a month or so before John IX was ac­know­
ledged by all.117
The main political involvement of the aristocratic elite in the politics of the city
was, as in Rome, in the form of plots and challenges to archiepiscopal policies,
though not very often against the person of the archbishop himself. These were
almost always prompted by the political choices of the archbishops in relation to
the papacy, the kings of Italy, and later the Ottonian emperors. They evidently
occurred precisely because the archbishops were closely related to the great ducal
families, who had interests in one party or another, either favoured or opposed by
the archbishop. This began early on, with Archbishop John V (726–44), and is
characteristic in many ways of later conflicts. When the Lombards attacked
Ravenna and conquered it, through treachery suggested Agnellus, the treachery
was imputed to the archbishop and his party; John V was sent into exile from
Ravenna to Venice by some of the citizens.118 His secretary, representing the
clergy, suggested that he bribe the exarch, who recalled him. The bribe was to
consist in the exarch arresting those who had sent the archbishop into exile,
recalling their emphyteutic leases, and fining them (on the grounds that the leases
involved a clause of not causing harm to the archbishop), and then passing on a
twentieth of the fines to the exarch. This conflict had as its background the
Byzantine attack on Ravenna to regain it in the 730s. The clergy and various
young men fought to defend the city against the Byzantines, supported by the
tears and prayers of the elders and priests, and followed by great rejoicing when
the Byzantine navy abandoned the attack.119 Haussig’s interpretation of the whole

114 See 155–6. 115 LP I, 96 ch. 19. 116 LP I, 96 ch. 25–6.

117 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, p. 153; Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 352 and 354–5.
118 Agnellus, LP chs. 151–2; see also N. Tamassia, ‘L’enfiteusi ecclesiastica ravennate e un racconto
di Agnello’, Atti e memorie della R. Deputazione di Storia patria per le province di Ravenna 10 (1920),
pp. 109–20.
119 Agnellus, LP ch. 153.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 219

conflict is of an issue principally related to papal and imperial policies.120 My own

reading of it is more in terms of a conflict between two secular parties in the city.
One included the archbishop and his clergy (accused of conniving with the
Lombards), with some of the aristocracy (the fighting young men), both of whom
appear to have supported a Lombard settlement, as obviously did many of the
citizens of Ravenna, who fought the Byzantine attack on the city. The opposing
party comprised other aristocratic families supporting the Eastern Empire, and
here Agnellus seems to be their mouthpiece.
The conflict in the city continued with the same protagonists, reorganized into
different and shifting alliances, after Aistulf ’s conquest. Aistulf had attempted to
impress on the Ravennati the extent to which he saw himself as heir to the exarch,
and he had repeatedly presented himself as delegated by the emperor, and who
would be acting as a new Theodoric, as he did in his laws of 750 when he talked
about traditum nobis a Domino populo Romanorum—of the Exarchate.121 I am
inclined to agree with Bertolini’s argument—however unlikely it may seem, since
it is based on the not very reliable Chronicon Salernitanum—that Aistulf may well
have been granted the government in the Exarchate by the Exarch Eutychius him-
self, perhaps only temporarily, in the hope of a Byzantine reversal of fortunes.122
The argument seems to me to provide a rather better explanation of the next set
of events in Ravenna. The emperor did not appoint another exarch after Eutychius’
flight to Venice, but dealt with the Lombards directly through the pope; he may
therefore have accepted that, if not Aistulf, at the very least the archbishop of
Ravenna would have, in effect, become the Byzantine representative in the city—
as the pope had become one in Rome. In this case, Archbishop Sergius may have
sought to strengthen an alliance with Aistulf.123 This would, of course, have put
him on a collision course with Pope Stephen II, who was supporting the Franks,
as indeed happened, and led to his trial and imprisonment in Rome. But, at the
same time, it may also have caused him some trouble in Ravenna itself, with the
party still supporting the Empire.
While Sergius was imprisoned in Rome, Stephen II had sent deputies to
Ravenna to take control of the city. On his return from Rome, Sergius himself
had been opposed by the Ravennati who threatened the life of the pope and his

120 H. W. Haussig, ‘L’arcivescovo di Ravenna, il papa ed il re dei Franchi’, CARB 19 (1972),

pp. 187–218.
121 C. Azzara and S. Gaparri, eds., Le leggi dei Longobardi. Storia, memoria e diritto di un popolo
germanico, (Milan, 1992) pp. 280–1.
122 See Chapter 1 for the chlamys on the altar of the Petriana, and other symbolic gestures; Aistulf
is Flavius in his diploma in 751, see C. Brühl, ed., Codex Diplomaticum Langobardorum, III/1 (Rome,
1973), no. 23; O. Bertolini, ‘Ordinamenti militari e strutture sociali dei Longobardi in Italia’, in
Ordinamenti militari in Occidente nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 15 (1968), pp. 429–607, esp. pp. 502–7,
and the Chronicon Salernitanum 2, p. 4. On Aistulf ’s revival of the idea of a Theodoric-style deputed
government, see Haussig, ‘L’arcivescovo di Ravenna’, CARB, p. 211.
123 Bertolini, ‘Sergio Arcivescovo di Ravenna’, pp. 61, 84.
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220 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

dep­uties on their passage through Ravenna, indicating the city’s and its clergy’s
op­pos­ition to Roman authority, while the archbishop now advised a more dis-
creet and moderate course of action.124 Archbishop Sergius’ return had led to
the pontifically appointed representatives in the city being removed, with
Sergius taking back his authority and governing like an exarch.125 It appears
that Archbishop Sergius and Pope Paul, Stephen II’s successor, who had freed
Sergius, had reached some sort of compromise, through which the former
acknowledged that the Church of Rome had the right to control Ravenna but
that, in practice, the arch­bishop held the real power over the city and the terri-
tory of the Exarchate by papal delegation, and that no papal envoys would be
sent to rule over it. This arrangement was challenged by the so-called ‘Greek’
party in Ravenna, opposed to any rapprochement with Rome, especially as various
members of the Ravennate aristocracy had been captured and held prisoner in
Rome at the same time as Sergius. They supported the last attempt by the
em­perors to regain Ravenna from the Franco-papal party through the Byzantine
attack on the city, backed by the Venetian fleet, but were eventually defeated by
the main body of the Ravennate army, presumably supporting the archbishop and
accepting his truce with the papacy.
Agnellus’ account, even without its anti-Roman bias, tells only part of the
story. The most clearly stated conflict of Sergius, according to him, was with his
­clergy.126 Agnellus appears to make this a conflict on liturgical issues, which it
may have been in part, if Sergius planned to introduce a more stringent Roman
liturgy in Ravenna, against the opposition of the ‘Greek’ clergy.127 I would suggest
that the elite members of the Ravenna clergy, the iudices, were also directly
involved in urban conflicts. The ‘Greek’ party, rather than being only comprised
of the priests following Byzantine practices, may well have been a more general
pro-Byzantine party, and therefore an anti-Frankish, but also anti-Roman, party,
unhappy with Sergius’ submission to the papacy and, like him at first, preferring
to accept Aistulf, the self-proclaimed heir to Byzantine rule in the Exarchate, to
papal control.128 Moreover, such a group would probably have opposed the arch­
bishop on several grounds. The first was the perception that, in order to gain his
freedom, Sergius had given permission to the pope to take away some of the
treasures of the Church of Ravenna. Sergius fully intended to allow the papal

124 Agnellus, LP, ch. 158; On Sergius’ story, see Bertolini, ‘Sergio Arcivescovo di Ravenna’, pp. 52–6,
Bertolini, ‘I primi tempi del governo temporale dei papi sull’Esarcato di Ravenna’, CARB 10 (1963),
pp. 7–12, and ‘Il problema delle origini del potere temporale dei papi’, pp. 487–547; see also Savigni,
‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 332–6, and Haussig, ‘L’arcivescovo di Ravenna’, pp. 187–218.
125 Agnellus, LP, ch. 159, p. 284. 126 Agnellus, LP ch. 154. 127 Agnellus, LP ch. 154.
128 Agnellus, LP chs. 152, 154, 157; see also the letter of Pope Paul to Pepin in 858 in CC no.14; on
this, Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 333–5; Bertolini, ‘Sergio Arcivescovo di Ravenna’, pp. 61–4. The
Chronicon Salernitanum may well not be the most reliable source for this period. However, when an
entry of such significance is only recorded in a slightly marginal source for an event and nowhere else
in the usual sources—perhaps less censored or self-censored—I would find it unwise to ignore it.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 221

representative to gain these treasures, as the clergy knew. For that reason, part of
them, together with ‘the Ravenna citizens’, suggested killing the pope on his visit
to Ravenna on the way to Francia. This plot was only avoided when the arch­deacon
came up with the trick of removing most of the treasures from their repository, so
that the visiting pope would find hardly anything there when he came to claim his
share.129 No mention was made of Sergius’ presence during these events, except
to ensure that he did not hear of the planned trick, suggesting that he, at least, was
prepared to keep his word towards the pope, to the fury of many Ravennati
(including the deacon Leo, Sergius’ successor, who was to be another thorn in the
papal side under Stephen III). The visiting papal party was not taken in and,
clearly set on getting its revenge on those who had planned to kill the pope, then
hid away the treasures. Once back in Rome, the pope ‘sent very many enticements
and propitiatory letters to certain noble Ravennate judges, urging that those who
had agreed to the murder of the pope should come to Rome . . . and they were
imprisoned at Rome for so long that they all died there’, and there is the faintest
suggestion by Agnellus that perhaps Sergius helped the pope find out who they
were.130 In Chapter 6, I will return to the issue of why it is that the Ravennati
seem to have been ready to join the Lombards, and to fight the Empire—not a
point often made in the historiography, though increasingly in recent decades
historians have been able to show how superficial Ravenna’s attachment to the
Byzantine Empire was in the present, however strongly it may have claimed its
Roman heritage and traditions from the past.
Pope Paul had understood that he had to reconcile the papacy with the
Ravennati—especially after a large number of the Ravenna elite had been
im­prisoned in Rome and ill-treated so that they died there—in order to avoid the
build-up of an anti-Roman current, which would then amalgamate with a pro-
Lombard group clearly already active in the city since Archbishop John V. The
truce between Sergius and the pope held: not only did Sergius keep away from
anti-papal plots, but, faithful to his oath, he actually warned the pope of a planned
attempt by the Byzantines, led by the spatharius Leo together with the Venetians,
to reconquer the city. Warned by the archbishop, an alliance of pope, Franks,
Lombards of King Desiderius, and Ravenna citizens, defeated the Byzantine
navy.131 Sergius also supported the papacy because the issue of iconoclasm was
once again brought to the fore by the Byzantine emperors. Deliyannis has argued
convincingly that the absence of a single mention of the issue of iconoclasm in
Agnellus’ work was in fact due to his anti-papalism: he knew perfectly well that
the archbishops, whatever else they may do, always supported the papacy, and

129 Agnellus, LP ch. 158.

130 Agnellus, LP chs. 159, though Agnellus may have confused this episode with the earlier taking
of hostages from Ravenna by the Carolingian abbot and missus Fulrad; see LP I. 94 ch. 47 and note 12
on p. 284.
131 Agnellus, LP ch. 159, also CC, nos 17, 31, 38; Bertolini, ‘Sergio Arcivescovo di Ravenna’, pp. 77–81.
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222 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

opposed the emperor, with regard to iconoclasm.132 True to his views and dislike
of Rome, Agnellus did not say so clearly, and only really addressed the issue of
iconoclasm indirectly, through comprehensive descriptions of images present
everywhere.133
Archbishop Leo (770–8), Sergius’ successor, had been installed with Frankish
aid, and proceeded to support both an anti-Roman and anti-Lombard policy,
notably through the execution of Paul Afiarta. Leo, while supporting Charlemagne
and giving new impetus to the autonomistic tendencies of the Church of
Ravenna—he was the first to actually use the titulature of Italiae exarchus, and the
first to be officially recognized as heir to the exarch by the Franks in the 778 treaty
with the papacy, which also added Imola and Bologna to the see of Ravenna—
governed Ravenna himself, but was flanked by a form of secular authority in the
form of three elective tribunes, Julian, Peter, and Vitalian.134 Leo continued his
anti-papal policies, Pope Hadrian I says in a letter to Charlemagne, complaining
that Leo forbade the Ravennati and the Emilians to go to Rome to receive instruc-
tions from the pope concerning the administration of the Exarchate.135 Hadrian
did, however, specify that this was true of the Ravennati and Emilians alone,
while the inhabitants of the Pentapolis were more amenable to papal control. The
point is worth making since later on we will encounter several times this differ-
ence in attitude between the core of the Romagna in its opposition to Rome, while
cives from the Pentapolis cities were more inclined to appeal to the pope.
With Archbishop John VI (778–85), we see once again some opposition
between the archbishop and his clergy. To show how awful John VI was, Agnellus
gives us a story about a young man who could not be forced out of the monastery
of S. Martino in Aqua, which the archbishop coveted, ‘on account of the nobility
of his parents’ (obviously a family monastery); the archbishop cursed him, refused
him communion and, when the young man died, rejoiced openly.136 This anecdote
is revealing: the young man was called Deusdedit, son of a tribune Peter; his fam-
ily held a monastery, he died in his villa on the Via Aurelia, 12 kilometres from
the city, and was buried in a bier decorated with ‘the fringe of gold of Basilius’.
Here we see clearly all the trappings of an old exarchal family living according to
traditional Roman standards, and the tribune Peter could chronologically be the
same one who had been one of the three secular tribunes around Archbishop Leo.
Moreover, based on their names, these people may conceivably be among the
ancestors of the future Traversari, one of whose frequent Christian names was
Deusdedit. The Traversari are not known as a ducal family until the late ninth
century, but the family is likely to have begun as tribunes. This is, of course, a

132 Mauskopf Deliyannis, ‘Agnellus of Ravenna and Iconoclasm’, pp. 559–76, esp. 575.
133 Ibid., pp. 565–6 and 569–75.
134 Rubeus, Historiarum Ravennatum Libri Decem, v, p. 228. On Leo, see Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’,
pp. 336–7.
135 CC no. 51. 136 Agnellus, LP ch. 163.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 223

mere suggestion, since it is difficult to write the story backwards into the previous
century, but it would make sense of the later evidence. Whether this would
make John VI another anti-papal archbishop trying to recover property for the
Church of Ravenna, rather than just a nasty man, is a possibility, even though
Agnellus, generally on the anti-papal side too, might not have been expected to
be so hostile to John VI in that case. However, Agnellus’ anti-Roman views
could sometimes be swayed by personal elements, as we know from his vindic-
tive attitude to the ultimate anti-Roman Archbishop George, against whom he
held a personal grudge.
Leo’s successor was Archbishop Gratiosus (785–88), when the Church of
Ravenna was on the best possible terms with Charlemagne until his visitation of
787 and the spoliation of the imperial palace by his missi.137 The king and his
missi appeared to want to be directly involved in the election of the next arch­
bishop: in 788/9 Hadrian I wrote to Charlemagne protesting strongly about this,
as well as about alleged Frankish depredations and alienation of Church property
as a result of Frankish involvement.138 During the reign of the next archbishops,
such depredations continued, and Pope Leo III this time wrote to Charlemagne
on the same topic, lamenting the loss of many ecclesiastical patrimonial lands
through the granting of emphyteutic leases on a vast scale to powerful men to
obtain their support, and the subsequent ‘devastation’ of the Church.139 Under
Archbishop Valerius (806–10), the main event was Pepin’s attempt to conquer
Venice and the peace of 810/12.140 The next Archbishop, Martin (810–16), was
another anti-Roman and pro-Carolingian figure, who refused to go to Rome at
Pope Leo III’s invitation, but received with great honour in Ravenna Charlemagne’s
missus, the Archbishop John of Arles, sent to judge the matter.141
With Agnellus’ account tapering off after 840, we have less information con-
cerning the archbishops’ involvement with the people of Ravenna, as opposed to
major political and ideological issues. We gain some idea of the relations between
archbishop and city only from Archbishop John VIII (853–78) and his brother
the dux Gregory onwards, the two rebels who were such a thorn in the side of
Popes Leo IV, Nicholas I, Hadrian II, and John VIII. The story of Archbishop
John VIII’s dealings with the popes has already been told in Chapter 1, from his
attempt to gain the support of the Emperor Louis II, his role against Pope Nicholas
I in the Photius affair and that of Lothar II’s divorce, and then of Lambert of

137 See Chapters 1, 3, and 5. 138 CC no. 85. 139 CC no. 94.
140 Rubeus, whom Savigni trusts on this information, suggests that a large part of the Ravenna
nobility followed Pepin, and supported him, to the extent that he seems to have established some
sort of headquarters there, as well as his capital in Verona, perhaps attempting to use this as a base
to extend his power in Italy with greater autonomy from his father, the very reason the Ravennate
aristocracy may have had for supporting him; see Rubeus, Historiarum Ravennatum Libri Decem, V,
pp. 234–6; Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 341. In the absence of Rubeus giving any source for this
information, it has to be seen as, at best, speculative.
141 Agnellus, LP, ch. 168.
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224 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Spoleto. As a result of his policy, John VIII took over some of what had been
direct property of the Church of Rome and incorporated it into that of Ravenna.
Defending the rights of the Church of Ravenna was a constant element of his
reign. He enforced the archiepiscopal exemption from the obligatory presence in
Rome, and attempted to stop his suffragan bishops and clergy from going there
too; he imposed an annual visit by himself and his familia (including soldiers) on
his suffragans, charged them a tribute of 200 mancusi each as a donative, made it
an obligation for them to feed his suite until their resources were exhausted, to
provide horses, and to cultivate archiepiscopal lands, incorporating some of the
property and monasteries of other dioceses into the Ravenna patrimony.142 He
consecrated new bishops without papal permission or local involvement in their
election, attempted to remove key elements of jurisdiction from local judges to
the archbishops, and imposed on his suffragans that they should by turns leave
their diocese for a month each year, which they would spend in Ravenna, and
carry out his episcopal duties there for twenty or thirty days each. The point of
these measures was to create a party supporting Ravenna in other dioceses of
Romagna and Emilia, where, unlike in the city itself, the anti-Roman sentiment
was not necessarily shared by the clergy, who preferred the rule of distant Rome
to that of overpoweringly close Ravenna. It was often through the use of op­pos­
ition of these cities that the papacy gained its successes against the archbishop.
Papal opposition from Leo IV in 853 succeeded in quashing some of these pol­
icies.143 But Leo IV’s position was weakened by the affair of the accusation of the
superista Gratian, and subsequently by the pope’s death and succession problems,
so that Archbishop John VIII could continue his policies of reinforcing archi­epis­
co­pal power. It was only as a result of the protest and appeal by one of the suffra-
gans, the bishop of Imola, to Pope Nicholas I, that papal letters forbade the
archbishop’s actions, and called him to Rome again. John VIII refused the invita-
tion on the grounds of exemption, and was excommunicated; he went to Pavia to
gain the support of Louis II, in which he succeeded, but was challenged again by a
group of ‘Ravennati and Emilians’ who requested from the pope the return of
their properties and the removal of the constraints set on them by the arch­bishop.144
It is not clear whether these were the suffragan clergy or members of a pro-Roman

142 LP I. 107, chs. 21–4. Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 25–37; Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 345–7. Many of
these were detailed in the appeal made against him by his suffragans from Emilia in the acts of the 853
council which condemned and excommunicated John VIII; see Mansi, Sacrorum Conciliorum XV, 668
and 599.
143 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 25–37.
144 LP I. 107, chs. 24–9. Also the letter of Nicholas to John VIII of Ravenna in MGH Ep. VI/5, no.
105. On the whole affair, see also specifically H. Fuhrmann, ‘Papst Nikolaus I und die Absetzung des
Erzbishofs Johann von Ravenna’, Zeitschrift fur Rechtsgeschichte 54 (1958), pp. 353–8; J. Belletzkie,
‘Pope Nicholas I and John of Ravenna; the struggle for ecclesiastical rights in the ninth century’,
Church History 49 (1980), pp. 262–72, and K. Herbers, ‘Der Konflikt Papst Nikolaus I. mit Erzbischof
Johannes VII. von Ravenna, 861’, in Diplomatische und chronologische Studien aus der Arbeit an den
Regesta Imperii, ed. P.-J. Heinig (Cologne–Vienna, 1991).
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 225

party in the city, which joined forces with other secular as well as ecclesiastical
aristocracies in Emilia. At the synod which he convoked in 861 at the Lateran,
while the excommunicated Archbishop this time did not have the full support of
Louis II, who was by now on better terms with the pope, Pope Nicholas I was
reconciled with John. The archbishop was readmitted to Communion, but was
set the following conditions, later reiterated in a bull.145 The archbishops were to
go to Rome every two years and allow any of their clergy to do so freely; they
would not consecrate bishops in Emilia unless they had been locally elected, and
not without papal approval; the tribute imposed on the suffragans would be
removed; any judgement involving private cases would be submitted to the apos-
tolic missus and the Roman vestararius in Ravenna; and all properties taken
from either private owners or the Church of Rome would be returned to them. In
effect, John VIII was stopped for a while. But only mo­ment­ar­ily. Louis II grad­
ual­ly took over the cities of the old Exarchate and the Pentapolis, stopped their
dues to Rome, and appointed his own men to public charges, effectively acting as
though it were part of the Carolingian Empire.146 After Pope Nicholas I’s death,
and given Pope Hadrian II’s preoccupation with Frankish affairs, Archbishop
John VIII did not implement the Roman synod’s rulings but, on the contrary,
annexed other papal properties, including monasteries like Pomposa, and numer-
ous fundi, which he claimed as direct property of the Church of Ravenna, even as
the new Pope John VIII (872–82) in his letters tried to keep control of those, and
of papal administrative authority in the Exarchate. His interventions to that end
included granting fiscal exemptions to Bishop Leo of Adria, and appointing the
bishop of Faenza.147 As the new pope was deeply involved in the political situ­
ation following the death of the Emperor Louis II,148 Archbishop John VIII used
the opportunity to his advantage: he, as well as many of the Ravenna aristocracy,
supported the Spoletan dukes, confiscated the property of papal party fideles, the
Dukes John and Deusdedit, and took away the keys of the city from the papal
vestararius in 876.149 In 877, the deacon John, cartularius of the Church of
Ravenna, opened the doors of the city to Lambert of Spoleto. Pope John VIII sent
a letter to the dukes and iudices of Ravenna asking them to stop Lambert’s
progress, but without success.150
Archbishop John VIII died in 878 and was succeeded by Romanus (878–88/9),151
whom the pope asked for restitution of the property of the papal representatives,

145 LP I. 107, chs. 32–6.

146 LIP, pp. 200–3; see P. Delogu, ‘Strutture politiche e ideologia nel regno di Lodovico II’, BISI 80
(1968) pp. 136–89 at p. 175.
147 Pope John VIII’s letters in MGH Ep. VII/5, nos 277, 280, 284; on Leo of Adria, see Kehr, ed.,
Italia Pontificia, pp. 189–90.
148 See Chapters 1 and 5. 149 124 in MGH Ep. VII/5; see Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 123–7.
150 124 in MGH Ep. VII/5.
151 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 25–37; Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 350–2.
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226 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Dukes John and Deusdedit, confiscated by Archbishop John VIII.152 Despite

papal requests and a brief return, it was again confiscated by Romanus, who
accused Deusdedit of ‘incest’ in his uncanonical marriage with Maria. Deusdedit
appealed to the pope, and a synod in 880 had him absolved.153 In the meantime,
his father-in-law, Duke Paul Traversari, had been assassinated, al­ leged­ly by
Romanus’ right-hand man, Mainbertus.154 The papal party in Ravenna rebelled,
but Romanus threw in his lot with the duke of Spoleto and allowed him to have
jurisdiction in the city in 881. The Deusdedit affair needs some attention, since it
shows to what extent it was mixed up, not just with the struggle between pope
and archbishop, but also with the policies of Romanus to extend greater control
over the aristocracy of the Exarchate by using the most modern of Carolingian
canonical legal tools. We know from Pope John VIII’s letters to Romanus that the
archbishop was concerned about the issue of incest (as defined by Carolingian
reformers) in the diocese, and that he had presented thirty-two couples accused
of it for judgement, having apparently acknowledged that it was indeed papal
courts that were in charge of enforcing the stricter Carolingian legislation on this
score.155 Betti has shown how Romanus then used the affair of Deusdedit to judge
the case himself, and dissolve the marriage, as well as the reasons for his involve-
ment in this particular conflict.156 Romanus’ approach was to encourage ex­og­am­
ous marriages among the aristocratic elite of the old Exarchate—as opposed to
the endogamous marriages, which only reinforced the power of a small elite of
the exarchal aristocracy—with the newly established and politically powerful
Frankish aristocracy. This would be facilitated by the new incest laws, and
Romanus could make a case of his promotion of Carolingian policies in Italy. As
we saw earlier, marriages of this kind became more frequent in the ninth century,
and the archbishops encouraged such marital strategies in order to create a net-
work of alliances which would strengthen the territorial possessions of the
Church of Ravenna. This would occur either through recovery of land granted by
the Carolingians to the Frankish aristocracy, or from new donations to the
Church from wealthy lords further afield. Romanus focused specifically on the
case of Deusdedit, the papal deputy in Ravenna, which legally fell into the newly
defined category of incest—indeed, the defence did not challenge the actual valid-
ity of the accusation, only the fact that it had been allowed to go ahead in the first
place, and that it was the pope who was supposed to judge such cases, not the
archbishop—because it provided an excellent opportunity to ‘discredit and neu-
tralize’ his political opponent, and to gain the upper hand in the conflict between
himself and the pope, Deusdedit’s protector. Even though the pope had absolved

152 95 in MGH Ep. VII/5. 153 286 in MGH Ep. VII/5.

154 Epp. nos 95, 281–6, 311–14, in MGH Ep. VII.5; Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’.
155 Epp. nos 261, 281, and 286 in MGH Ep. VII/5.
156 Betti, ‘Pro causa Deusdedit’, pp. 457–77.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 227

Deusdedit, it appears that this was not obeyed in Ravenna—proof if ever needed
of the political nature of the case. The archbishop subsequently gave Maria as a
wife to someone else, without Deusdedit being able to do anything about it.
Romanus’ other policies had, in the meantime, also continued to develop in
the direction of increasing control of the Church of Ravenna locally. In 881,
when the bishop of Faenza died, Romanus refused to consecrate the papal
appointee to the see, instead setting up his own candidate, Constantine. Even
though the pope excommunicated Constantine and forbade Romanus to conse-
crate new bishops, Constantine remained in place.157 The same year, he welcomed
to Ravenna the opponents of the bishop of Piacenza, and in 884 he supported the
candidature of his man, Mainbertus, who was pushed into the see of Bologna.158
Opposition by some of his own clergy did not stop him: in 883, two deacons, both
called John, who had had property confiscated by the archbishop, and a few other
malcontents appealed to the pope, who ordered the clergy of Ravenna to remove
Mainbertus, who was seen as the main troublemaker, and hand him over to Duke
John, the pope’s representative.159 The pope also ordered the Dukes Martin, John,
Demetrius, and Romanus to dislodge Mainbertus; none of them would have acted
thus against the interests of both archbishop and themselves, and of course this
did not happen. Despite Romanus’ excommunication in 881, and his later recon-
ciliation at the synod of Ravenna in 882 in the presence of Charles the Fat and the
pope, when he apparently agreed to what he was asked, in reality his policies did
not change in the least: he kept Mainbertus, and he continued to build a network
of support among the bishops of the archdiocese, notably bringing Faenza,
Bologna, and then, as a result of another contested election, Imola into the orbit
of Ravenna. In effect, Romanus had succeeded in building a consensus of the
main aristocratic families and the clergy of Ravenna around him in his anti-papal
actions, this time taking in many of the suffragan sees as well. Romanus’ position
was further reinforced after the death of Charles the Fat, when Arnulf, as well as
Berengar and Guy III of Spoleto tried to gain his support: he chose Berengar. In
888, before he died, at an assembly of the people and the clergy of Ravenna he had
his successor elected, and moreover had them agree to a decree that, from now
on, this was how the archbishops would be elected.
After Guy’s victory over Berengar at Trebbia in 889, and his imperial cor­on­
ation in 891 by Pope Stephen V, Guy incorporated the old Exarchate into the
Italian kingdom. The political story which followed from then on has been briefly
told in relation to Formosus, Guy, and Lambert, and the fight for Rome up to the
Ottonians. After Formosus’ coronation of Lambert, then the pope’s turnaround
with his appeal to King Arnulf, Lambert’s opponent, as an imperial candidate,
Formosus was demonized and ultimately had an infamous posthumous trial

157 284 in MGH Ep. VII/5. 158 Epp. 280 and 282 in MGH Ep. VII/5.
159 Epp. 312–14 in MGH Ep. VII/5.
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228 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

under Pope Stephen VI. On account of the dead pope’s links with Ravenna, when
he was supporting the Spoletan dynasty which had in effect controlled the city
since the time of Archbishop Dominic Ublatella, this continued ‘Formosian’ con-
flict was also reflected in Ravenna, in this instance with the deacon Theobald’s
challenge to Archbishop John IX’s election in 907.160 The archbishop, briefly
deposed, was reinstated, as was eventually Pope Sergius III in Rome, and the two
were on unusually good terms; so was Archbishop John IX with the ruler of
Rome, Theophylact. Archbishop John IX ruled Ravenna until 914, when he was
called by Theophylact’s family to Rome, to become Pope John X.161 As archbishop,
he was involved in a struggle to preserve the patrimony of the Church of Ravenna
situated in Salto (near Argenta or Galliera) and in Istria from the depredations of
Berengar’s men, Counts Dodo and Alboin, in which enterprise he had the sup-
port of Sergius III, who made the restitutions a condition of his coronation of
Berengar as emperor.162
All the same, from the point of view of the archbishops of Ravenna, Romanus’
successors until 907, even as they remained closely involved with the political
scene in Italy, left less evidence of internal involvement in the city—which could
also be the result of a lack of such a narrative as Agnellus’. Alberic had no interests
as far as the Romagna, and was too busy with his own Roman rule, while Hugh of
Provence was an outsider and not even emperor. In the old Exarchate, the rising
elites—the ducal families already mentioned—held power through their hold
over Church property and increasing intermarriage with the old Lombard and
Frankish elites as far as Tuscany. During his long reign Archbishop Peter IV
(927–71) continued to take over papal properties, especially in the Ferrarese, but
he also attempted to extent his jurisdiction over all the territories which were part
of the archdiocese of Ravenna—we recall that the areas of Church property of the
Ravenna archdiocese, and that of the authority of the archbishop as a ruler, were
originally far from identical—though perhaps not actually turning it into an
autonomous principality, as Buzzi once thought.163 It was on these grounds that
he attempted to sever the exceptionally close links of the Church with the
Ravennate elite, notably the Duchi family with which he went head to head,
against the opposition of his deacon Rainerius, who won at first, sending Peter IV
away and having him imprisoned in the family castle at Modigliana. After Peter’s
liberation, the placitum of 967, then the diploma of Otto I, theoretically returned
the Exarchate to Rome; in practice, however, it allowed the archbishops both
jurisdiction by imperial authority, including in Emilia, and the maintenance of

160 Duchesne, II, p. 140.

161 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 41–52; Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 393–422; Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 354–5;
Venni, ‘Giovanni X’, pp. 36–53.
162 For the relevant letters of both John IX and Sergius, see Löwenfeld, ‘Acht Briefe’, pp. 522 and
525, Fedele, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 79–103, and now Savigni, ‘Sacerdozio e regno’, pp. 14–23.
163 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 60–2; see Fasoli, ‘Il dominio territoriale’, p. 110.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 229

confiscated properties of the Roman patrimony. Thus Peter IV placed Ravenna

completely under Ottonian control.164 His successor, Honestus, of the Duchi
Honesti, even as he reversed Peter IV’s anti-Duchi policy and renewed the strong
tradition of emphyteutic leases to that family, nevertheless was an imperial vassal,
who was consecrated by Pope John XIII in Rome at Otto’s request in 971 and who
then followed the emperor on the battlefield when he was engaged in his
attempted reconquest of the south of Italy. Ravenna was becoming an imperial
fief, more and more involved in the Ottonian political sphere. The urban elites
were part of this new arrangement, and would not begin to challenge it before the
early eleventh century.

The Rest of the Clergy

Some of the conflicts between the archbishops and their clergy have already been
described, at least in so far as they were due to issues of family relations and
political choices, rather than to just ordinary friction such as may be revealed by
Agnellus’ account of his entourage suggesting to Archbishop Gratiosus (786–9)
that he should speak as little as possible during Charlemagne’s visit—Agnellus’
implication (or attempted slur) is that they thought him rather ‘innocent’, politely
implying him to have been so unworldy that he should leave the diplomacy to
those who were shrewder—or to issues of liturgical choices, which may have been
the case for Archbishop Sergius.165
The clergy in Ravenna was not alone in being closely connected with the ruling
families in the city; so were the clergy in the other cities of the province. They too
were often members of these families and, as such, were closely involved as
­grantors or lessees of the archbishop. The Codice Bavaro mentions, among grants
made by the Ravenna clergy to the Church of Ravenna, that by Felix, deacon and
vicedominus, of property in Rimini; leases such as that of Priscus defensor, or
Leontius cleric and cartularius and his wife, Barbara, and Stephen priest, in
Rimini and Senigallia respectively; and numerous transactions by the clergy of
the relevant churches.166 Sometimes the transactions were shared between a
cleric and a layman, suggesting a family relationship, as when Stephen, deacon of
Osimo, shared a lease with John dux and his wife. Naturally, numerous nuns were

164 Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, pp. 57–77; Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, pp. 358–9. Placitum of 967 see Benericetti
X/3, no. 128; Diploma of Otto I in DOI, no. 235.
165 Agnellus, LP, chs. 165, 154.
166 Rabotti et al., Breviarium Ecclesiae Ravennatis, nos 59, 55, 94, 96. See also the grant made by
Severinus priest of Ficoclo (Cervia), and leases taken by Benedict, deacon of the Church of Rimini,
Ursus priest of Rimini, Gesibert priest of Sennigallia, Stephen and Peter deacons, and Leo, Rofredus,
and Lupo priests of Osimo, John deacon and George priest of Iesi, and Mercurius and Lupicinius
priests of Montefeltro and their heirs, of land and houses, as indeed in two cases by Bishop Leo of
Osimo and Bishop Peter of Fossombrone; Rabotti et al., Breviarium Ecclesiae Ravennatis, nos 61–62,
66, 75, 107, 125–6, 142, 144, 149, 167–8, 182, 121, 175.
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230 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

widows, such as Theodosia and Trasiperga, respectively relicts of Julian dux of

Rimini and of the magister militum Faraonus of Iesi.167
Last but certainly not least were the notaries of the church, a group which had
remained of great significance on account of the maintenance in Ravenna of the
Byzantine-style administrative regime of an administrative personnel around
both the dukes and the archbishops. The patrimony of the Church had been
maintained from the sixth century onwards by an uninterrupted episcopal chan-
cery in the Roman tradition, with its notaries and archives—which is partly why
Archbishop George, who took away so many documents to France, and then lost
them at Fontenoy, was loathed by his clergy, possibly even more than he was for
having dilapidated the treasures of the Church. In the same way, after the almost
equally damaging attempt by the deacon Rainerius to set fire to the archives,
Archbishop Peter IV tried to reconstruct an inventory of the patrimony. As in
Rome, but perhaps with even greater precision, we are able to reconstruct this
personnel of the archiepiscopal court on the one hand, and that of the tabelliones
of the city on the other: a similar division that we saw between the scriniarii of the
Church of Rome and the tabelliones of the Urbs. Much of our information is due,
once again, to the work of Buzzi, and more recently to that of de Lorenzi.168
The archiepiscopal Curia, in charge of both the administrative and fiscal affairs
of the Church and its patrimony, was led by a camerarius—first a deacon, then the
archdeacon. The latter, whose role took over both functions, was effectively the
highest level below that of the archbishop, and naturally the post was mostly
occupied by a member of one of the main aristocratic families, directing the
Curia, administering the episcopal mensa, and appointing all the personnel in
charge of collecting the income from both Ravenna and its province.169 The Curia
officials below him included the treasurer, who was at the same time the primice-
rius of the notaries (head of the chancery) and of the land register. In addition,
there was a detached Curia outside the city, which administered and collected
rents and revenues, with at its head a deacon of the Church of Ravenna, and run
by rectors in charge of local rectories or repositories dotted around the territory
to receive the rents in kind.170 Another set of officials was that of the chancery, in
charge of drafting all documents, led by the primicerius of the notaries (later usu-
ally the archdeacon and treasurer), with at least three notaries working under
him. The personnel of the chancery included the primicerius of the defensores
and several advocates.171 The notaries were often members of the great families
in the city, as we saw earlier with Sergius I and Gerard I, and, like other members
of these families, their names too tend to be Honestus, Desiderius, or similar.

167 Rabotti et al., Breviarium Ecclesiae Ravennatis, nos 125, 20, 64.
168 Buzzi, ‘La curia’; P. De Lorenzi, Storia del notariato ravennate, 2 vols (Ravenna, 1961–2).
169 Buzzi, ‘La curia’, pp. 10–15; De Lorenzi, Storia del notariato, I, pp. 15–16.
170 Buzzi, ‘La curia’, pp. 14–21. 171 Buzzi, ‘La curia’, pp. 21–43.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 231

We saw earlier that there was, in parallel with this, an urban Curia (for a while run
by papal deputies), later replaced by imperial missi. This Curia, which appears to
have still existed as a physical building in the Caput Portici area, near the church
of S. Agata, and to have been situated in a turreted palace,172 had a personnel of
tabelliones, who were generally of consular rank (most were actually consuls),
married and mostly passing on the posts to their sons.173 The tabelliones of both
Curiae could either have their own offices or work mostly for one ‘employer’, such
as the monastery of S. Andrea Maggiore, several monasteries, or all of these at
once.174 They were sometimes also lessees of the archbishop, for example the
notary Peter V (978–9), who received in emphyteusis a house and land in
Ravenna in the regio of S. Pietro Maggiore, while Andrew I (980–1000) did the
same with two houses for his daughters Ingiza and Bona in 994.175

Merchants and Artisans

The other category of the middle-range elite in the city, who also often called
themselves consuls, were the negociatores, the merchants. Late antique Ravenna
had been a major international commercial centre around its port of Classe,
which had started to decline from the eighth century onwards, being gradually
overtaken by Comacchio, and eventually by Venice. Venetian merchants were
attested in Ravenna as early as the late eighth century, when Pope Hadrian I, at
Charlemagne’s request, asked the archbishop that they should be expelled. They
were conspicuous in the life of the city, and appear as witnesses or neighbours in
various documents, as did Boninus veneticus in 850.176 Other merchants are
mentioned with an ‘ethnic’ epithet, for example John son of Peter aka Grecus in
965 and Elia son of Justus, Jew, in 969; and some people are just called ‘Lombards’,
like the aurifex Hugh.177
The majority, of course, were local to Ravenna, or to parts of the old Exarchate.
In Ravenna, they had a schola negociatorum, of whom at one point Marinus aka
Bonizo was the cartularius. He belonged to possibly the best-known, at any rate
the best-documented, family of negotiatores, the Marini, whom we find in numer-
ous other transactions: Vitalis aka de Marino (978–89), and another Vitalis, the
son of Marinus, who took on land held previously by his father and father-in-law
in 958.178 In 995 it was Domenicus consul who was the capitularius scholae

172 Benericetti X/1, no. 73 and Benericetti X/3 nos 205 and 213.
173 Buzzi, ‘La curia’, pp. 57–64, and a detailed list; De Lorenzi, Storia del notariato, I, pp. 19–22, and
II for a catalogue.
174 Buzzi, ‘La curia’, pp. 64–74. 175 Benericetti X/3, nos 204 and 261.
176 Benericetti X/8–9, no. 150. 177 Benericetti X/1, nos 120, 129; X/4, no. 277.
178 Benericetti X/1, no. 78; X/3, no. 209; X/4 no. 294. On the Marini, see the genealogical table in
Buzzi, ‘Ricerche’, p. 110.
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232 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

negociatorum in a transaction with S. Vitale, and another Dominic, one of the

tabelliones, son of the tabellio Peter, has a lease witnessed by another consul and
several negociatores.179 The emphyteutic lease for Severus aka Sigico nobilis vir
and his wife, Rodelinda aka Rotja, was witnessed in 943 only by negociatores, and
even classier in their perception that same year were Venerius clarissimus negociator
and his wife, Clemencia clarissima, with their sons in a pactum with Archbishop
Peter IV.180
These were the most self-conscious among the transactors. Others were more
down to earth, such as the three brothers who in 964 rented some salt pans in
Comacchio, and even more so the sons of a negociator and callegarius in 948 in a
livello lease.181 The category of negociator is clearly very broad, from those of con-
sular rank, and other clarissimi and nobili viri, to more modest artisans, who
appear increasingly in the tenth century. Callegari (shoemakers) are fairly com-
mon, and some from other places are also attested in the documents, for example
one Gregory in Faenza in 975; other trades found in the documentation are
smiths, like Stephen faber and Maria fabrissa in 971, and Martin faber in 911,
Hugh the Lombard aurifex in 955, and members of the schola pescatorum in
943.182 Many of the leases were not for land but for houses in the city, some very
detailed in their description, allowing us to see how high some negociatores were
in the social order. In 980 Sasso and his wife, Ravenna, a clarissima, received the
lease on a cubiculum solaratum, while a John callegarius and his wife received in
990 one third of a complex of houses which was all used by the same family.183
There also seems to have been a move towards increasing the number of emphy-
teutic leases further down the social scale, especially under Archbishop Honestus.
He granted such leases, one on a house in Ravenna, in the Regio S. Vincentio, to
the son of a negociator et callegarius in 974,184 and at least another seven others
to various not outstandingly distinguished grantees, though in some cases it was
the witnesses who were more highly placed: in 972, for example, we have Andreas
dux as one, while others include consuls of various kinds.185 It would be interest-
ing to see if the move was specific to Honorius—only one lease each of this kind
remains from Archbishops Peter and John—or whether it represents a growing
trend into the eleventh century, as it does in Rome.
We find the same increasing onomastic mix here as we saw at the level of the
highest elites. In 967 and 968 we have examples of mixed marriages between
Gosbertus and his wife Petronia in Rimini, Farulf and his wife Anna, and even
the colonus Marcus and his wife Maria aka Rodelinda.186 In 891 in Senigallia,

179 Benericetti X/4, no. 335, and X/1, no. 81. 180 Benericetti X/1, nos 51 and 50.
181 Benericetti X/2, no. 114, and X/1, no. 59.
182 Benericetti X/4, no. 305; X/2, no. 155, X/1, no. 80; X/4, no. 277; X/1, no. 48.
183 Benericetti X/3, nos 218, 247. 184 Benericetti X/2, no. 180.
185 Benericetti X/2, nos 159, 160: ‘Deusdedit consul de Ponte Augusti’, ‘Natalis consul de Calcinaria’.
186 Benericetti X/2, nos 126, 127, 142.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 233

both spouse—the coloni Astulf and Ermenberga—have Lombard names, while an

apparently Roman family (father Leo, mother Reparata, children Maurus and
Christodulus) have another child called Gutta.187 Such acceptance of the mix of
people of originally different ethnic groups in the old Exarchate, and in the city of
Ravenna itself, is supported by other references showing the situation on the
ground, and the mix of people in the topography. Gottfred nobilis vir and his wife,
Adelberga clarissima, were granted a house in Ravenna in 993 by the archbishop,
while in 920 in Rimini another petitioner was granted a house whose neighbours
were on one side an Engelrada, and on the other a Pepin.188
These are the people of Ravenna, whom Agnellus always defines as cives.
Unlike the Roman Liber Pontificalis, we have no other narrative material from
Ravenna and, since the surviving documents are not the right medium for such
definitions, no other way of knowing how the Ravennati defined themselves,
other than how they were defined by others, notably by the popes. This is a prob-
lem we will not encounter in Venice, where a wider range of sources, in addition
to John the Deacon’s Historia Veneticorum, help us see how the people perceived
themselves, their past, and their contemporaries.

Conclusions

At the start of our period, Ravenna was, like Rome, a key centre of Byzantine
authority in Italy, indeed it outranked Rome as the see of the Exarchate, as against
Rome’s lower status as a duchy, which was only a component part of the Exarchate
of Italy. Just as in Rome, the elites of Ravenna had emerged from the Byzantine
civilian and military ranks, which took on the titles, roles, and wealth associated
with this background. While the duke of Rome and the hierarchy associated with
him gradually disappeared, to be subsumed into the papal administrative govern-
ment of the city, so, to a certain extent, the archbishop in Ravenna took on the
main administrative, defensive, judicial, and economic functions of the exarch
after 750, and the main aristocratic families helped him in these roles, sometimes
also being families whose members became archbishops themselves. But, and
here we encounter the first major difference with the Roman situation, the sub-
suming of the power of these elite families in Ravenna was nowhere near as com-
plete as that of the Roman aristocracy into the papal government, at least in the
late-eighth and ninth centuries. An important part of the aristocratic elite of
Ravenna remained secular, and continued to hold a role of some importance in
the government of the city, even if appointed by the archbishop or, controver-
sially, by the pope. Whether being genuinely ‘independent’ in a modern sense

187 Benericetti X/8–9, nos 41–2.

188 Benericetti X/2, no. 102; X/1, no. 126; X/4, nos 241, 255; X/1, no. 33.
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234 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

from the archbishop or not, they were at the very least not technically appointed
by, or responsible to, him—as we might infer from the suggestion that when the
pope sent Afiarta to Ravenna so that he could be shipped off to Constantinople
in exile, the archbishop (as he was legally bound to do) passed him on to the
‘consularis’ to be judged and ultimately executed.
The important ducal families, both in the city of Ravenna itself and in the
Romagna, the Duchi, later split into Honesti, Romualdi, Traversari, and the mag-
istri militum closely related to them, defined their status through their wealth,
mostly held in emphyteusis from the Church, their role in government, and, of
course, their titles. Again as in Rome, these were inherited from the late antique/
Byzantine tradition, some reflecting a real function (dukes and magistri militum),
some a social pre-eminence (clarissimi, eminentissimi, viri honesti). In view of the
crucial role of these families, ascertaining their origins becomes key, and it has
been an important part of the more recent historiography on the subject, which
has reopened the dossier discussed by Buzzi in the earlier part of the twentieth
century. Brown, Carile, and, especially, most recently Cosentino, Schoolman, and
Haubrich have looked at the possible origins of these families, notably through
the anthroponymy, and have been instrumental in tracing these, especially in
terms of the fundamental element which we can reconstruct for this area: the
importance of the Latin/Lombard/Frankish social and cultural mix, from the
ninth century onwards. This can be assumed, to a certain extent, if far from com-
pletely and automatically, from the mix of Roman and Lombard and Frankish
names for marriage partners and their children, at all social levels. More conclu-
sively in terms of evidence, it can certainly be deduced from families where one of
the members is specifically said to be ex lege Langobardorum/Allamanorum/
Francorum. The figures recently established have shown an extraordinary pro-
gression from the average such input in the 750 to 1000 period, with a sharp
increase in ‘immigrants’, that is people from the Regnum Italiae. Here we have a
very important distinction in social and cultural evolution from the same period
in the history of Rome and its immediate environment.
Another essential element, which may reflect the remaining influence of a
form of secular role for the elite families of Ravenna, is the fact that, with another
form of potential authority at their disposal (including wealth, private churches
and monasteries under their control, or papal delegation of power), the elites’
infighting to control the archiepiscopal throne appears to have been less ferocious
than it was in Rome—and thus the number of plots and depositions less frequent.
City violence, though hardly unknown, was perhaps less dominant as a means of
political dissent and potential rise to power. One could suggest that this might
have been the case on account of the stakes being lower than those associated
with the already overarching international role of the papacy and the Empire in
Rome. But the explanation would not be sufficient in political terms, since the
third city, Venice, and its elites, without any imperial or ecclesiastical ambitions
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 235

and technically subject to an imperial power, would prove to have the most violent
early history in terms of fighting for the supreme political function. The next
section will attempt to explain why.

Venice

The political and geographical situation of Venice was, at first sight, entirely
different from those of Rome and Ravenna. Unlike them, it had not technically
changed its status and regime at all during the course of the eighth century,
remaining an integral part of Byzantine rule in Italy. Like Naples and other cities
of the Langobardia minor, it too was still technically under the authority of the
Eastern Roman Empire—the emperor in Constantinople and his delegates, dukes,
magistri militum, and tribunes, with a centre of power, as has been suggested, in
the castrum of Olivolo. The capital of the old Exarchate, Ravenna, and that of the
duchy of Rome had both abandoned Byzantine rule, at first for that of the pope
and archbishop in the second half of the eighth century, then for that of the
Frankish rulers and Carolingian Empire in the ninth century, then again for the
Regnum Italiae for Ravenna and the principate of Alberic for Rome, and finally
for the Ottonian Empire in the tenth century. Venice was not in that position. It
remained in theory a city under Byzantine control throughout the period and, in
spite of a failed attempt by Charlemagne to conquer it in the early 800s, its pol­it­ical
status did not change in theory. How did this impact on the status and prac­tical
situation of its people, and were the city elites different in their nature and behav-
iour from those of Rome and Ravenna?

The Families of the Future Doges

We recall from the early history of Venice, as told in Chapter 1, that when Pope
Gregory told the armies of the Byzantine cities to elect their own dukes, the
Venetians chose Ursus—the first genuinely autonomous duke. Ursus may have
belonged to a family from Malamocco, since his son Theodatus or Deusdedit,
when he eventually replaced him after another major political breakdown, was
said to be from there—the first time that we hear of two doges belonging to a
‘family’, though not actually succeeding one another as father and son in office.
Ursus was eventually killed by the Venetians, who then declared their wish to be
ruled no longer by a duke but once again by a magister militum, chosen for one
year only. Five such magistri succeeded each other (the second being in fact
Deusdedit, son of Ursus). Two opposing views among historians have held sway
until now. The first was that the return to a government by the magistri militum
was simply the normalization of the situation, with Venice returning to the
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236 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

trad­ition­al Byzantine administration, which had been briefly challenged when

the Venetians chose their own government, that is the duke, as directed by the
pope. The second view sees the rule by the magistri militum, limited to one year as
it was, as an expression of aristocratic local power wishing to keep closer control
over the islands, and the subsequent return to rule by the duke as a return to the
traditional Byzantine order, with central power represented by the dukes.189
Whichever one of these two one chooses, in this swing between occasional rebel-
lion followed by a return to the usual Byzantine administrative and political
system, it remains a fact that in no case can one accept John’s pretensions of
autonomous political choice and government of the area of the Venetiae.
A third explanation, which seems to me equally plausible, is that the issues
involved were not primarily ones relating to the bigger picture of Byzantine
versus autonomous administration—a rather too modern view in a context when
it may have been difficult to imagine a different rule than that of Byzantium,
however distant. It was rather an issue of rivalry between the two increasingly
different priorities in the development of the province of the Venetiae, priorities
represented respectively by Cittanova, the old ‘capital’, as the figurehead of the
traditional land-based Venetia, and that of the rising power of the Venetia maritima,
with a centre of gravity moving towards the southern lagoon, primarily Malamocco.
John the Deacon continues his narrative by stating that, having become restless
once again, the Venetians now ‘detested the function of magister militum’, so that,
having disposed of the fifth of these, they elected a new duke in 742, who was
none other than Deusdedit, son of Ursus, based in Malamocco, where he reigned
for thirteen years.190 The transfer of the centre of the duchy from Cittanova to
Malamocco, which had already happened, may have been the result of the partial
destruction of Cittanova in 737, when Duke Ursus was killed. This episode, we
are told, prompted the exile of the main aristocratic families from Cittanova, not
to Malamocco, but to Rivoalto,191 a move to which I shall return later as being one
of the most crucial in the foundation myth of the city. Deusdedit’s main achieve-
ment was the building of a castrum at Brondolo near Chioggia, also inland from
the southern lagoon, a key site from then on in the Venetian strategy of control of
its terraferma. Increasingly, economic power would move towards Rivoalto (Rialto).
The centre of political power, on the other hand, remained dual, with some of
the Byzantine administrative government based in Olivolo and Torcello, while the
‘autonomous’ ducal power remained in Malamocco. Deusdedit’s successor,

189 The debate involved on the one hand Cessi, Venezia ducale, p. 104; Carile, ‘La formazione’, p. 28;
and Ortalli, ‘Venezia dalle origini’, p. 367; and, on the other, Pertusi, ‘L’impero bizantino’, p. 69. It has
been summarized and discussed by Berto in his commentary on John the Deacon, esp. in note 12 to
Book II, p. 225.
190 JnD II. 11; Origo I, p. 29.
191 JnD II. 17 and 26 on Cittanova, where he says that Obelerius and Beatus destroyed it more
completely later. On the move to Rivoalto, Origo, I ch. 9, pp. 46–7; see also G. Fedalto, ‘Cittanova
Eracliana e le origini di Venezia’, Veneto orientale 4 (1984), pp. 3–11.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 237

Dominic Monegario, was, significantly, flanked by two tribunes, on which the

Venetians insisted. According to John, this was presumably in order to control his
power, though, again, it has also been suggested that this may have been the result
of a Byzantine attempt to regain control over the government of the city. One
elem­ent not perhaps sufficiently put forward is that the role of the two tribunes
may also have been that of representing the two poles of the increasingly differ-
ent, if not opposing, Venetian interests—the land-based and the maritime—
increasingly crystallizing around a ‘northern’ and a ‘southern’ lagoon.
After Dominic Monegario’s death in 765, a new doge was elected by the
Venetians, named Maurice Galbaio. Power remained officially delegated by the
Byzantine emperor, and the election sanctioned by him. However, major changes
had taken place, in that the man in charge was no longer a Byzantine official
appointed by the emperor but a local magnate, agreed on by other local magnates.
Thus Galbaio’s title in 770/1 was ‘consul (ypatos) et imperialis dux Venetiarum pro-
vinciae’, defined as a representative of the Byzantine emperor by the patriarch of
Grado in a letter to the pope.192 He governed for thirty-one years, and towards
the end of his reign he asked the Venetians to let him associate his son John to the
government. This would be the start of a long-standing tradition for the doge to
appoint, often but not always with the people’s approval, a co-regent from among
close family members. This was a transparent way of attempting to build a power
base for the family as rulers of the duchy. John remained sole doge in 787 and,
after a while, associated his own son Maurice as co-regent, though John the
Deacon does not tell us whether this was also done with the consent of the
Venetians. Maurice’s attack on Patriarch John of Grado and the latter’s demise,
then his successor Patriarch Fortunatus’ flight from Grado to the court of
Charlemagne, taking with him the opposing faction to the Galbaio from among
Venetian maiores, led to the flight of the Galbaio dukes themselves, and to the
eventual election of the tribune Obelerius from Malamocco as the new doge, by
the opposing faction to the Galbaio.193
Like the Galbaio doges, Obelerius also co-opted a family member, his brother
Beatus, to rule with him. Obelerius and Beatus appear to have been more
de­cided­ly pro-Frankish in their political choices. This signalled the start of a
period of oscillating policies between an apparently pro-Byzantine faction,
­centred on the old capital of Cittanova, and an apparently pro-Frankish faction
with the doges of Malamocco. In that context Patriarch Fortunatus’ political role
seems to have been highly significant. He appears to have achieved his goal of a
rapprochement with the Franks, through the victory of Obelerius and Beatus and
the desertion by Bishop Christopher of Olivolo to his side. Significantly, however,
the two doges now entrusted the diocese of Olivolo to one John, ‘elected by the

192 MGH Ep. III/1 no. 19.

193 On the narrative of the early Venetian history and its complexities, see Chapter 1.
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238 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

­ eople’, and refused to return it to Christopher, Fortunatus’ ally, until Fortunatus

p
captured John and only released him on condition that the doges return the see to
Christopher. John eventually returned ‘home’ to the abbacy of S. Servolo. But
Obelerius, as a doge, was clearly as concerned as the Galbaio doge had been when
he set it up that Olivolo should be held by a ducal appointee, faithful to the doge
and head of the Venetian Church; this would remain the doges’ position through-
out, fighting to create a Church of Venice rather than remaining a dependency of
Grado. It led to every doge, of whatever family, fighting Fortunatus on those
grounds. Fortunatus briefly returned to Grado, but as soon as he heard of the
arrival of Nicetas’s Byzantine fleet in the Adriatic, he fled once again to Francia.
His flight allowed the doges, who had not wanted to accept his return as patri-
arch, to kill two birds with one stone: to get rid of him and his Frankish allies in
the face of Byzantine muscle-flexing, and to grab the opportunity to appoint the
previous Bishop John of Olivolo as the new patriarch of Grado.
Obelerius and Beatus had, in the first instance, been seen as more closely asso-
ciated with the Frankish court, where they went in 805 to define the relations
between Franks and Byzantines.194 It is possible that the destruction of Cittanova,
the city of the Galbaio, and even the doges’ attack on Dalmatia may have been a
result of Frankish demands. But Obelerius and Beatus shifted their allegiance
once again to Byzantium, whether willingly or not, when the Byzantine fleet sent
by the emperor and commanded by the patricius Nicetas arrived in the Adriatic
to oppose the attempt by Pepin, Charlemagne’s son and king of Italy since 781, to
conquer Venice. This powerful Byzantine fleet was the last one ever to reach
Venice, and it is significant that this attempt should have been made by the
Byzantines, who clearly regarded a possible loss of Venice as the sign of the end of
their power in central Italy and the Adriatic. More importantly, having got rid of
Fortunatus and Christopher, and having set up their man John in Grado,
Obelerius and Beatus may have realized that a Frankish conquest of Venice was
potentially too close and, as Venetians had done since the earliest days, preferred
the Byzantines who were further away. One may therefore wonder whether it was
not they themselves who called on the Byzantines to send a fleet, even as they
were officially on the Frankish side—which would explain the harsh words of the
Annales Regnum Francorum about them when describing the perfidia ducum
Veneticorum.195 At this point they were in a position to negotiate their status and
power with the Byzantines, which they did successfully. Both doges were given
higher Byzantine titles, either to reward them, or to ensure their staying on board—
Obelerius as spatarius, while Beatus was ‘invited’ to return to Constantinople with
Nicetas and two high-profile hostages, including Bishop Christopher of Olivolo.

194 ARF 806. A. Guillou, ‘La presenza bizantina nell’alto Adriatico’, Antichità altoadriatiche, 28
(1986), pp. 407–21.
195 ARF 808 and 810.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 239

There Beatus was invested as ypatos and sent back to Venice in triumph, while
Christopher was exiled. Once again, Byzantine control over Venice was not made
clear by John the Deacon, who would have thought that to acknowledge it would
have indicated external pressure on Venice, but is rather implied by his mention,
in passing, of the presence and role of the Byzantine envoy, Arsafius, who clearly
had the upper hand. It may also be that the Byzantines thought Obelerius and
Beatus unreliable: at any rate Arsafius, ‘with the agreement and help of the
Venetians’, whisked the two doges away, Obelerius to Constantinople and Beatus
to Zara. Berto explained the changes in the brothers’ alliances through a change
in orientation of their policies, dictated by circumstances.196 I would suggest that
the shifts in Obelerius’ and Beatus’ policies need not have been so much a pol­it­
ical choice by the two brothers as an indication of their willingness to go along
with whoever gained the upper hand in imperial terms, while concentrating on
promoting the rising role of Venice, and indeed very probably of their own fam-
ily. I would see it as a characteristic example of Venetian government, which saw
each ruling family consistently choosing to play the card of an alliance with who-
ever was further away, and less likely to control the city and its trade, never in
favour of one party or another as such (with the possible exception of Peter IV
Candiano later), but always in favour of those pol­icies which would allow for the
greater independence of Venice, especially if allied to the greater good of the
ruling ducal family.
The family of Obelerius represented the last proper attempt by the principally
landowning tribunes, in this case from the southern lagoon, at ruling the dogado.
After them, there would no longer be any doges from the smaller landholding
military elite without some wealth at least acquired through the commercial
expansion of Venice. The successors to the ducal function would be from members
of families who had expanded their interests beyond the land, into trade and the
processing of salt.197 Such were the next ruling family, originally from the northern
lagoon, and specifically from the old capital of Cittanova—the Particiaci. Theirs
was an example of an aristocratic family whose wealth was based on a com­bin­
ation of land in the terraferma and the islands, as well as monetary wealth
acquired through commerce—increasingly the model for the wealth of noble
families in the city. The destruction of Cittanova in 737, when Duke Ursus was
killed, was reported in the Origo as the cause for the exile of the main aristocratic
families from Cittanova to Rivoalto.198 This later coalesced into the constructed
story of the departure of the twelve noble families from Cittanova to settle in
Rialto being at the roots of the Venice patriciate.

196 JnD, see Berto, n. 59 to Book II, p. 231.

197 Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 735; Castagnetti, ‘Insediamenti’ and ‘Famiglie e affermazione politica’, in
SV, pp. 585–7 and 613–44; Castagnetti, La società veneziana nel medioevo I and II.
198 Origo, first version, ch. 9, pp. 46–7, and third version, chs 8 and 10, pp. 146–53 and 157–60;
G. Rösch, Der venezianische Adel bis zur Schliessung des Grossen Rats (Sigmaringen, 1989), pp. 17–34.
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240 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Agnellus Particiaco was to be flanked by two tribunes, changing annually.

There has been some debate as to whether this was a return to the traditional
Byzantine administrative framework of the emperor asserting some control over
the local duke through the appointment of these magistri militum (as the two
tribunes were termed); or whether it had to do with the tribunes being elected by
the rest of the local aristocracy, who wished to keep closer control over the ruler.
In the latter case, the implication is that the existence of the tribunes was then
curtailed by a return to the traditional Byzantine order with the imperial power
being represented by the dukes.199 Particiaco, we recall, moved the seat of the
duchy from both Cittanova and Malamocco to Rialto, which would become the
new centre around the new ducal palace.200
Agnellus had co-opted his sons Justinian and John as doges. The former then
left for Constantinople, where he was made ypatos, then returned to Venice, but
refused to be co-regent with his brother. John had to leave and go into exile, first
to Louis the Pious’s court, then to Constantinople. It is worth noting that, faced
with John’s request for help, Louis the Pious denied it, either because he did not
want to become involved in Venetian affairs, and possibly breach the treaty of
Aachen, or because he was too busy elsewhere. (Perhaps, sensing such an opening
to regain control over Venice, Charlemagne, like the Ottonians later, may not
have passed up the opportunity). Faced with this refusal, Agnellus, in what seems
an example of unexplained family politics, chose to take on Justinian as co-ruler,
and to exile John to Zara.201 The policies of Agnellus are unclear. Was John rather
inept at governing, which is why his father, seeing in Justinian better qualities as a
ruler, preferred Justinian and exiled John? If so, one wonders why Agnellus
appointed John at all, if he trusted him so little. One explanation could be that the
doges were by now very clear that, in order to maintain control within the family,
they had to have no loopholes, such as perhaps a dead doge with no associated
member of the family in post. Indeed, in view of the subsequent number of con-
spiracies against John, while there were none known against Justinian, it is pos­
sible that Agnellus may have been right in his judgement of his son’s political
capabilities. Nevertheless, it was a dangerous move since, naturally, John did not
stay put but went roaming about Italy, asking Louis the Pious for help against his
father, until his father too was forced to ask Louis the Pious for his capture and
return to Venice. John was again exiled, this time to Constantinople, where he
remained until his father’s death. At this point Justinian ruled alone at first, but he
finally recalled his brother John back from Constantinople as co-regent and, after
Justinian’s death in 829, John remained as sole doge. This move again requires
some explanation. Why did Justinian do this? Was he forced to do it by part of the

199 JnD II. 29; see Cessi, Venezia ducale, p. 104, Carile, ‘La formazione’, p. 28, and Ortalli, ‘Venezia
dalle origini’, p. 367, represent the former view; Pertusi, ‘L’impero bizantino’, p. 69, the second.
200 JnD II. 29; on the importance of the move, see Chapter 5. 201 JnD II. 31.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 241

aristocracy? Was he so conscious of the need for building up power within the
family, through family succession, that this became stronger than personal views?
Or, indeed, since they continued to rule together for some years, was the original
problem not with the brothers but with their father, Agnellus? My personal
in­clin­ation would be to suggest a combination of the latter two, with the two
brothers fighting to establish the family in power, and perhaps finding it easier to
compromise without their father being involved.
A first conspiracy against the doges, uniting major figures such as the tribune
John Monetario—a family name of growing significance in the next 150 years—
failed, and the guilty fled to Francia to the court of Lothar. This too may have
been an attempt by some parts of the aristocracy, marginalized by Agnellus, to
oppose the Particiaci’s growing power. Eventually, in 836, the sole Particiaco left
as doge, John, was deposed by a conspiracy led by the Mastalici, who captured
him during the feast of St Peter in the cathedral, had him shaved and made a
cleric, and sent him to live in Grado, while the Venetians elected a new doge,
Peter Tradonico.202 Despite his success in fighting the Saracens with the Emperor
Lothar, Tradonico was later recalled as having been hated by omnus Venecie popu-
lus on account of his harsh rule, enforced by his ‘servi’, and he was murdered in
856 following yet another conspiracy, while his ‘servi’ were exiled to the island of
Poveglia.203 Among the plotters, there appeared for the first time some of the
most famous names of later Venetian rulers—Gradenigo, Candiano, Falier,
Flabianico.204 These were representatives of the new, rising elite, supposedly the
original families which had moved from Cittanova to Rialto, fighting for position.
But the plotters may also have been simply using the fin-de-règne moment to try
and unseat existing families like the Particiaci, though they all belonged to the
same elites with a Cittanova origin. The plotters failed and were punished, but
would be back within a generation.
The new doge, Ursus I, was one of the key figures in early Venetian history.
Like his predecessors, Ursus I also had members of his family co-opted as co-
regents, his son John II then his brother Peter; in fact three of his four sons ended
up being doges, the fourth being the unfortunate Badoer, who was mortally
wounded in the attack by the duke of Comacchio. Ursus I had been recognized by
the Byzantine emperor with the higher dignity of protospatarius, but at the same
time he was also the first doge to set up a matrimonial alliance with the aristoc-
racy of the Regnum, when his daughter Felicia married John, Duke of Bologna.205

202 JnD II. 48–9; see Cessi, Venezia Ducale I, p. 222, and Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, pp. 740–2.
203 Origo, 134–7, but not in JnD, which calls him ‘nobilissimus’ and focuses on his exploits against
the Saracens, together with the patricius Theodosius from Constantinople, who spent a year in Venice.
Note that the expression ‘omnus Venecie populus’ appears in the Origo and therefore belongs to the
twelfth century; it would be interesting to know to what extent it expresses a reality different from that
of the ninth century.
204 JnD III. 1. 205 JnD III. 14, 22.
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242 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

When he died in 881, he was succeeded by his son John II, who, when ill, retired
and chose his brother Peter as his successor. Peter having predeceased him, and
John II having recovered, he returned to power for a short while, then decided to
withdraw from it. Before doing this, he offered to allow the Venetian ‘people’ to
elect a new doge, which they did in Peter I Candiano. According to John the
Deacon, John II attempted to include a more proactive role for the Venetians,
who were given permission to elect the new doge ‘in front of his house’. John’s
point here is to show that this was a real election by the people, who actually par-
ticipated in the choice rather than just ratified and formally acclaimed the new
doge.206 John II then called the new doge to the palace, handed him the insignia
of power, and retired to his own house. John the Deacon’s point is once again to
underline the ‘freedom’ of the people of Venice to choose their ruler and give him
permission to become so. Indirectly, the insistence in this story on the fact that
the dogal function was elective and limited in time is made clear by the fact
that the doge and his family did not use the palace as a permanent residence: they
lived in their own houses, and only inhabited the palace during the time they held
the ducal function officially. They then returned to their houses when they ceased
to exercise the ducal function, as John II did. Peter I Candiano lasted only five
months, having embarked on an aggressive policy of attacking the Slavs, which
led him to be defeated and killed by them. The ‘people’ of Venice recalled John II,
who refused the charge and gave them permission to elect whomever they chose.
Their choice was Peter, son of Dominic Tribuno and Agnella, niece of Peter I
Candiano,207 suggesting that some families, even if one was allied to them by
marriage alone, were beginning to be perceived as having some kind of as­so­ci­
ation with the rule of the dogado, if not actually a monopoly on it.
The reign of Peter Tribuno, which saw further expansion of Rialto as an urban
economic and political centre and capital, was succeeded by that of Ursus
Particiaco, who after twenty years retired as a monk.208 The claim that Ursus
belonged to the Particiaco family has been debated, though it seems very likely
that he did, even if it was a side branch of the original family, a suggestion rein-
forced by the fact that we now see the name of Badoer used as a Christian name,
associated with the characteristic Particiaco name of Ursus.209 He too sent his son
to Constantinople to receive confirmation of the election.210 Ortalli suggested
that Ursus’ retirement to a monastery may not have been by choice, but as a result
of his unpopular tendency to favour peace with the pirates at any cost, which was
ill-accepted by some of the aristocracy, who were more approving of the more

206 JnD III. 30–2, 35. Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, pp. 756–8, and Ortalli, ‘Venezia dalle origini’, pp. 402–3.
207 JnD III. 35.
208 JnD III. 37, 39, 40, 43; for the development of Rialto see Chapter 5. On Tribuno, see Ortalli, ‘Il
Ducato’, pp. 752–3.
209 M. Pozza, I Badoer. Una famiglia veneziana dal X al XIII secolo (Abano Terme, 1982), pp. 9–11.
210 JnD III. 40.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 243

militaristic Candiani.211 This would explain why he was not succeeded by his son,
but by Peter II Candiano, the son of Peter I Candiano, who was regarded as
having died for Venice in his fight against the Slavs. When Peter II Candiano died
in 939, he was succeeded by the son of Ursus Particiaco, Ursus II, also known as
Peter Badoer, who was in turn succeeded, on his death in 942, by the son of Peter
II Candiano, Peter III. It looks as though there was some kind of unofficial agree-
ment that these two families should share power by alternating their hold on the
ducal title.212 If so, this ‘agreement’ came to an end with the rise of another family
challenging the Candiani—the Orseolo. The first appearance of an Orseolo may
have been that of a Peter Rosolo who, together with an Ursus Badoer, were the
leaders of a naval expedition against the Narentani pirates set up by Peter III
Candiano, which had only moderate success.213 Since the politics and factional
struggles of Peter IV Candiano, Peter I Orseolo, and then his son Peter II Orseolo
are central to their rule, I will deal with them separately.

The Other Aristocratic Families

The original political structure of Venice was, of course, the Byzantine one of
dukes, magistri militum, and tribunes. The magistri militum gradually disap-
peared after the eighth century, and we only find the title twice more in Venetian
sources.214 Most of note, other than the doges themselves, are the tribunes. As we
can see when we discuss any of the elite involved in the early history of Venice, we
find that, with very few exceptions, all names are composed of a Christian name
and a surname. This unusually early use of the cognomen was already in place in
Venice in the late eighth century, as we can tell from the ducal names of Monegario
and Galbaio, though others, like the Doges Obelerius and Beatus, and various
tribunes who style themselves by their location (like cata . . .), are equally common
at this stage.215 I will return in Chapter 6 to the importance of this factor, both in
terms of self-consciousness of this elite and of the connection (or not) of this
naming pattern with a perceived Byzantine tradition, by comparing it with Rome.

211 JnD III. 43; Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 761. 212 Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 763.
213 JnD IV. 6.
214 Cessi, I. 44, referring to a Rainerius Geno in 819; he was more likely to have been a duke of the
area of terraferma, where the S. Ilario grant which mentions him was situated, though that too would
by then have been Venetian terraferma; and I. 45 in 824, with the mention of a magister militum John.
215 D. Olivieri, I Cognomi della Venezia Euganea (Geneva: Biblioteca dell’Archivum Romanicum,
ser. 2., vol. 6, 1983); G. B. Pellegrini, Ricerche di toponomastica veneta (Padua, 1987), and
G. B. Pellegrini, Toponomastica Veneta (Venice, 1961); and M. De Biasi, Toponomastica a Venezia
(Venice, 1981). We now have a major new resource for the study of these names and families at this
period in the recent prosopography by L. A. Berto, In Search of the First Venetians: Prosopography of
Early Medieval Venice (Turnhout, 2014); see also V. West-Harling, ‘Personal Names and Saints’ Cult in
Venice, the Adriatic and the entroterra in the Ninth and Tenth Centuries’, in Gasparri and Gelichi,
eds., The Age of Affirmation, pp. 263–76.
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244 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

The study of the remaining documents, keeping in mind all the usual caveats
associated with the problems of survival, made worse in this instance by the
known disappearance of many through the fire at the ducal chancery in 976 and
of subsequent deadly fires in the city in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, never-
theless allows us to follow the decline of some families and the rise of others in
the ninth and tenth centuries. A summary of this evolution would look something
like this. In 819, the witnesses to the foundation charter of the monastery of
S. Ilario, and the move there of the monastery of S. Servolo, included five tribunes,
only known by their Christian names.216 In 829, we have again six tribunes
­witnessing Doge Justinian Particiaco’s will; one must note, however, that the
family’s landed property, either inherited or acquired by Justinian or his father,
came from the purchase of land belonging to various tribunes or, in some cases,
their daughters (some of them nuns, such as Agatha, daughter of the ex-Doge
Maurice Galbaio), in places like Jesolo, Torcello, and Cittanova.217 Of the sellers,
only one family, that of a Grauso, reappears subsequently, as the Grausi. In the 853
will of Bishop Ursus of Olivolo, there are again seven tribunes among the wit-
nesses, several styling themselves with the Greek cata plus a place name. One had
a Christian name which later became a family name, Foscari—a not uncommon
practice. Equally, two families which appear in this document for the first time,
the Mastalici and the Contarini, were on course to become two of the rising stars
in the city.218 In 880 they appear again in an agreement between the doge and the
Patriarch of Aquileia Walpert, in which there were, however, only two people call-
ing themselves tribunes (out of eight witnesses), as usual associated with places,
Luprio (Aulibato) and Gemino (Vigilius); at the same time, at least two of the
other witnesses were now using the titles of patricius; the Mastalici are also
witnesses.219 The ducal decree of 900 helping rebuild S. Stefano of Altino after the
Hungarian attacks only includes one tribune, with the other two major names
belonging to two by now well-established families, the Gradenici and the
Badoer.220 Several documents dating from between 932 and 953 give us the first
appearance of three other major families, the Bonoaldi and the Mauroceni, first
associated with Istria, and the de Molin, while the treaty with Istria in 977
includes a Mauroceno, but also, for the first time, a Noheli and an Andreadi.221
The two very important decrees by Peter IV Candiano forbidding first the slave
trade (960), then the arms trade (971), were the first two documents to include
the signatures of the foremost families in the city in large numbers.222 This time,
there are more than one member for the really significant families: in 960, for
example, we have the Mauroceni with four family members, and the Bonoaldo,

216 Cessi, I. 44, and DV no. 2. 217 Cessi, I. 53, and DV no. 4.
218 Cessi, I. 60, and DV no. 5. 219 Cessi, II. 15, and DV no. 6.
220 Cessi, II. 25, and DV no. 7. 221 Cessi, II. 35, and DV no. 11.
222 Cessi, II. 41 and 49, and DV nos 18 and 19.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 245

Gradenici, and Flabiani with two, from the families already in place, and, for the
first time, the Bragadin with three, and another three families with two. In 971,
we have again the old families like the Mauroceni, the de Molin, and the Bragadin
with one member each, but among the newer families we find two representatives
for each of the Barbadici, the Sturladi, and the Orseolo.223 Clearly one needs to
moderate the long-lasting traditional view of a gradual decline of the tribunicial
families in positions of power.224 This is often less a decline in numbers and wealth
than a transformation, either through successful adaptation to the new political,
social, and economic conditions, or through a takeover by the smaller and poorer
landed families by the more successful trading ones. Occasionally, the assimila-
tion comes through marriage, as was the case of Doge Peter Tribuno, the son of a
tribune and of Agnella Particiaco, and then doge himself. But the change seems
more a matter of political and geographical awareness: those who understood
that power was increasingly in trade and in Rialto, and moved with it, remained
powerful and became richer, while the others gradually faded away. Thus we see
two later famous tribunes, Bonus of Malamocco and Rusticus of Torcello, clearly
engaging in trade, and risky trade at that, being the men who went to Alexandria,
from where they brought back the relics of St Mark; or the tribune Aurius from
Torcello, who had the means to build the churches on the island.225 A further
picture of the rising families can be obtained from the successive negotiators and
witnesses to the repeated renewal of the Pactum Lotharii over 150 years: Vigilius
and Leo ‘veneticus’ (Charles the Fat), Maurice and Vitalis ‘veneticos’ (Guy),
Stefanus Coloprinus (Rudolf), the same and John Fabianicum (Hugh), John
Contarini (Otto I), Badovarius Noheli and Peter Andreadi tribunes (Otto II) and
John Orseolo (Otto III); this appears to be a succession of merchants up to
increasingly higher placed aristocrats. Nevertheless, two of these families, now at
the apex of the social and political tree, the Noheli and Andreadi, still called
themselves tribunes.
In 932 there were twenty people mentioned in the tribute agreement with
Capodistria as participants, and fifty-four signatories as witnesses. Of the inhabit-
ants of Istrian cities, only one is directly qualified as ‘veneticus’. Twenty-eight at
least of the fifty-four names are characteristic for men said to be from the Adriatic
hinterland, originally associated with the Exarchate. Many among them are indis-
tinguishable from the most common Venetian (though in some cases just general
Italian) names: Dominic, Vitalis, Ursus, Maurice, George, and, of course, John,

223 In 960: Mauroceni (4), Bonoaldo (2), de Molino (1), Badoer (1), Gradenici (2), Flabiani (2),
Contarini (1), Grausoni (1); first time, Petrolonghi (2), Bragadin (3), Coloprini (1), Succogallo or
Saccogallo (2), Heliadi (1), Longo (2), Orseolo (1). In 971: Mauroceni (1), de Molino (1), Bragadin (1),
Coloprini (1), Succogallo (1), Andreadi (1), Noheli (1); first time, Faletri (1), Barbadici (2), Sturladi
(2), Stornato (1), Orseoli (2).
224 Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 735; Castagnetti, ‘Insediamenti’ and ‘Famiglie e affermazione politica’, in
SV, pp. 585–7 and 613–44;
225 Colombi, ‘Translatio S. Marci’, p. 118; Origo I, pp. 31–4.
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246 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

while 120 years of Carolingian presence have yielded a variety of Lombard or

Frankish names such as Audebertus, Faragarius, Amelricus, and Theoderic.
Significantly too, we have a mix of the two, such as Sergius, son of Giselpert or
Giselpergus, or Accius brother of Folcard, showing either the intermarriage
between the two ethnic groups or the borrowing of naming practices in Istria. It is
even more interesting to correlate, when possible, the personal names with the
nature of their titles—Audebertus locopositus, Dominic scavinus—and their place
of origin when given—Dominic of Istria Ciontauriaci, George of Armentressa of
Isola, John son of Felicitas of Melinda. This is another practical demonstration,
both of the association of Frankish names and Byzantine functions and titles, or
vice versa, and of the ubiquity of some of the ‘Venetian’ names throughout Istrian
cities. For most of these people, it is not possible to determine whether they are
Istrians, or Venetians living in Istria, which shows the common roots of the two.
We know that, among the families living in Rialto, several were of Istrian origin,
like the Jubianici from Justinopolis, just as several bishops of Torcello also came
from Istria.226 In 977, nearly fifty years after the first treaty, we find only one per-
son among the participants in the new Istrian treaty who had probably attended
the original agreement in 932, but there are several people who were probably the
children of some of the above. Among the names recorded in 977, only three have
a possibly Frankish origin: Olmann, Waltram (whose brother is, however, called
Benedict, and both nephews are part of the Andreadi family), and Robert, the
notary. Of the others, many names belong to the Venetian/Istrian/Adriatic trad­
ition, but also to families of note in Venice itself: the Mauroceni, the Noheli/Noeli,
the Andreadi. These may have been merchants who had family members in the
main trading cities of Istria, rather than Istrian families made good who were
migrating towards the bright lights of Venice. What really matters, however, is the
constant flow and interaction between Venetians and their Adriatic background.
A set of three very important documents from the end of the tenth century
provide us with an exceptionally full snapshot of the by-now fully fledged set of
key families in the city, many being names still recognizable today as those of the
main patrician families throughout the history of the city. These documents are
four sets of tithes imposed by the doge, in 978, 978/9, and 979/91, and sometime
between 994 and 1001.227 The first gives us the names of Heliadi, Succogallo, and,
for the first time, Dandolo; the second includes older names (Orseolo, Gradenici,
Bonoaldi, Bragadin, Barbadici), but also a slew of new ones—Monetari, Boldu,
Loredan, and (da) Canal. Finally, two more documents provide another two long
lists of the main families in the city. The first is the foundation charter of S. Giorgio

226 Origo III, pp. 128–9.

227 Cessi, II. 57, 58, 59, and 70, and DV nos 22, 23, 24; Orseolo (1), Monetari (2), Boldu (1), de
Molino (4), Flabiani (1), Canal (7), Faletri (1), Foscari (3), Longo (1), and Bragadin (1).
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 247

Maggiore in 982.228 Among the signatories are the usual names,229 but with a strong
presence of some families, with three each for the Stornato and Badoer, four
Bonoaldi, five Orseolo, and no less than nine Mauroceni, admittedly the founder’s
family. The Mauroceni remained at the forefront in the documentation, notably
as sellers of land to the monastery of Brondolo in 991, and as one of the two rep-
resentatives of the doge at the placitum of 996, dealing one final time with the
conflict between Venice and the bishop of Belluno regarding their contested
rights over Cittanova.230 One last key document, dated to between 994 and 1001,
gives an even more complete picture of the key players in the city.231 It comes at
the height of Peter II Orseolo’s power, and demonstrates his acceptance and high
reputation among his peers. These actually put their names to a promissio,
en­gaging themselves to refrain from fomenting trouble ‘in the palace’, which is to
say that they accepted forgoing the far from uncommon coups attempted by these
various families worried about the possibility of too much power being appropri-
ated by one of them. The signatories were the Noheli, Barbolano, Gradenico,
Contareni, Bembo, Heliadi, and Badoer once, the Mauroceni, Centranici,
Bonoaldi, Andreadi, and Flabianici, as well as Orseoli, twice, and the de Molin
with four names.
This body of documents provides the means to study the decline of some of the
early Venetian families, which had been part of the original military body ruling
in the Exarchate, with their power based on a combination of military delegated
power and possession of land, and the rise of others, notably through a study of
the geography of their origins and means of power. By the twelfth century many
Venetian elite families had put forward the claim of originating in various parts of
northern Italy, from which they had allegedly migrated, first to such places as
Cittanova Eracleia and Equilo/Jesolo, and from there to Rialto in the ninth
century. By studying the geographical location of the main Venetian families
as they themselves put forward in the two catalogues found in the Origo—of
which one was claimed by Cessi in his edition to be incorporating a probably
original ninth-century text—one can at least document, in the foundation myths
of these fam­ilies, where they thought they came from, and how they still main-
tained the memory of that real or fictional origin in the twelfth century.232 When
doing so, we find their alleged origin in cities like Mantua, Cremona, Pavia,
Treviso, Ferrara, Forli, Parma, and even Florence. Some families were said to have
arrived directly from there, though often we find prestigious families with no

228 Cessi, II. 61, and DV no. 25 (with a gap); see also the edition in Lanfranchi, Giorgio Maggiore.
229 Mastalici, Coloprini, Bembo, Grausoni, Andreadi, Dandolo, Noheli, and Contarini once; two
members each of the Centranico, Barbolan, Bragadin, Flabianico, Succogallo, and Sturlato families.
230 Cessi, II. 74. 231 Cessi II. 81, and DV no. 33.
232 Origo, first version, ch. 9, pp. 43–4 and 46–7, and third version, chs. 8 and 10, pp. 146–53 and
157–60; Rösch, Der venezianische Adel, pp. 17–34. Origo: the earliest catalogue, in Version 3, dates
from 1081 to 1118, but it is possible that the catalogue in Version 1 is a copy of an older, ninth-century
version, according to Rösch, Der Venezianische Adel, p. 25.
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248 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

other place of origin than Cittanova (Orseoli and Bragadin). In addition, most of
the above families are specifically said to have been tribunes. The evidence based
on the shift in prosperity and success of these important families suggests that the
old tribunician families, unless they adapted to the new trade and maritime eco-
nomics of the city, did not survive—their names dwindled away from the docu-
ments, and finally disappeared from them altogether. Many original major names
continued to exist, and increase in status and prosperity, but they were no longer
the only ones. A new set of families came on board in the second half of the cen-
tury, who were not part of the noble class before, but who gradually came to
prom­in­ence. Eventually, they became equally important in the documentation,
especially in tax returns, meaning that they were among the richest people in the
city. An all-encompassing document such as the foundation charter of S. Giorgio
may be inclusive in incorporating all the traditional great names as a mark of
respect, but the tax returns and the decrees on the slave and arms trade are prob-
ably more significant in terms of commercial and economic weight.
While it is of considerable interest to see where the main families of primates
thought, or wanted it thought, they came from, increasingly in the tenth century
what becomes significant is where they actually lived in the city. One recalls the
way in which tribunes often defined themselves in relation to the area where they
lived, such as de Gemino or de Luprio.233 The gradual impact of leading families
on the urban planning and development of the city is evident from the top­og­raphy.
As we move on into the tenth century, families begin to be associated not only
with islands—for example, Torcello, Murano, or Malamocco—but more precisely
with areas such as Rivoalto, Castello, Dorsoduro, and Canaleclo (Cannaregio),
and even with specific canals—de rivo S. Laurentio, S. Marini, S. Toma, or
S. Apostolorum.234 Well-known names such as Bonoaldo (rivo S. Laurentio) and
Longhi (rivo S. Tomà) are given and, in some cases, a family seems to have been
associated with more than one place—the Bonoaldi, for example, with the rivo
S. Laurentio as well as with Malamocco, and the da Canal with Malamocco,
Murano, Constantiniaco, and Castello.235 Despite its apparent destruction after
Obelerius’ rebellion, Malamocco seems to have recovered, with not a few im­port­
ant families still living there and, above all, being sufficiently well off to pay the
taxes agreed with the Doges Tribuno Memmo and Peter II Orseolo. Another
inference from the fact that some families, or various members thereof, already
had several houses is not simply their wealth. It is also that, as part of the old elite
originally associated with one of the older settlements like Malamocco or Murano,
they were increasingly moving closer to the centre of power and trade, as did the
Badoer and the Mauroceni in Rialto, and the da Canal in Castello. Moreover, they

233 Cessi, I. 15.

234 Cessi, II. 49, 58, 59, 61, and 70, and DV nos 19, 23, 24, for the first 3; see also Dorigo, Venezia
romanica, pp. 26–7.
235 Cessi, II. 58, 59, 61, and 70.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 249

also contributed to the expansion of the city in its newly settled areas of Dorsoduro
and Cannaregio, an expansion in which the doges were directly involved. The
doges encouraged these developments, for example by supporting the new
Dorsoduro settlement—giving the ‘licentiam . . . paludes cultandi . . . et domos aedi-
ficandi’—promoting the draining and clearing of marshy ground, as Doge Ursus
Particiaco (864–81) and other members of that family did, and also ‘advised’ on
drainage in other areas of Dorsoduro, such as S. Basilio, S. Vio, and in Castello
around S. Antonin.236 Areas developed before the eleventh-century major expan-
sion of the city were especially those of Gemino (across Castello from SS Apostoli
all the way to Bragora and up to the monastery of S. Daniele) and Luprio, later
also known as Lacus Badovariorum (obviously connected to the Badoer posses-
sions). Luprio was vast, and in the ninth and tenth centuries stretched across
S. Croce, from the parishes of S. Canciano to the two S. Simeone, and up to
S. Polo and Dorsoduro, encompassing the ‘lakes’ of S. Margherita, S. Pantalon,
and S. Trovasio, as yet undrained areas which would become future campi.237
Gemino had the core of the early church foundations (S. Giovanni in Bragora,
S. Martino, S. Severo, which belonged to the monastery of S. Lorenzo, and
S. Maria Formosa).238 Canaleclum had been one of early areas of development,
and so had been the commercial zone of S. Salvador, S. Demetrio, then S. Bortolo,
on the edge of the Rialto Bridge. This was even earlier than the Rialto settlement
of the ninth–tenth centuries around the old churches of S. Teodoro, S. Menna,
S. Vittorio, then S. Moisè, and of course later the Piazza itself.239 Churches became
the power base of individual families: Dorigo has studied in detail, including
through extensive tables, these growing connections between families and urban
geography.240 The economic shift from the tenth and especially eleventh centuries
onwards matched the development of ducal power centred on Rialto and the
Grand Canal, and of the increasingly maritime base of the city. It may thus explain
the topography and economic weighting of the city from the line of demographic
occupation and economic power extending from Castello to Cannaregio before
the ninth century to the deliberate building up of the St Mark’s power node and
the Grand Canal focus.

The Struggle for Control of the Duchy

In Chapter 1, while following the narrative of the three Galbaio reigns, Fortunatus’
attempts to control Grado, and the vicissitudes of the Carolingian period for the
city, I was mostly telling the tale as the sources suggested it. Here I should like to

236 JnD III. 27; Dorigo, Venezia romanica, pp. 15–6, 26, 29–30.
237 Dorigo, Venezia romanica, pp. 7, 15, 26–30. 238 Dorigo, Venezia romanica, p. 14.
239 Dorigo, Venezia romanica, pp. 13–4.
240 Dorigo, Venezia romanica, pp. 53–66, and esp. the tables on pp. 57–61.
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250 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

dig deeper into the various ever-changing alliances, leading to, or brought about
by, plots to dislodge one or another ducal family, to try and understand which
men, families, and interests they represented. The first example is that of Maurice
Galbaio, who, according to traditional historiography, being from Cittanova, a
Byzantine foundation, was said to be pro-Byzantine, as were his son John, then
grandson Maurice. But at this stage this would have been an anachronism: no
doge would actually have imagined being anything else, since Venice belonged to
the Eastern Roman Empire. Thus, when John and Maurice II to all intents and
purposes killed Patriarch John of Grado, their action was prompted not because
the patriarch was ‘pro-Frankish’, but probably because they saw the coronation of
Charlemagne as a potentially risky opportunity for new alliances to be formed
between Grado, as the patriarchate of Venice, and the Carolingian Empire. Does
the idea that Maurice II was pushed out by the ‘tribunes’ party’, including the new
Doges Obelerius and Beato, because he was pro-Byzantine and they were pro-
Frankish, actually hold? It seems much more likely that this was not a political
choice in imperial terms, but the reflection of a conflict between two sets of fam­
ilies, from Cittanova and Malamocco respectively, for dominance in the lagoon.
When Pepin attempted to gain control over Venice, was the fight against him one
against the Carolingians, and for the Byzantines in principle, as so much of
Venetian historiography saw it until Ortalli and Gasparri, or was it a fight against
a ruler coming too close to Venice in terms of direct control? It is probable that
we may have a little of both, since there had been a clear takeover by the
Carolingians of the Italian kingdom, and they had not returned it to Byzantium.
Therefore Venice, as a Byzantine possession, might have seen it as necessary to
defend its traditional alliance with Byzantium, as well as being more or less forced
into it by the presence of Nicetas and the imperial fleet in the Adriatic. But it is
also likely that the conflict played out at imperial level also played into the hands
of conflicts of interests between, for example, the Malamocco tribunes and the
expanding vision of Venice as a rising power, in need of strong defences against
foreign aggressors like the Carolingians. It would have been apparent that Venice
needed a more easily defensible internal lagoon, as well as being in need of
expansion onto a larger island. Obelerius and his brothers, the ‘doges of
Malamocco’, were said to have been men with a more limited or traditional
vision, using the Carolingian alliance against rising families like the Particiaco,
who were expanding merchants as well as rulers and who, therefore, needed the
better geographical base of Rialto, to which Agnellus Particiaco moved the centre
of power. The ‘Frankish alliance’ of Obelerius would obviously not have been
accepted by fam­ilies like the Particiaci, who preferred the remote and more prof-
itable Byzantine association, one of less significance for the more expansionist
Malamocco fam­ilies. And this, it has been argued, is what may have led Obelerius
to his Frankish alliance, while Pepin and Charles used this opportunity to gain
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 251

ground. I will return shortly to the implications of the agreement between

Charlemagne and Nicephorus, which led to Obelerius and his brother being
invited to Constantinople, and to the issue of whether Obelerius was a ‘turncoat’
or just a practical Venetian going with the interests of the city. Here, I should like
to suggest that, when Obelerius and Beatus were deposed, this was only the first
ex­ample of the increasingly evident policy of almost all Venetian families always
to support the ‘distant ruler’ rather than the potentially more dangerous one next
door, in this case the Carolingians. Whenever doges or important families, such
as the later Candiani or Coloprini, attempted alliances with Italy’s rulers, whether
Carolingians, kings of Italy, or Ottonians, they were deposed by the Venetian
elite. Peter IV Candiano’s alliance with Marquess Hugh of Tuscany, Berengar,
then Otto I, Peter I Orseolo’s secret flight to Cuxa, then Doge Tribuno Menio’s
apparent support for the Coloprini, perceived as ‘selling’ the city to Otto II, are
all examples of how getting too close to royal and imperial power in Italy was a
bad move, especially after Otto II’s blockade of the city. Even Peter II Orseolo,
with all his prestige, and despite his more open pro-Ottonian stance, was in fact
prudent about being seen to be too friendly with the Western emperor; hence
perhaps the secrecy of Otto III’s visit to Venice, likely to have been wanted by the
doge himself.
To the first discussion, concerning the existence of a split between pro-Byzantine
and pro-Frankish families on those grounds, and to what extent there was a use of
external imperial events on the basis of pro-Byzantine or pro-Frankish choices
rather than on the basis of family interest, must now be added a second question.
Was there a link between the merchant families, the northern lagoon, their ori-
gins in the old Venetia, and their Byzantine stance, in opposition to the families
from Malamocco and the southern lagoon islands, who were more pro-Frankish?
Traditionally, this has been the view of Cessi, Pertusi, and others after them. This
in turn, then, begs the question of whether some families represented ‘foreign’
interests, especially imperial ones, or whether they just used ‘foreign’ ­crises to fur-
ther either their personal advantage or the advantage of Venice, or both? I fully
believe the latter to have been the case. But if one were to contend that a deliber-
ate pro-Frankish or pro-Byzantine choice weighed more heavily than I seem to
imply, then we must ask another question too: was there a change over time in
such choices? If one were to see the stance of the Galbaio doges versus Obelerius
and Beatus at the start of the ninth century as really being about Byzantine versus
Frankish choices, then was the fight between the Morosini and Coloprini families
in the late 970s to early 980s a matter of personal choice of which doge to follow,
or of one family being pro-Ottonian and the other not? To my mind, here also the
external factors were used by the participants, but in reality we are dealing with
an internal power struggle between two elite families, in which the Ottonians
were involved but were not crucial to the argument.
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252 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Most of the questions posed here are best followed through the core element of
Venetian political rule—the elections, conspiracies, and depositions of the doges.
I have already mentioned some of these conspiracies previously, beginning with
the three against the Particiaco doges, seen as an attempt by some parts of the
aristocracy, marginalized by Doge Agnellus, to oppose the Particiaci’s growing
power. One had been led by Obelerius after his return from Constantinople,
where he had been exiled. When he attempted a coup to regain his power in
Venice, John Particiaco sent an army to capture him near Pellestrina, but the
army split into two, and one part of it, the people from Malamocco, joined
Obelerius. John was victorious in destroying them, capturing Obelerius and hav-
ing him executed, and, as a bonus, destroying Malamocco in 831.241 John the
Deacon describes this conspiracy as a major disaster, not because it might have
been a pro-Frankish one, but because of the revelation of Malamocco’s loyalties:
had it succeeded, all that the Particiaci had created at Rialto would have been
reversed, and the centre of the lagoon would have gone back away from Rialto.
Clearly this reflected the doge’s own views since, once defeated by the ducal army,
Obelerius was executed and, far more importantly, Malamocco was destroyed, to
the extent that it would never again resurface as a city of political significance.
The main conspiracy against John took place sometime between 829 and 831,
when the tribune Caroso and a sizeable and consequent group of the highest aris-
tocracy attempted to depose him. Doge John fled to Francia to Charles the Bald,
together with a sizeable group (over thirty) of the nobility which left with him,
and they went either to Francia or, in some cases, only as far as Mestre, where
they succeeded in attracting many more Venetians opposed to Caroso’s rule.242
Caroso ruled as doge for a year, but John Particiaco’s followers returned, deposed
Caroso and his followers, and for a year, with admirable restraint, did not elect
another doge but simply asked Bishop Ursus of Olivolo (another Particiaco) to
govern, while awaiting Doge John’s return from Francia. Caroso’s attempt has
been seen as the last time the tribunate tried to control power, a not entirely
unproblematic view since Caroso himself was a man of very great standing and
power, witnessing state and other important documents, such as Justinian’s will,
second only after the clergy, and first among the secular magnates; moreover,
there were as many tribunes on his side as on the Particiaci side.243 A study of the
names involved in the Caroso conspiracy reveals them to have been, other than
Caroso himself, another five men, of whom one was Dominic Monetario (usually

241 JnD II. 41.

242 JnD II. 44; on the conspiracy, see Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, pp. 735–6; Cessi, Venezia Ducale, pp. 206–8;
for the members and especially the two tribunicial families of the Caroso and the Monetario, see
Castagnetti, La Società veneziana nel medioevo I, p. 172, and Castagnetti, ‘Famiglie e affermazione
politica’, in SV, p. 616.
243 Berto, JnD, n. 104, p. 237, rightly suggests that it would be wrong to see this with the traditional
view that the rebellion was a form of opposition between the old tribunate and the new families like
the Particiaci.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 253

identified with the later Monegario family). We recall that a John Monetario—
conceivably named after his trade as a moneyer or banker, which then became the
cognomen of the family—had already been part of a previous conspiracy against
Agnellus Particiaco. This might lead one to see the family as one opposing the
Particiaci, and Dominic Monetario as joining Caroso on those grounds, meaning
that he wanted Caroso as doge not because he was a tribune but because he
opposed the Particiaci. In the same way, Marinus Patricius, another conspirator,
would be next seen, unharmed, in Torcello, where his base was, restoring the
church of the Virgin.244
These two examples of opposition to John suggest two conclusions. The first is
that one cannot simply contrast the Particiaci, as members of a new aristocracy
which combined both trade and lands as the source of their wealth, with the
‘tribunate’, which had remained attached to the land, and in particular to land on
the islands of the lagoon like Malamocco or Torcello, since we have men called
tribunes in both camps. The second conclusion is that made by Ortalli, who sug-
gests that the rebellion showed a double fracture in Venetian society, one hori-
zontal and geographical, with the opposition of Rialto and the islands, and the
other vertical, with the opposition between the old tribunician class and the new
aristocratic one, both leading to tensions and a conflict resulting in Malamocco in
particular resenting the transfer of power to Rialto, with the doge’s emphatic
response showing the fear of a breakup of the unity of Venice itself.245
John’s rule was not destined to end peacefully, and another conspiracy, led by
the Mastalici family, had him tonsured. This time the rebelling faction was not led
by an old-style tribune family but by one of the new aristocracy, from the same
group from which the Particiaci had emerged, originally from Cittanova, and
now with a mixed wealth base in Rialto. In other words, the power struggle was
now among groups of the same families of new rulers. On the other hand, one
could also argue that all these families were originally families of the tribunate,
and that the Particiaci were in fact tribunes who had ‘got it right’, saw clearly
where the future lay, and diversified their wealth, which they had gained in the
first place by buying land from other tribunes like Maurice Galbaio. They were
not a truly different group, only more astute and successful tribunes, who moved
away from a purely land-based background and thus became the successful Rialto
trade families which had become dominant by the tenth century in Venice.
Another neuralgic point came a century later, with the rule of Peter III
Candiano. Like his predecessors, he also chose, with the agreement of the people,
to have his son Peter as a co-ruler. However, young Peter turned out to be a very
large handful. He rebelled against his father, and his supporters came to blows
with his father’s supporters in Rialto: the ‘people’ supported the old doge and

244 JnD III. 3. 245 Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 736.

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254 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

wanted to kill the younger Peter, though his father prevailed in only having him
exiled with his followers.246 The ‘people’, together with the bishops and clergy,
swore an oath never to allow him to return, and he left Venice to put himself at
the service of Berengar II. He gained great favour by fighting alongside Berengar,
who then allowed him to take revenge on the Venetians by going to Ravenna
where, with six Ravennate ships, he attacked the seven Venetian ships in port and
captured them. But when Peter III died, ‘many Venetians’, including bishops and
abbots, ‘forgot their oath’ and sent thirty ships to Ravenna to ask the young Peter
to return to Venice. The story of the clash between father and son, beyond the fam-
ily tension, should be examined as a revealing pattern in the struggle of the
Venetian elites. When the ‘people’ took an oath against the younger Peter to forbid
his return, was this truly at the request of his father, as John the Deacon claims, or
is it more likely that the opposing factions supporting father and son corresponded
to major families on either side? When Peter was recalled, John the Deacon tells us
that it was because of the ‘people’s fickleness’, but once again other factors may
have played a role: fear of Berengar II, whom Peter IV had joined, or, even likelier,
fear because he had proved successful in defeating Venetian ships—so that it was
clearly better to have him as a doge rather than as an enemy of Venice.
I should like to explore two more aspects of the complex events leading to
Peter IV’s recall. It might be possible to see the opposition between father and son
(Peter III and Peter IV) also in terms of ecclesiastical allegiances, since on both
the occasion of taking the oath against Peter and that of recalling him, the clergy,
bishops, and abbots of Venice are mentioned; was Peter perhaps a candidate of, or
at any rate supported by, the clergy, against some of the aristocracy? Was he per-
haps supported by some of the clergy, for example the monastic clergy, morally
more inflexible, against the bishops—a hypothesis which is not unthinkable, since
he was the doge who later took the most radical anti-slavery measures with his
decrees forbidding the slave trade and arms trade to the Muslims, and was also
responsible for ejecting Bishop Mineus of Torcello from his see for simony?247
Peter IV was one of the few doges to show some interest in ecclesiastical policy in
the tenth century, before Peter II Orseolo, and he placed members of his family in
key positions, giving the abbacy of S. Zaccaria to his ex-wife, and the patriarchate
of Grado to their son. When defeating the Venetian ships, he had done so with
the help of the Ravennate navy—incidentally allowing us to glimpse how Venice
dominated the port of Ravenna, where it came and went with its trading fleet. But

246 JnD IV. 8–10.

247 Origo III, p. 130. This is discussed by Berto, ‘Pietro IV Candiano’, pp. 162–8, recalling the debate
between G. Cracco, ‘I testi agiografici: religione e politica nella Venezia del Mille’ in SV, pp. 923–61,
on one side, and Ortalli and Castagnetti on the other. On Peter IV, see JnD, IV. 9–13; Ortalli, ‘Il
Ducato’, pp. 763–8; Castagnetti, ‘Famiglie e affermazione politica’, pp. 623–6 and Castagnetti., La soci-
età veneziana nel medioevo I; see also M. Pozza, 1981, ‘Vitale-Ugo Candiano. Alle origini di una
famiglia comitale del regno italico’, Studi Veneziani, n.s. 5, pp. 15–33 at 18–23, 28–30.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 255

the Ravenna connection is especially significant here. Peter IV’s first wife, Joanna,
came from a Ravennate family.248 This has crucial political significance, and I will
return to it after looking at Peter IV’s policies with regard to his allegiance to the
king of Italy (Berengar II), then the Emperor Otto I.
Peter’s actions at this point seem to confirm his political engagement in Italy. It
has been said that—at first from inclination and later increasingly from political
views acquired during his exile in the Regnum at the courts, first of Berengar II,
later of Otto I—Peter IV wanted a much closer relationship with the Regnum
Italiae, then the Ottonian empire, and a more personal style of government in the
mould of that of the great imperial deputies in the Italian kingdom.249 His first act
on returning to Venice, for example, was to demand an oath of fidelity, a novel
concept in the Venetian political landscape. The oath was only the first mani­fest­
ation of such new practices. Other policies followed. His association with
Berengar, then, when the latter rebelled against Otto I with Otto himself, led Peter
IV into an increasing involvement with central Italian power struggles, notably
with attacks in support of Otto on such cities as Ferrara and Oderzo, in Romagna
and in the Pentapolis, which both mostly supported Berengar. This Italian engage-
ment was carried out with the help of what amounted to an army of Italian sol-
diers, which Peter brought with him to Venice and used as a mercenary bodyguard
for himself in the palace. One may well wonder what prompted his change of
alliance from Berengar to Otto: belief that Venice should be part of Italy and a
Western Empire, governed on the Ottonian model—perhaps an idealistic mod-
ern historiographical view—or political opportunism?
There is no doubt, however, that Peter IV’s engagement with Italian affairs was
further enhanced by his family policies going back to his father himself. Peter III
had married a woman of obvious Longobard descent, Richelda. His two sons, the
future Peter IV and Vitalis, also married into the Italian aristocracy. Either before
or after 963, when he became doge, Peter IV divorced his first wife, Joanna, whom
he nevertheless took the precaution of installing as abbess of S. Zaccaria, the fore-
most ducal monastery, in order to marry Waldrada, sister of Marquess Hugh of
Tuscany and niece of the Empress Adelheid—that is to say, one of the foremost
heiresses of the kingdom.250 Whether he married her because of this connection,
or because he wanted to marry into a powerful Italian family and then, for family
reasons, supported the emperor and made use of the imperial association to fur-
ther his local power base, cannot be known. Certainly Waldrada brought him a
vast patrimony on the Italian mainland, to which were added the estates gained
by Peter IV’s brother Vitalis, who changed his name to Hugh. Vitalis-Hugh

248 DOI, p. 368; on this, see Provesi, ‘Le due mogli di Pietro IV Candiano’, pp. 1–31.
249 On Peter IV’s reign, see Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, pp. 763–6, and Berto, ‘Pietro IV Candiano’, pp.
163–8.
250 Berto, JnD, note 16 to Book IV on the date issue.
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256 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

married Emilia, from the Lombard family of Count Hubert of Vicenza, with
estates of great consequence in the counties of Vicenza, Padua, and Treviso. This
would later enable Vitalis to be appointed count of Vicenza by Otto III, and then
count of Padua, a title he held between 998 and 1001.251 It may thus seem that
Peter IV’s second marriage was a reflection of a clear change of policy, as has
always been thought until now.
But—and this is a big but—Peter IV’s family policies seem to have been rather
more complex than that. The Candiano family’s alliance with the Ottonians, and
with leading families in the Empire, may well have run counter to that of another
family group in Venice, that of the first wife of Peter IV, Joanna, from a Ravennate
family based in an area where the marquess of Tuscany had interests. When he
divorced Joanna, with her Ravenna family associations, he gave her the most
important ‘post’ a woman could have in Venice in terms of power, that of abbess
of S. Zaccaria, and as soon as he was able to, he appointed his son by her, Vitalis
Candiano, patriarch of Grado. This may have been due to the need to appease her
family, and their probable supporters in Venice, by showing her the respect com-
mensurate with her position. On the other hand, it may also be that the doge’s
‘two wives’ represented two sides of his policies; not necessarily as many have
seen them, following each other, with the first marriage representing a traditional
alliance and the second a rejection of this in favour of his newly found enthusi-
asm for the kingdom of Italy and then Otto I, but rather as a dual policy of alli-
ances with both the Empire and the Venetian families which had an interest in
the continuation of Venetian autonomy of trade. The compromise may not have
been completely successful, and it may be that some of Joanna’s relatives were
among the most unsatisfied of the aristocratic families which plotted Peter IV’s
removal, especially once a son had been born to him and Waldrada. We certainly
know that not all the Candiani supported Peter, and that at least one of his broth-
ers was among the plotters who killed him outside the palace. The attack by Otto
II on Venice in 982, as described by John the Deacon, may thus not have been
actually directed by Otto II but possibly by the family group of the Tuscan mar-
quess and the Empress Adelheid in the background, with Otto II, involved in
southern Italy, possibly sitting back to see which way the situation would go. On
the other hand, Peter IV himself may well have hedged his bets and, while marry-
ing Waldrada and the Regnum, he had in fact maintained an interest in Joanna
and her supporters in Venice, as we saw earlier. The policies of the Candiano fam-
ily, with its strong interests in the Regnum, were to use every kind of support of
the aristocracy of the terraferma, including the Ottonian emperor himself, in
their fight against the rival Orseolo family. On the other hand, whatever the

251 On this alliance, La società veneziana nel medioevo II, pp. 11–22, and Pozza, ‘Vitale-Ugo’.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 257

murky alliances in the city were, the Ottonians were able and willing to profit from
internal dissension among elite families, to attempt greater control of Venice.
Peter IV’s essential sin remained, at least as John the Deacon saw it, to have
ruled in the tradition of an Italian lord for years over the increasingly exasperated
Venetians, who tried to resist him but could never get close enough to him, on
account of the way he was protected in the palace by his loyal ‘foreign soldiers’. As
a result, the Venetians finally concocted the assassination plot of 976. Many
important Venetian families, such as the Orseolo, the Morosini, and the Coloprini,
and even several Candiani, increasingly feared his Italian alliance, especially after
Peter IV and Waldrada had a son. They may have been additionally unhappy with
a too-close Western alliance, at a time when it seemed that Byzantium, under the
successfully military and political rule of the Emperor Basil II in the Balkans
towards the Adriatic, might once again be powerful enough to become annoyed
by it and place restrictions on Venetian trade in the Byzantine Empire. Peter IV’s
anti-slavery and anti-Muslim policies could also have been perceived by many as
hostile to Venetian trade. The usual Venetian policy was always to support the
more remote power, and not become too closely embroiled in the complex
Ottonian politics in Italy, which was not felt to be to the advantage of the Venetian
state and commerce. At any rate, discontent was so high that many aristocratic
families were prepared, like the Orseolo, to sacrifice their own houses in this plot,
which involved waiting for the wind to be in the right direction and setting fire to
the whole area across the palace, in the hope and expectation that the wind would
carry the fire there and effectively force Doge Pietro IV to come out of his forti-
fied residence. Whether the story as told is genuine or not, it certainly makes the
point about the unity achieved by aristocratic families against Peter IV. The plot
was successful, and Peter IV and his son were indeed driven out by smoke and
fire, only to be killed by the angry mob awaiting them, among which were his
brother and other members of his own family. The fire allegedly consumed over
300 houses and three churches—according to John the Deacon, and taking into
account the symbolic value of the figures—as well as the ducal palace itself and,
most importantly for us, the ducal chancery. This explains the few surviving
docu­ments relating to pre-976 Venice, unless they were preserved in monasteries.
Vitalis, the eldest son of the murdered doge, fled Venice to take refuge in Saxony
with Otto II.252 It is to be noted that for the first time in John the Deacon’s text the
palace is clearly depicted as a fortress, a fact which in itself would have greatly
angered the Venetian elites, who would thus have been denied access to it, in what
was felt to have become a despotic government. Peter IV was said to have
addressed the nobles and to reproach his own ‘brothers’ for taking part in the
conspiracy, a telling example of factional division within the family; we do not

252 JnD IV, 15.

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258 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

know whom he meant by his brothers, since the only one we know, Vitalis/Hugh,
was unlikely to have been one of them, but the text mentions a Stephen Candiano,
otherwise unknown.253 We do know, however, that a Candiano faction then left
Venice and sought refuge at the Ottonian court, offering Otto II a wedge against
Venice by using the internal strife to his advantage. Among the members of this
faction was another Vitalis, presumably the patriarch of Grado (also called dux),
the son of Peter IV, appointed by him in this position, who had his allodial and
patrimonial lands confiscated and only later returned.254
The head of the plotters, Peter I Orseolo, became the new doge in 976. He ruled
for two years only, and here too one can guess at the underlying political land-
scape in which he had to operate. Peter I was described by John the Deacon as a
saint in the making. He was said to be much more interested in his spiritual life
and salvation than in secular power, even to the extent of remaining celibate after
his wife had one son only, and being strongly influenced by Abbot Guarino of
Cuxà in Languedoc on his visit to Venice towards abandoning power to take up
the monastic habit. The narrative claims that, when Guarino came back to Venice
after a year, Peter went off with him, at night and in secret, without telling any-
body, including his wife, and rode all the way to Vercelli, and from then on to
Cuxà, where he became a monk.255 This took place in 978, after a plot by Candiano
supporters against him had been revealed and foiled, but forgiven by the doge.
There is another possible interpretation, which may be that, having been agreed
on as the new doge once Candiano was dead, Peter I Orseolo was now no longer
agreeable to the plotters, who wanted to get rid of him. His flight might then have
been the result of negotiations, and a condition of his survival, which would
explain the pall of secrecy over the departure. It is also possible that Peter was
feeling guilty about his involvement in the plot to dislodge Peter IV, and thus his
exceptional generosity to the people of Venice in alms was to expiate this guilt. It
may even be conceivable that, however rich the family, such generosity may have
been perceived by his son Peter II as endangering the family finances—possibly
leading him quite happily to hope for his father’s departure. Yet another in­ter­pret­
ation is that Orseolo’s flight was ‘ordered’ by Otto II via his envoy Guarino, as a
form of revenge for Peter IV Candiano’s death, which was said to have horrified
him.256 At any rate, Otto II’s wrath or eagerness to conquer Venice led him to
support the most serious blockade of the city so far in its history.257 According to

253 JnD IV.12–13.

254 Cessi II. 58, and DV no. 23. See R. Capasso, ‘Candiano Vitale’, DBI 17 (1974), pp. 772–4.The
confusion created by the existence of several Vitalis, Peter IV’s brother, his son the patriarch of Grado,
as well as the next doge, from another family, is such that even Berto, In search, pp. 347–8 and 440,
leaves the matter open.
255 JnD IV. 16–18. On Peter I Orseolo, Ortalli, Petrus I; Ortalli, ‘Quando il Doge diventa santo’,
pp. 15–48.
256 Ortalli, Petrus I, p. 12. 257 JnD IV, 21.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 259

John the Deacon, had it not been for Otto II’s going off to wage war in southern
Italy, and subsequently dying through an act of God which saved the city, Venice
might indeed not have been able to resist the starvation of the siege.258 For a year,
a Vitalis patriarch of Grado ruled and successfully brokered peace with the
Ottonians, through the mediation of the two empresses ruling as regents,
Adelheid and Theophano, before himself then taking the monastic habit at
S. Ilario.259 He was succeeded as patriarch of Grado by Vitalis Candiano, Peter
IV’s son by his first wife, Joanna, while the new doge was Tribuno Memmo, whose
rule would mostly be marked by one of the longest and fiercest examples of early
medieval family infighting in the city. John the Deacon’s narratives about both
Peter IV Candiano and Otto II’s revenge by attacking Venice have been chal-
lenged, and this is an important point to keep in mind.
Tribuno Memmo’s rule inaugurated a tumultuous period of factional strife in
the city.260 He had married the daughter of Peter IV Candiano. Menio’s longish
period in power (978–90) was dominated by the fight between the two factions of
the Coloprini supporters of the Candiani, who were, according to Ortalli, a family
representing the ‘imperial’ faction in the tradition of Peter IV Candiano, and the
Morosini.261 It began in the best tradition of the Capulet–Montague conflict, to
which indeed some historians have compared it. Dominic Morosini was mur-
dered by a faction of the Coloprini led by the head of the family, Stephen. Faced
with the desire for revenge of the Morosini, Stephen Coloprini left Venice with his
sons and some relatives and went to Otto II’s court, where he pushed the emperor
to attack Venice, notably by offering him £1000 in gold if allowed to be the next
doge. He set camp in Padua with his son Dominic, while other men on his side
set up theirs so as to surround the city.262 Otto embarked on a massive siege of the
city.263 Having already refused to renew the traditional pact with Venice (the only
ruler since Lothar I to do so), Otto allowed a large area of Italy to be used as a
background for the siege, from Pavia, the Adige, and Ravenna to Mestre and
Istria, which was in fact the Coloprini’s family base. He also delivered an edict
forbidding communications with all Venetians in the Empire, forbidding im­per­
ial subjects to travel to Venice and cutting off the food provision of the city, en­ab­
ling him to set up a nearly successful blockade. Meanwhile, Tribuno Memmo
allowed the traitors’ houses to be devastated, and their families imprisoned. The
siege of Venice, lifted by the death of Otto II in Rome in 983, led the Coloprini
and their allies to request what was in effect political asylum in Pavia from the
Empresses Adelheid and Theophano, who were regents for the infant Otto III.

258 JnD IV, 26.

259 JnD IV, 19; Origo III. p. 126; this is a different Vitalis (son of a Leo Barbolanus) from Peter IV’s
son, also called Vitalis and also later patriarch of Grado.
260 JnD IV. 20. 261 Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, pp. 769–71. 262 JnD IV. 20, 24–5.
263 JnD IV. 24, 26; for a different view about the background to the siege as a form of pressure of
Ottonian court family politics, see Provesi, ‘Le due mogli di Pietro IV Candiano’.
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260 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

After Stephen’s death, the empresses again mediated and obtained from Memmo
an agreement that the Coloprini should be allowed to return to Venice un­mo­
lest­ed, meaning that the doge should guarantee their safety from the revenge of
the Morosini.264 Allowed to return, three Coloprini brothers were, however, set
upon by four Morosini and killed. Protestations by Memmo that he was in no way
involved were not believed by either party, which both accused him of complicity,
so that he was eventually forced by the ‘people’ to become a monk at S. Zaccaria.
John the Deacon tells us that not all Coloprini were involved in this feud, only
those who had followed Stephen as head of the family. This adds another layer to
the complexity: it makes it a different conflict from one where there were entire
families on each side of the divide in an internal city conflict. It is likely that, in
the case of internal divisions and fighting for control, as in the case of the
Candiani in 976, family infighting was acceptable. But in this case the Coloprini
not only went outside the city, and involved external factors, that is the emperor,
in the conflict, but they goaded and bribed the enemies of Venice to attack the
city.265 Possibly, in such a situation, members of the family were en­titled not to
follow the lead of the head of the family, since this was not simply a matter of
fighting for power in the city, but a form of treason. A second point concerns the
issue of Memmo himself: if he started by being a Coloprini supporter, then shifted
allegiance when threatened with deposition by one of them, this would explain
why he was accused by them of not doing enough to safeguard them on their
return. On the other hand, Memmo may have supported the Coloprini as long as
this was an internal conflict, but would have refused to do so once it became a
matter of ‘treason’ which threatened the whole city. This would certainly lend
more weight to the idea that fighting for control within Venice by various factions
was acceptable, but as soon as an external factor intervened which threatened its
very survival, and by then almost independence, all rallied behind the doge—a
fact not perhaps clear enough to the Coloprini clan. Such an in­ter­pret­ation may
also go some way towards explaining why a doge as inept as John the Deacon
makes Memmo out to have been actually managed to stay in power for quite a
long time (over twelve years) under those circumstances. Ortalli argued that this
was because no internal faction was in fact powerful enough to gain the upper
hand and depose him.266 This is likely but may have been compounded by the fact
that, faced with the perceived treason of some of the Coloprini, all other factions,
including some of the remaining Coloprini themselves, chose to support the
existing doge, at least for as long as the danger of the siege was evident. Once the
danger was over and Peter II Orseolo was chosen as the new doge, a truce was
established, with a notable lack of further conspiracies (though possibly John the
Deacon avoided telling us if there were any). Either Peter II’s balancing act of
reconciling various families was successful, or they may have decided that in­tern­al

264 JnD IV. 27–8. 265 JnD IV. 24. 266 Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 771.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 261

strife on the level achieved by the Coloprini–Morosini conflict, which had led to
the imperial blockade of the city, was too much of a risk to the survival of Venice
and its successful trade. It could be that Peter II’s success on the international
scene in terms of maintaining the peace with both Constantinople and the
Ottonians gave no opening to the play of factions relying on foreign alliances, as it
had done before. Whatever the reasons, the concord was made manifest by the
large number of signatories to the 998 oath, taken by all families to refrain from
provoking rebellions and fights in the ‘palace’, and the doge’s stature and prestige
were clearly stated, not only through his imperial alliances but also through the
display of his power within the urban fabric of Venice.267

The Remaining Venetians

The Clergy
I have already mentioned the patriarchs of Grado, that is the archbishops whose
diocese included Venice, in so far as most of their activities were associated with,
and later dependent on, Venice. Their political role from 750 onwards was para-
mount and almost eclipsed any information we may have about their other ac­tiv­
ities. So far as we can follow them, four elements appear to be of interest: their
family associations with the most politically significant Venetian families; their
difficulties with other patriarchs, notably those of Aquileia, and the conflict with
the bishops of Istria, both in terms of authority and property of the see; their
occasional clashes with the doges, notably Ursus I, until they effectively gave up
and moved to Venice as an adjunct to the ducal power; and, finally, their political
involvement with the Carolingians, especially in the case of Fortunatus. The fam-
ily associations with the doges and other major families of the Venetian elite have
already been discussed, especially for the tenth century in relation to Vitalis IV,
the son of Peter IV Candiano.

The Bishops of the Lagoon

With the exception of the patriarchate of Grado and the bishops of Olivolo/
Castello, who were either involved in a major way with Venetian politics in the
ninth century, like Fortunatus or Vitalis in the affair of Bishop Dominic of Olivolo
under Doge Ursus,268 the Venetian episcopate had a much lower profile on the
whole than its counterpart anywhere else in Italy. It also had a lower profile than
the great Venetian monasteries and, of course, than the doges’ church, the Basilica
of St Mark. This is partly due to the genesis of Venetian dioceses, most of which

267 Cessi II. 81, and DV no. 33; see G. Ortalli, ‘Pietro II Orseolo Dux Veneticorum et Dalmaticorum’,
in Venezia e la Dalmazia Anno Mille, ed. N. Fiorentin (Venice, 2002).
268 See Chapters 1 and 4.
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262 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

were small and said to have been moved from the terraferma, often preserving
this association until well into our period. The ‘historical’ sees said to have
been transferred from the terraferma to the islands were Altino, Concordia,
Oderzo, Equilo, and Padua, respectively to Torcello, Caorle, Murano, Jesolo, and
Malamocco.269 The only other major see, apart from Grado, was that of Olivolo/
Castello, probably corresponding to the original Byzantine centre of power. As a
centre of religious power, however, this was quickly overshadowed by the real seat
of power of the doges in Rialto, without them at any point attempting to bring the
two closer to each other. Whether the development of the Venetian Church took
the line it did on account of the small size of the dioceses, or of the disproportion-
ate role of the doges and the cult of St Mark, or because it preserved longer the
late Roman separation between the secular power and ecclesiastical function of
bishops, is a debate on which I will focus in Chapter 4. Here I need only mention
that the bishops from early on were pretty much the doges’ appointees, and they
also sometimes belonged to the same families as the doges. For this reason, I shall
here look at a few of them from that angle. John the Deacon’s narrative only men-
tions a few, when they fit in with the narrative, and a few more are known from
documents to which they contributed. Mostly, our attempts to reconstruct epis-
copal lists need to be based on the Origo, with its hagiographical style, and hence
are highly speculative.270 Those recounted here are mentioned because they show
the connections between the ecclesiastical and the ducal families.
The list of bishops of Torcello gives their origin and often their filiation, allow-
ing us to know of men like Justus, son of Agnellus Particiaco; Dominic, son of
Peter Candiano; and Ursus, second son of Peter II Orseolo. While the first two are
only entered in the list, and we have no other information about them, the latter
became patriarch of Grado in the early eleventh century and was responsible for
the rebuilding of the cathedral of Torcello.271 Others, without being associated
with actual ruling families, are part of other aristocratic groups, if we accept the
evidence of the Origo: Senator (from a Murano family), Dominic, son of Leo
Coloprinus, Peter, son of the tribune Andreadi, and several others are members
of the main noble family in Torcello, that of the tribune Aurius, whom we have
encountered before as a member of the Caroso conspiracy.272 The third bishop of
Torcello, Deusdedit, was his son, while another Dominic was the son of the

269 For the classic view, see the discussion in G. Cuscito, ‘L’origine degli episcopati lagunari tra
archeologia e cronachistica’, in Aquileia e l’arco adriatico, Antichità altoadriatiche 36 (Udine, 1990), pp.
152–74.
270 Origo I: Patriarchs, pp. 42–5; Bishops of Torcello p. 46 Bishops of Olivolo pp. 36–41; Origo III,
pp. 123–7; pp. 128–9 and pp. 132–7.
271 Berto, ‘In search’, pp. 456–63, has no other information and does not enter the first two. On
Ursus Orseolo, JnD IV. 77 and the lists in J.-C. Picard, Le souvenir des évêques: sépultures, listes épisco-
pales et culte des évêques en Italie du Nord des origines au Xe siècle, BEFAR 268 (1988), Rome,
pp. 400–10.
272 Origo III, pp. 129–30.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 263

tribune Aurius Maior, and John and Valerius were the sons of another tribune,
Aurius—a family with a strong Torcello base, since they were also founders of
several churches there.273 But not all bishops were local. Severinus and Deusdedit
came from Istria, preceded by the fourth bishop, Honoratus from Treviso.274
Gislebert, a son of Carloman, who tried to lay hands on the rights of S. Stefano of
Altino, which was under the protection of the doge, and was castigated by the latter
and told off in the placitum of 919, was a Bavarian.275 It may be of some significance
that he should have been the only ‘foreign’ bishop, possibly more used to Carolingian
traditions, and one over whom the doge had to assert his authority.
In the case of Olivolo, the first bishop, Obeliebatus (775–98), was the man
appointed by Doge Maurice Galbaio in 775, when he effectively chose to turn
Castello/Olivolo into the diocese of Venice. His successor Christopher (798–806)
followed Maurice and John Galbaio into exile, then returned with Patriarch
Fortunatus. But he was not allowed by Obelerius to go back to his see, which had
been given, in the meantime, to John, who had been made patriarch of Grado in
806, replacing Fortunatus, who had fled.276 Ursus Particiaco was related to Doges
Justinian and John, and also to the later abbess of S. Lorenzo Romana, to whom
he left in his will in 853 this monastery, which he had founded.277 After the de­pos­
ition of Caroso, while awaiting Doge John’s return from exile, Ursus ruled the
dogado together with two tribunes.278 He had been present to receive, together
with Doge Justinian, the body of St Mark in 829 but, significantly, did not try to
have, or succeed in having, the relics go to either Grado or Olivolo: an indication
of the extent to which episcopal power in the city had already been totally sub-
sumed into that of the doge. The Origo tells us of several other bishops associated
either with ducal families, such as John ‘of Candiana’, son of Magnus Candiano of
Rialto, or with prominent aristocratic families, such as George, son of George
Andreadi, and Dominic Gradenigo, son of John, chosen (‘elected’ says the text—a
slip of the pen which is revealing of the perception of the extent of ducal power)
by Peter Orseolo.279 We only hear of one bishop whom the doge opposed, rather
than controlled: Dominic of Vercelli, son of a local nobleman in spite of his name,
who received his investiture at St Mark’s even though Tradonicus was against it,
and was confirmed by the patriarch of Grado.280

273 See Chapter 4. 274 Origo III, pp. 128–9.

275 Cessi II. 25 and DV no. 7; Origo III, p. 130.
276 JnD II. 19, 21; G. Fedalto, ‘Le origini della diocesi di Venezia’, in Le origini della chiesa di Venezia.
Contributi alla storia della chiesa veneziana I, ed. F. Tonon, (Venice, 1987), pp. 123–42; G. Fedalto.,
‘Organizzazione ecclesiastica e vita religiosa nella Venetia Maritima’, in Carile, Le origini di Venezia;
D. Rando, ‘Le strutture della chiesa locale’, in SV, pp. 645–75, esp. 646–7; D. Rando, Una Chiesa di
Frontiera. Le istituzioni ecclesiastiche veneziane nei secoli VI–XII (Bologna, 1994), p. 22; S. Tramontin,
‘Fondazione e sviluppo della diocesi’, in Patriarcato di Venezia, ed. S. Tramontin, (Padua, 1991), pp.
21–45; and R. Cessi, ‘La crisi ecclesiastica veneziana al tempo del duca Orso’, in his Le origini del
ducato veneziano, pp. 83–6.
277 JnD II. 56; Cessi I. 60, and DV no. 5. 278 JnD II. 44. 279 Origo III, pp. 133, 139.
280 Origo III, pp. 134–5.
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264 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Other bishops appear randomly and rarely. Two were involved in the conflict
between Doge Ursus II and the Patriarch of Grado Peter in relation to the election
of Bishop Dominic of Torcello, having been asked by Pope John VIII to attend the
synod of Ravenna in 877 to settle the dispute, and being excommunicated for
arriving there after it had finished.281 Dominic of Malamocco acted as the envoy
of Doge Ursus Particiaco in the negotiations with the King of the Bulgarians
Simeon for the ransoming of Ursus’ son Peter, after the latter had been taken captive
on his return from Constantinople, and he was once again the doge’s representative,
together with Stephen Coloprino, for the renewal of the Pactum Lotharii in 925
with King Rudolf.282 It seems evident that most bishops were just that—in charge of
the religious life in their small dioceses, perhaps occasionally functioning as a ducal
ambassador or a witness to ducal acts. Many had been priests in the city, rather than
members of great noble families, like Christopher II (806, 819), plebanus (parish
priest) of the church of S. Moisè, and Laurence, both later b ­ ishops of Olivolo.283
Only the bishops of Olivolo and Torcello had a more significant presence and role,
and it was these posts alone which were occasionally, but by no means generally,
occupied by members of the aristocratic elite of the city.

The Rest of the Clergy

We have already seen parish priests become bishops of Olivolo, but at least
another forty-one priests are mentioned in various sources. Of these, six were
also notaries, two were cancelarii (Dominic in 880 and another in 960), and one a
grammaticus (Martin in 982).284 The ducal chancellor is mentioned on several
occasions, for example the tribune and notary Dimitrius is nostre capelle primice-
rium in 819,285 and Marcus priest (plebanus) of S. Giminiano is notarius et ducalis
aule Veneciarum cancellarius.286 Obviously there were many simple priests, whom
we know from their witnessing documents, such as Desiderius and Justus in
Justinian Particiaco’s will. Also mentioned are several sons of priests: Businiacus,
son of Felix Businiacus,287 and the cleric Michael, son of Michael Monetario,
future plebanus of S. Maria di Murano.288
A variety of other clergy appears throughout, from archdeacons of Grado to
various members of the diaconate: Constantine in the will of Bishop Ursus
Particiaco is the first, followed by another twenty or so recorded, several of them
chaplains to the doge, and clearly associated with the ducal court as cancellarius,
notarius capelle curtis palacii, or just notaries and scribes, up to the deacon and
notary Marinus, who witnessed the renewed pactum between Otto III and Peter

281 JnD III. 18. 282 JnD III. 40; Cessi II. 32, and DV no. 21. 283 JnD II. 26.
284 See the full list of extant priests, deacons, and notaries in Berto, In search, pp. 465–72.
285 Cessi, I. 44, and DV no. 23. 286 Cessi, I. 44, and DV no. 23. 287 Cessi, II. 71.
288 Cessi, II. 87, and DV no. 34.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 265

II Orseolo in 992.289 The doge’s chaplains and chancellors were taken from the
ranks of priests and deacons, and some continued their careers upwards from
there, as did Peter Grussuri, chancellor and father of the future Bishop of
Olivolo Grausus, and Dominic Tanolicus/Tornaricus, chancellor then himself
bishop of Olivolo.290
A few clergy were bishops through their family connections (Ursus Particiaco,
Vitalis IV Candiano, Ursus Orseolo), especially if these were families which had
managed to ensconce themselves into ducal power for more than one generation.
However, compared to the overall number of bishops across all the dioceses,
even at patriarchal level, there seems much less of a ducal family presence among
these bishops than we otherwise see with the popes in Rome, the archbishops of
Ravenna, and even the bishops of Romagna. Sometimes, as with the above-
mentioned families, there was an attempt by a powerful aristocratic family to
monopolize ducal as well as episcopal power, as we saw with the Particiaci and
the Candiani. But, in Venice, this does not seem so much for the purpose of
strengthening the power of that family itself in that function—the ducal one—as
for creating a family network which could then be left in a place of power later
on, to be used as a springboard should the occasion arise for that family to be
able to regain control of the dogado. The situation of the Venetian Church was,
from very early on, very different from that of the powerful figures of the arch-
bishops of Ravenna and the popes, and even more so from that of the formidable
episcopal rulers of Lombard and Carolingian cities. Its nearest parallel could be
the princes of Benevento and their control over their clergy. The situation of the
patriarchate of Grado had been a difficult one from the start, being a kind of
doub­let, as it were, of the existing Aquileia. Just like the tradition suggested for
the other episcopal sees in the lagoon, it too had moved east to the islands, but
had not succeeded in creating a successful urban site for itself, as Altino had done
when it moved to Torcello and the latter became an economic hub.291 Not only
were the arch­bishops of Aquileia always on the lookout for occasions to under-
mine what they regarded as a superfluous see, once Aquileia had been restored,
but Grado did not have either the landed wealth or the power of Aquileia once
this had become part of Carolingian Italy. Grado struggled to keep its traditional
bases, for example in Istria, where the bishops of the province decided to place
themselves under the authority of Aquileia, and even the popes had to accept

289 Cessi II. 69, and I. 60, and DV nos 35, 30. See F. Parcianello, Documentazione e notariato a
Venezia nell’età ducale (Padua, 2012).
290 Origo III. pp. 46 and 133.
291 For Torcello and its beginnings, see G. Ortalli, ‘Torcello e la genesi di Venezia’, in Torcello alle
origini di Venezia tra Occidente e Oriente, ed. G. Caputo and G. Gentili (Venice, 2009); and Crouzet-
Pavan, La mort lente de Torcello, pp. 36–73. On the new excavations, which focus on the old port
rather than, as until recently, on the cathedral area, see D. Calaon et al., Torcello scavata. Patrimonio
condiviso. 2: Lo scavo.
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266 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

this.292 This would seem sufficient to explain the relative political weakness of the
Church of Grado, Fortunatus’ efforts and great wealth notwithstanding—his
ambition was precisely to reinforce the resources and prestige of Grado to obtain
such power. Such a relative lack of resources, compared, for example, with those
of the Church of Ravenna, and even lack of prestige, were as yet nothing com-
pared to the main reason for the failure of Grado, then of the Venetian Church
itself, to become a power in the city. This reason was the rise of ducal power
which, consolidated by the possession of the relics of St Mark, was fundamentally
oriented towards a secular government, through its own administrative tools
(gastaldi, judges, placiti),293 and through its economic and social model of a rotating
aristocratic power, which controlled the resources of trade and salt production.
Here also one could look at examples such as Salerno, and possibly Naples,
though the doges never went as far as to combine both ducal and episcopal charge
into one person, as they did in Naples. Whether this model is due to a common
tradition of Byzantine government, or on the contrary to a Lombard-style gov-
ernment, is something to consider in my final chapter.
If the secular clergy’s weight in the political arena was so relatively slight, was
this equally the case for the regular clergy? Looking at them as a whole, monks,
nuns, and even heads of religious houses also conspicuously lacked close links with
the aristocratic elite. Three exceptions are evident, though in two cases, despite
their aristocratic foundation, monastic houses almost immediately lose this family
link: the Particiaci for S. Lorenzo, and the Morosini/Mauroceni for S. Giorgio
Maggiore.294 Bishop Ursus Particiaco had founded S. Lorenzo in his will in 853,
and given it to his sister Romana; but, although we know of one other nun there
from a distinguished family, Trionessa Gradonicus, at the end of the tenth century,
no other Particiaco was subsequently connected with the monastery. S. Giorgio’s
founder was the monk, John Morosini, who had left Venice with Peter I Orseolo
in 978 to go to Cuxà, and was, according to John the Deacon, also the doge’s
son-in-law.295 He was granted by Doge Tribuno Memmo the right to establish a
monastery on S. Giorgio, a ducal property, in 982, and the family were present en
masse at the foundation, with at least eight family members signing the charter.296
It is conceivable that this was also a deliberate attempt by the doge at showing his
support for the Morosini, to whom he was accused of having been unfavourable
in the conflict between that family and the Coloprini, and thus using the event as

292 Letters of Pope Stephen III to the Bishops of Istria, asking them to return to the authority of
Grado, and to Archbishop John of Grado (771–2), MGH Ep. III, nos 714 and 715; according to JnD II.
43, the bishops did so in 827. For Fortunatus’ wealth and economic investment policy, see
M. McCormick, Origins of the European Economy. Communications and Commerce, AD 300–900
(Cambridge, 2001), pp. 255–8.
293 Cessi, I. 44, and DV no. 2; for the gastaldi, judges and placiti, see Chapter 5.
294 For the history and role of Venetian monasteries, see Chapter 4.
295 JnD IV.18; see M. Stoffella, ‘Morosini Giovanni’, DBI 77, pp. 138–40.
296 Cessi II. 61, and DV no. 25.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 267

a way of showing goodwill. Other ducal foundations or refoundations, such as

Brondolo or S. Servolo/S. Ilario, though extremely rich and power­ful monasteries
in their own right, had no particular family links with the powerful figures of the
city that we know of. The exception, the third monastery, is S. Zaccaria, Justinian
Particiaco’s foundation, or at least endowment. S. Zaccaria was the most im­port­
ant monastic house in the city, both socially and politically, with almost every
ducal family having some of its women as nuns there, and economically, in terms
of resources in land, revenues on the terraferma, and houses and commercial
properties in the city itself. From the start, Justinian’s widow, Felicitas, and his
daughter-in-law Romana, who had been charged with finishing the construction
out of the doge’s legacy, joined S. Zaccaria. Joanna, daughter of Doge Ursus II,
was abbess and restored the monastery.297 In 963, another Joanna, the divorced
wife of Peter IV Candiano, who became abbess, was granted by Otto I a con­firm­
ation diploma for the possessions and rights of the monastery.298 As we saw earl­
ier, she probably played a considerable political role in the city, as did her and
Peter’s son Vitalis, the future patriarch of Grado. The list of future abbesses con-
tinues to display the names of the most important ducal families, to whom they
were related. The high profile of S. Zaccaria led it to play an important role in the
religious and political life of Venice at key times. Apart from being the mauso-
leum of several doges after their death, it was also at the centre of the ceremony of
investiture of the doge, who obtained his ceremonial hat from the nuns, and
whose annual Easter visit with the procession between the monastery and the
ducal palace was a central event in the city’s identity.299 Exceptional political
events also took place there, for example the murder of Doge Peter Tradonico in
the church in 846.300 The nuns acted as peacemakers, most notably in the
Morosini–Coloprini feud. After the assassination of Dominic Morosini by the
Coloprini at the start of the feud, Dominic was brought to S. Zaccaria, where he
died and was buried;301 when the three Coloprini were killed by the Morosini
after their return to Venice, and their bodies thrown into a canal, they were fished
out, and their mother and widows took them to be buried at S. Zaccaria.

The Populus

Returning to the laymen in the city, we are once again confronted with the issue
of how they fitted into the frequent definition of the populus. To what extent does
the word apply to all the inhabitants, including the aristocratic elite, or only to
those who were not part of the elite? It may seem that the second model applies in

297 JnD III. 22. 298 JnD II. 45, and DV no. 24.
299 See Chapters 3 and 4. 300 JnD III. 1, and see Chapters 1 and 4.
301 JnD IV. 20 and 28.
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268 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the case of Venice, as it did in Rome. Key formulae are those used in the Pactum
Lotharii, made cum omnibus habitantibus vestre (the doge’s) potestatis, tam cum
vestro patriarchatu seu episcopis ac sacerdotibus quam et primatibus seu reliquo
populo et cuncta generalitate ad ducatum Venetiae pertinentibus.302 The placitum
of 900 mentions the doge and suo cum episcopis et judicibus et populo Veneciarum,303
while that of 919 regarding SS Felice e Fortunato di Ammiana takes place in
publico placito una cum nostris primatibus et ibique circumstantibus fidelibus et
una parte populi terrae nostrae,304 with magna parte populi, maiores videlicet, medi-
ocres et minores.305 This formula is often repeated, for example as Waldrada’s pay-off
took place ad omnem populum Veneticorum maiores et mediocres et minores, a
maximo usque ad minimum . . . nec contra ullam veneticum maiorem aut minorem.306
The most telling formulae can be found in the agreements between the doges and
Venetian families relating the levy of the one-tenth tax, as in Tribunus . . . dux
Venecie . . . insimul cum episcopis nostris et cunctis [pri]matibus seu et populo
Venecie,307 and also for Peter II with the promissio omnes tam judices et nobilles
homines Venetie qui et mediocres a maximo usque ad min­imum308 not to riot in the
palace.309 It would appear that, generally speaking, Venetian custom was to sep­ar­
ate, in its thinking, the elite called maiores, primates, or iudices, from the reliquo
populo, whom one would therefore assume to have been the so-called mediocres
et minores. We could suggest, tentatively, that in Venice at least the word populus
did indeed routinely mean the whole free male population of the city—not a
revolutionary view, but one which does suppose that, here at any rate, unlike in
Rome or Ravenna where one cannot be very precise about the use of this word,
we could have a rather rare example of a genuine attempt at social consensus.
Who then were the mediocres et minores?

Merchants and Aristocrats: the Same People?

We immediately hit a crucial difficulty in the case of Venice, which we did not
encounter when dealing with the negociatores in Rome or Ravenna. Are Venetian
merchants a separate group, a set of mediocres, or are they in fact the same social
and economic elite as that of the aristocracy of power discussed earlier?
The earliest evidence mentioning Venetian merchants cannot clarify the issue.
In the mid-eighth century Pope Zacharias mentioned Venetian traders in Rome
buying slaves to sell to the Muslims in Africa, which he himself then bought from
the Venetians and set free.310 At the end of the eighth century, in the famous letter
of 785 from Pope Hadrian I to Charlemagne replying to his request that he

302 Cessi, II. 21, and DV no. 19. 303 Cessi, II. 25, and DV no. 7.
304 Cessi, II. 49, and DV no. 19. 305 Cessi, II. 31, and DV no. 9.
306 Cessi, II. 54. 307 Cessi, II. 61, and DV no. 25.
308 Peter II also talks about ‘suos primates et proceres Venetiae hominum cum commune consilium et
una voluntate’; see Cessi, II. 81, and DV no. 33.
309 Cessi II. 57, and DV no. 22. 310 LP I. 93 ch. 22.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 269

(Hadrian) should ask the archbishop of Ravenna that Venetian merchants should
be expelled from Ravenna and the Pentapolis and their goods confiscated, the
description of the traders is generic.311 Similarly, when Pope Leo III wrote to
Charlemagne in 913 telling him of the destruction of Venetian ships returning
from Spain,312 or when in 862 an inventory from Bobbio mentioned merchandise
(pepper, cumin and linen) acquired through Venice, the texts only talk about
‘Venetian ships’.313
Later, we start coming across more specific names like Dominicus Navigaioso.314
But when we begin to encounter individual figures—men like Bonus and Rusticus
of Torcello, who brought the relics of St Mark from Alexandria—we see that they
were merchants with ships but were also tribunes. Similarly, both wills of the
Particiaci, Doge Justinian’s and Bishop Ursus’, make it clear that their wealth was
partly due to buying and owning a lot of property on the terraferma, but also
from investments in commercial naval ventures, which brought them expensive
items like pepper, which alone could have allowed them to have the kind of for-
tune that they possessed already in monetary form. The sums spent by both Peter
I and Peter II Orseolo were testimony to the riches gained from trade, as was the
detailed inventory of what constituted the forms of wealth or wealth-creation
given to the Duchess Waldrada by Peter I after her husband’s death. This included
de omnes res et species magnae vel parvae, tam terris, casis, aurum factum et non
factum, argentum factum et non factum, sive aere, ferro, stagno, plumbo, lectis,
sterneis, arma, navigia, ordinea, utensilia preter laboratoria, servos et ancillas,
mobile vel immobile, et de omnibus sese moventibus plenissimam et veram inter
nos statuimus deliberatum finem; verum etiam et de omni collegantia, rogadia,
commendatione, prestito atque negociis, et omni ratione, altercatione, capitulatione,
inquisitione, querimonia, et de universis capitulis etiam.315 My point here is that, in
Venetian terms, trading was the basis of the great wealth of the aristocratic pol­it­
ical elite, as much as landowning in the terraferma, which means that the concept
of ‘merchant’ was quite different from that of the middle-class moneyed category
found across much of Italy, even in contemporary Amalfi or Naples. Obviously
there were differences between the Orseolo as doges, who owned ships and con-
siderable financial and economic tools for trading, and men who, like Bonus and

311 CC no. 84; see Chapter 1. 312 Cessi, I. 42.

313 A. Castagnetti, ed., Inventari altomedievali di terre, coloni e redditi (Rome, 1979), pp. 138, 159.
314 Cessi, II. 49, and DV no. 19; for Bonus and Rusticus see, for example, Rösch, Der Venezianische
Adel, p. 52, and H. Zug Tucci, ‘Negociare in omnibus partibus per terram et per acquam: il mercante
veneziano’, Mercati e mercanti nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 40 (1993), pp. 51–79. The main work on
the medieval economic issues, and thus also on the merchants, is McCormick, Origins of the European
Economy, esp. pp. 523–31, 632–3, almost superseding G. Luzzatto, ‘Les activités économiques du
patriciat vénitien (X–XIV siècle)’, in his Studi di storia economica veneziana (Padua, 1954), pp. 125–65.
See also, for details, G. Migliardi O’Riordan and A. Schiavon, Tipologie di documenti commerciali ven-
eziani. Nolo, mutuo, prestito a cambio marittimo, colleganza (Venice, 1988).
315 Cessi, II. 54.
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270 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Rusticus, actually climbed on the boats to go either east or up the Po, Sile, or
Brenta rivers. But these differences were of size rather than of nature. This is why,
when looking at the signatories to the two decrees of Peter IV Candiano on the
slave and arms trade, which would have been of interest only to those people
engaged in it, we see a panorama of every major name that we have already
encountered relating to the elite families in the city, including those of current
and future ducal families, like the Candiano, Morosini/Mauroceni, Orseolo,
Gradenico, Falier/Faletro, Bragadin, and many others.316 The same applies to the
treaties with the Istrian cities. Charlemagne’s attempts to prevent Venetian mer-
chants from trading in Ravenna are evidence of how powerful Venetian trade
already was by then, since it was seen as a major form of war sanction. At the
same time, it is precisely because Venetian ships had become so powerful as war-
ships that we can assume they were run by the same aristocratic elite, which pre-
sumably functioned in both war and peace, as we saw with their expeditions
against the Saracens and the pirates.317
The doges were responsible for ensuring the smooth development of trade.
They did so for the eastern trade, as we know from the chrysobull of 992 of the
Emperors Basil II and Constantine to Peter II, reducing the Constantinopolitan
tolls for Venetian ships by placing them under the legislation of the logothete of
the palace rather than, as was customary, under that of greedy toll officers, who
continued to be responsible for the ships from Amalfi, Longobardia, and Bari.318
The doges were also responsible for facilitating trade on the other side, hence the
importance of the repeated renewals of the Pactum Lotharii, the commercial
advantages given by Otto III to the Venetians, allowing them to trade anywhere in
the Empire, and his privilege granting the right of trading in several ports on the
Po.319 The doges were also fighting every authority on the mainland, especially
the Bishops Sicard of Ceneda for the port of Settimo on the Livenza, Rozo of
Treviso for tolls in the port of Treviso, and John of Belluno for Cittanova,320 to
attempt to control as much of the trade to the north of the dogado, just as they
had effectively wiped out that of Comacchio and were present in force in Ravenna.
The other concern of the doges was to promote Venice’s own main source of
industrial wealth: salt.321 The treaties with Sicard and Roizo were not just about
retaining some of the port rights, but also about the assurance that there would be
no tolls on Venetian salt. The doge was not above getting directly involved in

316 Cessi II. 41 and 49; DV nos 18 and 19. 317 See Chapters 1 and 5.
318 Cessi, II. 68; now Pozza and Ravegnani, I trattati con Bisanzio, no. 1. On the Venetian presence
in the Eastern Empire, see M. E. Martin, ‘The Venetians in the Byzantine Empire before 1204’,
Byzantinische Forschung 13 (1988), pp. 201–14. For the links between politics and economic develop-
ment, see also G. Luzzatto, ‘L’economia veneziana nei suoi rapporti con la politica nell’alto medio evo’,
in Le origini di Venezia, ed. G. P. Bognetti (Florence, 1964), pp. 141–66.
319 Cessi II. 75, and DV no. 36. 320 Cessi II. 78, 90 (Ceneda); 89 (Treviso); 82, 86 (Belluno).
321 J.-C. Hocquet, Le sel et la fortune de Venise (Lille, 1978–9).
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 271

transactions regarding the salt pans, as he did in 991 with the sale by one
Theodosius to Abbot Leo of Brondolo of salt pans in Chioggia.322

Artisans
Apart from producing salt, and trading and fishing, tenth-century Venetians also
included a variety of artisans.323 The most prominent were the monetarii, one
family of which became one of the elite in the tenth century. Other traditional
trades included millers, where once again one family, the de Molin, had joined
the elite by then. A Faletro calderarius, as well as various men whose trade became
their family name (first seen in the tenth century), like Saponarius, Scandolarius,
and Staniarius, are among the rich who paid the tax of one tenth, and gave pallia,
camisias, legamen de ferro, peliciam urtam de agnello, as well as money in 994–1001,324
whereas the widow of Bonus calligarius gave scaramangias, modia de calcina,
castoneas, perhaps being too poor to pay with money.325 Some were immigrants:
John Greculo ‘the Greek’ carbonarius, John son of John texerius of Ravenna,
though both paid tax, as did Adam ‘filius Cari judieis’.326

Slaves
Last but not least, we find in Venice a category seldom encountered in Roman or
Ravennate documents: slaves.327 Already in Rome in the eighth century the pope
freed the slaves that Venetian merchants were exporting to Africa. The trade was
forbidden in the Pactum Lotharii and its renewals, but it had clearly not stopped
by the time Peter IV Candiano attempted once again to forbid it. Our documents
naturally only mention manumitted (freed) slaves, who were therefore capable of
becoming successful citizens, to the extent of engaging in trade and paying tax.
Their number is quite impressive, and we find them at all levels, some having
been the slaves of doges (Jeremiah liberto Petri Urseolo ducis) and of priests
(Ioannes Langobardo liberto Petro presbitero de Sancto lacobo). Several were called
Lombards (lohannes Lomgobardo liberto Iannis Cypriani, possibly Ottolo Bechario
liberto Iohanno Sagornino, and Restaldo liberto Dominico Florentio), and one of
these had been specifically a slave to a Greek man (Johanis Longobardo libertus of
Ursus Daneo).328 Several other elite families had had slaves which they

322 Lanfranchi Strina, SS. Trinità e S. Michele, II no. 3.

323 For the complete list, see Berto, In Search, Appendix 7, pp. 391–5. 324 Cessi, II. 71.
325 Cessi, II. 57, and DV no. 22. 326 Cessi, II. 59 ,and DV no. 24.
327 There is a vast literature on the issue of the Venetian slave trade, which contributed greatly to
the wealth of the city, despite repeted injunctions to desist. It is not possible to expand on this here,
especially since there are very good summaries and debates available in the bibliography, foremost of
which is McCormick’s Origins of the European Economy, pp. 752–77, esp. 752–8 and 763–76; conse-
quently, my brief mention of the category here will limit itself to considering the evidence from pri-
mary sources with regard to the documented presence and role of individual ex-slaves in the urban
development of the city.
328 Cessi, II. 58, and DV no. 23.
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272 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

manumitted—the de Canal, Gradonico, and Bragadin, for example329—though

naturally this implies that they probably had others which they had not. The
number of these successful manumitted slaves, with sufficient power and wealth
to pay taxes and to be among the signatories of ducal documents, seems to imply
some measure of social mobility, which is, of course, one of the characteristics of
Venetian society at this stage.

Conclusions

There is no doubt that, until the reign of the first Galbaio doges, Venice was gov-
erned in a way common to any area of Byzantine Italy. From the second half of
the eighth century, no doubt as a result of the papal instruction to Byzantine cities
to choose their own dukes, the custom became that of electing a local powerful
man, whom the Byzantine emperor then confirmed in his post as his representa-
tive. A first shift came about when the Doges Obelerius and Beatus took power,
most likely in a challenge to the Galbaio dynasty. This was probably not so much
on account of a deliberate foreign policy choice of Frankish alliances over the
Byzantine ones, but rather so as to use the opportunities offered by a conflict that
was soon to erupt into open warfare between the two Empires, both attempting to
gain control over the city. In reality, two factors were behind the struggles between
rival families to gain power in the city. The first was a gradual transition from
families whose wealth would have been originally mainly of a landed kind, based
in areas of the terraferma like Cittanova or Altino, to families whose original
landed wealth rapidly expanded to include the results of maritime trade in the
Adriatic, as was the case of the Particiaci. One needs to recall the fact that, if
Justinian Particiaco talked about a fleet and large amounts of money in his will,
this was still a relatively modest part of his wealth compared to his large posses-
sions in the form of fields, vineyards, meadows, orchards, mills, houses, and fif-
teen massarizie (farms), from Cittanova, Mestre, and Treviso, and from Torcello
to Jesolo. His brother, the Bishop Ursus, when endowing S. Lorenzo, also did so
with land and vineyards, and both also included labourers and fishermen. The
second factor supporting the struggle for power between various families was
perhaps that of the shifting pre-eminence, and ultimately hardening of settle-
ment, between various areas of the lagoon, where until the 820s we have as yet not
one decisive ‘capital’ but several centres with a variety of functions: the political
focus of Byzantine power in Olivolo (by then also the episcopal see), the major

329 Lei a liberto, Dominicus liberto Petro Campolo, Baruzzo liberto Dominico Sagornino, Martinus
libertus Michaelis, filii lo. Grecco, Martinus liberto Iohannis de Canali, Adalberto liberto Marino
Gradonico, Martinus liberto Dominici Madri, Constantius libertus Ursi Bragadini, Eramo liberto Urso
Bragadini, Helias libertus Staphili de Equilo.
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the actors: elites and populus, ii: ravenna and venice 273

trading post of Torcello in the northern lagoon, and a whole series of rival old
cities (Cittanova, Altino, Grado), some with Lombard connections, and the
southern lagoon (Malamocco). At the beginning of the ninth century, faced with
the Carolingian attempt to conquer Venice, it seems likely that a need was felt for
a more rigid style of political organization, focused around one defensible place, a
choice either suggested by Agnellus Particiaco and supported by the Byzantines, or
possibly even suggested by them, close to Olivolo at Rialto. But the main outcome
of the fight between the two Empires for Venice was no doubt the fact that the city
elites understood the importance of Venice in the political and commercial stakes
between the two powers and, consequently, the fundamental im­port­ance of the
ruling figure and family when it came to control of the city. From then on, fighting
for control of the ducal function became fiercer, often through plots and deposi-
tions of the current doge. The Particiaci got rid of Obelerius and his brothers, then
they themselves were deposed in turn, but not before they had put in some strong
markers for future ducal power. These included the effective ‘creation’ of Rivoalto
as the centre of power, political as well as spiritual and military, of the city—palace
and basilica, relics and cult of St Mark, building centre of the fleet—in other words,
control over the Church, monastic foundations, and the navy. Already at this
point, Venetian policy had become the classic balancing act between support of
the Byzantines (sending the navy to southern Italy to fight the Saracens) and peace
with the respective masters of Italy (peace and trade treaty with Lothar I and all
successive rulers of the Regnum Italiae, then with the Ottonians).
The core element of the more or less permanent infighting for ducal power in
the city, however, is that it was a fight for control of the city, never for its inde-
pendence or indeed for its expansion. The families of ‘dogabili’ were pretty well
equal in wealth and status and, while some rose and others fell a little at various
points, they were extremely similar in their backgrounds and resources. Most
importantly, they were all both aristocrats—in terms of landed wealth on the ter-
raferma, in the duchy, the Veneto, the old Exarchate, and Istria—and merchants.
Their interest was not in an independent Venice, but in one which could benefit
from both its alliances, for freedom of exploitation, rights and tolls over their
lands, and from trade advantages with both. Hence the mix of, for example, the
Carolingian-style control over Church and monasteries, the use of administrative
and judicial rules, not to mention the minting of Carolingian coins, together with
the Byzantine titles and insignia of power, trade rights through chrysobulls, and
exemption of taxes in Constantinople. The Venetian elite did not see the city as
the ‘gate to the East’ or the ‘bridge between East and West’: it saw itself as needing
to play one against the other when necessary, or to use both (as it did for its coinage),
in a most skilful and beneficial way. For that purpose, and despite the apparent
continuous simili-civil war between families to control the city, it was never at
risk of disintegrating from the inside—only of having one family replaced with
another of a similar background. The only risks to the city—Pepin I’s attack and
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274 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Otto II’s siege—were external ones, and, when they happened, there was a pretty
immediate rallying round of most families against the external threat. This hap-
pened not only with Otto II after the Peter Candiano IV episode, but also when
the threat had to be dealt with by economic means (agreement of the elite to pay
taxes to support the doges), or through social consensus when the city and its
peaceful functioning was at stake (agreement of these same elites to cease too
vicious a form of infighting, which might lead to disturbances of the peace at the
centre of political power in Rialto).
I shall return at a later stage to an analysis of the similarities and differences
between the three cities of Rome, Ravenna, and Venice in terms of the behaviour
of their elites and people, to see whether the similarities can be attributed to their
common past of Byzantine rule, and whether they did develop subsequent behav-
iour of a different kind on account of different interaction with other political,
social, and cultural traditions in Italy. Before doing this, it will be useful to
observe, not only the actors in the play, but also the stage, decor, and settings in
which they evolved.
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4
The Stage
Places of Power, Instruments of Control

The purpose of the previous chapter was to examine the people: the actors who
were involved in the evolution of these two and a half centuries in the history
of Italy. In this chapter, I shall examine their place of action, the stage as it were,
on which they evolved in each city. The stage is composed of several sets. The
first is made up of the physical places where these people live and rule, their
residences in this world: palaces of emperors, kings and popes, and, below
them, those of doges and archbishops; and, below them again, the residences of
the aristocracy. The second set is composed of other scenes on which power is
manifested and exercised: churches and monasteries. These residences of the
saints are served by priests, monks, and nuns, who are the spiritual elite prepar­
ing and facilitating the way for the elite of this world, through prayer and inter­
cession. But the play on this stage also has a need for properties: the instruments
for exercising power. First of these are the manifestations which display wealth
and munificence, to impress, enthral, and reassure: charity, art, and architecture.
Such manifestations also come through words, written and spoken, making
power concrete and vis­ible, through the ways of addressing the rulers with their
right titles to acclaim them, or to confirm their legitimacy in writing, in the
form of documents and coins. Above all, exercising power on the political and
social stage comes through that most powerful manifestation of all in every
society: symbols. In this instance the symbolic value emanates from a variety of
emblems which embody power, and through the fundamental expression of it
in the exchange of gifts.

The Places

Residences of the Rulers

For the sake of clarity, I am here dividing the rulers into several categories, going
‘down’ the hierarchy, as it were, from the top—the emperor and the pope. I will
then look separately at the next set of ruling figures: the archbishop of Ravenna,
the doge in Venice, and one specific figure who does not belong in any preordained

Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000: Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present, and the Construction of City Identity.
Veronica West-Harling, Oxford University Press (2020). © Veronica West-Harling.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754206.001.0001
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276 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

category, the princeps Alberic. Finally, extending the circle further, I propose to
look in some detail at the residences of the aristocratic elite.

Imperial and Papal Palaces

Until the end of Byzantine rule in Rome, the two centres of power in the city were
the Lateran episcopium for the pope and the, admittedly much reduced in size,
old imperial palace of the emperors on the Palatine, where the duke of Rome and
other imperial officials resided. When Constans II came to Rome in 663, he still
resided on the Palatine; the seal of the Exarch Paul (723–6) shows him to have
still been there in the 720s.1 When the emperor was not present, as was mostly
the case, an image, or icon, of him would be received in Rome with acclamations
at the time of the new emperor’s adventus and would be placed in the imperial
palace to signify his real presence in the city. The strong implications of such an
image as an effective substitute for the imperial presence can be inferred from the
placing of the icon of the Emperor Phocas and the Empress Leontia in 603 in
what was probably the palatine chapel, S. Cesario, after its official acclamation
in the basilica Iulia inside the Lateran.2 Equally significant was the fact that the
father of Pope John VII was a Greek imperial functionary, whose title was curator
palatium, and who was in charge of the maintenance of the imperial palace on the
Palatine.3 His son, when he became pope, attempted an unusual move, which was
to remove the seat of the episcopium from the Lateran to the Palatine, where he
planned to build a new episcopium, in proximity and of equal status, to the im­per­
ial site. This move could be taken to show an increasing awareness both of the
role of the papacy in the city and of its now equal status with the imperial repre­
sentative. Incidentally, it also confirms the extent to which, in seventh- and
eighth-century Rome, the Palatine, especially the Domus Augustana Flavia and,
inside it, S. Cesario the palatine chapel, were still perceived as places of power,
indeed the centre of power in the city.4 Moving the papal residence there was a
way of associating it with the heart of political power in Rome, of setting the

1 LP I. 78; see Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo, pp. 48, 53; on the Palatine, see also Augenti ,
‘Il potere e la memoria’, pp. 197–207, and Augenti , ‘Continuity and Discontinuity’, pp. 45–53. For the
most recent work on the residences of the rules as centres of power, see F. A. Bauer, Visualisierungen
von Herrschaft. Frühmittelalterliche Residenzen—Gestalt und Zeremoniell (Istanbul, 2011).
2 Gregory I, letter no 13,1 in MGH Ep. II, p. 364, or ed. in Norberg, Registrum, p. 1101; see also
M. C. Carile, ‘Imperial Icons in Late Antiquity and Byzantium. The Iconic Image of the Emperor
between Representation and Presence’, Ikon 2 (2006), pp. 75–98, and Luchterhandt, ‘Il sovrano sotto
l’immagine’, pp. 45–76.
3 LP I. 87.
4 Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo, pp. 45–60; A. Augenti, ‘Continuity and Discontinuity from Late
Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages in Europe and across the Mediterranean Basin’, in Papers from the
EAA Third Annual Meeting at Ravenna 1997, vol. II. Classical and Medieval, ed. M. Pearce and M. Tosi
(Oxford, 1998), pp. 44–6. On S. Cesario, see A. Bartoli, ‘Scoperta dell’oratorio e del monastero di
S. Cesario sul Palatino’, Bullettino di Archeologia Cristiana 13 (1907), pp. 191–204, and L. Iamurri and
S. Ciofetta, ‘S. Maria Antiqua e S. Cesareo in Palatio’, Roma Sacra. Guida alle chiese della città eterna
1/3 (1995), pp. 26–31.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 277

papacy as an equal to it,5 as well as of Christianizing the Palatine, the last place
which had seen churches established in the centre of Rome.6
John VII embarked on his programme of transformation with the embellish­
ment of a church in the old vestibule of the Domus Tiberiana, which became
S. Maria Antiqua, in parallel with his other major effort to transform parts of
St Peter’s.7 His perception of Rome was centred on the Palatine and the Vatican,
and he planned to remove the episcopium, by then a somewhat isolated and not
heavily populated space, from its first place in the sacred topography of the city at
the Lateran. Both the Palatine and, below it, the Roman Forum retained a strong
symbolic function as the scene of Rome’s imperial past and present, even if large
parts of them were in fact in ruins or next to decaying monuments. However,
John VII’s reign was very short, and it has been traditionally retained that he did
not succeed in moving the patriarchium to the Palatine. A new study by Spera,
based on the very recent archaeological excavations at the foot of the Palatine,

5 There has been some debate about whether the choice was made on account of bringing the
Patriarchium closer to the Byzantine power, that is the duke of Rome’s and exarch’s residence, which
was Bertolini’s view, or whether, as suggested by Nordhagen and Sansterre, this was due to John VII’s
balancing act of imperial obedience versus papal independence, as illustrated by his inclusion of a
portrait of Pope Martin I in S. Maria Antiqua. The return to the Lateran by Zacharias was, according
to Bertolini, either because the papacy no longer felt in need of imperial protection or because it was
no longer needed to be close to the Byzantine centre of power, since it was no longer there; see
Bertolini, Roma di fronte a Bisanzio, pp. 504–6 and A. Van Dijk, ‘Jerusalem, Antioch, Rome and
Constantinople: The Peter Cycle in the Oratory of Pope John VII (705–709)’, Dumbarton Oak Papers
55 (2001), pp. 305–28. On Zacharias’s court see J. Osborne, ‘The papal court during the pontificate of
Zacharias (AD 741–52)’, in Court Culture in the Early Middle Ages: The Proceedings of the First Alcuin
Conference, ed. C. Cubitt (Turnhout, 2003), pp. 223–34. The body of work on S. Maria Antiqua is
considerable. The most recent is Osborne, Rasmus Brandt, and Morganti, eds., Santa Maria Antiqua,
for example the paper by B. Brenk, ‘Papal Patronage in a Greek Church in Rome’, in Santa Maria
Antiqua al Foro Romano cento anni dopo. Atti del colloquio internazionale, Roma, 5–6 maggio 2000, ed.
J. Osborne, J. Rasmus Brandt, and G. Morganti (Rome, 2004) pp. 67–81. Older reference works are
L. Duchesne, ‘S. Maria Antiqua. Notes sur la topographie de Rome au Moyen Age’, MEFREM 17
(1897), pp. 13–37; W. Grüneisen, Sainte Marie Antique (Rome, 1911); P. Romanelli and P. J. Nordhagen,
S. Maria Antiqua (Rome, 1964); and E. Bonardi, ‘S. Maria Antiqua’, Forma Urbis 3/1 (1998), pp. 32–9.
6 For example in Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo, pp. 37–50; L. Duchesne, ‘Le Palatin chrétien’,
Nuovo Bullettino di Archeologia Cristiana 6 (1900), pp. 17–28; L. Spera, ‘La cristianizzazione del Foro
romano e del Palatino. Prima e dopo Giovanni VII’, in Andaloro et al., eds., Santa Maria Antiqua,
pp. 96–109. See also Chapter 5.
7 On John VII and his work at S. Maria Antiqua, see P. J. Nordhagen, ‘The earliest decorations in
S. Maria Antiqua and their date’, Acta ad archaeologiam et historiam pertinentia, Institutum Romanum
Norvegiae 1 (1962), pp. 53–72; ‘The Frescoes of John VII (AD 705–7) in S. Maria Antiqua in Rome’,
ibid., 3 (1968), esp. pp. 87–96, and ‘Sta Maria Antique: the frescoes of the seventh century’, ibid., 8
(1978), pp. 89–141, repr. in P. J. Nordhagen, Studies in Byzantine and Early Medieval Painting (London,
1990); J. Sansterre, ‘Jean VII (705–707): idéologie pontificale et réalisme politique’, in Rayonnement
grec. Hommage a Charles Delvoye, ed. L. Hadermann-Misguich and G. Raepsaet, (Brussels, 1982),
pp. 377–88, esp. ‘A propos de la signification politico-religieuse de certaines fresques de Jean VII
à Sante-Marie-Antique’, pp. 434–40. M. Andaloro, ‘I mosaici dell’Oratorio di Giovanni VII’, in
Fragmenta Picta: affreschi e mosaici staccati del medieovo romano, ed. M. Andaloro (Rome, 1989),
pp. 169–77, and M. Andaloro et al. eds., Santa Maria Antiqua. Most recently, see P. Delogu, ‘Theologia
Picta: Giovanni VIII e l’Adorazione del crocefisso in Santa Maria Antiqua di Roma’, in Ingenita
Curiositas: Studi sull’Italia medievale per Giovanni Vitolo, ed. B. Figliuolo, R. Di Meglio and
A. Ambrosio (Battipaglia, 2017), pp. 259–85.
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278 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

suggests, convincingly to my mind, that he did in fact do so, moving to part of the
old Domus Augustana, rather than, as traditionally thought, to the old Domus
Tiberiana above S. Maria Antiqua.8 He had new offices built, archaeologically
dated to the early eighth century, including through the find of a stamp with John
VII’s name on it, and these offices included the papal archives and scrinium, or
Testamentum-Chartularium, now almost definitely identified with the edifice
called the Turris Chartularia.9 By the time of Pope Zacharias (741–52), Byzantine
control of the city was effectively over, and the Palatine was no longer a locus of
power, so the episcopium was definitely at the Lateran.10 The Palatine was
abandoned as a palace and saw the transformation of some of the old buildings
into churches and monasteries, most famously S. Maria in Pallara, founded in
the tenth century by Peter Medicus, possibly from an existing church of
Carolingian origin.11
The Lateran Palace, with the significant semantic change from patriarchium
(its name itself an attempt at parallelism with Constantinople) to palatium in the
ninth century, showing its gradual assimilation in language and concept to the
late Roman and Eastern imperial ruler’s palace in Constantinople, was seen as the
centre of papal Rome by the Romans, notwithstanding its physical separation
from the most populous part of the city. At its heart, from Gregory III onwards,
was the new, enhanced relic collection of the Sancta Sanctorum chapel, especially
the Acheiropoita icon, which became the protector of the city as it faced a

8 L. Spera, ‘Il papato e Roma nell’VIII secolo. Rileggere la “svolta” istituzionale attraverso la docu­
mentazione archeologica’, Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana 92 (2016), pp. 393–430 at 396–408. For the
excavations see L. Saguì and M. Cante, ‘Archeologia e architettura nell’area delle ‘Terme di Elogabalo’,
alle pendici nord-orientali del Palatino. Dagli isolati giulio-claudii alla chiesa paleocristiana’, Thiasos.
Rivista di Archeologia e architettura antica 4 (2015), pp. 35–75 and L. Saguì and M. Cante, ‘Pendici
nord-orientali del Palatino: ultime novità dalle ‘Terme di Elogabalo’, in Le regole del gioco. Studi in
onore di Clementina Pannella (Rome, 2016), pp. 443–61.
9 Some of this material was already known, but the recent finds have permitted a closer dating of
the material and identification of specific environements of the palace as a residence made for habi­ta­
tion at this period; Spera, ‘Il papato e Roma’, pp. 399–405, Figs. 4 (stamp of John VII) and 6 (Turris
Chartularia).
10 LP I. 93, c. 18; see G. Massimo, ‘Papa Zaccaria e i lavori di rinnovamento del Patriarchio
Lateranense (741–752)’, Arte Medievale 2/1 (2003), pp. 17–37. The word patriarchium began to be
used in the mid-seventh century, as a challenge to Constantinople and Monothelitism, and only in the
late eighth century did it evolve towards palatium, used for example in the Liber Pontificalis for Pope
Valentine in 827, though it was already found in other contexts, such as a charter from Farfa in 813;
see RF II. no 199. After 827, the usage alternates between patriarchium and palatium, though under a
pope like Leo IV, whose views of government were very much centred on a ‘papal court’, as we see in
his letter of 853 arranging for the government of the city in his absence, palatium is strongly favoured;
see F. Marazzi, ‘Riflessioni sull’affermarsi del Laterano come residenza pontificia (secoli IV–IX)’, in his
Patrimonia Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae, pp. 295–302, esp. pp. 296–8; and P. Liverani, ‘Dal palatium
imperiale al palatium pontificio’, in Rome AD 300–800. Power and Symbol—Image and Reality, ed.
J. Rasmus Brandt (Rome: Acta ad archaeologiam et artium historiam pertinentia 17, 2003), pp. 143–63
at 160–1.
11 Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo, p. 66. See also P. Fedele, ‘Una chiesa del Palatino: S. Maria in
Pallara’, ASRSP 26 (1903), pp. 343–80, and now Marchiori, ‘Art and reform’. I am grateful to
C. Wickham for this reference and for lending me this thesis.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 279

Lombard attack, and was carried in procession by Pope Stephen II.12 After the
return of the episcopium to the Lateran, Popes Zacharias, then Hadrian I, had
worked to revive the material infrastructure of the city, including the walls, ­towers,
and aqueducts. One aqueduct, the Clodio, was specifically geared towards serving
the Lateran area, including the palace baths.13 Just as importantly, as an immedi­
ate result of the boost in wealth brought to Rome by the first Carolingians,14
the papacy became engaged both in a vast programme of church restorations, to
which I shall return later in this chapter, and in extensive re­dec­or­ation of the
Lateran Palace.15 The patriarchium had two throne rooms, baths, a treasure room,
a chapel, archives, and a library. Its role as a place of power is made clear by the
fighting to control it at election time. Success was marked by the cere­mony of the
possessio, the taking possession of the complex by the new pope, with the coronation
and banquet under the two bust ‘icons’ of St Peter and St Paul (sub apostolis)
placed above the entrance to the main ceremonial space of the palace in front of
Leo III’s new triclinium, the basilica of Pope Theodore.16 It became even more of a
locus of power with the rebuilding of the official reception spaces, not­ably the hall
of honour, the macrona, and the triclinia of Pope Leo III. Leo III’s built two

12 LP I. 94, c. 11; see below, Chapter 4, p. 62 and n. 200.

13 Spera, ‘Il papato e Roma’, pp. 412–30; Marazzi, ‘Riflessioni’; and Luchterhandt, ‘Vom Haus des
Bischofs’, pp. 73–92.
14 Wickham has always suggested that the great wealth available to the papacy at this point was due
to its control of ex-imperial land and the reorganization of the domuscultae; see below notes 341 and
350. This is very likely as a background change and results, but I believe that Delogu is nonetheless
right in seeing the Carolingian injection of funds into the city, especially at the time of Pope Leo III, as
the main immediate cause of the extraordinary amount of precious metal, in particular, which the
papacy so lavishly used in its building programme; see his latest article, P. Delogu, ‘The popes and
their town in the time of Charlemagne’, in Encounters, Excavations and Argosies. Essays for Richard
Hodges, ed. J. Mitchell, J. Moreland, and B. Leal (Oxford, 2017), pp. 105–15.
15 The historiography on the Lateran Palace is extensive and goes back to C. Rohault de Fleury, Le
Latran au Moyen Age (Paris, 1877), and P. Lauer, Le Palais du Latran (Paris, 1911), the two classic, if
somewhat old, studies, as is R. Elze, ‘Das sacrum palatium lateranense im 10. und 11. Jahrhundert’,
Studi gregoriani 4 (1952), pp. 27–54; see now U. Real, ‘La residenza lateranense dall’età di Giustiniano
all’inizio dell’epoca carolingia’, MEFREM 116 (2004), pp. 95–100; A. Ballardini, ‘In antiquissimo ac
venerabili Lateranensi palatio: la residenza dei pontefici secondo il Liber Pontificalis’, in Le corti nell’alto
medioevo, Settimane 63 (2015), II. pp. 889–927; M. Delle Rose, ‘Il Patriarchio: Note storiche-topogra­
fiche’, in Pietrangeli, Il Palazzo Apostolico Lateranense, pp. 19–35 at 22–5, and M. Cecchelli Trinci,
‘Laterano’, in Pietrangeli, San Giovanni in Laterano, pp. 38–59; (A. Ippoliti, II Palazzo Apostolico del
Laterano (Rome, 2008), deals mostly with later material;) P. Liverani, ‘L’Episcopio lateranense dalle
origini all’alto Medioevo’, in Des ‘Domus ecclesiae’ aux palais épiscopaux, ed. S. Balcon-Berry, F. Baratte,
et al., (Turnhout, 2012), pp. 119–31, and P. Liverani, ed., Giornata di studio tematica dedicata al
Patriarchio Lateranense, MEFREM Antiquité 116 (2004), pp. 7–178. Also useful are P. Verzone, ‘La
distruzione dei Palazzi imperiali di Roma e di Ravenna e la ristrutturazione del Palazzo Lateranense
nel IX secolo nei rapporti con quello di Costantinopoli’, in Roma e l’età carolingia, pp. 39–54;
A. Monciatti, Il Palazzo Vaticano nel Medioevo (Florence, 2005), pp. 3–8; G. Delfin, ‘Contributo alla
storia del Laterano’, Roma e l’età carolingia, pp. 223–7.
16 Luchterhandt, ‘Il sovrano sotto l’immagine’, pp. 47–8. See also G. B. Ladner, ‘I mosaici e gli affre­
schi ecclesiastico-politici nell’antico palazzo lateranense’, in Images and Ideas in the Middle Ages, I, ed.
G. B. Ladner (Rome, 1983), pp. 347–66; and C. Cecchelli, ‘Note sulla topografia dell’antico Laterano.
La Ecclesia Theodorae, la basilica domus theodori papae, la basilica Julia’, in Studi e documenti sulla
Roma sacra, vol. 1, ed. C. Cecchelli (Rome, 1951) I, pp. 143–53.
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280 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

triclinia, one in which he received Charlemagne, and another, begun in 799, with
an even stronger imperial message. The model for the triclinia was the Hall
of Nineteen Couches in the imperial palace in Constantinople…, to highlight the
papacy replacing imperial power in Rome in ideological terms.17 Also important
in terms of influence on the Lateran Palace was Pope Zacharias’s visit to Pavia and
Ravenna, with their palaces, which led him to include secular iconography in
some of the frescoes. Pope Leo III’s extension of the building programme, with
the huge rebuild of the Lateran Palace to double its previous surface and his
­imitation of the imperial style of Constantinople, with its throne, banquets, great
decorative schemes, and large amounts of porphyry, underlines his focus on the
Lateran, the centre of his power, and effectively his court. His vast expenditure on
the Lateran, as well as the Franks’ support of him, may have been another reason
for the plot against him by the more traditionalist among the elite of the city.
Pope Gregory IV (828–44), when restoring the Lateran living quarters, had
another triclinium built, decorated with an apse mosaic and paintings. The tri-
clinia, with their references to imperial audience halls, both at the Lateran and in
the Vatican Palace, were obvious ways of flagging the popes as heirs to the
Byzantine emperor in Rome. By the time of Pope Leo IV (847–55) most of this
Lateran splendour had gone, and he again restored the palace: the Liber Pontificalis
tells us that his two predecessors never dined there, so that Leo IV found that all
adornments and table equipment had been stolen.18 Unfortunately, the effort
required to maintain the palace needed to be a continuous one: the neglect had
gone to such lengths that when Leo IV wanted to hold a banquet in one of the
famous triclinia, there were no crockery or vessels to be found for it.19 Pope
Stephen V (885–91), when he arrived there after his election, found it pillaged

17 LP I. 103, c. 15. Discussions of the triclinia and imperial iconography are very numerous. For the
artistic side, see Wilpert, Die römischen Mosaiken, pp. 19–20; Matthiae, Pittura romana, pp. 197–9;
Krautheimer, Profile of a City, pp. 114–22, esp. 115–16. In terms of places of power, see Noble, Republic
of St Peter, pp. 323–4; G. Curzi, ‘The two triclinia of Leo III as “icons of power” ’, Ikon 9 (2016),
pp. 141–52; C. Walter, ‘Papal political imagery in the medieval Lateran Palace’, Cahiers archéologiques
20 (1970), pp. 155–76 at 169–76; H. Belting, ‘Die beiden Palastaulen Leos Ill. im Lateran und die
Entstehung einer päpstlichen Programmkunst’, Frühmittelaterliche Studien 12 (1978), pp. 55–83;
M. Di Berardo, ‘Le aule di rappresentanza’, in Pietrangeli, Il Palazzo Apostolico Lateranense, pp. 36–49,
who has good reproductions of many later medieval and Renaissance drawings of the rooms;
Luchterhandt, ‘Päpstlicher Palastbau’, pp. 109–22; Luchterhandt, ‘Rom und Aachen: die Karolinger
und der päpstliche Hof um 800’, in Beumann, Karl der Grosse, pp. 104–13, esp. pp. 109–11, with a
reconstruction of the triclinium maius; Luchterhandt, ‘Famulus Petri. Karl der Grosse in der romis­
chen Mosaikbildern Leos III’, in Stiegemann and Wemhoff, 799. Kunst und Kultur, III, pp. 55–70,
Luchterhandt, ‘Rinascita a Roma’, pp. 322–73; A. Iacobini, ‘II mosaico del Triclinio Lateranense’; in
Andaloro ed., Fragmenta picta, pp. 189–96. See also the discussion by A. Cadili, ‘Costantino e
l’autorappresentazione del papato. Arte, architettura e cerimoniali romani’, in Costantino I. Enciclopedia
Costantiniana sulla figura dell’imperatore del cosidetto Editto di Milano 313–2013, 2 vols (Rome, 2013),
I, pp. 713–35 at 713–16; and Luchterhandt, ‘Famulus Petri’, pp. 55–70.
18 LP I. 105, c.16; for Gregory IV see C. Scherer, Der Pontifikat Gregors IV. (827– 844): Vorstellungen
und Wahrnehmungen papstlichen Handelns im 9. Jahrhundert (Stuttgart, 2013), and for Leo IV see
Herbers, Leo IV.
19 LP I. 105 c. 16.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 281

and derelict.20 He toured the palace with the imperial missus, the bishops, and
other Roman nobles to make them register the looting of the palace which had
taken place before his arrival, presumably so that he could not be accused of it
himself. The new pope’s honesty is deliberately underlined by the Liber Pontificalis;
evidently it had been customary for the people of the city to engage in such loot­
ing after the death of a pope, a practice which several popes attempted to forbid,
to no effect. Perhaps this says something about the Romans’ perception of their
bishop—which in turn may go some way towards explaining the looting, since
people might have expected to find the pope living in such a wealthy manner as
to tempt them to despoil him. Maintaining the complex was hard work, and under
Pope Stephen VI (896–7) the basilica itself collapsed; together with the palace, it
was then slowly rebuilt, painted, and decorated by Popes John IX (898–900),
Sergius III (904–11), and John X (911–28).21
The Lateran Palace was not the only locus of power: so was the area outside it,
up to the basilica. The Campus Lateranensis had been at the centre of papal ideol­
ogy and display since the eighth century.22 The portico (Laubiae) of the Lateran
Palace was modelled on a Byzantine aula, and used for laudes and acclamations.
It, and the campus around it, represented the secular power of the pope, with the
statue of the She-Wolf symbol of Rome, the statue of Marcus Aurelius, thought
then to have represented Constantine, and part of a genuine statue of Constantine
with the orb and sword, the embodiment of Roma caput mundi. The Campus
Lateranensis was a symbol of the identity of Rome in terms of its awareness of
Romanitas, with its symbols of the memory of the Roman city. I shall return to
this in Chapter 6.
That the Lateran complex—the house and church of Rome’s bishop from
the first and still at the core of the religious and liturgical life of the city, as we see
from the processions for major feasts and the fact that the legitimimacy of the
choice of the new pope depended on its control—should require such constant
rebuilds after dramatic events suggests a certain lack of maintenance. This was
perhaps due to the increasing absence of the popes—unless one assumes the so-
called ‘rebuilding’ to have actually been nothing but maintenance, written up by
the Liber’s rhetoric. The lack of maintenance was presumably the result of the
papacy’s increasing involvement, not only with the Carolingians, but also with all
pilgrims from northern areas. Unlike the Romans, their focus on Rome was as a
city of pilgrimage to the tomb of St Peter, and their centre of attention was always
the area of the Vatican.

20 LP I. 112, c. 6. 21 LP II. 115, 122, 125; BenSor, p. 159.

22 Herklotz, ‘Der Campus Lateranensis’, pp. 32–42; also rev. in Herklotz, Gli eredi di Costantino,
pp. 91–4; see also Krautheimer, Profile of a City, pp. 256–8, and P. Liverani, ‘Monumenti di epoca
­classica nel Patriarchio e nel Campo Lateranense’, in Pietrangeli, Il Palazzo Apostolico Lateranense,
pp. 106–15.
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282 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

The Franks, and generally all northern Europeans, used the term Rome when
speaking of the city of St Peter, but what they often meant was, in fact, the Vatican.
High-born guests were, of course, shown the city and received in the Lateran,
as not only Charlemagne but any important northern ecclesiastics such as
Archbishop Wilfrid of York had been in 642, and interested pilgrims toured the
city churches, as we know from the Itinerary of Einsiedeln.23 The touring of city
churches was not infrequently with a view to finding a less well-protected one,
whose relics could be stolen and taken back north of the Alps, as Einhard did.24
Nevertheless, the focus of the pilgrims’ devotion remained the Vatican, and
Charlemagne was no different, as seen from his perfunctory visit to the city after
asking for, and obtaining, papal permission to do so, and his centralization of his
court near St Peter’s. Whether he actually built a palace there, or whether his suc­
cessors did (the earliest mention of a Carolingian palace relates to the Emperor
Lothar), or even to what extent it was a self-contained palace as opposed to part
of a building that belonged to the papal complex,25 the fact remains that Charles,
let alone his successors, never actually thought of establishing their residence on
the Palatine. This may have been because it had been the palace of the Eastern
emperor, from whom the Carolingians wanted to distinguish their power, or even
because it had been the palace of the pagan emperors, while for the Carolingians
Rome signified not ancient, but Constantinian, Rome.26 Bougard suggests that
the presence of a Carolingian palace in Rome would have been impossible
according to the terms of the Constitutum Constantini, because Rome was the city
of the pope, over which he, and not the Franks, held sovereignty.27 Whether the
Constitutum was actually implemented so strictly at such an early period, and
whether Leo III, for example, would have been able to prevent the emperor from
being in the city had he so wished, is impossible to know. At any rate, either
because what was the norm when there was a Byzantine emperor ruling the city
was obviously no longer possible or indeed desirable for a Frankish king, not even

23 The Life of Bishop Wilfrid by Eddius Stephanus, ed. and tr. B. Colgrave, 2nd edn (Cambridge,
1985), churches 33 and 55, pp. 66–7 and 120–1; IE.
24 Einhard, Translatio et Miracula Sanctorum Marcellini et Petri (BHL–5233), ed. G. Waitz, MGH
SS 15,1 (1887), pp. 239–64.
25 The first reference to it may be that of Leo III’s triclinium at St Peter’s in 799, LP I. 98, c. 27, but
the first time is is called a palace was in a charter of Louis III’s in 901, when it was called the palace
founded near St Peter’s and its audience hall was known as the large apse (laubia maior); see FSI 37,
p. 29; see K. B. Steinke, Die mittelalterlichen Vatikanpaläste und ihre Kapellen (Vatican City, 1984),
p. 27–30.
26 On the perception of Rome, see, for example, R. Schieffer, ‘Die Karolinger und Rom’, in Roma fra
Oriente e Occidente, Settimane 49 (2002), pp. 101–27, and below, Chapter 5.
27 F. Bougard, ‘Les palais royaux et imperiaux de l’Italie carolingienne et ottonienne’, in Palais
royaux et princiers au Moyen Age, ed. A. Renoux (Le Mans, 1996), pp. 181–96 at p. 185. There has been
considerable interest in the concept and reality of palaces in the early medieval period, with recent
work in Italy including E. Woltmer, ‘Palatia imperiali e mobilità della corte (secoli IX–XII)’, in Arti e
Storia nel Medioevo (2002) I, pp. 557–630, and L. Baldini Lippolis, ‘Palatia, praetoria ed episcopia:
alcune osservazioni’, in La villa restaurata e i nuovi studi sull’edilizia residenziale tardoantica, ed.
P. Pensabene and C. Sfameni (Bari, 2014), pp. 163–70.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 283

for the Frankish emperor, or because the Carolingians had no interest in the city
of Rome itself, the fact remains that the Carolingian palace and the centre of
Carolingian government in the form of the imperial missi were at the Vatican, as
we see from the charter granted by the Emperor Louis III in the laubia maior of
the palace at the Needle.28
During the period of Carolingian rule in Rome the only centre of power, where
the emperors like Lothar and Louis II occasionally stayed, was the Vatican Palace,
which must have also been the official residence of the imperial missus. After 901,
under Louis III, this palace was no longer mentioned as a centre of secular power,
and King Hugh of Provence, when in Rome to marry Marozia in 932, was
ensconced in the fortified Castel Sant’Angelo. It is likely that when Otto I came to
Rome, he stayed at the Vatican, probably in the old Carolingian palace, and it is
only with Otto III that we again need question where the imperial palace was.
Like all Roman aristocrats, and even more so since the centre of power of the first
generation of Theophylact’s family had been there, Otto III too probably stayed
on the Aventine. The debate is still ongoing about whether he remained there or
not. Currently we still have two views, the first suggested by Schramm, strongly
supported by Brühl, and apparently accepted by Toubert and Augenti: this is that
Otto III, true to his ideas of renovatio, actually took up residence on the Palatine.29
Görich further explained his move to the Palatine on the (rather weak) grounds
that much of it was in the hands of de Imiza family, who were ‘pro-imperial’.30 The
move to the Palatine is contested by Santangeli Valenzani and others, such as Le
Pogam, who believe that Otto stayed on the Aventine, just as members of the
Roman elite families, probably at SS Alessio e Bonifazio, in what Brühl has
defined as a ‘monastery palace’.31 The location of Otto III’s palace in Rome has
continued to be at the centre of the debate: the issue is not just topographical but
ideological, linked to whether Otto III saw himself restoring the Palatine as a
­centre of power as an integral part of his Renovatio imperii Romani. Augenti made
two points which would appear to support the Palatine version. At S. Maria in

28 Monciatti, Il Palazzo Vaticano, pp. 8–15; the needle (Agulia) refers to the obelisk in front of it;
see also Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 174–7, who suggests there was the embryo of a papal palace,
next to which the Carolingian one was later built.
29 Schramm, Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio, pp. 87–187; C. Brühl, ‘Die Kaiserpfalz bei St. Peter und
die Pfalz Ottos III auf dem Palatin’, QFIAB 34 (1954), pp. 1–30, with a new version in C. Brühl, Aus
Mittelalter und Diplomatik. Gesammelte Aufsätze Band I: Studien zur Verfassungsgeschichte und
Stadttopographie, 2 vols (Hildesheim, 1989), pp. 3–51; Toubert, Les Structures II, p. 1012; Augenti, Il
Palatino nel Medioevo, pp. 74–5.
30 Görich, ‘Die de Imiza’.
31 R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘La residenza di Ottone III sul Palatino. Un mito storiografico?’,
Bullettino della Commissione Archeologica Communale di Roma 102 (2001), pp. 163–8; P. Y. Le Pogam,
‘Otton III sur le Palatin ou sur l’Aventin? Notes sur les residences aristocratiques de l’Aventin au Xe
siecle, notamment celle de Sainte-Sabine’, MEFREM 116 (2004), pp. 595–608. On the concept of ‘mon­
astery palaces’, see Brühl, Fodrum, pp. 12–106, 118–26, 392–452, and 452–577; also Brühl, ‘Königs-,
Bischofs- und Stadtpfalz in den Städten des “Regnum Italiae” vom 9–13. Jahrhundert’, repr. in Brühl,
Aus Mittelalter und Diplomatik, pp. 32–51.
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284 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Pallara, there was an altar to St Bartholomew, which could not be earlier than
1000 because it was a cult imported into Rome by the Ottonians; moreover,
Otto III took part in a synod there in 1001 with Pope Silvester, in Pallaria, which
may have been the opportunity for the gift of the altar.32 Secondly, the monastery
at S. Cesario, occupied by Greek monks, was, as we know from the episode of
Theophano attending the deathbed of St Sabas there, a favourite with the
Ottonians. Conflicting views need not be incompatible; it is quite possible that
Otto III did indeed live on the Aventine, but also that he planned to restore the
imperial palace on the Palatine and live there eventually, as Schramm suggested,
but died too soon.33 This view further fits with the ferocious opposition Otto
encountered from the Romans. Mostly they were not that concerned when there
was an emperor at St Peter’s, outside the city, but it became a very real problem if
and when he wanted to rule inside the city itself.34
Just as Charlemagne and his successors never attempted to rebuild or to restore
the existing imperial (in their eyes Byzantine) palace complex on the Palatine,
neither did they do so in Ravenna. There, the late antique imperial palace had
been subsequently used by the Gothic kings and by the exarchs.35 When Ravenna
was conquered by Aistulf in 751, the palace was clearly still habitable. Aistulf took
up residence there, began restoring it, and may have been the original founder of
S. Salvatore ad Calchis36 as a palatine chapel, with a significant name since it was
copied from the imperial palace of the Chalkè in Constantinople. He also began
restoring the Basilica Petriana. He wanted to be seen as the successor of the
exarchs, and as the emperor’s delegate, the heir of Byzantium in Ravenna.37 Placing
himself ideologically as the heir to the exarchs was one reason for his apparent
acceptance of the autonomistic position of the Church of Ravenna against
Rome.38 With the Franks, the ideological stance changed. When Charlemagne
came to Ravenna, he would not stay in the palace, which is unlikely to have
decayed so much since Aistulf as to make basic restoration and habitation impos­
sible. He may have deliberately wanted to distance himself from the Roman

32 ‘Vita Bernwardi’, in MGH SS IV, ch. 22. 33 Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo, pp. 74–5.
34 On the Romans’ opposition to Otto III, see Chapter 5.
35 Augenti, ‘Archeologia e topografia a Ravenna’, pp. 7–32, esp. 22–6 and 30–1; Augenti, Palatia,
pp. 26–37, 44–7; Augenti, ‘Luoghi e non luoghi: palazzi e città nell’Italia tardoantica e medievale’, in
Les palais dans la ville. Espaces urbains et lieux de la puissance publique dans la méditerranée médiévale,
ed. P. Boucheron and J. Chiffoleau (Lyon, 2004), pp. 15–20 and 27; Cirelli, Ravenna, pp. 78–91; G. De
Francovich, Il Palatium di Teodorico a Ravenna e la cosidetta ‘architettura di potenza’: Problemi
d’interpretazione di raffigurazioni architettoniche nell’arte tardoantica e altomedioevale (Rome, 1970),
pp. 55–7; E. Dyggve, Ravennatum Palatium Sacrum: la basilica ipetrale per cerimonie: studi
sull’architettura dei palazzi della tarda antichità (Copenhagen, 1941); E. Russo, ‘Una nuova proposta
per la sequenza cronologica del palazzo imperiale di Ravenna’, in Ravenna da capitale imperiale,
pp. 155–236; and P. Porta, ‘Il centro del potere: il problema del palazzo del esarco’, in SR II.1, pp. 269–86;
C. Rizzardi, ‘Rinnovamento architettonico a Ravenna durante l’impero degli Ottoni: problemi ed
aspetti’, CARB 37 (1990), pp. 393–415.
36 J. Ortalli, ‘L’edilizia abitativa’, SR II.1, pp. 167–92. 37 Agnellus, LP, ch. 155.
38 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 332.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 285

imperial past, as he had done in Rome. Most likely, he wanted to remove himself
from any associations with the exarchal palace in Ravenna, especially as the
pope himself had at first equated him in status with the exarch when the Liber
Pontificalis described his welcome on his entry into Rome in 774.39 Charles would
have been unlikely to be happy at being compared to the deputy of the Eastern
emperor. Nonetheless, Charles also wanted to preserve, and indeed benefit from,
the prestige of both the imperial and the Theodorician past by association. And
what better way to do this than to take it with him, as it were, and transport its
imperial aura to his new imperial capital at Aachen? He wrote to Pope Hadrian
I to ask if his men could remove the marble columns and floors, and other archi­
tecture, from the palace in Ravenna, to be reused in the new palace he was plan­
ning to build for himself at Aachen.40 Hadrian authorized the removal of all
items which had fallen down, though clearly Frankish envoys did not worry too
much about nuances and took away any worthwhile objects, including those that
needed to be forcibly removed from walls and ceilings.41 These spoliations, much
resented locally, led to the complete ruin of the palace and the subsequent topo­
graph­ic­al modifications, especially in the northern area. The complex lost its
structure, was divided up into small areas of land, on one of which was built or
rebuilt the church of S. Salvatore ad Calchis, and was then turned into private
houses, with reuse of the building materials, by the Ravenna aristocracy.42
Another church was built, S. Salvatore in Fundamento Regio, and also the first
aristocratic house monastery of S. Maria in domo Ferrata, in the house of
Ingelrada, the daughter of the comes palatii Hucbald and wife of Duke Martin.43

39 LP I, 97, c. 36.
40 Letter by Hadrian in CC 81; Einhard, c. 26; see A. Ranaldi and P. Novara, ‘Karl der Grosse,
Ravenna und Aachen’, in Beumann, Karl der Grosse, pp. 140–9.
41 Augenti, ‘Archeologia e topografia a Ravenna’, pp. 7–23 and Augenti, ‘The Palace of Theoderic at
Ravenna: a new analysis of the complex’, in Housing in Late Antiquity: from palaces to shops, ed.
L. Lavan, L. Özgenel, and A. C. Sarantis, Housing in Late Antiquity: from palaces to shops (Leiden,
2007), pp. 425–53. It is not quite clear whether the palace of Theodoric, and later of the exarchs, and
the late antique imperial palace of Valentinian III ‘ad lauretum’ were in fact one and the same—
Agnellus seems to imply that the latter was near the Porta Vandalaria, but Charlemagne’s spoliations
clearly involved the former. Later on Leo III protested at the extent of the spoliations; Letters 2 and 10
in MGH Ep. V.
42 B. Baldini, Antichi chiostri ravennati. Cronologia dei monasteri benedettini femminili (Ravenna,
2003), pp. 11–32; Augenti, ‘Ravenna e Classe’, pp. 190–6; Cirelli, Ravenna, pp. 153–63. On the link
between aristocratic residences and power in the tenth century, see J. P. Brunterc’h, ‘Habitat et pouvoir
à Ravenne au Xe siècle’, Francia 29/1 (2002), pp. 70–80.
43 Cirelli, Ravenna, pp. 160–1; Mauskopf Deliyannis, Ravenna in Late Antiquity, pp. 288–91;
Ortalli, ‘L’edilizia abitativa’, pp. 182–4; and the various works by Novara, Ad Religionis Claustrum
Construendum; Edilizia abitativa nel medioevo ravennate: un’indagine attraverso le fonti scritte e il
riscontro del dato archeologico (Ravenna, 2008); ‘Edilizia abitativa nella Ravenna altomedievale: docu­
menti d’archivio e indagini sul sopravissuto’, in IV Congresso nazionale di archeologia medievale,
Abbazia di San Galgano (Chiusdino-Siena), 26–30 settembre 2006, ed. R. Francovich and M. Valenti
(Florence, 2006), pp. 556–62; ‘I monasteri ravennati in età ottoniana: una difficile indagine archeo­
logica’, in Missio Ad Gentes. Ravenna e l’evangelizzazione dell’Est europeo ed. P. Novara (Ravenna,
2002), pp. 51–9; and ‘Una “domus” ravennate della comitissa Ingelrada’, Torriceliana 55–6 (2004–5),
pp. 103–15.
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286 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

We are not told where later Carolingians stayed when in Ravenna, and one might
suppose that it would have been at the episcopium.
One also needs to consider the so-called Ottonian palace in Ravenna. The
Roman situation had an impact on the Ravennate one: here too there is a debate
as to whether there was a palace or not. It has long been taken for granted that
Otto I or Otto II had built a palace at S. Severo in Classe.44 The archaeology of the
site seems to show that this would have been difficult, because, in the current state
of the excavation, one fails to see where one could place an imperial palace there,
unless it was a part of the monastery itself, say a part of the abbot’s residence
which had been put at the disposal of the court. A second hypothesis has been put
forward, which is that of a palace at Sablonaria, between Classe and Ravenna.45
Finally, a third is that of a palace outside Porta S. Lorenzo, on land belonging to
the monastery of S. Lorenzo in Cesarea, to which it later reverted.46 This may
have had a small church dedicated to St Paul as a palatine chapel, meaning that it
too may have been part of the monastery, though topographically distant, and
thus more likely to have been a pied-à-terre than a palace—the most convincing
view in my opinion. The fact that there was a palace in the later eleventh century
is no proof that there was one in existence in the tenth—German imperial pres­
ence was much more forceful in Ravenna under the Salians. It is, however, pos­
sible that the Ottonian custom of calling any place where the emperor issued a
document a palatium was fundamentally part of the Ottonian tradition of peri­
pat­et­ic government, whereby the palace is where the emperor is.47 If this is indeed
so, then this gives us a good view of the perception of Ravenna by the Ottonians
in the tenth century—not their new capital or Second Rome, as some Ravennati
may have thought and hoped for, but a second best if, as so often, Rome proved
uncontrollable.
Both the Carolingians and the Ottonians, within a by then well-established
tradition of the fundamental political role of some great abbeys, may have thought
that a palace which was part of a monastic or ecclesiastical complex, at St Peter’s,

44 A. Augenti, ‘Dalla villa romana al monastero medievale: il complesso di San Severo a Classe’, in
Ideologia e cultura artistica tra Adriatico e Mediterraneo orientale (IV–X secolo). Il ruolo dell’autorità
ecclesiastica alla luce di nuovi scavi e ricerche. Atti del Convegno internazionale Bologna-Ravenna, 26–9
Novembre 2007, ed. R. Farioli Campanati et al. (Ravenna, 2009), p. 245; Cirelli, Ravenna, pp. 144–6;
S. Gelichi, ‘Il paesaggio urbano tra V e X secolo’, in SR II.1, pp. 153–66 at p.158; Zimmerman, ‘Nella
tradizione di città capitale’, pp. 107–15 at pp. 111 and 112; Bougard, ‘Les palais royaux’, p. 185, agrees
with this.
45 M. Uhlirz, ‘Die Restitution des Exarchates Ravenna durch die Ottonen. Mit einem Exkurs: Die
kaiserliche Pfalz vor den Toren Ravennas’, MIÖG 50 (1936), pp. 1–34.
46 P. Novara, ‘Note sul “palazzo degli Ottoni” in Ravenna e sulla cappella di San Paolo Fuori Porta
San Lorenzo. Le fonti’, Civiltà padana 3 (1990), pp. 79–89.
47 Brühl, Fodrum, pp. 118–26, and J. W. Bernhardt, Itinerant Kingship and Royal Monasteries in
Early medieval Germany (Cambridge, 1993), are the most detailed studies, though the older ones by
J. Fleckenstein, Die Hofkapelle der deutschen Könige, 2 vols (Stuttgart, 1959–66), and K. Leyser, Rule
and conflict in an early medieval society: Ottonian Saxony (London, 1979), as well as Reuter, Germany
in the Early Middle Ages, pp. 208–12, are still most valuable.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 287

S. Alessio, or S. Severo, was a perfectly fit and well-defined locus of power.

Otto III, perhaps with his mother’s tradition behind him, was the only one who,
in his plans for reviving the Palatine, showed more affinity with a different, late
antique, Eastern imperial or Byzantine idea of the palace, of the kind found on
the Palatine, in Ravenna’s exarchal palace, or the Doge’s Palace in Venice.

Palaces of the Ruling Elite: Doges, Archbishops, Prince

Beside imperial, royal, and papal palaces the other major places of power were the
doges’ and patriarchal palaces in Venice, the Ravenna episcopium, and the palace
of the princeps Alberic.
There are in Venice only two palaces: the Doge’s Palace, and the Patriarch’s
Palace, the latter originally situated at S. Zulian, where it was at the time of Doge
Ursus I,48 later at S. Silvestro, and finally attached to the Basilica of St Mark. In
Venice, no one else lived in a palace: aristocratic families made a point of living in
their own houses, except when they were elected to office as doges. This im­port­
ant point is made twice by John the Deacon, the first time when he tells the story
of Doge Ursus II who, when ill and having decided to resign, went back to his
house; after he allowed the Venetians to choose another doge, they elected Peter
Candiano ‘in front of his house’ (infra domum ipsius).49 Similarly, when Peter
I Orseolo was elected doge, with the palace itself having partly burnt down in the
976 fire, he decided to stay in his own house while rebuilding the ducal palace.50
This story has been much discussed, in view of what we are told of the Orseolo
house, placed in the way of the fire, having possibly been sacrificed in order for
the conspirators, of whom Peter I was one, to be able to cause the fire in the first
place.51 This rumour, which clearly circulated to the extent that Peter Damian
knew of it a century later, and which may in fact have been a negotiating factor in
the subsequent elevation of Peter I to doge,52 must have been fairly widespread.
This may well be why John the Deacon was so keen to point out that his patron
and hero, Peter II Orseolo’s father, could not possibly have been involved in the
conspiracy since—and he insists on this fact—Peter I went back ‘to his house’,
meaning that this had not been destroyed. Thus John could show that Peter I had
not contributed to setting the fire to burn the palace. If the conspiracy participa­
tion of Peter I is true, and not just rhetoric, it begs the question of where Peter
I might have been able to live while the ducal palace was being rebuilt, and
­suggests the answer that already rich Venetian families owned more than one

48 JnD III.13; Fedalto, ‘Le origini della diocesi di Venezia’, pp. 123–42; Fedalto, ‘Organizzazione
ecclesiastica’, pp. 251–410; Rando, ‘Le strutture della chiesa locale’, pp. 645–675, esp. 646–7; Rando,
Una Chiesa di Frontiera, p. 22; Tramontin, ‘Fondazione e sviluppo della diocesi’, pp. 21–45; and Ortalli,
‘Il Ducato’, pp. 753–5.
49 JnD III.32. 50 JnD II.14.
51 On a discussion of the ramifications of the story, see Ortalli, Petrus I, and Ortalli, ‘Quando il
Doge diventa santo’, pp. 15–48.
52 Peter Damian, Vita Romualdi, pp. 21–24, esp. 23.
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288 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

property in the city. It is also conceivable, of course, that in view of his role in the
conspiracy, Peter I may have been rather afraid of being anywhere else than in his
own house, at least until strong walls protected him from possible revenge from
the Candiani. Nevertheless, for the doges it was a key factor of their representa­
tion that there should not have been any suggestion that the ducal palace ever
became associated with any one family, as opposed to being only the seat of power
in the city.
The first ducal palace was begun by the Particiaci and subsequently restored
by Peter I, then Peter II Orseolo, and the body of St Mark was translated into
what was at first the palace’s chapel, which then became the Basilica of St Mark,
in 836.53 As the palace chapel became more and more public and identified with
St Mark, the patron of the city, so the palace itself was also increasingly perceived
as the supreme and real place of power. No incident proves this better than its
ruthless destruction by fire in 976. John the Deacon claims that there was no way
for the Venetians to get hold of Peter IV in the palace, because the latter was so
well defended by Peter’s much hated Italian mercenaries—a significant and
revealing glimpse of how far the doges had been able to create an impregnable
refuge in the palace.54 Hence the necessity of setting it on fire, even at the cost of
‘over 300 houses’ (symbolic number notwithstanding, there were certainly many
houses of noble families situated in the vicinity of the palace), which also burned
down. This is how identified power in Venice had become with the doge and the
palace. Not surprisingly, the first thing that the new Doge Peter I Orseolo did was
to begin rebuilding the palace.
As mentioned earlier, the late antique palace in Ravenna, in use until at least
the eighth century, was not used for the next fifty or so years until Charlemagne’s
missi helped themselves to its interior decoration.55 By contrast, the archiepis­
copal palace saw relatively little change over the period. Its evolution has been
studied by both Miller and Rizzardi.56 The earliest Catholic episcopium had prob­
ably been the Domus Ursiana near the Catholic cathedral, but it then moved to
what would become known as the Domus Valeriana (789–810), where the Arian

53 JnD II. 39; S. Tramontin, ‘Origini e sviluppi della leggenda marciana’, in Tonon, Le origini della
chiesa di Venezia, pp. 167–86; S. Tramontin, ‘San Marco’, in Culto dei santi a Venezia, ed. S. Tramontin,
A. Niero, G. Musolino, and C. Candiani (Venice, 1965), pp. 41–73. More recently, see the comprehen­
sive study by F. Veronese in his thesis ‘Reliquie in movimento. Traslazioni, agiografie e politica tra
Venetia e Alemannia (VIII–X secolo)’ (Universities of Padova and Paris VIII Vincennes, 2012).
54 JnD IV. 55 Charles’s letter to Hadrian, in CC 81, and Einhard, ch. 26.
56 Agnellus, LP, chs. 145 and 163. F. W. Deichmann, ‘Studi sulla Ravenna scomparsa’, Felix Ravenna
103–4 (1972), pp. 94–112; Mauskopf Deliyannis, Ravenna in Late Antiquity, p. 294, and M. C. Miller,
‘The development of the archiepiscopal residence in Ravenna 300–1300’, Felix Ravenna 141–4 (1991–2),
pp. 145–173, and her more recent M. C. Miller, The Bishop’s Palace. Architecture and Authority in
Medieval Italy (Ithaca, 2000), pp. 22–33 and 56–7; also important are P. Novara, ‘Palatium domni epis-
copi: appunti archeologici sull’aria circostante la cattedrale di Ravenna attraverso alcuni fondi speciali’,
in Benericetti ed., Colligite Fragmenta, pp. 131–813 at pp. 164–83, and Cirelli, ‘Ravenna – Rise of a
Late Antique capital’, pp. 245–6.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 289

episcopium had been, in a classic example of appropriation of space for orthodoxy.

The complex included a private chapel, dedicated to St Andrew, a rare early
ex­ample of a chapel inside the episcopium: even the Lateran Palace had its first
such chapel, that of S. Silvestro, only in the seventh century, and the Sancta
Sanctorum chapel was first mentioned under Pope Stephen III. The episcopium
included a reception dining room, the triclinium known as Quinque accubitae,
still in use at the time of Charlemagne, who was invited to eat there by Archbishop
Gratiosus.57 This would obviously have only applied to special occasions: the
ordinary episcopal mensa was in the episcopal building, and Archbishop John VI
(726–44) ate there with his clergy, supra vivarium.58 The complex was in the typical
shape of Ravenna official buildings, a semicircle inside a polygon on the model of
Constantinople. The triclinium would have been an emulation of the court of
Constantinople, whose palaces were themselves essentially the original polyap­
sidal villae of the Western Roman aristocracy of late antiquity. But the Ravenna
episcopium had five apses, making it more impressive than the usual three. The
panels of the triclinium had superimposed or parallel Old and New Testament
cycles, as at St Peter’s and S. Paolo in Rome, clearly an acknowledgement of the
supremacy of Rome. The triclinium was built slightly earlier than the building and
decorating by Pope Leo III of his Lateran triclinia, said to have been modelled on
the imperial palace in Constantinople: perhaps a closer example may have been
available in Ravenna. The importance of suitable representation rooms had the
purpose of enhancing episcopal authority, parallel to that of the secular ruler.
A few additions were made to the episcopium over the centuries, for example
with the building of the Domus Felicis in 712, and the episcopal vivarium under
Archbishop John VIII, as well as the baths of the clergy and the domus built for
them by Archbishop Valerius in the ninth century.59 Rents from the lands of the
Church of Ravenna were collected at various centres or warehouses called recto-
ria, for example at Rimini, Fano, and Pesaro, and consigned to Ravenna in domo
episcopii. Gradually over the early medieval period, the episcopium changed
orien­ta­tion: from opening south-east of the cathedral at first, it shifted to looking
towards the marketplace. The southern buildings, including the baths, were aban­
doned and two charters from 979 and 982 under Archbishop Honorius already

57 Agnellus, LP c. 165; see C. Rizzardi, ‘Le sale di rappresentanza dell’episcopio di Ravenna

nell’ambito dell’edilizia religiosa occidentale ed orientale dal tardoantico all’alto medioevo’, in
L’Audience. Rituels et cadres spatiaux dans l’Antiquité et le Haut Moyen Age, ed. J.-P. Caillet and M. Sot
(Paris, 2007), pp. 221–39.
58 Agnellus, LP c. 163; C. Rizzardi, ‘L’episcopio di Ravenna nell’ambito dell’edilizia religiosa occi­
dentale ed orientale dal Tardoantico all’alto Medioevo: gli ambienti di rappresentanza’, Atti e memorie
della Deputazione di storia patria per le Romagne 55 (2005), pp. 147–74.
59 Agnellus, LP, chs. 145 and 163. Deichmann, ‘Studi sulla Ravenna scomparsa’, pp. 94–112;
Mauskopf Deliyannis, Ravenna in Late Antiquity, p. 294; Miller, ‘The development’, pp. 141–4, and
Miller, The Bishop’s Palace, pp. 22–33 and 56–7.
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290 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

show the decline of the landscape in this area.60 The new leases granted by him
included destroyed walls and remnants of ancient buildings. The new buildings
faced the piazza, where access was from the road rather than the cathedral.
This reorientation of space, and change of name, corresponded to the renewed
prestige, status, and power of the archbishops in the Ottonian/Salian period, after
they had become, to all intents and purposes, ‘vassals’ of the emperor. It came to
reflect, first, the triumph of orthodoxy by the ninth century with the Domus
Valeriana, then the rise of episcopal power as fostered by Charlemagne and his
use of bishops in politics. The alliance with imperial power was demonstrated by
the reorientation of the episcopal palace to face the city, where the emperor’s
power was and, closely linked to it, the archiepiscopal power too.
In Rome, the key areas inhabited by the rulers of the city were the Aventine and
the area of the Fora and the beginning of Via Lata. The Aventine had already
been, in Roman times, the traditional aristocratic zone of the city, both for being
higher and more salubrious and also because it was opposite the imperial power­
house on the Palatine. The area of the Fora, the heart of public republican and
imperial Rome, was clearly important to the ‘strategies of settlement’ of the
Roman aristocracy, especially for the family of Alberic and his friends. All their
houses were around SS Apostoli (himself) and the Via Lata (his three cousins
Marozia, Stefania, and Teodora), and Alberic made gifts to churches in the reused
monumental complexes of the imperial Fora, such as the monastery of S. Basilio
in scala mortuorum, built on the podium of the temple of Mars Ultor in the
Forum of Augustus.61 When it first came to prominence, the family of Theophylact,
like that of other major aristocratic functionaries such as Gregory de Aventino,
settled on the Aventine.62 The family still lived there—Theophylact and his wife
Theodora, then their daughter Marozia and her son Alberic, born in the family
home, which he would later turn into the monastic foundation of S. Maria de
Aventino (now S. Maria del Priorato)—when he initiated the reform of Odo of
Cluny in the city.63 After rejecting his mother’s marriage to King Hugh, and after

60 Benericetti X/3, nos 208 and 223.

61 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, I Fori imperiali, pp. 47–59; Santangeli Valenzani,
‘L’insediamento aristocratico’, pp. 229–46; Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Topografia del potere a Roma nel X
secolo’, in West-Harling, Three Empires, pp. 135–55; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 22–8.
62 RS no. 55.
63 A. Rota, ‘La riforma monastica del princeps Alberico II nello stato romano ed il suo significato
per il potere indipendente del princeps’, ASRSP 79 (1956), pp. 12–22; I. Rosé, ‘La presence “clunisi­
enne” a Rome et dans sa region au 10. siecle: reformes et ecclesiologie monastiques d’Odon à Maïeul’,
in Il monachesimo italiano dall’età longobarda all’età ottoniana, secc. 8–10.: atti del 7. Convegno di studi
storici sull’Italia benedettina, Nonantola (Modena), 10–13 settembre 2003, ed. G. Spinelli (Nonantola:
Convegno di studi storici sull’Italia benedettina 7, 2003), p. 231–71; G. Antonelli, ‘L’opera di Odone di
Cluny in Italia’, Benedictina 4 (1950), pp. 19–40. Sickel, ‘Alberic II’, and more recently, Hamilton’s
papers, collected in B. Hamilton, Monastic Reform, Catharism and the Crusades, 900–1300 (London,
1979), ‘The monastic revival in tenth-century Rome’ (1962), pp. 25–67; ‘The Monastery of S. Alessio
and the religious and intellectual renaissance of tenth-century Rome’ (1967), pp. 265–310; B. Hamilton,
‘The house of Theophylact and the promotion of religious life among women in tenth-century Rome’,
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 291

having thrown Hugh out of Rome and became sole ruler of the city, Alberic
deliberately moved out of Castel Sant’Angelo, where Hugh and his mother had
been ensconced, to the area closest to the imperial end of the Fora: his palace was
back at the old core of power on the Via Lata, at SS Apostoli.64 One might remark
in passing on the fact that this was also an interesting choice of location in rela­
tion to its name: the cult of the Twelve Apostles was strongly associated with the
im­per­ial family in Constantinople, notably at the Apostoleion. This was a sym­
bolic move away from a fortified residence, as used by tyrants alone,65 to a palace
admittedly, but, like Augustus, only the foremost one among his peers. Alberic
made a point of living in his own house as a princeps; even the doges in Venice,
while living in their own houses before and after their period of office, did make
the ducal palace their residence while in office.66

Residences of the Aristocracy

Very little is known of the residential choices of the Roman elite in the ninth cen­
tury, other than through our knowledge of the family background of the popes. It
is through this that we can work out where these families chose to live. These
areas were at the foot, or within the perimeter, of the central zone of the old
im­per­ial city: the area of S. Silvestro in Capite and the Via Lata (family home of
Popes Stephen II and Paul), the Via Lata near S. Marco (Hadrian I, Valentine), the
Regio III around S. Martino ai Monti and Trajan’s Baths on the Esquiline
(Hadrian II), the Regio IV (Sergius II).67 In the tenth century, Leo VIII (963–5)
was the son of a protoscriniarius from the Clivus Argentarius, Benedict VI (972–4)
the son of a monk Ildebrand of the Regio VIII sub Capitolio, and John XV’s
(985–96) family lived in the Gallina Alba area, that is on the Quirinale near the
Baths of Diocletian.68
As Santangeli Valenzani has shown, the half century which saw the end of
Eastern imperial rule in the city enabled the popes for the first time to have access
to, and then take control of, this huge area of property and real-estate capital no

Studia Monastica 12 (1970), pp. 195–217; R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Aristocratic evergetism and urban
monasteries’, in Western monasticism ante litteram: the space of monastic observance in late antiquity
and the early Middle Ages, ed. H. W. Dey and E. Fentress (Turnhout, 2011), p. 273, and Wickham,
Medieval Rome, pp. 24–8. For the family home, see G. Schneider Graziosi, ‘La “domus Theodorae”
sull’Aventino’, Bulletino Communale 42 (1914), pp. 328–42, and now R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘L’iscrizione
di Teodora da Santa Sabina. Una nuova ipotesi di interpretazione’, in Scritti in ricordo di Gaetano
Messineo ed. E. Mangani, and A. Pellegrino (Roma, 2016), pp. 345–54.

64 RS, no. 155 (Alberic’s 942 placitum); Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Topografia del potere’.
65 Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Topografia del potere’, p. 149.
66 JnD III. 32, where he highlights how one doge, after becoming ill and withdrawing from the
ducal charge, left the palace to go back to his house.
67 LP I, 95 c. 5, 97 c. 1, 102 c. 1, 108 c. 1, 104, c. 1. On the area around S. Marco and its aristocratic
links see D. Manacorda, ‘Trasformazioni dell’abitato nel Campo Marzio’, pp. 31–51, 42–8.
68 In the tenth century again the references are to the Regio VIII at the foot of the Capitol LP II, 137,
p. 255, and in the Gallina Albas region on the Quirinal near the Baths of Diocletian, LP II, 141, p. 260.
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292 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

longer belonging to the imperial fisc.69 The ninth century is a crucial period for
change in the city, notably with the beginning of the encroachment of private
space onto the public space of the Fora, even if still only around the edges in the
Fora of Nerva and Caesar. Some of the main roads, especially the Argiletum, were
not only preserved but repaved and reused, and the aristocratic houses excavated
there, which Santagelo Valenzani defines as Carolingian in the sense that they
date from the height of the period of Carolingian control over the city in the ninth
century, were clearly meant to open onto a main road.70 These houses, of the
domus solarata type, with two floors, of which relatively little is known since the
top floor, the piano nobile where the family lived, is no longer there, show
the reuse of marble columns and capitals.71 The attempt made by the Roman aristoc­
racy to associate itself topographically with the centre of the Roman past never­
theless still respected the central part, especially the Roman Forum, perceived
as the core of old Rome, and, of course, the Capitoline Hill and the Palatine, until
the tenth century. This is visible from the fact that the ground level in the Roman
Forum, for example in front of the Basilica Emilia, remained the same, and only
started to rise between the late eighth and the mid-ninth century (though very
slowly). It would not rise by the three-quarters of a metre which would later turn
it into the ‘Campo Vaccino’ until the late eleventh to twelfth centuries. In 982, for
example, we find a significant example of this phenomenon: it relates to a house,
probably of a similar type to those in the Forum of Nerva, built effectively inside
the temple quod vocatur Romuleum72—erroneously so called, since it was the
temple of Venus and Rome, but known by the name of Romuleum for a long time.
The other major public space with which the aristocracy associated itself was
the area of the old Campus Martius. It was known as the Terme Alessandrine,73
around and between the Pantheon and Piazza Navona, up to the present Largo
Argentina. The latter in particular had been part of the zone of settlement of the
old senatorial aristocracy, most notably of the Anici family. This area, especially

69 The works by Santangeli Valenzani are of crucial importance and I draw heavily on their
conclusions in this book. Essential are: Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo,
pp. 31–101, 157–88; Santangeli Valenzani, ‘L’insediamento aristocratico’; Santangeli Valenzani,
‘Aristocratic evergetism’; Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Pellegrini, senatori e papi: gli xenodochia a Roma’, Rivista
dell’Istituto Nazionale d’Archeologia e Storia dell’Arte 20 (1996), pp. 203–26; Santangeli Valenzani,
‘Residential building’, in Smith, Early Medieval Rome, pp. 101–12; Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Abitare a
Roma, pp. 41–61.
70 R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Strade, case e orti nell’alto medioevo nell’area del foro di Nerva’, in
MEFREM 111 (1999), pp. 163–9; Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, ‘I Fori imperiali nell’alto
medioevo’, in Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 34–8; Pani Ermini, ‘Forma Urbis’, pp. 287–323 at
296–304.
71 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 47–50; Santangeli Valenzani,
‘Residential building’.
72 SMN, a. 982, no. 1.
73 Fiore Cavaliere, ‘Le terme alessandrine’, pp. 119–45 at 121–6, 145; Pani Ermini, ‘Forma Urbis’,
pp. 315–17; Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Tra la Porticus Minucia e il Calcarario’, pp. 57–98; Wickham,
Medieval Rome, pp. 120, 130–4.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 293

around the church of S. Marco, suffered badly from floods, as it did for example in
791 under Hadrian I, then again in the ninth century; S. Marco was restored first
by Pope Gregory IV, who had been its titular priest, and again later by Sergius II
(844–7).74 The church was associated with Hadrian I’s family, one of the most
prominent in the city. In the Largo Argentina area, after the disappearance of the
remains of the Anicii complex, we see the first examples of the new style of
houses, built on the same model as those in the Forum of Nerva and that of
Trajan, only larger. Here a ninth–tenth-century domus is six to seven times the
size of the ones in the Forum of Nerva. Like most aristocratic houses of a high
level, this domus probably had the standard two floors, with some reuse of marble
from Roman monuments on the top floor, its own private baths, a curtis around it
incorporating a church, possibly with a significant relic,75 and almost certainly
prestigious decorative schemes, such as that still extant in the church of S. Maria
in Via Lata, a possession of the family of Alberic in the tenth century.76 Less char­
acteristically, the house opened not onto a road, but onto the interior, a plan akin
to the traditional Roman domus, which we still find in Ravenna.77 A rare example
of a textual description of a ninth-century house is the very large one sold by
the consul and dux Peter to the Emperor Louis II in 868: pro solaria abitationis
mee cum area in qua extat cum curte et sala seu cappella que est edificata in honore
Sancti Blassi cum balneo et viridiario.78 Also, as in Ravenna, we find houses
increasingly called curtes by the end of the tenth century. There are fewer descrip­
tions of them in Rome, but one is the aristocratic domus built by Lambert, son of
Aldus, in Scorteclari near the Terme Alessandrine, later sold to Farfa after numer­
ous court cases. These enable us to have at least one reasonably good description
of the house.79 It was one-storeyed, built in the middle of ruins, within an area
enclosed by Roman classical walls (curtis), with reused materials and spaces (in this
case the Roman baths turned into an orchard, and the well), with an entrance
flanked by Roman columns. This style of housing, only distinguished by a greater

74 LP I. 97 c. 94–6; 103 chs. 8, 18; 104. c. 22.

75 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 41–4, 50. For a discussion of
Roman aristocratic houses and their evolution in the tenth century and the changes thereafter, see
Hubert, Espace urbain, pp. 171–84.
76 On the link between Alberic’s family and the monastery of S. Ciriaco in Via Lata, see L. Cavazzi,
La diaconia di S. Maria in Via Lata e il monastero di S. Ciriaco (Rome, 1908), and SMVL, Introduction,
ed. Hartmann, vol. 1; F. Martinelli, Primo trofeo della S.ma Croce eretta in Roma nella Via Lata . . . e
chiese detti Santi Stefano, Ciriaco e Nicolo di Camigliano (Rome, 1655), pp. 57–71; Meneghini and
Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 42–4; another example of such a house, a domus
solarata with a marble staircase, is mentioned, for example, as the house belonging to land given by
John Crescentius to Farfa in 1013; see RF no. 699 (doc. 667).
77 The description of a characteristic house (domucella cenaculata) in Ravenna in 975–6 is, for
example, that of the negociator Unalso; see Benericetti X/2 no. 189. See also R. Santangeli Valenzani,
Edilizia residenziale in Italia nell’Altomedioevo (Rome, 2011).
78 Liber Instrumentorum seu Chronicorum Monasterii Casauriensis, facsimile edn (L’Aquila, 1982),
fols. 74v–75r (De curte et cappella Sancti Blassi de Roma comperata a Ludovico augusto DCCC libris
argenti).
79 RF nos 426, 504, 616, 668–9.
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294 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

degree of space, comfort, and display of reused Roman prestige materials among
people according to their economic and social status, was in effect the standard
style of aristocratic residence up to the eleventh century in Rome.80
Another element of interest in relation to the topography of the city and its
elites is the case of the Palatine.81 In the late seventh century, it was still in use as
the Byzantine centre of power,82 but it declined as such under the Carolingians,
was abandoned as a palace, and saw the transformation of some of its buildings
into churches and monasteries, most famously S. Maria in Pallara.83 By the tenth
century, the Palatine had large areas of private aristocratic property, often granted
to monasteries. Thus, while it was no longer an area of imperial power, there was
an increasing interest in the Palatine on the part of some aristocratic families in
the tenth century, especially the de Imiza. This as can be inferred from Stephen de
Imiza’s grant of 975 to SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro; the family already
had a foothold in the area in 963.84 The de Papa family of John de Papa de septem
viis around the Septizodium was another such aristocratic family.85
Santangeli Valenzani has suggested a very convincing model, showing the pro­
cess by which aristocratic settlement in Rome displayed a tendency to take over
property through the accumulation of neighbouring areas, to create a compact
nucleus in which to settle dependents, and on which the family could maintain its
hegemony.86 (See Figure 4.1.) His examples include the domus solarata from the
Basilica Emilia, as well as those from the Forum of Nerva, and the curtes of Largo
Argentina. He shows how these expanded to control the smaller, more popular
domus terrinee, such as those in the Forum of Caesar. Such control was more akin
to creating plots for dependants, mostly for agricultural use, sometimes as an
­economic investment, but also and above all as a social and political investment
in purchasing control over people. The model may well have started earlier, for
example around S. Silvestro, where the family home of Popes Stephen II and Paul
was turned into a family monastery.87 S. Silvestro itself was at the centre of a net­
work of alliances supporting aristocratic families. During the 799 coup against
Pope Leo III, the place chosen by the plotters was close to S. Lorenzo in Lucina,
and the later ceremony to depose Leo also took place at S. Silvestro,88 as did the
second attempt to mutilate him. Major aristocratic houses were situated along the

80 Hubert, Espace urbain, pp. 181–3.

81 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 209–15; Augenti, Il Palatino
nel medioevo, pp. 45–74; Augenti, ‘Il potere e la memoria’; Augenti, ‘Continuity and Discontinuity’.
82 LP I, 87 and 93, c. 18; Augenti, Il Palatino nel medioevo, p. 60.
83 Fedele, ‘Una chiesa del Palatino’, pp. 343–80.
84 C. Wickham, ‘Conclusions’, in West-Harling, Three empires, pp. 325–9; Meneghini and Santangeli
Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, p. 211; SSAG no. 151, pp. 581–4.
85 Augenti, Il Palatino nel medioevo, pp. 62–3.
86 Santangeli, ‘L’insediamento aristocratico’, pp. 229–93.
87 LP I. 95 c. 5; Federici, ‘S. Silvestro de Capite’, 213–21, and foundation charter of 761 by Paul I,
no. I.
88 Leo III letter in MGH Ep. VI, 10; Alcuin’s letter in MGH Ep. II Ep 179.
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Figure 4.1 Aristocratic residences, ninth and tenth centuries, Rome (copyright R. Santangeli
Valenzani). The numbers refer to the routes in the Itineary of Einsiedeln.
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296 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

great axes of traditional Rome, even though a few new transit areas grew, leading
to a slow transformation of part of the public spaces of imperial Rome, such as
the Porticus Minucia and the Campus Kaloleonis in the Forum of Trajan. Smaller
houses shifted to secondary roads. This accumulation of neighbouring property is
striking when we look at the consolidation of monastic property of a family group
like Alberic’s and his dependents around the Via Lata, or parts of Trastevere for
Benedict Campaninus.
In Ravenna, the evidence for aristocratic houses is better than for many other
locations, based both on leases and sales acts, and on archaeological work for two
major domus, that of the Countess Ingelrada and of the Traversari. Just as in
Rome, the aristocracy continued to use both the existing houses, and the term
domus, into the tenth century. There is increasing evidence of the transformation
of the domus, or the building of new houses on empty plots, in the form of salae,
the traditional form of the Lombard house. More study needs to be carried out to
establish whether the increasing use of the word sala in charters is chrono­logic­
al­ly coherent with the increase in mixed marriages, and in Lombard and Frankish
settlements in the Romagna and in Ravenna from the ninth century onwards, as
we saw in Chapter 3—or whether it came in earlier as a form of influence of a
Lombard lifestyle.
The words describing the houses requested by members of the elites from the
archbishop vary, from the traditional domus or domucella, to mansio or mansio
solarata, to cubiculum and, increasingly, to sala, often sala pedeplana. There is
a fairly large number of these, many described in detail in their location and
neighbourhood, others internally as well.89 The best example is that of the house
(domucella cenaculata) leased by Archbishop Honestus to the family of negociato-
res of Unalso in 975/6, a two-storey house with four rooms and a toilet on the first
floor and a well with a marble head and evacuation on the lower level; the house
had its own haraporticum from the platea, its own petrista with entrance and exit,
and all the other appurtenances.90 We hear of such houses throughout the ninth
and tenth centuries, almost all granted on the basis of emphyteutic leases, that is
to high-status lessees, mostly by the archbishops.91 There are examples of negocia-
tores acquiring them, such as John and his wife, Constantina, granted a mansio

89 Brunterc’h, ‘Habitat et pouvoir’, pp. 57–84, pour des descriptions detaillees de plusieurs de ces
maisons.
90 Benericetti X/2 no. 253: cum superioribus et inferioribus suis, habente in superiora cubiculos quat-
tuor et necessarium unum et ascenso scalae, et inferiora . . . et puteo integro cum puteale marmoreo et
delta sua habentes ipsa curte ex una parte murum suum extendentem in latitudinem suam pedes viginti
uno. Verum eciam cum haraportico suo da platea et cum petristam su[] cum ingresso et egresso suo et
cum omnibus sibi pertinentibus.
91 Benericetti C8/9, no. 129; Benericetti X/4 no. 356; Benericetti X/3 no. 280. Exceptions are a
mansion called a saletta, a garden, granted in livello, the first by Archbishop Peter in 949, the second
by Duke John in 947, and a domucella granted by George archdeacon and primicerius, notarius and
prior of the basilica of S. Agnese in 980—the latter to a callegarius, the others to people otherwise
unknown.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 297

solarata by Archbishop Honestus in 959 (the grant was renewed in 972), John aka
Bonizo, who leased a two-storey domus petrita, as well as some land near the
Curia in 978, and Sasso and his wife, Ravenna clarissima, who rented a cubiculum
solariatum in 979/80.92 Nevertheless, most domus tended to be granted to the
aristocratic elites, like Peter nobilis vir, son of Martinus de Cristoduli consul and
his wife, Sinigilda (958/9), Deusdedit and Ermengarda and their sons Apollinaris
and Tribuno (965)—of ducal rank—or Gottfred nobilis vir and his wife, Adelberga
clarissima (993). Often these elegant documents are witnessed by other equally
distinguished elite members, consuls, dukes, and so on, though occasionally
important negociatores like John aka Bonizo also make the rank, in a pattern of
notariate and social practices very close to those of Rome.93
The houses mentioned were clearly among the most prestigious in the city, not
only grand in their two storeys and their stone building, but also well situated in
the central areas: around the churches of S. Pietro, S. Martino, S. Andrea, S. Agata,
S. Michele in Africisco, in front of monasteries like S. Maria in Cereseo, near the
Curia and the Platea Maior; but also near the old imperial quarter, like the area of
Quartoregio, Erculana, or indeed inside the old imperial palace, such as the house
of Duke John near the monastery of S. Stefano in fundamentum (Regis).94 They
mostly faced onto a platea, and were sometimes described as having a haraporti-
cum, a word suggestive of the maintenance of the memory of late Roman urban­
ism and its porticoes.95 Inside, they may have, as the house described above, four
cubiculi, as well as marble columns.96 It is not possible to work out the size of
these houses in the space of this chapter, but that previously described mentioned
a wall of twenty-one feet on one side. Nor is it likely that the main aristocratic
families in the city only had one such house: in 947, Duke John gave a lease of a
garden in Ravenna in the Regio S. Lorenzo, a garden described by the lessee as
near the laubia de domo vestra qui vocatur de Hatja, clearly implying that the
duke had more than one.97
Obviously, some houses had been destroyed at some point, or had fallen down,
such as the two mentioned in 989 and 993, both situated in the region of S. Agata
Maggiore.98 Even what may have been ‘new’ houses by tenth-century standards,
that is not late antique ones, fell down and left a vacuamentum, as was the case of
a house called Nova, memory of which still existed in 978/9, but where there was
now a vacant spot granted by Archbishop Honorius to a negociator Vitalis de

92 Benericetti X/2, nos 160 and 221; Benericetti X/3, nos 273 and 285.
93 Benericetti X/2 nos 162 and 182; Benericetti X/3 no. 323.
94 Benericetti C8/9, no. 52; Benericetti X/2 nos 160, 162, 221; Benericetti X/3 nos 276, 280, 285,
313, 317, 323, 328; Benericetti X/4 no. 356.
95 For example, Benericetti X/2, no. 253; Benericetti X/3 no. 302.
96 Benericetti X/2, no. 162 (958–9). 97 Benericetti X/4, no. 284.
98 Benericetti X/3 nos 313 and 317.
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298 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Marino for him to build a new house.99 It is noticeable, however, that several
older domus had been replaced not by a new domus but by a sala inibi edificata
(989); likewise in 987/91, John aka Ermenfred and his brother Gregory the sub­
deacon received from Count Arardus and his wife, Ingelrada aka Ingiza, a pensio
for a destroyed house (domus), now a sala.100
In Venice, we are at a great disadvantage when we have to describe the houses
of elite families. Our written evidence in that respect is non-existent between the
time of Cassiodorus’ famous letter with its depiction of cabins on stilts, and John
the Deacon, who talks about houses in terms of locus of habitation for the elite
of the city without, however, actually describing any. The only aspect of domestic
architecture of the city elites that we might deduce from his narrative is that, from
early on, they had more than one house. This could have been either because they
had a house on the island where they originated, and then built one in Rialto later,
as the latter became increasingly important, or just that they had more than one
house in Rialto itself. Whether this was because the topography did not allow for
large tracts of land to be used, and thus different generations and branches of
noble families built another house when they expanded—as we know that
they did later in Venetian history—or whether they built more as new land was
drained and cultivated, is unknown. It is also not known what form any such
houses had before the eleventh century, since the archaeology of Venice in the
historic centre is, understandably in view of the constraints of later building in
such a small space, very little developed. Two points only can be made. The first is
that, to begin with at any rate, at the time of the Galbaio and the Particiaci for
example, the important families had houses in a variety of locations on the terra­
ferma, as did Justinian Particiaco who, in his will, left a whole set of houses, in
varying states of decay, in Jesolo and elsewhere, to be used as building materials
for S. Zaccaria. Whether these families gradually moved to Rialto and abandoned
such other houses, or kept, and later acquired, others on the terraferma, is not
known for this period. The second point, which needs stressing, is that the very
absence of mention or discussion, by John the Deacon in particular, of any of
these houses as centres of power for the elite seems to demonstrate most for­
cibly to what extent power in Venice was concentrated exclusively on control
of the ducal title and ducal palace. Individual families did not count as such in
that respect, unless they became doges—a fact which may be sufficient to
explain the ferocity of the fighting for the post, unlike in Ravenna for example,
where there could be more than one family at the pinnacle of local politics at
any one time.

99 Benericetti X/3 no. 276; see E. Cirelli, ‘Spolia e riuso di materiali tra la tarda Antichità e l’alto
Medioevo a Ravenna’, in Hortus Artium Medievalium 17 (2011), pp. 209–18, and R. Romanelli,
Reimpieghi a Ravenna tra 10. e 12. secolo nei campanili, nelle cripte e nelle chiese, (Spoleto, 2011).
100 Benericetti X/3 nos 313 and 317.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 299

There are some definite similarities in the use of residences of the leading men
in the three cities—but also significant differences. The most evident similarity is
the reuse of the places of power of the imperial Roman past in Rome and in
Ravenna, with their two imperial palaces. The Palatine in Rome lost its status as
the political seat of governement with the arrival of the Franks, in this instance
the Carolingian rulers, quite deliberately perhaps, so as to move away from its
associations with both the older pagan and Byzantine seat of government. A new
association was created, not with the centre of papal government at the Lateran,
but near St Peter’s—the embodiment, to Frankish eyes, of the value of Rome.
The same happened in Ravenna, where Charlemagne also avoided the imperial,
then exarchal, palace. Interestingly, this was very much unlike Aistulf, who had
restored it and lived in it, in a deliberate imitation of exarchal, and thus Roman,
power. Charles, on the other hand, removed not only the physical symbols of
power from the palace but also the mystique attached to them, to carry them
away with him to Francia. The Carolingians were not interested in the reuse of
Roman sites of power, especially the Palatine, where no efforts were made to
remove any decorative scheme or symbols—unlike in Ravenna. That Charlemagne
did not undertake such a move in Rome, but did so in Ravenna, while the two late
antique sites of power had similar Roman and Byzantine associations, suggests
that the difference, in his eyes, was that the palace in Ravenna had also been the
residence of Theodoric. The mystique that Charles was carrying away, just as he
did the statues of the Gothic king, was that of Theodoric, whom he greatly
admired. The close identification between the two has, in fact, made it still impos­
sible to be certain whether the famous surviving equestrian statue said to be of
Charlemagne represents him or Theodoric.
The Palatine did not return to favour as a ruler residence (with the exception of
Otto III’s plans) even under the government of Alberic, with perfect justification.
Alberic would not have wanted to be seen to be placing himself above his
­aristocratic peers—like Augustus, he deliberately made himself their equal, living
where they did. However, they, as a group, returned to the reuse of the Roman
places of power and prestige, with houses built as close as possible to, if not inside,
the area of the Roman and the imperial Fora, and, for the first time, again on the
Palatine. Important families like the de Imiza in effect took over large tracts of
land on the hill, and even the ‘ownership’ of Roman monuments like the Septizodium.
This kind of reuse of the Roman centre was similarly seen in Ravenna, where
important aristocratic families like the Duchi Deusdedit carved up between them
the area of the old palace, to set up their domus and monasteries. There seems to
be a definite move, among the aristocracy of both cities, more evident in Rome, to
bring its members and their houses, which is to say their authority, as close as
possible to the locus of power of the Roman past.
The same does not apply to the episcopal residences. The archiepiscopal palace
in Ravenna shows little in the way of prestige building. The centre of papal power
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300 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

in the Lateran does so only up to a point, and then mostly as an imitation of the
representations of power in the Byzantine world, notably in the decoration of
Leo III’s famous triclinia. While these are aimed at the Romans themselves, to sug­
gest the papacy’s role as a replacement for the imperial power of Constantinople,
any direct Carolingian impact is limited, on account of the fundamental lack of
interest of the Franks for anything other than St Peter’s, where they established
their residence and contributed to the embellishment of the complex. This focus
would have been further strengthened by the fact that the Franks’, and indeed all
northern European pilgrims’, interest was in relics—in which the Lateran basilica,
at any rate, was sadly lacking—until the popes began to enhance and advertise the
value of the relics collected in the Sancta Sanctorum. The hiatus between the
function of Rome as the centre of the episcopal power of the pope, and as St Peter’s
city in the Vatican, to which I will return several times in this chapter, is clearly
visible in the different perceptions as to which is its centre of government, and
where the people with power live in it.
The issue is much clearer in Venice. Admittedly, there was no ‘old’ centre of
government there, but there was a specific adoption of a centre of power based
on a late antique model. The choice to set up a ducal palace (very likely with
Byzantine agreement, and placed in a line with the episcopal see) was entirely ex
novo. But this new place of power was created to have it all: centre of government
and defence, and shrine of the city’s saint—both under the complete control of
the secular authority of the doge. This enabled the creation of a complete locus of
power, governmental and religious, controlled by the lay ruler. To that extent the
Venetian situation was unlike that of Rome, where the centre of government
(Palatine, then Lateran) and centre of the main cult (St Peter’s) were at opposite
ends of the city; and unlike that of Ravenna, where the main relics were distrib­
uted around various churches, while the archbishop as default leader did not have
a powerful government centre. Having such a concentrated focus of the ruling
earthly power (the doge) and the heavenly power of the patron saint’s relics
(St Mark) no doubt contributed in equal measure to the expansion of Venice: the
first, in medieval Europe, would not have been possible without the second.
The residence of the saint was as important as, often more so than, that of the
governing prince.

Residences of the Saints

The rulers of this world had their residences, and so too had the even more
power­ful rulers of the next world: God and his saints. New churches were built
and dedicated, older ones were restored and rededicated, relics were added to
each of them, and their other-worldly patrons were worshipped and celebrated in
them. Also added to them, or newly founded, were monasteries, the houses of
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 301

intercession for the salvation of the founders’ and all men’s souls, but also of
­control and power of the owners in the local landscape.

Churches
Foundations and Restorations
The history of churches in all three cities has been discussed and written on
almost as much as that of the Carolingians and the papacy. It has been analysed
from the point of view of the Christianization of space, of ecclesiastical, imperial,
and aristocratic patronage, of artistic and architectural features, of theological
significance, and of every other aspect that could be debated. My section here will
therefore be only a summary of previous work on these aspects, and will focus on
the two specific elements most relevant from my own perspective. These are: the
importance of various churches within the choices made by the city’s ruling elite
in its political and cultural orientation; and the role of some churches, especially
of their relics, in the developing identity of the city. The second of these themes
will be more widely discussed in Chapter 6, and I will only lay the foundations of
the argument here.
My short history of the churches of Rome begins with a general observation
regarding what seems to have been their overall decrepitude throughout the first
half of the eighth century. This was the combined result of the decline of the
power, and investment, of the Byzantine government of the Exarchate; the diffi­
culty of supporting their maintenance by the popes; and the abandoning of the
city by the old senatorial aristocracy, which had mostly moved east after the
Lombard conquest. The recently risen local aristocracy of the army was gradually
replacing them in terms of church foundations and decoration. But the struggles
of the papacy to maintain its role, with the diminished resources resulting from
the confiscation of essential territories in Sicily and the south of Italy, and to
retain control over Rome against both Byzantine envoys and Lombard pressure,
clearly produced a loss of funds and energy which can increasingly be seen in the
absence of maintenance of numerous churches. The new diaconiae created then
could be seen precisely as resulting from this decline, with the need to reduce and
centralize the maintenance and building activity which the papacy could afford,
and where it would need to focus most. The list of necessary basic consolidation
work given by the biographers of Popes Gregory II and Gregory III reads like a
sorry tale, that of pontiffs trying very hard at least to prevent well-known churches
from collapse. Gregory II (715–31), we are told, restored many churches that were
about to fall down, including the basilicas of S. Paolo and S. Lorenzo fuori le
Mura, the abandoned monastery of Andrea Cata Barbara near S. Maria Maggiore,
and S. Croce, which was roofless. Gregory III (731–41) renewed the endowment
of the monastery of SS Giovanni Evangelista, Giovanni Battista e Pancrazio serv­
ing the Lateran, which had been ‘abandoned by every monastic order’. He put in a
new roof and vault at S. Andrea at St Peter’s, rebuilt the basilicas of S. Callixto and
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302 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

SS Marcellino e Pietro near the Lateran, and the roof at SS Processo e Martiniano,
S. Genesio, the Pantheon, S. Marco on the Via Appia, and various other cemeterial
basilicas. Such a huge backlog of maintenance, clearly to the point of complete
decay, and so many examples of roofless churches and abandoned monasteries,
perhaps overstated, are nevertheless significant.101 Whether it is significant of just
a lack of resources, will, and neglect, or significant of the decline and topo­graph­
ic­al reorganization of the population of the city around fewer foci, is a question
which has been discussed by many scholars, of whom Krautheimer, Marazzi,
Delogu, and Santangeli Valenzani are just a few. What is evident is the widespread
slowdown of urban activity, whether relating to churches or to other major amen­
ities, such as walls and water supplies, throughout the period.
This was to change, at first slowly, with the papal takeover of ex-imperial fiscal
land, and its use as a resource for Rome, then more dramatically with the arrival
of the Franks and their funds. From the pontificate of Zacharias onwards, the
pace of restorations and renovations accelerated, but it also began to go hand in
hand with new foundations, extensions, and internal redecoration of churches,
which by definition implies that they were by then properly rebuilt, and that there
was enough money to spend on externals such as curtains or images. Gregory II
had modestly built a new oratory at St Peter’s; Gregory III, who had been given by
the exarch six twisted onyx columns from a Ravenna monument for St Peter’s,
also continued to focus on the most obvious, which was St Peter’s, while Zacharias
built a new triclinium at the Lateran, set up a library of his own books at St Peter’s,
and granted the revenues from the domusculta Lauretum to provide lights for
St Peter’s.102 After the discovery in the Lateran basilica of the believed lost relic of
the head of St George, the pope set up a new diaconia with a church dedicated to
the saint in Velabro. Even with Stephen II, apart from his concentrating on char­it­
able structures like the diaconiae and the xenodochiae, the pope’s work essentially
revolved around the major basilicas, for example when he established the weekly
Saturday litany at St Peter’s, S. Paolo, and S. Maria Maggiore, added a fourth mon­
astery to serve St Peter’s, as well as a tower and bells, and a chapel dedicated to
Petronilla, or some images at S. Maria Maggiore.103 With Paul (757–67), we still
hear about St Peter’s most, for example his chapel to the Virgin there and the
church of S. Maria ad Gradis, but there is also some building of new churches
throughout the city, such as SS Pietro e Paolo on the Via Sacra in the Forum.104 It
is impossible to cite the details of Popes Hadrian I’s and Leo III’s building and
restoration work in the city, which fills pages of the Liber Pontificalis, but a few

101 Moreover, it seems that at first the repairs were quick fixes, since the same repairs, for example
to roofs and beams, were mentioned under several consecutive popes; presumably this would be
either because the repairs were so slow, or because they had been done hastily in order to avoid col­
lapse, and thus had to be redone more than once.
102 LP I. 93 chs. 18–19, 24–7. 103 LP I. 94, chs. 4,13, 40, 47, 52.
104 LP I. 95, ch. 6.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 303

could be mentioned as being revealing.105 Leo restored S. Susanna, the baptistery

at S. Maria Maggiore and numerous churches in Lazio. He had been a priest at
S. Susanna, and from now on we see that, if a pope only restored or embellished
one church, it was that with which he had been associated as a priest or deacon.
Leo could begin to concentrate, not just on major basilicas, but also on smaller
buildings, such as baptisteries. And he extended his restorations into the Campagna.
Increasingly popes would also begin to transform Roman monu­ ments into
churches, or build churches and diaconiae on top of them, or inside them, or next
to them, as did Pope Paschal I (817–24) with, for example, the church of S. Ciriaco
in Thermis, or Pope Gregory IV at S. Abbaciro ad Elephantum (Forum Olitorium)
and S. Adriano at the Three Fates, in the former Roman Curia. I shall return to the
issue of this papal takeover and transformation of the im­per­ial space of Rome in
the next chapter in greater detail.
Another area of increasing interest on the part of the popes were the ceme­ter­
ies outside the city, and the churches built ad martyres, which were increasingly
endangered by Lombard raids or other fighting. The shock of King Aistulf ’s siege
of the city, including, according to the Liber Pontificalis, his digging up the ceme­
ter­ies to collect relics of the martyrs, presumably in order to remove these to
Pavia, was considerable. It led to the start, under Pope Paul I, of the removal of
large numbers of the bodies of martyrs from the cemeteries to churches inside the
city. Paul himself had the body of St Petronilla brought in from the Via Appia to
St Peter’s. His successor, Hadrian I (772–95), mostly pursued a policy of res­tor­
ation of the tombs and churches in the cemeteries themselves, but, from Paschal
I onwards, the papacy began a major operation of recuperation and transfer into
the city of the relics of the saints buried outside it. Paschal himself was its main
author, with his translation of the relics of allegedly over 2,000 martyrs. This, as
Goodson has shown, was part of a wide-ranging ideological effort, and was char­
acteristic of the new attitude of the papacy towards relics, an attitude which had
evolved radically from the start of the new Frankish alliance.106
The period between 750 and 850, which saw the papal renaissance in Rome,
also meant that, for the first time, people became aware of some of the buildings
in the city as part of ‘the past’. As such, they were no longer venerated only as a
component of traditional piety but also because they had become objects of
memory, of reflection, and of awareness of the past of the city. Since they were no
longer just ‘old’ and needed to be kept going, but were by now venerable ruins, the
perception of their value changed. Thus the management of cemeteries, still part
of the papal duties until Hadrian I, who took it seriously, changed: relics were no
longer venerated in situ but brought into the city, and new churches were built to
house them. The new splendid rebuilding campaign, strongly favoured by Leo III,

105 LP I. 97 and 98.

106 Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal I, p. 214–16, and see Chapter 6.
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304 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

also meant more frequent demolition of buildings from early Christian times.
The reform of the Roman liturgical calendar of stations, which led to new
churches being added to the older ones, for example the diaconiae, meant that
restorations of churches were now only made if there was a liturgical need to do
so, because these churches had a stational role. In several cases, this meant that
the restoration of such churches where there was no need for pastoral care,
because they were in areas of the disabitato (scarcely populated), even though
they were often the most derelict and most in need of urgent restoration, was no
longer a priority. On the other hand, the churches in the still populated area
between the Campus Martius and the Lateran via the Celio were sometimes not
just kept going but rebuilt, because they were still used for papal Masses. It has
been suggested that this was, in effect, a ‘competizione con il proprio passato’,107
not always well accepted by all in the city, hence perhaps the hostility to Leo III
and Paschal I.
Before pursuing the issue, it is necessary to look outside Rome, to see whether
Ravenna or Venice were following a similar course in terms of foundation and
building of churches. Ravenna had a problem similar to Rome in relation to its
Roman past, yet also completely different. Rome’s most visible form of its past in
the centre of the city was its pagan one. Consequently, its monuments had been
abandoned through lack of use if they were temples, palaces, or symbols of the
imperial past, and rarely converted into churches before the ninth century, with
the notable exception of the Pantheon. The Roman past in Ravenna—that of the
late antique, then of the Byzantine, period—was, by contrast, fully Christian,
since the city had effectively begun its ascent from the fifth century onwards, and
its glories were mostly its great basilicas: the Ursiana cathedral (also called
the Anastasis), situated in the Regio Herculana near the Vincileonian Gate, the
Petriana basilica in Classe, S. Vitale in the Regio Ad Frigiselo, S. Croce (also
called S. Ierusalem), S. Pietro Maggiore (also called the Basilica Apostolorum),
and S. Martino in Ciel d’Oro, which had been the chapel of Theodoric’s Palace,
later taken over by the Orthodox Church from Arian worship and known as
S. Apollinare Nuovo from the ninth century onwards.108 Faced with their heavily
laden Christian past in the city, the archbishops in Ravenna were rarely required,
or indeed in a position, to intervene in a major way, except to tinker with their
churches: a cella added to either S. Apollinare in Classe or the Ursiana by
Archbishop Sergius, the rebuilding of the flooded church of S. Eufemia ad
Arietem by Archbishop Martin.109 The Ravennati had also lost out on some major

107 Luchterhandt, ‘Rinascita a Roma’, p. 331.

108 On the great traditional churches, the best detailed study remains Deichmann, Ravenna. See
also Verhoeven, The early Christian Monuments, Pt I, pp. 27–49, and Pt III, pp. 247–88; and Jäggi,
Ravenna, Kunst und Kultur.
109 Agnellus, LP, chs. 159 and 168.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 305

restoration work planned by King Aistulf, who had meant to rebuild the Basilica
Petriana, destroyed by an earthquake, and had begun to restore its columns.
In addition to those cited above, the churches of ninth-century Ravenna were
S. Pietro Maggiore, S. Giovanni Battista, and SS Donato e Martino, to which we
need to add in the tenth century those of S. Eusebio, S. Michele in Africisco,
S. Stefano ad Balneum Gothorum, and S. Agnese. Though we know that these
were probably already there before that date, they first appear in the written
sources at this point.110 Others were mentioned from much earlier on.111 In add­
ition, we have the problem of a variety of churches dedicated to St Mary, some not
clearly identified, some probably monastic.112 Altogether a rather small group,
including the great basilicas, smaller churches and pievi, monastic churches,
chapels, xenodochiae, and other charitable churches, most still under the control
of the archbishop, except for small, private house foundations.
In the tenth century the number of church foundations rose to about twenty-
seven, partly due to episcopal intervention, for example as chapels attached
to existing churches,113 or through the addition of a characteristic Carolingian
feature—the crypt—to the cathedral, and to S. Apollinare Nuovo, S. Vittorio,
S. Andrea, and the Basilica Apostolorum.114 Most of these new churches were still
only fairly small oratoria. For example, inside the perimeter of the old exarchal
palace there were sixteen such small oratoria, some associated with other
churches, for example with the Basilica Apostolorum.115
Thus, before 1000 we know of altogether eighty-four churches in the city, of
which forty-one were monastic and thirty-six ordinary churches and chapels;
of these, only four are known from post-1000 sources, though, suggesting a

110 Benericetti, C8/9 34, then Benericetti X/4, no. 333; X/1 nos 52, 79; X/3 nos 213, 248, 276; on
the churches of Ravenna, see Deichmann, ‘Studi sulla Ravenna scomparsa’, pp. 94–112, 61–7 and
76–90; M. Mazzotti, ‘Elenco delle chiese ravennati attraverso i secoli’, Felix Ravenna 105–6 (1973),
pp. 229–55.
111 S. Giorgio, SS Mercuriale e Grato, S. Andrea near Porta S. Lorenzo, S. Tommaso fuori
Porta S. Lorenzo, S. Eufemia fuori Porta Aurea, SS Angelo e Severino ad orologium, S. Donato,
S. Martino, S. Stefano in fundamentum (Regis), SS Sergio, Bacco and 40 martiri, and S. Nicandro; see
Benericetti X/1 nos 1, 80; X/2 nos 114, 160—associated with dukes; X/1 nos 38, 59; X/2 no. 127; X/3
no. 273; 95, 241; 265, 271; 101; 136, 146, 217; 223; 239; 16 times; 191, 284, 284 947; Benericetti X/4,
307–8; 204.
112 S. Maria ad Matrona, S. Maria ad Ponte Augusto, S. Maria a Ponte Calciato, and S. Maria ad
Sacrii Palatii; see Benericetti, 62, 189, 319, 102, 148, and 208.
113 Novara, ‘Per una ricostruzione del paesaggio’, pp. 133–81; Cirelli, Ravenna, pp. 154–9.
114 E. P. Iacco, La Basilica di S. Apollinare Nuovo di Ravenna attraverso i secoli (Bologna, 2004);
C. Ricci, ‘L’antico Duomo di Ravenna’, Felix Ravenna 37 (1931); P. Novara, La Cattedrale di
Ravenna: storia e archeologia (Ravenna, 1997); M. G. Borghi, La Basilica di S. Vittore in Ravenna:
prototipo delle costruzioni esarcali (Milan, 1941); F. Savio, ‘Il culto di S. Vittore a Ravenna’, Nuovo
Bullettino di archeologia cristiana 7 (1902), pp. 185–93; P. Verzone, L’architettura religiosa dell’alto
medioevo nell’Italia settentrionale (Milan, 1942), pp. 5 and 166–168, and ibid., ‘Le chiese deutero­
bizantine del Ravennate nel quadro dell’architettura carolingia e protoromanica’, CARB 8 (1961),
pp. 338–41.
115 S. Giustina in Capite Porticus, the monastery of S. Stefano ad Balneum Gothorum (977),
S. Martino post ecclesia maiorem (964) and another eleven, see Cirelli, Ravenna, pp. 149–60.
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306 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

foundation before that date.116 Many have interesting toponyms, referring to the
Roman past of the city (S. Michele dell’Orologio near the statue of Hercules
known as ad Horologium), to its Arian past (S. Agata dei Goti, S. Stefano ad
Balneum Gothorum), to the palace—as in the churches in Palazzo, del Sacro
Palazzo, in Palazzolo—or to Theodoric’s mausoleum, known as the Rotonda, in
the monastery of S. Maria della Rotonda. (See Map 6.)
The situation in Venice was very different. This is not solely on account of the
lack of an inherited body of Roman buildings to demolish, convert, or transform
but, more significantly, because few churches founded in Venice were actually
ecclesiastical foundations, or even in ecclesiastical hands.117 Some were clearly so:
Bishop Maurus of Olivolo was said to have founded the church of the Angelo
Raffaele in Dorsoduro,118 while the baptistery and some walls of the basilica at
Torcello may date, archaeologically, from the reign of Bishop Deusdedit I
(c.692–c.724), but were mostly rebuilt on previous foundations by Bishop Deusdedit
II (864–7).119 However, even such foundations, especially the legendary ones
attributed to Bishop Magnus of Oderzo or Maurus, were quite often ‘refounded’,
meaning built anew, by one of the Venetian families: S. Giovanni in Bragora by
John Tanolicus in 811, or S. Raffaele, rebuilt after a fire in 899 by the Candiani and
Arianni families.120 Bishops were founders of churches, notably John of Candiana
of S. Raffaele in Dorsoduro, and Peter Marturio of S. Agostino.121 Close links with
family foundations were maintained, through grants but also through gifts of
­relics. S. Maria Formosa, for example, was founded by the uncle of Bishop Peter
Tanolicus, who then translated there the relics of SS Nicomedius, Saturninus, and
Romanus,122 though it was equally claimed that the Bishop of Olivolo, Dominic
Tanolicus, had brought the relics, and those of St John the Baptist, and given them
to the church at the time of Peter III Candiano.123
The doges’ and their families’ role was essential in terms of church foundations,
though theirs were often at first monastic ones, with the exception of St Mark’s.
Originally the palatine chapel of the ducal palace, St Mark’s was built on the

116 Mazzotti, ‘Elenco delle chiese ravennati’.

117 On the churches of Venice, the standard works are U. Franzoi and D. Di Stefano, Le chiese di
Venezia (Venice, 1976); C. Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli delle chiese’, in Tramontin et al., Culto dei santi,
pp. 99–153; A. Zorzi, Venezia Scomparsa (Milan, 1984); and E. Concina, Venezia. Le chiese e le arti,
2 vols (Udine, 1995). A fair amount of the information relies on the essential Corner’s Ecclesiae
Venetae of 1749, reprinted in 1990 as Notizie storiche delle chiese e monasteri di Venezia e di Torcello.
118 Origo III p. 132; L. Scoffo, Cenni storici sulla chiesa e parrocchia di S. Raffaele Arcangelo in
Dorsoduro (Venezia, 1862), pp. 10–12.
119 De Min, ‘Tra due elementi sospesa’, in Venezia, costruzione di un paesaggio urbano, ed.
E. Concina and M. De Min (Venice, 2000), p. 108; Caputo and Gentili, eds., Torcello alle origini di
Venezia.
120 G. Andreis, Cenni storici sulla chiesa e parocchia di S. Giovanni in Bragora, 2nd edn (Venice,
1903), pp. 8–9; Scoffo, S. Raffaele, p. 10.
121 Origo III, pp. 133, 139, 145. 122 Origo III, p. 138.
123 Origo, p. 138; Andreis, Cenni storici, pp. 8–9.
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Map 6 Early Medieval Ravenna

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308 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

model of Aachen, with both a Carolingian crypt and the building of a westwork,124
and, it has also been suggested, on the model of the Anastasis (now Holy Sepulchre)
Church in Jerusalem, elegantissima formae basilica, ad eam similitudinem quam
supra Domini tumulum Hierosolymis viderat, with pictures of many colours.125
The Anastasis could have been known to John Particiaco, who, when in exile in
Constantinople, went to Jerusalem; he was also said to have been a great col­
lector of relics.126 In order to achieve the space, the doges demolished one of
the older churches in that location, and extended the area by acquiring land
from S. Zaccaria, the monastery founded by Justinian Particiaco.127 The name
S. Zaccaria itself is revealing, since it was that of a palace chapel of the emperors
at Constantinople, from where it had migrated, with the same significance, to
Ravenna. After the burning down of the palace in 976, the basilica was rebuilt by
Peter I Orseolo, and later his son Peter II continued the restorations, adding a
hospital of St Mark, and the Zecca, centre of the Venetian mint.128
The cathedral of Olivolo had been founded by Doge Maurice, and even though
the bishop had to be agreed on and consecrated by the patriarch of Grado, it was
often the doge who appointed him: we saw this with the famous example of the
quarrel between Doge Ursus and Patriarch John of Grado about the appointment
of Bishop Dominic.129 Other ducal foundations included that of S. Nicolò dei
Mendicoli, founded by Doge Ursus I in 864.130
The most striking fact remains that most Venetian churches, including parochial
ones, were founded and endowed, including with relics, by aristocratic fam­ilies.
S. Maria del Giglio, long known as S. Maria Zobenigo, contemporary with the trans­
fer of Venetian power from Malamocco to Rialto, was alleged to have been built by
the Jubanico family.131 Numerous other churches were ascribed, in the admittedly
later Origo, to families such as the Lupanici (S. Ermacora), the Bradonici (S. Daniele,
S. Polo, S. Benedetto, the latter together with the Coloprini and the Faletri), the
Mauroceni (S. Mauro, S. Gabriele, S. Agostino), or the Mastalici.132 (See Map 7.)

124 See below Chapter 4, p. 70.    125 Colombi, ‘Translatio S. Marci’, pp. 128–9.
126 Colombi, ‘Translatio S. Marci’, p. 122.
127 On the monastery and church of S. Zaccaria, see several papers in B. Aikema, M. Mancini, and
P. Modesti, eds.,‘In centro et oculis urbis nostre’: la chiesa e il monastero di San Zaccaria (Venice, 2016),
as well as the older S. Tramontin, ‘San Zaccaria’, Venezia Sacra 13 (1979), and Franzoi and Di Stefano,
Le chiese, pp. 390–404.
128 JnD IV. 12, 32.
129 Cessi, ‘La crisi ecclesiastica veneziana’; A. Niero, ‘La sistemazione ecclesiastica del ducato di
Venezia’, in Tonon, Le origini della chiesa di Venezia, pp. 101–21; A. Rossi, ‘La contesa fra il Doge Orso
I Particiaco e il patriarca di Grado Pietro’, in Studi di storia politico-ecclesiastica veneziana anteriore al
Mille (Bologna, 1901), pp. 27–43.
130 R. Scarpa, Notizie della chiesa e parrocchia di S. Nicolò dei Mendicoli. Dalle origini al restauro
compiuto dal ‘Venice in Peril’ Fund nell’anno 1975 (MS, 1976), p. 2.
131 M. Brunetti, Sta Maria del Giglio vulgo Zobenigo nell’arte e nella storia (Venice, 2009), p. 6; also
Origo, who adds the names of Gumbarinus Barbolicus, Reginus Griciosus, and Ranosus Carosus
among the founders. The dedication was to S. Maria del Giglio, but its early record as Zobenigo was
seen as confirming the association with the Jubanico family.
132 Other churches mentioned are S. Maria Formosa (Bausus Barboli), SS Apostoli (Gardocus
Gardolicus), Ana Sophia/Verbum Christi (Grausoni and George tribune), S. Tommaso (tribune
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Map 7 Venice/Rialto in the ninth and tenth centuries (copyright D. Calaon)

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310 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

The names we find here, said by the Origo to have been Venetians from
Cittanova and Equilo who went to Rialto and ‘built beautiful churches and pal­
aces’, were those of families already encountered previously as key figures taking
part in placita, subscribing or witnessing documents and paying taxes: the
Lupanici, Bradonici, Mastalici, Grausoni, Coloprini, Faletri, Mauroceni, Tanolici,
and, of course, the Particiaci and Candiani. Several built and endowed more
than one church, like the Lupanici, Bradonici, Mauroceni, and Barboli (S. Maria
Formosa and S. Maria Zobenigo), as well as the ducal families of the Particiaci
and the Candiani. Others got together and founded several churches, like the
Flabianici, Benati, and Coloprini, who contributed to S. Silvestro and S. Paternian.
Some of the founders of churches were, of course, both members of aristocratic
families and of the Church, as were those of S. Maria Formosa and S. Agostino by
the tribune Marturius, son of Bishop Ursus; but many were not.133 It is noticeable
how many churches were built around areas specifically associated with particu­
lar aristocratic family residences.134 This is obvious in Rialto, and contributed to
the rooting of particular families in both already existing, and developing, areas
of the city. Dorigo has traced this gradual takeover of family control over certain
areas, like the Lupanici in Luprio. Most parish churches remained the property of
the founders, who continued to exercise the giuspatronatus, that is to be re­spon­
sible for the church and the appointment of the plebanus (the parish priest), and
to control their endowments. Thus many churches in Venice, including parish
churches, were not under the control of the bishop but of the founding families.
A similar pattern was present in other areas of the lagoon, notably Ammiana, and
Costanziaco, with the Frauduni and the family of the tribune Aurius on Ammiana
(S. Lorenzo), or on Costanziaco, with SS Sergio e Bacco, to which relics were
given by a Stephen Scopacalle; and, of course, Torcello, where the monastery of
S. Giovanni Battista was established by Aurius and the Frauduni before 950.135
Altogether the phenomenon was far more noticeable in Venice than in Ravenna
and Rome, where monasteries were founded and controlled by elite families, as
were family chapels, but not parish churches, which remained under the author­
ity of the bishop. This apparent weakness of episcopal control over the churches
and clergy of the city is again noticeable when one looks at the most important
devotional feature of these churches, their relics and artistic treasures.

Emilianus), S. Salvador (Cavarnariti) (Maurocenus, Gumbus, Lupanicus and others), S. Gregorio

(Pressus), S. Vitale (Calosus/Kailosus, Barbadicis, and Ranosus), S. Samuele (Bololus Buldu),
S. Margherita (Gemo Busignaci Germanus), S. Pantaleon (Bachus and Calprinus Alboli), S. Jacopo
(Cynopius), and S. Apolenarius/S. Apolin (Campolis); Origo III, pp. 142–5 and 156–7.

133 Origo III, p. 138. We recall that his was also a name associated with the group of conspirators
around Caroso, see Chapter 2.
134 Dorigo, Venezia Romanica, I, pp. 57–69.
135 A. Niero, ‘Santi di Torcello e di Eraclea tra storia e leggenda’, in Tonon, Le origini della Chiesa di
Venezia, pp. 31–76 at 52–6.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 311

Dedications and Relics

In Venice, relics frequently came to the city through aristocratic families, whether
those of the doges, like the Particiaci with St Mark, or lesser ones. According to
the Origo, such families granted relics or property. Early on Valeressus and Pepin
gave relics of St Martin, as well as building a church to him, and a schola of the
saints Michael and Vitus, to which they gave perpetual gifts of gold and silver.136
The several joint founders of S. Silvestro and S. Paternian gave them land, gold,
and silver, as well as ‘things’ pertaining to church services. Other, better docu­
mented relics’ transfers and gifts were those, already mentioned, of SS Sergius and
Bacchus and St John the Baptist. Even more high-profile were the translation of
St Zacharias;137 of St Fosca, a third-century martyr from Ravenna whose relics
were brought back from Sabratha in Tunisia by the Venetian merchant Vitalis,
who gave them to Torcello, where Ursus Particiaco built a church for them in 873;138
and the acquisition of the relics of the saints Sabina, Pancratius, Nereus, and
Achilleus, Lizerius, and Leo from Rome by the nuns of S. Zaccaria, who alleged
that these had been given to them as a gift by the fleeing Pope Benedict III (855–8),
when he had briefly taken refuge in Venice.139
Venice was gradually becoming an intermediary for relics from the East to
Western churches, such as those of SS Genesius and Eugenius, acquired by the
Frankish Count of Treviso Gebeard.140 This, to the fury of the Venetians, was
said to have been the case of St Mark’s relics themselves. The most famous of all
translations—that of 828/9, of the relics of the Evangelist Mark from Alexandria
by the two merchants Bonus and Rusticus—was challenged by the monks of
Reichenau, who claimed that they had acquired the relics from Bishop Ratold of
Verona in 830, who himself had received them from no less that the fleeing Doge
John Particiaco when the latter had had to take refuge with the Carolingians as a
result of Obelerius’ rebellion—implying that he had traded the relics in order to
gain support from the Carolingians.141 The story might seem to be confirmed by

136 Origo, III, pp. 142–5 and 156–7. This unreliable source gives, for example, the mythical gifts by
Narses, alleged to have founded the two churches of S. Teodoro and S. Mennas near the palace. But
other entries are too specific to have been totally invented: a Salvianus and his mother, Antonina,
came from Salonica to Venice, bringing with them the relics of St Demetrius, Anastasia, and Barbara,
together with Valeressi and Batioculum, who brought relics of S. Bartholomew, and built the church of
S. Demetrio.
137 A. Niero, ‘Culto dei santi dell’antico testamento’, in Tramontin et al., Culto dei santi, pp. 155–80;
Tramontin, ‘San Zaccaria’, p. 73.
138 Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese; Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 124; A. Vicario Piegadi, Leggende
sopra Sta Fosca vergine e martire di Ravenna e sopra la chiesa di Sta Fosca in Venezia (Venice, 1847).
139 Tramontin, ‘San Zaccaria’, p. 73; this story is not mentioned in the LP, which does discuss
Benedict III’s election and the counterplot with the seizure of the Lateran by Anastasius.
140 Moro, ‘Venezia e l’Occidente’; E. Morini, ‘Il Levante della santità. I percorsi delle reliquie
dall’Oriente all’Italia’, in Le relazioni internazionali, Settimane 58 (2011), pp. 873–940, esp. 873–91 on
the translation of St Mark.
141 Zettler, ‘La traslazione di san Marco’, pp. 689–709; Tramontin, ‘S. Marco’; and Niero, A., 1965,
‘Reliquie e corpi dei santi’, in Tramontin et al., Culto dei santi, pp. 41–73 and 192–4. The most im­port­
ant recent work has been summarized in various papers in Niero, ed., S. Marco: Aspetti storici e
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312 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the fact that the relics were said to have been ‘lost’ after the fire of 976, and only
‘discovered’ again in a miraculous way in 1094, when the Contarini doge began
the third rebuild of the basilica. It is, of course, contradicted by John the Deacon’s
assertion that the reason Otto III gave for wanting to come to Venice was in order
to worship the relics of St Mark.142 Again, one may wish to split the difference by
suggesting that a relic of St Mark, whose arrival in Venice had made such waves
in the West, may well have been taken with him by John Particiaco as a bargain­
ing tool, and followed the route of Verona then Reichenau, while the rest of the
relics stayed in Venice. Or one may imagine that John the Deacon was recounting
Otto III’s desire to see the relics in a special effort to confirm their presence in
Venice, possibly even with Otto’s agreement, since he was, at this stage, so keen to
acquire the help of Peter II Orseolo for his eastern policies. One may not wish to
go as far as to suggest that, if so, one of the reasons we have so little knowledge of
what passed between the emperor and the doge during the two days of the for­
mer’s visit to Venice may have been the secret return of some of the relics by Otto
to Venice from Reichenau!
Unsurprisingly, the dedications of numerous Venetian churches were heavily
indebted to Ravenna, and to the area of the old Exarchate, especially Grado and
its region. The most famous of these associations is that of St Zacharias, to whom
there was a chapel dedicated near the imperial and exarchal palace in Ravenna, as
there was a chapel in the imperial palace in Constantinople since the fifth cen­tury.143
This may have been partly at the root of the placing of the monastery of S. Zaccaria
itself near the ducal palace, or rather of the choice of that particular dedicatee for
the ducal foundation near the palace.144 The Ravenna cult was still going strong
in the tenth century, when two churches of that name are mentioned there in 959
and 964.145 It is not clear whether the Zacharias in question was originally the
prophet, but it seems almost certain that by the time of his establishment in
Venice, he was understood to be John the Baptist’s father, as witnessed by the
founding in the vicinity of the church of S. Giovanni in Bragora—the setting up

agiografici, notably Grégoire, R., ‘Riflessioni sull’agiografia marciana’, pp. 411–27; Niero, 1970, ‘Questioni
agiografiche su San Marco’, Studi Veneziani, 12, pp. 18–27; Tramontin, S., 1970, ‘Realtà e leggenda nei
racconti marciani veneti’, Studi Veneziani, 12, pp. 35–58; and Lebe, R., 1981, Quando S. Marco approdò
a Venezia: Il culto dell’evangelista e il miracolo politico della Repubblica di Venezia, Rome, as well as
Tramontin, S., ‘Culto e liturgia’, and Cracco, ‘I testi agiografici’, pp. 900–9 and pp. 925–8 and 935–46;
on this, see Veronese in the Introduction, note 43.

142 JnD IV. 59.

143 Niero, ‘Culto’, in Tramontin et al., Culto dei santi, pp. 155–80 at 171–2.
144 On the monastery and church of S. Zaccaria, see several papers in Aikema, Mancini, and
Modesti, eds.,‘In centro et oculis urbis nostre’; the older Tramontin, ‘San Zaccaria’; Franzoi and Di
Stefano, Le chiese, pp. 390–404; and B. Bertoli and A. Perissa, Chiesa di San Zaccaria: arte e devozione
(Venice, 1994).
145 Niero, ‘Culto’, p. 172.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 313

of churches to related members of the same holy family in close proximity to each
other is a well-known phenomenon of medieval sacred urban topography.146
Several major military saints in the Byzantine tradition, such as George,
Theodore, and Demetrius, had probably been associated with Ravenna in the first
instance, and later on in Venice their cult was also obviously related to their mili­
tary function. We know that the original dedication of S. Bartolomeo (S. Bortolo)
was to St Demetrius, and we are told on several occasions of the legendary
foundation by Narses himself, during his retirement in Venice, of the church of
S. Teodoro.147
The cult of Ravenna saints most visible in Venice at this date are those of Severus,
Pantaleon, and Fosca. One can see this in the choice of dedications of Venetian
churches founded, or allegedly founded, in the ninth and tenth cen­tur­ies.148 The
church of S. Severo, already in existence by the 850s, was given to the monastic
foundation of S. Lorenzo.149 The original island monastery of S. Servolo was given
a new dedication when it moved to the terraferma.150 This dedication to St Hilary
has been hotly debated, with regard to whether the Hilary involved was the
bishop of Poitiers, the saint of Padua, or, as seems most likely, Ilario/Ellero, the
Ravennate bishop who was the dedicatee of the great monastery of S. Ellero in
Galeata.151 The church of S. Pantalon was already in place by 1007, when it was
first rebuilt.152 A man called Pantaleon is documented in 880, and another is a
signatory of Doge Peter IV’s letter forbidding the slave trade in 971—clearly,
the cult was sufficiently popular to have entered the onomastic trad­ition.153 The
church of S. Fosca in Cannaregio is a tenth-century foundation.154 In parallel, the

146 Niero, ‘Culto’, pp. 175–6.

147 Origo, pp. 143 and 64–6; Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese; and Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 125.
148 Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’.
149 In the will of Bishop Ursus of Olivolo of 853 in Cessi I. 60 and DV no. 5; Candiani, ‘Antichi
titoli’, pp. 99–153, at p. 122; Gaeta, S. Lorenzo, pp. xiii–xv. On the will’s authenticity, see the discussion
in M. Pozza, ‘Il testamento del vescovo Orso (853 febbraio): documento genuino o falsificato?’, in
Historiae. Scritti per Gherardo Ortalli, ed. C. Azzara, E. Orlando, M. Pozza, and A. Rizzi (Venice,
2013), pp. 49–59.
150 Cessi I. 44 and DV no. 2; N. E. Vanzan Marchini, S. Servolo e Venezia: Un isola e la sua storia
(Verona, 2004), pp. 23–4. On the dedication, see A. Niero, ‘Noticina sul titolo “San Servolo” ’, Centro di
Studi Storici Mestre 7–8 (1965–6). See also L. Lanfranchi, ‘I documenti sui più antichi insediamenti
monastici nella laguna veneziana’, pp. 143–50 at 144, and G. Spinelli, ‘I primi insediamenti monastici
lagunari nel contesto della storia politica e religiosa veneziana’, pp. 151–66 at 154–56, both in Tonon,
Le origini della Chiesa di Venezia.
151 A. Niero, ‘Sull’intitolazione “monasterium beati Yllarii et Benedicti” ’, Centro di Studi Storici
Mestre 7–8 (1965–6), and also Lanfranchi and Strina, SS. Ilario e Benedetto. For S. Ellero, see B. Girotti,
‘Vita monastica in Emilia Romagna: il caso di Sant’Ellero’, in Pagani e Cristiani: forme ed attestazioni di
religiosità del mondo antico in Emilia, ed. C. Corti, D. Neri, and P. Pancaldi (Bologna, 2001), pp. 243–50,
and on the great importance of the monastery, especially for Ravenna, see A. Torre, ‘Gli Arcivescovi di
Ravenna e il monastero di S. Ellero in Galeata’, Studi Romagnoli 10 (1959), pp. 97–106.
152 Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 113; see Corner, Ecclesiae Venetae; G. Fiocco, ‘Tradizioni orientali
nella pietà veneziana’, CARB 15 (1968), pp. 141–8.
153 Pactum of 880 between Walbertus patriarch of Aquileia and Doge Ursus I Particiaco; Cessi II.25
and DV no. 6, and in the letter of Peter IV Candiano, DV no. 19.
154 Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese; Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 124.
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314 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

name of Fuscho/Foscho, Fuscheli, Fuschari as a first name, as in Fuscari Nimicani

in 978, starts appearing in the tenth century, in what would then become the
Foscari/ni family.155 Another saint whose connection may be with Ravenna,
given the early presence of the name in the Particiaco family, for example, was
Ursus, who has sometimes been associated with the patron saint of Aosta—a con­
nection far from impossible for Venice but somewhat less likely than that with the
bishop of Ravenna.156 The connection with Ravenna was not broken after the
tenth century, since S. Aponal (S. Apollinare) in San Polo was founded in 1034,
and possibly later in that century S. Vitale (S. Vidal).157 It is pos­sible that other
cults may have been associated by the first Venetians with Ravenna, rather than
with the original cult location. St Justina of Padua, St Geminianus of Modena,
and St Agatha all had churches in pre-tenth-century Ravenna.158 They too are
found in three early foundations in Venice: S. Giustina in Castello, S. Geminiano,
now destroyed, legendarily founded in the sixth cen­tury and an important church
opposite St Mark’s still in the tenth century, and S. Agata, which was the original
tenth-century dedication of S. Boldù in San Polo.159 Last but not least, other
saints from the Exarchate outside Ravenna also had cults in Venice, notably
St Paternianus of Fano, whose first church was burned down in the 976 fire and
rebuilt after 999; St Cassianus of Imola, with a ninth-century church in S. Croce;
and St Sofia of Fermo near Ancona, to whom it is believed the Venetian church
was originally dedicated, rather than, as has been often assumed, in imitation of
the Hagia Sophia.160
A much-commented issue has been the cult of Old Testament saints in Venice,
traditionally thought to be associated with the Byzantine tradition maintained in
Ravenna.161 I have already mentioned St Zacharias. The church dedicated to the
Archangel Raphael, which had a characteristic cylindrical campanile in the
tenth-century Ravennate style, is one of the earliest whose existence in the city
we can definitely document, as early as 899.162 There was a church and monastery
of S. Daniele, allegedly founded by the Bragadin family in the ninth century, while
S. Stae (Eustachio) had been first dedicated to St Isaia, and S. Samuele goes back

155 Tithes of Peter I Orseolo of 978; Cessi II. 57 and DV no. 22.
156 A. Niero, ‘I santi nell’onomastica’, in Santità a Venezia, ed. S. Tramontin, A. Niero, and
G. Musolino (Venice, 1972), pp. 105–65 at 115.
157 Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese, and Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 109.
158 Ibid., pp. 101–2, 124, 118.
159 Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese; and Zorzi, Venezia Scomparsa, p. 215.
160 Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, pp. 102–3, 120–1, 110, 125; although Zorzi, Venezia Scomparsa,
pp. 355–6, believes that S. Sofia’s dedication was based on the Hagia Sophia. St Cassian of Imola was
an important saint in the old exarchal area; witness his patronage of Comacchio Cathedral and of the
church of the original foundation of St Romuald at S. Adalberto in Pereo; see Novara, ed., Alle origini
di Sant’Adalberto, pp. 81–4, and Novara, ‘Il monastero di Sant’Adalberto in Pereo’, Bollettino economico
della Camera di Commercio, Industria, Artigianato e Agricoltura di Ravenna 2 (1991), pp. 25–39.
161 The main paper on the subject remains Niero, ‘Culto’.
162 Niero, ‘Culto’, p. 162; and Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 315

to the end of the tenth century.163 An interesting case is that of Simeon, with
two churches dedicated to saints of that name, one to St Simeon the Prophet
(S. Simeone Grande) founded in 967, while the other, S. Simeone Piccolo, was in
fact dedicated to SS Simeon and Jude, also in the tenth century.164 Some of the
Old Testament figures had their own office in the eleventh-century Venetian
liturgy—notably Daniel, Jeremiah, Job, Lazarus, Moses, Samuel, and Simeon—
but whether the office or the church came first is not certain.165 All were certainly
already present in standard Western martyrologies, at the same date as in
Venice.166 Some also had cults elsewhere in the terraferma, for example Jeremiah
in Padua, Job in Friuli as S. Giopo, Daniel also in Friuli with a church in 921 and
one in Vicenza before 1000.167 The only totally unusual dedication is that to
S. Moisè, a unique example in Venice. The story has it that the church had been
originally dedicated to St Victor when built in 796, though it was also alleged to
have been founded by Longinus ‘prefect of Ravenna’, and was later rebuilt and
rededicated by a supposed Mosè Venier168; whether this was so or not, there is
evidence of the use of the name of the church before the beginning of the elev­
enth century, when John the Deacon mentioned that Christopher, the future
bishop of Olivolo, had been plebanus of S. Moisè in 807, and this person was also
mentioned in the Particiaci grant to S. Ilario in 819.
The duchy’s second hagiographical connection was with the Adriatic but to its
north. In that area, of course, the first and foremost of these links was with the
saints of Aquileia, some of whom had relocated to Grado, or those from Grado
itself. The most important was St Mark himself, though after the Venetian
translation the Venetians took good care to press the association with Venice
directly, and to obscure the existence of a Grado connection, where there was a
church dedicated to St Mark, mentioned among those embellished by Patriarch
Fortunatus.169 The two patron saints of Grado, Hermacoras and Fortunatus, were
associated with the church of S. Marcuola in Venice since the tenth century,
though their cult mostly took off in the eleventh century, when their relics were
translated there from Grado.170 Another saint of Grado with dedications in
Venice was St Eufemia. In addition to her church at Mazzorbo, another church

163 Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese, and Niero, ‘Culto’, pp. 163, 169–70; Zorzi, Venezia Scomparsa,
pp. 219–20; Concina, Venezia, II. p. 370.
164 Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese.
165 Niero, ‘Culto’, p. 158; S. Tramontin, ‘Influsso orientale nel culto dei santi a Venezia fino al secolo
XV’, in Venezia e il Levante fino al secolo XV. Atti del Convegno internazionale di storia della civiltà
veneziana (Florence, 1973), pp. 801–20 at pp. 814–15.
166 J. Dubois ed., Le Martyrologe d’Usuard (Bruxelles, 1965).
167 Olivieri, I cognomi della Venezia euganea, pp. 138–9. 168 Niero, ‘Culto’, p. 168.
169 See the reference in 825 to Patriarch Fortunatus’ list of gifts to the churches of Grado, Cessi,
I. 45 and DV no. 3, JnD, II. 28; S. Tavano, ‘Il culto di S. Marco a Grado’, in Scritti storici in memoria di
Paolo Lino Zovatto, ed. A. Tagliaferro (Milan, 1972), pp. 201–19.
170 Niero, ‘I santi patroni di Venezia’, in Tramontin et al., Culto dei santi, pp. 82–4; Franzoi and Di
Stefano, Le chiese.
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316 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

was dedicated to her on the Giudecca.171 St Canciano, yet another Grado saint,
had a church in Castello, and St Giuliano or Zulian, martyr of Isola d’Istria, one
not far from St Mark’s, from the ninth century onwards, where the patriarch of
Grado had his first palace, and where he took refuge for a whole year during his
conflict with Doge Ursus I.172 St Servilius or Servolo, third-century martyr of
Trieste, had been the dedicatee of the original Venetian Benedictine monastery,
before it moved to the mainland and became S. Ilario.173 A saint whose as­so­ci­
ation is not clear, though one may expect him to have been St Benedict’s disciple,
was St Maurus. There was also a bishop of Ravenna Maurus, and the cult seems
to have been active in Istria, and especially in Trieste.174 But there was also, of
course, one of the duchy’s first and most revered bishops, the legendary St Maurus,
alleged founder of numerous churches based on revelations made to him in a
dream, and he was also a saint from the Adriatic mainland.175 The church of
S. Angelo’s original dedication in 920 was to St Maurus, and there was also a
Burano church whose priest became the bishop of Olivolo in the tenth century.176
The Mauroceni family, whose name has been related to that saint, and who
came to prominence in the tenth century, were associated with Murano and
with Istria.177
Church foundations in Venice were from the start the result of a demographic
and economic expansion under the aegis of the aristocratic merchant families
(including those which gave doges to the city). A few had bishops and related
ecclesiastics among their founders, but their founding of churches was on account
of their family connections rather than of their own Church association. The
expansion of churches in the ninth and tenth centuries in Rivoalto is quite excep­
tional. It reflects the demographic leap and the topographical expansion of the
city, partly sponsored by the doges, as in Dorsoduro, partly by families which
gradually ‘colonized’ certain areas of the city, often draining and clearing them up
first, and established their houses and their ecclesiastical foundations there, con­
trolling the area.178 In the case of Venice, that is to say of Rivoalto, as a relatively
new urban setting the pattern was one of families with money funding churches,
and then, when the area expanded, one of these was turned into the parish church

171 Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 123; Zorzi, Venezia Scomparsa, p. 285; Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le
chiese, makes the point from the Origo that the church on the Giudecca was dedicated to a whole
group of Grado saints—Dorothea, Tecla and Erasma, as well as Eufemia—making the Grado connec­
tion even more obvious.
172 Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, pp. 109 and 112; JnD, III. 13.
173 JnD, II. 36; Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 121; see above, n. 32.
174 Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 103. 175 Origo, pp. 32–7 and 57–67.
176 Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese; Zorzi, Venezia Scomparsa, pp. 206–8 and 287; Cessi, II. 87,
and DV no. 34, for the 999 oath.
177 The 977 treaty is edited in Cessi II. 56 and DV no. 21.
178 Dorigo, Venezia Romanica I, pp. 57–69; E. Crouzet-Pavan, Venise triomphante: les horizons d’un
mythe, 2nd edn (Paris, 2004), ch. 1; McCormick, Origins of the European Economy, pp. 529–30;
Bellavitis and Romanelli, Venezia, pp. 22–9.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 317

by the bishop; this would explain the original founding pattern, as it did in Rome
for example in the fourth century. What it does not explain, though, is the fact
that the families kept control over these churches, and that the bishop was either
unable or unwilling to seize it from them at a later stage. The aristocratic families’
control was manifested from the first in their choice of dedication. Most of these
were inspired by the tradition of Ravenna and the Exarchate, as we can see from
specific pairings, such as SS Philip and James with Proclus, found in Ravenna and
Venice alone, in the church of S. Provolo, dedicated to the three,179 or in specific
topographical associations (S. Zaccaria/S. Giovanni). Family control was reinforced,
not only through their material support for their foundations but also through
spiritual support, with the members of these families being the main purveyors of
relics. Whether brought in through purchase, theft, removal for safety from the
East by Venetian merchants, or translated from the mainland (including Grado)
as Venice’s prestige rose, here too the role of rich individual families, who gained
authority over tracts of the city by providing places and objects of worship for the
growing population, was fundamental.
Ravenna’s situation requires less detailed study, since there was much less fun­
damental change in relations between the different protagonists in the city, the
archbishop remaining the traditional and powerful patron of churches. As in
Venice, the most frequent dedication of Ravennate churches was to the Virgin,
with sixteen churches, of which twelve were monastic ones. The next set of
dedicatees in Ravenna were St Peter and St Stephen (five each), St Andrew (four),
St Michael and St Apollinarius (three each), and the monastic saints, St Martin
and St Agatha, with two churches each.180 These were the first-rank saints, to whom
one needs to add a few others found in the procession of saints at S. Apollinare
Nuovo, behind the leaders St Martin and St Laurence: for example, Sts Cassian,
Paternian, and Cyprian. Other popular saints were not actually Ravenna ones but
were associated with it in some way, through devotions which we already saw in
Venice. In view of its apparent influence on Venice, it is significant that Ravenna
itself was certainly not well endowed in terms of saints and relics of its own, cer­
tainly not of any on the level of St Mark. Ravenna’s great sixth-century Archbishop
Maximian of Pola had obtained for the city the relics of St Andrew, but had been
forced to return them to Constantinople.181 Henceforth Ravenna could never
compete with Rome and Constantinople. As Agnellus put it, ‘if he had buried the
body of blessed Andrew, brother of Peter the prince, here, the Roman popes
would not thus have subjugated us’.182

179 Franzoi and Di Stefano, Le chiese, and Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, p. 101.
180 Mazzotti, ‘Elenco delle chiese ravennati’, pp. 232–55. Others were St Salvatore, St Laurence,
St Nicholas, St Victor, St Giustina, St Eufemia, St John Baptist, St Zacharias, St Severinus, St Donatus,
SS Sergius and Bacchus.
181 Agnellus, LP, ch. 76. 182 Ibid.
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318 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Ravenna’s patron saint was St Apollinarius, alleged to have been sent to the city
by St Peter himself. His cult was first mentioned by the Bishop Peter Chrysologus
at Classe, with a translation in 549, and the saint was also named by Gregory the
Great when he sent his candidate Marinianus to become bishop of Ravenna
in 596.183 The cult became even more important, for the clergy at least, from the
seventh century onwards, when a Vita was produced, possibly as part of the
attempt at autocephaly by the Church of Ravenna. Another translation was then
alleged to have taken palace in 856, to S. Martino, to save the relics from Saracen
attacks.184 But although the city had this protomartyr and bishop who could
link in to the apostolic succession, and several later saints such as Severus, Peter
Chrysologus, and Maximian,185 it was never going to be in the leading group as
saints’ relics went. Apollinarius was essentially a clergy saint, not a popular
pilgrimage-venerated one around whose cult the city as a whole could rally. This
certainly contributed to reducing his role, unlike in Rome, which constructed so
much of its medieval identity on the cult of St Peter. The archbishops of Ravenna
did their best with various translations of relics, from Archbishop Petronax, who
translated the body of Archbishop Maximian to a worthier place, and especially
Archbishop Peter IV, who translated the relics of St Apollinarius from Classe to
S. Martino, known by 962 as S. Apollinare Nuovo186 Attempts were made to pro­
vide literary texts, partly on the model of the Vita of St Apollinarius, for example
a Vita of Probus in the tenth century.187 There was a definite trend in Ravenna
towards ‘inventing’ saints. The apostolic link of Apollinarius himself, as highlighted
in the Vita, seems to have been constructed from almost nothing. Various other
key saints were also ‘appropriated’ though the creation of links to major saints
elsewhere, notably Vitalis and Ursicinus, allegedly part of the family of Gervasius
and Protasius of Milan, Ursicinus’ body being said to have been translated by
Archbishop Honestus to the crypt of the Ursiana. The most extreme case was that
of Barbatianus. A completely invented saint, said to have been from Antioch and

183 Gregory, Reg VI.31, CCSL 140, p. 140.

184 F. Lanzoni, ‘Le fonti della leggenda di Sant’Apollinare di Ravenna’, Atti e memorie della Regia
Deputazione di Storia patria per le Romagne, 4th ser. 1–3 (1915), pp. 112–76, and G. Zattoni, ‘Il valore
storico della “Passio” di S. Apollinare e la fondazione dell’episcopato a Ravenna e in Romagna’, Rivista
storico-critica delle scienze teologiche 1–2 (1906); see now Verhoeven, The Early Christian Monuments,
pp. 56–67. For the translation, see the twelfth-century ‘Historia Traslationis Beati Apollinarii’, in
L. A. Muratori, Rerum Italicarum Scriptores I/2 (Bari, 1725), p. 533 ff., though Verhoeven, The Early
Christian Monuments, p. 66, rejects the evidence of such a translation.
185 Agnellus, LP, chs. 13–18 (Severus), chs. 24–7 (Peter I, actual Peter Chrysologus, though
Agnellus confuses him with Peter II, chs. 47–51), and chs. 69–83 (Maximian).
186 On Petronax, see Agnellus, LP, and Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 34; G. Gerola, ‘La cripta di
Sant’Apollinare Nuovo a Ravenna’, Nuovo Bullettino di archeologia cristiana 24–5 (1920), pp. 7–26;
G. Bovini, ‘L’antica abside e la cripta di Sant’Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna’, Felix Ravenna 54 (1950),
pp. 14–30. See also F. Lanzoni, ‘Studi storico-liturgici su Sant’Apollinare Nuovo’, Felix Ravenna Suppl. 2
(1916), pp. 83–98, and P. Novara, ed., Ubi multi peccatores occurrunt . . . Storia e archeologia della
chiesa di S. Apollinare Nuovo, del monastero benedettino, poi convento der Frati Minori Osservanti, e del
quartiere ritenuto l’area palaziale della Ravenna tardoantica (Ravenna, 1999), pp. 23–42.
187 Vita Probi, AASS Nov. IV, 478–81; BHL 6946.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 319

have come to Ravenna with Galla Placidia, a Vita was produced for him in the
ninth century,188 and a body was later translated to S. Zaccaria and subsequently
to the Ursiana before the twelfth century. Efforts were also made to venerate
some early bishops, especially Severus and Eleucadius, the possibly fictitious
third bishop. Eleucadius was buried in Classe, like Probus, and although his
relics were allegedly removed by Aistulf, a cult continued in the eighth and
ninth centuries, when Bishop Valerius (789–810) erected a ciborium above his
altar in the church. Severus, on the other hand, was alleged to have had his
relics taken away in 836 by a priest Felix, who gave them to Archbishop Otgar
of Mainz, from where they were later moved to Erfurt.189 Despite all these
efforts, including the ‘construction’ of passiones of potential saints in order
to obtain a collection whose prestige would be more in line with Ravenna’s
status,190 at no point did the city manage to create a patron saint of real im­port­
ance, who could act as a focal point for both popular devotion and Church or
city identity.
Some of the churches of Ravenna, regardless of their relics, were significant in
another way for my purpose. Their names—for example, S. Maria in Xenodochio,
S. Maria in Cosmedin, S. Maria Blacherne, S. Maria della Rotonda, S. Pietro
Orphanotrophium, SS Sergio e Bacco, S. Maria Maggiore—were only too obvi­
ously reminiscent of Constantinople, but also more directly of Rome.191 Unlike
Ravenna, Rome was, of course, not short of relics. Even more so than Venice with
St Mark, the very continuity of the existence and glory of Rome was its possession
of the bodies of thousands of martyrs—saintly popes such as Leo, Damasius, or
Gregory I, and, above all, the relics of St Peter. Since I will discuss the significance
of both St Peter’s and St Mark’s relics, and of the pilgrimages associated with
them, in Chapter 5; here I will focus on the other relics which formed Rome’s
hoard of sanctity.
As we know from numerous sources and studies, the tombs of the saints,
essentially the martyrs who were buried in the numerous cemeteries outside the
walls of Rome, were strictly protected from profanation. It has been traditionally
assumed that papal ideology from the first, but more clearly since Gregory I,

188 PL 106, col 769 ff.

189 ‘Vita e traslatio S. Severi’ by Liutolf of Fulda, MGH SS XV, pp. 289–92; Agnellus does not mention
this.
190 Verhoeven, The Early Christian Monuments, pp. 92–3.
191 For S. Maria della Rotonda, the Ravennate name, which refers to the local version of Theodoric’s
mausoleum, is, of course, different from the Rotonda in Rome, which is the Pantheon. Nevertheless,
the appropriation and transformation of the Roman or late Roman name in both cases are striking.
For a recent study on ‘foreign’ saints in Rome, notably Greek ones associated with diaconiae and
monasteries, see M. Maskarinec, ‘Foreign saints at home in eighth and ninth-century Rome: The
patrocinia of diaconiae, xenodochia, and Greek monasteries’, in Cuius patrocinio tota gaudet regio.
Saints’ Cults and the Dynamics of Regional Cohesion, ed. S. Kuzmová, A. Marinković, and T. Vedriš
(Zagreb: Bibliotheca Hagiotheca. Series Colloquia 3, 2014), pp. 21–37.
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320 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

forbade any opening and translation of the bodies of the martyrs.192 Even faced
with the constantly growing demand for bodily relics, from Constantinople
first, then from the recently coverted peoples in northern Europe, Franks and
Anglo-Saxons, followed by other Germanic groups of the Carolingian world and
eventually the Lombards, the papacy refused to budge on this point. Thus, any
bodily relics obtained by pilgrims to the city were generally stolen or bought from
unscrupulous intermediaries. However, faced with the pressure from various
sieges of the city, notably King Aistulf ’s, and the risks to the cemeteries associated
with both the violence and the perceived greed of the attackers, the popes grad­
ual­ly began to bring into the city the bodies most at risk, and to place them in city
churches thereafter dedicated to them. This was to be, for a long time, a piecemeal
operation, in response to a crisis or a particular need. The first example of a major
translation was that by Pope Gregory III of the relics of St Chrysogonus to a
church which the pope dedicated to him. Subsequently, Pope Paul instigated
a much more definite policy in this direction, with translations of relics to
S. Silvestro (his own foundation), S. Maria in Cosmedin, and S. Maria in turris.193
Paul’s best-known translation was that of the body of St Petronilla from the ceme­
tery where she was buried (and where Gregory III had still been celebrating her
feast, actually creating a new liturgical station there not long before), to St Peter’s,
in a chapel dedicated to her. This translation of a saint associated with St Peter
(she was believed to have been his daughter) was politically motivated and
allowed for the creation of a devotion specifically associated with the family of
Pepin, and later with the Frankish Carolingian dynasty. The story of the placing of
the baptism shawl of Gisela, Pepin’s newborn daughter, on the altar of the chapel,
as she became the pope’s god-daughter, is one of the key elements of the newly
developing papal alliance with the Franks, and the decoration of the chapel with
images relating to the Emperor Constantine was a clear political message to the
new dynasty.194

192 The letter of Gregory is edited in his Reg. epist., CCSL 140–140A, IV. 30, pp. 248–50. However,
more recent views have attempted to soften this interpretation, for example Julia Smith, who suggests
that Gregory’s letter to the Empress Constantina was not an expression of a Roman or papal ‘policy’
but an ad hoc response to this particular request, and that there was no actual rule on bodily relics,
with some examples of early ones being given as gifts; see J. M. H. Smith, ‘Care of Relics in Early
Medieval Rome’, in Rome and Religion in the Medieval West: Studies in Honour of Thomas F.X. Noble,
ed. V. L. Garver and O. M. Phelan (Farnham, 2014), pp. 179–205. In the same vein, see Bauer, Das Bild
der Stadt, who gives examples of earlier translation from Pope Pelagius II onwards, pp. 121–4.
193 LP I. 92 ch. 9; 95 chs. 4–6; see Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 124–37.
194 LP I. 92, ch.13, on the statio in the cemetery, and I. 95, ch. 3; On all this, see C. Goodson, ‘To be
the daughter of St Peter: St Petronilla and forging the franco-papal alliance’, in West-Harling, Three
Empires, pp. 159–88, at pp. 160–1, as well as The Rome of Pope Paschal I, pp. 184–5 and 214–15;
A. Angenendt, ‘Mensa Pippini Regis. Zur liturgischen Präsenz der Karolinger in Sankt Peter’, in
Hundert Jahre Deutsches Priesterkolleg beim Campo Santo Teutonico 1876–976. Beiträge zu seiner
Geschichte, ed. E. Gatz (Rome, 1977), pp. 52–68, and A. Angenendt, ‘Das geistliche Bündnis der Päpste
mit den Karolingern (754–796)’, Historisches Jahrbuch 100 (1980), pp. 1–94; and A. M. Voci, ‘Petronilla
auxiliatrix regis Francorum. Anno 757: sulla memoria del re dei Franchi presso S. Pietro’, BISI 99
(1993), pp. 1–28. See also Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 91–4 and 117–20.
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 14/04/20, SPi

the stage: places of power, instruments of control 321

St Peter’s was, of course, the main goal for the pilgrims to Rome, followed by
the touring of the other four great basilicas: S. Paolo, S. Maria Maggiore, S. Croce,
and S. Giovanni in Laterano. There, pilgrims would have been able to worship
either the saint’s bodily relics (St Paul’s), or relics associated with Christ (the crib
at S. Maria Maggiore, relics of the cross at S. Croce). Next in order of importance
for the pilgrims were the two different sets of Roman shrines: those inside the city
walls, and those in the cemeteries outside. Gradually, more and more relics were
moved inside the city, as had been those of numerous martyrs such as St Praxedis,
St Pancras, and hundreds of others, to newly built or restored city churches.
Many still remained outside the walls, including some very important ones, like
St Laurence or St Agnes in their original basilicas. Churches inside the city also
had relics of their own, for example the craticula of St Laurence at S. Lorenzo in
craticula, or St Peter’s chains at S. Pietro in Vincoli. The pilgrims’ itineraries or
guidebooks—not only the famous Itinerary of Einsiedeln but also the De locis
sanctis, or the Notitia ecclesiarum urbis Romae, combined with the lists of gifts of
the popes detailed in the Liber Pontificalis (especially that of Leo III in 807)—give
a thorough view of the relics’ scene in the city.195 One perhaps even more ad­mir­
able text, because we know that it was not a guidebook but a genuine pilgrim’s
diary, is the pilgrimage itinerary of Sigeric Archbishop of Canterbury when
he visited Rome in 990.196 He toured twenty-two churches inside and outside the
walls, to worship at the shrines of what were obviously seen by pilgrims to be the
highlights of the Roman treasures.
Perhaps the least interesting, from the point of view of the average pilgrim, was
the Lateran basilica itself, with almost no relics of note, even though it was the
papal seat and the official cathedral of Rome.197 However, the pilgrims (at least
the most privileged among them, such as Sigeric) were probably allowed to
venerate the most sacred relic trove in the city. This could be found in the papal
chapel of the Lateran Palace, dedicated to St Laurence but known from the
­seventh century onwards as the Sancta Sanctorum on account of its priceless
­collection of relics and artefacts, including a relic of the Holy Cross. The original
fourth-century chapel, set up on the location of the old papal library and archive,
was entirely refurbished in the thirteenth century, and the only early decorative
feature now left is a mosaic of St Augustine dating from the sixth century.
However, the relics, whether walled or enclosed in caskets, remained there until
the early part of the twentieth century, when most were moved to the Vatican

195 Ed. in VZ, pp. 155–207, 101–31, 67–99, 291–307, and also in Geertman, More Veterum, pp. 200–1,
198–9. The most recent discussion of the itineraries is in Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 15–17.
196 V. Ortenberg, ‘Archbishop Sigeric’s Pilgrimage to Rome in 990’, Anglo-Saxon England 19 (1990),
pp. 127–246.
197 CB, pp. 1–92, and R. Krautheimer, ‘La basilica costantiniana al Laterano. Un tentativo di ricos­
truzione’, Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana 43 (1967), pp. 155–64; De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 161–7;
Pietrangeli, San Giovanni in Laterano, pp. 11–20.
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322 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Museum and were studied by Lauer, Wilpert, Grisar, and now by Smith.198 Some
of the relics were known to contemporaries individually, through being men­
tioned in the Liber Pontificalis. Most famous among them was the icon of Christ
Acheropoita. Its dating is still uncertain, though it was thought in medieval Rome
to have been brought there by St Peter or by the Emperor Titus.199 Its first attested
appearance in Rome was under Stephen II (752–7), who carried it out in proces­
sion at the time of one of Aistulf ’s attacks on the city.200 Wilpert placed the icon at
a date in the fifth or, at the latest, mid-sixth century, and implied that it may have
been in Rome long before the eighth century, when it came to the fore.201 The
icon was seen as one of great antiquity and holiness, and was closely involved
with Roman liturgical events. It was part of the ceremonies beginning in the
Sancta Sanctorum on Easter morning, before the procession went on for the main
Mass to S. Maria Maggiore. It was already well established as part of the Vigil
procession for the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin, from the Lateran to
S. Maria Maggiore, by the time of Pope Leo IV.202 The earliest list of relics from
the Sancta Sanctorum is part of a twelfth-century description of the Lateran
basilica and palace by the Roman deacon John in the later eleventh or twelfth

198 P. Lauer, Le Trésor du Sancta Sanctorum (Paris, 1906), and P. Lauer, ed., ‘Les fouilles du
Sancta Sanctorum au Latran’, in MEFREM 20 (1900), pp. 251–87; H. Grisar, Die römische Kapelle
Sancta Sanctorum und ihr Schatz (Freiburg, 1908); W. F. Volbach, Il tesoro della Cappella Sancta
Sanctorum (Vatican City, 1941); Smith, ‘Care of Relics’, pp. 179–205; Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt,
pp. 75–80; see also E. Morello, ‘Il tesoro del Sancta Sanctorum’, and M. Righetti Tosti-Croce, ‘Il
Sancta Sanctorum: architettura’, both in Pietrangeli, Il Palazzo Apostolico Lateranense, pp. 91–105
and 50–7; and the more popular I. Lafratta, ‘La cappella Sancta Sanctorum’, in Roma. Ieri, oggi,
domani 8/82 (1995), pp. 104–7, and D. Mondini, ‘Reliquie incarnate: le “sacre teste“ di Pietro e
Paolo a San Giovanni in Laterano a Roma’, in Del visibile credere: pellegrinaggi, santuari, miracoli,
reliquie, ed. D. Scotto (Florence, 2011), pp. 265–96. L. Donadono, La Scala Santa a San Giovanni in
Laterano (Rome, 2000); M. Cempanari, Sancta Sanctorum lateranense: il santuario della Scala
Santa delle origini ai nostri giorni, 2 vols (Rome, 2003); and Cordini, G., ‘ “Non est in Toto Sanctior
Orbe Locus”: Collecting Relics in Early Medieval Rome’, in Treasures of Heaven: Saints, Relics and
Devotion in Medieval Europe, ed. M. Bagnoli, A. Klein, A. Holger, C. G. Mann, and J. Robinson
(London, 2010), pp. 69–78.
199 J. Wilpert, ‘L’acheropita ossia l’immagine del Salvatore nella Cappella del Sancta Sanctorum’,
L’Arte 10 (1906), pp. 161–77, 247–62, and more recently M. Andaloro, ‘L’Acheropita’, in Pietrangeli, Il
Palazzo Apostolico Lateranense, pp. 80–9, and Pl. p. 80; and G. Wolf, Salus populi romani. Die
Geschichte römischer Kultbilder im Mittelalter (Weinheim, 1990). More recently there has been a
renewal of interest and work on the subject; see La nuova icona Acheropita di Cristo Salvatore per la
liturgia papale nella domenica di Pasqua, Vatican City, 2007; K. Noreen, ‘Revealing the sacred: the icon
of Christ in the Sancta Sanctorum, Rome’, Word and Image 22 (2006), pp. 228–37, and S. Romano,
‘L’icône acheiropiète du Latran. Fonction d’une image absente’ in Art, Cérémonial et Liturgie au Moyen
Âge. Actes du colloque de 3e cycle Romand des Lettres Lausanne-Fribourg, 24–5 mars, 14–15 avril,
12–13 mai 2000, ed. N. Bock, P. Kurmann, S. Romano, and J.-M. Spieser (Rome, 2003), pp. 301–19, at
306–13; and Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 77–80. An alternative version was that Patriarch Germanus
of Constantinople, at the time of Emperor Leo the Isaurian, in order to save the precious icon—said to
have been that on the Great Gate of Constantinople—from iconoclasm, set it afloat in the Bosphorus,
from where it miraculously reached the mouth of the Tiber; Grisar, Die römische Kapelle Sancta sanc-
torum, pp. 40–4.
200 LP I. 94, ch. 11. 201 Wilpert, ‘L’acheropita’. 202 See Chapter 5.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 323

cen­tury.203 Most famous among them were ‘the heads of the holy apostles Peter
and Paul, and the heads of the holy virgins Agnes and Euphemia’, as well as those
in the three famous reliquaries described by John:

In that holy palace there is an oratory of St Laurence, in which three altars

are considered to be most holy. First, in a cypress tree chest which Pope
Leo III had made, there are three caskets. In the first, there is a cross of
the purest gold adorned with gems and precious stones, that is, amethyst,
emerald, and pearls. In the middle of the cross is the umbilical cord of our
Lord Jesus Christ. It is anointed with balsam, and every year this balsam is
renewed, when the lord pope and his cardinals carry it in procession for the
feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross from the chapel of St Laurence to the
basilica of the Saviour called the Constantinian basilica. In the second casket,
made of silver and gilt, there is an enamelled cross with stories carved on it,
and inside it is the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. In the third box, which
is made of silver, are the sandals, that is, the footwear of our Lord Jesus
Christ. In the second gilt box, the wood of the Holy Cross which Heraclius
brought with him from Persia when he had vanquished Chosroe, together
with the body of St Anastasius the martyr, which is inside the marble altar of
St Laurence.204

A whole range of other New Testament relics were venerated in the Sancta
Sanctorum, such as Christ’s sandals and the tunic of John the Baptist, as well as,
already in the seventh century, some of Christ’s blood, a piece of the Manger
or the Flagellation Column, stones and pieces of ground from holy places in
Palestine, and many others. There was also a treasure trove of relics normally kept
in the high altar of the basilica itself but which, at times of risk or danger, were
moved to the Sancta Sanctorum. They included Old Testament relics (rods of
Aaron and Moses, candelabra from the Temple), and New Testament ones (bread
from the five loaves and two fishes, Christ’s seamless tunic and his purple cloak,
the Sudarium, pieces of the table from the Last Supper, blood and water from
his side at the Crucifixion), as well as relics of John the Baptist and John the
Evangelist. Finally, in modern times, when the treasure was opened and moved,
in addition to these relics a series of relics’ labels was found, most of which can be

203 The original Latin text is printed in Grisar, Die römische Kapelle Sancta sanctorum, pp. 58–9,
and in VZ II, pp. 101–31; see also V. West-Harling, ‘Roman Highlights and their English Afterlife’, in
England and Rome in the Early Middle Ages: Pilgrimage, Art, and Politics, ed. F. Tinti (Turnhout, 2014),
pp. 179–216 at 196–7; see C. Vogel, ‘La “Descriptio ecclesiae Lateranensis” du diacre Jean’, in Mélanges
en l’honneur de Monseigneur Michel Andrieu, Revue des sciences religieuses, vol. hors série
(Strasbourg, 1956).
204 Tr. West-Harling; see Mondini, ‘Reliquie incarnate’, pp. 265–96.
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324 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

dated through palaeography.205 Thus several not mentioned by John the Deacon
must predate the tenth century, as stated on these labels.206
Increasing pressure from northern European pilgrims, rulers, and ecclesiastics
eventually brought about the relaxing of the translation rule,207 to the extent that
popes from Paul I to Pachal I in effect opened the floodgates, the latter by himself
effecting the translation of over 2,000 martyrs’ relics to the church of S. Prassede,
which he had completely appropriated and redecorated. The translation is recorded
in a famous inscription in the church, which explains how the pope was ‘building
the home of the saints’, using, says Goodson, ‘Rome’s sacred capital to consolidate
the signs and systems of papal might, and participating in the emerging pattern of
saints’ veneration’.208 Pope Paul had used the relics as part of his request for help
to Pepin, but he opened the gate to the engagement of the papacy with northern
Europe. Both they and later the Carolingians themselves would use saints’
­relics for foundations, exchanges, diplomacy, and consolidation, as a ‘primary
mechanism of politics’.209 Moreover, the inscription at S. Prassede, though written

205 B. Galland, Les authentiques de reliques du Sancta Sanctorum (Vatican City: Studi e Testi 421,
2004); see also the discussions in K. Noreen, ‘Opening of the Holy of Holies: Early twentieth-century
Explorations of the Sancta Sanctorum (Rome)’, Church History 80 (2011), pp. 520–46. One such dis­
cussion of the trustworthiness of palaeography for the dating of the arrival of the relics in Rome is by
Smith, ‘Care of Relics’.
206 They are those of Isaac, Martha, Cornelius, Aldegund, Elias, Arsenius, Cosmas and Damian,
Anastasia, Constantine, Epiphanius, George, Theoctistus, Philip, and Andrew.
207 A vast literature has been written on this subject, of which a few key references are given here:
J. M. McCulloh, ‘The Cult of Relics in the Letters and Dialogues of Pope Gregory the Great:
A Lexicographical Study’, Traditio 32 (1976), pp. 145–84; J. M. McCulloh, ‘From Antiquity to the
Middle Ages: Continuity and Change in Papal Relic Policy from the sixth to the eighth Century’, in
Pietas. Festschrift für Bernhard Kötting, ed. E. Dassmann and K. Suso Frank (Münster, 1980), pp. 313–24;
M. Dal Santo, Debating the Saints’ Cults in the Age of Gregory the Great (Oxford, 2012); D. H. Miller,
‘The Roman Revolution of the Eighth Century: a study of the ideological background of papal sep­ar­
ation from Byzantium and alliance with the Franks’, Mediaeval Studies 36 (1974), pp. 79–133 and
D. H. Miller, ‘Byzantine-papal relations during the pontificate of Paul I’, Byzantine Zeitschrift 68
(1975), pp. 47–62; more recently, see the work of Alan Thacker, moderating the position, ‘Martyr Cult
Within the Walls: Saints and Relics in the Roman Tituli Churches of the Fourth to Seventh Centuries’,
in Text, Image, Interpretation: Studies in Anglo-Saxon Literature and its Insular Context, ed. A. Minnis
and J. Roberts, (Turnhout, 2007), pp. 31–70, and also Smith, J. M. H., ‘Old Saints, New Cults: Roman
Relics in Carolingian Francia’, in Smith, Early Medieval Rome, pp. 317–39, on the way in which, after a
pause under Hadrian I, the relic translations again became common tools in the ‘high-level politics as
gifts’ after 826.
208 Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal I, p. 197.
209 Ibid., pp. 218–22; C. Goodson, ‘The Relics Translations of Paschal I: Transforming City and
Cult’, in Roman bodies: Antiquity to the Eighteenth Century, ed. A. Hopkins and M. Wyke (London,
2005), pp. 123–41; see also J. J. Emerick, ‘Altars personified: The cult of the saints and the chapel
­system in Pope Paschal I’s S. Prassede (817–819)’, in Archaeology in architecture, ed. D. Mauskopf
Deliyannis (Mainz, 2005), pp. 43–63, U. Nilgen, ‘Die grosse Reliquieninschrift von Santa Prassede’,
Römische Quartalschrift 69 (1974), pp. 7–29, and C. Goodson, ‘Building for Bodies: the Architecture
of saint veneration in Early Medieval Rome’, in Ó Carragain and Neuman de Vegvar, Roma Felix,
pp. 51–79. Of the vast literature on the cult of relics and their veneration, I will mention only some of
the most recent work. This includes A. Angenendt, Heilige und Reliquien. Die Geschichte ihres Kultes
vom frühen Christentum bis zur Gegenwart (Munich, 2007); S. Boesch Gajano, ‘Reliques et pouvoirs’,
in Les reliques. Objets, cultes, symbols, ed. E. Bozóky and A.-M. Hélvetius (Turnhout, 1999), pp. 255–69,
and her other edited works such as La santità (Bari, 1999), La tesaurizzazione delle reliquie, In
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 325

within the parameters of traditional Roman epigraphy, was in fact modelled on

the litanies or Libri Memoriales by then common in Frankish monasteries.
Like them, its over 2,000 saints are placed according to categories, just as, in
parallel, they are placed in the great mosaic on the triumphal arch.210 This huge
translation was an act meant to be noted both in Rome and abroad, and to be
both a means of cohesion of the Roman community and a means of comman­
deering the patrimony of sanctity of Rome, associating the veneration of relics in
the city with papal liturgy.
Under Paschal’s successor, Gregory IV, many more relics began to make their
way outside the city, for example those of St Sebastian to St Médard of Soissons,
St Gorgonius to Gorze, Nabor to ‘Novacella’, Nazarius to Lorsch, and SS Marcellinus
and Peter, stolen by Einhard on his Roman trip after his envoy had failed to

Sanctorum 2 (Rome, 2005), and collective works under her aegis, such as Associazione italiana per lo
studio della santità, dei culti e dell’agiografia, Santità, culti, agiografia: temi e prospettive: atti del 1.
Convegno di studio dell’Associazione italiana per lo studio della santità, dei culti e dell’agiografia: Roma,
24–6 ottobre 1996, 1997 (Rome, 1997); Agiografia altomedioevale (Bologna, 1976); Miracoli: dai segni
alla storia (Rome, 2000). In English see J. M. H. Smith, ‘Portable Christianity: Relics in the Medieval
West (c. 700–1200)’, Proceedings of the British Academy 181 (2012), pp. 143–67 and J. M. H. Smith,
‘Saints and their Cults’, in Cambridge History of Christianity, vol. III, AD 600–1100, ed. T. F. X. Noble
and J. M. H.Smith, (Cambridge, 2008), pp. 581–605; A. Walsham, ‘Introduction: Relics and Remains,’
in Relics and Remains, ed. A. Walsham (Oxford: Past and Present Supplements 5, 2010), pp. 9–36;
L. Canetti, Frammenti di eternità. Corpi e reliquie tra Antichità e Medioevo (Roma, 2002); M. Stelladoro,
‘Significato, ruolo, potere e culto delle reliquie’, in Reliques et sainteté dans l’espace medieval, ed.
J.-L. Deuffic (Saint-Denis, 2006), pp. 65–87; Bagnoli et al. eds., Treasures of Heaven; and above all the
work of Patrick Geary, for example ‘The Ninth-Century Relic Trade: A Response to Popular Piety?’, in
Religion and the People, 800–1700, ed. J. Obelkevich (Chapel Hill, 1979), pp. 8–19; ‘The Saint and the
Shrine: The Pilgrim’s Goal in the Middle Ages’, in Wallfahrt kennt keine Grenzen, ed. L. Lenz Kriss-
Rettenbeck and G. Möhler (Münich, 1984), pp. 265–74; Living with the Dead in the Middle Ages
(Ithaca, 1994), pp. 163–76; ‘Sacred Commodities: The Circulation of Medieval Relics’, in The Social
Life of Things: Commodities in Cultural Perspective, ed. A. Appadurai, (Cambridge, 1986), pp. 169–91.
Specifically on the exchange of relics, including through theft: J. Guiraud, ‘Le commerce des reliques
au commencement du IXe siècle’, in Mélanges G. B. De Rossi (Paris, 1892), pp. 73–95; and H. Silvestre,
‘Commerce et vol de reliques au Moyen-Âge’, Revue belge de philologie et d’histoire 30 (1952),
pp. 721–773; most work is now superseded by Geary’s most famous book, Furta Sacra. Thefts of Relics
in the Central Middle Ages (Princeton, 1990). On the use of relics as gifts for political purposes, see, for
example, R. Michalowski, ‘Le don d’amitié dans la société carolingienne et les translationes sancto­
rum’, in Hagiographies, culture set sociétés. Actes du Colloque organisé à Nanterre et à Paris (2–5 mai
1979) (Paris, 1981), pp. 399–416; F. Carlà, ‘Exchange and the Saints: gift-giving and the commerce of
relics’, in Gift Giving and the ‘Embedded’ Economy in the Ancient World, ed. F. Carlà and M. Gori
(Heidelberg, 2014), pp. 404–37; E. Bozoky, La Politique des reliques de Constantin a Saint Louis: protec-
tion collective et legitimation du pouvoir (Paris, 2006); and J. M. H. Smith, ‘Rulers and Relics, c.750–950:
Treasure on Earth, Treasure in Heaven’, in Walsham, Relics and Remains, pp. 73–96.

210 Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal I, pp. 228–41, and Goodson, ‘Building for Bodies’; on the
apse see also M. B. Mauck, ‘The Mosaic of the Triumphal Arch of S. Prassede. A Liturgical
Interpretation’, Speculum 62 (1987), pp. 813–28. K. Herbers, ‘Reliques romaines au IXe siècle: ren­
forcements des liaisons avec la papauté?’ in Hagiographie, idéologie et politique au Moyen Âge en
Occident’ in Actes du colloque international du Centre d’Études Supérieures de Civilisation Médiévale
de Poitiers (11–14 septembre 2008), ed. E. Bozóky, Turnhout 2012, pp. 111–126 and C. Mancho,
Paschal I: autorité pontificale et création artistique à Rome au début di IXe siècle, in Faire et voire
l’autorité pendant l’Antiquité et le Moyen Age. Images et monuments, ed. A.-O. Poilpré, Paris 2016,
pp. 71–96.
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326 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

acquire the relics of St Tiburtius from an unscrupulous priest.211 Most eager to

seek relics were the Anglo-Saxon pilgrims who, since the age of the abbot of
Monkwearmouth-Jarrow Benedict Bishop, Archbishop Wilfrid of York, and
Aldhelm of Malmesbury in the seventh century, were always keen to visit Rome.212
Chasing relics continued and became even more important with the Ottonians.
They obtained, through various means, relics such as those of St Bartholomew, in
some cases by playing a pope and a church against each other. A famous example
of this was the request made by Otto II to the pope to let him have an arm of
St Cyriacus, from the monastery of that name, for his new foundation at
Gerstenrode. The pope did so, to the outrage of the nuns and the abbess Petronia:
the next day, she went and berated Otto to such an extent that he offered to give it
back—whereupon she generously offered to let him keep it, if he undertook to
help her gain a relic of St Nicholas as soon as possible.213 She won.

Liturgy and Ideology

The cult of relics had a key role to play in the organization of the liturgy in the
city, as well as in artistic and architectural changes. After functioning as a charac­
teristic late antique, then Byzantine, city, Rome began its transformation into a
city profoundly shaped by northern European pilgrimage needs and financial
support. This was part of Rome’s gradual shift from being the city of the foremost
Western bishop to being the spiritual capital of western Europe at the time of
the Carolingian presence, and the head of the papal monarchy from the eleventh
cen­tury onwards.

211 For St Sebastian’s body to Soissons by abbot Hilduin of St Denis to St Medard’s in Soissons, see
ARF 826; Nabor, Nazarius, and Gorgonius, in the Annals of Lorsch, in MGH SSRG, a. 767; Einhard,
Translatio et Miracula, pp. 8, 10—when Hilduin’s priest failed to get the relics, four Frankish monks
broke into the basilica on the Via Labicana on behalf of Einhard and tried to steal the relics of
St Tiburtius, but they failed and so took those of saints Marcellinus and Peter instead, on two consecu­
tive days; see also M. Bondois, La translation des saints Marcellin et Pierre. Etude sur Einhard et sa
politique de 827 à 834 (Paris, 1907). They were taken first to Strasburg, then to Michelstadt, and even­
tually to Seligenstadt. On the use of relics as diplomatic gifts and thefts in this context, see Bauer, Das
Bild der Stadt, pp. 144–6.
212 Bede, Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum ed. and tr. R. A. B. Mynors and B. Colgrave
(Oxford, 1969), IV.18 and V.19; Abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow: Bede’s Homily i. 13 on Benedict
Biscop, Bede’s History of the abbots of Wearmouth and Jarrow, the anonymous Life of Ceolfrith, Bede’s
Letter to Ecgbert, Bishop of York ed. and tr. C. Grocock and I. N. Wood (Oxford, 2013); Colgrave, ed.
and tr., The Life of Bishop Wilfrid, ch. 33, pp. 66–7: ‘reliquiarum sanctarum ab electis viris plurimum ad
consolationem ecclesiarum Brittanniae adeptus, nomina singulorum scribens, quae cuiusque sancti
essent reliquiae’, and ch. 55, pp. 120–1: ‘moreque suo ab electis viris sanctas reliquias nominatim congre-
gans’. On the early Anglo-Saxon quest for relics in Rome, see A. Thacker, ‘In Search of Saints: The
English Church and the Cult of Roman Apostles and Martyrs in the Seventh and Eighth Centuries’, in
Smith, Early Medieval Rome, pp. 247–77 at 259–64; Smith, ‘Rome of the Martyrs. Saints, Cults and
Relics, Fourth to Seventh Centuries’, in Ó Carragain and Neuman de Vegvar, Roma Felix, pp. 13–49;
William of Malmesbury, Gesta pontificum Anglorum, ed. and tr. M. Winterbottom and M. Thomson
pp. 548–51; see M. Lapidge, ‘The Career of Aldhelm’, Anglo-Saxon England 36 (2007), pp. 52–64, and
J. Story, ‘Aldhelm and Old St Peter’s, Rome’, Anglo-Saxon England 39 (2010), pp. 7–20.
213 Martinelli, Primo trofeo, pp. 125–9.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 327

Because of the wealth of information that we have about the liturgy and the
cult of relics in Rome, it is, by default, the best example to use to follow the devel­
opment of post-Byzantine Italian cults, art, and architecture. Roman stational
­liturgy has been studied thoroughly for centuries, and it has also been analysed as
a manifestation of social and political order in the city.214 Without spending too
much time on well-known features, I will pick up the story from Pope Gregory III
onwards. He developed two aspects of the liturgy in the city. The first was the
modelling of the offices in the Lateran basilica on those of St Peter’s (note that this
was not the other way round, as one might expect from the cathedral of the city,
and is therefore significant in the continuing ascent of St Peter’s in prestige,
under the pressure of pilgrims). The second was the setting up of new celebra­
tions, including vigils and masses in the cemeteries, with lights brought there
from the Lateran, by a priest chosen by the pope.215 Pope Stephen II’s well-known
Great Litany procession with the Acheropoita icon from the Lateran to S. Maria
Maggiore, barefoot, with all the clergy and the ‘whole Roman assembly’, on the
occasion of the Lombard attack on the city, is a well-known cliché, expressing the
unity of the city in the face of danger; but also, with its distribution of charity in
the form of new tunics and chasubles to the clergy, and the redemption of
debtors, it was a liturgical formula for bringing forgiveness from God for people’s
sins.216 Pope Leo III expanded the successful formula, by setting out three days of
litanies (Rogation Days) before Ascension Day, in imitation of the Church of Gaul,
while previously in Rome there had only been the Laetania Maior on 25 April—a
telling example of the Church of Rome modelling itself on the Frankish Church.217
This was not a one-way process, and much still went the other way, for example
when Pope Gregory IV led the Emperor Louis the Pious to extend the celebration
of the Feast of All Saints to the whole of Francia in 835.218
It is not possible, or indeed necessary, here to discuss in detail the liturgy
of Rome, a vast topic with an even vaster historiography, and I will only make
one point, arising out of the above comments. At the time of the Frankish
involvement in Italy, the Roman liturgy was essentially focused on the key

214 See Chapters 2 and 4; De Blaauw, Cultus et Decor; Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, pp. 936–1033;
L. Reekmans, ‘L’implantation monumentale chrétienne dans la zone suburbaine de Rome du IVe au
IXe siècle’, Rivista di archeologia cristiana 54 (1968), pp. 173–207; L. Reekmans., ‘L’implantation monu­
mentale chrétienne dans l’espace urbain de Rome de 300 à 850’, in Actes du Xl Congrès international
d’archéologie chrétienne, I (Rome, 1989), pp. 874–915; J. F. Romano, Liturgy and Society in Early
Medieval Rome (Farnham, 2014). On the Lateran specifically, see S. De Blaauw, ‘Il patriarchio, la
basilica lateranense e la liturgia,’ MEFREM 116 (2004), pp. 161–71.
215 LP I. 92, chs. 10, 17. 216 LP I. 94, chs. 11–12.
217 LP I. 98, ch. 43. Notably in the diocese of Vienne, where these had been introduced c.470, and
then extended to the whole of Gaul at the council of Orléans in 511, Davis, LPC8, p. 199 n. 94. For the
original Roman feast, see J. Dyer, ‘Roman Processions of the Major Litany (litaniae maiores) from the
Sixth to the Twelfth Century’, in Roma Felix, pp. 113–38.
218 Chronicon Sigeberti 835, PL 160 col. 159; see G. Knopp, ‘Sanctorum nomina seriatim. Die
Anfänge der Allerheiligenlitanei und ihre Verbindung mit den laudes regiae’, Römische Quartalschrift
65 (1970), pp. 185–231.
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328 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

ceremonies associated with the stations. The reinforcement of the stational liturgy
was constant, as shown, for example, by Leo III’s gift to St Peter’s of twenty-four
com­mu­nion chalices for each region, for acolytes to carry in procession to the
stational churches.219 Subsequent popes continued the gifts of major liturgical
items for the stational liturgy, some by replacing tired or lost objects: Leo IV, for
example, replaced a cross given by Charlemagne to be carried in procession
before the pope, which had been stolen, while Benedict III restored seven proces­
sional crosses ‘broken through age’.220 But other than this, the Church of Rome
was sadly deficient in the precision of its liturgy. A well-known case is the diffi­
culty that the pope had in supplying Pepin, who had asked for books containing
the liturgical texts used in Rome: Pope Paul said that he could only send an
an­tiph­on­al and a responsory, because these were all that he had.221 Since it is
unlikely that, like some modern academics, the pope would not have wanted to
lend his books, especially as he was attempting to obtain Pepin’s help, one must
assume that the dearth of books in the city was genuine. The implication is that
Rome had relatively little need of liturgical books, and that there was a certain
lack of harmonization between churches. It is very much as a result of the
demands made to the popes by the Franks, especially by Pepin, then Charlemagne,
who wanted to ‘Romanize’ the Frankish liturgy so that it would be modelled on
that of Rome, that the popes were faced with the need to streamline the liturgy of the
churches in the city itself. It was not their initiative which pressed for either this
stand­ard­iza­tion or indeed the wish to Romanize other Churches in the West in
imitation of Rome. It was Charlemagne who wanted his clergy to be taught the
Roman chant—a fact about which the Roman clergy was rather unhappy—and

219 LP I. 98, ch. 112. 220 LP I. 105, chs. 17 and 106; ch. 33.
221 MGH Ep. III/1, no. 24; on this discussion about liturgical cross-influences, the standard account
is C. Vogel, ‘Les échanges liturgiques entre Rome et les pays francs jusqu’à l’époque de Charlemagne’,
in Le Chiese nei Regni dell’Europa Occidentale, Settimane 7 (1960), pp. 185–295 C. Vogel, ‘Les motives
de la romanisation du culte sous Pépin le Bref (751–68) et Charlemagne (774–814)’, in O. Capitani,
Culto cristiano e politica imperiale carolingia. Atti del XVIII Convegno di studi sul tema, Todi 9–12
ottobre 1977 (Todi, 1979), pp. 15–41 and C. Vogel, ‘La reforme cultuelle sous Pépin le Bref et sous
Charlemagne’, in Die Karolingische Renaissance, ed. E. Patzelt (Graz, 1965), pp. 172–272; and
P.-M. Gy, ‘L’unification liturgique de l’Occident et la liturgie de la curie romaine’, Revue des sciences
philosophiques et théologiques 59 (1975), pp. 601–12. More recently, work on the Frankish impact on
the Roman liturgy has included Y. Hen, The royal patronage of liturgy in Frankish Gaul to the death of
Charles the Bald (877) (Woodbridge, 2001); Y. Hen, ‘The Romanization of the Frankish liturgy: ideal,
reality and the rhetoric of reform’, in Rome across Time and Space: Cultural Transmission and the
Exchange of Ideas, c. 500–1400, ed. R. McKitterick, J. Osborne, and C. Bolgia (Cambridge, 2011),
pp. 111–23; Y. Hen, ‘Die karolingische Liturgie und Rom’, in Karl der Große, Charlemagne. Orte der
Macht, ed. Pohle, F. (Dresden, 2014), pp. 338–45; and P. Carmassi, ‘La liturgia romana tra il V e il IX
secolo’, in Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 144–53. Several of Rosamond McKittericks’s books and
papers, from the early The Frankish Church and the Carolingian Reforms, 789–895 (London, 1977), to,
for example, ‘Unity and diversity in the Carolingian Church’, repr. in Unity and Diversity in the Church,
ed. R. N. Swanson (Oxford, 1996), pp. 55–82, touch on the subject. The most recent paper is by
Albiero, L., ‘Secundum romanam consuetudienem: la riforma liturgica in epoca carolingia’, in Il Secolo
Di Carlo Magno. Istituzioni, letterature e cultura del tempo carolingio, ed. I. Pagani and F. Santi
(Florence, 2016), pp. 151–76.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 329

it was he who asked Hadrian I to send him a sacramentary in 785/6, and a

­lectionary—both incomplete and in need of reworking by the Franks. Chrodegang
of Metz contributed to this, being the possible author of the ‘new’ Gelasian
Sacramentary, which was a synthesis of a series of partial books used in Rome for
the Mass, the ‘old’ Gelasian and the Gregorian sacramentaries. With the help of
Alcuin, Benedict of Aniane, and Amalarius of Metz, the Carolingians then
continued to rework old, and provide new books, which were in effect a ‘new’
liturgical literature, invented in order to standardize the usage of the Frankish
Church.222 The reason for this was eminently political, driven by the veneration
for St Peter but also by the love for order and control which could be developed
when allegedly modelling Carolingian practice on Rome. The Anglo-Saxons had
highlighted and promoted the cult of St Peter in the West, and held the papacy in
strong ven­er­ation, in gratitude for Gregory the Great’s initial conversion mission
to England. It was the Franks who imposed the liturgical practices of Rome in
the Frankish world—though this move had begun with St Boniface, himself an
Anglo-Saxon.223 Such a move was aimed at an alignment of Frankish religious
and institutional life on that of the Roman Church. Of equal weight here is the
personal devotion, notably of Charlemagne himself, to St Peter, which translated
into practical facts, such as his massive injection of wealth from Frankish con­
quests into the glorification of the Roman see of Peter, as well as his political
involvement in Italy in the first place. The point one needs to underline, however,
is that Charlemagne also expected Rome to conform with the new rules of the
Roman liturgy—which the Franks themselves had put together in a far more
composed form than it had been in Rome itself. An example of Frankish tradition
imposed in Rome was that of the ordines, which reached Rome through the
medium of Carolingian books. Others, ultimately, were the Ottonian Romano-
German Pontifical in the tenth century, but also the Sacramentary itself, the Rule
of St Benedict, and possibly the Roman Passionary,224 a kind of book not neces­
sarily needed previously, since it was not until Hadrian I that specific texts for
the passiones of saints were actually read out in Roman churches. The Franks’
de­ter­min­ation to celebrate more Romanorum went so far as to adapt what were in

222 H. Schneider, ‘Karolingische Kirchen-und Liturgiereform. Ein konservativer Neuaufbruch’, in

Stiegemann and Wemhoff, 799. Kunst und Kultur, II, pp. 772–81, insists that the principal mover in
the reform was Amalarius of Metz.
223 On the reforms of the Frankish Church, see the classics J. M. Wallace Hadrill, The Frankish
Church (Oxford, 1983), and McKitterick, The Frankish Church. More specifically on Boniface, the
­literature is rather old; the most relevant is probably T. Schieffer, Angelsachsen und Franken: zwei
Studien zur Kirchengeschichte des 8. Jahrhunderts (Mainz, 1951), and W.-P. Romain, Saint Boniface et
la naissance de l’Europe (Paris, 1990).
224 For the latter see G. Vocino, ‘Roma Sacra on Demand: Exporting and Appropriating Roman
Saints through Hagiography and Liturgy, eighth-ninth Centuries’, Communication at the Leeds IMC
2015: 8 July, Sessions 1013c, who argues that the passionary (a style of liturgical book which did not
exist in Rome) was put together somewhere in a monastery around Lake Constance, and later reached
Rome from this Carolingian environment.
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330 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

effect the specific features of the stational liturgy of Rome to northern Europe:
north of the Alps the ‘stations’ ceased to be related to Roman churches and
became instead a form of procession between altars in each church. However,
other changes were needed too because, traditionally, churches north of the Alps
were oriented, and the celebrant stood facing the congregation, to the west. In
Rome, on the other hand, the celebrant was facing the congregation to the east,
because the tradition of having the altar facing east was not applied in the early
churches; to be able to celebrate ad Orientem, as Rome did according to the Ordo
I for example, it was necessary to establish a western apse in Francia, as was cus­
tomary in Roman churches. Such a western end is included, for example, in the
plan of S. Gall. Similarly, the need for processions to the relics influenced the
architecture of crypts north of the Alps.225
The growing impact of pilgrimage, and its focus on relics and intercession,
had implications for its main architectural manifestation under the influence of
northern pilgrims: the adoption in many Roman churches of the Carolingian
crypt. Paschal I foregrounded this in his churches, as did several of his successors.
Annular crypts, originally modelled on St Peter’s, spread to northern Europe
from Rome and became popular when the papacy began to focus on its northern
European pilgrims, on account of the key function of these crypts in relic cults
and pilgrimage processions north of the Alps.226 Such was their success there that
they came back in force to Rome, and were added to numerous churches by
popes using Frankish ideas. For that same reason—the liturgical importance of
processions—we find two other architectural innovations, both from the area of
Frankish ecclesiology. One is the introduction of the westwork (Westwerk), or
western end of the church, as a parallel to its eastern end, which was at its most
famous in German monastic churches such as Corvey and Fulda, and whose
­purpose was to allow for liturgical and processional action at both ends of the
church.227 The second, later innovation consisted of a change in the position of

225 C. Heitz, ‘More romano. Problèmes d’architecture et liturgie carolingienne’, in Roma e l’età
c­arolingia, pp. 27–38; C. Heitz, ‘L’architettura religiosa carolingia in relazione alla liturgia sacra’,
in Capitani, ed., Culto cristiano, pp. 339–62; C. Heitz, Recherches sur les rapports entre architecture et
liturgie à l’époque carolingienne (Paris, 1963); C. Heitz, L’architecture religieuse carolingienne: les formes
et leurs fonctions (Paris, 1980); C. Heitz, ‘Architecture et liturgie en France de l’époque carolingienne
à l’an mil’, Hortus artium medievalium 1 (1995), pp. 57–73; more recently, P. Piva, ‘L’ambulacro e i
“tragitti” di pellegrinaggio nelle chiese d’Occidente, secoli X–XII’, in P. Piva, Arte Medievale. Le vie
dello spazio liturgico (Milan, 2010), pp. 81–94; Schneider, ‘Karolingische Kirchen- und Liturgiereform’,
pp. 772–81. J. J. Emerick, ‘Building more romano in Francia during the third quarter of the eighth
century: the abbey church at St Denis and its model’, in McKitterick et al., eds., Rome across Time and
Space, pp. 127–50, esp. 142–50, on St Peter’s (the model).
226 D. De Bernardi Ferrero, ‘Cripte presbiterali romane e cripte carolingie’ in Roma e l’età carolingia,
pp. 325–30; M. Magni, ‘Cryptes du haut Moyen Âge en Italie; problèmes de typologie du IXe jusqu’au
début du XIe siècle’, Cahiers Archéologiques 28 (1979), pp. 41–85, and the older classic B. M. Apollonj
Ghetti, ‘Le confessioni semianulari nelle basiliche romane’, in Roma sotterranea, ed. R. Luciani (Rome,
1884), pp. 203–13.
227 Krautheimer, Profile of a City, p. 139; Heitz, C., ‘L’architettura religiosa carolingia’, pp. 339–62;
M. D’Onofrio, Roma e Aquisgrana (Napoli, 1983), pp. 27–32 and 67–99. The standard works on the
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 331

the episcopal cathedra in relation to the altar and the congregation. It introduced
a fundamental change in the Roman liturgy itself. From the celebration as exem­
plified by the Ordo Romanus I, standard in Rome at the end of the seventh to the
beginning of the eighth century and still in use until the end of the ninth, where
the celebrant was behind the altar, as he had been in early Christian churches,
this move shows the progressive imposition of the new-style celebration as
exemplified by the Roman–German Pontifical under Otto I, where the celebrant
had his back to the nave.228 Among other offerings, the cathedra given by Charles
the Bald was one of the most spectacular such gifts of imperial munificence as
was the illuminated Bible of Charles the Bald, which he offered to S. Paolo fuori
le Mura.229
Even though Carolingian influence in Rome became paramount, the Byzantine
past was not forgotten, and links continued with Constantinople, almost as
symbolically as the two chapels adjacent to St Peter’s being dedicated respectively
to the patron saint of the Frankish dynasty, Petronilla, and the Apostle of
Constantinople, Andrew. The revival of interest in Byzantine affairs which took
place in the theological and political sphere was also visible in the liturgy.
Pope Benedict III revived the practice, which had become obsolete by the ninth
cen­tury, of having Greek lessons in the lectionary, and he introduced a new
stational epistolary in both Latin and Greek; Benedict was strongly supported by

architecture of Roman churches remain M. Armellini, Le Chiese di Roma dal secolo IV al secolo X IX,
2 vols (Rome, 1887, ed. and rev. by C. Cecchelli, 1942); C. Huelsen, Le Chiese di Roma nel Medio Evo
(Florence, 1927); CB; O. Marucchi, Elements d’archéologie chrétienne, t. III. Basiliques et églises de
Rome (Paris–Rome, 1902); E. Mâle, Rome et ses vieilles églises (Paris, 1942); and G. Matthiae, Le chiese
di Roma dal IV al X secolo (Rome, 1962). They are now supplemented by H. Brandenburg, The Ancient
Churches of Rome, From the Fourth to the Seventh Centuries (Turnhout, 2005).

228 On the liturgical rules, see Andrieu, Ordines romani: ordines I, II, III et XI, and C. Vogel and
R. Elze, eds., Le Pontifical romano-germanique du Xe siècle, 4 vols (Vatican City, 1963–72). The Ordo I
has been re-edited with commentaries by Romano, Liturgy and Society, pp. 229–48 and Romano, ‘The
Fates of Liturgies: Towards a History of the First Roman Ordo’, Antiphon 11 (2007), pp. 43–77. Most
of the work on the subject is due to S. De Blaauw, ‘Architettura e arredo ecclesiastico a Roma (V–IX
secolo)’, in Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 52–61; S. De Blaauw, ‘Liturgical features of Roman churches:
manifestations of the Church of Rome?’, in Chiese locali e chiese regionali, Settimane 61 (2014),
pp. 324–37; S. De Blaauw, ‘L’altare nelle chiese di Roma come centro di culto e di committenza papale’,
in Roma nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 48, pp. 969–90; and F. A. Bauer, ‘The Liturgical Arrangements of
Early Medieval Roman Church Buildings’, Mededelingen van het Nederlands lnstituut te Rome 59
(2000), pp. 101–28.
229 On the Bible of Charles the Bald see the most recent works: V. Jemolo and M. Morelli eds., La
Bibbia di S. Paolo fuori le Mura: abbazia di S. Paolo fuori le Mura, Roma, 29 giugno-30 settembre 1981.
Catalogo (Rome, 1981); La Bibbia di San Paolo fuori le mura: biblia sacra, codex membranaceus saeculi
9 (Rome, 1994); and M. Cardinali, ed., La Bibbia carolingia dell’Abbazia di San Paolo fuori le Mura
(Vatican City, 2009); on the cathedra of St Peter, see M. Maccarrone, ‘Die Cathedra Sancti Petri im
Hochmittelalter. Vom Symbol des päpstlichen Amtes zum Kultobjekt; Die Cathedra Sancti Petri im
Hochmittelalter. Vom Symbol des päpstlichen Amtes zum Kultobjekt’, Römische Quartalschrift fur
christliche Altertumskunde und fur Kirchengeschichte 76 (1981), pp. 172–207, 138–72; Gandolfo, F.,
1976, ‘La cattedra di Pasquale I in S. Maria Maggiore’, in Roma e l’età carolingia, Rome, pp. 55–67; and
Frugoni, ‘L’ideologia del potere imperiale’.
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332 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the Patriarch Photius, who believed that his predecessor, Pope Leo IV, had
­initiated, and that Benedict III had continued, the recitation of the Byzantine
Creed in Rome. Some of this revival was driven by Anastasius Bibliothecarius.230
The liturgy of Ravenna presents us with another problem. Did Ravenna still
use what Carolingians like Charles the Bald would call the ‘Greek’ liturgy? In a
letter addressed to the Church of Ravenna at the synod of 877, Charles castigated
it for still celebrating with usages from the liturgy of either St James (Jerusalem)
or St Basil (Constantinople), and requested it to use the Roman liturgy, a standard
request as part of the Carolingian attempt to unify the liturgy.231 This may well
have been a genuine issue, if one follows Lanzoni, who argued that one of the
few witnesses of the liturgy used in Ravenna, a rotulus, shows that, at least as
far as the Advent liturgy was concerned—the only surviving fragment—the
liturgy of Ravenna was different from that of Rome; however, he also suggested
that this would no longer have been an issue in the ninth century.232 Finally,
it is necessary to point out that we have no surviving evidence for the liturgy
used in Venice before the eleventh century; even the first list of saints and
their feasts does not predate 1000, and there is no evidence available about the
liturgical practices of Grado either, which would have allowed one to extrapolate
to a point.
Some Carolingian input can be seen also in Ravennate and Venetian churches,
though in no way to the same extent as in Rome. Its main impact is to be found in
the growing number of crypts, and in the new fashion for building bell towers.
Crypts were inserted into every Ravennate church. At S. Apollinare Nuovo, it was
probably built when the body of St Apollinarius was brought into the city from
Classe for fear of Saracen raids, and it was on that occasion that the church
changed its name from S. Martino in Ciel d’Oro.233 Later, a new crypt was also
built at S. Apollinare in Classe, when the saint’s body was taken back there,
though both churches continued to claim his relics. The crypt is dated to the
ninth century, and was of the circular type seen at S. Cecilia, SS Quattro Coronati,
S. Crisogono, S. Marco, S. Pancrazio, and S. Prassede in Rome, all from that
period. A crypt with columns, different from the Roman model but similar to
that of one of the contemporary pievi in Romagna, S. Pietro at Bagnacavallo, was

230 See Chapters 1 and 5.

231 A. Jacob, ‘Une lettre de Charles le Chauve à l’Eglise de Ravenne’, Revue d’Histoire Ecclésiastique
62 (1972), pp. 415–22.
232 F. Lanzoni, ‘Reliquie della liturgia ravennate del secolo IX secondo il Liber Pontificalis di
Agnello’, Rassegna Gregoriana 9 (1910), cols. 327–38, and F. Lanzoni, ‘Reliquie dell’antico officio
divino di Ravenna in Agnello’, Rassegna Gregoriana 8 (1909), pp. 243–6; K. Gamber, ‘Der Ordo
Romanus IV, ein Dokument der ravennatischen Liturgie des 8. Jht.’, Römisches Quartalschrift 66
(1971), pp. 154–70. A. Baumstark, Liturgia romana e liturgia dell’Esarcato (Rome, 1904), deals with
the original links between the two.
233 Gerola, ‘La cripta di Sant’Apollinare Nuovo’, pp. 23–5; Iacco, La Basilica di S. Apollinare Nuovo;
Deichmann, Ravenna, II.1; Verhoeven, The Early Christian Monuments, pp. 43–5, 266, 287–8.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 333

added to the cathedral in the tenth century, when the bodies of SS Gratus and
Ursicinus were translated there in 975/6.234 Other Romagna pievi similarly had a
rebuild, with a crypt and a newly elevated presbiterium above it, as we can see at
S. Giovanni del Tò.235
The most widely debated crypt within the remit of my three cities remains that
of St Mark’s in Venice. It has been reconstructed on the basis of literary texts
like the Translatio S. Marci of c.960–70, evidence from an early twelfth-century
enamel from the Pala d’Oro, showing one cupola and door, and recent arch­
aeo­logic­al work carried out by Ettore Vio.236 The complex archaeological and
interpretative work appears to prove quite conclusively the existence of both a
Carolingian-style crypt and a westwork in the original basilica. This would be
entirely in keeping with the efforts made by the doges to turn the basilica from a
private palatine chapel modelled on S. Vitale, Aachen, and the Apostoleion into a
pilgrimage church around the relics of St Mark.237

234 Verzone, ‘Le chiese deuterobizantine’, p. 340; Novara, La cattedrale di Ravenna.

235 G. Galassi, ‘L’architettura protoromanica nell’Esarcato’, Suppl III to Felix Ravenna 3 (1928),
pp. 129–61, at 145; also M. G. Borghi, Architettura esarcale e le principali chiese del Veneto e della
Romagna fra VI e il X secolo, (Ravenna, 1940).
236 The new edition of the Translatio text, superseding the traditional N. McLeary in his ‘Note
storiche e archeologiche sul testo della “translatio S. Marci” ’, Memorie storiche foriogiuliesi 27–9
(1931–3), is now that by Colombi, ‘Translatio S. Marci’, pp. 73–129, at pp. 112–29. The most recent
participants to discuss this are E. Vio, ‘Cripta o prima capella ducale’, in San Marco. La cripta. Il res-
tauro, ed. E. Vio (Milan, 1993), pp. 23–70; W. Dorigo, ‘Lo stato della discussione storico-archeologica
dopo i nuovi lavori nella cripta di S. Marco’, in ibid., pp. 25–41; W. Dorigo, ‘Una discussione e nuove
precisazioni sulla capella sancti Marci nel IX–X secolo’, Venezia Arti 7 (1993), pp. 17–36; and R. Cecchi,
La basilica di S. Marco. La costruzione bizantina del IX secolo. Permanenze e trasformazioni (Venice,
2003), pp. 1–32; now M. Agazzi, ‘San Marco: da cappella palatina a cripta contariniana; San Marco:
from a palatine chapel to a contarinian crypt’, in Le cripte di Venezia. Gli ambienti di culto sommersi
della cristianità medievale. The crypts of Venice. The submerged places of worship of medieval christian-
ity, ed. M. Zorzi (Treviso, 2018), pp. 24–51.
237 AASS V, 847–60, pp. 854–5. Vio reconstructed the crypt, where relics were kept, and the retro­
crypt, used as an entrance for pilgrims. As shown by the technique of massive blocks of stones typical
of the Carolingian period, the current crypt, gradually heightened, goes back to the origins of the
basilica, though the relics were originally not under the altar but either under ground or in a sar­
cophagus, possibly even a wooden casket inside a sarcophagus, just as they had been taken out of the
Apostle’s tomb in Alexandria. Vio explained why his conclusions suggest a different structure from
that implied in the narrative of John the Deacon, which seems to imply that this was not a crypt but
part of the original Particiaco church, with the current crypt wall being in fact part of the demolished
church of S. Teodoro, while the basilica itself was the Particiaco chapel of Carolingian style with a
westwork. According to Vio, only the pavement and the tomb, supported on columns with capitals of
Verona stone, were in place in 829. Later, lateral columns were inserted to support the crypt, between
the building of the first St Mark’s in 829 and the second in 978, rebuilt after the fire of 976, when Pietro
I Orseolo removed the relic for safety but left the two crypts. Dorigo also believed the current crypt to
have been the Particiaco chapel, despite evidence of the existence of a ‘crypt’ (‘capella inferior’) in the
narrative of John the Deacon. Dorigo believed that John’s ‘crypt’ must in fact have been the church of
S. Teodoro already mentioned in Particiaco’s will, which later became an annex of St. Mark’s crypt; so
that the wall of the crypt was part of S. Teodoro, before the latter was incorporated into St Mark’s
church. This interpretation could match the three levels described by John the Deacon, and also the
text of the Vita of Peter I Orseolo, if one accepts the existence of a westwork-type building like Corvey
or St Riquier at St Mark’s. The three levels were not quite in line: on one level the chapel in John the
Deacon corresponds to the western chapel, under which is an atrium of the kind called ‘crypt’ at
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334 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

A second major change, due to another Carolingian innovation, was the

introduction of the bell tower, or campanile. While originally used within the
monastic liturgy, the idea was the result of the Carolingian ecclesiastical reform
and new rules established at the beginning of the ninth century in order to call
people to mass.238 North of the Alps there was originally a wooden structure on
top of the roof, but from the tenth century onwards the sound of bells became so
important that new towers were built specially for them, rather than just convert­
ing other structures. In Rome, the first evidence for the existence of a campanile
is the building of a bell tower at St Peter’s by Pope Stephen II.239 The absence of
references to campanili in Agnellus’ Liber Pontificalis has generally been taken as
evidence that there were none in Ravenna before the ninth century, but Ravenna
seems to have the first reference to a separate campanile tower in the West, and
further towers were built in the ninth and tenth centuries.240 It is significant
that, in Ravenna, except for S. Pietro Maggiore, all other campanili were attached
either to the cathedral or a Benedictine monastic church, seemingly confirming
Carolingian influence regarding the use of bells. Great use was made of campanili
for most of the pievi that we know in Romagna—not just in the city but also
inland—with reused materials.241 True to its tradition of imitating the style of
Ravenna, Venice also began building campanili, though we only know of one
possibly dating from before 1100, at S. Nicolò dei Mendicoli. Later still, the

Corvey and St Riquier: this is the current retrocrypt, while the ‘capella inferior’ from John the Deacon’s
description corresponds to the current crypt.

238 R. Fabbri, I campanili ravennati. Storia e restauro (Ravenna, 2008); P. Novara, ‘Campanili raven­
nati. Appunti di storia e archeologia’, in Corti, Neri, and Pancaldi, eds., Pagani e Cristiani, pp. 202–3.
239 LP I. 94, ch. 47. S. De Blaauw, ‘Campanae supra urbem. Sull’uso delle campane nella Roma
medievale’, Rivista di Storia della Chiesa in Italia 47 (1993), pp. 367–413.
240 S. Pietro Maggiore (now S. Francesco) in the second half of the ninth century; then the first
circular towers at S. Apollinare Nuovo, S. Apollinare in Classe, S. Maria Maggiore, S. Giovanni
Battista, and the square tower of S. Giovanni Evangelista, all from the ninth–tenth centuries; see
Novara, ‘Campanili’, pp. 205–8; There is still a debate around the dates proposed for the first cam­
panili. Galassi, ‘L’architettura protoromanica’, pp. 141–5 places the campanili of S. Pietro Maggiore and
S. Giovanni Evangelista in the second half of the eighth century, and the first cylindrical towers on the
model of S. Apollinare Nuovo at the beginning of the ninth century, while Verzone, ‘Le chiese deuter­
obizantine’, pp. 348–50, favours an eleventh-century date for most Ravenna churches and Romagna
pievi campanili. Novara, ‘Campanili’, leaves the dating open by saying that current views are for either
the second half of the ninth to the beginning of the eleventh century, or the mid-eleventh to the
beginning of the twelfth century. In addition to the Carolingian influence, however, some have argued
for parallels with other Adriatic towers, especially that of the Cathedral of Caorle; see P. Novara,
‘Ravenna, Pomposa e l’architettura cultuale del bacino del medio e alto Adriatico nel Medioevo’, in
M. Tagliaferri, ed., Architetture del sacro nel bacino adriatico: Figure, forme e liturgie della cristianiz-
zazione e evangelizzazione dal IV al XIII secolo (Bologna: Centro Studi e Ricerche Antica Provincia
Ravennate 24, 2011), pp. 149–64 at 160–3. Precisely for that reason, I would favour her first choice of
dating, between the ninth and the eleventh centuries.
241 S. Maria in Centrumlicinium of Fabriago (diocese of Ravenna), SS Pietro e Paolo of Pieve
Quinta (diocese of Faenza), built at the same time as the church around 950, S. Pietro at Bagnacavallo,
S. Giovanni del Tò; see Novara, ‘Campanili’, pp. 212–18; Verzone, ‘Le chiese deuterobizantine’,
pp. 347–50.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 335

fashion was continued by the Ottonians, sometimes in a more spectacular manner,

as when they built the campanile at Pomposa, going from one to four rows of
arches at each level of the tower.
The story of the churches of Rome is one which goes from an apparent decline
in their condition (even if we accept this to have been sometimes exaggerated
by the Liber Pontificalis for the purpose of enhancing the merit of subsequent
papal restorations), partly due to the increasingly absent Byzantine administra­
tion in the city and more dilapidations, to one of papal restorations. Some of these
changes pertained to the old-established churches, like the tituli. Others, increas­
ingly so, were focused on new or revived structures direcly adapted to the new
needs of the city: the diaconiae for charitable purposes for the Romans, and
xenodochia or residences for pilgrims, as a response to the rise in pilgrimages to
St Peter’s and the need to accommodate ever larger numbers of visitors. The ori­
gin­al churches, still very present on account of their venerable antiquity, espe­
cially through their role in the stational liturgy of the city, were preserved. The
others were increasingly built or rebuilt in areas of new urban growth, especially
at the Vatican, and were almost without fail under papal control. It was the pope
who built, rebuilt, and translated relics and funded the city’s churches—rarely do
we find any private foundations other than the monasteries, even in the tenth
cen­tury, in Rome. Likewise, the archbishop of Ravenna too was in charge of the
city churches, with very few new foundations. Like Rome, and even more so,
Ravenna lived on the existing heritage of its late antique and Byzantine founda­
tions. Some novelties did come through in both cases: a few ‘private’ aristocratic
foundations of churches; and, above all, the implementation, under Carolingian
influence, of two key features favoured by the Frankish reformers. The first was
the annular crypt for pilgrimage traffic; the other was the multiplication of the
campanili, to allow for the call to Mass of the whole population.
On the whole, even taking into account some differences due to the im­port­ance
of the stational liturgy in Rome, or to the pilgrimage to St Peter’s, the evolution of
the churches of Rome and Ravenna—their permanence and links with the bishop,
and the people’s understanding of their role—were fundamentally very similar. So
were the manifestations of the cult of the saints and their relics in all three cities:
broadly speaking, they all tended to follow a similar model of specific places and
styles of worship, including the procession of pilgrims to and around the shrines,
common to those of St Peter, St Mark, and St Apollinarius. But one of these key
late antique heritages is almost completely absent in Venice. Here, we have one
outstanding church, that of the patron saint of the duchy and the city—a ducal
foundation, which the doge controls as a secular leader (to the extent of also
appointing its clergy). There are no other such churches in the city (when doges
founded one, they did so as private individuals, for their families). The most
un­usual feature of Venetian churches is their foundation, almost without excep­
tion by aristocratic families, as part of their colonization of a particular area of the
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336 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

urban space. This applies also to relics, most of which reached the city via private
individuals or families (very rarely from a bishop, for example, and even then
mostly because of his association with the family of the founder or benefactor,
like S. Giovanni in Bragora). These relics, on the other hand, and the saints and
dedications of these churches, relate very closely to saints either from the old
Exarchate and Pentapolis, especially Ravenna itself, or from the north Adriatic
arc from Veneto to Istria via Friuli—very rarely from the eastern Mediterranean.
The example of Venice is thus a highly hybrid one. It was under Byzantine rule,
and its inhabitants used almost exclusively late antique ‘Italian’ names, and imported
saints and relics from the old Italian Byzantine areas. For obvious r­easons,
Venice could not live on an inherited monumental past like Rome and Ravenna.
Therefore it built a new landscape of churches, saints, and relics. But it is not its
ruler, the doge, who did this, it was every aristocratic family. They left the con­
struction and development of the city’s saint, St Mark, and his cult to the secular
authority. While in Rome, the churches were ‘stationary’, as it were (staying where
they had been built originally), and it was the relics which had to move around to
match them (from the cemeteries, or brought to the Sancta Sanctorum), on the
pope’s decision; in Venice the doge, a layman, ran the state cult, and left the rest
of the churches to individuals, to the extent that these churches became in effect
a mix of pievi and private family churches (the family appointed the priest,
for example, not the bishop). This pattern could be said to correspond perhaps
more to a Lombard urban model. Both Rome and Ravenna had adopted
Frankish liturgical and architectural features, as had Venice; but the lesser
weight of the past may have contributed to making the Venetians’ relations to
their Church develop greater parallels with that of the Lombard, rather than of
the Byzantine, tradition.

Homes of the Elite in this World and the Next: the Monasteries
Pope Gregory I had converted his aristocratic domus on the Celio into a monas­
tery following the Rule of St Benedict, and had dedicated it to St Andrew242—a
dedication to which would later be added that to St Gregory himself. Even this,
the first Benedictine monastery in the city, did not always remain so, and Roman
monasteries rarely followed the Rule of St Benedict, or that alone.243 The debate

242 Gregory the Great, Dialogues, tr. O. Zimmermann, 1959, Washington, Book II; John the
Deacon’s Sancti Gregorii Magni Vita, 4. 85.
243 Roman monasteries are a vast topic, and key works listing and describing them are: P. Caraffa,
Monasticon Italiae I. Roma e Lazio (Cesena: Centro Storico Benedettino Italiano, 1983), and G. Ferrari,
Early Roman monasteries (Vatican City, 1957). On Roman monasticism see, R. Grégoire, ‘Monaci e
monasteri in Roma nei secoli VI–VII’, and L. Pani Ermini, ‘Testimonianze archeologiche di monasteri
a Roma nell’alto medioevo’, both in ASRSP 104 (1981), pp. 5–24 and 25–45; T. Di Carpegna Falconieri,
‘Considerazioni sul monachesimo romano tra i secoli IX e XII e sui rapporti con la Sede Apostolica’, in
Dinamiche Istituzionali delle Reti Monastiche e Canonicali nell’Italia dei secoli X–XII. Atti del XXVIII
Convegno del Centro Studi Avellaniti, Fonte Avellana, 29–31 agosto 2006, ed. N. D’Acunto (Verona,
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 337

about the knowledge and implementation of the Rule of St Benedict in Rome has
been ongoing for a long time, with views varying from a date as early as the
seventh to as late as the tenth century for its introduction there. There seems to be
little to suggest an early date. The cult of the saint was known, though not neces­
sarily made visible, at least until he begins to appear in frescoes in the mid-eighth
century under Pope Hadrian I, for example in the cemetery of S. Ermete restored
by him.244 This would be entirely consistent with the gradually rising influence of
the Frankish authorities in Rome, even though the move, either then or after the
reforms of Benedict of Aniane, never actually influenced Roman monasteries to
take on the Rule as their one and only guide. Most Roman monasteries were of a
mixed kind. They incorporated a variety of rules and customs, some dependent
on the founding pope, and we know relatively little about their day-to-day practice,
except that, even in those which were not Greek, it became increasingly custom­
ary to celebrate the nightly office. Latin monasteries, whether basilical or inde­
pendent of a church they had to serve, existed side by side with Greek ones. They
sometimes incorporated Greek elements, even more so after the seventh-century
influx of refugees from the East fleeing Islamic expansion and Monothelitism.245
The Greek exodus continued during the two iconoclastic ­periods, welcomed by the
popes and often used to gain personnel for Roman monasteries, including those
which they had founded. Such was the case of Pope Paul, who consolidated the
monastery founded by his brother Stephen II in their family home, originally
dedicated to St Dionysius, later to SS Stephen and Silvester, finally becoming
S. Silvestro in Capite, after the translation of the latter’s body there in 761.246 True
to the tradition of this very wealthy family, the monastery was richly endowed
and open to refugees from iconoclasm, to the extent of following the Greek
liturgy, and probably of having a Greek abbot. Pope Gregory II also, when restor­
ing the monastery serving S. Paolo fuori le Mura, with which the Greek saint
Anastasius was associated, placed Greek monks there, as he probably did when he
turned his own house into a monastery, dedicated to St Agatha.247 By 840, even SS
Andrea e Gregorio had had Greek monks since 715/31, and would only have

2007), pp. 357–80, and the very important paper by H. Dey, ‘Public service or private devotion? The
diverse faces of monasticism in late antique and early medieval Rome’, Acta ad archeologiam et Artium
Historiam Pertinentia 23 (2010), pp. 209–28.

244 LP I. 97 ch. 79; see Matthiae, Pittura romana; Pani Ermini, ‘Testimonianze archeologiche’, p. 41.
245 On Greek monasteries in Rome, see the main work by Sansterre, Les moines grecs, pp. 1–119,
especially on the foundations, pp. 32–9; and his articles, ‘Le monachisme byzantin a Rome’, in
Bisanzio, Roma e l’Italia nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 34 (1988), II, p. 701–46; also Grégoire, ‘Monaci e
monasteri’, pp. 10–15.
246 LP I. 95, ch. 5; see Federici, ‘S. Silvestro de Capite’, pp. 213–20; Ferrari, Roman monasteries,
pp. 302–14; Sansterre, Les moines grecs, p. 36; Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 97–102. See also CB IV,
pp. 148–62 esp. 161.
247 LP I. 91, ch. 10; Ferrari, Roman monasteries, pp. 19–22; Sansterre, Les moines grecs, pp. 36–7.
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338 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Latin monks again in the tenth century: its abbot in 945 was a Benedict.248
Another well-established Greek monastery until the tenth century was S. Saba on
the Aventine: under Hadrian I it had a hegumenos called Pardus, who acted as the
pope’s envoy to Charlemagne.249 It was precisely the fact that Greek and Latin
monasteries were institutionally all under papal control which made the co­habi­
ta­tion relatively harmonious and allowed for the highly successful experiment of
the double monastery of SS Alessio e Bonifazio, according to Hamilton.250
Also Greek was S. Erasmo on the Celio. When Leo III was attacked during the
Laetania Maior procession, he was taken to S. Silvestro, served by Greek monks,
which supported the aristocratic party which had favoured Hadrian I, and was
then imprisoned at S. Erasmo.251 Greek monasteries in the city were sometimes
used as prisons, in the conflicts opposing various factions among the aristocracy
and the popes, though there is no complete agreement as to whether this was a
permanent state of affairs or just an occasional event, as Sansterre proposes in
relation to the rebellion of 799.252 He suggests that the imprisonment of Leo III at
S. Silvestro was not on account of it being Greek, but of it being the centre of the
family power of Hadrian I and his military aristocratic family support, the same
as that of the founder Paul I. However, Sansterre also admits that there is some
truth in Geertman’s view about the ‘neutral’ use of Greek monasteries as prisons,
since they were so for both the family of Toto of Nepi and his brother Pope
Constantine II, and, some years later, for their enemies the primicerius Christopher
and his son Sergius. But the first two were imprisoned in monasteries, which were
nevertheless different from those where the other two were kept, suggesting that

248 Ferrari, Roman monasteries, pp. 138–51; Caraffa, Monasticon, pp. 56–7; see also SSAG, pp. ix–xiii;
CB I, pp. 41–2; M. Richiello, ‘La chiesa e il convento dei Santi Bonifacio ed Alessio’, pp. 23–35 and
M. Richiello, ‘La chiesa e il complesso conventuale dalle origini al XVII secolo’, pp. 36–55 at 36–43,
both in La storia e il restauro del complesso conventuale dei Santi Bonifacio ed Alessio nell’Aventino, ed.
O. Muratore and M. Richiello (Rome, 2004).
249 LP I. 97, ch. 21; Ferrari, Roman monasteries, pp. 281–90; Caraffa, Monasticon, pp. 75–6; CB, IV,
pp. 51–71.
250 The consensus of opinion for some time, especially after Bernard Hamilton’s work on S. Alessio
in his ‘Monastic Revival’, pp. 25–67, and ‘The Monastery of S. Alessio’, pp. 265–310, has been that this
was a new and very successful experiment in Rome of a double monastery housing both Greek and
Latin monks. The view has recently been challenged by Sansterre, ‘Le monachisme byzantin a Rome’,
pp. 702 and 711–13, who believes that this interpretation relies on a misreading of a passage from the
Vita Adalberti by Bruno of Querfurt, and suggests that Greek monks were only visitors to the monas­
tery, which was in fact fully Latin; Richiello, ‘La chiesa e il convento’, pp. 23–35, disagrees. For
Sansterre’s view, see also ‘Le monastère de Saint-Boniface-et-Alexis sur l’Aventin et l’expansion du
christianisme dans le cadre de la ‘Renovatio imperii Romanorum’ d’Otton III. Une révision’, Révue
bénédictine 100/4 (1990), pp. 492–506.
251 LP I. 98, chs. 13–14; Ferrari, Roman monasteries, pp. 118–31 at 120; Caraffa, Monasticon, p. 52;
Camobreco, ‘Il monastero’, pp. 265–300 at 271–80.
252 Ferrari, Roman monasteries, p. 146, suggests a frequent use, giving the example of Pope
Constantine II being imprisoned at S. Saba, his brother at S. Silvestro, the primicerius Christopher at
S. Agata in Suburra, and his son Sergius at S. Andrea Recanati in 768. Geertman, More Veterum,
claims that this use of Greek monasteries for political reasons was because they were outside the
political scene and thus perceived to be ‘neutral’, pp. 116, 219. On Sansterre’s argument, see Sansterre,
Les moines grecs, pp. 72–100.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 339

there was no specific Greek monastic policy in Rome but only individual loyalties.
Ferrari and Patlagean argued that Greek monks, as anti-iconoclasts who had
taken refuge in Rome and been under the protection of the popes, were strong
political supporters of papal supremacy, sometimes even pushing the popes to
greater intransigence towards Byzantine authorities. They also suggest that Greek
and Latin monasteries often seemed to have opposing political allegiances,
with the former always supporting stronger papal authority; Sansterre’s position
is more nuanced.253
In Pope Hadrian’s day, the Liber Pontificalis mentioned seven Greek monaster­
ies, sixteen Latin monasteries serving basilicas, twenty-two Latin monasteries of
men and women, three Latin nunneries serving basilicas, and one Greek nun­
nery. Hadrian spent much time establishing or restoring monasteries, sometimes
amalgamating them, and he maintained papal concern for the monasteries
serving the great basilicas and the tituli. This tradition had originated with Pope
Gregory III, who had set up the celebration of offices in major basilicas and
restored the night-time offices, which had become slack. Originally the twenty-four-
hour office had been a Greek feature, but it became widespread in Rome, even
though the celebration was usually in Latin.254 The model was St Peter’s, which
had both priests and monks from the four monasteries serving it: S. Martino,
S. Stefano Minore, SS Giovanni e Paolo, and S. Stefano Maggiore.255 The other
major basilicas had several monasteries serving them too. S. Maria Maggiore had
S. Bibiana ad ursum pileatum, a nunnery whose first known abbess was Eufrosina
(981–1020), and which had some not negligible wealth around the basilica itself,
at Porta Maggiore and on Lake Bracciano; S. Andrea de Piscina or Piscinula,
originally known as Catabarbara; and S. Andrea delle Fratte.256 S. Paolo was
served by S. Anastasio alle Tre Fontane and SS Giovanni e Paolo, and S. Giovanni
in Laterano by SS Pancrazio, Giovanni Battista e Giovanni Evangelista, SS Andrea
e Bartolomeo, S. Stefano iuxta Laterano, and SS Sergio e Bacco.257 Pope Paschal
I continued to welcome Greek refugee monks, as well as founding and endowing
with gifts of relics a new, Greek-served monastery as S. Prassede, which continued

253 Ferrari, Roman monasteries, p. 146; E. Patlagean, ‘Variations imperiales sur le theme romain’,
Roma fra Oriente e Occidente, Settimane 49 (2002), pp. 1–47; Sansterre, Les moines grecs, pp. 113–46;
on this see Chapter 5.
254 LP I. 92, chs. 9–10.
255 On the monasteries serving St Peter, see, for example, Grégoire, ‘Monaci e monasteri’, p. 9;
Schiaparelli, ‘Le carte antiche’; Caraffa, Monasticon, pp. 69–70, 80–1, and 55; De Blaauw, Cultus et
decor, pp. 517–20.
256 G. Ferri, ‘Le carte dell’archivio Liberiano dal secolo X al XV’, ASRSP 27 (1904), pp. 153–66; De
Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 342–6; V. Saxer, Sainte Marie Majeure. Une basilique de Rome dans
l’histoire de la ville e de son ėglise (V–XIII secolo) (Rome, 2001), pp. 70–7.
257 A. Milella, ‘Brevi riflessioni sui monasteri annessi alle basiliche titolari romane’, in Monasteri in
Europa occidentale (secoli VIII–XI): topografia e strutture, ed. F. De Rubeis and F. Marazzi (Rome,
2008), pp. 135–45; CB V, pp. 93–164 and 1–92. For the Lateran monasteries, see Cecchelli Trinci,
‘Laterano’, pp. 38–59 at 47–8, and De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 168–9.
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340 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

until the Greek monks were replaced by Latin ones in the tenth century.258 He
also intervened at S. Agnese, a monastery of Greek nuns, which he visited and
found in ruins, and charged a Greek priest to restore it, but gave it to Benedictine
nuns thereafter.259
Until the tenth century, papal involvement with monasteries in the city, whether
restoring or reforming them, or founding new ones in their own homes—as had
Gregory II, Gregory III, and Paul—was the classic model of as­so­ci­ation between
the Roman Church and monastic life in the city. Another two points of intersec­
tion between the two were the liturgical and charitable roles of the monasteries,
whether as clergy serving the basilicas, or as originators and then continuators
until the ninth century of the system of the diaconiae. These two connections
were indeed paramount within the life of the Roman Church in the early medi­
eval period, though it may be necessary to tone down the impression given by di
Carpegna Falconieri of the ‘presenza massiccia’ of monastic involvement in the
life of the Roman Church and the papacy.260 His argument relies heavily on the
fact that, as liturgical celebration in the main basilicas was carried out by monks,
as was the system of poor relief, this is naturally what pilgrims in particular would
have been immediately confronted with. At the same time, he gives an impressive
catalogue of monks used for the purposes of diplomatic missions by the popes.
But, if the great basilicas were, until the tenth century, served by monks in li­tur­
gic­al terms, they were not necessarily the centre of religious life within the city for
many of its inhabitants, as opposed to the pilgrims. However numerous the
examples of monks among the higher echelons of the diplomatic exchanges, this
does not negate the fact that it was the Lateran hierarchy which constituted the
papal environment. Some of the men who were given the charge of a monastery,
such as Anastasius when he was made abbot of S. Maria in Trastevere, received
them not because they were monks but as high-profile figures.
The last of the mode of association of the monasteries with the Roman Church
was the interconnectedness of Roman monasteries with the great abbeys of Lazio,
notably Farfa and Subiaco, which had dependent houses in the city.261 Farfa had a

258 Fedele, ‘Tabularium S. Praxedis’, pp. 27–8; Caraffa, Monasticon, p. 73; Sansterre, Les moines
grecs, p. 38.
259 Lori Sanfilippo, ‘Le più antiche carte’, pp. 67–71; Ferrari, Roman monasteries, pp. 28–32; Caraffa,
Monasticon, p. 39.
260 Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Considerazioni sul monachesimo romano’, p. 375. In fact, the numbers
invoked by di Carpegna are themselves telling: over the period 768–1003 in his Appendix 1, he men­
tions a grand total of sixteen names of ‘monks’, of whom five are popes who had been associated with
a monastery—but two of these (Paschal I and Leo IV) were monks of two of the monasteries serving
St Peter’s, and thus not necessarily chosen for their monastic background. Quite a few of the other
men listed were in fact Lateran functionaries checking up on monastic life (Zacharias scriniarius
abbot and Benedict scriniarius ‘visitator’ of S. Erasmo, Anastasius Bibliothecarius priest of S. Marcello
then granted the abbacy of S. Maria in Trastevere); pp. 376–7.
261 Lori Sanfilippo, ‘I possessi romani’, pp. 13–89; M. Costambeys, Power and patronage in Early
Medieval Italy. Local Society, italian Politics and the Abbey of Farfa c. 700–900 (Cambridge, 2007), esp.
chs. 5 and 8; and Wickham, Medieval Rome; pp. 130–4.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 341

cella (SS Maria e Benedetto), situated in the middle of the Terme Alessandrine
in the Campus Martius, with land, gardens, arches, columns, and the oratory of
S. Salvatore, which the abbey claimed to have possessed since the time of Lothar.262
It fought over these properties with the church of S. Eustachio in a long dispute at
the end of the tenth century, and gained a privilege from Otto III in 998.263 Some
Crescentii also had possessions in the area: land and a domus solarata with its
marble staircase, well, private entry from the road, and marble columns, belong­
ing to the heir of one Lambert, who was under the tutela of a Crescentius, was
sold, perhaps by that same Crescentius, to Farfa after 1013.264 Subiaco’s main
Roman outpost after 938 was S. Erasmo on the Celio.
By the same token, most Roman monasteries had vast properties in Lazio,
especially SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro, SS Alessio e Bonifazio, and SS
Cosma e Damiano, most of which were in the hands of Roman aristocratic
fam­ilies, to which they had been leased on emphyteutic leases. They sometimes
included castles and settlements close to roads leading to the city, with a large
number of small owners and leaseholders, rather different from the pattern of
large blocks of land for monasteries like Farfa in the Sabina.265 Donors from both
the city and the Campagna gave a variety of properties to these Roman monasteries.
Stephen de Imiza left lands in Sutri, Nepi, Aricia, Tivoli, and in the city of Rome,
including a mill on the Tiber, to SS Andrea and Gregorio in Clivo Scauro, and
Alberic granted property to the same monastery in 945.266 Benedict Campaninus
made massive land grants to his foundation of SS Cosma e Damiano in Mica
Aurea in Trastevere.267 Otto III gave the church on the Isola Tiberina to the mon­
astery of SS Alessio e Bonifazio in 996, and the same monastery received grants
from the Roman aristocracy in the territory of Albano.268 Characteristic examples
of such transactions are that of the castellum at Sorbo, owned by Peter vestararius
and his brother Stephen originally, but by 996 in the possession of SS Alessio e
Bonifazio, and the mill of the castellum of the Isola Farnese, leased by SS Cosma e
Damiano to a priest John in 989.269
Such aristocratic gifts to monasteries, both in the city and outside it, like
Subiaco and Farfa, were part of the new development of monasticism in Rome in

262 RF, no. 428; Fiore Cavaliere, ‘Le terme alessandrine’, pp. 127–41.
263 Fiore Cavaliere, ‘Le terme alessandrine’, p. 121. 264 RF no. 667.
265 Wickham, ‘Historical and Topographical Notes’, PBSR 46 (1978), pp. 132–83, and 48 (1979),
pp. 66–95, study many of these properties in detail. Wickham also argues that the incastellamento we
find there was carried out by the choice of the people, and probably not for defence purposes but
rather based on places which had often been Byzantine military and administrative centres—rather
unlike the Sabina of Toubert. Wickham saw it as a reflection of the importance of the Roman aristocracy
and Church in crystallizing local political and judicial rights.
266 SSAG, nos 4, 68.
267 J. B. Lloyd and K. Bull-Simonsen Einaudi, SS. Cosma e Damiano in Mica Aurea. Architettura,
storia e storiografia di un monastero romano soppresso. Testo latino e italiano (Rome, 1998), pp. 26–49.
268 SSAB, no. 5, is the imperial privilege of Otto III of 31 May 996 (pp. 371–4).
269 Wickham, ‘Early Medieval South Etruria’, pp. 163–5.
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342 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the tenth century. By then we no longer see only the pope colonize the monu­mental
space of the city: everybody appropriates the old public space. In the eighth and
ninth centuries, the papacy, through papal foundations and res­tor­ations of both
churches and monasteries, including xenodochiae and diaconiae, had implanted a
network of assistance, and helped expand papal power and control over the city,
largely in relation to pilgrims from northern Europe. In the tenth century, it was
the aristocracy, and especially Alberic and his entourage, who were responsible
for the foundation and reform of monasteries, which were part of their own
strategy of territorial control of the city. Such tenth-century foundations were
aristocratic, not papal, whether chapels in palaces, or new monasteries, founded
or promoted by Alberic and his family or friends: SS Ciriaco e Nicola in Via Lata
by the women of Theophylact and Alberic’s family, S. Maria de Aventino by
Alberic himself, or SS Cosma e Damiano in Mica Aurea by Benedict Campaninus.
Whether through their grants and gifts, or through their control over abbots as a
result of a reform programme, it was the aristocracy which was involved with
monasticism, while the papacy was not.270 (See Figure 4.2.)
The monastic reform in Rome had at first been loosely associated with the
revival of Greek Basilian monasticism in Italy, led by men like Nilus of Rossano
and Sabas of Collesano, around communities like Grottaferrata outside the city or
S. Cesario on the Palatine.271 The real reform began when the princeps Alberic
invited Odo of Cluny to Rome, and made him ‘archimandrite’ over all monasteries
in the city, asking him to reform them by turning them into Benedictine ones.272
The reform began in Alberic’s own family home on the Aventine, which he turned
into the monastery of S. Maria de Aventino. Later, Alberic gained from Pope Leo VII
a privilege confirming the grant of a castle in Campania to Subiaco,273 while
Odo reformed SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro in 935. Several of Alberic’s
courtiers imitated him, most famously Benedict Campaninus, the founder of SS
Cosma e Damiano in Mica Aurea sometime between 936 and 949, who invited
the first abbot, Venerandus, to come to Rome from Farfa to rule over the new

270 Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Pellegrini, senatori e papi’, pp. 203–26, and ‘L’insediamento aristocratico’,
pp. 29–46; also G. Barone, ‘La chiesa di Roma: tradizioni, realtà, orizzonti (secoli VIII–XI)’, in Chiese
locali e chiese regionali nell’Alto Medioevo, Settimane 61 (2014), pp. 189–225 esp. 200–5.
271 A. Pertusi, ‘Rapporti tra il monachesimo italo-greco ed il monachesimo bizantino nell’alto
medioevo’, in La Chiesa greca in Italia dall’VIII al XVI secolo. Atti del Convegno storico interecclesiale
(Bari, 30 apr-4 maggio 1969), 3 vols (Padua: Italia Sacra. Studi e Problemi di Storia Ecclesiastica 20–2,
1972–3), pp. 473–520 at 473–482, 502–3; B. Hamilton and P. M. McNulty, ‘Orientale lumen et magistra
latinitas: Greek influences on Western monasticism (900–1100)’, in Hamilton, Monastic Reform,
pp. 181–216, esp. 181–96.
272 Rota, ‘La riforma monastica’, pp. 11–21; Hamilton, ‘Monastic Revival in Tenth-Century Rome’,
pp. 42–60; Rosé, ‘La présence “clunisienne” à Rome’, pp. 231–71. G. Barone, Gorze e Cluny a Roma, in
Retour aux sources: textes, études et documents d’histoire médiévale offerts à Michel Parisse, ed.
S. Gouguenheim, Paris 2004, pp. 583–90. For the first reformed monastery see D. Gallavotti Cavallero
and R. U. Montini, S. Maria in Aventino (S. Maria del Priorato) (Rome, 1984).
273 RS no. 16.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 343

Figure 4.2 Tenth-century aristocratic monastic foundations in Rome (copyright

R. Santangeli Valenzani)

monastery.274 Petrus Medicus, who died between 973 and 999, having founded
the monastery of S. Maria in Pallara on the Palatine, was another.275 (Plate 6)
Alberic’s and Odo’s reform was also implemented in Rome at S. Paolo, S. Lorenzo,
and S. Agnese, and at Subiaco, Farfa, and S. Elia of Nepi, a monastery later con­
trolled by SS Ciriaco e Nicola in Rome. This, as we saw, had also been a founda­
tion under Alberic’s inspiration, by three women of his family, who brought the
relics of St Ciriacus from the cemetery outside Rome and gave them to the mon­
astery on the Via Lata renamed S. Ciriaco.276
A well-established traditional perception is that Alberic’s reform was due to his
understanding of his role as that of an emperor, since there was not one at the
time, that is to protect the Church by settling its problems and reforming it, as the
Carolingians had purported to do. In other words, the vacancy of the Empire in
Italy from 923 to the death of Berengar in 962, corresponding, as it did, largely

274 SSCD, pp. 18–24.

275 Fedele, ‘Una chiesa del Palatino’, pp. 343–80, esp. 369–70; J. Enckell Julliard, ‘Il Palatino e i
Benedettini: un unicum iconografico a S. Maria in Pallara’, Rivista dell’Istituto Nazionale d’Archeologia
e Storia dell’Arte, ser. 25, 57 (2003), pp. 209–30. I shall return in Chapter 6 to the importance of the
Pallara toponym, which kept the memory of the Palladium in the Temple of Vesta.
276 SMVL, I; Cavazzi, La diaconia di S. Maria in Via Lata; see also Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Aristocratic
evergetism’, pp. 273–87.
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344 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

with the period of of Alberic’s rule, led Alberic to act as emperor and thus to set
up monastic reform. But Santangeli Valenzani has demonstrated quite con­vin­
cing­ly the link between aristocratic foundations and influence through territorial
control over specific parts of the city, especially when the monastery in question
was part of an aristocratic curtis and landholding. Control over it meant ter­ri­tor­
ial control over the area where the family had wealth and influence, as well as the
possibility of influence through the choice of the abbot or abbess.277 Such a family
strategy of control was spiritual as well as territorial, as exemplified by the story of
the translation of the relics of St Ciriacus by the three ladies in the foundation
narrative of the monastery. Wickham dismissed the story as a twelfth-century
construct, on the grounds that some of the land mentioned did not in fact appear
in the abbey’s documents before the late eleventh century.278 I am not entirely
convinced by this, since it is far from unknown for hagiographers to add later
names in an earlier version of a text; since we no longer have the original manu­
script, we cannot be certain of its form or whether there were additions or changes
made to it. Certainly the text uses a chronologically plausible hagiographical
topos, with the relics, allegedly of their own volition as they were carried by a cart
with oxen, stopping several times and refusing to advance until the third time
when they finally moved and stopped on the Via Lata, in the location to which
they were supposed to go in the first place. Every time, the cart’s moving had been
prompted by the cousins granting more property to the monastery; but this is not
the point. The clue is in the fact that, to get to where they were going to anyway,
they did not do so in a straight line and by the shortest route, but went over large
parts of the family property, in effect sanctifying both it and the owner, with the
saint’s divine approval for the family as well as popular support for the ruler
through elite consensus. Aristocratic families showed a tendency to take over
property through the accumulation of neighbouring areas, to create a compact
nucleus in which to settle their dependants, and on which they would hold
their hegemony.279 We saw this in the pattern of settlement foregrounded by the
archaeological finds in the Fora, for example the domus solarata from the Basilica
Emilia, the Forum of Nerva, or the curtes from Largo Argentina. Individual
domus were extended, and these were perhaps served by the people with domus
terrinee in the Forum of Caesar, in the form of ‘lotissements’ for dependants, if
one follows Santangeli Valenzani’s reconstruction. This would be mostly for
agricultural use and economic investment, but also for social and political control
over people. Such an accumulation of neighbouring property would thus be

277 Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Aristocratic evergetism’, pp. 273–87.

278 The story of the foundation is edited in Martinelli, Primo trofeo, pp. 57–71. See also Hamilton,
‘The monastic revival’, pp. 52–4, and C. Wickham, ‘La struttura della proprietà fondiaria nell’agro
romano, 900–1150’, ASRSP 132 (2009), pp. 203–5 and 210–15.
279 Santangeli Valenzani, ‘L’insediamento aristocratico’, pp. 229–93.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 345

consolidated through monastic property belonging to a family group, such as

Alberic and his dependants on the Via Lata.
The aristocratic foundations of the house of Theophylact and Alberic, and their
followers, were aimed at family and territorial control over the topography of the
city, and above all as a spiritual centre with a specific family saint, clearly demon­
strating the importance of relics as part of aristocratic family identity and power.
This could also have been an attempt to get back control of a spiritual kind in a
different way, through a focus on the Roman past and its saints, while most
ninth-century popes had looked north, that is towards controlling pilgrimages,
and hence the charitable network. No monastery in the city was founded by a
pope in the tenth century, the only one with a papal privilege being the refounded
S. Bonifazio, originally founded in the sixth or seventh century but revived at the
end of the tenth century, when the Metropolitan of Damascus Sergius came to
Rome. He became abbot of the monastery of S. Bonifazio, having brought with
him a Greek life of St Alexius, which linked the saint with the Aventine. The story
it told was that Alexius’ father, Epiphanius, had lived there and was about to cele­
brate the wedding of his son and a young noblewoman, when Alexius decided to
live in chastity instead and, abandoning his family and bride, fled to Syria. Thirty
years later, he returned but, when his father did not recognize him in the beggar
he had become, he took up residence anonymously, still as a beggar, under the
staircase of the family home. He went on living there unrecognized for many
years, and only when he died did his father become aware of who he was. The
staircase in question was brought to the church and became its main relic.280 The
life came with a fake act of donation by Epiphanius, written in fact at the time of
Sergius, or of his successors, abbots Leo I or John de Canaparo. The donation was
confirmed by a diploma by Otto III in 996, while the monastery under abbot
Sergius acquired great prestige through the spread of the cult of Alexius in Rome
between 984 and 987. Resident in the monastery as monks were Archbishop
Adalbert, before he went to Prague and was martyred there, John de Canaparo,
who wrote a new Vita of Alexis around 1000/04, and Bruno, the ‘apostle’ of the
Russians.281 SS Alessio e Bonifazio became known as one of the great centres of
learning, both Greek and Latin, in the city. It was a key player in the religious and
political landscape of Rome, especially during the time of abbot Leo, and a bridge
between the aristocracy of Rome and the Ottonians from 980 onwards. Part of
this role was due to the huge success of the cult of St Alexius himself. As Chris

280 SSAB, pp. 351–62, and see documents nos I and II (fake donation of Epiphanius); no. III is the
document of 23 Oct 987 (pp. 368–9), and no. V the imperial privilege of Otto III of 31 May 996.
281 J.-M. Sansterre, ‘Les missionaires latins, grecs et orientaux en Bulgarie dans la seconde moitié
du IXe siècle’, Byzantion 52 (1982), pp. 375–88; V. Peri, ‘La Chiesa di Roma e le missioni “Ad gentes”
(sec. 8.-9.)’, in Il primato del vescovo di Roma nel primo millennio, ed. M. Maccarrone (Città del
Vaticano, 1991), pp. 568–642; now also I. Wood, The Missionary Life: Saints and the Evangelisation of
Europe 400–1050 (London, 2001), pp. 173–9, and V. Peri, ‘L’ ingresso degli Slavi nella cristianità
altomedievale europea’, in Roma fra Oriente e Occidente, Settimane 49, Spoleto, pp. 402–53.
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346 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Wickham has pointed out, it was ‘the only Roman church in our period to use
relic-miracles to buttress the development of its cult, doubtless because the cult
was so new’, and as a result commanded a considerable ‘range of support . . . from
Rome’s leadership’.282 A visual confirmation of this success comes from the pres­
ence, already at the end of the tenth century, of a representation of St Alexius in a
fresco at S. Clemente.283 The Gotha of the Roman aristocracy was connected with
the monastery. Crescentius I became a monk and was buried there in 984; the de
Meliosus, and Stefania senatrix and her husband, Count Benedict, gave land to the
monastery in 987; Leo, son of John de Primicerio, sold some land in Albano,
which was presumably then donated to the monastery, since the document of the
sale is preserved in the archives of S. Alessio.284 The most significant aspect of the
political success of S. Alessio was the fact that it was cherished not just by various
members of the highest Roman aristocracy but also by the Ottonians: Otto II was
there in 981, Otto III confirmed its properties in 996,285 and it was mentioned in
the monastic miracle collection as giving a decorated cloak for the high altar.
Several sculpted stones with the imperial eagle of the Ottonians are found in the
complex.286 ‘For a moment [S. Alessio] represented a religious aggregation which
was not restricted to any faction in the city’s leadership. On the contrary: it
showed the common identity of that leadership, as a group which had the same
essential reactions, expressed (doubtless) competitively in its patronage, to an
exciting new cult.’287
The monastic landscapes of Ravenna and Venice are not dissimilar to that of
Rome, and to each other. Ravenna had its traditional monasteries, associated with
the great basilicas founded from the sixth century onwards, for example at
S. Vitale, S. Martino in Ciel d’Oro (later S. Apollinare Nuovo), S. Apollinare in
Classe, and S. Severo.288 As in Rome, in tenth-century Ravenna we also find a

282 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 203. The basic analysis of the monastery in this period is
Hamilton, ‘The monastery of S. Alessio’, p. 271, for Otto II; and K. Bosl, ‘Das Kloster San Alessio auf
dem Aventin zu Rom. Griechisch-lateinisch-slavische Kontakte in römischen Klöstern vom 6./7. bis zum
Ende des 10. Jhts.’, in Beiträge zur Südosteuropa-Forschung anlässlich des II. Int. Balkanolegenkongresses
in Athen, ed. H.-G. Beck and A. Schnaus (Munich, 1970), pp. 15–28. L. Duchesne, ‘Notes sur la topog­
raphie de Rome au Moyen Age—VII. Les légendes chrétiennes de l’Aventin’, MEFREM 13 (1973),
pp. 115–140, is still the most sensible analysis of the appearance of the St Alexius cult in Rome, and its
probable connection to the exiled bishop Sergius of Damascus (d.981); in LP, II, p. 256, he publishes
the epitaph of Crescentius I (d.984).
283 Richiello, ‘La chiesa e il complesso conventuale’, p. 38 and Fig. 27.
284 SSAB, nos 2, 3, the ‘Meliosi’ and Theophylact gifts, are the first references to SS Bonifazio e
Alessio as the monastery’s saints; no. 4 is the sale by the de Primicerio family.
285 SSAB, no. 5 is Otto III’s confirmation; no. 1 is the 1002 ratification.
286 Richiello, ‘La chiesa e il complesso conventuale, pp. 41–3 and Fig. 37.
287 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 204.
288 On Ravenna monasteries in general see E. Morini, ‘Le strutture monastiche a Ravenna’, in SR
II.2, pp. 305–21; Novara, Ad Religionis Claustrum Construendum; Novara, ‘I monasteri ravennati’,
pp. 51–9. The most recent works are M. Bondi, Proprietà e spazi monastici tra VIII e XIII secolo: Il caso
di Ravenna e Classe (Bologna, 2017), and E. Cirelli, ‘Monasteri greci a Ravenna nell’alto Medioevo
(VI–X sec.): storia e archeologia’, in Monasteri italo-greci secoli VII–XI: Una lettura archeologica, ed.
F. Marazzi and C. Raimondo (Isernia, 2019), pp. 15–25.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 347

number of refoundations, amalgamations, and foundations ex novo of monasteries,

under the aegis of the main aristocratic families, though in Ravenna these controlled
the archiepiscopal see as well. Thus, for example, S. Maria in Cereseo and S. Martino
would eventually merge together into the existing monastery of S. Andrea,
which became a nunnery at the beginning of the eleventh century, while S. Maria
in Palazzuolo became associated with S. Maria Rotunda or ad Farrum (whose
church was Theodoric’s Mausoleum) and gradually wasted away in favour of the
latter.289 One of the most celebrated among such new foundations and currently
one of the best known, through a long and extensive archaeological excavation by
Augenti and his team over ten years, is S. Severo in Classe.290 Augenti suggests
that, although the first appearance of the monastery in the written sources is in
955, it was probably founded sometime early in the tenth cen­tury, perhaps as part
of an attempt by the archbishops to recolonize areas which had been part of the
Ravenna conurbation in late antiquity but had gradually declined demo­graph­
ic­al­ly and economically following the end of Classe as a major trading port after
the eighth century. Such an attempt to establish new foundations around old
ba­­silicas, for both economic and prestige reasons, were similar to some of the
pol­icies of Roman aristocrats, with their foundations on reclaimed areas, and
are found around Ravenna with S. Maria in Palazzuolo, S. Adalberto in Pereo
(both failed attempts because the areas were clearly too difficult to cultivate),
and Pomposa.
There had been several Greek monasteries in the city, notably that at
Blachernas, S. Lorenzo in Cesarea, and S. Teodoro a Calchis, but, generally speak­
ing, most were following the Benedictine Rule, at least from the ninth century
onwards.291 A good example may have been that of S. Maria in Cosmedin, an
eminently Greek name, which grew around the reclaimed Arian baptistery in the

289 M. Bondi, Paesaggi monastici nel Ravennate tra fonti scritte e dati archeologici (Bologna, 2012),
pp. 17–20, 49–50, and 65–7; G. Pasquali, ‘Economia e paesaggio rurale dei “deserta” alle porte di
Ravenna: l’isola litoranea di Palazzolo dal VI al XIV secolo’, Atti e Memorie della Deputazione di Storia
Patria per le Province di Romagna 34 (1983), pp. 131–149.
290 On the archeological reports see A. Augenti, ‘Nuove indagini archeologiche a Classe’, in
Ravenna da capitale imperiale, pp. 237–252; A. Augenti, ‘Dalla villa romana al monastero medievale’,
pp. 245–60, with a good overall photo, p. 240 Fig. 6; A. Augenti, ‘San Severo: Archeologia di un comp­
lesso monumentale’, in La Basilica Ritrovata. I restauri dei mosaici antichi di San Severo in Classe,
Ravenna, ed. P. Racagni (Bologna, 2010), pp. 21–37; and A. Augenti, I. Begnozzi, M. Bondi, E. Cirelli,
D. Ferreri, C. Malagutti, and P. Scozzari, ‘Il monastero di S. Severo a Classe. Risultati delle campagne
di scavo 2006–2011’ in IV Congresso Nazionale di Archeologia Medievale, L’Aquila 12–15 sett 2012, ed.
F. Redi and A. Forgione (Florence, 2012), for the most recent. The most accessible summaries are in
Augenti, La basilica, il monastero di San Severo in Classe, and A. Augenti and E. Cirelli, ‘San Severo
and religious life in Ravenna during the ninth and tenth centuries’, in Herrin and Nelson, Ravenna,
pp. 297–321, with a clear plan (Fig. 13.3) and an overall early history (pp. 297–301).
291 J. Sansterre, ‘Monaci e monasteri greci a Ravenna’, in SR II.2, pp. 323–9; in his ‘Note marginale’,
pp. 158–9, he suggested that Greek monasticism was used by the Exarchate as a power tool, which
explains why after the end of Exarchate many monasteries became Benedictine. For a more recent
study, see E. Cirelli, ‘Monasteri greci a Ravenna nell’alto Medioevo (VI–X sec.): storia e archeologia’, in
F. Marazzi and C. Raimondo, eds., Monasteri italo-greci (secoli vii–xi). Una lettura archeologica
(Isernia, 2018), pp. 15–25.
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348 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

eighth century. The latter itself became the monastic church and was attested in
767 as one of the Greek monasteries. But at the end of the eighth century, after the
fall of the Exarchate, most monasteries became Benedictine, like S. Apollinare in
Classe and S. Vittorio, not surprisingly given the favour shown to Benedictine
monasticism by the Carolingians and then the Ottonians. S. Maria in Cosmedin
enjoyed grants and privileges from emperors and popes, and had a vast patri­
mony. It may have been rebuilt in the ninth or tenth century, as shown by the
feature known as the Wall of Drogdo, uniting the monastery and the church of
S. Teodoro, whose apse was restored at that time with frescoes of the martyrdom
of the saint.292
The monasteries of Ravenna had considerable landed wealth and, like those in
Rome, they too were deeply interconnected with the great aristocratic families.
Heads of major religious houses in Ravenna were often members of aristocratic
families. The abbesses Sergia and her successor at S. Maria in Cereseo, Benedicta,
who welcomed the Empress Theophano and the child Otto III in 967 at the abbey,
were Sergii; Romuald, abbot of S. Apollinare in Classe first, then founder and first
abbott of S. Adalberto in Pereo, was a Romualdi/Traversari duke.293 A deacon
whose name we do not know, but who was the son of Duke Paul Traversari, was
abbot of S. Maria.294 The largest number of leases of emphyteusis of the Church
were with members of many of these same families, and frequently with monastic
houses led by abbots and abbesses also from these families. In 942 Maria ‘dudum
ducarissa’, widow of Duke Deusdedit, now a nun, gave to Sergia, the abbess of
S. Maria in Cereseo, her consanguinea, land in the Faentino, and the pieve of
S. Stefano in Panigale, while in 997 Adalbert de Romualdo consul and his wife
requested an emphyteutic lease from Bonizo, priest and abbot of S. Maria in
Palazzuolo.295 (See Map 8.)
The urban aristocracy was also responsible for the building of churches and
monasteries, many of which were their private chapels or family monasteries and
often situated within the limits of the old, by then ruined, imperial palace taken
over by these aristocratic domus.296 Good examples are the church of S. Maria
in domo ferrata, inside the domus of the Countess Ingelrada, and the two nun­
neries of S. Maria in Cereseo and S. Andrea.297 S. Apollinare in Classe, S. Maria in

292 P. Novara, ‘Rileggere un restauro. Nuove indagini sul paramento del cosidetto Muro di
Drogdone in Ravenna’, Archeologia Medievale 17 (1990), pp. 661–87, at 680.
293 For Sergia and Romuald, see Chapter 2, including genealogies. For Romuald’s family,
see Benericetti, ‘Componenti cronologiche, pp. 483–99, esp. 483–7, and Benericetti, ‘San Romualdo’,
pp. 71–89.
294 Benericetti X/3, no. 265. 295 Benericetti X/4, nos 281 and 345.
296 Baldini, Antichi chiostri ravennati, pp. 11–32; Augenti, ‘Ravenna e Classe’, pp. 190–6; Cirelli,
Ravenna, pp. 153–63. On the link between aristocratic residences and power in the tenth century, see
Brunterc’h, ‘Habitat et pouvoir’, pp. 70–80. See also Ortalli, ‘L’edilizia abitativa’, pp. 182–4.
297 Cirelli, Ravenna, pp. 160–1; Mauskopf Deliyannis, Ravenna in Late Antiquity, pp. 288–91; and
the various works by P. Novara, including ‘Una “domus” ravennate’, pp. 103–15.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 349

Map 8 Estates of the main Ravenna monasteries in the ex-Exarchate and the
Pentapolis (copyright M. Bondi)

Cereseo, and S. Maria in Palazzuolo were consistently among the owners and
grantors in the city, as were S. Maria foris Porta and S. Maria in Cosmedin in
the ninth century, and S. Apollinare Nuovo, S. Maria in Faro, and S. Severo in
the tenth.298

298 On the patrimony of the monasteries see Bondi, Paesaggi monastici, pp. 22–48 (S. Maria
in Cereseo), pp. 51–64 (S. Martino post ecclesiam maiorem), pp. 71–120 (Sant’Andrea Maggiore),
pp. 133–92 (S. Severo), and pp. 209–39 (S. Apollinare in Classe).
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350 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

The most significant new foundations in Ravenna and its hinterland were also
linked to both aristocratic and imperial efforts. The abbey of Pomposa, whose
foundation date is unknown, was already mentioned in a letter from Pope John
VIII to the Emperor Louis II, claiming that the monastery was a supporter of
Rome against Ravenna; in 987 Otto III granted it to S. Salvatore in Pavia, a grant
confirmed again in 999 and 1000.299 It gained its fame in the first place from its
association with St Romuald.300 The scion of the most important ducal family of
Ravenna, Romuald became a monk after a life of enjoyment of the world, and he
rapidly rose to fame as a hermit and reformer. He met Otto III in Rome in 998,
and at the emperor’s insistence the monks of S. Apollinare in Classe elected
him as their abbot. After a year of conflict with them, he met Otto in Rome and
renounced his post, but then returned with the emperor to Ravenna in 1000 and,
the following year, founded the monastery of S. Adalberto in Pereo. The clue is, of
course, in the name—a highly significant dedication, showing Otto’s interest in
the foundation to the extent of giving it the name of the martyred Adalbert of
Prague, his old tutor and spiritual mentor. Romuald was present in Pomposa at a
placitum on 4 April 1001, which he signed as abbot of Pomposa, when the abbey,
which had by then been given to Cluny by Archbishop Gerbert, was taken away
from them and given back to the archbishop of Ravenna. Pomposa had been
under the control of Pereo for a while, with Romuald in charge, but in 1001 it
separated from it and subsequently also became exempt from Ravenna. Its er­­
emit­ic reputation brought to Romuald several famous disciples, such as Bruno of
Querfurt, and possibly even William of Dijon in 998. Romuald had constant dif­
ficulties in his monasteries, for encouraging the eremitic life over the community,
and he eventually left Ravenna for Istria, returning to Italy much later—this time
not to Ravenna, but to found the hermitage of Camaldoli in Tuscany.
The issues of family control and political role of Venetian monasteries are not
that different from those of both Rome and Ravenna.301 Close family connections

299 John VIII’s letter in Jaffé, Italia Pontificia V, no. 11; MGH OIIID. II 327, then III, 770 no. 341,
then 802 no. 375, repr. in Pomposa. Storia, Arte, Architettura, ed. A. Samaritani and C. Di Francesco
(Ferrara, 1999), and A. Samaritani, Regesta Pomposiae (874–1199) (Rovigo: Monumenta Historica
Ecclesiae Comaclensis 46 and 49, 1963).
300 For the vast literature on St Romuald, see, for example, A. Samaritani, ‘Eremo, cenobio, mis­
sione e martirio dall’Abbazia di Pomposa a Kiev’, in I rapporti tra le comunità monastiche benedettine
italiane tra alto e pieno Medioevo. Atti del III Convegno del ‘Centro di studi Farfensi’, Santa Vittoria in
Matenano, 11-12-13 settembre 1992 (Verona, 1994), pp. 220–8; Benericetti, ‘San Romualdo’, pp. 71–89;
Orioli, ‘Ottone III’, pp. 81–4; G. Montanari, ‘San Romualdo’, in Novara, Missio ad gentes, pp. 19–20;
Novara, ‘Il monastero di Sant’Adalberto’, pp. 25–39; and in a more general way without the specific
Ravenna connection, see the articles in Ottone III e Romualdo di Ravenna.
301 For general surveys of Venetian monasteries, see G. Mazzucco, ed., Monasteri benedettini nella
laguna di Venezia: Catalogo di Mostra, Venice, Biblioteca Nazionale Marciana (Venice, 1983), nos 1, 4,
5, 6, 7, 8, 9; M. Pozza, ‘Per una storia dei monasteri veneziani nei secoli VIII–XII’, in Il monachesimo
nel veneto medioevale, Abbazia di S. Maria di Mogliano Veneto (Treviso), ed. F. G. B. Trolese (Cesena:
Centro Storico Benedettino Italiano, 1998), pp. 17–38; Rando, Una Chiesa di Frontiera, pp. 43–72;
Rando, ‘Le strutture della chiesa’, pp. 645–73; Lanfranchi, ‘I documenti sui più antichi insediamenti’,
pp. 144–7; and Spinelli, ‘I primi insediamenti’, pp. 151–62. On ducal control over the monasteries in
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 351

were even closer for Venetian monasteries. Some of the most prestigious were
family foundations. First and foremost was S. Zaccaria, founded by Justinian
Particiaco in 819. Its abbess was almost invariably one of the women of the doge’s
family. But here the important element is that, after the first century of its exist­
ence, the nunnery was no longer associated with the original founding family.
For what mattered to the highest degree for S. Zaccaria was its connection with
the doge ex officio, not with any single family. Justinian’s widow, Felicia, and
his daughter-in-law, Romana, were the first women involved in this way, while
Joanna, daughter of Doge Ursus I, restored the monastery the first time, and
another Joanna, divorced wife of Peter IV Candiano, ruled over it.302 Many doges,
the Particiaci, Ursus I, Peter Tribuno and Tribuno Memmo, were buried there.303
S. Zaccaria was the most prestigious of ducal foundations.304 The foundation
diploma of 827, which purported to come from the Emperor Leo V, who sent
money, relics, and workmen for the monastery, is a fake and was fabricated to
further enhance the prestige of the monastery later. Nonetheless, the monastery
had been given prestigious relics, presumably from the collection that Justinian
Particiaco had acquired in Constantinople, among which was that of St Zacharias
himself, translated there on 6 September 827. Other relics were added, of SS
Nereus and Achileus, Lizerius, Pancratius, Sabina, and a Pope Leo, said to have
been given by Pope Benedict III in 855. At any rate, they reached Venice, presum­
ably from Rome and including the Spanish martyr Lizerius, sometime before
1000, since Otto III venerated them then. At the time of Otto Orseolo (1009–26),
the hermit Tarasio’s relics were allegedly translated there from the East. S. Zaccaria
continued to play a very important part in the lives of the doges, even if some­
times a negative one. In 864 Peter Tradonicus was murdered in church, while the
plotters found refuge in the atrium of the monastery, and in 911 Peter Tribunus
was made to abdicate and become a monk there, where he was eventually buried.
Nothing remains from the first monastery of the beginning of the ninth century,
except fragments of a mosaic in the chapel of S. Tarasio, or of the first restoration
by Joanna, the daughter of Ursus Particiaco, at the end of the ninth century. The
only remains are those of the second church, including the tenth-eleventh cen­tury
crypt with the tombs of the doges, and the plan of the church, though the central
and right nave were much altered after the 15th century.

Carolingian style, see Pozza, ‘Per una storia dei monasteri veneziani’, and P. A. Passolunghi, ‘Origini e
sviluppo del monachesimo veneto sino al secolo XII’, in Trolese, Il monachesimo, pp. 4–6.

302 Will of Justinian, see Cessi I. 53, and DV no. 4; JnD II. 39, III. 22, IV. 11.
303 JnD III. 27 (Ursus); III. 39 (Peter Tribuno); IV. 29 (Tribuno Memmo).
304 Tramontin, ‘San Zaccaria’, pp. 9–13; see S. Carraro, ‘Il monastero di San Zaccaria, i dogi di
Venezia (secoli IX–XII)’ and A. Rapetti, ‘Una communità e le sue badesse. Organizzazione e recluta­
mento a San Zaccaria (IX–XIII secolo)’, both in Aikema, Mancini, and Modesti, eds.,‘In centro et oculis
urbis nostre’, pp. 9–22 and 23–36.
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352 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

S. Servolo, probably already a Benedictine monastery around 810, before the

transfer of the ducal seat to Rialto, may have at first harboured refugees from
Altino.305 Abbot John requested from Doges Agnellus and Justinian Particiaco
permission to move away, when the first island became too small and, in 819, the
doge allowed the move, to land he had granted to the monastery on the terra­
ferma, where it became S. Ilario. The story is in itself revealing of how much the
controlling hand was that of the doge, who had to be asked to allow the move.
Most monks were transferred there, though some remained at S. Servolo, and it
was written in S. Ilario’s foundation charter that the monastery had to maintain
them there. S. Servolo may have been used as a hospice for old monks, thus mak­
ing possible the secrecy of the meeting of the doge and Otto III there. S. Ilario was
the burial place of Justinian Particiaco and maintained a tradition of strong
Patriciaco patronage, but it later became the Candiano necropolis, and imperial
privileges were granted to it several times, in 839 by Lothar, in 883 by Charles the
Fat (two estates in the Trevisano), and in 981 by Otto II.306 The monastery of
S. Gregorio, already documented in 806, also Benedictine in the tenth century,
was then dependent on S. Ilario, and in 1249, when SS Ilario e Benedetto moved
to it, it became known as SS Ilario, Benedetto e Gregorio.307
In 982 Dominic Morosini, on his return from Cuxà, received from Tribuno
Memmo the church of S. Giorgio, founded by the Particiaci, in order to set up a
Benedictine monastery there.308 The foundation charter of S. Giorgio Maggiore, on
20 December 982, was signed by most great families of the Venetian aristocracy—
over 130 names, including Mastalicio, Coloprino, Mauroceno, Orseolo, Barbolano,
Badoer, Stornato, Centranico, Andreadis, Dandolo, Flabianico, Noheli, Contarini,
and Zen, rallying around the doge and the bishop of Olivolo. When in 991
Memmo himself had to flee, he went to S. Giorgio.
S. Lorenzo was another Particiaco foundation, though in this case by the
brother of the doge, Bishop Ursus.309 Ursus was in every way a member of the
Particiaci, as shown not just by his rule but also by his wealth, based as much on
trade as the rest of the family (he left in his will a pound of pepper, sign of trade

305 Vanzan Marchini, S. Servolo e Venezia, pp. 13–29; C. Carlon, ed., Il recupero di San Servolo: vicende
storiche dell’isola e progetto generale di restauro (Venice, 2004), pp. 45–7. Story and charter in Lanfranchi
and Strina, SS. Ilario e Benedetto, pp. 8–17; see also D. Calaon, M. Ferri, and C. Bragato, ‘SS. Ilario e
Benedetto (IX secolo): un monastero del nascente dogado veneziano tra terra e laguna’, in V Congresso
nazionale di archeologia medievale, ed. G. Volpe and P. Favia (Florence, 2011), pp. 498–9 and 503.
306 Lanfranchi and Strina, SS. Ilario e Benedetto, no. 2; Cessi II. 17 and 60 and PV no. 18 (given as
false) and 30; see also C. Brühl, ‘Die älteste Kaiserurkunden für das Kloster S. Ilario bei Venedig’, in
C. Brühl, Aus Mittelalter und Diplomatik, I, pp. 801–10 and A. Rapetti, ‘Il doge e i suoi monaci. Il
monastero dei Santi Ilario e Benedetto di Venezia fra laguna e terraferma nei secoli IX–X’, in Reti
Medievali Rivista, 18 (2017), 2, pp. 3–28.
307 S. Moreni, L’Abbazia di S. Gregorio a Venezia (Venice, 2011), p. 24.
308 Lanfranchi, S. Giorgio Maggiore, pp. 17–26. On the history of the monastery see also
G. Damerini, L’isola e il cenobio di S. Giorgio Maggiore (Venice, 1969).
309 Will of Bishop Ursus in Gaeta, S. Lorenzo, no. 1; S. Carraro, La laguna delle donne. Il monaches-
imo femminile a Venezia tra il IX e il XIV secolo (Pisa, 2015), pp. 23–40, on S. Lorenzo and S. Zaccaria.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 353

links), and by his understanding of the importance of church and monastic control
in Venice. Like Justinian, who had contributed to the founding and patronage of
both S. Zaccaria and S. Servolo, Ursus too founded a monastery for Benedictine
nuns in Castello, which he placed under the rule of his sister Romana. He gave it
to her in his will of 853. John the Deacon tells us that Justinian Particiaco and his
wife took up residence there when they returned from Constantinople in 813,
refusing to stay in the ducal palace. The monastery was also given the church of
S. Severo by Ursus.310 The Particiaci control over the Church of Venice through
holding the episcopal see of Olivolo, and the three great monasteries of S. Ilario,
S. Zaccaria, and S. Lorenzo, is the first example of the association between the
doges, St Mark, the Church of Venice, and its monasteries.
Monasteries were also given land, either by the founding families or by the
nobility of the Regnum, especially S. Zaccaria, which received grants from the
Counts of Verona Ingelfred and Milo, and Brondolo, with a grant from Count
Almeric and his wife, Franca.311 In 928 the first grant was renewed with the
royal confirmation of Hugh, with a few more estates added by the bishop of
Verona Notker.312 In 963 Otto I himself confirmed it again, and it was renewed
by the Countess Ildeburga, wife of Count Adalbert, on the same terms as
before.313 Likewise, Count Milo of Verona and his wife, Franca, also made a grant
to S. Zaccaria.314 Venetian monastic houses and families traditionally owned
large extents of land and rights on the terraferma outside the dogado, in the
Kingdom of Italy, which was part of the reason for the repeated request to each
new king to confirm the privileges granted to the Venetians. In the ninth century,
for example, the will of Justinian Particiaco mentioned, among his estates, some
on the terraferma at Jesolo and Gambarara near Marghera, and some in the coun­
ties of Padua and Treviso; and in 800 Dominic abbot of Brondolo also received
land from Sergius dux of Senigallia, thus connecting the abbey to one of the fore­
most ducal families in Ravenna and the Romagna.315 A privilege of Charles III in
883 granted the estates of Cereseria and Pladano to the monastery of SS Ilario e
Benedetto.316 The importance of the possessions by Venetians on the terraferma
must never be underestimated, and we can see it repeatedly underlined, not just
through the renewal of the pacta but also from the overall concern of the doges
to maintain their free access to and from the Regnum, then the Empire.317

310 Cessi I. 60, and DV no. 5. 311 Cessi II. 30, 72; DV nos 8.
312 Cessi II, no. 34; DV no. 10. 313 Cessi II, no. 45; DV no. 24.
314 Cessi II, no. 39, and DV no. 16; on Milo, see Hlawitschka, Franken und Alemannen, no. 120,
pp. 237–40.
315 Lanfranchi and Strina, SS. Ilario e Benedetto, no. 2, pp. 19–24; Lanfranchi Strina, SS. Trinità e
S. Michele, II, no. 1.
316 Lanfranchi and Strina, SS. Ilario e Benedetto, no. 4, pp. 27–9.
317 On the pacta, see Chapter 5; for the importance of control on the terraferma see, for example,
Moro, ‘Venezia e l’occidente’, and Gasparri, ‘Venezia fra l’Italia bizantina e il Regno Italico’, pp. 41–57
and 61–110.
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354 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

But the monasteries also received gifts of relics, which were at the centre of their
importance. John Particiaco, from the family which had founded S. Ilario and
S. Zaccaria, also gave the relics of St George and St Calbanus to S. Servolo, as well
as building two churches dedicated to them there, while John, son of Doge Ursus
I, who built SS Cornelio e Cipriano in Vinea Contra in Malamocco, gave it the
relics of Cyprian.318
The doges exercised control over monasteries in what could be seen as a char­
acteristically Carolingian style of government, through immunities and abbatial
appointments of members of the ducal family, especially in major political
nerve centres like S. Zaccaria, S. Servolo/SS Ilario e Benedetto, S. Lorenzo, and
S. Michele Archangelo of Brondolo. Often this was a way of ensuring control
over the areas of the terraferma on which such monasteries were situated, for
example in the case of S. Ilario and Brondolo.319 These monasteries followed the
Benedictine Rule (so much so that, when some like S. Servolo had followed
another rule, they were led to change this to become Benedictine)—a prime
Carolingian government tool since Benedict of Aniane’s reform in 817. All mon­
asteries in the dogado remained Benedictine in this traditional form, even
S. Giorgio founded by Dominic Morosini on his return from S. Michel de Cuxà,
where he had experienced the Cluniac Reform.320 Significantly, there was no
importing of any form of Greek monastic lifestyle at any time, even as a result of
the revival of Basilian monasticism under the influence of St Nilus in the south of
Italy and Rome in the tenth century—just as there had not been any in Ravenna.
The dogado stuck to the monastic model of Carolingian Europe, and the doges
continued to use the political power that this monastic tradition gave them, as we
can see from the founding of S. Ilario in 819, a monastery built on land granted by
the doge, and one whose buildings were partly made up of construction materials
willed to it by Justinian Particiaco from his estates in Jesolo in 829.321 Similarly,
the monks of S. Stefano of Altino had asked the doge to help them rebuild their
monastery in 900 and, with his help, they transferred the main body of the abbey
to the new monastery of SS Felice e Fortunato of Ammiana, also built on land
granted by the doge. Far from being Greek-style ascetic retreats, the monasteries
of Venice were a political and social tool in the Western Benedictine mould.
Throughout the ninth and tenth centuries, the doges maintained control over
them, exercised through several means.

318 JnD III.3.

319 Rando, Una Chiesa di frontiera, pp. 43–72; Rando, ‘Le strutture della chiesa locale’, pp. 645–73;
Tramontin, ‘Fondazione e sviluppo della diocesi’; on the ducal control over the monasteries in Carolingian
style, see Pozza, ‘Per una storia dei monasteri veneziani’, and Passolunghi, ‘Origini e sviluppo’, pp. 4–6;
Spinelli, ‘Primi insediamenti’, pp. 151–60.
320 Lanfranchi, S. Giorgio Maggiore, II, pp. 19–27.
321 JnDn III. 27 and 39, for example; and 22, telling the story of the first restoration of the monas­
tery at the end of the ninth century by Orso Particiaco’s daughter, who was the abbess at the time;
Tramontin, ‘San Zaccaria’.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 355

Most monasteries remained under the control of the original endowment by

the founding family, for example the Particiaci and S. Zaccaria and S. Ilario, dur­
ing the first century of their existence. But the importance of these monasteries
went beyond that of the family connection. It came from their association with
ducal power as such, especially power most closely linked to the area of St Mark
in a physical way. It took the form of power over abbatial appointments, even
when the abbots or abbesses were not related to the founding family—as long as
they were related to the ducal family in power. In the case of female monasteries
in particular, it was also exercised through the use of the monastery to place
female members of the family, who would uphold its political as well as spiritual
value, the abbesses of S. Zaccaria being the prime example in the tenth century.
This took precedence over the actual family connections, as we see in the case
of S. Lorenzo, whose first abbess was Romana, sister of Ursus Particiaco, and
therefore of the doge’s family. Nevertheless, after her there is no other notice of
Particiaci women, or indeed of any very august name from the Venetian aristoc­
racy: S. Lorenzo was a Particiaco foundation, but of a bishop not a doge, and the
link with power, both political and topographical, was weak.322 Immunity from
episcopal interference, supported by the doge against the bishop, even when the
latter was himself a ducal appointee as in the case of S. Stefano’s quarrel with the
bishop of Torcello,323 was a key feature of the close link between monasteries
and the doge, who was then their only protector. Finally, territorial as well as
­economic expansion was rooted in the use of monastic buildings for economic
­reasons, such as hunting on the terraferma at S. Ilario, and, far more importantly,
in the use of the economic resources of the curtes and castelli, which were
run, unlike Venetian economic units, entirely according to the seigniorial feudal
­model.324 Monasteries were used for additional political purposes: to display
power, for example in the ducal procession to S. Zaccaria from the Doge’s Palace
at Easter; and to provide hospitality for visiting rulers—Louis II in 863 at
Brondolo, and Otto III to Doge Peter II Orseolo. Otto spent most of his time first
at S. Servolo, by then an almost empty, and therefore particularly discreet,
meeting place, then at S. Zaccaria.325 But one needs to highlight once again a key
conclusion with regard to Venetian monasteries: the powerful ones, regardless of
whether they were male or female, and regardless of the continuation of their link
with the founding family, were those which kept a close connection with
ducal power.
In view of their roots in the pagan society in Rome, the first Roman monaster­
ies fulfilled only a spiritual role rather than the immense political, economic, and
judicial ones which monasteries in early medieval Eruope would come to exert
from the sixth century onwards. With a few exceptions, such as the papal

322 Carraro, La laguna delle donne, pp. 23–40. 323 See Chapter 1.
324 Rando, Una Chiesa di frontiera, pp. 54–60, 105–8. 325 JnDn, IV, 57.
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356 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

foundation of S. Silvestro for example, they remained so in Rome itself almost

until the tenth century. It was at that point, under Alberic and his reformer Odo
of Cluny’s influence, that the Roman aristocracy began to either found new mon­
asteries (S. Ciriaco in Via Lata by Alberic’s own family) or endow existing ones
(like SS Andrea e Gregorio) with large grants of land, which would make them,
and sometimes their mother houses like Farfa and Subiaco, the equivalent of the
great political and economic forces that Carolingian monasteries had already
become by the late eighth century. While the original pattern of small religious
foundations had also held sway in Ravenna, this was to change in the ninth cen­
tury, after Ravenna became closer to the Regnum Italiae and the Carolingians.
From then on, monasteries both old (S. Apollinare, S. Vitale) and new (S. Maria
in Cereseo) became very similar to the Carolingian pattern of immensely wealthy
houses associated with the richest and more powerful families, like the Duchi
Sergi. In this instance, Ravenna fully took on the benefits of the Carolingian
reform of Benedict of Aniane, with its hierarchy of command and involvement in
reforming society, a pattern which the Particiaci in Venice also found very useful
for their own monastic foundations at S. Ilario and S. Zaccaria. This model, allow­
ing the ruler to control abbatial elections and to act as protector of the monastery,
was embraced by the doges, who used these advantages in exchange for the
monasteries’ provision of wealth, political refuge, and prayers for salvation.
Roman monasticism had never become such a force until the eleventh century
(admittedly in the city of the popes), as monasticism under the influence of the
Carolingian Benedictine reform would do in both Ravenna and Venice by the
ninth century.

Instruments of Control

In the first section of this chapter I have been looking at places of power—palaces,
churches, monasteries—and how they came to be defined as such through their
ownership by or association with men of power. In this second section, I propose
to examine what could be called the instruments, or means, by which power was
exercised in these places. These could be based on two fundamental aspects of
medieval public life and relations: displays of material generosity on the part of
the people in power, and displays of acknowledged forms of symbolic and con­
sensual manifestations of this power. To the first belong the material generosity of
charity and assistance to the poor, the sick, and pilgrims; and the spiritual generosity
in the provision of art to the glory of God as part of the Christian community’s
worship of Him. To the second belong the properties of power: the proclaiming
of the ruler’s presence in oral or written form, through the titles he used, on the
coins he minted, and through the emblems of power that he held up to the gaze of
his subjects.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 357

Manifestations of power

The first form of display was generosity to the less fortunate.

Charity and the Charitable System

Examples of direct papal charity on particular occasions are regularly mentioned.
From Pope Gregory II onwards, and still with Nicholas I, who brought water back
to St Peter’s when its aqueduct collapsed, popes regularly restored the water
supply through repairs to the aqueducts. Many had to deal with floods: one was
2 metres high, covering the Via Lata for seven days under Gregory II; another in
791 under Pope Hadrian I; and yet another under Pope Nicholas, when the Tiber
flooded the Via Lata up to the Clivus Argentarius.326 Hadrian organized food dis­
tribution by boat, then gave gifts to the Via Lata inhabitants; Pope Gregory IV
restored the Sabbatina aqueduct to help people who could not grind their wheat
because the Tiber mills did not work, and also distributed money; Benedict III
also dispensed money at St Peter’s—gold to the clergy and leading men, and silver
to the people.327 Some popes were particularly inventive. Pope Nicholas organ­
ized a system for the care of the poor and disabled by issuing them with discs of
entitlement; Stephen V, son of a very rich father, who used his private wealth to
relieve the poor and feed orphans, as well as entertaining various nobles at his
table every day, also came up with an ingenious idea: faced with empty granaries
and cellars, and no money for the clergy and the scholae, he offered to pay people
for every locust they caught during a plague of the insects in the country.328
Occasionally other solutions were proposed, and Gregory II established a monas­
tery specifically to take care of old people, a gerochomium, behind S. Maria
Maggiore.329 Such individual remedies at times of particular stress were only of
use during crisis situations. In a more general way, the city had to find ways of
coping with food distribution on a day-to-day basis.
After the end of the imperial-sponsored Annona, Rome’s charitable system at
first relied on monastic charity, then on the two parallel systems of the xenodochia
and the diaconiae. The diaconiae had already been in place by the time of Gregory
the Great in Byzantine Italy, for example in Naples and in Ravenna. In the latter
case, the system continued to function, as in Rome, until the tenth century, and
we hear of S. Andrea Ierichomium and S. Pietro Orphanotrophium in Agnellus,330
the diaconia of S. Giorgio in 959,331 and S. Maria in Xenodochio.332 In Rome, con­
trol of public charity had initially been in the hands of aristocratic patrons, who
founded and endowed xenodochia like that of the Anicii in the Porticus Minucia,

326 LP I. 91, ch. 6; 97, ch. 94; 107, ch. 15. 327 LP I. 97, ch. 94; 103, ch. 19; 106, ch. 34.
328 LP I. 107, ch. 51; 112, ch. 19. 329 LP I. 91 ch. 3.
330 Agnellus, LP, chs. 148 and 62. See also Deichmann, ‘Studi sulla Ravenna scomparsa’, pp. 65–6.
331 Benericetti X/2, no. 97. 332 Mazzotti, ‘Elenco delle chiese ravennati’, no. 121, p. 244.
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358 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

the Valerii on the Celio, S. Maria in caput porticu in the middle of Trajan’s market,
and S. Pellegrino in Numachia in the middle of the Circus of Nero.333 Originally
privately founded, often in the middle of an aristocratic complex for greater visi­
bility and because the charity was aimed at the Roman local poor, these were still
functional at the beginning of the eighth century. As the original senatorial fam­
ilies and their resources abandoned the city after the sixth century, the army,
which had put down roots and saw the papacy as the natural leader of the city,
became the new aristocracy of the Byzantine duchy at the end of the seventh
cen­tury.334 Even as the papacy lost its Sicilian resources, it set up the new system
of the domuscultae in the Roman Campagna, and thus gradually took control of
the charitable system. This had become papal, though administered by the new
aristocratic elite now in charge of the diaconiae, which we also find in Ravenna
under the authority of the archbishop. The diaconia seems to have been, in the
first instance, a monastery, whose function was to distribute the imperial and
papal resources in the form of food for the poor, providing facilities for baths and
sometimes functioning as an orphanage, under the patronage of a pater diaco-
niae. The institution remained attached to a monastery until the late eighth cen­
tury, when it was under the control of a secular dispensator. He would frequently
be a noble high official from the Lateran, such as Theodotus dux, then primicerius,
uncle of Pope Hadrian I. Increasingly, the diaconiae were served by a non-monastic
clergy. Dey has shown very convincingly that Roman monasticism in late
an­tiquity and the early Middle Ages was very focused on the idea of ‘public ser­
vice’, as opposed to only ‘private devotion’, which only gradually became the main
form of accepted monastic life, and that the role of diaconiae and xenodochia,
originally served by monks, was at first the principal manifestation of Roman
male monasticism.335 When the papacy restored some of the old xenodochia, and
founded new diaconiae, it effectively restructured the charitable system in the sec­
ond half of the eighth century. This was in order to respond to the rising need for
a rational use of the resources available, geared towards the places where the poor
were (rather than where senatorial families connected with the area wanted to be
seen operating) and, above all, along the pilgrimage routes. This takeover of the

333 For the history of the charitable system, there is a long bibliography starting with such classic
papers as H.-I. Marrou, ‘L’origine orientale des diaconies romaines’, MEFREM 57 (1940), pp. 95–142,
J. Lestocquoy, ‘Administration de Rome et diaconies du VIIe au IXe siècle’, Rivista di archeologia cristi-
ana 7 (1930), pp. 261–98; and O. Bertolini, ‘Per la storia delle diaconie romane nell’alto medioevo sino
alla fine del secolo VIII’, ASRSP 70 (1947), pp. 1–145. More recently, the best work has been that of
Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 73–91, and especially Santangeli
Valenzani, ‘Pellegrini, senatori, papi’; F. R. Stasolla, ‘A proposito delle strutture assistenziali ecclesias­
tiche: gli xenodochi’, ASRSP 121 (1998), pp. 5–45; A. M. Giuntella, ‘Gli spazi dell’assistenza e della
meditazione’, in Roma nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 48, pp. 639–92; R. D’Amico, ‘L’organizzazione
assistenziale: le diaconie’, in Paroli and Delogu, La storia economica di Roma, pp. 229–36; Pani Ermini,
Pt VIII in her Christiana loca.
334 See Chapter 2, and also Delogu, ‘Solium imperii’, pp. 83–108, repr. in Delogu, ed., Roma medi­
evale. Aggiornamenti.
335 Dey, ‘Public service or private devotion?’, pp. 209–28.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 359

city’s charitable institutions and space was especially important in view of the
papacy’s increasing northern European and Carolingian association, from which
the increasing pilgrims’ influx came on account of the cult of St Peter. The papacy
saw it as essential to create a charitable network to cope with the rising flow of
northern European pilgrims, especially after the Carolingians’ arrival in the city.
In turn, this growing network was a way of increasing papal power.
When Gregory III restored the diaconia of S. Maria in Aquiro, and extended
that of SS Sergio e Bacco, thus rebuilding and enlarging one diaconia in the
Campus Martius and one in the Forum (where there was the greatest concentra­
tion of these diaconiae, notably SS Cosma e Damiano and S. Maria Antiqua), he
was still catering for the poor of the city, in the most densely populated areas.
With Zacharias, we begin to see a new pattern. He supported the distribution of
alms from the patriarchate to the sick and the poor of the city, but also to the poor
and pilgrims at St Peter’s. He restored four long-deserted xenodochia, and founded
the new one of S. Eustachio in Platana in the Campus Martius, in the centre of
the city, for the poor; he also founded two new xenodochia outside the walls.
Gregory III clearly put much effort into the restoration of existing diaconiae and
xenodochia, but, with the exception of S. Eustachio, most of these restorations and
foundations were outside the city, and for pilgrims not the poor of the city. He
restored three previously declining diaconiae at St Peter’s; demolished and rebuilt
S. Maria in Cosmedin, which was in ruins and threatened by the classical monu­
ment tilting above it; and likewise SS Sergio e Bacco, embedded in the Arch of
Septimius Severus and at risk from the possible fall of the temple of Concord. He
made provision for the poor at the newly established diaconia of S. Adriano at the
Three Fates in the Curia, and at SS Cosma e Damiano. Papal assistance was still
concentrated in the Forum, which retained a great deal of importance in the
topography of city, as reflected in the density of charitable establishments close to
each other, just as they would later be at St Peter’s.336 Up to Hadrian, there had
been sixteen diaconiae in the city,337 to which he added two.338 From Pope Leo III
onwards, the popes were mostly involved with the centres at St Peter’s. Leo III
built houses for pilgrims near St Peter’s, and baths and xenodochia for pilgrims
from ‘distant regions’; Paschal made the abbot of one of St Peter’s monasteries

336 L. Reekmans, ‘Le développement topographique du Vatican à la fin de l’Antiquité et au début du

Moyen Age (300–850), in Mélanges d’Archéologie et d’Histoire de l’Art offerts au Prof. J. Lavalleye
(Louvain, 1970), pp. 197–235, esp. 215–18 and 222–8; Santangeli, ‘Pellegrini, senatori, papi’, pp. 203–26;
Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 172–4.
337 S. Maria in Domnica, S. Lucia in Silice, S. Maria Antiqua, S. Angelo in Pescheria, S. Vito in
Macello, S. Agata in Suburra, S. Maria in Via Lata, SS Sergio e Bacco, S. Teodoro, S. Maria in Aquiro,
S. Eustachio, S. Lucia in Septem Solis, S. Maria in Cosmedin, S. Giorgio in Velabro, SS Nereo e Achilleo,
and S. Bonifazio.
338 S. Adriano at the Three Fates, SS Cosma e Damiano (already a church, but the diaconia was
new). New archaeological work at the Curia has uncovered eighth-century frescoes which include a
portrait of Hadrian; see Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 480–3 and Fig. IV.2.1.
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360 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

responsible for charity to pilgrims; and Nicholas took great care of the pilgrims in
the Leonine City, though he was also responsible for some building work and
embellishments at S. Maria in Cosmedin.339 Pope Leo IV was the only one to be
involved with the diaconiae in the city centre, and the Forum in particular, having
also built the new diaconia of S. Maria Nova to replace the destroyed S. Maria
Antiqua after the 847 earthquake.340
To support the charitable system of the city by bringing food to be distributed
from the diaconiae, Pope Zacharias undertook the real economic exploitation of
the domuscultae outside Rome in the papal patrimony. His successor, Hadrian I,
created four new ones—at Capracorum, two at Galeria on the Aurelia and on
the Portuensis, and Calvisianum on the Ardeatina—all for the use of the poor,
including his own food distribution to one hundred poor a day at the Lateran.341
Marazzi has detailed the way in which the papacy took over the management of
the papal patrimony, and how it reorganized its resources in the context of its
policy of autonomous government.342 The story has been told several times in the
past by Bertolini, Brezzi, Llewellyn, Arnaldi, and Noble, focusing notably on the
papal need for resources after the end of Byzantine control. More recently,
Wickham argued that the development of the domuscultae was part of an attempt
to recolonize an abandoned, or at the very least atrophied, Roman suburbium in
demographic and economic terms, while Delogu defined the development of the
domuscultae as a change showing a ‘quadro di ricorso all’economia diretta come
più affidabile di quella monetaria’.343 Marazzi’s argument could be summarized
thus: before the distancing of the papacy from the East from the mid-eighth cen­tury
onwards, it had already gained increasing autonomy in the administration of
Rome, including for poor relief, and it was in charge of the payment of the Roman
army. This was not because the popes had taken this away from the Empire on
account of ideas of papal sovereignty, but because it had been the Byzantines’
choice to give it to the popes and make it their responsibility, through the agree­
ment between the Emperor Constantine IV and Pope John V, then Pope Conon

339 LP I. 98, ch. 90; 100, ch. 2; 107, ch. 11; see Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 172–4.
340 LP I. 106, ch. 22.
341 LP I. 97, chs. 54–5, 63; The literature on the domuscultae is considerable, with its main repre­
sentative being Federico Marazzi in his (in reverse chronological order) ‘La configurazione istituzion­
ale del potere pontificio nel quadro del processo di territorializzazione dei “Patrimonia Sancti Petri” ’,
in Martin, Peters-Custot and Prigent, L’héritage byzantin en Italie, II, pp. 261–78; ‘Il Liber Pontificalis e
le domuscultae’, in Geertman, ed., Il Liber pontificalis e la storia materiale, pp. 167–88; ‘Da suburbium
a territorium’, pp. 713–55; ‘I patrimoni della chiesa romana’, pp. 33–50; Patrimonia Sanctae Romanae
Ecclesiae, pp. 1–334; ‘Le proprietà immobiliari urbane della Chiesa Romana tra IV e IX secolo: red­
dito, struttura e gestione’, in Le sol et l’immeuble. Les formes dissociées de la proprieté immobilière dans
les villes de France et d’Italie (XII–XIX sècles), ed. E. Hubert and O. Faron (Paris: Collection EFR 206,
1995), p. 151–68; and ‘Le domuscultæ papali della Campagna Romana: un problema storico, topogra­
fico e archeologico dell’alto medioevo’, Romana Gens 2 (1985), pp. 13–18.
342 Marazzi, ‘Il Liber Pontificalis e le domuscultae’, p. 168 and bibliography; Marazzi, Patrimonia
Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae, pp. 166–293.
343 Delogu, ‘Oro e argento in Roma’, p. 279.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 361

in the 680s. When the Emperor tried to take back imperial fiscal rights in 722/3,
a crisis arose because he was effectively going back on this agreement, and the
papacy was going to lose what it had grown accustomed to thinking of as its own
wealth, to use as it saw fit. The refusal to comply with imperial demands led to
the loss of papal lands. The combined weight of it, and of iconoclasm, led to the
excommunication of the Emperor Leo III, the shift of alliance towards the Franks,
and the start of the building up of a territorial lordship ‘on the ashes of the Roman
duchy’. Marazzi follows in the footsteps of Delogu and Wickham in defining the
system as having a centre of economic management for a land complex, where
the lord has direct control over production, with his own functionaries and pos­
sibilities for storage of the final product.344 It has been argued that this change
was parallel to the development of the Lombard curtis, though Delogu has wisely
pointed out that the model already existed, to some extent, in the late antique
latifundia with their pretoria; he also showed that the seignorial model was limited,
in the sense that consumption was not on the spot but was taken to where it was
needed, sometimes quite a way away, that is in the city of Rome.345 In that sense,
the Roman domuscultae were a somewhat bastardized, still fairly new, construct,
even if they were modelled, to a certain extent, on the Lombard curtes so dom­in­ant
in the Sabina, which Toubert has studied.346
The papacy tried to involve the local aristocracy in these new economic
­developments of the eighth century. Some nobles were benefactors. One Theodore
granted one of his estates on the Tiburtina, and another in Tuscia, to become
domuscultae, and Count Peter, together with Agnes, widow of the former primic-
erius Agatho, and Theodota, widow of the former praefectorius Dominic, gave an
estate to St Peter, exchanged with the estate of one Leoninus consul et dux, later
monk, at the time of Pope Zacharias, which was also turned into a domusculta.347
It was also Zacharias who made the domuscultae inalienable Church property,
which was partly at the root of the troubles later experienced by popes who were
accused of abusive confiscations by the Emperor Lothar.348 The enmeshing of pri­
vate Church property with what was left of the fiscal properties of the Empire—a
mixture to which the papacy added the reinforcement of its jurisdiction over the
area—and the attempt to take over public rights from the imperial authorities led
to a patrimonialization of Lazio, which extended and deepened papal control and
its exercise. The popes attempted to justify this, and to show how fairly they had
behaved in this takeover, as the Liber Pontificalis bends over backwards to show,
for example, in Hadrian’s creation of the domusculta at Capracorum. That this
was not perceived to be so, perhaps due to the papal agents’ exactions, which were
seen as abuses—for example when Hadrian took over properties claimed by

344 Marazzi, ‘Il Liber Pontificalis e le domuscultae’, pp. 168–73.

345 Delogu, ‘Oro e argento in Roma’, p. 279. 346 Toubert, Les structures, pp. 449–87.
347 LP I. 93, chs. 25–6. 348 See Chapter 2.
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362 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Farfa—is made clear by the resistance of the local aristocracy. The resistance
was exercised sometimes through a refusal to comply, and sometimes through
rebellions—of which that of Toto of Nepi in 767/78 may have been one—thus
contributing to the military aristocracy’s opposition to growing papal control.349
As we saw ealier, this opposition rumbled on for a long time and resurfaced
periodically, with the same complaint, the most conspicuous being the attempt to
involve Lothar in the argument and ultimately to make him ‘give back’ some of
the contested properties. The setting up of the domuscultae by Zacharias and
Hadrian had the purpose of reinforcing the institutions through which the papacy
could facilitate its control of Rome and its territory. While not economically new,
since it borrowed a traditional manorial (demesne/tenants) system, the political
attempt by the papacy to counteract the establishment of aristocratic power bases
around Rome, which would lead to the later move to create its own castelli, was
certainly part of the agenda of the popes.350
The domuscultae presumably did not produce quite enough to support the
­system the popes had envisioned in order to support the subsistence of Rome
through the direct import and distribution of food by papal functionaries from
papal granaries, even with the newly acquired papal control over fiscal imperial
land. Hence the attempts made by the popes in the eighth century to request from
the Eastern emperors the return of their Sicilian estates, as Hadrian I requested of
Irene at the council of Constantinople,351 and Nicholas of the Emperor Michael in
a letter of 860.352 Faced with imperial refusal, the papacy’s choice was to make
grants of land to the Roman aristocracy, with a diminishing of the available
patrimony and a rise of the monastic property, which, in turn, signified growing
autonomy for the aristocratic families associated with these. Some of these noble­
men were not just benefactors but were also directly responsible for running the
institutions,353 as secular patrons of diaconiae—like Theodotus, dispensator of
S. Maria Antiqua and founder of the new diaconia of S. Angelo in Pescheria
(Plate 7).354 In parallel with the success of the diaconiae, the xenodochia ­gradually
disappeared, to be replaced by the scholae of the foreign pilgrims, just as the rise
of the pilgrimage industry was inexorable. In the next chapter, I will return to
these, since they were so closely linked to pilgrimage.355
The story of the evolution of the xenodochia, then of the diaconiae, is that of
increased control of the papacy over the city, going hand in hand with the grow­
ing nature of Rome as a city of pilgrimage and cult of St Peter. It is perhaps partly

349 Marazzi, ‘Il Liber Pontificalis e le domuscultae’, pp. 174–83.

350 Ibid., pp. 182–3; Wickham, ‘Early Medieval South Etruria’, pp. 174–6 ; and see Chapter 5.
351 Ep. no. 2 in MGH Ep V/3, esp. p. 57. 352 Ep. no. 82 in MGH Ep VI/5.
353 Marazzi, ‘Roma, il Lazio, il Mediterraneo’, pp. 279–81.
354 LP I. 97, ch. 2; on this, see Lori Sanfilippo, ‘Un “luoco famoso” nel medioevo’, pp. 231–68 at
232–4.
355 E. Hubert, ‘Les résidences des étrangers à Rome’, in Roma fra Oriente e Occidente, Settimane 49
(2002), pp. 173–204; see Chapter 4.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 363

for that reason that, not being in control of poor relief in Rome, Alberic and the
tenth-century aristocracy chose to regain some of this power on the ground
through the monastic reform, and made the monasteries associated with them
major landholders in the city and in Lazio.

Art and Architecture

Major artistic changes had been implemented during the eighth century, through
a campaign of beautification of the churches, often seen as part of the papal
fight against iconoclasm. Popes Stephen III and Paul were both deeply concerned
about iconoclasm, Paul about the renewed fervour of the Emperor Constantine
V. Both decorated Roman churches, Gregory III when he received from the
Exarch Eutychius six twisted columns from an unknown Ravenna monu­ment,
which he placed in St Peter’s, while installing, in the Chapel of the Virgin in
St Peter’s, what may well be the only known example of an actual statue of
the Virgin, ‘standing upright, made of gilded silver weighing 150 lb’, where he
planned his own tomb to be—a chapel, moreover, forbidden to women, accord­
ing to Peter Mallius writing in the twelfth century.356
As we saw earlier, the state of Roman monuments was clearly poor. Gregory II,
one recalls, restored many churches ‘about to fall down’, as well as roofless ones
like S. Croce, and the provision of new roofs and vaulting are recurring themes
during his reign and that of his successor, Zacharias, who also restored ‘poverty-
stricken’ buildings, including the Lateran Palace. With Pope Hadrian I, the papacy
began to speed up the dismantling of imperial Rome, at first only deliberately
knocking down monuments and temples if they threatened churches, as did the
Temple of Hercules built by Pompey near the Circus Maximus, which was tilting
above the church of S. Maria in Cosmedin, or the temple of Concord above that
of the diaconia of SS Sergio e Bacco.
Also from Hadrian I onwards, the programme of redecoration and adornment
of churches, including St Peter’s, accelerated, with the help of Charlemagne’s
gifts. All titular churches were given veils, crosses, silver, and images, as did the
diaconiae, and new bronze doors for St Peter were brought to Rome from
Perugia.357 The pace of restorations accelerated even more with Pope Leo III,

356 LP I. 92, ch. 5; 95, ch. 6 and Davis, LPC8, p. 84 n. 16.

357 LP I. 97, ch. 96. On the decoration of Roman churches, from a vast literature, the most general
works are: Matthiae, Pittura romana; Matthiae, Mosaici medievali; Wilpert, Die romischen Mosaiken;
W. Oakeshott, The Mosaics of Rome from the Third to the Fourteenth Century (London, 1967);
S. Waetzoldt, Die Kopien des 17. Jahrhunderts nach Mosaiken und Wandmalereien in Rom (Vienna,
1964); R. Morey, Lost Mosaics and Frescoes of Rome of the Medieval Period (Princeton, 1915); more
specifically, F. Betti, ‘La pittura a Roma dal IV al IX secolo’, and L. Paroli, ‘La scultura a Roma dal IV al IX
secolo’, both in Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 122–31 esp. 130–1 and 132–43. The most recent work
sare Andaloro and Romano, Arte e iconografia a Roma, and La Pittura medievale a Roma, esp. vols II
and III; and J. Osborne, Medieval Rome. A history in art (London, 2007), whose ‘The artistic culture of
early medieval Rome’, in Roma nell’Alto Medioevo, Settimane 48, Spoleto, is also very useful. For
Hadrian see also F. A. Bauer, ‘Il rinnovamento di Roma sotto Adriano I alla luce del Liber Pontificalis:
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364 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

whose campaign of reroofing churches, tituli, diaconiae, cemeterial basilicas, and,

crucially, S. Paolo after the 801 earthquake, was vast, while he also extended the
Lateran Palace and even sent roof beams to help restore S. Apollinare in Ravenna.
His huge list of gifts is minutely detailed by the Liber Pontificalis.358 Iconographical
details are also forthcoming, for example the gift of a cloth with a representation
of the Chaeretismos (presumably a deliberate use of the Greek word for the
Annunciation, and also an anti-iconoclastic point made) for S. Maria Maggiore,
cloths for St Peter’s depicting Peter binding and loosening sinners, and other
images as well as jewels. Leo III put up two silver shields engraved with the Creed,
one in Latin and one in Greek, presumably addressing the issues around the
Filioque dispute with the Franks in 809. This arose when the Frankish Church,
following Charlemagne’s decision as a result of the theological debate which we
can follow through the Libri Carolini, chose to include the Filioque in the Creed.359
Perhaps significantly with regard to the still split allegiance of the papacy, the pope
preferred to have it omitted in order to avoid controversy with the Greek views. It
was indeed omitted in Rome, while the Frankish Church continued to use it, and
only in the eleventh century was it finally included in the Mass in Rome.360
This huge work of restoration and adornment of churches shows the wealth of
the papacy, derived partly from the papal use of old imperial land and from the
domuscultae, but above all from Charlemagne’s vast array of gifts to St Peter’s,
when he granted much of the Avar treasure gained when his son Pepin triumphed
over them. But the display was not simply a matter of showing off wealth. Far
more important was the use of images everywhere to highlight papal and Italian
support for icons, and the triumph of their position at the second council of
Nicea in 787. To highlight further the transmission of the imperial function to
the Carolingians, several popes made gifts of objects representing emperors to
churches. Pope Gregory IV gave a purple veil representing the emperor to S. Paolo,
and later Pope Leo IV had gold panels made at St Peter’s, representing Christ,
St Peter, St Paul, and St Andrew, with Leo IV and his ‘spiritual son the Lord

immagine e realta’, in Geertman, ed., Il Liber pontificalis e la storia materiale, pp. 189–203, and
Geertman, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 137–144, as well as Hartmann, Hadrian I, pp. 82–91, 113–53. For
Carolingian art in Rome over the period, see the excellent introduction by G. Curzi, ‘Carolingi e
Ottoni: arte a Roma da Adriano I a Silvestro II (772–1003)’, in Papacy and Art, ed. M. Kato (Tokyo:
Collected Papers on Medieval Art in Europe 1, 2015), pp. 196–210, esp. 195–204; and the most recent
exhibition catalogue, Stiegemann and Wemhoff, 799. Kunst und Kultur.

358 LP I. 98, chs. 26–112, and esp. the famous Catalogue at chs. 68–81; see, for example, Geertman,
More Veterum, pp. 82–129. Geertman gives the most detailed account and list of the papal interven­
tions in the city, starting with Hadrian I, pp. 7–36; Leo III, pp. 37–70; Gregory IV, pp. 71–79; and later
ninth-century popes, pp. 80–1. For Leo III see L. E. Philipps, ‘A Note on the Gifts of Leo III to the
churches of Rome: “Vestes cum storiis” ’, Ephemerides Liturgicae 102 (1988), pp. 72–8, and now Bauer,
Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 227–31.
359 For a particularly clear summary of the issue of the Libri Carolini, see Arnaldi, G., 1979, ‘La
questione dei Libri Carolini’, in Capitani, ed., Culto cristiano, Todi, pp. 63–86.
360 Davis, LPC9, p. 219 n. 171.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 365

Emperor Lothar’.361 The most famous image displaying papal and Carolingian
harmony is, of course, the famous and still extant (though much-restored) mosaic
of Leo III’s Lateran triclinium. It features a symmetrical representation of the
dele­ga­tion of power, by Christ to St Peter and the Emperor Constantine, and
below by St Peter to Pope Leo III on one side, and to Charlemagne on the ­other.362
The iconographic programme only reinforced the themes of Charlemagne as a
successor to the Empire of Constantine, which had already been put forward
under his father, Pepin, by Pope Paul who, after the translation of the relics of St
Petronilla,363 had ordered that chapel in St Peter’s decorated with paintings relating
the story of Constantine. Leo III’s renovations at the Lateran have been said to show
papal determination to propose the papacy as a successor to the Byzantine Empire.364
Yet, at the same time, that same Leo III was active in promoting the imperial
iconography of Charlemagne in the Lateran and at S. Susanna, his own titulus,
which he restored and where he had the apse made—sadly now lost though known
from later drawings—also depicting Leo III and Charlemagne (Plate 8).365
Moreover, if Giunta is correct, the iconography of the absidal arch at SS Nereo e
Achilleo was meant to be a refutation of Spanish adoptionism; the heresy had
become of such major concern to Charlemagne that he asked Leo III to hold a
council in Rome in 798 and anathematize its pro­pon­ent, Bishop Felix.366 Leo did
so, perhaps reinforcing the point with the images in SS Nereo e Achilleo, in yet
another manifestation of the alliance between popes and Carolingians.
The impact of the Carolingians was at its most evident in art and architecture
with Pope Paschal. He continued the major building programme begun by Leo III

361 LP I. 103, ch. 27; 105, ch. 35.

362 Discussions of the triclinium and its imperial iconography are in Wilpert, Die römischen
Mosaiken, pp. 19–20; Matthiae, Pittura romana, pp. 197–9 for the artistic problems; and in general in
Krautheimer, Profile of a City, pp. 114–22; Noble, Republic of St Peter, pp. 323–4; and C. Davis-Weyer,
‘Eine patristische Apologie des “Imperium Romanum” und die Mosaiken der Aula Leonina’, in
Munuscula Discipulorum. Kunsthistorische Studien Hans Kauffmann zum 70. Geburtstag 1966, ed.
T. Buddensieg and M. Winner (Berlin, 1968), pp. 71–83. For the triclinia, see Krautheimer, Profile of a
City, pp. 115–16; Curzi, ‘The two triclinia’, pp. 141–52; Walter, ‘Papal political imagery’, pp. 155–76;
Belting, ‘Die beiden Palastaulen Leos III’, pp. 55–83; Luchterhandt, ‘Päpstlicher Palastbau’, pp. 109–22;
Luchterhandt, ‘Rom und Aachen’, pp. 55–70; Iacobini, ‘II mosaico’, pp. 189–96; and Bauer, Das Bild der
Stadt, pp. 68–75, 109–117, and the bringing together of several reconstructions, Ills. 19–20 and 69, 71.
363 Goodson, ‘To be the daughter of St Peter’, pp. 159–88.
364 See H. Belting, ‘I mosaici dell’aula leonina come testimonianza della prima “renovatio” nell’arte
medievale a Roma’, in Roma e l’età carolingia, pp. 167–82, who suggests that Leo III’s mosaics at the
Lateran but also on the arch at SS Nereo ed Achilleo, and the now lost ones at St Peter’s with the
Traditio Legis and at S. Susanna, support this view.
365 Davis-Weyer, ‘Das Apsismosaik’, pp. 177–94, esp. Pls. 3–4, 7–9, and 11; A. Bonanni, ‘La basilica
di S. Susanna in Roma’, in 1983–1993: dieci anni di archeologia cristiana, ed. E. Russo (Cassino, 2003),
pp. 359–76; M. Trinci Cecchelli et al., 2004, ‘Santa Susanna’, in Paroli and Vendittelli eds., Roma
dall’antichità all’alto medioevo II, pp. 328–41; and Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 107–9 and Ill. 40–4;
and M. Andaloro, ‘S. Susanna. Gli affreschi frammentari’, in Roma dall’Antichità al Medioevo, ed.
Arena, pp. 643–5.
366 Giunta, ‘I mosaici dell’arco absidale’, pp. 195–200; Wisskirchen, ‘Leo III und die Mosaikprogramme’,
pp. 139–51. See also Curzi, ‘La decorazione musiva’, pp. 21–46; Utro, ‘Una falsa testimonianza’,
pp. 507–18.
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366 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

in his own churches at S. Prassede, S. Maria in Domnica, and S. Cecilia, with the
creation of the apse mosaics, the insertion of annular crypts, and the transfer of
relics. Much work has been done in recent years on Paschal’s churches, especially
on S. Prassede, for example by Ballardini, Goodson, and Wisskirchen, who have
examined in great detail the scope of Paschal’s work in Rome, its design, and
­purpose.367 Goodson’s argument has been that Paschal’s building work focused
on specific areas of the city, those best suited to a papal appropriation of city space
because they were either outside the centre or in an area of relative abandonment
of occupation, but still placed between the Lateran and St Peter’s. His seem to be
lesser churches in the Roman landscape, but they have specific meanings within
his programme. Both S. Cecilia and S. Prassede are churches located in the houses
of the founders and martyrs in, respectively, Trastevere and Celio, and in the case
of S. Prassede, on the procession route to S. Maria Maggiore, while S. Maria in
Domnica was a diaconia on a main road. In architectural terms, their keyword
was prestige. This was in the form of monumental entrances, roof beams (for the
acquisition of which Carolingian help was being solicited), and a reshaping and
refocusing on the liturgical space of power in the presbiterium, where a deliberate
sacralization of the space took place with the creation of the vertical line of crypt,
high altar, and ciborium. The focus was clearly set on the Eucharistic liturgy and
the processions; Paschal’s gifts were liturgical luxuries (silver, gold, silks), and
annex chapels, like the Zeno chapel at S. Prassede and the Chapel of the Baths at
S. Cecilia, are focused on obtaining the intercession of the two saints. To this
interpretation, we now need to add an important revisiting of the topic by
Luchterhandt in several papers, of which the most important re-examines Paschal
I’s ecclesiastical topography.368 Luchterhandt does not deny Paschal’s purpose in

367 A. Ballardini, ‘Dai Gesta di Pasquale I secondo il “Liber Pontificalis” ai monumenta iconografici
delle basiliche romane di S. Prassede, S. Maria Domnica e S. Cecilia in Trastevere’, ASRSP 122 (1999),
pp. 5–68; Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal I, pp. 90–197; see also Goodson, ‘Revival and Reality:
The Carolingian Renaissance in Rome and the basilica of S. Prassede’, in Continuatio et renovatio, ed.
S. Sande (Rome: Istituto di Norvegia, Acta ad archaeologiam et artium historiam pertinentia 20,
2007), pp. 163–92, and CB, III, pp. 232–59. Other work on S. Prassede is by V. Pace, ‘La “felix culpa”
di Richard Krautheimer: Roma, Santa Prassede e la “Rinascenza carolingia” ’, and M. Caperna,
‘Osservazioni sull’architettura della basilica di S. Prassede alla luce delle nuove conoscenze’, both in
Ecclesiae urbis, ed. F. Guidobaldi and G. Guidobaldi, 2 vols. (Vatican City, 2002), I, pp. 65–75, and II,
pp. 933–57; P. J. Nordhagen, ‘Un problema di carattere iconografico e tecnico a S. Prassede’, in Roma e
l’età carolingia, pp. 159–65; Mauck, ‘The Mosaic of the Triumphal Arch’, pp. 813–28; R. Wisskirchen,
‘Das Mosaikprogramm vom S. Prassede in Rom. Ikonographie und Ikonologie’, Jahrbuch für Antike
und Christentum 17 (1990); M. G. Sundell, Mosaics in the Eternal City (Arizona, 2007), pp. 1–49 esp.
10–36; and Mancho Suárez, C., 2010–11, ‘Pasquale I, Santa Prassede, Roma e Santa Prassede’, Arte
medievale, s. IV, 1, pp. 31–47; R. Wisskirchen, Die Mosaiken der Kirche Santa Prassede in Rom (Mainz:
Zaberns Bildbände zur Archäologie 5, 1992); C. Zaccagnini, ‘Nuove osservazioni sugli affreschi
altomedievali della chiesa romana di S. Prassede, Rivista dell’lstituto Nazionale d’Archeologia e Storia
dell’Arte 22 (1999), pp. 83–114; and the monograph on the architecture of the church by M. Caperna,
La Basilica di Santa Prassede. Il significato della vicenda architettonica (Rome, 2014). On Paschal at Sta
Cecilia, see G. Hartmann, ‘Paschalis I. und die heilige Cäcilia. Ein Translationsbericht im Liber
Pontificalis’, QFIAB 87 (2007), pp. 36–70.
368 Luchterhandt, ‘Papst Paschalis I’, pp. 383–402.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 367

using the iconography for anti-iconoclastic purposes, and also the translations of
relics as a form of enhancement of papal authority by associating it so clearly with
relics. He does, however, bring a new and totally convincing focus on Paschal’s
Stiftungspolitik in Rome as part of his reinforcement of the family power of a
Roman nobleman. Like those of his aristocratic predecessors in the mid-eighth
century: Stephen II and Paul at S. Silvestro, and his successors who would imitate
him,,such as Gregory IV at his titulus of S. Marco, Stephen IV and Sergius II at
theirs at S. Martino ai Monti and S. Pietro ad Vincula, Paschal I’s foundations also
favoured churches close to the family home, in fact churches associated with the
family area of influence and power, claims Luchterhandt. In Paschal’s case, this was,
he argues, on the Esquiline, thus explaining his choice of patronage of S. Prassede,
in which he actually built what was to all intents and purposes a ‘family chapel’,
S. Zeno,369 while his interest was very definitely centred in that area, not just with
S. Maria in Domnica, but also very much with S. Maria Maggiore. As we saw
previously, important Roman families generally had one son who was sent into
the Church, generally meaning the Lateran hierarchy, and he often restored or
adorned his titulus, turning it into a ‘family’ church used as memoria. Paschal’s
interest in S. Prassede was part of this family strategy, confirmed by his interest in
S. Maria Maggiore and its relics—especially the praesepium, the basilica to which
he made the most numerous gifts, and which he used for the stational liturgy
more than any others, including for the great festivals traditionally celebrated at
St Peter’s or the Lateran (Palm Sunday, Whit Sunday, and Ascension Day), which
he shifted to S. Maria Maggiore.370
Paschal’s translation of relics to S. Prassede, just as his ‘discovery’ of the relics
of St Cecilia, were indeed part of the papacy’s new focus on its legitimacy because
of relics, especially those with a story attached to them, like those of sisters
Prassede and Pudenziana, or Cecilia and her husband Valentinian. From Hadrian
I onwards, the custom of reading the gesta and passiones of the martyrs on their
feast day in their tituli grew, to the detriment of their traditional cult in their
ceme­ter­ies. Paschal I saw a need to reconcile the traditional Roman perception of
cult of the martyrs in situ with bringing relics into the city, and he did so partly by
reconciling the more traditional aristocracy to this new development through
favouring a close association between them and specific churches. Partly, his was
the choice of a member of such a family, we assume. Partly, he deliberately kept
his distance from the Lateran, whose primacy had been purposefully built up by

369 G. Mackie, ‘The San Zeno chapel: a prayer for salvation’, PBSR 57 (1989), pp. 172–99.
370 Ibid., p. 389; D. Kinney, ‘The Praesepia in Santa Maria in Trastevere and Santa Maria Maggiore’,
in Marmoribus vestita. Miscellanea in onore di Federico Guidobaldi, ed. O. Brandt and P. Pergola
(Vatican City, 2011), pp. 777–95. On S. Maria Maggiore see also Saxer, Sainte Marie Majeure. Also
looking at Paschal’s policy with regard to his churches is C. Mancho Suárez, ‘Pascal Ier: Autorité pon­
tificale et création artistique à Rome au début du IXe siècle. Quelques notes’, in Faire et Voir l’autorité
pendant l’antiquité et le Moyen Âge. Images et monuments, actes de la journée d’étude tenue à Paris le 14
novembre 2014 à Institut national d’histoire de l’art, ed. A.-O. Poilpré (Paris, 2014), pp. 71–96.
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368 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Leo III, a pope with no aristocratic background, who had attempted to make its
bureacracy a centre of power. Paschal kept away from this Lateran bureacracy and
attempted to reconcile two traditions, that of family foundations and that of a
focus on relics, even though this was not in the traditional form of Roman
piety expressed through the cult in situ, which belonged to the old patterns
of veneration.
Key elements in Paschal’s programme were, therefore, the focus on interces­
sion through the power of relics, with a strong element of interest in early Roman
martyrs, and through the implementation of Carolingian elements in the liturgy,
notably the processional crypts, and the prescribed separation between clergy
and laity. The latter was implemented through the reorganization of liturgical
space in the presbiterium, with the celebrant no longer facing the people, and the
reinforcing of the specific gender and social zoning of the space, for example the
senatorium and the matroneum.371 But Carolingian impact extended to the small­
est of liturgical furnishings. Ciboria, ambos, cathedrae, marble decoration of
capitals and of the choir enclosure (trasenna), as well as marble, stone, and silver
crucifixes, were all markedly influenced by Carolingian iconography and stylistic
motifs, as at S. Martino ai Monti or SS Quattro Coronati.372 Carolingian reliefs
and sculptures have survived only erratically, but there must have been a fairly
large number from many churches, if one is to take into account all the items now
found in the Lapidarium of the Museo di Roma, for example, with survivals from

371 See De Blaauw’s work, for example ‘Architettura e arredo’, pp. 52–61; ‘L’altare nelle chiese di
Roma’, pp. 969–90; and ‘Liturgical features’, pp. 324–37. See also E. De Benedictis, ‘The Senatorium
and Matroneum in the early Roman Church’, Rivista di Archeologia Christiana 57 (1981), pp. 69–85.
372 De Blaauw, ‘Architettura e arredo’, pp. 56–61; L. Barelli, ‘Il reimpiego delle preesistenze nelle
costruzioni di età carolingia a Roma: II. Il caso dei SS. Quattro Coronati’, in Il reimpiego in architettura.
Recupero, trasformazione, uso, ed. J.-F. Bernard, P. Bernardi, and D. Esposito (Rome, 2014), pp. 315–28,
and E. Thunø, ‘Some Remarks on the S. Barbara Chapel in Ss. Quattro Coronati in Rome’, Arte
Medievale, s. II, 10, 2 (1996), pp. 15–22; and F. Astolfi, ‘Il complesso di S. Martino ai Monti’, Forma
Urbis 4/10 (1999), pp. 21–6; see also CB III, pp. 87–124 esp. 108–13, and CB IV, pp. 1–36 esp. 29–31.
On the impact of the reuse of architectural models under Carolingian influence, see A. Ballardini,
‘Scultura per l’arredo liturgico nella Roma di Pasquale I: tra modelli paleocristiani e “Flechtwerk” ’, in
Medioevo mediterraneo: arte e storia. Atti del convegno, Parma 2004, ed. A. C. Quintavalle (Milan,
2007), pp. 225–46, and P. Barresi and P. Pensabene, ‘La “rinascita carolingia” del IX secolo: reimpiego,
architettura, progettazione’, in La cristianizzazione in Italia tra Tardoantico e Altomedioevo. Atti del IX
Congresso Nazionale di Archeologia Crisitiana (Agrigento, 20–5 novembre 2004), ed. R. M. Bonacasa
Carra and E. Vitale (Palermo, 2007), pp. 381–439. The most important recent work is by L. Barelli,
‘I quadriportici nell’architettura religiosa della Roma carolingia (secoli viii e IX)’, in Giornate di studio
in onore di Claudio Tiberi (Rome: Quaderni dell’Istituto di storia dell’architettura, 2012), pp. 71–81,
and her Architettura e tecnica costruttiva a Roma nell’altomedioevo (Rome, 2018), especially:
‘Firmissimum Ponere Aedificium. Tecniche costruttive nella Roma Carolingia’, pp. 17–76; ‘Arcos
A Fundamentis Construxit. Il perduto portico di Sergio II (844–847) nella Basilica Lateranense’,
pp. 77–92; ‘Leo Papa Fieri Iussit. Leone IV (847–855) e la ricostruzione della basilica dei Ss. Quattro
Coronati’, pp. 93–172; and ‘Meliorem Erigere Statum. Osservazioni sull’architettura religiosa a Roma
nella prima metà del IX secolo’, pp. 173–96. Carolingian silverwork was a favoured form in Rome; see
V. H. Ebern, ‘Werke liturgischer Goldschmiedekunst in karolingischer Zeit’ in Culto Cristiano e polit-
ica imperiale carolingia 9–12 ottobre 1977. Atti del XVIII convegno di studi sulla Spiritualità Medievale
(Todi, 1979), pp. 303–36.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 369

sources as diverse as Castel Sant’Angelo, S. Basilio in scala mortuorum, S. Andrea

de Piscina, S. Pudenziana, and S. Sabina.373
However, Paschal’s imagery was not solely concerned with Carolingian paral­
lels. The pope had to contend with a revival of iconoclasm from 815 onwards,
under the Emperor Leo V, and his vast and complex mosaics in the apses of his
churches, but above all in the narrative imagery of S. Prassede, were specifically
designed to counter this new iconoclastic threat. This was visible in the icon­og­
raphy of the apse and the triumphal arch, with its apocalyptic themes, but also in
less obvious images, such as the representations in fresco of the martyrdom of the
saints Crysantius and Daria and Julian and Basilissa, suggesting resistance to
imperial power used for persecution.374 Previous popes had already used icon­og­
raphy in Roman churches to make theological and political points, starting with
Gregory I’s fundamental arguments about the validity of images for teaching
purposes.375 Another pope who had done the same had been John VII, whose
iconographic programme at S. Maria Antiqua has been the object of a large body
of writings. It is now agreed, broadly speaking, that it reflected the pope’s subtle,
but nonetheless definite, refusal to bow to imperial heretical views, to the extent
of including the portrait of Pope Martin, considered a martyr for not accepting
Monothelitism and dying as a result of his opposition to it in the seventh cen­tury.376
Pope Zacharias’s purposeful promotion of images at S. Maria Maggiore, and his
successors’ support, in their monasteries, of Greek refugees from iconoclasm as
monks and abbots, led to Paschal’s imagery making the same point.377 Andaloro

373 F. Betti, ‘Sculture carolingie del Lapidario del Museo di Roma: materiale inedito e contesti di
provenienza’, Bollettino dei Musei Comunali di Roma n.s. 17 (2003), pp. 142–61. See also G. Curzi, ‘Tra
Saraceni e Lanzichenecchi. Crocifissi monumentali di età carolingia nella basilica di San Pietro’, Arte
Medievale n.s. 2 (2003), pp. 15–28, and K. C. Schüppel, Silberne und goldene Monumentalkruzifixe: ein
Beitrag zur mittelalterlichen Liturgie- und Kulturgeschichte (Weimar, 2005).
374 U. Nilgen, ‘Die römischen Apsisprogramme der karolingischen Epoche. Päpstliche Repräsentation
und Liturgie’, in Stiegemann and Wemhoff, 799. Kunst und Kultur, pp. 542–9.
375 Western views on images had been shaped by Gregory the Great, who allowed their use for
didactic purposes for the non-literate. The debate was very different in Rome from Byzantium, claims
Maria Andaloro, ‘Il Liber Pontificalis e la questione delle immagini da Sergio I a Adriano I’, in Roma e
l’età carolingia, pp. 69–78. Because Rome had preserved and spread Gregory the Great’s view of images
towards northern Europe, the Carolingian tradition preserved this devotional and teaching purpose.
Thus there are only thirty-five ‘icons’ recorded in Rome, as opposed to the thousands which seems to
have been available in the Byzantine Empire, which would explain why the issue of iconoclasm was so
much more problematic in Byzantium; on this, see also T. F. X. Noble, Images, Iconoclasm, and the
Carolingians (Philadelphia, 2009), and J.-M. Sansterre, ‘Entre deux mondes? La vénération des images
à Rome et en Italie d’apres les textes des Ve–XI siècles’, in Roma fra Oriente e Occidente, Settimane 49
(2002), II, pp. 993–1050; A. Carile, ‘L’iconoclasmo tra Bisanzio e l’Italia’, in Culto delle immagini e crisi
iconoclasta. Atti del Convegno di Studi (Catania, 16–17 maggio 1984) (Palermo, 1986), pp. 13–54; and
V. Peri, ‘Il culto delle immagini e delle reliquie nella crisi dell’iconoclastia’, in San Luca evangelista tes-
timone della fede che unisce. Atti del congresso internazionale, Padova, 16–21 ottobre 2000 (Padua,
2004), III, pp. 152–202.
376 See above, note 5.
377 Another key element in Paschal’s programme was the representation of the Lamb of God: the
traditional view was that, at S. Maria Antiqua for example, the image of the Lamb of God being substi­
tuted with a cross was a reflection of Roman obedience to the decrees of Constantinople forbidding
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370 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

has been particularly successful in showing the use and efficacy of icons,
­representations of image cycles, as well as papal portraits in the major basilicas as
part of the anti-iconoclastic campaign in Rome.378
At the same time, Paschal I’s use of Carolingian models was balanced by a
deliberate artistic renewal according to early Christian models, then Byzantine
ones, available in Rome. The best example of this duality is the chapel of S. Zeno
at S. Prassede.379 (Plate 9) Davis-Weyer claims that behind the presumed
Byzantine Harrowing of Hell in the chapel lies in fact a powerful Carolingian
influence.380 Concurrently, Kartsonis, looking at the same iconographical motif
in S. Zeno, admits the influence of the style of fresco from the Carolingian church
at Mustair, for example in the angels added onto what is originally a Byzantine
iconography; but she also suggests that the theme of David and Solomon rising
out of their sarcophagi is Byzantine, while their crowns, for example, are neither
Byzantine nor Carolingian but specifically Roman, of the same type as those we
see, for example, at S. Cecilia.381 Another form of revival was that of the Roman
decorative tradition of the opus sectile for the pavement of churches.382 We must
also take into account that not all Carolingian impact on Roman art and architecture
was ‘new’, whether in terms of iconography, style, or scope. True to the ideo­logic­al

the Adoration of the Lamb; see above note. At S. Prassede, which is in many ways a copy of SS Cosma
e Damiano’s sixth-century apse mosaic and transept, one can see Paschal’s purposeful reaffirming of
the Adoration of the Lamb when faced once again with iconoclasm; see Nordhagen, ‘Un problema di
carattere iconografico’, pp. 159–66.

378 M. Andaloro, ‘Dal ritratto all’icona’, pp. 23–54, and M. Andaloro and S. Romano, ‘L’immagine
nell’abside’, pp. 73–102 at 73–88, both in Andaloro and Romano, Arte e iconografia a Roma; Andaloro,
‘Immagine e immagini nel Liber Pontificalis da Adriano I a Pasquale I’, in Geertman, ed., Il Liber pon-
tificalis e la storia materiale, pp. 45–104; Andaloro, ‘Le icone a Roma in età preiconoclasta’, in Roma fra
Oriente e Occidente, Settimane 49 (2002). See also A. Ballardini, ‘Fare immagini tra Occidente e
Oriente: Claudio di Torino, Pasquale I e Leone V l’Armeno’, in Quintavalle, ed., Medioevo mediterra-
neo, pp. 194–214.
379 Krautheimer, Profile of a City, pp. 122–41; on the chapel see Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal
I, pp. 160–72; Ballardini, ‘Dai Gesta di Pasquale I’, pp. 5–68, and R. Wisskirchen, ‘Zur Zenokapelle in
S. Prasede/Rom’, Frühmittelalterliche Studien 25 (1991), pp. 96–108.
380 C. Davis-Weyer, ‘Die ältesten Darstellungen der Hadesfahrt Christi’, in Roma e l’età carolingia,
pp. 183–94; Wisskirchen, ‘Zur Zenokapelle’. The first representation of the motif in Rome was in the
chapel of John VII and was, according to Nordhagen, aimed at conveying an imperial theme; see his ‘The
“Harrowing of Hell” as imperial iconography. A note on its earliest use’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 75
(1982), pp. 345–8, repr. in his Studies in Byzantine and Early Medieval Painting (London, 1990), no XVI.
381 Kartsonis, Anastasis, pp. 88–91; see also on this Sansterre, Les moines grecs, pp. 163–71, who
agrees that, while there was some pre-iconoclasm Byzantine influence in Rome, even S. Maria
Antiqua, traditionally seen as the ultimate Byzantine church, had a mix of Byzantine motifs and
­specific Roman ones, notably the famous Maria Regina depiction, and that the chapel of S. Zeno, just
as several manuscripts produced in Rome, shows a strong early Christian and Carolingian influence.
On this, see also Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal I, pp. 149–56, and J. Osborne, ‘Rome and
Constantinople in the ninth century’, in McKitterick et al., ed., Rome across Time and Space, pp. 222–36.
For Maria Regina see M. Lawrence, ‘Maria Regina’, Art Bulletin 7 (1925), pp. 150–61; U. Nilgen, ‘Maria
Regina. Ein politischer Kultbildtypus?’, Römisches Jahrbuch fur Kunstgeschichte 19 (1981), pp. 3–33 at
5–8, and J. Osborne, ‘Early Medieval Painting in S. Clemente, Rome: the Madonna and Child in the
Niche’, Gesta 20 (1981), pp. 299–310 at 303–6.
382 C. McClendon, ‘The revival of opus sectile pavement in Rome and the vicinity in the Carolingian
period’, PBSR 48 (1980), pp. 157–65.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 371

views of Carolingian writers, a considerable part of such intervention was in the

form of restoration of late antique art, whether in terms of architectural reinforce­
ment, as at S. Martino in Monti, or of intervention for the purposes of restoration,
for example in the mosaics of S. Maria Maggiore and S. Pudenziana, or just in
terms of narrative models, such as Paschal’s apse mosaics imitating SS Cosma e
Damiano.383 Restoring early Christian art became part of a papal attempt to gain
a monopoly on the renewal of the city.384
We saw earlier that the second half of the ninth century was a period of some
rapprochement with the Byzantine Empire, made possible by the end of icono­
clasm. It was in part prompted by the attacks on Rome in 881, which made popes
such as John VIII request help from the Emperor Basil I, who was already
­concerned with reclaiming the south of Italy. More frequent direct contacts with
Constantinople also ensured a renewed fashion for Byzantine art. This would
have been known through gifts made by the Emperor Michael III, twice to the
popes, including a gold-covered manuscript of the Gospels, a Greek-style chalice
cover, and numerous silk curtains and altar cloths to Benedict III in 855, and later
again through the dispatch of high officials to Pope Nicholas, with more precious
gifts, to request papal support for Photius.385

383 A. S. Spain, ‘Carolingian Restorations of the Mosaics of S. Maria Maggiore’, Gesta 16 (1977),
pp. 13–22; see also V. Elbern, ‘L’arte carolingia e l’Antico’, in Roma, centro ideale della cultura dell’antico
nei secc. XV e XVI. Atti del convegno internazionale, Roma 1985 (Milan, 1989), pp. 48–58; V. Pace,
‘Immagini sacre nei programmi figurativi della Roma altomedievale (V–IX secolo): livelli di percezi­
one e di fruizione’, in his Arte a Roma nel Medioevo. Committenza, ideologia e cultura figurativa in
monumenti e libri (Naples, 2000), pp. 269–86 at 279–83; W. Tronzo,‘Apse decoration, the liturgy and
the perception of art in medieval Rome’, in Italian Church Decoration of the Middle Ages and Early
Renaissance. Functions, Forms and Regional Traditions: Ten Contributions to a Colloquium held at the
Villa Spelman, Florence, ed. W. Tronzo (Bologna, 1989), pp. 167–93; and Nilgen, ‘Die römische
Apsisprogramme’, pp. 542–9. See Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 190–203, on the papal monopoly on
the programme of restoring the antique.
384 The issue of the reuse of Roman antiquities by the papacy and generally in Rome in the Middle
Ages is a vast one, on which I shall touch in Chapter 6. Here I need to mention more general works
from among the large number in existence, such as C. Nardella, ‘L’antiquaria romana dal Liber
Pontificalis ai Mirabilia urbis Romae’, in Roma antica nel Medioevo. Mito, rappresentazioni, soprav-
vivenze nella Respublica Christiana dei secoli IX–XIII. Atti della XIV settimana internazionale di studio
(Mendola, 24–8 agosto 1998), ed. P. Zerbi (Milan, 2001), pp. 423–48; U. Nilgen, ‘Roma e le antichità
romane nelle raffigurazioni medievali’, in Roma antica nel Medioevo., pp. 449–76; some of the great
classics such as S. Settis, ed., Memoria dell’antico nell’arte italiana, I. L’uso dei classici; II. I generi e i temi
ritrovati; III. Dalla tradizione all’archeologia Turin (1984–6), which notably includes two papers by
M. Greenhalgh, ‘Ipsa ruina docet: l’uso dell’antico nel Medioevo’, I, pp. 113–67, and ‘Iconografia antica
e sue trasformazioni durante il Medioevo’, II, pp. 155–96; P. Liverani, ‘Reading Spolia in Late antiquity
and Contemporary Perception’, in Reuse value: spolia and appropriation in art and architecture, from
Constantine to Sherrie Levine, ed. R. Brilliant and D. Kinney (Farnham, 2011), pp. 33–51; the work of
Dale Kinney himself, for example his ‘Spolia, damnatio and renovatio memoriae’, Memoirs of the
American Academy in Rome 42 (1997), pp. 117–48, and ‘Communication in a visual mode: papal apse
mosaics’, Journal of Medieval History 44 (2018), pp. 311–32; and that of S. Settis, ‘Roma fuori di Roma:
periferie della memoria’, in Roma nell’Alto Medioevo, Settimane 48, Spoleto; A. Esch, ‘Reimpiego
dell’antico nel Medioevo. La prospettiva dell’archeologo, la prospettiva dello storico’, in Ideologie e
pratiche del reimpiego nell’Alto Medioevo, Settimane 46, Spoleto, pp. 73–108; and L. De Lachenal,
Spolia. Uso e reimpiego dell’antico dal III al XIV secolo (Milan, 1995).
385 LP I. 106, chs. 32–3; 107, ch. 38. Osborne, ‘Rome and Constantinople’, pp. 222–36, at 227–31,
argues that Byzantine influences were once again strong in Rome at this point, for example in the
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372 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

As well as architectural contributions, mosaics, marbles, gold and silver panels,

gifts, especially in the form of reliquaries, cult vessels, silk embroideries, enamels,
and panels with precious stones were the most common manifestation of papal
wealth, used for the sake of the adornment of Roman churches. While I would
refer the reader to the attempts made by numerous scholars to list and detail these,
from Geertman to Delogu and Bauer for example,386 here I propose to give only
one example of the building up of a papal treasure: that of the Sancta Sanctorum
in the Lateran Palace. The chapel did indeed house the most highly venerated
relics in the city, and many of the less prestigious ones were kept in little bags
which have survived. But the more important were given special reliquaries, and
some of the most highly prized of these have also survived. Apart from the
Acheropoita icon, the second-best-known item in the collection was a reliquary
cross, now in the Vatican Museum, generally dated to between the sixth and
eighth centuries. It was known to Bede, presumably from his source’s copy of the
relevant item in the Liber Pontificalis. This is his description:

By divine revelation, Pope Sergius found a silver chest in the sanctuary of the
blessed Apostle Peter, where it had long lain hidden in a very dark corner. In it
was a cross adorned with diverse precious stones. When he had removed the
four metal plates by which the gems were embedded, he discovered inside the
cross a piece of the salvific Cross of the Lord, of marvellous size. From that
time forward, each year on the day of the Exaltation [of the Cross] this [relic] is
kissed and adored by all the people in the basilica of the Saviour, known as the
Constantinian [basilica].387

Anastasis on the tomb of St Cyril in S. Clemente, and in S. Maria in Secundicerio (pp. 229–30), and
especially in two MSS possibly written in a Greek scriptorium in Rome; see Chapter 5. The arguments
on S. Clemente (the tomb was that of a missionary to Moravia, where Greek influence was strong) and
S. Maria in Secundicerio, in the area of the Schola Greca near S. Maria in Cosmedin, do not seem to
me sufficient to justify the idea of a ‘Byzantine art revival’: first of all, Byzantium was only just emer­
ging from a long iconoclastic period and, secondly, the two examples given have specific eastern links,
which did not necessarily apply to most of Roman art.

386 Geertman, More Veterum; P. Delogu, ‘The rebirth of Rome in the eighth and ninth centuries’, in
The rebirth of towns in the West AD 700–1050: Based on papers presented to the 4th joint CBA/DUA
international conference on the Rebirth of Towns in the West AD 700–1050: Museum of London, 1986,
ed. R. Hodges and B. Hobley (London, 1988), pp. 277–80 and Table 2; P. Delogu, ‘L’importazione di
tessuti preziosi’, in Delogu, ed., Roma medievale. Aggiornamenti, pp. 123–42; H. Belting, Papal artistic
commissions as definitions of the Church in Rome (Pennsylvania, 1987); A. Iacobini, “ ‘Aurea Roma”—
Le arti preziose da Costantino all’età carolingia: committenza, produzione, circolazione’, in Roma tra
Oriente e Occidente, Settimane 49 (2002), pp. 651–93; M. C. Miller, ‘The sources of textiles and
vestments in Early Medieval Rome’, in Garver and Phelan, Rome and Religion in the Medieval West,
pp. 83–99; and F. Riganati, ‘Manufatti tessili per la custodia e il culto delle reliquie nella Roma
altomedi­evale’, in Boesch Gajano, La thesauzzazione delle reliquie, pp. 17–32.
387 Bede, De temporum ratione liber, ed. W. Jones (Turnhout, 1977) pp. 529–30; Bede, The
Reckoning of Time, tr. Wallis, p. 233. LP, I, 374.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 373

This enamel cross was decorated with scenes from the early life of Christ, many in
the early Christian style seen at S. Maria Maggiore or in Ravenna.388 The protect­
ing casket given by Pope Paschal I was decorated with parallel scenes, with the
same iconography, while the post-Carolingian lid figured Christ between Peter
and Paul.389 A second jewelled cross, dating from the eighth century and possibly
given by Charlemagne to Hadrian I, contained the relic of the Circumcision. It
was encased in a silver casket, decorated with scenes from the adult life of Christ,
set around the central panel depicting a conflation of Christ as high priest cele­
brating the sacrifice on the altar, and the Last Supper, while the sides depict twelve
post-Resurrection scenes. It has been identified as possibly of Frankish or Anglo-
Saxon manufacture.390 The first cross contained a piece of the True Cross, and
was used as part of two major processions, that on Good Friday from the Lateran
to S. Croce for the papal mass, according to the Ordo Romanum I,391 and that on
the feast day of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, when it was anointed with balm.
Other New Testament relics venerated in the Sancta Sanctorum were also kept in
reliquaries decorated with a rich iconography, for example the tenth-century
wooden reliquary with a painted lid depicting the Nativity and the Baptism at the
bottom, and the Three Maries and the Ascension at the top, around a Crucifixion
in the central panel.392 Many other reliquaries made of precious woods, ivory, and
enamel, and covered in precious gems and silver, were also decorated with New
Testament figures, including ‘portraits’ of Peter and Paul.393 The Sancta Sanctorum
contained a whole variety of other artefacts, precious textiles from all around the
Mediterranean—crosses, glass ampullae holding relics, medallions, and many
wood and ivory caskets—available for the veneration of visitors.
Subsequent ninth-century popes continued to intervene in Rome. Gregory IV
rebuilt his old titulus at S. Marco, and enriched it, and many other churches with
the usual gifts; Sergius II did the same at S. Martino, which shows very similar
Carolingian features and building techniques to the churches of Paschal I; while
Leo IV intervened comprehensively in the restoration of a large number of

388 On the cross and its casket, see Lauer, Le Trésor du Sancta Sanctorum, pp. 40–9 and 60–6, pls VI
and VIII; Grisar, Die römische Kapelle Sancta sanctorum, pp. 80–2; Volbach, Il tesoro, pp. 15–16, pls 8
and 11; G. Cornini, ‘Reliquiario della vera Croce. Croce smaltata di Pasquale I.- Croce reliquiario di
argento dorato’, in Signum Salutis, ed. C. Garcia de Castro Valdes (Oviedo, 2008), pp. 128–38.
389 The lid cannot be earlier than the Carolingian period, since Peter’s tonsure is of the ‘Irish’ type
introduced by Irish monks within the Carolingian world, and first seen in such manuscripts as the
Bible of Charles the Bald (Bibliothèque Nationale de France, MS lat. 1141, fol. 5v).
390 Lauer, Le Trésor du Sancta Sanctorum, pp. 49–59 and 66–71, Pls VIII–IX; Grisar, Die römische
Kapelle Sancta sanctorum, pp. 82–97; Morello, ‘Il tesoro del Sancta Sanctorum’, has the best photos of
the two crosses, pp. 100–1; on the reliquary casket, see also Goodson, The Rome of Pope Paschal I,
p. 262.
391 Lauer, Le Trésor du Sancta Sanctorum; Andrieu, Ordines romani, II: Les Textes: Ordines I–XIII,
pp. 67–108.
392 Lauer, Le Trésor du Sancta Sanctorum, pp. 97–9, pl. XIV.2; Grisar, Die römische Kapelle Sancta
sanctorum, pp. 113–17; Volbach, Il tesoro, p. 20, pl. 14.
393 Volbach, Il tesoro, pl. 16.
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374 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

churches—in the city, outside it in the cemeteries, and throughout Lazio.394 Most
importantly, he embarked on the considerable work of building a wall around the
Borgo of St Peter, to protect it from Saracen attacks like that which so badly dam­
aged St Peter’s as well as S. Paolo, and succeeded in bringing together the people
of Rome and environs to take charge of building small areas of the wall, until its
completion.395 At the end of the century, after the Saracen raids in the 870s which
again devastated St Peter’s and S. Paolo, walls were built at S. Paolo too, and
popes continued restoring the basilicas, notably Pope Formosus, who redecorated
St Peter’s with a cycle of paintings from Old and New Testament scenes and papal
portraits.396 In the tenth century, Pope John XV (985–96) decorated S. Maria ad
Gradis at St Peter’s with pictures.397 The Lateran basilica had also suffered (badly)
from neglect, and a succession of popes, after the collapse of the roof and some of
the church at the time of Stephen VI, proceeded to restore it—John IX then
Sergius III, John X, and famously John XII, who had the chapel of S. Tommaso,
the sacristy, painted and decorated.398
Gradually another, more classicizing, influence developed in the artistic pro­
duction of the city, in parallel with the growing role of the princeps Alberic and of
parts of the Roman aristocracy, supporters of the Cluniac Reform. We can see this
from the artistic inspiration of the reliquary made for the family relic of Duke
Alberic of Spoleto, that of St Savinus.399 Duke Alberic, husband of Marozia, was
the father of the princeps Alberic. The relic was the main one of the monastery of
S. Maria de Aventino (now S. Maria del Priorato), the family home which Alberic
had turned into a family monastery and from which he had begun his Roman
implementation of the reform of Cluny by Odo. Such influences continued in the
fresco cycles of the monastery founded by the women of Alberic’s family at SS
Ciriaco e Nicola on the Via Lata, a few of which are still visible after their removal
to the Crypta Balbi Museum; and also in the fresco cycle commissioned by Petrus
Medicus for the monastic church of his foundation on the Palatine, S. Maria in
Pallara (now S. Sebastiano al Palatino, or S. Sebastianello).400 They were also

394 LP I. 103, chs. 8–43; 104, chs. 27–39; M. Cecchelli, ‘Il titulus di papa Marco a piazza Venezia’,
Forma Urbis 2/3 (1997), pp. 31–4, and C. Bolgia, ‘The mosaics of Gregory IV at S. Marco, Rome: papal
response to Venice, Byzantium, and the Carolingians’, Speculum 81 (2006), pp. 1–34; M. L. Accorsi, ‘II
complesso dei SS. Silvestro e Martino ai Monti dal III al IX secolo’, in F. Guidobaldi and G. Guidobaldi,
eds., Ecclesiae urbis, I, pp. 533–63; and Herbers, Leo IV, pp. 135–96. On Carolingian architecture in
Rome, see also Luchterhandt, ‘Rinascita a Roma’, pp. 322–73.
395 LP I. 105, chs. 68–74. See also Chapter 5.
396 LP II. 113; BenSor p. 154; Invectiva, p. 139; and MGH SS III, p. 714.
397 LP II. 114.
398 LP II. 115, 118, 122, and 125; BenSor, pp. 154, 156, 159; see also John the Deacon, ‘Liber de
ecclesia Lateranensi’, in Migne, PL 194, col. 1559; see Pomarici, ‘Medioevo. Architettura’, pp. 60–87,
and S. De Blaauw, ‘A medieval portico in S. Giovanni in Laterano’, PBSR 58 (1990), pp. 299–312.
399 A. Peroni and S. Riccioni, ‘The reliquary altar of Sta Maria del Priorato’, in Smith, Early Medieval
Rome, pp. 135–50 at 140, 148–50.
400 For the frescoes at S. Ciriaco in Via Lata, see the Catalogue of the Crypta Balbi Museum,
pp. 448–69; for S. Maria in Pallara, see Marchiori, ‘Art and reform’, and Marchiori, ‘Medieval
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 375

re­iter­ated for the burial of Otto II in the Vatican, with the classical Roman
sarcophagus used; but the only direct Ottonian contribution to Roman art was
the building of the church of S. Adalberto in Isola in 997 by Otto III, in honour of
his friend Adalbert of Prague. Otto III gave it a mosaic of the Saviour on the
façade, and a new carved baptismal font, the only artefact which still survives,
depicting possibly the emperor himself.401 It is noticeable, however, that the name,
so closely associated with Otto III, did not last long, and that, very soon after, the
relics of St Bartholomew were brought to Rome by the emperor in 998, and the
church immediately became known as S. Bartolomeo.402 It has been suggested by
some art historians that new iconographical motifs, notably the Washing of the
Feet, began to appear in Rome as a result of Ottonian manuscript influence, for
ex­ample in the now lost fresco of S. Urbano alla Caffarella, and in the cycle of the
life of St Benedict in the church of S. Crisogono.403
While sharing some architectural and artistic issues with Rome with regard to
its fifth- and sixth-century buildings and mosaics, Ravenna and Venice were at
the centre of the artistic movement described variously in the past as deutero-
Byzantine (Gerola, Galassi), exarchal (Fiocco), deutero-Ravennate (Salmi), or
exarchal-Adriatic, and currently best defined as North Adriatic.404 It was a con­
tinuation of the early Christian style found in Aquileia and Grado, and along the
Istrian coast in such places as Parenzo and Pola, of the Byzantine style of Ravenna
as it spread throughout the Exarchate, and of the inclusion of Longobard, then
Carolingian, features.405 Its characteristic architectural form remains that of the
early Christian basilica on the model of S. Apollinare and S. Severo in Ravenna,
S. Eufemia at Grado, and the Duomo at Parenzo, with occasional more recent
additions, as in the church of Caorle: polygonal external apses, a basilical type

Wallpainting in the church of Santa Maria in Pallara, Rome: the use of objective dating criteria’, PBSR
77 (2009), pp. 225–55. For Roman painting in the tenth century see Matthiae, Pittura romana; and
F. Gandolfo, ‘Il ritratto di committenza’, in M. Andaloro and S. Romano, eds., Arte e iconografia a
Roma, pp. 175–92.

401 G. De Francovich, ‘Contributi alla scultura ottoniana in Italia. Il puteale di S. Bartolomeo

all’Isola’, Bollettino d’Arte 30 (1936), pp. 207–24. For a recent view of it, see M.-P. Guermandi, ed.,
Imperiituro: Renovatio imperii: Ravenna nell’Europa ottoniana (Bologna, 2014), Pl. p. 128.
402 Inscription of 1113 on the front of the church.
403 Waetzoldt, Die Kopien des 17. Jahrhunderts, p. 78 and Pl. 565; Matthiae, Pittura romana,
pp. 240–1; F. Hermanin, L’arte in Roma dal secolo VIII al XIV (Bologna, 1945), pp. 223–5.
404 G. Gerola, ‘L’architettura deuterobizantina di Ravenna’, in Ricordi di Ravenna medievale nel VI
centenario della morte di Dante (Ravenna, 1921), pp. 15–112; Galassi, ‘L’architettura protoromanica’;
G. Fiocco, ‘L’arte esarcale lungo le lagune di Venezia’, AIVSLA 97 (1937–1938), pp. 587–600; also
see G. Fiocco, ‘Ravenna e l’arte dell’Esarcato’, in Le Meraviglie del passato (Milan, 1958), pp. 31–70;
G. Fiocco and M. Salmi, ‘A proposito di arte esarcale’, Le Arti 3/4 and 3/5 (1941), pp. 44–6, 46–7,
372–5 (the latter only Fiocco). For more recent forms of the discussion see C. Rizzardi, Venezia e
Bisanzio: aspetti della cultura artistica bizantina da Ravenna a Venezia, V–XIV secolo (Venice, 2005)
and C. Rizzardi, ‘Chiesa e impero nel medioevo: le abbazie di Ravenna e dell’area padano-adriatica fra
tradizione e innovazione’, Hortus Artium Medievalium 13 (2007), pp. 117–34.
405 Fiocco, ‘Arte esarcale’; Verzone, ‘Le chiese deuterobizantine’, pp. 355–61; Verzone, ‘La scultura
decorativa dell’alto medioevo in Oriente e in Occidente’ II, CARB 1963, pp. 381–8.
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376 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

with three naves, and later a cylindrical campanile.406 The original concept
referred to a seventh-century inscription at Torcello, explaining that the Exarch
Isaac had ordered the magister militum of the Venetia maritima and Istria to build
a church of S. Maria in Torcello.407 That church had an early Christian/Byzantine
mosaic apse with winged angels in clipei, as had S. Vitale and the chapel of
S. Andrea in the episcopium in Ravenna, and later S. Zeno at S. Prassede. Other
churches with mosaics of a similar kind in Venice were S. Teodoro, probably
built by the patricius Narses Nicetas at the beginning of the ninth century, and
S. Margherita, around 836.408 Later the campanili of S. Erasmo, S. Giovanni
Battista on the Giudecca, and the Angelo Raffaele churches were part of the same
pattern as in Ravenna and the pievi of the Romagna. The important factor here is
that this post-exarchal art did not remain unchanged over time, as did Byzantine
art. Though it may have preserved the original plan of the polygonal apse basilica,
for example, it moved away from its late antique features, under the impact of
the liturgical changes imposed by the Carolingians: annular crypts for the relics
and pilgrims—and hence a raised presytery—accompanied in some cases by a
Carolingian-style ciborium on the altar, campanili for the by-now obligatory
bells, and the creation of a westwork. This model, already seen in Rome in the
rebuilt churches of Paschal I, for example, becomes characteristic both of the
great basilicas of Ravenna itself, notably the two S. Appollinare and S. Pietro
Maggiore, and of most pievi under the architectural influence of Ravenna, at
Bagnacavallo, S. Arcangelo di Romagna, Pieve Quinta, and S. Giovanni del Tò
(Plate 10).409 Generally, this ‘post-exarchal’ art spread from Ravenna to the
Veneto/Adriatic zone, and there has been a debate about whether materials for
construction in the Venetia, including those for St Mark’s, had not, in fact, come
first through Ravenna.410
The discussions around the reconstruction of the first two basilicas of St Mark
in Venice cannot possibly be done justice here, and I will attempt a simple sum­
mary solely for the purposes of my analysis of the means of power as expressed
through architecture. St Mark’s was built at first on the model of Aachen, with

406 Concina, Venezia, and, esp., Storia dell’architettura di Venezia dal VII al XX secolo (Milan, 1995),
I, pp. 17–45; S. Bettini, ‘Il cammino dell’arte dalla Venezia paleocristiana alla Venezia bizantina’, in
Branca ed., Storia della civiltà veneziana I, pp. 116–28 esp. 120–8, and S. Bettini, Venezia. Nascita di
una città (Milan, 1988), pp. 94–97, 101–6 and 125–57; and G. Cuscito, ‘L’alto Adriatico paleocristiano’,
in Caputo and Gentili, eds., Torcello alle origini di Venezia, pp. 32–49 esp. 38–49.
407 Lazzarini, ‘Un’iscrizione torcellana’, pp. 123–32; Pertusi, ‘L’iscrizione torcellana’, pp. 9–38.
408 Others, with no exact known date, were S. Giacomo at Rialto, S. Eufemia on the Giudecca,
S. Zaccaria, S. Agnese, S. Vitale, S. Silvestro, S. Giovanni Decollato, as well as the cathedrals at Murano
and Caorle.
409 Fiocco, ‘Arte esarcale’, pp. 141–54; Verzone, ‘Le chiese deuterobizantine’, pp. 338–47;
M. Mazzotti, Le pievi ravennati (Ravenna, 1975); A. Vasina, ‘Le pievi dell’area Ravennate prima e
dopo il Mille’, in Le istituzioni ecclesiastiche della ‘societas christiana’ dei secoli XI–XII. Diocesi, pievi
e parrochie. Atti della sesta settimana internazionale di studio, Milano 1–7 sett. 1974 (Milan, 1977),
pp. 607–27.
410 Novara, P., ‘Ravenna, Pomposa e l’architettura cultuale’, pp. 149–64.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 377

both a Carolingian crypt and a westwork,411 and possibly also on the model of the
Anastasis in Jerusalem, and was decorated with pictures ‘of many colours’.412 The
current consensus is that there were three basilicas in turn on this site, the first
being that of Justinian Particiaco.413 It is likely to have had three naves, and there
has been a suggestion that this might even have been a non-figural or un­dec­­
orated building, with a central dome and four others above it.414 It is not possible
to establish whether this church was actually destroyed and rebuilt, or just
repaired, after the fire of 976. This second basilica, post-dating 976, remained in
place throughout the eleventh century, but its original plan as a palatine chapel
was gradually transformed, to make it less like a Byzantine shrine and more like a
Western pilgrimage church. In 1094, when the relics of St Mark were ‘rediscov­
ered’ inside a pillar of the basilica, this was knocked down and the third,
Contarinian, St Mark’s was built (today’s surviving basilica), in effect enfolding
the older Particiaco one.
There are two remaining crypts with features dating back to the ninth and
tenth centuries in Venice, those of S. Zaccaria (Plate 11) and St Mark’s, with their
semi-circular apses inside a pentagonal frame. The plan reflects the original exar­
chal tradition, and various no-longer-existing crypts, like that of S. Salvador, were
similar.415 The excavations at S. Lorenzo in Castello, still ongoing, suggest that
there may have been an early seventh-century church there, but this is likely to
have been rebuilt when the monastery was founded, during the same period as
that of St Mark’s, and by another Particiaco. The two crypts display numerous
parallel building techniques.416 In both cases we have walls with Roman-style
bricks of two kinds, incidentally suggesting the limited extent of the local

411 See above, note 237. 412 Colombi, ‘Translatio S. Marci’, pp. 128–9.
413 Cecchi, La basilica di San Marco, pp. 19–39. On the basilica in general see the four volumes of
San Marco: Basilica patriarcale di Venezia, the first two edited respectively by O. Demus and
M. Andaloro (Milan, 1990 and 1991), the next two focusing specifically on the crypt (Milan, 1992 and
1993), as well as the classics by O. Demus, The Church of San Marco in Venice: history, architecture,
sculpture (Washington D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Series 6, 1960), and R. Polacco, S. Marco: la basilica
d’oro (Milan, 1991).
414 J. Warren, ‘San Marco, Venice’, Ateneo Veneto 28 (1990), pp. 295–302 at 300, who suggests that it
was in fact a reflection of the acceptance of iconoclasm.
415 On the crypt and the pavement of S. Zaccaria, see Tramontin, ‘San Zaccaria’, pp. 20–1, who
defined the pavement mosaic as ‘Romanesque’, and Concina, Venezia, I, pp. 238–49; the latest work on
the early church, the crypt, and the mosaic pavements are by G. Trevisan, ‘Le fasi antiche della chiesa
di San Zaccaria’, pp. 53–73, and S. Minguzzi, ‘I pavimenti antichi’, pp. 75–94, in Aikema, Mancini, and
Modesti, eds.,‘In centro et oculis urbis nostre’; on S. Salvatore, see G. Guidarelli, La chiesa di San
Salvador a Venezia (Venice, 2009), p. 9.
416 On S. Lorenzo see the various reports of Maurizia De Min, who has excavated the church, not­
ably: M. De Min, ‘Lo scavo archeologico nella chiesa di San Lorenzo di Castello a Venezia’, in Studi di
Archeologia della X Regio (Rome, 2014), cols. 495–516; ‘La chiesa di San Lorenzo di Castello: un esem­
pio di correlato al restauro architettonico’, in Ritrovare restaurando. Rinvenimenti e scoperte a Venezia e
in Laguna, ed. M. De Min (Venice, 2000), pp. 41–2; and on the comparison with St Mark’s, ‘La chiesa
di S. Lorenzo di Castello a Venezia: le fasi construttive dal IX al XII secolo: alcune analogie con San
Marco’, in Scienza e tecnica del restauro della basilica di San Marco, 2 vols, ed. E. Vio and A. Lepschy
(Padua, 1999), pp. 189–218 at 191–209.
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378 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

production of building material at this point in the ninth century, which still
relied heavily on reused material. Before the tenth-century fire which ravaged it,
S. Lorenzo was also modelled on the standard basilical model of the Veneto area,
its nearest parallel being the church of S. Mauro at Jesolo (ninth–tenth century).
The ori­gin­al floor of the monastery was at the level where a mosaic floor of the
ninth–tenth century, with geometric motifs, has been found, but it was raised
after the fire. While there are similarities in the building techniques and the pave­
ment, a major difference between the crypts at St Mark’s and at S. Lorenzo is that
we have, in the first case, a retro-crypt higher than the crypt, probably open onto
part of nave, with stairs leading down to the crypt until the eleventh century when
they were covered up and the crypt became an underground one; at S. Lorenzo we
have the opposite, a retro-crypt which is lower than the crypt proper.
Other major architectural work has taken place at the cathedral of Olivolo/
Castello, and at Torcello. For Torcello, we have a lot less information than for
Venice for the period of the seventh–eighth centuries, but the first basilica, prob­
ably built under Bishop Deusdedit I (c.692–c.724), was later rebuilt by Bishop
Deusdedit II (864–7) on the previous foundations. He created a passage linking it
with the early Christian baptistery, which was of a late Roman circular model,
with three doors, three niches, and eight columns around an annular plan, on the
model of the still extant baptistery at Concordia (fourth–fifth century).417
Deusdedit II also raised the level of the pavement and mosaic floor, and restored
the façade. In 1008, under Peter II Orseolo, his brother Bishop Ursus built the apse
and the steps to it, and a pseudo-crypt, and added frescoes. The now famous wall
mosaics of the Last Judgement were begun at that time. The excavations of the bap­
tistery at Torcello have shown that an early eighth-century building was built on the
model and with the techniques of a fourth–fifth century one, rather than with those
of the art and techniques of the period in that area. This would suggest that eighth-
century Torcello was either archaic and cut off from recent developments, or that it
deliberately attempted to imitate the style of Altino, where the roots of Torcello had
been, perhaps as a deliberate form of cultivation of its late Roman past. The second
hypothesis seems a likelier explanation, in view of the deliberate choice by the
bishops to define themselves as being of Altino-Torcello until the tenth century.
Such an attitude may also account for the fact that, just as was the custom in Rome

417 M. De Min, ‘La campagna di scavo nel complesso basilicale di Santa Maria Assunta a Torcello’,
in Le Missioni Archeologiche dell’Università Ca’Foscari di Venezia (Venice, 2008), pp. 23–8; M. De Min,
‘Edilizia ecclesiale e domestica altomedioevale nel territorio lagunare: Nuovi dati conoscitivi da ind­
agini archeologiche nel cantiere di restauro a Torcello’, in L’Archeologia dell’Adriatico dalla Preistoria al
Medioevo. Convegno internazionale, Ravenna, 7-8-9 giugno 2001 (Florence, 2003), pp. 600–15; M. De
Min, ‘Tra due elementi sospesa’, pp. 99–133. The early excavations are in L. Leciejewicz et al., Torcello:
Scavi 1961–1962 (Rome, 1977), and L. Leciejewicz, ed., Torcello: nuove ricerche archeologiche (Rome,
2000); the more general surveys of R. Polacco, La cattedrale di Torcello (Venice), and A. Niero, La
basilica di Torcello e Santa Fosca (Venice, 1974), and now the catalogue of the 2009 exhibition, Caputo
and Gentili, Torcello: alle origini di Venezia, deal with recent research on the two churches.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 379

and Ravenna, the relics of St Heliodorus, when buried in the church, were placed in
a third-century sarcophagus—a form of prestige inhumation.418
Other lagoon localities have left even fewer archaeological traces.419 At
Costanziaco, a possible seventh–eighth-century chapel dedicated to St Peter was
adorned with a tympanum in the ninth century, but the two pievi on the island,
one having kept its Byzantine military association with its dedication to SS Sergius
and Bacchus, were mostly wooden buildings and had already declined by the
twelfth century. Similarly, at Ammiana the large seventh–eighth-century settle­
ment with a castrum was supported by four churches, and mostly by the monas­
tery of SS Felicio e Fortunato, which had provided refuge to the monks of Altino
in the early tenth century.
There is also relatively little remaining of the art and buildings of ninth- and
tenth-century Venice. From very early on, the reuse of architectural salvage from
the terraferma had been consistently practised. Justinian Particiaco left in his will
the remains of his houses in Jesolo to be used as building materials for the con­
struction of S. Ilario, and material of this kind was used even when new buildings
were erected, such as the palace built by the Particiaci in Cittanova.420 Marble
fragments from S. Pietro in Castello, perhaps originally from the older church of
SS Sergio e Bacco,421 or at S. Maria in Torcello, show a variety of sculptural forms
in the plutei, reused sarcophagi, capitals, and well heads, comprehensively dec­­
orated with animal and bird forms, spirals, rosettes, crosses, and interlace often
found in the hinterland between Verona and Aquileia.422 The reuse of sculpture

418 The issue of reuse of Roman artefacts in the early Middle Ages is one on which numerous
papers and books have been produced. For Venice in particular, the traditional view has been for a
long time that there was always a preference for importing artefacts from afar, especially
Constantinople, rather than using what was available on the terraferma. This view, perhaps more con­
vincing for the later Middle Ages, as studied by M. Greenhalgh, has been challenged through showing
the reuse for practical and economic purposes of the stone, capitals, cornices, sarcophagi, and bricks
in the earlier period, as the will of Justinian Particiaco and the foundation charter of S. Ilario show.
There were economic reasons which dictated this, for example the very slow revival of brick produc­
tion in the duchy, even then on the Roman model in terms of length and width, only thicker; see De
Min, ‘La chiesa di S. Lorenzo di Castello a Venezia: le fasi costruttive’, pp. 196–7. However, the main
reason for the reuse of columns, stelae, inscriptions, sarcophagi, and so on was one of ideology on the
grounds of prestige. On this, and art in Venice, see the work of Dorigo, above note 237, and also L’arte
a Venezia dal IX al XII secolo.
419 For the most recent overall surveys of the archaeology of the lagoon, see E. Canal, ‘Le Venezie
sommerse: quarant’anni di archeologia lagunare’, in La Laguna di Venezia, ed. G. Caniato, E. Turri,
and M. Zanetti (Verona, 1995), and F. Baudo, ‘Stato degli studi, linee di ricerca e prospettive future per
l’archeologia dell’edilizia religiosa altomedievale nella Laguna di Venezia’, PhD thesis, Università Ca’
Foscari (Venice, 2004).
420 Will of Justinian, see Cessi I. 53, and DV no. 4; charter of S. Ilario, see above note 306.
421 On the most recent archaeological excavations at Olivolo/Castello see S. Tuzzato, ‘Venezia. Gli
scavi di S. Pietro in Castello (Olivolo)’, Quaderni di Archeologia del Veneto 7 and 9 (1991), pp. 92–103,
and pp. 72–8; S. Tuzzato, ‘Le strutture lignee’, pp. 479–86; on Torcello, De Min, ‘ “Tra due elementi
sospesa” ’, pp. 100–7, 122–8, and Concina, Venezia, I, pp. 112–19.
422 On the crypt and the pavement of S. Zaccaria, see Tramontin, ‘San Zaccaria’, pp. 20–1, who
defines the pavement mosaic as ‘Romanesque’, and Concina, Venezia, I, pp. 238–49. On the sculpture,
Dorigo, L’arte a Venezia. The mosaic at S. Zaccaria is still in place, while those of SS Ilario e Benedetto
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380 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

from the lagoon was frequent, in the Lombard/Carolingian fusion style of the
ninth and tenth centuries, as seen in the Carolingian-style crypts.423 The oldest
sarcophagi, now preserved in the Correr museum courtyard, display close paral­
lels with the exarchal as well as Lombard decorations, with trees, crosses, and
peacocks, and characteristic eighth-century-style repetitive zoomorphic and geo­
metric motifs and interlace.424 A good example, still well preserved, is the ci­bor­
ium of SS Maria e Donato of Murano.425 A sarcophagus of one Donatus from
S. Ilario, reusing an old one with an added inscription, and that of one Dominic,
priest, from Torcello, from 980, display the same ‘Adriatic’ style.426 The inscrip­
tions relating to a Domenicus T, Barbus, Vitalis et Petrus, of the eighth–ninth
centuries, also reflect parallels found as far as Friuli and the north Adriatic, or
Ravenna and Pomposa.427 The plutei in St Mark’s, seemingly belonging to the
mid-Byzantine renaissance style, can be shown not to have been modelled on
contemporary Constantinople sculpture but to be an imitation of Ravenna art.428
The few surviving mosaics from contemporary Venetian churches—the floors of
the chapel of S. Tarasio at S. Zaccaria, and of S. Ilario—were clearly in the early
Christian tradition of the Aquileia and Grado floors.429
Unlike in Rome or Ravenna, we know little about either liturgical decoration
or objects in Venice, though they are sometimes mentioned under the generic
label of ‘gifts’, as when donated by Patriarch Fortunatus to various Grado churches,
or when removed by Peter I Orseolo prior to his flight to Cuxa. He was said to
have taken many pallia from the Doge’s Palace—gold, silver, jewels, metalwork,
and liturgical vases.430 One assumes that some would have resembled the Pala

have been moved, together with a variety of other pieces of sculpture, to the courtyard of the
Archaeological Museum in Venice. On the latter, see R. Farioli, ‘Pavimenti di Aquileia e pavimenti di
Ravenna: il problema delle maestranze’, in Aquileia e Ravenna. Atti dell’VIII Settimana di Studi
Aquileiesi, Antichità Altoadriatiche XIII (Udine, 1978), pp. 277–80. What else is left of the sculpture of
the period can be found in the courtyard of the Procuratorie of S. Marco (and I thank the Proto of
S. Marco, Dott.re Ettore Vio, for allowing me access to them in 2012) and in the Cloister of
S. Apollonia, now the Museo Diocesano of Venice.

423 Bettini, Venezia. Nascita di una città, pp. 94–7, 125–57; Dorigo, ‘Lo stato della discussione
storico-archeologica’, pp. 25–42 esp. 36–7.
424 M. Agazzi, ‘Sarcofagi altomedievali nel territorio del dogado veneziano’, in Medioevo: immagini
e ideologie. Atti del Convegno internazionale di studi Parma, 23–7 settembre 2002, ed. M. Quintavalle
(Milan, 2005), pp. 565–75.
425 M. Agazzi, ‘Un ciborio altomedioevale a Murano’, in Hadriatica. Attorno a Venezia e al
Medioevo tra arti, storia e storiografia. Scritti in onore di Wladimiro Dorigo, ed. E. Concina,
G. Trovabene, and M. Agazzi (Padua, 2002), pp. 43–54.
426 Ibid., Photos 21 and 27.
427 M. Vecchi, Sculture tardo-antiche e alto-medievali di Murano (Rome, 1995), pp. 73, 76–7, 101
and 104, with Pls. 111bis, 116, 148, and 153.
428 Minguzzi, S., 1997, ‘Plutei mediobizantini conservati in San Marco’, in Storia dell’arte marciana.
Sculture, tesoro, arazzi. Atti del Convegno internazionale di studi, Venezia, 11–14 ottobre 1994, 3 vols,
ed. R. Polacco (Venice, 1997), III, pp. 113–24.
429 C. Rizzardi, Mosaici altoadriatici: il rapporto artistico Venezia-Bisanzio-Ravenna in età medi­
evale (Ravenna, 1985).
430 Cessi I. 45, and see Ortalli, Petrus I.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 381

d’Oro which Peter I had had made in Constantinople—though it is not otherwise

descibed by John the Deacon, and disappeared when removed by Peter I when he
fled the city—and possibly even the famous episcopal chair that Peter II gave as a
present to Otto III, and which he, in turn, then presented to Ravenna.431 Mid-
Byzantine objects, such as the drinking cup ascribed to the Emperor Justin II,
currently in the Treasury of St Mark’s, cannot be assumed to have been in Venice
at the time. Grabar has shown that Byzantine objects, including icons, which are
now found in Venice were in fact produced during the ninth–tenth century
Byzantine artistic revival, but probably rarely reached the city from Constantinople
at the time, and that they were brought to Venice after 1204; he based his view on
the fact that the thirteenth century was not a particularly innovative period in
Byzantine art, and therefore what the Venetians brought back from Constantinople
were not the relatively few and perhaps somewhat inferior objects made then, but
rather the ‘old’ artefacts from 200 to 300 years earlier.432
Ravenna churches were generally not likely to suffer much from ravages other
than those of time. This must not make us forget the constant spoliations, even
under the most popular of the archbishops: for example, it was under Sergius that
Church treasure was removed by the pope’s envoy—out of greed, Agnellus tells
us. He gives a list of the treasures that the pope took from Ravenna, which
included any relics which the cathedral clergy had not been able to hide quickly
enough—‘nine full weights of gold, several silver vessels and spoons of silver,
large vases . . . various other things of gold and silver’.433 Archbishop Martin gave
Charlemagne’s missus a table with silver which had been a bequest of Archbishop
Valerius to the Church, as well as a gold-covered copy of the Gospels, and the
Carolingians indirectly benefited from the large amount of treasure lost by
Archbishop George at Fontenoy.434 Some did attempt a partial restoration of this
wealth. Archbishop Martin, who, despite Agnellus’ hostility towards him for
­having dared to deprive him of the monastery of S. Maria Blacherne in favour of
another, seems to have used the ‘simoniac’ gift of 200 solidi from Agnellus’ com­
petitor to provide a liturgical vase for the chrism.435 Occasionally, even the
Carolingians gave things back to Ravenna: Louis the Pious added several other
vessels to his father’s bequest of a silver table with the image of Rome to the city.436
Even papal gifts occasionally reached the city: Pope Zacharias stopped in Ravenna
on his way to Francia, celebrated mass in S. Apollinare, and gave it a purple altar
cloth with pearls, and Pope Leo III sent beams for the restoration of S. Apollinare,

431 JnD IV, 18 and 62.

432 A. Grabar, ‘Vasi di vetro dipinto’, in H. R. Hahnloser, Il Tesoro di San Marco: Il Tesoro e il Museo
(Florence, 1971), pp. 5–97.
433 Agnellus, LP, ch. 158. 434 Agnellus, LP, chs. 169, 173.
435 Agnellus, LP, ch. 167.
436 Agnellus, LP, ch. 170; see D. Mauskopf Deliyannis, ‘Charlemagne’s silver tables: the ideology of
an imperial capital’, Early Medieval Europe 12/2 (2003), pp. 159–77.
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382 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

and gifts of silk and silver.437 Certainly Carolingian influence on the art of
Ravenna was present, and we can see it in one of the few surviving artefacts, the
ciborium of S. Eleucadio, of the ninth century, in S. Apollinare in Classe.438 The
traditional late antique style remained highly visible there until the tenth century,
and archbishops would still be buried in prestige Roman sarcophagi: we still have
those of Archbishops Gratiosus and John, as well as the cathedrae of Damianus
and Felix.
Monuments in the city were occasionally damanged. The mosaics of Theodoric
were still visible in Ravenna in 800—Agnellus says they were in the apse of the
triclinium ad mare439—when they were removed by Charlemagne, with Hadrian
I’s permission. As we saw earlier, Frankish missi interpreted this very loosely and
took much more than they had been allowed to do,440 notably the famous statue
of Theodoric as part of the imperial imagery. The statue was then placed, not in
the palatine chapel of Aachen, but in the imperial palace itself, in the part signifi­
cantly known as the Lateranum, where Charlemagne also reused mosaics from
the imperial basilica in Trier, in a very clear message of the build-up of an archi­
tecture of power. His choosing to use the Ravenna mosaics and porphyry col­
umns as part of a programme of imperial renovation was deliberate. Another
representation of Theodoric in military habit, flanked by the personifications of
Rome and Ravenna,441 over the door of the Chalkè in Ravenna, an artefact also
mentioned by Agnellus, may well also have been a victim of the Carolingian
clean-out. The Ottonians, not directly responsible for any remaining art or
architecture in the city, did attempt what has been called a ‘mise au goût du jour’.
Sometimes they even benefited the city directly, for example when Otto III gave
it the rather splendid ivory chair which he had received as a gift from Doge
Peter II Orseolo.442
After the worship of God, care of the poor was the second most important
function of the medieval Church, as indeed it was supposed to be that of any

437 Agnellus, LP, ch. 155, 168; LP I. 98, ch. 106.

438 Rizzardi, ‘Il ciborio di Sant’Eleucadio’, pp. 161–7.
439 Agnellus, LP, ch. 171; R. Zanotto, ‘Mosaici (e sectilia) reimpiegati da Ravenna ad Aquisgrana:
contesto storico e questioni aperte’, in VII Colloquio dell’ASCOM. Atti Pompei, 22–5 marzo 2000
(Pompeii, 2001), pp. 587–93.
440 Letter of Hadrian in 787, in CC no. 81; letters of Leo III, in MGH Ep. V/3 nos 2 and 10. See for
example B. Brenk, ‘Spolia from Constantine to Charlemagne: Aesthetics versus Ideology’, in Studies on
Art and Archeology in Honor of Ernst Kitzinger on his Seventy-Fifth Birthday, Dumbarton Oaks Papers
41 (1987), pp. 103–9.
441 G. Bovini, ‘Il “Regisole”: un monumento equestre ravennate trasportato a Pavia nell’Alto
Medioevo’, CARB 10 (1963), pp. 51–66; see Agnellus, LP, ch. 94. More recently, Luchterhandt, ‘Rom
und Aachen’, pp. 106–8.
442 Rizzardi, ‘Rinnovamento architettonico’, pp. 393–415; JnD IV. 62: Berto, p. 262 n. 108 believes,
with C. Bertelli, ‘Le arti suntuarie: prestigio sociale e tesaurizzazione’, in SR II. 2, p. 185, that this is the
cathedra of Maxentius; see also C. Rizzardi, ‘Massimiano a Ravenna: la cattedra eburnea del Museo
Archivescovile alla luce di nuove ricerche’, in Farioli Campanati et al., eds., Ideologia e cultura artistica
tra Adriatico e Mediterraneo orientale (IV–X secolo), pp. 229–43.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 383

Christian governing institution. At first, the Churches of Rome and Ravenna,

with their respective bishops, did so through specific institutions which had
sprung up in the late antique period and continued in Byzantine Italy—the diaco-
niae and the xenodochia. Ravenna continued to do so into the tenth century,
using the resources of its vast estates, brought back into the city and redistributed
through churches and monasteries. Venice did not have such a framework, and
its unusual structure, with relatively poor episcopal sees, was probably grad­
ual­ly developing a system of charity based on parish churches and the families
which ‘owned’ them—though we do not know anything about it at this stage.
What we do know about assistance to the poor is limited to information about
the doges’ involvement, whether through exceptional charity donations, like
those of Peter I and Peter II Orseolo, or the building of the hospice/hospital of
St Mark opposite the ducal palace by the latter. Once again, it appears that, in
Venice, the doge was effectively in charge of what, in most contemporary cities,
would have been an episcopal function. Rome, on the other hand, after follow­
ing the model of the late antique city continued under Byzantine rule, began to
change, not in terms of the nature of episcopal involvement (which remained
the same as that of the archbishops of Ravenna, for example) but in terms of
size. The charitable function of the late antique senatorial aristocracy, which
had gradually left the city, was taken over by the popes, but had to expand to an
unimaginable degree on account of Rome’s hugely enhanced status as the goal
for thousands of pilgrims. Frankish devotion and financial resources poured into
it, and led to the need for accommodation and hospitals to be provided, but also
for water (repairing the aqueducts) and food (to be imported from papal estates).
Thus the demands of pilgrimage, which led to the complete control of the char­it­
able system, were a key element in creating, supporting, and demonstrating papal
power in the city.
The first main role of the Church was the worship of God, made manifest on
earth through buildings and their decoration. Building churches and adorning
them, with objects and pictures of beauty, but also with the right (as opposed to the
‘heretic’) message, with precious materials and expensive complex craftsmanship,
lighting and perfuming them with expensive candles and incense, was both
­worshipping God and also, as is so clearly shown by the donor portraits of popes
protected by the patron saints in the apse mosaics for all to see, a clear display of
the favour of God towards the Church of Rome and its bishop. The gradual move
to isolate the holiest part of the church building, around the presbytery, for the
clergy, and its sides for the aristocratic elite of the city further contributed to iden­
tifying the social hierarchy as sanctioned by God himself and made manifest in
art. But it also served to create a common identity as ‘Roman’, one made up not
only of status but also of a common artistic sensibility, uniting the members of a
Church which understood the same images and visual vocabulary, under the
leading authority of the bishop responsible to God for his flock.
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384 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Statements of Power

Power and control in the city were made visible through displays of charity and care
of the people, through displays in images and in buildings which reflected and
enhanced the status of their patrons, but also through forms of display which were
part of the ordinary framework of life. When handling a document or a coin, the
citizen was also recording, sometimes unconsciously, the name of the governing
power, the fact that, at a certain date, they represented public authority, and that this
name was of use in recognizing everyday commercial transactions by being
inscribed on a coin. This kind of power, through the awareness, if not always the
actual recognition, of the written word by those less literate was another mani­fest­
ation of authority, and an instrument of power. This is a topic on which much work
has already been carried out, in relation to both the ideological elements of titles,
the numismatic evidence, and the diplomatic rules of the documents. I shall there­
fore only mention a few ‘headlines’ and overall conclusions in this chapter.
The first form of stating power was that of the name by which the authority was
called and acknowledged.

Titulature and Dating

From the first, the issues at stake between the Byzantines and the Carolingians in
Italy had been as much about imperial ideology as about political and economic
control. This involved rival claims in terms of imperial authority and the ideo­
logic­al debate about the Imitatio/Renovatio of the Roman Empire. Details of
Charles’s titles, invocation in documents, seals, bulls, diplomas, various crowns,
and coinage inscriptions, have been discussed in detail and reproduced many
times, most famously by Schramm and Classen, as have been the perceptions of
these by contemporaries.443 From the moment when, in 800,

Pope Leo placed a crown on [Charlemagne’s] head, and he was hailed by the
whole Roman people: To the august Charles, crowned by God, the great and
peaceful emperor of the Romans, life and victory! After the acclamations the
pope addressed him in the manner of the old emperors. The name of Patricius
was now abandoned and he was called emperor,

443 Numerous studies have been made of this event, the best known of the older ones being R. Folz,
Le couronement imperial de Charlemagne (Paris, 1964, repr. 2008); among the most important work
on Carolingian coronations, see Brühl, Aus Mittelalter und Diplomatik, I, Appendix I, pp. 407–12;
Schramm, Kaiser, Könige und Päpste, I, pp. 220–95, and II, pp. 15–168; and Classen, Karl der Grosse,
pp. 62–87. The coronation and the attempt to associate it with St Peter was very much part of the papal
effort to bind Charlemagne closer to Rome; see Schieffer, ‘Die Karolinger und Rom’, pp. 101–27. For
the contemporary view, see most recently M. Becher, ‘Karl der Grosse und Papst Leo III. Die
Ereignisse der Jahre 799 und 800 aus der Sicht der Zeitgenossen’, in Stiegemann and Wemhoff, 799.
Kunst und Kultur, pp. 22–36, and I. H. Garipzanov, The Symbolic Language of Authority in the
Carolingian World (c.751–877) (Leiden, 2008).
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 385

Einhard claims that Byzantine emperors had suspicions about the Franks wanting
to take power away from them, despite Charlemagne’s efforts to reassure them.444
Charlemagne, though he continued to use the title of ‘the august, most pious and
most glorious Lord and Emperor’, did not directly address the thorny issue relat­
ing to imperial titulature.445 He may have used the titles of Augustus and
Imperator, and that of Romanorum gubernans imperum, but he never did use the
one title that would have been completely unacceptable to the Byzantines, that of
Imperator Romanorum. The issue, from the Byzantine point of view, was not that
of using the title of emperor, but that of ‘emperor of the Romans’. The Byzantines
saw themselves as ‘the Romans’ and since, in their world view, there could only be
one emperor, who was that of the Romans, for a Western king to call himself
emperor would mean that he claimed to rule over the ‘Romans’, that is over the
Eastern Empire too. A compromise was reached when the Byzantines accepted
the principle of Charles being the ‘emperor’, while Michael was ‘emperor of the
Romans’.446 In 812, Michael, Nicephorus’s son, sent envoys to Aachen and, after
sealing the resulting treaty, which settled the situation of Venice, the envoys
addressed Charlemagne in Greek, calling him emperor and basileus.447 Charlemagne
used the Renovatio Romani Imperii phrase, together with a representation of the
walls of Rome and a gate with a cross above it and the word Rome attached, on a
seal,448 but only after 812, following the official recognition of his imperial status by
Constantinople, did he use the formula Imperator Augustus on his coinage.
Subsequently, the title he used was that of Dominus Karolus serenissimus augustus,
and domno piissimo perpetuo augusto Karolo, a Deo coronato magno imperatore for
Charles the Bald.449 Neither did Louis the Pious and his sons, even Charles the Bald,
call themselves Imperator Romanorum, though his seal was inscribed with
Renovatio Imperii Romani et Francorum,450 and when Louis II did use the wording,
we saw how badly the Emperor Basil I reacted. From 800 onwards, Pope Leo III
used Charlemagne’s regnal years for his coinage451 and the dating of his letters, as
would all successive popes when there was an emperor, until the end of the eleventh
century after the Gregorian Reform. The same formula would be later used by the
papacy for Western non-Carolingian emperors, such as Guy and Otto I.452

444 ARF 801; Einhard, II. 16. 445 Notker III. 23; V.33.
446 P. Grierson, ‘The Carolingian Empire in the eyes of Byzantium’, in Nascita dell’Europa ed Europa
carolingia, pp. 885–916.
447 ARF 812. In fact the suggestion was made by Benedict of Soracte that Charlemagne effectively
surrendered Venice in exchange for the recognition of his imperial title; BenSor, pp. 114–15.
448 Schramm, Kaiser, Könige und Päpste, II, p. 23 and Fig. 6.
449 Pope Leo III’s letter to the bishops of Aquitaine (795–816), ed. in Pflugk-Harttung, p. 3; Pope
John VIII’s letter to the monastery of Flavigny (877), Pflugk-Harttung, p. 5.
450 Pflugk-Harttung, pp. 119–39, and Brühl, Aus Mittelalter und Diplomatik, I, Appendix, pp. 407–12,
on the coronations and titles of all emperors from Lothar until Arnulf.
451 Coin reproduced in Toubert, Les Structures, II, p. 689, Pl. 1, and Fig.1.
452 Pope Formosus’ letter to St Denis (891–4) and Pope John XII’s letter to the Archbishop of Trier
(962), Brühl, Aus Mittelalter und Diplomatik, I, pp. 6 and 8.
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386 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

We saw earlier that Alberic’s title in the first instance was the same as that of his
grandfather Theophylact, senator omnium Romanorum, while later he used that
of patricius, finally settling on princeps. But Alberic went on to mix and match,
using whichever title was the most expedient in a specific context. Unlike
Otto III’s titles, for example, his were not empty of meaning but used according to
whom he was addressing (Byzantines, Romans, King Hugh, the aristocracy of
Lazio). The progression and changes in his titles show his readiness to use
whichever means were at his disposal, at that particular moment and for that
particular purpose.
Great attention has been paid, especially by Noble, to the issue of papal titula­
ture and its evolution over the eighth century. The popes had a specific vocabu­
lary at their disposal, of which the expression servus servorum Dei was the earliest,
and most consistently, used. Later on, and certainly by the Carolingian period,
they were increasingly using the title papa, designed to highlight the special and
unique status of the successor to St Peter. Of the two parallel strands on which the
papacy rested its authority—imperial delegation and the succession of the Keeper
of the Keys of Heaven—it comes as no surprise that the popes were increasingly
inclined to underline the latter, which had been present from the origins but
pressed upon them very strongly by pilgrims of all ranks. The first and most trad­
ition­al titles, which had been used for bishops from the first centuries, were not
easy to restrict to the papacy, and for that reason they continued to be deliberately
used by the archbishops of Ravenna in their challenge to Roman authority. The
basis of this challenge was the fact that the archbishops saw themselves as equal to
Rome in patriarchal authority, especially after the end of the Exarchate. This
meant that they could claim to be the heirs of the exarchs, and to rule as such.
From Archbishop Sergius (748–69), then Leo (770–8), who called himself Leo,
servus servorum Dei, divina gratia sanctae catholicae Ecclesiae Ravennatis
­archiepiscopus et primas, Italiae exarchus, they used the title of exarch. More chal­
len­ging­ly, they also used the the titles papa, apostolicus, and servus servorum Dei
until the thirteenth century.453 Agnellus consistently called the pope and arch­
bishop equal brothers, as he did for the visit of Pope Stephen in Ravenna: ‘both
bishops kissed, the Roman and the Ravennate’.454 Nevertheless, by the later tenth
century, when the conflict with Rome abated, many Ravenna documents used
both the imperial and papal regnal dates, showing acceptance by the archbishops
of the principle of papal supremacy.
Venetian doges at first used titles which implied their subjection to Byzantium,
especially in documents dealing with the Empire: Maurice was consul et im­per­
ialis dux venetiarum provinciae in 761,455 Justinian imperialis hypatus et Venetiae

453 G. Orioli, ‘Le “intitulationes” degli archivescovi di Ravenna’, Bollettino della Badia greca di
Grottaferrata n.s. 31 (1977), pp. 93–102.
454 Agnellus, LP, ch. 170. 455 Cessi I, 30.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 387

dux,456 while Peter Tradonicus (836–64) was spatarius, Ursus I Particiaco

(865–82) was protospatarius, and, by 900, Doge Peter was imperiali protospatario
et Veneticorum duce.457 Peter II Orseolo, still a protospatarius, was granted the
title of dux Veneticorum ac Dalmaticorum; when Peter II’s Orseolo’s son John was
sent to Constantinople, the rank rose again, and he was made patricius by the
Emperor Basil II.458 The doges continued to make use of Byzantine aulic titles,
progressing from the modest ypatos for the first doges, through spatarius for
Ursus I Particiaco, to the highest protospatarius.459 Byzantine titles ascended in
im­port­ance as Venice became more powerful and was increasingly needed by the
Byzantines as an ally, and higher titles were often granted to the doges when
Venetian help was sought with naval support in the south of Italy. These were the
titles used in official documents which still acknowledged Venice’s Byzantine
association. When the city dealt with the Carolingians, Italian kings, or emperors,
and generally with matters more specifically associated with the Italian mainland,
the titles used were those of doge, such as dux Venetiarum460 or dux Veneticorum.461
The way that people defined themselves through the titles they adopted showed
their perception of their power and its origins. Equally, if not more important,
was the way in which these titles were accepted and adopted by others, including
the recipients or subjects of the person in power. This can sometimes be deduced
from the the way in which documents are dated according to who is reckoned to
be the ruler. Papal documents are, in a way, the simplest, and reflect the papacy’s
perception in the evolution of its sovereignty. During the period of Byzantine
rule, they were of course dated by the regnal years of the Eastern emperors. From
the moment Charlemagne revived the imperial title in the West, they used the
regnal years of the Carolingians, which continued for as long as there was an
emperor, even up to Berengar, and once again after Otto I became emperor. A few
periods are of interest: the oscillations between the use of Byzantine imperial dat­
ing under Zacharias, and eventually the use of papal dating alone from Hadrian
I until Leo III; the papal dating alone during the period of the kings of Italy at the
beginning of the tenth century; and the occasional use of the name of the princeps
Alberic. Variations in the titulature reflect very clearly how such titles were per­
ceived as a statement of power, of the grantor of an act, or of the grantor’s status as
a delegate of a higher power.

456 Cessi, I. 52 and DV no. 9, a forgery of a charter foundation of S. Zaccaria.

457 Cessi, II. 35, and DV no. 11. 458 JnD IV. 65, 72.
459 V. Lazzarini, ‘I titoli dei dogi di Venezia’, Nuovo Archivio Veneto 2 (1903), pp. 271–80; R. Cessi,
‘L’Investitura Ducale’, AIVSLA 126 (1968), pp. 251–94; G. Ravegnani, ‘Dignità bizantine dei dogi di
Venezia’, in Benzoni et al., Studi Veneti offerti a Gaetano Cozzi, pp. 19–29; G. Ravegnani, ‘Insegne del
potere e titoli ducali’, in SV, pp. 829–46; G. Ravegnani, ‘I dogi di Venezia e la corte di Bisanzio’, in
L’eredità greca e l’ellenismo veneziano, ed. G. Benzoni (Florence, 2002), pp. 23–51. A paper by A. Carile,
‘Venezia e Bisanzio’, in Le Relazioni internazionali, Settimane 58 (2010), pp. 629–87, includes a useful
list of all doges and their Byzantine titles in an Appendix, pp. 684–5.
460 Cessi, II. 37, and DV no. 13. 461 Cessi, II. 40, and DV no. 17.
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388 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

The archiepiscopal chancery in Ravenna sometimes used the regnal years of

the archbishop, but certainly always, if there was an emperor, that of his regnal
year and indiction. In that respect, true to its imperial leanings, it was even more
scrupulous than Rome. The notaries of the chancery were always aware of who
the king or emperor was, used the regnal years of both kings of Italy and em­perors
for dating in the tenth century, and always got them right (unlike papal dates),
even down to the level of livello leases, when they included such dating. At the
time of Louis II, we have such a lease, which has an imperial dating even though
it dealt with a group of modest coloni, so keen were either they themselves, or
more likely a scrupulous notary, to link the document to the emperor.462 The
knowledge of who the emperor was at that particular moment was normally
extremely accurate, even in those cases when, despite there being an official
regency for Otto III, Ravenna saw this as an absence of a crowned ruler, and a
contemporary lease of 987 insisted that there was no emperor, imperatore non-
dum habemus.463
The pattern of dating of Venetian documents is especially intriguing. Two pos­
sible scenarios are plausible. In the first, one could argue that we see a contrast
between the use of Byzantine imperial dating for prestigious state documents in
Venice, while for ordinary documents the dating from the Carolingians onwards
is reckoned by regnal years of emperors and kings of Italy, and for purely internal
documents, such as grants of land or fisheries in the lagoon, the dating increasingly
relies on the Anno Domini style. This would suggest that the official ac­know­
ledge­ment of the rule of the Byzantine emperors remained in place until the elev­
enth century for treaties, Church grants, and official edicts. The will of Justinian,
the 880 concession to Aquileia, the grant made by Doge Peter to S. Stefano of
Altino in 900, then the 919 immunity charter of Doge John to it, the letter of Peter
IV forbidding the sale of slaves in 960, Peter I Orseolo’s and Vitalis’s collection of
tithes, not to mention the 992 treaty, were all dated by the regnal year of the
Byzantine emperor. On the other hand, documents such as the Emperors Louis’s
and Lothar’s pacta and grants, as well as those signed by the kings of Italy and the
Ottonians, the pactum with Istria, and the 944 peace between Aquileia and Grado,
were dated by the reigns of Kings Berengar, Rudolf, and Hugh, and the Emperors
Guy and Otto.464 There is a clear distinction here between an ‘official’ main­ten­
ance of Byzantine sovereignty, an Italian grounding for normal business, and an
even more informal one with AD for local affairs.

462 Benericetti C8/9, nos 25, 26, 27. On dating issues, see H. Fichtenau, ‘Politische Datierungen des
frühen Mittelalters’, in Intitulatio II: Lateinische Herrscher- und Fürstentitel im neunten und zehnten
Jahrhundert, ed. H. Wolfram, MIÖG 24 (1973), pp. 453–540.
463 Benericetti X/3 no. 238.
464 See the interesting discussion in M. Pozza, ‘Gli usi cronologici nei più antichi documenti
veneziani (secoli IX–XI)’, in Studi in memoria di Giorgio Costamagna, ed. D. Puncuh (Genoa, 2003),
pp. 801–48.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 389

In a second scenario, one could also argue that the pattern is not dependent on
the binomial Byzantine official versus Italian and local affairs, but reflects a
chronological evolution. It would then be the case that up to the ninth century the
dating remained mostly Byzantine, and then became more strongly Carolingian,
even for documents involving Istria, as Venice was increasingly drawn into Italy.
In the second half of the tenth century, when the Byzantine Empire may have
seemed stronger again, Venice used what was effectively a parallel Byzantine and
Ottonian dating in both public and private documents: the chancery dated the
documents according to the style of whoever it was doing business with, just as it
used a double coinage, Byzantine aurei when dealing with its eastern trade,
Carolingian denarii otherwise.465 While the second scenario might seem likelier,
it is possible to imagine that there was some of both scenarios involved, on the
grounds that Venetian attitudes seem to have been totally pragmatic, not con­
cerned with theoretical concepts, and flexible in their dealing with external forces.
In all three cases, there is no doubt that the titulature used in official documents
by popes, archbishops of Ravenna, and doges in Venice was fully d ­ ependent, first
and foremost, on the highest authority to which they had to refer, that is the
authority from which they held their power. This was at first the Eastern emperor
for all three, then either him or the Western emperor, and only sometimes, by
default, their own individual authorities, if there was no emperor in place. This
indication, especially when we encounter it, not simply as a title but as a specific
dating device, is revealing of contemporary perceptions of who actually held power
in the city—the charters had to be granted under the authority of a legitimately rec­
ognized and accepted ruler—at any rate for the literate elite writing and receiving
them. These elites appear to have functioned in the same way in all three cities,
requesting, using, witnessing, and acknowledging the value of the t­ itulature and the
dating of the written material on which they based their rights and agreements.
At the level below these, among the less literate, or non-literate, urban inhabit­
ants, were those who could still see and recognize the signs of power on coins.

Coinage
Eighth-century Italy saw the transformation of the Byzantine trimetallic system
to the Carolingian monometallic system also adopted by the papacy.466 The

465 Cessi II. 89, and DV no. 36.

466 McCormick, Origins of the European Economy, with his long discussion of the evolution of
coinage in the early medieval West, pp. 319–84 and pp. 681–7, and P. Grierson’s large body of work,
the most general being, with M. Blackburn, The Early Middle Ages (5th-10th Centuries), vol. I of
Medieval European Coinage (Cambridge, 1986). For the kingdom of Italy see, for example, Arslan,
Repertorio, A. Rovelli, ‘774. The mints of the kingdom of Italy. A survey’, in Gasparri, 774. Ipotesi su
una transizione, pp. 119–40, and A. Rovelli, ‘Emission monetaire et administration dans le royaume
d’Italie. A propos des analyses des deniers carolingiens du Cabinet des Medailles’, Revue Numismatique
165 (2009), pp. 187–201; and E. A. Arslan and C. Morrisson, ‘Moneta e monete a Roma nell’alto
Medioevo,’ in Roma fra Oriente e Occidente, Settimane 49, Spoleto 2002, pp. 1255–305.
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390 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

limit­ed amount of available gold by the 740s to 760s led to the Carolingian reform
of coinage as set out in the Capitulary of Mantua of 781, which established the
silver denarius as the standard coinage for the Kingdom of Italy.467 Under Hadrian
I, the first pope to mint in his own name, the denarii were Carolingian, but the
style and the iconography were an imitation of Byzantine models.468 There was
relatively little coinage minted by the popes in Rome, and by 800, even though the
move away from the Byzantine monetary orbit was more or less achieved, neither
the existence of papal money nor the presence of Carolingian coinage were par­
ticularly high in Rome. In fact, it remained quite rare, as shown by the very few
Carolingian coins found in Roman hoards. The suggestion here is that, despite the
huge quantity of silver and gold available in the city for sumptuary purposes, there
was nevertheless a chronic shortage of small coinage for day-to-day transactions.469
This led to the continuing use of small old Byzantine coins, and indeed, in some
cases, of the large quantity of Anglo-Saxon coins brought into the city as a result of
the collection of Peter’s Pence. The Roman mint continued to function throughout
the ninth and tenth centuries, and it generally used the papal title, though Alberic
issued some coinage in his own name; but it ceased to function in the 980s.470
In Ravenna, too, the Byzantine mint ceased to function after 750, and the first
new coinage was that of Aistulf who, as part of his ambition to replace the exarch
there, minted his own tremissi and solidi between 751 and 753, with the legend
Flavius Aistulfus.471 Byzantine coins continued to circulate until the twelfth cen­
tury, and a set of forty-nine were found in 1960, but the last one minted there was
under Constantine V, as were the last ones minted in Comacchio.472
Until the ninth century, Venice continued to use Byzantine gold coins and had
no mint of its own. But, just as with the continuing use of Byzantine aulic titles
by the doges and the mix of dating of Venetian documents by regnal years of
Byzantine emperors or Italian rulers, so we find a similar duality in the coinage.
Byzantine coinage continued to circulate in the dogado, and was the currency
used by Venetian merchants in their eastern Mediterranean trade.473 However,

467 Ed. in C. Azzara and P. Moro, trs., I capitolari italici. Storia e diritto della dominazione carolingia
in Italia (Rome, 1998), no. 3.
468 Fusconi, Gli Antiquiores romani.
469 The Crypta Balbi hoard only yielded a few denarii, one of Charlemagne, one of Pope Stephen VI
and Charles the Fat, one of Benedict III and Louis II (855–8), while only one other, from Nicholas and
Louis II, was found at the Baths of Diocletian; see Rovelli, ‘La circolazione monetaria’, pp. 88–91.
470 Labruzzi, ‘Di una moneta di Alberico’, pp. 133–49; Fusconi, Gli Antiquiores romani. Toubert, Les
Structures.
471 E. Ranieri, La monetazione di Ravenna antica dal V al VIII secolo. Impero romano e bizantino,
regno ostrogoto e longobardo (Bologna, 2006); see also A. L. Morelli and P. Novara, ‘Sedi di zecca e
monetazione in Ravenna dall’Antichità al Tardo Medioevo’, Atti e memorie della Deputazione di Storia
Patria per la Province di Romagna 58 (2007), pp. 151–200 at pp. 160–6.
472 Arslan, Repertorio, pp. 32–6.
473 McCormick, Origins of the European Economy, pp. 352–3 and 361–84 (incl. Table 12.7, p. 366),
and Fig. 11.1, p. 320. For examples of such coins see the finds now in the Sezione Medievale e Moderna
of the Museo Archeologico di Torcello (http://sbmp.provincia.venezia.it/mir/musei/torcello/home.htm)
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 391

Venetians made the decision that, in parallel with it, silver denarii would be
minted in Venice with Carolingian inscriptions, the first ones going back to Louis
the Pious (814–40) and Lothar I (840–55).474 These were followed by so-called
‘anonymous’ coins (with no named ruler) with the inscription ‘Xe salva Venecias’
(855–80) and ‘Christus imperat’ (970–1024), based on the Carolingian tradition.
(see Plate 12 )475 It seems clear that both Byzantine and Carolingian, then Ottonian,
forms of coinage were running in parallel, an interesting occurrence since both
the Byzantine and the Carolingian Empires regarded coinage as a manifestation
of sovereignty.476 As usual, Venice managed to reconcile the two, sometimes by
striking coins with no reverse lines, so as to be able to work with both powers,
minting ‘Western’ coins for its links with Western local markets, while using gold
for international trade. The wealth of various forms of coinage, Byzantine up to
John Tzimisces, Carolingian, Berengarian from Verona, and Ottonian, not just
from Verona and Ravenna but in one case apparently minted in Venice itself
(found in Oderzo),477 shows just how wide Venetians had spread their net eco­
nomically, and how prepared they were to recognize the value of most forms
of coinage in the city. Conversely, they also had no scruples about benefiting
from the grant of minting rights by the Carolingians, by ‘adapting’ the standard
Carolingian coinage: Venice used its liminal political status not only to trade with
everybody but also to produce lower-quality denarii, because it was able to escape
direct Carolingian control over the production of its mint.478

Objects of Power: Emblems, Symbols, and Gifts

Another form of representing power is reflected in the use of emblems and sym­
bols, often supported by gifts. Such displays were frequently found in the context
of special events in the life of the city, such as festivals and processions, to which
I will return in the next chapter. Here we can see how ritual objects and symbols
became the embodiment of power.

and see, for example, the ninth- and tenth-century coins found at S. Elena and S. Tomà; Arslan,
Repertorio, p. 159.

474 Papadopoli, Le monete di Venezia, I, pp. 6–53, at 14–40; also reproduced in G. Rösch, ‘Mercatura
e moneta’, in SV, pp. 549–73, and in M. Stahl, Zecca. The Mint of Venice in the Middle Ages (Baltimore,
2000). These were, of course, minted well after Charlemagne abandoned his claim of sovereignty over
Venice and hence could only have been made for the purpose of commercial links.
475 Papadopoli, Le monete di Venezia, pp. 49–53. We find denarii with the legend d’s conserva
romano imp from before 840; see Arslan, Repertorio, p. 37.
476 Rovelli, ‘774. The mints of the kingdom of Italy’, p. 138. 477 Ibid., p. 154.
478 Recent reseach on the collection of coins of Charlemagne and Louis the Pious in the Cabinet
des Medailles in Paris has led the scholars in charge to discover that Venetian-minted Carolingian
denarii, in contrast to other Italian mints, contained a lower silver alloy (84% compared to 95% at the
time of Louis the Pious) and were slightly lighter (1.53 grams against 1.63 grams on average, itself less
than the legally prescribed 1.70 grams); see G. Sarah, M. Bompaire, M. McCormick, A. Rovelli, and
C. Guerrot, ‘Analyses élémentaires de monnaies de Charlemagne et Louis le Pieux du Cabinet des
Medailles: l’Italie carolingienne et Venise’, Revue Numismatique 164 (2008), pp. 355–406 esp. 379–92.
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392 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

The exchange of gifts is the most obvious symbolic gesture. Even without enter­
ing into the considerable historiography of a subject which has been consistently
at the forefront of anthropological research since Mauss’s seminal essay, and for
which an extensive bibliography is available for the medieval period,479 it is obvi­
ous that this early medieval culture of display and gift-exchange is ubiquituous
and always visible in our sources. My three examples show how this functioned.
The first of these examples is a case of how to use gifts injudiciously. Archbishop
George of Ravenna spent a great deal of money on gifts for the Emperor Lothar
on the occasion of the christening of Lothar’s daughter, which he wanted to
attend. Later, he took a large part of the treasure of the Church of Ravenna with
him, when he went to Francia with the mission of attempting a reconciliation
between Louis the Pious’s sons. But he was not felt to be neutral by the parties of
Charles the Bald and Louis the German, who thought he was on Lothar’s side,
and he failed in his mission. As a result, all the rich gifts which the archbishop
had brought with him (with the exception of a copy of the Gospels with gold
­covers prudently hidden under his shirt by one of his priests) were lost at
Fontenoy, many confiscated by Charles the Bald, who then reproached George
bitterly for having thus endangered, and lost, the wealth of his Church. The
Ravenna party were so poor that they could hardly feed themselves, let alone
return, and were not able to do so until, moved by pity, the Empress Judith actu­
ally offered George the gift of a small silver vase—an ironic gesture in view of
what he had brought with him and lost by directing his gifts to the wrong person.480
The case of Peter II Orseolo, by contrast, is, according to John the Deacon, a
model for the perfect use of gifts. When Otto III came to Venice and asked the
doge to let him know what he wished from the emperor, Peter is alleged to have
said that he wished for nothing except that the emperor should confirm the open
access of Italy to the Venetians and their peaceful enjoyment of any properties
they had within the Empire.481 Nevertheless, before the emperor left Venice, the
doge pressed him to accept some gifts, which he at first refused, explaining that
he had come to Venice to honour St Mark and his host. Pressed further, Otto
accepted three ‘token’ gifts, an ivory chair, a silver goblet, and a finely chiselled
chalice. On his return to Ravenna, Otto sent Peter II two imperial gold

479 See, for example, the papers in W. Davies and P. Fouracre, eds., The Languages of the Gift in the
Early Middle Ages (Cambridge, 2010). More specifically for the period, see P. Schreiner, ‘Diplomatische
Geschenke zwischen Byzanz und dem Westen ca. 800–1200: Eine Analyse der Texte mit Quellenanhang’,
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 58 (2004), pp. 251–82.
480 George did, however, have an illustrious predecessor on this score: according to Pope Hadrian I,
Charlemagne, in spite of his rich gifts to St Peter, was not so good at presenting the pope with the
appropriate level of respectful gift in the exchange mechanism. After Hadrian had allowed him to
remove so much from Ravenna, he obviously thought that the horse he had been sent by Charlemagne
in return was a substandard gift, and he felt rather slighted by it; CC no. 81; on this see Nelson,
‘Charlemagne and Ravenna’, p. 248.
481 JnD IV. 59.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 393

ornaments—a significant display of power—which the doge reciprocated with the

gift of an ivory-covered cathedra (thought by some to be what is now known as
Maximian’s chair). In another forceful display of his power, the emperor gave the
cathedra to Ravenna as a gift.482 But Peter II did not rest content with this. After
the invaluable help of the Venetian fleet in freeing Bari and incurring the Eastern
emperor’s gratitude, Peter’s eldest son, John, was sent to Constantinople:483 he
took with him valuable gifts, and in turn received even more valuable ones,
including the hand of a Byzantine princess of imperial blood, complete with a
palace in Constantinople. On his return to Venice, when there was feasting and
rejoicing for three days, the imperial gifts were, of course, highly prized, and the
doge’s family had its prestige heightened as a result.
The above were all gifts of moveable goods, presumably of intrinsic value on
the grounds of their gold, silver, precious stones, and workmanship. Naturally,
gifts could come in different guises, and the most valuable of all would have been
relics. Gifts and exchanges of relics have already been mentioned in relation to
Roman relics given by the popes to foreign rulers or pilgrims,484 or taken away
and used as political capital. An example of the latter were the relics of St Mark,
which Reichenau alleged to have received, via the bishop of Verona, from the
fugitive Doge John Particiaco, when he sought refuge in the Italian kingdom.485
The use of the gift here is far more than just a gift of a valuable object: it had the
same binding function, and political impact, as those mentioned previously.
Relics are now perceived as a form of symbol—they can vary from the religious
to the mundane, such as when they are valued as objects associated with a star
like Elvis or Princess Diana. To early medieval men and women, they were the
reality of the saint’s body and power. Other objects were also symbolic, especially
when recalling a glorious past, and Rome had more such objects and places than
anywhere else. Surrounded by the remains of the imperial glory—buildings,
­statues and places—it took some of them as key elements of its identity, such
as the statue of the she-wolf moved to the Lateran complex.486 Most symbols
in the city were linked to the Roman past, such as the Column (Antonina) or the
Three Fates (the Rostra). A similar phenomenon can be perceived in Ravenna,
where mentions of the Moneta or the Horologium continued into the tenth
­century. However, Ravenna’s main symbol, the Regisole statue of Theodoric, was
removed from it by the Franks, thus showing the risks of having a highly desirable
symbol if someone else happened to desire it for themselves.
The same phenomenon could also happen with emblems of power.487 Both
Romans and Venetians used the Byzantine tradition for that purpose. The most

482 JnD IV. 62. 483 JnD IV. 71.

484 See above, Chapter 4, pp. 65-66, and Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 144–6.
485 JnD IV. 73. 486 LP II. 140.
487 P. E. Schramm, Herrschaftszeichen und Staatsymbolik (Stuttgart: Schriften der MGH 13/2,
1955), and P. E. Schramm, Kaiser, Könige and Päpste, II and III, studying the seals, bulls, and crowns of
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394 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

immediately obvious was the crown, which at this stage was not exclusively
reserved for the emperor or the king: both used it on important occasions, but so
did Boso when, in 876, he was made ‘duke’ of Italy by Charles the Bald as a sign of
supremacy over the country, even if a delegated one.488 Later on the sceptre was
added, for Lothar I for example, and by the tenth century also the orb, which the
Ottonians reserved exclusively for the emperor. Kings and emperors were also
associated with the sword, even to the extent of its representation in the icon­og­
raphy in Charlemagne’s ‘portraits’ on Roman mosaics.
We are particularly well informed about Venetian power symbols, on account
of John the Deacon’s narrative of the passing of ducal insignia from the sick Doge
Ursus to the newly elected Peter Candiano I. They consisted of a sword, sceptre,
and seat. Elsewhere, we are told about other insignia of rank in the same Byzantine
tradition: the red socks and a Byzantine hat, as well as the seat and the umbrella
which were normally associated with imperial power in Constantinople.489 The
ducal hat, the cornu, became so closely identified with the doge that it remained
his symbol of office until the end of the Republic in 1797. From shortly after our
period, it was part of the duties of the nuns of S. Zaccaria to make the new hat for
each doge when he took office, and he was presented with it by the abbess; it is
hardly necessary to highlight again the close association of that monastery with
the rulers of the city.
Such Byzantine emblems and insignia were an expanded version of the late
antique imperial ritual elements. Nowhere is the link more clearly made than in
the clothing that Western emperors wore on solemn occasions. We are told very
specifically that Charlemagne always dressed in Frankish dress, except in Rome
in 797, and for his coronation in 800; and Charles the Bald wore ‘Greek’ clothes in
Francia on similar ceremonial occasions, commented on with some embarass­
ment by a chronicler.490 But the association with Byzantine imperial power was
already there earlier, as we saw with King Aistulf, who wore, then deposited, his
chlamys on the altar of the Basilica Ursiana in Ravenna as a demonstration of
his plan to replace the exarch as ruler of Ravenna. Last but not least, and also
emblematic of power in Rome, was the ritual of the reception of guests at specific
distances from the city—the further the distance, the more important the guest.
Imperial, that is Byzantine, ritual and emblems of power were naturally the source

ninth- and tenth-century Western emperors; R. Elze, ed., Päpste-Kaiser-Könige und die mittelalterliche
Herrschaftsymbolik, ed. B. Schimmelpfennig and L. Schmugge (London, 1982); see also H. Keller, ‘Die
Siegel und Bullen Ottos III.’, in Europas Mitte um 1000. Handbuch zur Ausstellung, ed. A. Wieczorek
and H.-M. Hinz (Stuttgart, 2000), II, pp. 767–73.

488 R. Elze, ‘Insegne del potere sovrano e delegato in Occidente’, in Simboli e simbologia dell’alto
medioevo, Settimane 23 (1976), pp. 569–93 at 575–6.
489 JnD III. 32. Pertusi, ‘Quedam Regalia Insignia’, pp. 3–121; G. Fasoli, ‘Liturgia e cerimoniale
ducale’, in Venezia e il Levante, repr. in Scritti, pp. 529–61; Ravegnani, ‘Insegne del potere’, pp. 829–46.
490 Einhard, ch. 23.
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 395

of the papal outfit, too. The tunic and cloak, and above all the red socks, red shoes,
and hat, which later became the tiara, were originally part of the imperial cere­
monial attire of the highest ranks of dignitaries, and were adopted by the popes as
a result. The papal court, in addition to its late antique titles and ceremonies,
made these emblems of status and power part of the life of Rome, highly visible in
its ceremonies and festivities.

Conclusions

This chapter has looked at the physical setting in which the people mentioned in
Chapters 2 and 3 evolved. The elites lived in palaces (imperial or episcopal, ducal
or aristocratic houses), in or around which the social and economic groups below
them also lived: negociatores, clergy, notaries and scribes, artisans, servants, and
slaves. Together, they worshipped in the city’s churches, and sometimes they
became monks and nuns in the city’s monasteries, the elite more often than not
in those that they themselves founded. The most common form of interaction
between the various social levels in urban society went through the medium of
display: display of wealth through charity and care of the poor; display of art and,
through it, control over the sacred (expensive commissions of artefacts, orthodox
doctrine, ability to acquire relics for the worship and salvation of all); display of
mastery of literacy, Latin and legal formulae, and manipulation of their symbolic
value. Display equalled, as well as required, wealth. Building and decorating pal­
aces and churches involved funding and controlling the workforce; transporting
heavy goods; acquiring and commissioning works of art with their precious
materials and relics; endowing monasteries with land and peasant workers; trans­
porting food, and providing water and hospitality for the poor and the large num­
ber of foreign pilgrims; finding the silver to mint coins, as well as the gold, ivory,
and gems to create valuable objects used for exchanges of gifts for embassies and
for public displays of sovereignty in the city, such as crowns. Every gesture and
object had a role and a place to play on this stage of power, both material and
spiritual. Every means to carry out such display was therefore used in the theatre
of the city as a form of set and prop.
But was there a difference in the way this physical background was used
between the three cities? Did they all utilize it in the same way? And, if so, was
this on account of their late antique inheritance upheld by a Byzantine tradition,
or for some other reason? And, if they did use it differently, how so, and why?
Let us examine the palaces first. Everybody used them, but not everybody built
them. The doges did so, of necessity, but there was only one, and this remained
the undisputed centre of power in the city and the duchy of Venice. Emperors
and bishops in Rome and Ravenna in theory did not need to build any: the late
antique palaces were there, still available, on the Palatine and in the exarchal
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396 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

palace, in the Lateran and the archiepiscopal domus in Ravenna. The latter two
kept their function, and remained the centres of episcopal power, even after res­
tor­ations and rebuilds. But the imperial palaces did not, for the ideological and
political reasons that I discussed earlier. A first contrast which we see, therefore, is
that the two cities which had an emperor present, even if only occasionally, built
new palaces for that purpose, and shifted their location at the same time—creating
by definition more than one centre of political power. Not so Venice. Similarly,
the elites in Rome and Ravenna behaved in a similar way when they built their
houses in areas located as close as possible, if not actually within, the reused
spaces of power and mystique of the imperial Roman past (regardless of the fact
that they took over what had been originally the public space of the Roman city).
This would become especially potent in the tenth-century Rome of Alberic and
his like-minded friends.
In ecclesiastical terms too the maintenance of the Roman, that is late antique,
past was paramount: churches of ancient prestige (even though now in little-
populated areas) remained part of the urban space in Rome. But here Ravenna
was different. It was so in part because of the scale of restorations, which the arch­
bishops in Ravenna could not match at the scale of papal undertakings carried
out with Carolingian funding, largely because of the pilgrimage and prestige of St
Peter. Rome, therefore, saw an upsurge of church-building, heavily influenced by
Carolingian models in terms of decorative schemes (crypts, bell towers), while
Ravenna was building or recycling small churches, especially old Arian churches,
and living mostly on its inheritance of the glories of Byzantine sixth-century
churches. On the other hand, monasteries in the two cities, while originally small
aristocratic private foundations, augmented with a few more important ones, and
later some of Greek rite, gradually evolved, but in very different ways. As Ravenna
became closely associated with the Italian kingdom, it had an increasing number
of foundations of large monastic houses, associated with the elite families of the
city (including that of the archbishops), with large and rich estates, and following
the Benedictine Rule: in brief, the model of the standard Carolingian monastery
after Benedict of Aniane’s reform. And this is precisely the model of Venetian
monasteries, too, many of them ducal foundations, and means for political and
economic control over both the city and its hinterland—as much a Carolingian
model as the use of architectural features like the ‘Westwerk’ and the pilgrimage
crypt. In the same way, what little we know of Venice’s charitable arrangements
seems to have been linked to ducal charitable gifts and the ducal hospice opposite
the ducal palace, though it is also likely to have had additions from the parish
churches, themselves almost ‘private’ churches under family control, who appointed
the plebanus, while the bishop had little impact on their lives. This is an extreme
example of divergence from the situation of Roman churches.
In another material form of power display, in art, the similarities between the
three cities seem undeniable. Here the late antique models, to which were added
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the stage: places of power, instruments of control 397

Byzantine prestige objects and iconography and, just as importantly, Carolingian

innovations in iconography or in building styles, were fused together to produce
variations, sometimes in the form of the style of ‘Rome’ or of the ‘Adriatic area’.
The same patterns would apply to the other imagery of power: official titulature
and dating based on the Byzantine definitions of rulership, chancery formulae, or
symbols of power, even those of delegated imperial power such as the ‘Greek
dress’ or red shoes/socks of popes and doges, and the minting of Carolingian
silver denarii.
Should one then suggest that there is a definite community of traditions in the
area of ‘intangible heritage’—art, symbols, ideology of rulership—which goes
back to the late antique, then to the Byzantine Italian past, even as more material
factors—imperial residences, church and monastic institutions and government,
or coinage—reflect the experience of life under the ‘new regime’ of the Carolingians
and Ottonians? A kind of nostalgia for the old ways in terms of the old-fashioned
concept of ‘mentalités’, as opposed to the new practical experience of everyday
life, a way of interpreting the presence of an aristocratic domus (thus called) in
the centre of the reclaimed space of the imperial palace, but rebuilt architecturally
around a main sala of the Lombard type?
Before accepting this view, which would perhaps have been much appreciated
by contemporaries on account of their own construction of their past, it may be
wise to consider the fact that similarities are not always due to this apparent
common past but to common features and responses by particular groups and to
specific events. For example, it is clear that awareness of and attachment to the
Roman imperial past was very strong in Rome, but this was among the Romans;
for the papacy, pulled into the dynamic of Carolingian politics and the northern
European pilgrimage interest, this was the dominant material framework in
which it was interested The proof of this is that, in the tenth century, when the
popes no longer had this prop, the revival of the Roman past by the aristocratic
elite of the city became paramount. Ravenna kept its attachment to the scenery of
the past in the city, but the protagonists changed; even the aristocracy became
much more closely intertwined with the northern European elites in Italy, and
hence took on their style of building and landed wealth, even as they preserved
the names, social titles, and notarial formulae of late antiquity. In Ravenna, as
among the aristocratic elites of Rome, the inherited props of the Byzantine past
were still stronger, in most cases, than the changes brought about by the Carolingian
conquest—but not totally. In Venice, by contrast, and notwithstanding its formal
allegiance to Byzantium in the present, the Carolingian–Italian presence in the
material cityscape was far greater.
It is now time to see whether a similar pattern can be identified, not in the
static sense in the stage and sets, but in the action of the play—the dynamic drama
of city life.
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5
Exercising Power in the City
The Public Space

In Chapter 4 I attempted to pinpoint and describe the places of power in a static

way, looking at such elements as palaces, churches, and monasteries, as well as
other immanent and permanent features embodying public authority: titles,
coins, and physical symbols of secular and/or ecclesiastical rulers. In this chapter
I propose to look at the exercise of power in a dynamic way. Power in the city was
not made manifest only through buildings and objects. It was also shown through
specific gatherings of people, and the activities in which they engaged: proces­
sions, pilgrimages, elections, or, a contrario, fighting and conflict.
The first section of this chapter proposes to examine the gradual appropriation
of the public space in the city. For the sake of clarity, I have divided this history,
along somewhat anachronistic categories in a medieval context, into ap­pro­pri­
ation of the public space by the Church and appropriation of it by laymen, in a
very broad sense, as a political space. The appropriation of public space by the
Church of Rome, to the point where this became so widespread as to cause con­
flict with the laymen in the tenth century, began from the moment of Constantine’s
support of it, through donations and encouragement. The gradual Christianization
of the city of Rome is an old and venerable topic of study, with a long and exten­
sive historiography. It is essential to recapitulate its main outline in order to be
able to follow the extension of the networks of processions and liturgical cere­
monies (including pilgrimages and coronations). I have tried to pare down this
story to its essentials, showing how the Church of Rome took over the urban
space, used it for constructing an urban liturgy, and gradually expanded it,
through the encouragement of the pilgrimage to Rome and the cult of St Peter. In
order to do so efficiently, the papacy had to do more than control the space. It had
to manage it. This was done through the gradual takeover of a variety of public
functions, which had been part of the public administration previously: distribu­
tion of food, water supply, restoration of the walls, and upkeep of the roads, for
example. I then look more specifically at the use of the public space by laymen as
a political arena, with a focus on tenth-century Rome, but also on Venice. In
Rome, the Theophylacts, Alberic, and the Crescentii, and in Venice the doges,
tried to reserve and highlight major public spaces for the use of the ruler, with
various degrees of success.

Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000: Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present, and the Construction of City Identity.
Veronica West-Harling, Oxford University Press (2020). © Veronica West-Harling.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754206.001.0001
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exercising power in the city: the public space 399

In the second section of this chapter, also divided into two subsections, I look
at public space first as a place of cohesion, then as one of conflict. Cohesion is
made manifest by consensual government through elections, coronations, and
public oaths, for example, and reinforced through representations of power, such
as ceremonies, processions, and festivals; public acts, such as assemblies for judi­
cial purposes; and united urban efforts towards defence. When cohesion fails, we
have conflict, made manifest through disputed elections, riots, and conspiracies.
My concluding section brings together some of the above elements in order to
define better how public space, and what takes place in it, makes it either a space
of unity or a space of separation.

Who Owns the Public Space in the City?

Christianization and Appropriation of the

Public Space by the Church in Rome

The Christianization of the city of Rome is possibly the oldest and most venerable
aspect of the study of the city in the early Middle Ages, made into an area of
ser­ious academic study by the celebrated names of De Rossi and Duchesne, fol­
lowed by those of Piétri, Krautheimer, Reekmans, Pani Ermini, and many others.1
The key elements of these studies are the gradual expansion of the Roman Church
from late antiquity onwards; the extension of the cemeteries, then of the network
of titular churches and basilicas, the latter with their own network of attendant
monasteries; the development of the Lateran complex with the papal palace up to
the ninth century; and the creation of a network of basilicas, tituli, and diaconiae
in the historic centre of imperial Rome.2 The Church in Rome was able to col­on­
ize parts of the public space of the city, often from the outer areas such as the
Lateran towards the centre of imperial Rome, and gradually transform it into

1 Among the most notable works are De Rossi, Inscriptiones Christianae; De Rossi and Silvagni,
Inscriptiones Christianae Urbis Romae. Nova Series; De Rossi, Roma sotterranea; L. Duchesne, for
example in his commentary on the Liber Pontificalis, and his papers such as ‘Les régions de Rome’, pp.
126–49, and Scripta minora; C. Piétri, Roma Christiana. Recherches sur l’Eglise de Rome, son organisa-
tion, sa politique, son idéologie, de Miltiade à Sixte III (311–440) (Rome: BEFAR 224, 1976–93); CB;
Reekmans, ‘L’implantation monumentale chrétienne’, pp. 173–207; Reekmans, ‘L’implantation monu­
mentale chrétienne dans l’espace urbain de Rome de 300 à 850’, pp. 874–915; Pani Ermini, ‘Forma
Urbis’, pp. 288–97.
2 Broadly speaking and with variations over time, the basilicas were the great churches in which
the pope celebrated Mass, while the tituli, varying between twenty-five and twenty-eight according to
sources from different periods, were private foundations to start with, which became a near equivalent
to parish churches over the centuries. In addition to the above, other recent key works on these themes
are Pani Ermini, Christiana loca; V. Saxer, ‘La Chiesa di Roma dal V al X secolo: amministrazione
centrale e organizzazione territoriale’, in Roma nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 48 (2001), pp. 493–632;
Barone, ‘La Chiesa di Roma’, pp. 189–225.
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400 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

churches and monasteries, some built ex novo, others using old public buildings
or parts of these, including in the Forum and on the Palatine, in order to serve an
increasingly Christian population after the fifth century.
Originally the basilicas, tituli, and other Christian centres were all situated in
the populated areas of the city, serving the pastoral needs of the Christian
community. From c.430, the popes started building churches to the Virgin, the
apostles, and martyrs, first on the Esquiline around S. Maria Maggiore, where
there were already five tituli; this was by then the most strongly Christianized
area of the city. But in the mid-fifth century most of Rome was still in appearance
a pagan city, with no churches in its monumental centre in the Forum, on the
Palatine, or on the Capitoline hill. This was easily explained, since churches were
mostly built in conspicuous places, such as on main roads and at major crossroads.
Their absence in the monumental and official centre of Rome would have been
due to two main factors. The first was that there was no room to put them there,
on account of the high concentration of buildings already in place, most of these
official buildings still in use.3 The second factor, deriving from the first, was that
there was not much reason to build churches in the monumental centre of the
city, where there were relatively few inhabitants anyway. The period from 550 to
850 is very well documented, thanks to the Liber Pontificalis, especially for the
Carolingian age, and most of all, for the papacy of Leo III. The well-known ‘cata­
logue’ of Leo III, which gives a list of Roman sanctuaries in the city around 807,
includes 117 which received gifts from him. Not all urban churches were included,
and many of the cemeterial basilicas were not; calculations suggest that there may
have been about 200 churches, oratories, monasteries, diaconiae, and hospices
inside the walls, and in the immediate suburbium, around 800.4 It is therefore
evident that the core of the Christian monumental expansion in Rome took place
between the sixth and the eighth centuries. Before the sixth century, most churches
were tituli for pastoral purposes. Afterwards, titular churches continued to function,
though in several places where they had been originally created the population
was much diminished. Nevertheless, as the oldest established churches in the pas­
toral landscape, they remained important through their continuing role in the
stational liturgy, and they were often served by attached monasteries. Many of the
new foundations in the city were churches with relics, diaconiae as char­it­able
­centres, and Greek and Latin monasteries. At the time of Leo III, the number of
tituli had gone down from twenty-five to twenty-two, two having become diaco-
niae and one, SS Pietro e Marcellino, having been abandoned. The number and
original location of the tituli founded by fourth- and fifth-century popes or rich

3 Many pagan buildings were still in use for their original purpose, except for the temples after
Theodosius. The Church initially avoided reusing temples as churches, especially those in the fora,
even though they were empty by then, and there was little in the way of other empty buildings to reuse
or space to build anew.
4 Geertman, More veterum, pp. 82–129.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 401

aristocrats often no longer corresponded to the demographic and topographical

reality of the city by the ninth and tenth centuries. Conversely, the diaconiae,
which had originally been for pilgrims and the poor, had become better adapted
geographically to the new demographic shape of the city and to access for the
arrival and distribution of food. They were placed near the imperial stores (hor-
rea) on the banks of the Tiber (S. Giorgio in Velabro, S. Maria in Cosmedin,
S. Teodoro), and on major road axes—the Via Sacra,5 the Via Lata,6 and the Caput
Africa road (S. Maria in Domnica). Most people in Rome lived along these routes,
though the diaconiae were not aimed only at the people living nearby: Rome had
no parishes as such, and the only attachment and identification with a residence
that people had would be, later on, the rioni.7
The sixth century saw a new and important development: the setting up of
sanctuaries in the monumental area of the city, especially in the Roman Forum.
Altogether, at least thirteen churches and oratories were either built or converted
in the Forum between the sixth and the ninth centuries, all nestling in pagan and
imperial buildings (though very rarely in temples), but not in the central, traffic
area of the Forum.8 S. Maria Antiqua was in the service area of the palace of
Domitian, rather than actually in the Forum. But setting up a church in a large
room, in part of a pagan imperial palace, was nevertheless a political move for the
Church of Rome, signalling a clear evolution in relations between Church and
Empire. For as long as the ‘Roman’ Empire held sway in Rome, the Palatine and
the Forum retained a strong symbolic function as the scene of the imperial past
and present, a function obvious from the continuing role of politics in the topog­
raphy. With the end of the Byzantine presence in Rome and the arrival of the
Carolingians, everything changed. I mentioned earlier the extent to which the
papacy was now free to use what had been imperial fiscal property, and the way in
which this led to fundamental changes in the public space at the heart of the city,

5 S. Adriano at the Three Fates, SS Cosma e Damiano, S. Maria Antiqua, then S. Maria Nova.
6 S. Maria in Aquiro and S. Maria in Via Lata.
7 These ‘regions’ were different from all previous forms of administrative divisions, such as the
fourteen Augustan regions, or the early medieval seven ecclesiastical regions—the rioni—whose
popu­lar origin or otherwise has been debated; they would become from the eleventh century the most
effective areas into which the city was divided.
8 SS Cosma e Damiano at the rear of the temple of Romulus, later turned into a diaconia by Pope
Hadrian I (772–95); S. Maria Antiqua, also a diaconia, later damaged by an earthquake and rebuilt by
Pope Leo IV (847–55) further away on the Via Sacra in the ruins of the temple of Venus and Rome as
S. Maria Nova. West of the Basilica Julia along the Vicus Jugarius was the seventh-century S. Maria in
Cannapara. Pope Honorius (625–38) had turned the Curia of the Senate into the church of S. Adriano
at the Three Fates, and Hadrian I made it a diaconia. Next to it the Secretarium of the Senate became
the church of S. Martina, first mentioned in the Life of Hadrian I. Between the temples of Concord,
Vespasian, and Saturn and the Arch of Septimus Severus was the diaconia of SS Sergio e Bacco, rebuilt
by Hadrian I; see, for example, M. Bonfigli, ‘La diaconia dei Ss. Sergio e Bacco nel Foro Romano. Fonti
e problemi’, Rivista di Archeologia Cristiana 50 (1974), pp. 55–85. On the Via Sacra near the Basilica of
Maxentius Pope Paul I (757–67) built an oratory to SS Pietro e Paolo.
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402 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

especially in the reuse of the marble and floors of public edifices.9 Until the eighth
century, the Church had mostly filled in gaps but never demolished or destroyed
Roman edifices. From the second half of that century, it began to intervene more
directly, at first with foundations inside pagan buildings, and sometimes with
the demolition of the latter if they were too derelict and presented a danger to the
churches on to which they could have collapsed. From Hadrian I, we see a
re­inforce­ment of the ecclesiastical presence in the form of new, as opposed to
restored, churches in the oldest part of the pagan city, whether as diaconiae
(S. Angelo in Pescheria, S. Giorgio in Velabro, S. Eustachio), replacements of
older churches (S. Maria Nova), or new foundations (SS Pietro e Paolo on the Via
Sacra) in the area of the Roman Forum.
The Palatine was still used for imperial offices until at least the beginning of the
eighth century,10 and until the tenth there was only one Christian sanctuary there,
S. Cesario, which had been the palatine chapel inside the imperial palace, and
later became part of a monastery. The slow Christianization of the Palatine was
due to its status as the main locus of power of the pagan and imperial city.11 For a
long time, apart from the palace chapel of S. Cesario, it only had one titular
church on its edges, S. Anastasia, though an important one in the papal stational
liturgy on account of its location. This church was restored by Pope Leo III, who
also added Carolingian-style walls on top of the central nave. S. Maria Antiqua,
founded at the latest in the sixth century as we know from its frescoes, though not
mentioned in the Liber Pontificalis until the eighth, was another example of the
closeness to the imperial palace seen as a bridgehead for a Christian presence on
the Palatine. The church was already richly decorated and in possession of the
oldest icon of the Virgin in the city, even before its restoration by Pope John VII.
S. Cesario was also possibly a sixth-century foundation, though it was first men­
tioned in the seventh when, as was customary on the accession of a new emperor,
the icon of Phocas was placed there in 603. Pope Sergius I was elected there in
687, before going on to the sacrum palatium (Lateran). In 823 when Einhard went
to look for relics with a monk called Basil, the monastery was served by Greek
monks; it remained Greek, and we know that when St Sabas of Collesano came to
Rome, he lived at S. Cesario and died there, with the Empress Theophano in
attendance.12 In the seventh and eighth centuries, the Palatine was still a place
of power. Byzantine authorities like the duke of Rome and, on his visits, the

9 See Chapter 2. On reusing inscriptions in particular, see R. Coates Stephens R., ‘Epigraphy as
“Spolia”. The reuse of inscriptions in early medieval buildings’, PBSR 70 (2002), pp. 275–96.
10 See Chapter 2 and also the inscription of John VII, ed. in Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo,
pp. 55–8, and Spera, ‘Il Papato e Roma’, Fig. 4.
11 Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo, pp. 43–4.
12 Translatio et miracula ss. Marcellini et Petri, MGH SS 15/1, pp. 239–64 at 393–5; Vita Bernwardi,
in J. Nolte, ‘Tercii Ottonis Imperatoris Didascalus. Die Vita Bernwardi von Thankmar (11. Jh.)’, in
Vormoderne Lebensläufe—erziehungshistorisch betrachtet, ed. R. W. Keck and E. Wiersing (Cologne:
Beiträge zur historischen Bildungsforschung 12, 1994), pp. 131–49.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 403

exarch—as we know from one remaining seal of the Exarch Paul (723–6)—probably
resided in the Domus Augustana Flavia. The palace was in the care of an imperial
curator, of whom Platon, John VII’s father, was one. Other than monasteries,
there were no churches built on the Palatine itself, though, only on the edges of it.
This may be due to a remaining reluctance to implant churches within the frame­
work of what had been the heart of pagan imperial Rome and its power, but
equally and more probably, it was just the result of the absence of people in the
central part of the hill.
The population level on the Palatine was more or less stable on the western side
of the hill towards the Forum Boarium, the Velabro, the diaconiae of S. Teodoro,
and S. Maria in Cosmedin, rebuilt by Hadrian I, in those areas which had been,
and remained, the commercial centre of Rome by the Tiber. S. Maria Antiqua
itself was a diaconia. In the valley of Velabro, there were two diaconiae (S. Teodoro
and S. Giorgio), the latter built by Pope Zacarias, and S. Maria in Cosmedin was
on the Forum Boarium, where the headquarters of the Prefecture of the Annona
had been. This was the area of the Schola Graeca, which had settled at the foot
of the Palatine when the Byzantine government had its headquarters there,
and was used by civil servants, the army, and traders close to it. Also close by
were S. Anastasia, and Pope Gregory IV mentioned a church of Abbacyrus ad
Alephantum (Elephas Herbarius) between the Forum Boarium and the Forum
Olitorium. The presence of all these diaconiae is witness to the continuing occu­
pation of the area, which remained a centre for social and economic, as well as
religious, life, at the nexus of road and river traffic. There were a few new founda­
tions on the Palatine, and gradually the Church conquered the old centre of
power, while at the same time preserving its role in the administration of the city
for as long as the Byzantine officials remained in place.13 On the Capitoline hill,
by contrast, there was no evidence of any church until 944, when the monastery
of S. Maria in Capitolio was first mentioned.
Another major area for the setting up of Christian churches was the Campus
Martius. On the edge of it, in the porticus Octaviae, was the diaconia of S. Angelo
in Pescheria, whose dispensator in 755 was Hadrian I’s uncle Duke Theodotus,
along with several other monasteries and the xenodochium of S. Lucia Aniciorum.
The Via Lata also had new churches—the basilica of SS Apostoli, the monastery
of S. Andrea in Biberatica, the diaconia of S. Maria in Via Lata (next to another
xenodochium, founded by Belisarius, near the Aqua Virgo), and the church of
S. Maria in Xenodochio. Paul I founded in his and his brother Stephen II’s family
home the monastery of SS Lorenzo e Silvestro (then S. Silvestro in Capite), to
which he donated many relics brought in from the cemeteries, as we saw earlier,
and which he entrusted to Greek monks. As part of the development of the route

13 Augenti, Il Palatino nel Medioevo, p. 60, and Duchesne, ‘Le Palatin chrétien’, pp. 19–23.
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404 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

towards the Vatican, the Via Recta (as it was first known), then called the Via
Sacra or Via Maior, churches and monasteries multiplied on either side. We have,
therefore, in the central and eastern part of the Campus Martius, between 550
and 850, three tituli, six churches, four diaconiae, and seven monasteries, of which
five were in the southern area near the Fora.14 This is testimony to a strong
Christian implantation, which contrasts rather strikingly with the single titulus of
S. Lorenzo in Damaso in the western part of the Campus Martius throughout the
period. This gap would continue to exist in the area, except along the Via Sacra,
and confirms topographically the gap between the city itself and the area left of
the Tiber where the Leonine City would develop. This absence of settlement west
of present-day Piazza Navona may well have reflected the apparent separation of
interests between the inhabitants of the city and the more foreign-based pilgrims’
focus on St Peter’s.
There was a definite papal attempt to reinforce the Christian landscape along
the processional route of the stational liturgy from the Lateran to the Vatican,
notably by the founding or restoration of the Esquiline and Celio churches. The
axis of the Via Maior leading from the Lateran to the Vatican via S. Clemente and
the SS Quattro Coronati, isolated as it had become among sparsely populated
settle­ments of houses, was at the core of the papal effort to maintain the Church’s
presence, in spite of the peripheral location of the Lateran. New ecclesiastical
structures were encouraged, such as the monastery of S. Erasmo and the diaconia
of S. Maria in Domnica near the Aqua Claudia, for pilgrims walking from the
Lateran to the centre of Rome.15 At the end of the eighth and in the first half of
the ninth century, restorations were carried out at the above churches, as well as
at S. Stefano Rotondo and SS Giovanni e Paolo, but after the first Carolingian
blossoming of work, only relatively small structures were built in this eastern
area, such as S. Agata in Caput Africae under Pope Leo III and the frescoed ora­
tory of S. Lorenzo super S. Clementem, built by Formosus.
In Suburra too, on the hill slope of the Esquiline, Gregory II turned his family
home into a monastery dedicated to S. Agata in Suburra. Other churches had
monasteries serving them.16 There was one diaconia, S. Vito in Macello (in the
Macellum Liviae) under Leo III, but most churches in the area were those of other

14 S. Maria in Campus Martius founded by Pope Zacharias for Greek nuns, refugees from
Constantinople, with the relics of St Gregory of Naziansus; the new church of S. Apollinare; and the
diaconia of S. Maria in Aquiro in the temple of Matidia. The Pantheon had been turned into S. Maria
ad Martyres in 609, and next to it was the diaconia of S. Eustachio mentioned under Pope Gregory II,
in the tenth century called in platana, presumably near the xenodochia in platana built by Stephen II.
S. Maria sopra Minerva was built on top of the temple of Minerva Chalcidica possibly already under
Zacharias and certainly by the time of the Itinerary of Einsiedeln; then S. Agnese in Agone was built.
15 C. Pavolini, ‘L’area del Celio fra l’antichità e il medioevo alla luce delle recenti indagini archeo­
logiche’, in Paroli and Delogu, La storia economica di Roma, pp. 65–8.
16 S. Eufemia, S. Lorenzo Panisperna, S. Lucia in Orfea, SS Silvestro e Martino, S. Agapito, S. Pietro
ad Vincula, Paschal I’s newly established monastery of Greek monks serving S. Prassede, then in­corp­
or­at­ing the monastery of S. Agnese ad duos Furnas.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 405

monasteries. S. Maria Maggiore had four serving it by the eighth century, including
that of SS Cosma e Damiano as a gerocomium (an old people’s home), established
by Gregory II. Also monastic were S. Isidoro, S. Bibinana, and SS Andrea e Lucia
Re(ca)nati. This eastern area of the city already had five tituli and five saints’
churches and chapels by the fifth century, as well as three diaconiae, but mostly,
between the sixth and the ninth century, the new establishments were monaster­
ies. Of the eighteen in the area, a few predated 600, but most were founded in the
eighth and ninth centuries, near an existing church which they served.
The Lateran area itself had a relatively densely populated area of churches and
sanctuaries. But these were mostly set up before 550, and there were few new
buildings added to the tituli after that, except for the four monasteries serving the
Lateran, and the Schola Cantorum restored by Sergius II. All new sanctuaries
were inside the episcopium. There were no diaconiae around, and S. Maria in
Domnica was quite far, no less than 850 metres away from the Lateran, unlike the
five diaconiae at the Vatican, surrounding St Peter’s, for the use of the pilgrims.
The Lateran complex had already been somewhat isolated at the time of its
foundation, for obvious reasons, since churches were mostly on the edges of the
pagan city. It became increasingly so as the demographic pattern changed, and
there were fewer people on the Celio and the Esquiline. The Lateran zone had
clusters around it, if only those of the administrative personnel, traders, and some
pilgrims, just as there were some around S. Lorenzo and S. Paolo fuori le Mura,
with minor additions in the sixth and seventh centuries, then nothing until the
relative revival of the eleventh century.
On the Celio, on the other hand, were several more prestigious churches: the
diaconia of S. Maria in Domnica rebuilt by Paschal I, the titulus of S. Stefano
Rotondo, and especially the monastery of S. Erasmo, probably founded in the
seventh century, one of the most important in the city until the eleventh century.
Not far away was possibly the most prestigious of all, the monastery founded by
Gregory the Great, later known as SS Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro. Here
too, as on the Esquiline, there were few ecclesiastical centres in the period 550 to
850, and these were mostly monasteries. Not dissimilar in its history and church
settlements was another old aristocratic zone of sparse occupation by the eighth
century—the Aventine. Here also there were a few sanctuaries: the titulus of
Balbina and the monastery of S. Saba on the Little Aventine, founded in the
seventh century and growing in success in the eighth and ninth centuries. Near
the titulus of S. Sabina was S. Bonifazio, which functioned as a diaconia around
800 but then took off as one of the most successful and fashionable monasteries,
under the new name of SS Alessio e Bonifazio, in 977. Across the Tiber, in
Trastevere, there were also few foundations, except for the three monasteries near
the three tituli which they served: Paschal I’s rebuilt S. Cecilia, Gregory III’s
monastery of SS Crisogono, Lorenzo e Stefano, and Gregory IV’s S. Maria in
Trastevere’s monastery of SS Maria, Callisto e Cornelio. There was one diaconia
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406 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

around 800, S. Agata de Caballo (Statue of Dioscuri in Baths of Constantine).

Altogether on the Quirinale, Celio, Aventine, and Trastevere, there were very
sparse Christian establishments—one diaconia per hill, and almost no new
churches, any new ones being generally monasteries.
To sum up. Between the sixth and the ninth centuries there was clearly an
intensifying of the Christian settlement in the centre of the city, in the Forum and
the Forum Boarium, on the Via Lata to S. Silvestro and S. Lorenzo in Lucina, as
well as in the eastern Campus Martius, and in the east in Suburra and towards the
Porta Tiburtina. The growing number of monasteries were there possibly to serve
churches, and for those who sought solitude, since there were very few people left
on the Celio or the Aventine. Monks were an essential part of the city clergy,
because they served the basilicas for the offices and the laus perennis. Not only the
basilicas, but also some tituli, had monasteries attached to them, as at S. Crisogono
and S. Prassede, and most monks were what was known in Rome as ‘Greek’,
though in reality they were ‘hellenophones’ from various places such as Syria,
Egypt, the Holy Land, and so on. There was a strong influx of such refugees from
the mid-seventh century onwards, as a result, first, of the Arab conquests, then of
imperial ‘heresies’ in Constantinople, and this continued to the end of the eighth
century until the Eighth Ecumenical Council, then again with the revival of
icono­clasm in the ninth century. These ‘Greek’ monks sought relatively deserted
places for their monasteries (S. Saba, S. Erasmo), and it was only later that they
were persuaded further into the city, for example when Stephen II and Paul I
founded S. Silvestro in Capite, and Paschal I, S. Prassede. Greek monks (and
nuns, for example at S. Agnese and S. Maria in Campus Martius), as we saw, were
strong supporters of the papacy.
The developing Christian network in the city suggests several conclusions.
First and foremost is that, if we accept that the diaconiae, with their strong social
and economic role, shared to some extent by the new churches, were in areas of
demographic strength, then it follows that the most densely populated areas of
the city were between the Forum and the Tiber, at the southern end of the
Campus Martius, on the Via Lata, where the aristocracy lived, and in the Suburra.
Two main changes occurred. The first was the pattern of settlements of the aris­
tocracy, which increasingly took over parts of the imperial Fora, the Palatine, and,
once again as in imperial times, the Aventine. The other change, from the late
eighth century onwards, was that the Vatican area around St Peter’s took off con­
siderably, and eventually became a borgo in its own right inside the Leonine City.
Nevertheless, and despite these significant shifts, there was no actual change in
the way the city defined itself. It was the Aurelian wall which continued to be the
separation between ‘Rome’ and ‘the rest’. Even increasingly isolated areas inside
the walls, such as the Lateran, were too important not to remain part of the city’s
identity, and Hadrian I underlined this by attempting to refashion the Campus
Lateranenis, as we will see in the next chapter.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 407

There was certainly constant restoration and beautification of churches inside

the city. However, there is no doubt that much of the papal interest was focused
on the expansion and support of churches, chapels, and charitable foundations in
the vicinity of St Peter’s, most of them for the use of foreign pilgrims. At this
point, one cannot really continue to speak of Christianization of the city, but
rather of the expansion of the Church in response to a new demand. We must
also not forget the suburbium around the city, which had about seventy-one
churches built between the sixth and ninth centuries, many along major routes to
the cemeteries. There were seventeen new monasteries, because monks often
wanted to be near the martyrs’ sanctuaries. Along most roads there was one mon­
astery, though there were two each around S. Paolo and S. Lorenzo. Tellingly,
there were eight around the Vatican. St Peter’s itself was served by the monasteries
of S. Martino, SS Giovanni e Paolo, S. Stefano Maggiore, and S. Stefano Minore.
At S. Lorenzo, after the building of the sixth-century basilica, there was almost no
work carried out, except for restorations. At S. Paolo’s settlement, after it had suf­
fered badly during the 846 Saracen attack, John VIII built Johannipolis, fortifying
the complex with walls, towers, and gates. At St Peter’s, before about 850 the only
protection and link with the city was via the Mausoleum of Hadrian (Castel
Sant’Angelo as it was becoming known by the tenth century), then the porticus
leading up to the piazza in front of the basilica—the Cortina. Between the sixth
and eighth centuries, there was very little growth in this area, though we begin to
see some monasteries, oratories, and the foreign scholae, whose first appearance is
in 799. But from the mid-eighth century, and in the ninth, there was considerable
change and a great demographic expansion, under Stephen II, and especially
Hadrian I and Leo III. Two new xenodochia for pilgrims were founded, repairs
were carried out to the portico, and to the Aqua Traiana, by Hadrian I, so as to
provide water for the mills of the Janiculum, and also the atrium with new baths
near the basilica. Gregory IV and Nicholas I again restored the aqueduct. Leo III
carried out a huge amount of building work at St Peter’s, especially around the
lodgings, at the new pontifical palace south of the basilica, near the obelisk of
Nero’s Circus and the hospice of S. Pietro in Naumachia, and restored houses and
baths for the poor and pilgrims, as well as setting up new baths near the obelisk.
This is even before we mention the beginning of Charlemagne’s Vatican palace.
The Vatican area had five diaconiae originally, but there was a great expansion in
their number, and that of the xenodochia, under Hadrian I and Leo III, many
along the porticus and several inside the St Peter’s complex itself. Except for the
scholae, diaconiae and hospices, that is the supporting network for pilgrims, and
the new monastery of S. Stefano Minore under Stephen II, there were few new
churches in the Vatican area.
Around 800, the Vatican took off as a pilgrimage centre, hence the rise out of
all proportion of the demographic centre around St Peter’s as a pilgrimage place:
monks serving the basilica; scholae with a gradually permanent population;
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Frankish palace and administrative centre; and pilgrims’ accommodation. The

other great basilicas had very little compared to the conurbation of the Leonine
City. But this developed outside the city of Rome itself, one mile beyond the wall,
so that after the attacks in 846 and the ensuing destruction, a decision was made
by Leo IV and Lothar to build a new wall, finished in 852, separating the complex
from the city even more noticeably. The Civitas Leoniana was two and a half
Roman miles in length, in the form of a rectangle across the Ager Vaticanus, with
forty-four towers and up to six gates. But by the ninth century there was no fusion
between the two: as we saw earlier with the geography of the Campus Martius
west of the Stadium of Domitian (Piazza Navona), there was little Christian
building (or indeed settlement) in that area of the bend of the Tiber, which left an
empty space between the city and the Vatican.
I have already touched on the increasing impact of pilgrimage on the activities
of the popes, especially in terms of the building of accommodation and facilities
for pilgrims with xenodochia and diaconiae around St Peter’s, the liberalization
of the rules about moving and giving away relics to pilgrims, and the use of
Carolingian funds for the rebuilding and beautification of churches.17 Here I need
to discuss in greater detail the importance of pilgrimage in political terms for
northern Europeans, including for kings and emperors. Before doing this, it
seems appropriate to look more closely at the root of the success of Roman
pilgrimage: the cult and veneration of St Peter.

The Cult of St Peter and the Pilgrimage ‘ad limina’

From the start, the Church of Rome’s primacy was established on St Peter’s
primacy among the Apostles. Christ had made Simon/Peter the cornerstone of
the Church, and had given him the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, to bind and
set loose sinners, that is to say to allow them entrance through the gates of
Heaven, or deny it.18 This literal interpretation of St Peter’s ‘power of the keys’ led
to the pope, the successor of St Peter, to be seen as first among bishops, just as
St Peter himself was the ‘Prince of the Apostles’. The principle of the primacy of the
Church of Rome because of Peter’s role was first set out by Pope Damasius (366–84),
and Pope Leo I (440–61) organized a college of custodes or cubicularii (later also
called mansionarii) for both St Peter’s and S. Paolo, headed by a praepositus in
charge of looking after the tomb and relics.19 From Gregory the Great onwards,

17 See Chapter 4. 18 Matt. 16:18.

19 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 454–5; on the primacy under Damasius and Leo see, for example,
Piétri, Roma christiana, I, pp. 856–81, and II, pp. 1151–628; the traditional works on the papacy, such
as Caspar, Geschichte des Papsttums, Grisar, Geschichte Roms, Richards, The Popes and the Papacy,
Collins, Keepers of the Keys of Heaven, Franconi, Storia dei papi e del papato, all include discussions of
it, and a summary is, for example, in R. Schieffer, ‘Der Papst als Patriarch von Rom’, in Il primato del
vescovo di Roma nel primo millenio, ed. M. Maccarrone (Vatican City, 1991), pp. 433–51. A short ver­
sion of the traditio legis principle as the basis for the primacy is in P. Franke, ‘Traditio legis und
Petrusprimat’, Vigiliae Christianis 26 (1972), pp. 263–71. Two classic works about the primacy and
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exercising power in the city: the public space 409

who undertook his well-known missionary programme of conversion of the

Germanic peoples of northern Italy and Europe from paganism (Anglo-Saxons)
or from Arianism (Lombards), this spiritual primacy was transformed into a
great veneration for St Peter himself, called the Head of the Apostolic College
(that is to say, the most powerful after Christ) and Keeper of the Keys of Heaven.
From this veneration, stronger with every missionary success, came a con­
stantly expanding flow of visitors to Rome, awed by its relics of the martyrs who
had died for their faith and established Christianity, and above all for St Peter,
who could wipe away sins and allow pilgrims to enter Heaven.20 From the
mid-seventh century, when the papacy began to have major trouble with the
Byzantine emperors on account of the Monothelite, then the iconoclastic, ‘here­
sies’, Western pilgrims to Rome, from the humblest to the kings, affirmed their
trust in the papacy as the repository of the pure faith and doctrine. They spurred
the popes to define the Orthodox faith in relation to the Byzantines, and Rome’s
first place in the hierarchy of Christian Churches. This forcibly affirmed belief in
the power of St Peter and the pope was made manifest, not simply through
increasing the role of the papacy as a political power in the West, and hence its
alliance with the Carolingians, but also in practice, on account of the considerable
number of pilgrims to the city. Through its association with St Peter, Rome,
always regarded as the Apostle’s city, became the goal of numerous pilgrims who
wished to die near the tomb of the Apostle, ad limina Sancti Petri, thereby secur­
ing almost certain access to Heaven. The devotion for the ‘owner’ of the city, as St
Peter was perceived to be, ensured the continuous success of the pilgrimage,
prompting pilgrims to visit and worship the relics of the Apostle in all the places
associated with him in Rome. The pilgrims also paid their respects to the pope,
the embodiment of St Peter on earth. This was why St Peter’s rapidly came to
benefit most from papal restorations and gifts in the Middle Ages. It was St Peter’s

Byzantium are A. Dvornik, Byzance et la primauté romaine (Paris, 1964), and J. Gouillard, ‘L’Église
d’Orient et la primauté romaine au temps de l’iconoclasme’, Istina 21 (1976), pp. 25–54.

20 McCulloh, ‘From Antiquity to the Middle Ages’, pp. 313–24; T. Zwölfer, Sankt Peter, Apostelfürst
und Himmelspförter: seine Verehrung bei den Angelsachsen und Franken (Stuttgart, 1929); more recent
are V. Ortenberg, ‘ “Angli aut angeli”: les Anglo-Saxons ont-ils sauvé la papauté au VIIe siècle?’, Revue
Mabillon 67 (1995), n. s. 6, pp. 5–32; M. Cecchelli, ‘Il culto di San Pietro in Roma’, in Pietro e Paolo nel
XIX centenario del martirio (Naples, 1969), pp. 133–65. L. Lazzari, ‘Il primato di Pietro nella Vita
Wilfridi’, and P. Lendinara, ‘Pietro, apostolo, vescovo e santo nella letteratura anglosassone’, both in La
figura di San Pietro nelle fonti del Medioevo: Atti del Convegno tenutosi in occasione dello Studio univer-
sitatum docentium congressus (Viterbo e Roma 5–8 settembre 2000), ed. L. Lazzari and A. M. Valente
Bacci (Louvain-la-Neuve, 2001), pp. 81–111 and 649–84; and N. Howe, ‘Rome: capital of Anglo Saxon
England’, Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 34 (2004). L. Bianchi, Ad limina Petri. Spazio e
memoria della Roma cristiana (Rome, 1999), and H. Brandenburg, ‘Die Aussagen der Schriftquellen
und der archäologischen Zeugnisse zum Kult der Apostelfürsten in Rom’, in Petrus und Paulus in
Rom, ed. S. Heid, (Freiburg/Br., 2011), pp. 351–82, are the most recent studies on the cult of the relics
of St Peter.
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410 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

which was the goal of visitors to Rome, and this is why the area around it saw
Rome’s greatest level of urban development, with its pilgrimage traffic.21

The Papal Response: the Scholae Peregrinorum, the Beautification

of St Peter’s, and the Valorization of the Roman Christian
Past and Monuments
The popes responded to the logistical problems posed by this surge of visitors in a
variety of ways. The first was the practical response of finding places for them to
lodge, feeding them, and looking after the sick and dying, since many pilgrims
came to Rome to die ad limina. At first, the institutions they used were the trad­
ition­al Roman ones of the xenodochia, then, as the number of pilgrims continued
to rise, including people who came to live in Rome and end their days there, they
invented new forms of accommodation for them in the form of the scholae (simi­
lar to ‘pensioni’ or colleges, providing lodging, food, medical assistance, and com­
pany) for each national group, which eventually became the Schola Francorum
(Franks), Schola Langobardorum (Italians), Schola Saxonum (Anglo-Saxons), and
Schola Frisonum (Frisians/North Europeans). The scholae have been studied in
detail in the past, and if we know little about their internal organization, we do
know at least, from the Liber Pontificalis, something about their role in the life of
the city at the time of major events such as the arrival of rulers in Rome. The
scholae peregrinorum from the eighth century onwards supplemented the five
diaconiae on the piazza and along the portico, the xenodochia established by
Stephen II, and the new buildings for accommodation and baths set up under Leo
III. The four scholae were part of the residential population of the city, which is
why they were present with their banners for the return reception of Leo III in
799, and played a major role as part of the military defence of the city against
Saracen attacks.22
After 846 and the building of the walls and the Civitas Leoniana, the complex’s
centrality became overwhelming. The Lateran Palace remained the official
administrative residence of the popes, but Leo III also began building south of the
Vatican a hall with mosaics and a triclinium similar to the Lateran one, where
foreign sovereigns could be officially welcomed; by the mid-ninth century, a hos-
picium was also built, in case the pope needed to stay longer at St Peter’s and
could not return to the Lateran, so that by then it had become possible to talk
about a Vatican palace.23 This was the heart of the Rome of the pilgrims, and the

21 It is impossible to list the huge literature on the pilgrimage to Rome, and I will only mention
some of the most notable recent work, such as D. J. Birch, Pilgrimage to Rome in the Middle Ages
(Woodbridge, 1998), pp. 23–7 and 89–149, and now Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 149–179, esp. 154–9.
22 LP I. 98, ch. 19 and 104, ch. 46; on the scholae see L. Cassanelli, ‘Gli insediamenti nordici in
Borgo: Le ‘Scolae peregrinorum’ e la presenza dei Carolingi a Roma’, in Roma e l’età carolingia, pp.
217–22; Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 176–7.
23 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, p. 517.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 411

area in which they were interested. Naturally, they were most interested in the
basilica and the tomb of St Peter himself. It became, during this period, a ‘stage
for the popes’.24
The original church, built by Constantine on the location of the tomb, had
been considerably redesigned by Gregory the Great, who had given the altar area
the form which it kept throughout the Middle Ages. This was so successful that it
effectively became the model for many Roman churches, and a great many else­
where in Europe.25 Of the first church, it is believed that there were still in place
the mosaic of Traditio Legis (the giving of the law by Christ to Peter and Paul, a
frequent iconographical motif in late antique and early Christian art) in the
apsidal arch, and that of Christ with Peter and Constantine on the triumphal arch
on the nave side, which had, however, been redone in the Carolingian period. All
were naturally scenes centring on Peter’s function as First of the Apostles.26 On
the sides of the nave were Old and New Testaments scenes, under which were
individual portraits of the popes from St Peter onwards. The last ones, represent­
ing the popes after 800, were added by Formosus, when he restored the frescoes
on the walls of the nave. He brought the number of papal portraits up to about a
hundred, but also added contemporary late ninth-century touches to the fresco
cycles with new scenes such as the Anastasis and the Crucifixion.27 The western
and southern walls may have had cycles of the life of St Peter, adding to the focus
of the church of its patron saint next to Christ. After Gregory the Great, the next
major interventions in the church were done by Leo III, for whom St Peter’s
always came first in terms of gifts and embellishments.28 However, the basilica
was again in a somewhat parlous state by the time of Gregory IV, who restored
the atrium, while Leo IV did so for the lateral naves. The popes always seemed to
have problems with the roof, which needed redoing regularly, most famously in

24 Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, p. 80 (‘Eine Bühne fur den Papst’).
25 On St Peter’s see, among the most recent work, A. Arbeiter, Alt-St. Peter in Geschichte und
Wissenschft. Abfolge der Bautern. Rekonstrucktion, Architekturprogramm (Berlin, 1988); H. Kessler,
Old St. Peter’s and Church Decoration in Medieval Italy (Spoleto: CISAM 17, 2002); J. Osborne and
R. McKitterick, eds., Old St Peter’s, Rome (Cambridge, 2013); and Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 159–72.
On St Peter as a model for churches in Europe, there is a large body of literature, including by C. Heitz,
see Chapter 4, notes 225–6; De Blaauw, ‘Liturgical features’, pp. 321–37.
26 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 461–2, 458–9; P. Franke, ‘Traditio legis und Petrusprimat’, Vigiliae
Christianis 26 (1972), pp. 263–71; on the mosaics at St Peter’s see the reproductions in Wilpert, Die
römischen Mosaiken, pp. 61–72; Matthiae, Mosaici medioevali; Matthiae, Pittura romana, pp. 57–80;
CB V, pp. 165–279. For the many lost ones, see Grimaldi, ‘Descrizione della basilica’ and Waetzoldt,
Die Kopien des 17. Jahrhunderts, Vienna.
27 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 532; Ladner, Die Papstbildnisse, on the few remaining early medi­
eval portraits of some of the popes, none from St Peter’s basilica but some from the Lateran (Leo III,
John XII, and John XIII), S. Maria Antiqua (Zacharias, Paul I, Hadrian I), S. Clemente (Leo IV),
S. Marco (Gregory IV), as well as Paschal I, numerous ones in his churches, and Formosus in the
unidentified oratory to S. Lorenzo on the Celio, I, pp. 99–179; Ladner, ‘Die Papstbildnisse auf Münzen
des 8. und 10. Jahrhunderts’, in Ladner, ed., Images and Ideas, pp. 30–8. For the parallel cycles of
episcopal portraits in other post-Byzantine cities, notably Ravenna and Naples, as well as at S. Paolo
and the Lateran basilica in Rome, see Andaloro, ‘Dal ritratto all’icona’, pp. 31–7.
28 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, p. 521.
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781/2, with Charlemagne’s help.29 In this instance, the ceiling inside was also
restored, keeping what would have been the late antique coffered style, which
would have required a great deal of money and skill, but was in keeping with the
Carolingian taste for reviving early Christian art.
Outside, the basilica had an atrium of thirty steps, later known as the Paradisus,
up to the narthex.30 The main door into the basilica, the Porta Argentea, was
restored after 846 with new silver panels with reliefs by Leo IV. Near them were
also inserted images of the first six Ecumenical Councils and, under Leo IV, a
representation of the Roman synod of 853, which had condemned Anastasius.
Such representations were obviously aimed at making known the decisions, as
well as highlighting the orthodoxy, of the Church of St Peter to all, in the most
public space in front of the basilica, but also at the top of the steps and the platform
which was the principal reception point of visitors, both ordinary pilgrims and
rulers. Above the platform there was another church, S. Maria ad Gradis or in
turris, with a mosaic of Christ, attributed to Paul I. The east door had gates
brought from Perugia by Hadrian I in 792, and Stephen II constructed the first, at
the time still extremely rare, campanile for the bell.31 Even during sometimes
difficult times for the popes in the tenth century, some, like John XV, added
some frescoes.32 The outside area was repeatedly redecorated: Stephen II did so
for the mosaic decor, and the water supply to the fountain, to which he moved the
Pigna—a famous large Roman stone pine cone—and Hadrian I restored the aque­
ducts, as well as the porticus and the bridge, which always suffered from intense
traffic. This was again damaged in 817, and restored by Paschal I.
The inside of the basilica benefited the most of the whole of Rome from the
enormous wealth gifted to the popes by Charlemagne and Louis the Pious.33
While the mosaics and frescoes in place were only restored, the preferred form of
decoration under the Carolingians was metalwork. The popes obliged, by giving
shape to the enormous quantities of gold and silver they received.34 The main
altar’s ciborium, first decorated with gold angels by Leo III, was then moved by
him to S. Maria Maggiore, while a new and even more imposing one was made
for St Peter’s. The porphyry columns, constantly reused throughout the res­tor­
ations, were the original Constantinian ones. Hadrian I had often added gold to
existing silver panels and, after 804, Leo III again added gold everywhere. Leo IV
gave a panel representing Christ, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection, with SS
Peter, Paul, Andrew, himself, and the Emperor Lothar, his ‘spiritual son’. Gold and

29 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, p. 522.

30 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 464–6, 524–5; on the atrium, see W. Mayer-Barkhausen, ‘Die
frühmittelalterlichen Vorbauten am Atrium von Alt St. Peter in Rom, zweitürmige Atrien, Westwerke
und karolingisch-ottonische Königskapellen’, Wallraf-Richartz Jahrbuch XX (1958), pp. 7–40.
31 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 526, 528. 32 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, p. 527.
33 Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 159–172, 181–5, and 87–8 discusses at length what he calls the
‘monumentalization’ of St Peter’s.
34 Krautheimer, Profile of a City, p. 112; Krautheimer, ‘The Carolingian Revival of Early Christian
Architecture’, Art Bulletin 24 (1942), pp. 1–38; J. Hubert, ‘Rome et la Renaissance carolingienne’, in
Roma e l’età carolingia, pp. 7–14.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 413

silver panels were typical of Carolingian decoration, and their profusion in

St Peter’s is significant in that context. On the altar itself were many crosses,
candelabra, and lights, including a jewelled cross, a gift of Leo IV, and a gold
crown with precious stones, which had been a gift from Charlemagne in 800.
This was not the only one from the family at that time, as among the numerous
rich textiles for the ecclesiastical year one was an altar pallium offered by
Hildegard, Charlemagne’s wife, in 780.35 The changes of the Carolingian period in
the area of the altar and choir, with the silver and gold images, were part of the
increasing monumentalization of the edifice, which also acquired many more
statues, as well as textiles, silks, veils, new altars, chapels, and mausolea.36 Leo IV,
then Nicholas I, con­tinued the gifts, above all to the confessio and the altar—silver
arches in the chancel and statues, for example. Hadrian I and Leo III had also
restored the plutei of the choir and the pavements. To the baldachin with the six
columns given to St Peter’s by the Exarch Eutychius were added new columns
and, for the first time, porphyry was again used by Leo III before 800 to highlight
the imperial status of the pope, or rather, as argued by Esch, because the popes
had been given the imperial insignia by Constantine, according to the Constitutum
Constantini; Nicholas I also used porphyry for the walls of the podium.37
The glorification and embellishment of the basilica were one thing. What the
pilgrims were most interested in, however, was the tomb of St Peter. Gregory the
Great had created the model of a martyrial church by setting up a vertical align­
ment, going upwards from the tomb in the confessio, with the altar and the epis­
copal cathedra on a podium right above it, creating effectively an ‘artificial
catacomb’.38 Pilgrims could approach the tomb from the basilica side through the
fenestrella opening into the confessio in front of the altar, or they could get even
closer to the tomb ad corpus, by going into the crypt. This had its own altar, which

35 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 524–7.

36 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 556–66; Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 87–8, 181–5, and recon­
structions, Ills. 36, 39.
37 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 547, 533, and De Blaauw, ‘Papst und Purpur. Porphyr in frühen
Kirchenausstattungen in Rom’, in Tesserae Festschrift fűr Josef Engemann (Münster, 1991), pp. 36–50.
On the use of porphyry as a sign of imperial association for the popes as well as for the emperors, see
for example A. Esch, ‘L’uso dell’antico nell’ideologia papale, imperiale e comunale’, in Roma antica nel
medioevo. Mito, rappresentazioni, sopravvivenze nella ‘Respublica Christiana’ dei secoli IX–XII (Milan,
2011) pp. 4–6. De Blaauw’s argument is not entirely convincing in my opinion, and perhaps relies too
much on the views about papal ambitions to become the new emperor, rather than to find a reliable
emperor to whom they could relate.
38 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 531–2; S. de Blaauw, ‘Die Krypta in stadtrömischen Kirchen:
Abbild eines Pilgerziels’, in Akten des XII. Internationalen Kongresses für Christliche Archäologie, Bonn
22–28 September 1991 (Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum. Ergänzungsband, 20.1; Studi di
antichità cristiana, 52), Münster 1995, pp. 559–67; M. Cecchelli, ‘La cripta semianulare vaticana e le
sue derivazioni romane’, in Atti del Convegno di Studi ‘L’orbis christianus antiquus di Gregorio Magno’,
Roma, 2004; L. Pani Ermini (ed.), (Miscellanea SRSP 51), Rome 2007, 1, pp. 105–20; and F. Guidobaldi,
A. Sabbi, ‘Cripte semianulari e altri ambienti devozionali ipogei o semipogei delle chiese di Roma
dall’età paleocristiana al Medioevo: aspetti tipologici e cronologia’, Atti Della Pontificia Accademia
Romana Di Archeologia (Serie iii) Rendiconti 83, Vatican 2016, pp. 443–566. On the original crypt and
its transformations during the development of St Peter’s and the creation of the Leonine City as part of
the pontifical liturgy, see A. Themelly, ‘Il pellegrinaggio petrino nella Roma alto-medievale:
dall’architettura “romana” della cripta pelagiana alla civitas Leonina’, in Lazzari and Valente Bacci, La
figura di San Pietro nelle fonti del Medioevo, pp. 484–504.
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414 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

was repeatedly restored and given gifts, for example of panels for the front by
Hadrian I, who added a silver panel representing Christ, Mary, Peter, and Andrew.
It was again restored by Leo III, who added to it Petronilla, believed to have been
Peter’s daughter, thus providing pilgrims with what was effectively a family por­
trait of St Peter’s family.39 The most important part was the confessio itself, with its
niche decorated in gold, with a mosaic in the absidiole above it. Hadrian I
changed the silver for gold panels, adding decorations and statues.40 Leo III
restored and added statues of Christ, Peter, and Paul, and some gold plating on
the floor. But after 864, when much of this precious metal had disappeared in the
Saracen attacks, the papacy was much poorer, and Leo IV had to make do with
less costly materials such as chiselled silver in his restorations.
Apart from individual veneration of the relics, pilgrims also had liturgical
needs. By 700 there were already daily Masses at the basilica, and on Sundays,
from Stephen III onwards, the celebrants other than the pope were bishops of the
suburbicarian sees.41 Special Masses for the great festivals, especially St Peter’s
feast on 29 June (gradually separated from St Paul, celebrated on the following
days, to enhance the status of both), were of great solemnity, though for the time
being the two most important feasts in the calendar, the Easter and Pentecost
vi­gils, were still celebrated at the Lateran, and St Peter only had ordinary Masses
for them. Even Charlemagne went to celebrate Easter at the Lateran.42 There is no
doubt that it had become essential vastly to increase the number of Masses, at vari­
ous altars such as those of the popular chapel dedicated by Gregory III to the
Saviour, Virgin, and All Saints, for pilgrimage purposes; there were also offices said
ante confessionem, as well as Masses in the crypt, and night celebrations were also
increased.43 Gregory the Great had set up a new, ideal arrangement, focusing on
the a vertical axis of altar above-crypt below at St Peter’s. This became the model
followed by many other Roman churches, including the older basilicas which had
no crypt, like the differently shaped Constantinian basilica at the Lateran, where
the crypt was added later. St Peter’s became the model for churches outside Rome,
once relics became an obligatory part of the altar, and the model of the annular
crypt for the purposes of facilitating the pilgrimage traffic became the norm in
Carolingian Europe. From there, it was brought back to most of Lombard Italy, to
become a standard feature of ninth- and tenth-century church architecture. At St
Peter’s, the popes of the Carolingian period transformed Gregory the Great’s basic
materials into sumptuous gold and silver objects, and incorporated the martyrial
plan of the original church into the much more significant liturgical developments
increasingly as important to pilgrims as veneration of the relics alone.
Pilgrims did spend some time visiting churches within the city of Rome itself—
that is, the eastern side of the Tiber. To do so, guidebooks were produced, most
famous among them being the Itinerary of Einsiedeln (see Figure 5.1). This, one of

39 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 534, 536–67. 40 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 539–42.
41 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 592–6. 42 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 600–2.
43 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 597–600, 619–20.
Figure 5.1 The Itinerary of Einsiedeln (Museo Nazionale Romano, Crypta Balbi)
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416 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

our most important sources from the whole of the Middle Ages, enables us to
have a glimpse of early medieval Rome, not just in terms of its churches but also
of its whole monumental landscape in the eighth–ninth centuries. Just as im­port­
ant­ly, it also allows us to understand how the Romans, or at any rate those based
in the Lateran, actually perceived their city at this stage.
The Itinerary, in the form of ‘Top Ten Things to See in Rome’, is composed of a
set of eight walks, or itineraries, which take in the ‘sights’, in the form of churches
with their relics (including some outside the walls in the cemeteries), but also, at
the same time, the monuments of ancient Rome—temples, statues, columns,
porticoes, and so on—on the principle of progress with alternating things to see
on one’s left and one’s right. There were other such guidebooks, of which we know
at least three from before 1000: the De locis sanctis martyrum quae sunt foris
civitatis Romae, followed by the early eighth-century work known as the Codex
Salisburgense, and one incorporated into the work of a twelfth-century chronicler,
William of Malmesbury, before the genre became even more fashionable in the
twelfth century. These latter guides, however, concentrated on churches and
their relics.44 The Itinerary of Einsiedeln was produced at the papal court for
Charlemagne’s court, if one accepts the claim of its last editor, Del Lungo—a claim
still contested by the more traditional attribution to a northern monastery, such
as Fulda—and was aimed at highlighting the parallels between ancient Roman
glory and papal restorations.45 The papacy took up, and developed, the pilgrim­
age in the ninth and tenth centuries, and the heightened papal prestige and
authority among the visitors to the city, from simple pilgrims to emperors,
allowed the popes further to fashion the papacy as a European force.
But the Romans themselves seem to have had a different perspective. Throughout
our period, we see an increasing tension between this pilgrimage-, Petrine-led
perception of Rome, which the papacy was happy to adopt as its power base, and
therefore to embed its increasing European-wide authority in it, and the Roman
inhabitants’ perception of their city and their Church.46 An anecdote by Notker
(though he is known to have made up a lot of his stories) could be illuminating, if
one accepts that he actually based it on real contemporary perception. He tells the
story of how, when Pope Leo III’s accusers wanted to swear their innocence, many
among them ‘begged that they might be allowed to swear on the tomb of Peter
that they were guiltless of the crime imputed to them’. Leo, ‘aware of their dishon­
esty’, begged Charlemagne not to be deceived by their cunning. Leo claimed that
they offered to do so because they knew that Peter would forgive them; therefore
he, Charlemagne, should look for the stone of the martyr Pancras, and they

44 All three are edited in VZ, pp. 101–31.

45 IE, p. 82; Bauer, Das Bild der Stadt, pp. 18–21, for example, still supports the attribution to Fulda.
46 Di Carpegna Falconieri, Il clero, pp. 39–49, 82–3, 92–3.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 417

should be made to swear on that.47 Leo may have been right—but this story could
conceivably also show that the local Roman martyr Pancras was more feared by
these Roman aristocrats than was St Peter. Even allowing for the exaggeration, it
is at least clear that the Romans were fully aware of the Franks’ reverence for
St Peter, and thought they could be deceived in this way. Other factors contribute
to showing how relatively limited the devotion towards St Peter was in the city
itself: Peter was not a common name, and most churches in the city, except
S. Pietro ai Vincoli, had local or regional dedications based on relics brought from
the cemeteries, or were dedicated to the Virgin Mary.48
Papal control over the city space also meant that the new owner had the right
to demolish, or otherwise dispose of, its built environment. The ninth century
was crucial in the transition of the old centre. Until the Carolingian period, the
monumental landscape of classical Rome had remained in a fairly good state of
preservation. Because of the need to reinforce the city’s fortifications and rebuild
the walls, as well as to set up those of the Leonine City, the popes ripped out the
floors of the imperial Fora to reuse the marble in churches and palaces.49 This was
the first example of actual spoliation and reuse of the monuments of the city
­centre, and it started the decline of the monumental fabric of the imperial Fora.
The popes preserved monuments as part of the memory of the city that they con­
structed, as we see in the Itinerary of Einsiedeln. This only makes one error of
identification when describing ancient monuments, that of calling the Stadium of
Domitian the Circus Flaminius.50 Otherwise, every name and identification is
completely accurate—making it clear that they were all remembered and known,
and that the papacy was keen to preserve them. The spoliation of the marble
floors in the Fora led to the building of large domus along the Via Sacra and the
Vicus Jugarius, and of small wooden houses like that in the northern corner of
the Atrium of Vesta, which remained functional until the tenth century. But the
concomitant result was the rise of the floor level in that area in the ninth and
tenth centuries, as well as the presence of artisans’ (cordwainers’) workshops in
the area of Cannapara and of modest houses in the Forum of Cesar.51 This infill of
private housing in the Fora, as well as newly established churches including

47 Notker 1, 26. I have argued elsewhere that the story may mean that Leo was aware that they may
have been prepared to perjure themselves if asked to swear an oath on the relics of St Peter, which they
would not do if asked to swear an oath on those of a local Roman saint they were closer to; see West-
Harling, ‘The Roman past’.
48 A similar, if perhaps less understandable, case is the absence of an apparent popular devotion to
St Mark in Venice; see Chapter 4.
49 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 54–5, 71–2; R. Coates-
Stephens, ‘The Walls and aqueducts of Rome in the Early Middle Ages, A.D. 500–1000’, Journal of
Roman Studies 88 (1998), pp. 166–78, and his subsequent, ‘Le ricostruzioni altomedievali delle Mura
Aureliane e degli acquedotti’, MEFREM 111 (1999), pp. 209–25.
50 IE; see also the essential papers by Delogu, ‘Solium imperii’, pp. 83–108, and ‘The rebirth of
Rome’, pp. 32–42.
51 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 157–74.
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S. Maria Nova, and the use made by the popes of still usable ruins, crypts, columns,
and arches, gradually led to the abandonment of the settlement there, an area
increasingly marshy by the eleventh century, when even the domus of the Forum
of Nerva were abandoned by the elite.52 Part of the problem with the destruction
of the buildings was the loss of the inscriptions which anchored the names of
these buildings in the popular memory: gradually the knowledge of the ancient
city or, at any rate, the correlation of monuments with their names became lost.
Around 840 the Liber Pontificalis, then the hagiography, has dragons living in the
disabitato, as mentioned by John the Deacon and the Mirabilia, but also fancy,
invented names for temples, such as Templum Fatalis, Templum Dianae, and
Templum Minervae, which bear no relation to reality on the ground—a mythical
city superimposing itself on the real city.53 Some major names remained in use:
the Colosseum, Trajan’s and Antoninus’ Columns, the She-wolf, but increasingly
the names of the regions, though officially in use, were no longer sufficient in the
popular mind to identify a place in a recognizable manner.

The Papacy’s Role in Running the City

The papacy did not just concentrate on churches in Rome. Its appropriation of the
urban space was almost as much one of restoration or maintenance of the built
environment in general, including the management of core resources, such as the
aqueducts, defensive structures or walls, towers, and gates.54 On the whole, little
change was seen in the road structure, and at the time of the composition of the
Itinerary of Einsiedeln most traditional roads were still in use,55 in some cases
repaved on top, like the Argiletum.56 Nonetheless, the areas of rich properties,
like the Aventine and the Celio, had been abandoned, and parts of the Esquiline
only remained looked after because of the churches and diaconiae, and their link
with the Lateran along the Via Maior.57 Other areas, and even monuments, were

52 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 44–7, 175–9.
53 Mirabilia urbis Romae, ed. and tr. F. M. Nichols; Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma
nell’alto medioevo, pp. 225–7; Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Topografia del potere’, pp. 135–55, and Santangeli
Valenzani, ‘Il vescovo, il drago e le vergini. Paesaggio urbano e paesaggio del mito nella leggenda di
S. Silvestro e il drago’, in Res bene gestae. Ricerche di storia urbana su Roma antica in onore di Eva
Margareta Steinby, ed. A. Leone et al. (Rome, 2016), p. 391. On the names in the Mirabilia, see
D. Kinney, ‘Spoliation in Medieval Rome’, in Spoliation in Medieval Rome: Perspektiven der
Spolienforschung 1 Spoliierung und Transposition, ed. S. Altekamp, C. Marcks-Jacobs, and P. Seiler
(Berlin, 2013), pp. 261–86.
54 Pani Ermini, ‘Forma Urbis’, pp. 288–97. Coates-Stephens, ‘The Walls and aqueducts’, discusses in
detail the work undertaken by the popes in terms of maintaining the aqueducts, in many cases outside
Rome itself in the Patrimonium, for many miles before they even reached the city. While they were the
main authority dealing with the problem of maintaining the flow of water for fountains, baths for pil­
grims and the poor and general hygiene, Ermini makes the point that there appear to have been some
private maintenance of them too, as well as private use in some of the aristocratic houses; see ibid., pp.
171–8, esp. 178.
55 Ibid., pp. 297–304; Santangeli, ‘Itinerary of Einsiedeln’, in Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 33–7.
56 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, pp. 47 and 178.
57 Pani Ermini, ‘Forma Urbis’, pp. 304–10.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 419

reused for living quarters, such as the Colosseum and the Theatre of Marcellus—a
phenomenon which by the tenth century had also reached the imperial Fora.58
A major concern for the popes was the need to maintain or restore the walls.
Pope Gregory II restored the city walls at S. Lorenzo, and Popes Gregory III and
Hadrian I carried out vast amounts of restoration of the destroyed walls and
­towers of the city. Hadrian I especially spent much money on this, apportioning it
stretch by stretch to the people of both the city and the suburbs, as well as those
from the Patrimonium, Tuscia, and Campania, all under papal command.59
Gregory IV, faced with the most serious Saracen attacks so far, initiated the first
walled area to protect a city, at Ostia, with the construction of the walled
Gregoriopolis.60 Most famous of all was the colossal undertaking of Pope Leo IV.
A great fire destroyed the Schola Saxonum; its residents immediately turned to
the pope for help, in what had obviously become the standard procedure of
appealing for papal financial and manpower support for the residents around St
Peter’s. Leo helped them rebuild the Schola but, on account of the Saracen threat,
he further decided to build a wall to encompass the whole area of the Vatican in
848–51.61 The Liber Pontificalis, in one of its most celebrated accommodations to
the truth, explains how Leo IV undertook this after asking his ‘spiritual son’, the
Emperor Lothar, for help, the latter immediately obliging with money. Frankish
sources contradict this account by stating that, aware of the constant Saracen
attacks on the city, Lothar had written to the pope, commanding him to repair the
walls and to enclose St Peter’s itself.62 The discussion is still ongoing as to which of
the two, Leo IV or Lothar, actually initiated the process. For example, based on
the name, the fact that only one of the two remaining inscriptions commemorating
the building mentions Lothar, and the impression that the popes did not often do
what the emperors told them, Wickham is inclined to see Leo as the mastermind
behind the building of the wall; Scholz, on the other hand, believes that the
impossibility of ascribing it to one of them shows the perfect harmony of their
collaboration.63 I would be inclined to trust Lothar’s capitulary ordering the con­
struction, at least in part, and to see the absence of Lothar’s name in one inscrip­
tion out of two as just as likely to be a clue as is its presence in the other. Using the
name of the pope was traditional and understandable in this context. Combined
with Leo IV’s inclusion of Lothar’s name in inscriptions and artefacts in St Peter’s,
and with the fact that popes needed to have an emperor in place even though they

58 R. Rea, ‘Il Colosseo nell’Alto Medioevo’, in Arena et al., Crypta Balbi, pp. 612–13; see also the
material in A. Gabucci, ed., 1999, Il Colosseo (Milan, 1999).
59 LP I, 97, ch. 92. On the walls see Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo,
pp. 54–65; Coates-Stephens, ‘The Walls and aqueducts’, pp. 166–71, esp. Fig. 1, p. 170; R. Ivaldi, Le
mura di Roma (Rome, 2005), pp. 55–70, on the Carolingians, the rebuilding of the walls, the Saracens,
and the Leonine City.
60 LP I, 103, chs. 38–40. 61 LP I, 105, chs. 38, 69–74.
62 Lothar’s capitulary ed. with tr. in Azzara e Moro, I Capitolari italici, no. 33, ch. 7 (p. 153).
63 Personal discussion; Scholz, Politik, Stuttgart, pp. 174–80.
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420 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

were technically the rulers of Rome, taking up such an order, which suited Leo IV
perfectly as long as the emperor contributed financially to it, would be entirely
plausible. In addition, it could be read as a form of collaboration/rivalry, as to
which one took better care of the Apostle’s city. The pope undertook a monumen­
tal piece of work, using teams of workers from the Roman Campagna in shifts,
and on completion he organized one of the great ritual acts of civic consensus in
the history of the city: he undertook a circuit of the walls with all the people of
Rome, sprinkling them with holy water, saying Mass for the safety of the people,
and following this with a distribution of money, enriching ‘all nobles of Rome’
with manifold gifts of gold, silver, and silk textiles.64 A similar wall had been built
around S. Paolo by John VIII, creating what became known as Johannipolis.65
Also responding to the need for protection against Saracen attacks, Pope Leo IV
built Leopoli/Cencelle.66 The walls gained a huge impact as part of the very per­
ception of Rome, especially for German chroniclers of the Ottonian period,
not­ably the continuator of Regino and Thietmar.67
In conclusion, the key point to make is that all the building work, embellish­
ments, and maintenance of the fabric of the city were the main form in which
power was exercised in Rome by the papacy—as it had been previously by the
emperors. The building programmes manifested and supported the rule of the
popes in several significant ways. They showed them to be responsible for, and in
charge of, the welfare of both Romans and pilgrims, spiritual but also temporal.
In spiritual terms, this was made manifest by the gradual expansion of the num­
ber of churches, as well as the restoration of those in disrepair, the building of
new ones to follow the shifts in population, the creation of monasteries to serve
them and to pray for all, and the transporting of relics from the cemeteries outside
Rome to protect both the martyrs and the devotees. In practical terms, papal care
was manifested through the maintenance of the network of supplies arriving in
the city; through the preservation of roads and bridges; through the main­ten­ance
of old, and the building of new, diaconiae, aqueducts, and sewage systems; and
the preservation or building of new walls for the defence of the citizens. The
popes gradually became more or less the main patrons and carers for the pilgrims
to the city, through hospices, xenodochiae, diaconiae, and scholae built in ever
greater numbers around St Peter’s, which they maintained, and often managed
directly, especially at times of crisis.

64 LP I, 105, ch. 74. 65 Register John VIII in MGH Ep VII/5 ed. E. Caspar, pp. 1–272.
66 LP I, 105, chs. 99–103; for the most recent excavations there see the report on Leopoli-Cencelle,
3 vols., II: Una città di fondazione papale (Rome, 1999), and esp. p. 41 on the remains of the Leonian
ninth-century wall, with the epigraphic dedication to Pope Leo IV.
67 See also the ‘Annals of Quedlinburg’ under 998, about the Crescentii and the walled defences of
Castel Sant’Angelo, MGH SSRG usum scholarum 72, pp. 498–9; R. Schieffer, ‘Mauern, Kirchen und
Türme. Zum Erscheinungsbild Roms bei deutschen Geschichtschreiben des 10. bis 12. Jahrhundert’,
in Rom im hohen Mittelalter. Reinhold Elze zur Vollendung seines siebzigsten Lebenjahr gewidmet, ed.
B. Schimmelpfennig and L. Schmugge (Sigmaringen, 1972), pp. 130–1.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 421

This shift of practical power in political and administrative terms, while being
originally part of the imperial administration’s duties, had been gradually
accepted. However, the shift went beyond the nature of the powers acquired by
the popes; it also expanded physically and visibly on the ground. The expansion
of ecclesiastical centres in the city was carried out in those areas which had been
the heart of imperial Rome, and it was thus done at the expense of the old im­per­
ial space, as well as of imperial power, especially on the Palatine and in the area of
the Fora. It took over public monumental spaces, for example through the setting
up of churches in what had been old pagan buildings, including ruined pagan
temples, such as that of Venus and Rome for S. Maria Nova or the Curia of the
Senate for the church of S. Adriano at the Three Fates, as well as imperial spaces of
power, for example part of the Palace of Domitian for S. Maria Antiqua; and it
reused imperial symbols such as the Roman statues on the Campus Lateranensis.
Furthermore, being free to reuse the spolia from the monumental centre of the
city, especially its marbles and columns, to restore and beautify churches, allowed
the papacy to become symbolically identified with the old imperial power, not­
ably through the reuse of imperial materials of power like porphyry. By coloniz­
ing these traditional spaces of power, which were still perceived as such until the
end of the Byzantine era, the Church of Rome identified itself with that power
and helped the transition, in people’s minds, from one to the other. The message
equating the papacy with the new power in Rome was further developed through
the embellishment of churches via wealth given by the Frankish emperors. This
was done partly through reviving the traditional Roman medium of mosaics and
sculpture, but also by endorsing new media especially favoured by the taste of
Carolingian emperors and northern pilgrims, such as metalwork (including pre­
cious stones), which were lavishly used for the decoration of churches in Rome
which held relics, and above all for St Peter’s and its confessio. These displays
enhanced the prestige of the papacy in relation to dazzled pilgrims, but they also
forcibly expressed the message about St Peter as head of the Apostles and the
pope as his successor. Such a message was conveyed through repeated decorative
frames, such as the mosaic of Christ with St Peter and the Emperor Constantine
in St Peter’s, and Leo IV’s panel with Christ, SS Peter, Paul, Andrew, himself, and
the Emperor Lothar, ‘his beloved son’, which highlighted the spiritual sub­or­din­
ation of the latter and their partnership of two equals.
Two other forms of building work further strengthen this view. One is shown
by the care taken by the popes to highlight the main axes of papal power, espe­
cially the Via Maior (Via Triomphalis) between the Lateran and the Vatican, the
two poles of papal power. They did so by restoring churches and diaconiae along­
side the Via Maior, and around the Lateran and the Vatican—not forgetting the
importance paid to the Campus Lateranensis as a place of power in its own right,
with its strongly symbolic buildings. The second was the choice made by the
popes of having the apostolic succession represented in fresco in the main
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422 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

ba­sil­icas, especially at St Peter’s, in the form of ‘portraits’—not a unique feature in

Rome, since bishops of Ravenna did the same. But in Rome the popes also added
some emperors’ names; and they proclaimed the right of the Church of Rome to
present itself as the ultimate defender of the orthodoxy of the faith, for example
by making a statement through the display in precious metals of the Creed, in
Latin and Greek, or of the excommunication of Anastasius, by the doors of St
Peter’s. St Peter’s itself was the ultimate projection of papal power in space through
the built environment: having to run the gauntlet of the numerous steps which
brought the pilgrim to the top of the atrium staircase to the esplanade where the
pope would receive visitors, entering through the sacred gate opened only for
major festivals or dignitaries, proceeding gradually through the church with
regu­lar stopping places on circles of porphyry inserted into the pavement, and
finally reaching the altar with the confessio below, was itself a display of power in a
phys­ic­al, built space, which matched the importance of the Keeper of the Keys.
The ninth century represents the height of papal building and display with
imperial resources. This was no doubt meant to underline the fact that St Peter
was at the height of the human hierarchy, and that the pope was his representa­
tive. This fact was already known to pilgrims, but what they saw in Rome at the
beginning of the period may not have been considered quite worthy of this
importance, either by the popes who needed to make pilgrims marvel, or by the
visitors themselves, who may have perceived the churches to be small and dilapi­
dated and were prepared to contribute in order to help build and decorate some­
thing better. At the same time, it is likely that the popes also wanted to provide
the Romans with the physical environment in which to live and worship, while
using this to make visible their control over the city.
Appropriately for Rome, my discussion of the gradual takeover and makeover
of the urban space was centred on the Church, since it had been effectively in
charge of the city since Gregory the Great—even through much of the period of
Byzantine rule, and certainly from the 730s onwards, when the latter was first
weakened, then removed, from the city. The popes were in charge of both the
religious life of the city (churches, monasteries, liturgy, relics, and so on) and its
practical side (maintenance of the built environment, building of walls and
defences, food provisioning, maintenance of the aqueducts). Carolingian rulers
were not concerned with life in the city and would only contribute to it occasion­
ally as pilgrims or, as the most engaged of them, Lothar and his son Louis II, with
defences, when they concerned St Peter’s. The Carolingian emperors did not act
as ‘secular’ rulers, as Byzantine emperors had, levying taxes or administering the
city through missi, since the government of Rome had been granted to the popes.
It is thus not until the tenth century that we have, once again, a form of secular
rule over the city, which is no longer papal but now belongs to powerful local
families, which attempt to wrest it back from the popes. At this point, laymen as
such came again to the fore in the political arena, not as part of the papal admin­
istration but as individual rulers in control of the city.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 423

Appropriation of the Public Space by Laymen as a Political Arena:

Rewriting Topographies in Rome, Venice, and Ravenna

Even while the popes were in control of urban changes, before Alberic’s rule,
when Rome reverted for a while to a secular government, the urban space
remained that of the Roman city. The importance of the area of the Fora as the
centre of the city (especially of the Roman Forum) was still perceived at such: the
original ground level was preserved (unlike other areas allowed to become buried
by several feet of earth), even when there was no longer a firm line between pub­
lic and private space, with public areas like parts of the temples and monuments
being taken over by churches, by great aristocratic families’ houses and their
family-controlled areas of clienteles. This would be the case in the imperial Fora
and beyond them on the Via Lata, around S. Marco, and ultimately on the
Aventine and the Palatine. The importance of the Roman past in the conscious­
ness of the Romans remained evident in the topography until the tenth century:
not only do we see this in the Itinerary of Einsiedeln at the end of the eighth cen­
tury, which, admittedly, was perhaps put together by the papal court—and essen­
tial for the popes as a power and prestige gesture vis-à-vis the Carolingians—but
it remained so in the popular consciousness throughout our period. De Blaauw
makes the point that the maintenance of S. Adriano at the Three Fates as either the
departure point or, at the very least, the stop for the Collecta during so many of
the core stational processions, at a time when this church itself had lost any
important function in the city, was due to the historical memory of the Curia of
the Senate, which it replaced.68 More names than one might expect did remain
part of the topographical canvas of the city, including those of roads and streets,
gates, cemeteries, mausolea, baths, and even temples, especially those on or in
which churches were built.69 I will return to the whole issue of romanitas and its
perceptions in Rome in Chapter 6.
Part of the Theophylacts’ family policy, and certainly Alberic’s own, in relation
to the reuse of the ancient topography of power, was deliberate. He supported
what one might call the attempt at reconstructing urbanism through government
intervention, even though this was associated with a person, Caleolus, who was
one of Alberic’s friends and supporters. Caleolus’ intervention has been seen as a
planned rezoning, or urban regeneration, in the Forum of Trajan—in the area
known as the Campus Carleo or Kaloleonis.70 Like his control of monasteries, and
of the Church, in order to make sure that they functioned well and carried out
their duties—a prerogative but also a duty perceived as part of the ruler’s (usually

68 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, p. 444.

69 Hubert, Espace urbain, pp. 97–123. See also Esch, ‘L’uso dell’antico’, pp. 4, 14–16, and
J.-L. Lemaitre, ‘La presence de la Rome antique dans la liturgie monastique et canoniale du IXe au
XIIIe siècle’, in Roma antica nel medioevo, pp. 98–118.
70 Meneghini and Santangeli Valenzani, Roma nell’alto medioevo, p. 48; Wickham, Medieval Rome,
p. 126 and note 45.
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424 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

the emperor’s) role—so Alberic’s intervention for the purposes of euergetism was
also felt to be part of a Roman ruler’s job description. Such interventions may
have been part of a deliberate policy of favouring the areas around the edges of
the imperial Fora and the beginnings of the Via Lata, where the princeps moved
his house, founded the monastery of S. Basilio in scala mortuorum in the Forum
of Augustus, and supported the foundation of a family monastery at S. Ciriaco by
his three cousins. This area had already had historical links with the aristocratic
families of the city in the ninth century, some of which we know from their asso­
ciation with the papacy, such as Popes Hadrian I, Valentine or Stephen V, whose
families all lived in the Via Lata area. The association still held for some tenth-
century popes like Leo VIII, son of the protoscriniarius John, who lived by the
Clivus Argentarius.71 He was an example of a family originally connected with
the Lateran administration, who went on to be associated with the papacy, while
several others—for example, the de Primicerius family—did not, but held power
and property as members of the great aristocracy around Alberic. Such families
did in fact expand their control over those same areas of traditional imperial
power, especially on the Palatine, where they held large tracts of land. They did
not necessarily build on it, sometimes granting that land to a monastery, as did
the de Imiza with the area around the Septizodium, to SS Andrea e Gregorio in
Clivo Scauro, or the de Papa. In other cases they themselves founded monasteries
on it, as did Peter Medicus at S. Maria in Pallara.72 For the ninth century, our
evidence of aristocratic families at the heart of the Roman imperial city is very
difficult to document, other than through extrapolating from the archaeological
remains of the two houses in the Forum of Nerva, and the evidence of the sale of
what was clearly a vast aristocratic domus to the Emperor Louis II in 868.73 In the
tenth century, the evidence for aristocratic settlement in the centre of the city and
in its old power spaces—the Palatine, the imperial For a, and the Aventine—
shows this to have been the result of a deliberate choice of the Roman nobility to
associate themselves with this tradition of secular power in its most highly symbolic
areas in the city.
In Venice, too, it was the ruler, the doge, who was at the heart of major topo­
graphical changes, which allowed him to choose and occupy the public space for
political purposes. The original ‘capital’ of the duchy, Cittanova Eracleia, had
declined, partly due to natural causes (silting up), and had been moved to
Malamocco.74 Olivolo had been the centre of the Byzantine administration.
Therefore, the final and most important move of the seat of the duchy from
Malamocco was a deliberate shift, corresponding to the new political order of the
Particiaci. Particiaco moved the seat to Rialto, which would become the centre

71 LP II. 134. 72 See Chapter 3.

73 Liber instrumentorum monasterii Casauriensis, f. 74v–75r. 74 See Chapter 1.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 425

around the new ducal palace, which he began to build.75 Rialto functioned as an
economic centre, and Bellavitis thinks that there was already a series of civilian
settlements north of an axis from the later S. Zaccaria to Olivolo in the eighth
century, with vineyards, gardens, fishing lakes, and salt pans.76 This would explain
the creation of a new diocese at Olivolo in 775, already the seat of Byzantine
power. The whole island could thus become the nucleus of a proper city, in pol­it­
ical, military, administrative, and spiritual terms.
There is, unfortunately, relatively little published archaeology of material cul­
ture in the city of Venice itself, where any building which did not burn down in
the great fires of the medieval period was replaced by Renaissance and baroque
houses. Most of the archaeology of the Lagoon has perforce been focused on the
islands, especially in the northern lagoon, where artefacts such as inscriptions,
coins, and various lapidary elements can be seen in the museums of Torcello and
Murano, and in the Archaeological Museum in Venice itself.77 Of the archaeo­
logical work carried out in the last hundred years or so, most has either focused
on excavations of, and around, ecclesiastical sites like St Mark’s or Torcello, and/
or on issues relating to the first urban development of the city in Castello, as well
as on architecture and art.78 One theory regarding the early history of the city
needs some discussion. In a set of papers written in the early 2000s, Ammermann
suggested that the focus on the subsequently very visible and highly successful
development of the area of St Mark’s, and especially on the essential role of the
Grand Canal as the main artery for the traffic of Venice, is consistent with the
archaeological evidence only after the ninth century: before that, the island of
Rialto was already a successful economic area, but its topography was different.79
Like him, Gelichi has also argued that archaeological finds extending from

75 JnD, II. 29. Ortalli, ‘Il Ducato’, p. 734; Dorigo, Venezia romanica, I, pp. 14–23, and Dorigo,
Venezia Origini, pp. 531–79; Bellavitis and Romanelli, Venezia, pp. 17–18. The literature on the Doge’s
Palace is considerable, and only some of the more recent and respectable work is cited. Among this are
U. Franzoi, T. Pignatti, and W. Wolters, Il Palazzo Ducale di Venezia (Treviso, 1990), and the earlier
E. Bassi, Il Palazzo Ducale nella storia e nell’arte di Venezia (Milan, 1960).
76 Bellavitis and Romanelli, Venezia, p. 18.
77 Gelichi, ‘Venezia tra archeologia e storia’, pp. 151–83. The two most recent surveys of the archae­
ology of the lagoon are De Min, ed., Ritrovare restaurando, and Baudo, ‘Stato degli studi, linee di
ricerca e prospettive’, though the older work by Canal, ‘Le Venezie sommerse’, remains valuable, espe­
cially for Costanziaco and S. Lorenzo di Ammiana.
78 Of the most recent bibliography on these, see, for St Mark’s, the four volumes of San Marco:
Basilica patriarcale di Venezia, the first two edited respectively by O. Demus and M. Andaloro, the
next two focusing specifically on the crypt, as well as the classics by Demus, The Church of San Marco
in Venice, and Polacco, S. Marco: la basilica d’oro. On Torcello, see as well as the key excavations of the
Polish team, reported in Leciejewicz, Torcello: Scavi 1961–1962, and Torcello: nuove ricerche archeolog-
iche, the more general surveys of Polacco, La cattedrale di Torcello, and Niero, La basilica di Torcello,
and the catalogue of the 2009 exhibition, Caputo and Gentili, Torcello alle origini di Venezia.
79 The modern archaeological work which focused on the history of the urban development of the
city (Rivoalto-Venice) itself has given us contrasting views, exemplified by Dorigo in his large corpus
of work, notably in his Venezia Romanica and Venezia: Origini on the one hand, and by Ammerman,
‘Venice before the Grand Canal’, pp. 141–58, and Ammerman and McClennen, Venice Before San
Marco, on the other.
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426 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Castello to Cannaregio, most recently the finds at Ca’ Vendramin, suggest that the
original axis of the city was not the Grand Canal but a set of waterways further
north, an axis further confirmed by the founding of the earliest churches in the
city alongside it, from the cathedral at Olivolo to the Cannaregio Canal.80 The
pattern of church foundations as described in the previous chapter seems to sup­
port this view for the seventh and eighth centuries: a large number of the earliest
churches, such as S. Giovanni in Bragora, S. Martino, S. Lorenzo in Castello, SS
Apostoli, S. Fosca, and S. Sofia, for example, are found on this axis stretching
east–west, from the cathedral S. Pietro in Castello to the railway station end of
Cannaregio on the northern side of the island. Against this, one might argue that
the foundation dates of most churches are unknown, and are mostly recorded at a
later date, while we know that at least two of the oldest churches in the city,
S. Nicolò dei Mendicoli and the Angelo Raffaele, are in Dorsoduro and definitely
not along an axis north of the Grand Canal. Ammermann’s view is that the
eighth-century settlement of Rialto was not only small but dispersed, not expand­
ing from a nucleus but rather ‘spread broadly over the best marsh islands that
happened to be available at the time’.81 In this context, people moved around in
small boats, for which the Grand Canal would have been less suitable than the
smaller and shorter network north of it, essentially between SS Apostoli and
Olivolo. If Ammermann’s views are to be accepted, this would suggest even more
strikingly the extent to which the change in the whole topography, then dem­og­
raphy, of the city, was determined by the religious policies of the doges, which
focused on St Mark’s, and ultimately their political choices, which fundamentally
changed the topography of power from the ninth century onwards.
Whether he had ‘commissioned’ the theft of the relics of St Mark or not, Doge
Agnellus immediately saw how to transform this happy event into an opportunity
for the creation of a Venetian Church, which would overtake Grado in prestige,
and how this could be used to create an unbreakable bond between Rialto, St Mark’s,
and the doge’s function. The relics, received with great rejoicing by both people and
doge, were placed in the chapel of his new palace while awaiting the building of
a shrine worthy of them in what would later be called the Basilica of St Mark.82
The important point is that the relics were not sent on to Grado, the archiepiscopal
see, even though it is probable that the whole process of bringing them from

80 Fozzatti, Ca’ Vendramin Calergi; Gelichi, ‘La storia di una nuova città’, pp. 51–97.
81 Ammerman, ‘Venice before the Grand Canal’, p. 150. Gradually Gelichi has moved away from
this idea of a northern axis, not entirely compatible with the archaeological evidence, and recently
Ammerman himself, in his latest paper, has suggested that there is evidence of settlement at St Mark’s
even earlier than the eighth century; see A. Ammerman et al., ‘Beneath the Basilica of San Marco: new
light on the origins of Venice,’ Antiquity 91 (2017), pp. 1620–9, and J. Meadows et al., ‘Archaeological
Evidence of Early Settlement in Venice: a Comment on Ammerman et al. (2017),’ Antiquity 92 (2018),
pp. 1640–9. The debate continues, though in this new form it is not quite relevant to the conclusions
proposed here.
82 JnD, II. 39.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 427

Alexandria may have been caused by the outrage following the downsizing of the
status of Grado the previous year at the synod of Mantua. Even more significantly,
the relics were not sent to the cathedral at Olivolo either. It was the doge who kept
them, and it was around the doge’s private chapel that the core of the spiritual
unity of the new urban centre was built.83 It was the doge who controlled the cult,
and it was his authority that had been enhanced by it.
The doges put much of their efforts precisely into creating, in the ducal palace
and the whole area around it, a shrine to the newly acquired relics of St Mark. The
cathedral at Olivolo had probably had its dedication changed, from the Byzantine
one of SS Sergius and Bacchus, to that of the Western, papal St Peter.84 New
churches were built or restored: from twelve in the eighth century, they reached
thirty-five in the ninth, with numbers exploding in the tenth century.85 Venice
was expanding with the doges’ encouragement. They granted rights for settlers,
for example in Dorsoduro and Poveglia, and above all they defended the city from
potential attackers, as in 899/900 when Peter Tribuno had a chain set across the
Grand Canal from S. Maria Zobenigo to S. Gregorio and a wall built from the Rio
Castello to the Piazza, to defend the city from Hungarian attacks.86 The chain’s
role may have been much less that of defence than as a demonstration of power,
on the model of Constantinople, which had exactly the same device stretching
across the Golden Horn, in an attempt to recreate an imperial public place in the
manner of Constantinople.
The real heart of the building of Venice was around the Doge’s Palace and
chapel at St Mark’s. The first palace was begun by the Particiaci, and subsequently
restored by Peter I, then Peter II Orseolo, and the body of St Mark was translated
from the palace into the basilica in 836.87 In order to achieve the space, the doges
demolished one of the older churches, S. Teodoro, and extended the area by
acquiring land from S. Zaccaria. The creation of what would come to be known as
the Platea Sancti Marci, as suggested by Agazzi,88 was the first deliberate Western

83 Dorigo, Venezia origini, pp. 536–7; see also J. Schulz, ‘Urbanism in Medieval Venice’, in City-
States in Classical Antiquity and Medieval Italy. Athens and Rome, Florence and Venice, ed. A. Molho,
K. Raaflaub, and J. Emlen (Stuttgart, 1991), pp. 419–41. On the links between political prestige and the
saint see J. Osborne, ‘Politics, diplomacy and the cult of relics in Venice and the northern Adriatic in
the first half of the ninth century’, Early Medieval Europe 8 (1999), pp. 369–86.
84 Origo, pp. 42 and 75.
85 E. Crouzet-Pavan, ‘Sopra Le Acque Salse’. Espaces, pouvoir et société à Venise à la fin du Moyen
Age (Rome, 1992), Maps 1 and 2; Dorigo, Venezia romanica, pp. 14–31; Dorigo, Venezia Origini,
pp. 462–76, 482–531, 591–633; and Ammerman, ‘Venice before the Grand Canal’, Figs. 3–6.
86 JnD, III. 39.
87 JnD, II. 47. The most recent participants to discuss this are Vio, ‘Cripta o prima capella ducale’,
pp. 23–70; Dorigo, ‘Lo stato della discussione storico-archeologica’, pp. 25–41; and Dorigo, ‘Una dis­
cussione’, pp. 17–36, as well as his Venezia Origini, pp. 531–80, and ‘La cultura carolingia della prima
“Capella Sancti Marci” ’, Hortus artium medievalium 8 (2002), pp. 149–58; and Cecchi, La basilica di
S. Marco, pp. 1–32.
88 M. Agazzi, Platea Sancti Marci. I luoghi marciani dall’XI al XIII secolo e la formazione della
Piazza (Venice, 1991), pp. 13–158 esp. pp. 13–19; see also J. Schulz, ‘La Piazza medievale di San
Marco’, Annali di architectura 415 (1992–3), pp. 134–56, whose focus is, however, more on the twelfth
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428 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

attempt at a unified civic space, built as a public scene of power from the outset
and deliberately not allowing private spaces to encroach. It was also made pos­sible
by the fact that, by that stage, the ‘state’, represented by the doge, already ef­fect­ive­ly
controlled most of the Piazza. Later, the doges tried to imitate Constantinople in
this search for a grand space of power, by unifying it, by surrounding the complex
of the palace and the basilica with the churches of S. Zulian and S. Geminiano,
spreading out to include S. Zaccaria on the one side and S. Moisè and S. Maria
Zobenigo on the other. This was perhaps in imitation of Constantinople, in par­
ticular of the Fora (Forum of Constantine, Forum Tauri, Forum Bovis, and Forum
of Arcadius). Agazzi suggests that this was an imitation, not only of the form but
also of the function, of the urbanism of Constantinople, through the use of a fos­
silized form of Roman public space for court ceremonies, justice, and religious
functions.89 The genesis of the Piazza, as Schulz also suggested, appears to have
been different from the more haphazard construction of the piazzas of other
major Italian cities: it was created to assemble the new city around the doge and
the saint in a state-controlled space of power.90
To summarize. One could certainly suggest that the Vatican and Lateran com­
plexes in Rome were at least as much driven by an ideological unifying purpose
around the ruling authority of the pope—or, rather, of St Peter. In Venice, the
attempt to unify the complex around the relics of St Mark was certainly led by the
same drive as in many Italian cities, which were in the process of building an
urban core sanctified by the relics of a patron saint. But it was also, and primarily,
led by the doges’ wish to unify the new urban nucleus around the centre of power,
the palatium of the doges. Significantly, just as St Mark’s relics had not reached
the bishop, so the episcopium and the cathedral were kept well away from what
had become the centre of both political and spiritual power. The transformation
of the basilica, from private chapel to popular pilgrimage place, highlights the
increasing identification of the city with St Mark and the doge.91 No incident
proves this better than the ruthless destruction by fire of the ducal palace in 976.
John the Deacon claims that there was no way for the rebelling populus to catch
Peter IV in the palace, because the latter was so well defended by Peter’s much-
hated Italian mercenaries.92 And how revealing it is that the doges had already
been able to create an impregnable refuge in the palace! Hence the necessity of
setting it on fire, even at the cost of many houses being sacrificed: a clear indication
of how identified power in Venice had become with the doge and the palace. And

to thirteenth centuries, and U. Franzoi, ‘Le trasformazioni edilizie e la definizione storico-architetton­

ica di Piazza San Marco’, and E. R. Trincanato, ‘Rappresentatività e funzionalità di Piazza San Marco’,
both in Piazza San Marco. L’architettura. La storia. Le funzioni, ed. G. Samonà, E. Franzoi, and
R. Trincanato (Padua, 1982).

89 Agazzi, Platea Sancti Marci, p. 150. 90 Schulz, ‘La Piazza medievale di San Marco’, p. 146.
91 Warren, ‘San Marco’, pp. 295–302, esp. p. 302. 92 JnD, IV. 12.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 429

the first thing that Peter I Orseolo began doing was to rebuild palace and basilica,
even more gloriously than before, while his son continued the res­tor­ations, added
the new hospital of St Mark, and the Zecca.93
Ravenna never had such a blank topographical canvas at its disposal as Venice.
It was already filled with sixth-century churches, and a late imperial, then
Theodorician, then exarchal, palace.94 Like Rome, it too was divided into regions,
starting from the old city, the Regio I. The Platea Maior (the old Via Popilia), was
part of the Regio III, imperial fiscal land, including what had been the palace of
Theodoric and its palatine chapel S. Giovanni Evangelista, the Moneta Aurea or
mint, the cathedral and baptistery of the Arians, and the basilica of the Goths.
This had been the area of the Gothic aristocracy and of the Arian clergy, later
taken on by the exarch. The Regio IV to the south-east of the Roman walls was
the area of the episcopium, with the cathedral and the baptistery, the surviving
baths, the Bagni del Clero, the archiepiscopal vivarium, and, from 712, Archbishop
Felix’s addition to the episcopal palace. By the tenth century, just as in Rome,
many documents ceased to define the topography on the basis of region numbers:
they maintained the notion of Regio, but this is more often than not associated
with a church, such as S. Pietro Maggiore, S. Andrea Maggiore, S. Agata Maggiore,
S. Rufillo.95 Also increasingly common was the topographical description based
on bridges and gates—the bridges of S. Apollinare or Ponte Coperto, Augusto,
Cipitello, Calciato, and gates like the Porta Aurea, Artemidori, Nova, S. Lorenzo,
Tremeduli, and S. Vittorio.96 While the old baths may have been decaying, the
transport axes were still visible in the roads, watercourses, and canals. The arch­
bishops’ main administrative role, as it had been the exarchs’, was to maintain the
structures and the infrastructure restored by Theodoric and the exarchs. This
included public roads, canals, public buildings, and especially public spaces like
the Platea Maior, bridges, walls, as well as at least one aqueduct still functioning
in the ninth century, and public and private baths, such as the Thermae in the
Via S. Alberto, still mentioned in the first half of the ninth century. But in
Ravenna, though the archbishops controlled the political affairs of the Romagna
and the old Pentapolis, and increasingly of Emilia, they had to share the day-to-day
running of the city, for example in terms of defence and justice, with the dukes.

93 Agazzi, Platea Sancti Marci, p. 16.

94 The best discussions of the urban landscape of Ravenna are by Gelichi, ‘Il paesaggio urbano’,
pp. 153–66; Ortalli, ‘L’edilizia abitativa’, pp. 167–92; Augenti, ‘Ravenna e Classe’, pp. 185–217; Augenti,
‘A tale of two cities. Rome and Ravenna between seventh and ninth century AD’, in Gasparri, 774.
Ipotesi su una transizione, pp. 175–98; Cirelli, Ravenna; Cirelli, ‘Ravenna – Rise of a Late Antique capi­
tal’, pp. 239–63; and Brunterc’h, ‘Habitat et pouvoir’, pp. 57–84. On the ‘internal memory’ of the city,
especially as seen by Agnellus and the Ravennate, and by the Carolingian historiography, see the very
important article by Savigni, ‘Memoria urbis’, pp. 615–701.
95 Benericetti X/1–4, nos. 52, 204, 208, 217, 264, 255, 300, 333, 245, 247, 249, 189; on Ravenna
churches, see Chapter 4, pp. 40–43.
96 Benericetti X/1–4, nos. 77, 122, 116–7, 206, 234, 189, 204, 319, 101, 297, 81, 160, 39, 95, 264, 271,
114, 291.
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430 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

The reality on the ground in Ravenna was such that, in practice, once we have
factored in some additions and restorations to the city, especially after the break-up
of the old exarchal palace and its takeover by individual aristocratic families,
there was little in the way of additional appropriation of the public space in the city.
Ravenna was still, to a large extent, a Roman city, and many of the ancient
toponyms were still used to place land and houses, especially in the old city, the
Regio I: the Miliarum Aureum in the Regione Herculana, the basilica of Hercules
ad Orologio (popularly known as Concaincullo!), the ninfei near the church of
S. Agnese, and others, such as the Regione de Ammoneta, which still defined the
urban landscape in 982 and until the eleventh century in the documents.97
Toponyms such as ad Orologio at Erculana, near Orologio Concaincullo, Caput
Portici and Quartoregio continued to be used, as were the earlier toponyms of
Pusterula, made famous by Agnellus’ story of the fight between its men and those of
the neighbouring area.98 People began to take their names from some of them:
Apollinaris and Deusdedit de Ponte Augusto, or Martin son of Sergius de Posterula.99
Sometimes even churches did so, for example S. Stefano ad Balneum Gothorum.100
There was little building work in the city after the sixth century but a constant
preservation of the structure and infrastructure which, even if much diminished,
recalled the Roman city, with its roads, streets, and stone houses, while the empty
spaces between those, which had not been built on in the sixth century, were
indeed infilled with new wooden houses, often the Lombard-style salae.
To conclude. The development of these three cities in terms of urban change
reflects a variation of scenarios applicable to two out of three in several ways,
though evolution was never similar in all three. They were all different in terms of
the expansion of the Church in the landscape, with Rome showing a slow process
of Christianization in the city, generally speaking from the periphery towards the
centre with its monumental and official nature, an evolution almost fully established
by the eighth century. By then the papacy had come to be seen as the le­git­im­ate
user and owner of the public space, as well as of the public powers of the emperors,
and was fully in charge of the reuse of space and architectural features, which it
would modify, rebuild, and embellish on a large scale during the ninth century.
Most of this revival was driven by the Church of Rome and the papacy, and the
uplift, both in quantity and in quality, corresponded to the period of Carolingian
rule, which brought with it vast resources in precious metals, as well as admiration
for the early Christian period, and an expectation of a renewed city worthy of the
Apostle Peter. The process of gradual Christianization of the space was not one

97 Gelichi, ‘Il paesaggio urbano’, pp. 157–60; Benericetti X/3 no. 328. For the moneta area, see
Morelli and Novara, ‘Sedi di zecca e monetazione’, pp. 176–81.
98 Benericetti X/2 no. 146; Benericetti X/3 nos. 261 and 205; Benericetti C8/9 no. 28; Benericetti
X/1 no. 62.
99 Benericetti X/3 nos. 207 and 271; Benericetti X/4 no. 321; Benericetti X/3 no. 274.
100 Benericetti X/1 no. 79.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 431

which had to be carried out in Ravenna, where churches and monasteries had
been founded from late antiquity with Eastern imperial support, and where the
reclaiming of the space was only about the takeover by the Church of the religious
establishments founded and endowed by the Arian Church. This change had rela­
tively little impact, in terms of changes of use or topography, being essentially a
replacement of one with the other, and we see relatively little ap­pro­pri­ation of the
original public space in the city (except within the ruins of the exarchal palace).
Venice, especially in Rialto, once the centre of gravity of the duchy moved there
with Agnellus Particiaco, saw a complete colonization of the space, both in terms
of building of churches and monasteries and of the centre of power of the ducal
palace, the Basilica of St Mark, and the open space around it—the main space of
power, under the control of the doge.
So far this has been a list of the differences between the cities. If we now try to
observe the similarities, the most evident is the development of the city in parallel
with, and as a result of, the cult of a most powerful patron saint—St Peter in Rome
and St Mark in Venice.101 In both cases, the centres of power (in Rome until the
end of the ninth century only) were those spiritually and physically around
the relics of the two apostles. But the similarities end there, since in Rome this centre
was promoted by the bishop with the enthusiastic support of people from outside
the city, and even outside Italy, the pilgrims. In Venice, on the other hand, the cult
was promoted by the doge, the secular political power—aware of its potential for
social unification, if not necessarily popular devotion. The doges had appropri­
ated the strength of the cult, making it into a defining city identity. This was not
the case in Rome at all, where St Peter was the saint of the pilgrims and of the
pope, while the secular elite constructed its identity in the tenth century, once we
begin to see it in the sources, around the deliberate appropriation of the Roman
imperial past. The case of Ravenna was less controversial, since the archbishops
there had not succeeded in fashioning a major cult for the city. At the same time,
this was perhaps less essential, since the balance of old and new, ecclesiastical and
secular, episcopal and aristocratic, in the city was fairly stable and conducive to
power-sharing through the frequent merging of the elites and the ecclesiastical
establishment.
A second set of similar changes this time places, not Rome and Venice against
Ravenna, but Rome and Ravenna against Venice. This is the very obvious fact that
Rome had a whole urban landscape inherited from the Roman period, a land­
scape which had to be either preserved and cherished, deliberately plundered and
demolished, or at the very least neglected into ruins. The responses in both Rome
and Ravenna were a mix of all three, with Ravenna often belonging to the third

101 San Pietro e San Marco: aspetti, luoghi della santità e della agiografia tra oriente e occidente: atti
dell’incontro di studio, Roma, Istituto patristico augustinianum, 29 aprile 2010 (Rome, 2012).
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432 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

category, while Rome alternated between the first two, sometimes chrono­logic­al­ly,
more often according to the social group involved.

The Public Space: Place of Cohesion, Place of Conflict

Creating Cohesion, Bringing the City Together

Urban space was not a dead space. It changed and morphed continuously in relation
to what was happening in it. Public space was essentially a dynamic concept—the
space in which things took place, were made to happen, were brought to public
attention—and it was used to provide the building blocks of civic identity. This
could be used in two basic ways: to unite or to divide. In the first cat­egory we have
ceremonies which bring the city together, and create or foster such identity; in the
second we have events which create, or result from, discord, and can lead to serious
disturbances and fissures in the community. Let me examine them in turn.

A Space of Popular Consensus for Public Office: Adventus Ceremonies,

Coronations, Oaths and Promises, Elections
The first and oldest public ceremony unifying the city at a time of new beginnings
was that of the imperial adventus, the emperor’s entry into the city, where he
would be received with acclamations. After Constantine’s removal of the capital
from Rome to Constantinople, then the deposition of the last Western emperor in
476, such ceremonies naturally trickled off, with the last being that of the Emperor
Constans II in the seventh century.102 Sometimes the ceremony, which effectively
marked the beginning of a new reign, would be substituted with the arrival of the
emperor’s image, his ‘icon’, which would be placed in the imperial palace on the
Palatine to indicate his presence in the city. Increasingly, even this dwindled away,
so that the nearest version of the adventus was that of the exarch, when he came
to the city from Ravenna and was received with a precise ceremonial defined in
the Liber Diurnus.103 With the end of the Exarchate, there was, of course, no
replacement in the second half of the eighth century, though Gasparri has made
the very significant point that, looking at the evidence for the reception of the
Lombard kings such as Liutprand and Desiderius in Rome, or indeed of the popes
in Pavia, there was no doubt in either party’s minds that each saw itself as dealing
with an equal, independent political power.104

102 LP I. 78. On the adventus ceremonies from the Roman principate to the successor states, see
M. McCormick, Eternal Victory. Triumphal Rulership in Late Antiquity, Byzantium and the Early
Medieval West (Cambridge, 1986), including the discussion on the Carolingian celebrations, pp. 350–87.
103 H. Foerster, ed., Liber Diurnus Romanorum Pontificatum (Bern, 1958), no. 59.
104 S. Gasparri, ‘Roma e i Longobardi’, in Roma nell’alto medioevo, Settimane 48, pp. 235–9.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 433

By the time Pope Hadrian I received Charlemagne in Rome in 774, he chose to

treat his adventus like that of a pseudo-exarch, to which the title of patricius
en­titled him. The ceremony consisted of the pope sending dignitaries (iudices) to
receive Charles 30 miles out of city, where they awaited him with banners, then
the pope himself welcoming the Frankish king 1 mile from the city, with the
scholae of the militia (effectively the people of the city) and their leaders, and chil­
dren with palms singing; then the pope brought him venerable crosses and insig-
nia, as was the ‘custom to receive the exarch’.105 When Leo III returned to Rome
on 29 November 799, he was said to have been welcomed by representatives of
the whole of Roman society and the foreign scholae at the Milvian Bridge, with
banners and chants, that is to say he was welcomed as both temporal and spiritual
leader.106 Charlemagne’s visit was to St Peter’s, with the public manifestation by
the king of his veneration for the Apostle both in the ceremonial space of the
atrium and the highly significant one of the confessio. The reception in the atrium,
with the pope waiting at the top of the steps for the climbing king,107 was the
ultimate manifestation of concord and acceptance by the citizens of Rome, whose
patricius Charles had been made, with the honorary addition of Romanorum to
his title. This title, though mentioned in the Frankish Annals as being that aban­
doned by Charles after his imperial coronation, is significant of the parallel held
in the mind of the pope between Charles’s holding of the highest Byzantine court
title, which had been traditionally granted to the exarch, and his role as a replace­
ment for the latter, before he took on the imperial mantle.108
The third stage of the reception was carried out first outside the church on the
atrium platform, in front of the doors: the oath or promissio.109 This platform was
the most important reception place for the popes. In 774 Hadrian I received
Charlemagne there. Sergius II received Louis II in 852, and John X received

105 LP I. 97 chs. 35–6. 106 LP I. 98 ch. 19.

107 LP I. 97 ch. 37. See A. T. Hack, Das Empfangenzeremoniell bei mittelalterlichen Papst-Kaiser-
Treffen, (Cologne: Regesta Imperii 18, 1999).
108 According to the LP, Charles asked the pope for permission to enter Rome, which the exarch
would not have needed; whether this was an attempt by the LP to establish papal supremacy, a form of
wishful thinking, or a courtesy act on Charlemagne’s part is impossible to ascertain. The title of
patricius, which had been once before granted by the Byzantine emperor to a Frank, Clovis, may also
have been one given to Charlemagne in this way, to make him subordinate to the Byzantine emperor.
But, whether to cancel this or to create a new title outside the Byzantine hierarchy, it was later supple­
mented in this instance by the term Romanorum, perhaps a hybrid form of acknowledged secular
pre-eminence more specific than the exarch’s but not as yet imperial. This seems to me a perfect
ex­ample of the fluidity of thinking of the popes in exceptional circumstances, letting them formulate
new approaches in a so far unheard-of situation, of which they could make use to negotiate with the
Franks (and Byzantium). At the same time, however, this negotiation was not perceived as a form of
‘going it alone’ but was still firmly attached to the need to have an emperor—a new, Western one, and
one who would delegate the rule over Rome to the pope, but who nevertheless was bringing back the
perceived natural political order in the West.
109 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 612–13, 616–18.
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434 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Berengar in 915, for their respective coronations.110 Afterwards (in 774), Charles,
Hadrian I, and a select number of dignitaries went to the crypt, where king and
pope swore a mutual oath of fidelity. The official donation by Pepin of the papal
Patrimonium was confirmed by Charles, through being placed on the confessio, as
close to an unbreakable vow as possible, since the Apostle was its witness. While
being more solemn for him than for others, nevertheless all important pilgrims
were thus welcomed on the platform in front of atrium, then proceeded with the
clergy and other dignitaries to the confessio to prostrate themselves at the tomb.
Gifts from kings were also deposited ante confessionem, for example Liutprand’s,
Pepin’s, and Charles’, just like important political documents. Until the eighth
century, all pilgrims could go to the crypt, usually in a one-way-traffic line, enter­
ing by the south, and exiting by the north, doors. At the entrance, Leo III had set
out large shields with the Latin and Greek Creed—a significant gesture in the
midst of the continuing debate between him and Charles as exemplified in the
Libri Carolini.111 The tradition of the oath at the tomb of St Peter was already an
old one, long-standing because of its powerful symbolic value. According to
Benedict of Soracte (plausibly in this instance), in 954, before his death, in the
crypt itself in fact, Alberic’s advisers and friends swore to have his son Octavian
elected pope.112
The most prestigious of all such ceremonies was, of course, the imperial cor­on­
ation. After Leo III’s return to Rome, Charles followed in 799 and presided over
the council which saw the pope clear himself with an oath of the wrongdoing of
which he had been accused. This also, being a solemn oath, took place at the con-
fessio at St Peter’s, as did later that of Paschal I. Leo III followed this with the
allegedly spontaneous coronation of Charles as emperor.113 While leaving aside
the historiography of this much-debated issue, recent work has shown quite
clearly the extent to which the event was stage-managed, with Charlemagne hav­
ing had to have consent to the plan.114 Being the first in the West, Charlemagne’s
imperial coronation set the precedent, but the pope’s role was to be as important
in it. The choice of St Peter’s itself was, naturally, because this was where northern

110 LP I, 97 chs. 37–8; 104, chs. 10–11; Gesta Berengarii ed. Dümmler, pp. 132–3 and Stella ed.,
Gesta Berengarii, pp. 1–3; also F. Bougard, ‘Le couronnement imperial de Bérenger Ier (1915) d’après
les Gesta Berengarii imperatoris’, in Rerum Gestarum Scriptor: Histoire et Historiographie au Moyen
Age. Mélanges Michel Sot, ed. M. Coumert, C. Isaïa, K. Krönert, and S. Shimahara (Paris, 2012),
pp. 329–43 esp. 330–2.
111 See Chapter 3. 112 BenSor, p. 172. 113 ARF 801.
114 As a standard example of the traditional historiography on the subject, see Folz, Le couronne-
ment imperial; De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 611–18, on imperial coronations; see also, on the cere­
mony, K. J. Benz, ‘Cum ab oratione surgerat. Überlegungen zur Kaiserkrönung Karls des Grossen’,
Deutches Archiv für Erforschung des Mittelalters 31 (1975), pp. 337–69, and P. Llewellyn, ‘Le contexte
romain du couronnement de Charlemagne. Le temps de l’Avent de l’année 800’, Le Moyen Âge 96
(1990), pp. 209–25, whose view, in my opinion right, was that Charles had expected and maybe
planned the imperial coronation, but was taken by surprise by the pope pre-empting him to ensure it
bound him close to Rome, and that Charles was unhappy with the pope stealing a march on him.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 435

Europeans perceived the centre of Rome to be, where the tomb of Peter was, not
at the Lateran, technically the head and mother church of the city. But the choice
of St Peter’s may also have been because it was outside the walls of Rome. that is
where the pope was the official ruler. The order of the ceremony was as follows:
the new emperor was received on the podium, then all made their entry through
the central door, the Porta Argentea, progressed up the nave with stops at which
prayers were said by the bishops of Albano, Porto, and Ostia, this last one anoint­
ing the emperor. After the oath to protect the pope and the Church, the emperor
prostrated himself in front of the confessio, then ascended to the apse podium
between the altar and the cathedra, where the pope crowned him, after which he
was acclaimed by the people and laudes were sung.115 That Charlemagne was
involved in the planning seems clear from the fact that he was crowned while
prostrate in front of the confessio, a ritual which was part of the order of consecra­
tion of bishops and popes.116 The Ordo XLV from the last decade of the tenth
century, which gives the order of the standard coronation ceremony as it would
have been enacted at the coronation of all emperors after Lothar—notably Louis
II, Charles the Bald, Charles III, Lambert and Guy, Arnulf, Berengar, and then
again the Ottos—shows the parallel of the ceremony with that of the papal conse­
cration on the podium.117 Specific mention was also made of the progress across
the basilica nave being interrupted by stops in places where there were porphyry
insertions in the pavement, in deliberate imitation of imperial Byzantine court
ceremonial.118 The symbolism of porphyry, revived by Leo III even as he made
the definitive break with the Eastern Empire, was to link the pope, then the
Western emperor, to the established imperial ideology.119

115 See, for example, R. Elze, ‘Die Herrscherlaudes im Mittelalter’, Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung
für Rechtsgeschichte. Kanonistische Abteilung 40 (1954), pp. 201–23 repr. in R. Elze, Päpste-Kaiser-Könige.
116 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 608–18.
117 Andrieu, Ordines romani, Ordo XLV, and De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 611–16; for individual
coronations, see Schramm, Kaiser, Könige and Päpste, I, pp. 220–99, on Charlemagne’s; II, pp. 119–39,
on Charles the Bald; and on the Ottonians, III, pp. 133–239; Brühl, Aus Mittelalter und Diplomatik,
Appendix 407–12; and G. Isabella, ‘I giorni del carisma. Incoronazioni regie e imperiali dei secoli X,
XI e XII’, in Il carisma nel secolo XI. Genesi, forme e dinamiche istituzionali. Atti del XXVII Convegno
del Centro studi avellaniti, Fonte Avellana, 30–1 agosto 2005 (Verona, 2006), pp. 83–102. For Berengar,
see also Bougard, ‘Le couronnement impérial de Bérenger Ier’, pp. 329–43. On the parallels between
papal and imperial coronations, see É. Ó Carragáin, ‘Interactions between Liturgy and Politics in Old
St Peter’s’, in Old Saint Peter’s, Rome, ed. McKitterick, R., et al., (Cambridge, 2013), pp. 670–741.
118 On the link between the St Peter’s porphyry plaques and the imitation of the Byzantine cere­
monial associated with the Porphyry Wheel in Constantinople, see P. Schreiner, ‘Omphalion und Rota
Porphyretica. Zum Kaiserzeremoniell in Konstantinopel und Rom’, in Byzance et les Slaves. Mélange
Ivan Dujčev (Paris, 1979), pp. 401–10, and M. Andrieu, ‘La “Rota porphyretica” de la basilique
Vaticane’, MEFREM 61 (1954), pp. 189–218.
119 See, for example, R. Schieffer, ‘Charlemagne and Rome’ in Paroli and Delogu, La storia eco-
nomica di Roma, pp. 615–16; Deug-Su, Cultura e ideologia. This was, however, only valid for Rome: it
is important to see that, as far as the Franks themselves were concerned, coronation by the pope was
not sufficient to create an emperor: this came from the coronation by the previous emperor, and the
acceptance of the Franks. Louis the Pious was indeed crowned ‘with the imperial diadem’ by the visit­
ing Pope Stephen IV in Rheims, and acclaimed with the Laudes (see Astronomer II. 26/2–3), but only
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436 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Papal elections were carried out within the public space of the Lateran and,
when peaceful, were the ultimate form of community consensus. Some popes
succeeded in achieving this—not many, since in most cases elections were fraught
occasions with rival contenders. Control of the Lateran complex was at stake
since, until the tenth century at least, it was this which was deemed to signify a
successful election. As the original seat of papal power, the Lateran complex
remained the seat of the Curia and administration, by contrast with the Vatican
area, the centre for pilgrims and thus outsiders. Both the basilica and the palace
had thrones, and the enthronement of the priest Philip was described in detail,
with the acclamation, the new pontiff being brought to the Lateran basilica, the
prayers, the peace, the move to the Lateran Palace, with once again the peace
being given from the pontifical throne, then the move up to the banqueting hall
for the banquet with the ecclesiastical and military elite of the city.120 This was,
however, the last description of the pope taking possession of the Lateran basilica;
after that, when elected, the new pope was still taken to the Lateran but to the
patriarchium, the palace, not the basilica, and his consecration, the rite which
actually made him pope, took place the following Sunday at St Peter’s—at the
tomb of St Peter first, then on the podium of the altar. Taking possession of the
Lateran palace and being enthroned there meant the pope’s investiture as a ruler,
parallel with that at St Peter as a bishop; significantly, the old ceremony ceased
to be used by the tenth century, being superseded by the more important one at
St Peter’s, which did double office.
Rome’s case was unique, not so much in having adventus and coronation cere­
monies, which Ravenna also had, but in giving us any information about these.
Roman sources, both narrative and liturgical, give details of those which actually
happened, and the liturgical and ceremonial instructions needed to carry out
such events when they would happen in the future. This followed on from its per­
ceived role as the imperial capital, metamorphosed into the papal city, which
emperors, whether Eastern or Western, came to visit, conquer, be crowned and
acclaimed—a role that Rome jealously preserved and highlighted in the eighth
and ninth centuries through papal propaganda. Ravenna, though it too had had
imperial adventus ceremonies in the sixth century, and at the end of the ninth

after having the legitimacy of his imperial function established with his coronation by his father in
813, when he ‘place[d] the crown on Louis’ head and order[ed] that should be called emperor and augus-
tus’ and ‘share[d] the imperial title with him’; see Einhard IV. 30; ARF 813. Similarly, Louis himself also
crowned his son Lothar at Aachen and ‘share[d] the name of emperor with him’; ARF 817. There was
certainly no sense at this stage that, even had the Frankish aristocracy been prepared to accept papal
coronation as the defining emperor-making ritual, either Charlemagne or Louis would have thought
this acceptable, and no pope actually thought that they could impose it. The same would apply even
when Pope Paschal in 823 invited Lothar to Rome and crowned him emperor, with the title of emperor
and augustus (ARF 823)—which he had already been given by his father at Aachen (Astronomer II. 36).

120 LP I. 96 ch. 10; De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 198–200.

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exercising power in the city: the public space 437

century would once again have imperial coronations and continued to receive
emperors from Charlemagne to Otto III, has left no documented evidence of
these events. Agnellus’ account focused only on Charlemagne’s interaction at the
official banquet with Archbishop Gratianus, through an anecdote which is aimed
at highlighting the latter’s sanctity. While we may deplore that Agnellus’ narrative
should have stopped in the mid-ninth century, this was not the only reason for
the scarcity of detail, since even Agnellus gives us no real narrative meat for
Charlemagne’s arrival in Ravenna. This is despite Agnellus’ attempt to set up
Ravenna as a rival to Rome, for which the Liber Pontificalis gives lavish descrip­
tions of adventus and coronation ceremonies. Moreover, Ravenna had always
supported the emperor, whoever he was, as long as he could be used as an ideo­
logical pawn against papal interference, and one would thus expect visits, cor­on­
ations, and councils held there to have been noted and described in detail. This
did not happen, whether for John VIII’s and Charles the Bald’s great council of
877, Formosus’ coronation of Lambert, or major assemblies under the Ottonians,
who were there in some cases once a year, presumably taking part in some sort of
crown-wearing ceremonial.
Neither do we hear of the circumstances of any of the Ottos’ official visits to
Ravenna. The nearest to an adventus is the power display of Otto III when he
invited his namesake, the son of Doge Peter II Orseolo, to join him there, and
proceeded to go down the river with him aboard a fleet of Ravenna ships.121 It is
likely that, on their arrival in the city at regular intervals, there was some cere­
mony to welcome the Ottonian emperors. In exceptional circumstances, such as
the joint arrival of both emperor and pope for a major council, such as that of
John VIII and Charles in 877, and Otto I and John XIII in 963, such a reception
would have been even more impressive. Sadly, even in the exceptional case of an
imperial coronation in Ravenna such as that of Lambert, we know nothing of the
order of events or circumstances. While those events were important and mem­
or­able, and a chronicler might have provided details, they may nonetheless have
been perceived as ‘accidental’. They happened to take place in Ravenna for specific
reasons, such as Guy’s and Lambert’s choice, or the Ottonians’ presence there, but
not because Ravenna had become their capital. For the Ottonians, it was ‘one of ’
their cities, just as they had palaces across Germany. For the Ravennati, it may
have been perceived as an equal choice to Rome, but the emperors did not neces­
sarily perceive it in this way.
We have no evidence from Ravenna about either the places or the ceremonies
associated with the archbishops’ election either, and can therefore only assume
that these were no different from any episcopal elections, generally made by the
clergy unless imposed by an external political power at times of conflict, such as

121 JnD IV. 43.

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438 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

that of Archbishop Leo I (770–8).122 Mention is made of the far from triumphal
return of Archbishop George, who was certainly not given a welcome reception,
and that of Archbishop Peter IV, after his captivity in Mogliana for a year and the
routing of Rainerius. While we have evidence of the placitum itself, the absence of
a narrative source in this instance, even one as imperfect as Agnellus’ account, is a
crucial factor in our lack of knowledge of events.
Venice had none of these ambitions and problems. Elections, the taking of
office of the doges, and public ceremonial, at this early stage in its history, were
quite low-key events. We do not know the location and manner of early ducal
elections in Venice, until we are told that the retiring Doge John II allowed a large
number of people to elect Peter I Candiano as the new doge ‘in front of his house’.
The story is suggestive of two points. First, the fact that this was unusual, most
doges having previously been elected by a far more restricted number of primates
until then. Secondly John the Deacon shows that this was a real election by the
people, who actually participated in the choice rather than just ratifying it and
formally acclaiming the new doge.123 John II called the newly elected doge to the
palace and handed him the insignia of power—no particularly public or mem­or­
able ceremonial is mentioned on this occasion—then retired to his own house.
Again and again, John reiterates the point that the palace was the area of ducal
power, and that the occupation of it effectively ‘made’ the doge—once removed
from power, he became a private citizen once again, going back to his home, while
the next doge controlled the palace. The lack of a public official ceremonial can be
accounted for by the fact that there was no autonomous power takeover, such as a
coronation or oath; the doges were technically appointed by the Byzantine
em­perors, even though in practice this meant that, once elected locally, they sent
an embassy to Constantinople to notify the emperor of their election, and
received in return confirmation of it through exchanges of gifts and the granting
of court titles. The process seems to have been singularly pragmatic and devoid of
the formal framework of early medieval politics, a fact which may conceivably
explain the attempt by Peter II Orseolo to create a highly symbolic popular festi­
val on his son John’s return from Constantinople with an imperial bride.
In Venice, for the period before the ninth century, there was no historical
­centre of power, whose control gave one authority over the duchy. This shifted
with the political factions, depending on families and type of power; even the
foundation myths of the city were based on changes of location. We can identify
here one of the fundamental differences between Venice and the other two cities.
Venice, naturally, had no tradition of an imperial centre of government, as did
Rome and Ravenna. In Rome, this centre was almost unchanged, from the estab­
lishing of the Lateran as the patriarchal see of Rome, until this was challenged by

122 See Chapter 3. 123 JnD III. 32.

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exercising power in the city: the public space 439

the gradual rise of the Vatican complex on account of St Peter. In Venice, such a
centre of power would not emerge until Rialto was chosen, and the focus for it
was created with the ducal palace. The public place of power was born and devel­
oped from current politics, not from the memory of tradition.

A Space of Representation and the Creation of City Identity:

Ceremonies, Processions, Festivals
In Rome, the adventus processions were paralleled, in a more ordinary context, by
the most important public and communal element in the life of the city: the sta­
tional liturgy. The life of the Church in Rome was defined by its liturgy, which was
one of constant movement between the ‘stations’, with processions.124 The ori­
gin­al twenty-five tituli (later reduced to twenty-two) were at the core of the sta­
tional liturgy, which was essential to the creation of city identity in Rome, of
which it was the binding element throughout the year. The stational system is well
documented for the eighth and ninth centuries, and its purpose was to maintain
the unity of the urban community around its bishop, even as it became increasingly
spread out across the city. At first it included rites like the fermentum, a distribu­
tion of bread consecrated by the bishop to the other churches, on Sundays, being
taken to the priests of the tituli from the papal altar. Similarly, liturgical vessels
which were the property of the whole Church were moved from the bishop’s to all
the other churches on relevant days, the proof of its proper functioning being
in the constant need for renewing vessels under Leo III and Gregory IV. Originally,
the stational liturgy took place on Sundays, but it was then extended to weekdays
from Gregory II onwards, who created the Mass on Thursdays in Lent. To the
original stational tituli were later added some of the diaconiae. There were in total
thirty-seven stational churches, of which thirty were early Christian ones and
seven newly created churches. The system was in place by the beginning of the
sixth century, and saw only a few additions later. Most churches were used only
once a year, but the main ones were used from four times (S. Anastasia, S. Paolo),
five times (S. Lorenzo), eight times (the Lateran basilica), ten times (SS Apostoli),
and, the highest, thirteen times for St Peter’s. The oldest festivals were, naturally,
those around Easter and the Baptism at the Lateran. Increasingly, though, the
episcopal church was left behind, and S. Maria Maggiore became a daughter-
church to the Lateran, or, as Saxer puts it, a ‘cathédrale de secours’.125 Most Marian
festivals, as well as those around Christmas and the Presentation, took place
there. St Peter’s gradually took on the greatest festivals like Christmas, the

124 The best accounts of the stational liturgy are Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, pp. 917–1033; Baldovin, The
urban character, pp. 143–58; and now De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, esp. pp. 34–5, 66–102. See also
S. J. P. Van Dijk, ‘The Urban and Papal Rites in Seventh and Eighth-Century Rome’, Sacris erudiri 12
(1961), pp. 472–570, and the classic J. P. Kirsch, Die Stationskirchen des Missale Romanum (Fribourg/
Breisgau, 1926), which discusses the churches themselves.
125 Saxer, Sainte Marie Majeure, pp. 124–5.
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440 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Epiphany, and Pentecost, as well as the ordination of all the clergy, though the
Easter and Pentecost vigils remained at the Lateran. There was a slow, but in­ex­or­
able, drift towards increasing the importance of what had been a peripheral
church at first at St Peter’s, even more so than the Lateran: by 800, St Peter’s was
increasingly perceived as being the main cathedral, as shown by the gradual shift
over time towards celebrating more and more of the stations, especially on major
festivals, there rather than at the Lateran.126
The stational liturgy, always Eucharistic, was meant to be one at which the
pope was present, since its purpose was to signify the unity of the whole city
under its bishop, even as this unity had come to be less manifest given the large
number of Romans and their links with individual tituli. The manifestation which
demonstrated this unity around the bishop (or increasingly his deputy) was the
procession. There were two kinds of processions. One, festive, could involve just
the clergy, or the clergy and the emperor during an adventus procession. The sec­
ond, the penitential procession, always included clergy and people. In both cases,
the fundamental principle of the procession was that it united people from all
seven ecclesiastical regions of the city. It began with taking the cross of their
region to one church previously decided on as the starting point, the Collecta
church, often situated some distance from the stational church;127 then everybody
processed together from the Collecta church to the stational church, where the
stational mass was to take place. Meanwhile, another procession would see the
pope and the clergy from the Lateran Palace go to the stational church too, where
the clergy of that church would welcome them. The pope, Curia members, dea­
cons, subdeacons and others, and the schola cantorum, met the priests, suburbi­
carian bishops, other local clergy, and people, when all converged on the stational
church. The processions could be simple ones for ordinary Sundays and festivals.
However, Gregory the Great had created, on two occasions, a new type of ad hoc
procession with a penitential purpose,128 and, after him, such new processions
were introduced and became a fairly regular occurrence at special times, whether
for penitential purposes or for celebration. Under Zacharias, we have one such, to
celebrate the peace obtained from Liutprand, while under Stephen II, on the con­
trary, an exceptional procession with the icon of the Acheropoita was probably
meant to ask for deliverance from Aistulf ’s attack.129 Many processions had as
their purpose to implore God’s forgiveness and deliverance from epidemics, Tiber

126 H. Geertman, ‘Forze centrifughe e centripete nella Roma Cristiana: il Laterano, la basilica Julia
e la basilica Liberiana’, Rendiconti. Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia 59 (1986–7), pp. 63–91.
127 Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, pp. 917–1033; Saxer, Sainte Marie Majeure, pp. 133–46; Baldovin, The urban
character, pp. 143–58; and now De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, esp. pp. 34–5, 66–102; Van Dijk, ‘The
Urban and Papal Rites’ pp. 472–570.
128 M. Andrews, ‘The Laetaniae Septiformes of Gregory I, S. Maria Maggiore and Early Marian
Cult in Rome’, in The Moving City: Processions, Passages, and Promenades in Ancient Rome, ed.
I. Östenberg, S. Malmberg, and J. Bjørnebye (London, 2015), pp. 155–64.
129 LP I. 93 ch. 13 and 94, ch. 11; for a list of all processions see Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, Appendix 1.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 441

floods, and Saracen attacks. Finally, some processions were simply part of the
translations of saints’ relics to city churches, the first being Zacharias’s translation of
the head of St George from the Lateran to the new church of S. Giorgio in Velabro.
Under Paul I, another two translations took place from cemeteries: the relics of St
Petronilla were brought from the cemetery of Domitilla to St Peter’s, and several
other martyrs were brought from various cemeteries, also to St Peter’s.130
The stational liturgy required considerable organization. Its material props
were given by the popes from early on, such as Pope Hilarius’ gift in the fifth cen­
tury of liturgical vases to each titulus.131 The liturgical plate for the stational
masses was kept in the Lateran or at S. Maria Maggiore, as were the liturgical
vestments, also kept at the Lateran under lock and key and being the responsibil­
ity of the vestiarius. It was his servants who took them to each stational church
and then had to return them to the Lateran at the end, to receive his seal, since
many were very valuable. To these items one needs to add the two large gold
crosses always carried by two subdeacons and preceding the pope from the
Lateran to the stational church. One had been offered by Charlemagne to Pope
Leo III, was stolen under Paschal I, and replaced by Leo IV. The seven crosses, the
insignia of the seven ecclesiastical regions of the city, painted and holding three
lights each, were kept at S. Anastasia on the Palatine and taken by porters to the
appropriate stational church. Each schola and community had its own insignia;
even the poor from the hospices processed with a wooden cross. Other features of
the processions were the candles and the incense presented to the pope when he
reached the stational church, all of which were part of the late antique court ritual,
from which it was incorporated into the papal ritual. The papal Mass was increas­
ingly akin to an imperial ceremonial, though it is not clear whether this was a
survival from late antiquity or a subsequent import from the Byzantine court. An
originally secular usage which spread to the processions involved banners. During
the Byzantine period, only the emperor or his representative, the exarch, were
entitled to be preceded by banners, which were a military feature. Increasingly,
secular and military banners were included in the processions, and they would
later be decorated with religious symbols.
Also with its origins in late antique imperial ritual were the order and hier­archy
of processions.132 The papal cortège very closely resembled royal or imperial ones:
two acolytes on foot preceded the horse-mounted cortège with the sub­deacons,
deacons, high functionaries of the Curia, and the pope himself on horseback, and

130 LP I. 95 chs. 3–4.

131 The account of the processions relies on the works referenced in note 124, and also Saxer, Sainte
Marie Majeure, pp. 133–46.
132 Ibid., pp. 111–18 and 139–41; B. Schimmelpfennig, ‘Die Bedeutung Roms im päpstlichen
Zeremoniell’, in Schimmelpfennig and Schmugge, eds., Rom im hohen Mittelalter, pp. 47–61 at 52–60,
describing essentially the order as given by Benedict the Canon in the twelfth century, but with spe­
cific notes on earlier components.
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442 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

the vestiarius. The cortège was arranged in order of rank, from the least important
at the front to the most important last, either on horseback or on foot. Many of
the ordinary clergy had already gone ahead to the stational church. When going
through the city the pope had originally worn ordinary clothes, but the
Byzantinization of the ritual from the sixth century onwards led to a formalized
Byzantine-style ceremonial with parallels to the adventus of the emperor. At the
stational church, curia members, chanters of scholae, baiuli who had brought the
liturgical vessels, and the holders of banners and of the seven crosses were already
seated. Outside the stational church, its clergy welcomed the pope with incense,
after which he went to the secretarium (sacristy), where he put on the vestments
for the Mass; then he processed, with all in the same order as they had arrived, to
the altar, preceded by holders of candles and one or two subdeacons with the
Gospels—the cortège basically preserved the order of reverse im­port­ance of all
the dignitaries. The pope reached the altar, where he sat on the cath­edra, with
the clergy arranged around him in the presbyterium, though not the laymen,
since the synods of 826 and 853 had expressly forbidden the presence of laymen
in the enclosure of clergy.133 The seating of all clergy and cardinals was also
arranged in hierarchical order at different levels in the apse, while beyond the
presbiterium were the separate areas of the senatorium and the matroneum for
the highest-ranking laymen and women, and in the nave was the populus, also
divided into a men’s and a women’s side.134 When leaving the church, the procession
did everything more or less in reverse order.135
Other than the ordinary stational liturgy, specific processions are mentioned in
the sources for particular celebrations in the liturgical calendar. Originally the
most important times of the liturgical year were Easter, the Ascension, and
Pentecost.136 Over time, the feasts of the saints (the sanctoral) took more and

133 On the gradual association of the altar and the liturgy with the clergy alone, see Bauer, Das Bild
der Stadt, pp. 87–8.
134 De Benedictis, ‘The Senatorium and Matroneum’, pp. 69–85.
135 P. Fabre and L. Duchesne, eds., Le Liber Censuum de l’Église romaine, 2 vols (Paris, 1910–52), for
15 Aug.; Andrieu, Ordines romani, Ordines L, XLIX and LI, for 15 Aug. and 8 Sept.; XX and L.VIII for
2 Feb.; and XX for 25 Mar. See De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 195–9, for the temporal, 436–42 on
Marian feasts, and Saxer, Sainte Marie Majeure, pp. 133–45 and 139–41.
136 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 53–9, on the early stational system. For the ordinary feasts of the
year (the temporal), the most important, Easter week and the Baptism on the Easter Vigil, remain
centred on the Lateran. Later introductions such as Christmas, the Epiphany, the Ascension and
Pentecost festivals, introduced in Rome in the second half of the fourth century, were set to be cele­
brated at St Peter’s. So were many of the festivals of the saints (the sanctoral), including, of course, that
of St Peter himself. When S. Maria Maggiore was built in the mid-fifth century, it rapidly became
equal to the Lateran, and thus major festivals like the stations of Easter Sunday and Christmas Eve
were celebrated there. But St Peter’s kept the others. The stational liturgy was firmed up in the second
half of the fifth century, and remained mostly unchanged, with just a few new feasts, such as the
Thursday in Lent under Gregory II. On that basis, all five main basilicas had celebrations most days
during ordinary times, for example the Lateran six, S. Maria Maggiore eight, and St Peter’s eleven days
of the temporal, and on the level below S. Paolo, S. Croce, and S. Lorenzo had respectively four, three,
and four stational days, SS Apostoli five and S. Maria ad Martyres two. Not only in quantitative but
also in qualitative levels we perceive a hierarchy of importance, since the great festivals were mostly
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exercising power in the city: the public space 443

more space—St Peter’s, of course, then those of other martyrs, and especially the
Marian feasts. Pope Sergius I introduced four new Marian celebrations in the
­seventh century: the Purification on 2 February, the Dormition or Assumption on
15 August, the Annunciation on 25 March, and the Nativity on 8 September, and
these rapidly became part of the papal liturgy. The four feasts of Mary all had
penitential processions attached to them (Laetaniae), which met at S. Adriano at
the Three Fates, and Carolingian metal panels given as gifts to S. Maria Maggiore
give us a depiction of them. Already under Gregory the Great processions from
the seven parts of the city (though different in their composition from each other)
ended at S. Maria Maggiore, a pattern used by Gregory II as a model for the festi­
vals of the Virgin. Details of the procession at the time of Leo IV show it to follow
the model of the first procession of 752/3, with the pope accompanying the
Lateran Acheropoita icon to S. Adriano at the Three Fates, then all processing
together towards S. Maria Maggiore, where, from the time of Sergius I, who
placed it in a new reliquary on the altar of the Sancta Sanctorum with a jewelled
cross, the icon would be shown for adoration to the people.137 The relic was also
taken in procession from the Lateran to S. Croce on Good Friday, and possibly on
the day of the Exaltation of the Cross on 14 September.
This was more or less the usual pattern of the Assumption procession on
15 August, with a few new developments. Mentioned under Leo IV, it went from
the Lateran to S. Adriano at the Three Fates, with the Archeropoita icon, the pope
on foot rather than on horseback, then with the clergy and people to S. Maria
Maggiore.138 Over time, it also evolved into a night-time procession. It began at
midnight from the Lateran, with the icon placed on a cart, then taken to S. Maria
Nova, where it was presented to the adoration of the people singing the Kyrie—a
change of church from the old titulus, since S. Maria Nova had become a much
more important church—then still to S. Adriano at the Three Fates, where there

held in the three great basilicas at the core of the stational liturgy, the Lateran and St Peter then
S. Maria Maggiore, the next three churches getting most of the Sundays and the others the rest of the
days; ibid., pp. 59–65. A similar hierarchy prevailed for the sanctoral—originally celebrated in the
cemeteries, saints’ festivals were then moved to the churches in Rome when the cemeteries fell into
disuse and were no longer part of the stational liturgy. Since the point of the stational liturgy was to
reunite the whole community of the city, with its bishop, to celebrate where the saint was buried, the
abandonment of the cemeteries increasingly meant that, from the seventh century onwards, the feasts
of saints were celebrated in their own churches and with their own congregation, rather than by the
whole city; ibid., pp. 415–20. See Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, pp. 964–80, and, for a complete list of proces­
sions, Appendix 1; for a detailed study, Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 324–30. For the detail of the
liturgy itself, see Romano, Liturgy and Society, in his Appendix 4, pp. 261–75.

137 LP I, 105, chs. 18–19.

138 On Roman icons, see Chapter 3, and here also Wolf, Salus populi romani, and Romano, ‘L’icône
acheiropiète’, pp. 312–13; for the Marian icons at S. Maria Nova, the Pantheon, and S. Maria in
Trastevere, see Andaloro, ‘Dal ritratto all’icona’, pp. 40–7, and those of Christ, pp. 47–54; and
E. Kitzinger, ‘On some icons of the VII century S. Francesca Romana’, in Late classical and medieval
studies in honour of A.M. Friend, ed. K. Weitzmann (Princeton, 1955), pp. 132–50.
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444 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

was a short prayer, while lights were lit on neighbouring roofs and in front of
doors. The procession then went back on the Via Sacra with the icon, and when it
reached S. Maria Nova it and the venerated icon of Mary from that church ‘met’
on the stairs, and the procession went back to S. Maria Maggiore. Later, this
encounter became the core of the ceremony: when Otto III and Pope Silvester
took part in the procession, the two images were set together next to each other
on the higher area on the steps of S. Maria Nova and worshipped with incense
and perfumes, while the scholae and all the people sang Latin and Greek chants,
and three hundred Kyrie. This icon of Mary from S. Maria Nova had been ori­
gin­ally at S. Maria Antiqua, and was one of the oldest, and most venerated, in
Rome. The ceremony then returned to S. Maria Maggiore for the culminating
moment, the ‘meeting’ of the Acheropoita with the icon of Mary of S. Maria
Maggiore, the ‘meeting of Christ and his mother’, after which the Acheropoita
was returned to the Sancta Sanctorum.139 This night procession became a popu­
lar festival and remained so to the end of the Middle Ages. One can see how
much it might have struck Otto III, for whom a hymn dedicated to the Virgin for
the occasion was written in 999.140 Like everywhere in West, the proliferation of
hymns and melodies made processions increasingly less penitential and more fes­
tive. The other three Marian feasts also had in common the meeting at S. Adriano
at the Three Fates, and the procession with one or several icons ending at S. Maria
Maggiore—symbols of the unity of the city, taking in as its starting point at
S. Adriano at the Three Fates the memory of the old Curia, and linking old Rome
and papal Rome together.141
The importance of the unifying element of the city around the pope was even
more evident in the Easter Monday procession, going from the Lateran to St
Peter’s, where the station was. The route was double: going to St Peter’s was along
a north–west route past the Colosseum, through the Fora, past SS Apostoli, across
the via Lata, and through the Campus Martius to the bridge. On the way back, it
went via Via dei Banchi Vecchi and Via del Pellegrino, through the Pigna region,
past S. Marco, across the Fora, and back as before. One particular feature was the
fact that along the Banchi Vecchi was the area where the Jewish community lived,
who came out to acclaim the pope. Taken together with the fact that the dual
route of the procession, cutting through some of the more crowded regions of
the city, meant that most people would have been within reach of it and the
papal procession at some point, we have here a very obvious unifying ritual, even

139 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 327 and note 18, discussing Kitzinger’s argument about the way in
which the two icons were ‘enthroned’ together at S. Maria Nova, which provided the inspiration for
the later iconography of the Virgin crowned by Christ in S. Maria in Trastevere. See also E. Parlato, ‘Le
icone in processione’, in Andaloro, Romano, Arte e iconografia, pp. 55–72 esp. 59–68 for the 15 August
procession.
140 Ed. in MGH Poetae V, pp. 466–8; see also Schramm, Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio, p. 115.
141 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 436–45; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 326–7.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 445

to the extent of including ‘outsiders’ like the Jews in a gesture of political

acknowledgement to the papal leadership of the city.142
Processions in Rome were not static events, and not only in terms of people
moving around. They changed over time, sometimes also in their function. When
Gregory the Great instigated his two exceptional processions, with the inhabit­
ants of the city divided into seven categories, not according to regions but to
social and matrimonial status,143 these were penitential gestures, meant to inter­
cede at times of collective trouble. But the processions carried out by successive
popes incorporated several elements. While the procession with icons was a ritual
found in Byzantine court ceremonies, and the use of icons was an old usage, espe­
cially in the penitential context in which Stephen II used the Acheropoita, carry­
ing it himself barefoot, the use of relics was taken from the ceremonies north of
the Alps, where translations and processions with relics were common. Such was
the case for the three Rogation Days of the Frankish liturgy.144 The 25 April
Laetania Maior procession was a penitential one, going from S. Lorenzo in Lucina
on the Via Flaminia, then outside the city with stations at S. Valentino and the
Milvian Bridge, then onto the other side of the Tiber, and ending at St Peter’s, an
itinerary which followed that of the earlier pagan Robigalia procession on that
date but which, more importantly, included the new Civitas Leoniana.145
Processions could also be used as a potent weapon to provide a unified front of
the community when in danger. Gregory the Great had had this in mind against
natural phenomena, Stephen II against Lombard attacks. Under Leo IV the
Assumption Day procession with the Lateran icon went back to S. Maria Maggiore
via the ‘caves’ on the side of the Esquiline, to try and fight the ‘foul dragon’ which
had taken residence by the church of S. Lucia in Orfea and was threatening the
people—the dragon was successfully defeated at the prayer of Leo IV.146 Another
procession, which mixed the penitential with an exceptional event, was that which
officially ended the Formosus affair. At the end of the ninth century, the infamous
‘Council of the Corpse’ saw Stephen VI officially condemning Formosus,

142 Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 327–9, gives further details about the social arrangement in
terms of hierarchy during the procession, but the material used is that of the twelfth-century writings
of Benedict the Canon and Cencius the Chamberlain; while it is likely that most elements would have
been already in place in the ninth and tenth centuries, we cannot be entirely sure of it. The earlier
Ordo L does show the processional hierarchy earlier, but it does not give the route.
143 Historiarum libri X, Gregorius Turonensis; see, for example, MGH SS 1 now repr. Turnhout,
2010, and Gregory the Great, Reg. XIII, 2; see Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, pp. 960–4 and Saxer, Sainte Marie
Majeure, pp. 133–6.
144 Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, list in Appendix 3; Saxer, Sainte Marie Majeure, pp. 141–2; for the transla­
tion of relics north of the Alps see also Chapter 4 and a complete list in Smith, Old Saints, New Cults,
pp. 317–34, in the Appendix: ‘Relic Translations from Rome to Francia 750–900’, pp. 335–9.
145 Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, pp. 969–70; Baldovin, The urban character; De Blaauw, Cultus et decor,
pp. 600–2; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 325–6, who also follows the later changes in the nature of
the procession as described in the twelfth century by Benedict the Canon.
146 LP I. 105 chs. 18–19; Saxer, ‘L’utilisation’, p. 970; Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Il vescovo, il drago e le
vergini’.
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446 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

deposing him post mortem, and having his body thrown into the Tiber.147 His
successor but one, Theodore II, held another council in 897, which condemned
Stephen VI and rehabilitated Formosus, retrieving his body from where it had
been pulled out of the river previously, and bringing it back in a procession mix­
ing the penitential and relic translation type, with the clergy and people of Rome,
to be buried at St Peter’s; here also is an example of a healing process for the
divided city.148 As part of the dynamic aspect of the history of processions in
Rome, some also disappeared. On 1 November the Collecta at SS Cosma e
Damiano, and the procession, would traditionally go to S. Cesario on the Palatine.
By the ninth century this church had seemingly been abandoned, and so was the
procession on the Clivus Palatinus up to the Flavian palace. This was a character­
istic response to the end of Byzantine authority in the city, when there was no
longer a station on the Palatine; the Franks would not have needed it, or been
interested. This example highlights how much the political history of Rome
impacts on the topography of the city.
While the Franks were desperately keen to borrow various features of the
Roman liturgy, for example with invitations to Roman chanters to teach them the
‘Roman’ chant, and with the copying of Roman liturgical books, in reality, as we saw
before, the dissemination was often the other way round, such as when the Franks
in Rome copied down the liturgical ordines of ceremonies for the first time, or took
to Francia poor-quality books, which they then supplemented and standardized.149
All this returned material, together with festivals like the Rogations, the veneration
of relics, and other features already seen in the liturgy, art, and architecture of Rome
as well as in its theological definitions, reflects the fact that Roman tradition was, in
effect, set during the Carolingian period. But this tradition was that of the papacy,
of St Peter’s, and of its tenants—not necessarily the liturgy of Rome in general. Even
the liturgies of the Lateran and the Vatican differed, though, significantly, attempts
were made in this period to streamline the first onto the second. In addition, the
first, again reformed by the Ottonians, started to move away from what had been
and remained the presbyteral liturgy of city churches, just as the papacy itself in the
later tenth century became increasingly focused on its foreign horizons, while the
clergy of Rome went its separate way.150
Processions took place during Church festivals. Some forms of city mass
groupings, however, were different. The main Roman event in the form of a pro­
cession, but which was also a form of game, was the Laudes Cornomanniae.151

147 On Formosus generally see Chapter 2 and Arnaldi, ‘Papa Formoso’, pp. 85–104; Sansterre,
‘Formoso’, pp. 55–61; more specifically on the episodes after his death, see Heckmann, ‘Der Fall
Formosus’, pp. 223–38.
148 LP II. 117; see Auxilius, ‘Invectiva’, in Dümmler, ed., Gesta Berengari, pp. 137–54.
149 Chapter 3. 150 Elze, ‘Das Sacrum palatium’, pp. 50–1; Di Carpegna Falconieri, Il clero.
151 G. Scarfone, ‘La festa romana della Cornomània’, Strenna dei Romanisti 46 (1985), pp. 627–40;
and the articles by M. Boiteux: ‘Cornomannia e carnevale a Roma nel medioevo’, La ricerca folklorica 6
(1982), pp. 57–64; ‘Cornomannie et carnaval romain médiéval’, in Le Carnaval, la féte et la communication
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exercising power in the city: the public space 447

This as yet not entirely well-understood celebration, originally perceived as a

characteristic carnivalesque example of social inversion, was celebrated on the
first Saturday after Easter. It was organized by the eighteen diaconiae of the city,
with the people getting together at the diaconal church, including the priest and
the mansionarius of the diaconia, the latter crowned with flowers in the shape of
horns and carrying a tambourine with bells. Everybody then went to the Campus
Lateranensis, where the pope came out to meet them all, receive the laudes of the
people arranged in a circle each, with the mansionarius dancing in the middle of
it with his tambourine, while the archpriest of the diaconia sat backwards on a
donkey with a dish of money on his head, and was allowed to grab as much of it
as he could to keep. The diaconia clergy set crowns at the feet of the pope, and
three animals specific to the three regions were symbolically set free; at the break-
up of the ceremony, everybody left to return home, but the festival continued
there with the mansionarius, still dressed up, going round the houses still playing
his tambourine, throwing laurel on the fires of each home, and giving presents of
sweetmeats to children, while the householder in turn gave him a monetary gift.
The meaning of the ceremonies has been discussed at length, and I agree with
Wickham that, carnivalesque elements notwithstanding, this was the wrong time
of year, after the cosmic and human order had been restored with the Easter
festival.152 On the other hand, the strong natural elements (flowers, music with bells,
animals set free, laurel) and the date of the ceremony on the first Saturday after
Easter may well have suggested a form of spring renewal, less solemn and formal
than Easter itself, and one in which the community of the city came together in a
merrier and lighter spirit right after the spiritual and liturgical mysteries of Easter.
That this should have included the clergy—from the pope down, together with
the Lateran officials, who actually contributed to it by bringing along the donkey
from the palace—was significant, showing that in this instance they did not func­
tion not qua clergy. They acted in a way which had nothing to do with their nor­
mal role, perhaps even one which was increasingly forbidden to the clergy:
making secular music, dressed in a manner recalling nature, and even giving
nature its traditional dues with the symbolism of the laurel, which the archpriest
burned in an almost parodic gesture of his usual priestly function of blessing.
While not necessarily recalling the inversion of the authority principle, the festival,
with its rural associations of renewal and joy, may well have been meant to provide
another form of city unity, through the older ludic function. The location of the
central part of the event—the meeting with clergy and pope—brought together

(Nice, 1983), pp. 111–25; ‘Le feste: cultura del riso e della derisione’, in Storia di Roma dall’antichità a
oggi, II, pp. 291–316; and R. Liver, ‘Cornomannia. Etymologisches und Religionsgeschichtliches zu
einem stadtromischem Fest des Mittelalters’, Vox romanica 30 (1975), pp. 32–43.

152 Wickham, Medieval Rome, p. 331.

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448 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

the people of Rome in one of its most highly symbolic places of secular power, the
Campus Lateranensis, this most significant place for papal ideology and display
since the eighth century, as we will see in Chapter 6.153
The stational liturgy and the religious processions, as well as the civic games in
Rome, were established and sanctified by a long tradition, which was not available
in Venice. There, the city had to construct its own festivals, both in religious terms
and for ludic purposes. Of the religious festivals, we have only one foundation
myth account—the procession for the translation of St Mark in 828—but other
than the fact that it brought together the whole city with the doge, and that the
relics were placed in what was the palace chapel, there are few details about it.154
We have a fairly detailed account of at least one other procession in Venice, that of
the doge to S. Zaccaria and back at Easter. The Vigil, then Easter Monday, proces­
sion to S. Zaccaria remained the height of ducal visibility, despite several inci­
dents of assassination and forced abdication of the doge. In the eleventh century
it changed its itinerary to avoid the very narrow, and hence dangerous, calle which
it had followed at first, suggesting that the route of the ducal procession was
immaterial, since it did not take the ruler around specific churches in the city. The
important part was the unifying of two poles of power—the ducal palace and the
‘state’ monastery—on the major religious festival of the year, thus sealing the close
association between the political and the Christian in the most visible way pos­
sible in terms of liturgical time and spaces of power.
We know very little about other Venetian festivals, except for the story of the
festival of the Marie, allegedly celebrating the collective wedding of young girls
who were then abducted by Narentani pirates in 943. The feast was associated
with S. Maria Formosa, where the procession began. While the story has a def­in­
ite founding-myth feel to it, including in its recall of the Rape of the Sabine
Women in Rome, it is possible that it did indeed have an old substratum: this
version refers to tenth-century events, while later on the feast changed its object
to a much more plausibly late medieval context, in which it celebrated the grant­
ing of a dowry by the doge to twelve beautiful and virtuous maidens.155 Another
equally tenuous suggestion is that there must have been, before the recorded
move to Rialto, a probable procession of some sort, time and event unknown,
which would have led the bishop to travel by water from Olivolo/Castello towards
the western part of the city in Cannaregio. The idea has been put forward by
Ammerman, based on the topography of churches founded in the eighth century,

153 Herklotz, ‘Der Campus Lateranensis’, pp. 32–42; also rev. in his Gli eredi di Costantino, pp. 91–4;
Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 335–7; and Liverani, ‘Monumenti di epoca classica’, pp. 106–15.
154 JnD II, 39; Colombi, ‘Translatio S. Marci’, ch. 16, pp. 127–9.
155 See S. Tramontin, ‘Una pagina di folklore religioso veneziano antico : la festa de “Le Marie” ’,
Atti del II Convegno di studi sul folklore padano, Modena, 19-20-21 marzo 1965: ‘La religiosita popolare
nella valle padana’ (Modena, 1966), pp. 401–18 and L. Urban Padoan, Tra sacro e profano: la festa delle
Marie (Venice, 1988).
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exercising power in the city: the public space 449

which seem to be placed alongside canals which would have been navigable all
the way by the bishop; in fact, it has been the basis for his argument that the early
demographic and economic axis of the occupation of Rivoalto before the Particiaci
was along the presupposed canal from Castello to Cannaregio.156 This would then
be superseded by the axis of the Grand Canal.
Just as with its political power, the main area of public space in Venice was
around St Mark’s, and increasingly so focused on the Piazza, as it developed into a
formal public space. One event described in detail is the return of Doge Pietro II
Orseolo’s son John from Constantinople. At the request of the Emperors Basil II
and Constantine, Peter had sent John to Constantinople to notify the emperor of
his accession. He was received with great honour, made a patricius, which no
­previous doge had been, and given in marriage a woman of imperial blood, the
daughter of the patricius Argyros. To do justice to the wedding of a niece of
the emperors, the doge’s son was allowed by imperial decree to marry her in the
imperial chapel, where they received from the patriarch the nuptial benediction,
and from the two emperors gold crowns, while the emperors placed their hands
on the newly-weds’ heads with great pomp in front of whole court, because they
wanted to celebrate this marriage with maximum splendour. The marriage feast
went on for three days in the Iconomios palace; then the couple went to live in a
palace given to them as dowry by the emperors. The celebration continued in
Venice on their return. Doge Peter II welcomed them with a great fleet, and
organized many banquets for them and ‘all the foreigners’, to the great rejoicing
of all the Venetians. A few days later, Mary ‘the Greek’ gave birth to a son, con­
ceived in Constantinople, which the doge baptized with the name of Basil, to
honour the emperor.157 Peter II was entirely aware of the important function of
the ceremonial procession. His carefully orchestrated departure for the conquest
of Dalmatia in 1000, with the standard of St Hermagoras given to him by the
patriarch of Grado, and his naval progress along the Adriatic coast with the pub­
lic submission of the various cities and peoples along it,158 show his skill at using
public displays and public space to unite the city behind him, just as his search for
political consensus is shown in his successful negotiation with the nobles of the
city, who promised to refrain from fights and brawls in the ‘palace’.
Fighting between rival city groups was an integral part of urban life and iden­
tity in medieval Italy (and, some would argue, has remained so in contemporary
Italy, whether through city events or football teams). Interestingly, Rome had, at
this stage, no games that we know of, especially not one in the form of a fight
involving rival city groups. This pattern of rivalry manifested as play fighting was,
however, in evidence in Ravenna and, if we were to believe older sources which
affirm its antiquity, in Venice too. The Venetian written and iconographical

156 Ammerman, ‘Venice before the Grand Canal’, pp. 148, 152–3.
157 JnD IV, 71–3. 158 JnD IV, 46–54.
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450 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

evidence for this only begins around 1300, with well-known fights between the
inhabitants known as the Nicolotti and the Castellani, which gave their names to
the Ponte dei Pugni in S. Barnabà and the Ponte della Guerrra at S. Fosca. It is not
unlikely that it should indeed go back further, a characteristic fact of Venetian life
being the continuation of older traditions, especially those involving anything to
do with water. But we have a definitely early medieval example of a very similar
‘game’, described in great detail because it turned out so badly, in early eighth-
century Ravenna. The two sets of evidence come from either earlier or later than
the period examined here, but their similarities, and the implication that they
were the absolute norm in the city by then, might lead one to wonder if they were
part of the community life of post-Byzantine Italian cities, or just of Italian cities
early on. Agnellus’ account of the fight that took palace during the reign of
Archbishop Damian (692–708) tells us how this traditional feast, with the inhab­
itants of the Teguriensian Gate opposing those of the Summus Vicus, also known
as the Posterulans, turned into a real fight when a great number among the
Posterulans were killed. A week later, having brooded on this, the Posterulans
decided to take their revenge in a decidedly unsporting way: at Mass in the cath­
edral on Sunday morning, they invited the Teguriensans to lunch, but asked them
to keep this invitation secret. After lunch, they set upon the guests, killed them,
and buried them in secret. Their families and the whole city were desperate at the
non-reappearance of the menfolk and, after much grief and lamentation,
Archbishop Damian instituted fasts and prayers with processions to ask God to
reveal what had happened. This is, incidentally, our only evidence of a penitential
procession in Ravenna, however suspiciously close in its description to the pro­
cessions described in the Roman Liber Pontificalis of Rome for Gregory the Great.
At the end of the three days of processions, the earth opened up to reveal the
bodies, the guilty men and their families were judged and punished by the judges,
and the area later became known as the Regio of the Criminals.159 There are two
interesting elements to this story, apart from the already-mentioned implication
that the fight was a normal ‘game’. One is the way in which, just as in Rome when
the pope brought together the community in a penitential procession to face a
common danger, here too the archbishop brought together the city, in a similar
arrangement of people coming from different areas, in groups according to their
social and marital status.160 Even worse, of course, was the fact that this deed of

159 Agnellus, LP, chs 127–9.

160 Agnellus, LP, ch. 129: ‘The bishop ordered the people to form separate processions. He stood
with the clerics and monks on one side; he ordered the laity, old men, adolescents and boys, together
to form one chorus; and the women, married and unmarried, widows and girls, in another part; and
the crowd of the paupers separately. They did not all walk together as one, but separately, a stone’s
throw apart. The priests, with holy vestments put aside, were wearing sack-cloth, and they walked
barefoot with ash scattered on their heads. All the nobles and commoners covered themselves with
hair shirts, they walked sorrowing with uncombed heads and filthy beards. The matrons, with their
pleasant clothing laid by, wore the garments of grief. All cropped their heads and bared their skin.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 451

shame was planned and initiated on Sunday at Mass, a particularly objectionable

form of disruption to the life of the community.
Public ceremonies which involved the whole city, especially processions and
games, and the year-in, year-our rhythm of the stational liturgy in Rome, were the
essential glue holding the city together. They were not specific to ex-Byzantine
towns, of course, and each urban community inherited, or in certain cases con­
structed, their own. Venice did so on the return of Peter II Orseolo’s son from
Constantinople with his bride, the event being partly a form of welcome to a son
and a Venetian who had done well for himself, but also a way of highlighting the
honour awarded to the city by the highest authority that it acknowledged. It was a
form of self-affirmation and display of success, not for others as much as for the
citizens of Venice itself, who could not just congratulate themselves but above all
were made to feel part of the same young successful community. Most im­port­
ant­ly once again, such events, like the Easter procession, were set up or led by the
doge and focused on ducal power as both the motor and the focus of the city’s
success and unity.
The community of Rome was different. Its celebrations went back a long way;
they were a regular feature along the liturgical year, and they focused on the same
places and gestures time and time again, which were enacted, not by a secular
leader, but by its bishop. The sense of unity in Rome was one based on the
an­tiquity of the ceremonial, its reassuring familiarity, and the involvement of the
whole city community, which participated closely at various stages of the pro­
ceedings. It is probable that the same elements were to be found in most cities
where religious festivals were celebrated by the community around its bishop,
with the memorialization of the city’s past, such as the feasts of the patron saint.
This was likely to have been the case in Ravenna too, though we only have the
evidence of an urban event gone wrong to help us see what happened. But Rome
was different in one other respect all the same. This was that the stational celebra­
tions were carried out not just on special occasions, but were part of the every-
week life of the city in a more restricted way, and served to cement communities
around particular churches and specific areas of the city. As a city, Rome had no
parishes as such, yet the maintenance of the stational liturgy meant that identifi­
cation at the most basic level remained with the original titulus or diaconia, its
banner and cross, for example. Such local community identification may not have
been unique in Italian cities, but the perceived antiquity of the symbols and

The beauty of the virgins was removed; they took off their changing clothes and capes and cast away from
them earrings and rings and bracelets and anklets and necklaces and perfumes and pins and mirrors
and crescents and emerald necklets and laudosias and ornaments, and all pleasant and desirable
things cast away, they were clothed in a song of lamentation. The infants hung from the breasts of their
mothers; the lamentation of men, the crying of children, the weeping of mothers, the roaring of the
cows, the neighing of the horses, the bleating of sheep, and [the noise] of other women and animals,
all the city cried together.’
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ceremonial is likely to have contributed to the Romans’ acute awareness of their

past, as did the whole urban landscape around them and the institutions to which
they were accustomed.

A Space of Assemblies: Justice, Rulership, Defence

The most immediate manifestation of power for an early medieval ruler was the
exercise of public justice. Popes, emperors, or doges were seen to administer just­
ice and make binding decisions when meeting together with the foremost citizens
in assemblies, frequently called placita. The placitum has a long history (and a
large historiography) as the key tool of government in Lombard Italy, but was
adapted by the Carolingians and became the norm in the context of the cities of
Roman law and Byzantine past as well. The placitum, the court in judgement, and
the synods or councils brought together the king or emperor, bishops, and aris­
tocracy. Typically representative of the first were placita like Alberic’s in 942 in
Rome, or the 936 meeting in the doge’s court when the complaint of the abbot of
S. Stefano of Altino against the bishop of Torcello was dealt with. Both were
examples of court cases in which the ruler, surrounded by his advisers and mem­
bers of the aristocratic elite, in the first example all individually named, was seen
to render justice, in the palace or place of his power. Before Alberic’s move to SS
Apostoli to his palace, the acknowledged temporal ruler in Rome, the pope, used
the Lateran Palace to render justice.
The Lateran was the official judicial centre for the citizens of Rome, with an
administrative staff including the superista, head of the army, and the vestararius,
the treasurer, both married laymen, the top jobs for Roman aristocrats in the
papal administration.161 The space of justice was the area known as ad lupam,
where the She-wolf deliberately recalled and perpetuated the memory of the
founding myth of Rome, and the porch of the palace.162 The pope could operate
there, and on occasions the system had to function without him. Before leaving
the city in 853, Leo IV gave an edict ruling that when the pope was away from
Rome, the nobles had to meet at the Lateran as usual to render justice. Because of
its association with justice, rulership, and ancient Rome, the Lateran would some­
times be the scene of trials with a rather rougher form of justice. When the Prefect

161 See Chapter 2.

162 There is quite a body of literature dealing with the She-wolf, and with the still controversial date
of the artefact, variously placed between the Carolingian period and the twelfth century on textual
versus archaeological grounds. There is no absolute evidence that the extant ‘Capitoline’ Lupa was the
actual statue meant by the Lupa of the Libellus and of Benedict of Soracte, and the debate continues;
see the most recent work by A. M. Carruba, La Lupa Capitolina (Rome, 2006); G. Bartoloni, ed., La
lupa capitolina. Nuove prospettive di studio, (Rome, 2010); and the recent summary in L. Rebaudo,
‘Libellus e Chronicon: Una nota sulla Lupa Capitolina nell’alto medioevo’, in I mille volti del passato.
Scritti in onore di Francesca Ghedini, ed. J. Bonetto et al., eds., (Rome, 2016), pp. 251–66. Also on the
She-wolf in its specific associations with justice-rendering, see A. Erler, Lupa, Lex und Reiterstandbild
im mittelalterlichen Rom (Wiesbaden, 1972).
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exercising power in the city: the public space 453

of the City Peter, who had defied Otto I by expelling Pope John XIII from Rome
in 965, was finally caught and executed, he was hung by his hair from the statue of
Marcus Aurelius (then believed to represent Constantine). In 985 the vilified
Boniface VII, after his killing, had his naked body dragged through the streets by
the populace, then taken to the Campus Lateranensis, attached to that same statue
and torn apart, until eventually the clergy collected the body and buried it.163
The second main kind of assembly in a public place was the synod, or council.
At first, in Rome, these were meetings of the clergy, either regular or exceptional,
to discuss matters of ecclesiastical discipline, theology, and reform. Gradually, on
occasions at least when they concerned very important issues such as the response
to iconoclasm and other ‘heresies’, they came to include the rulers as well, just as
they often did on similar occasions in Constantinople, when the emperor con­
voked and presided over them. The increasing closeness of the papacy and the
Frankish rulers meant that, more and more, the latter were involved in ec­cle­si­as­
tic­al issues as well as theological matters, the best illustration of this being
Charlemagne’s council of Frankfurt, whose outcome was Charles’s ruling on
Adoptionism and the production of the Libri Carolini at his behest. In Rome, this
was also becoming the rule, and emperors as well as representatives of the clergy
of the whole of Italy were present at councils debating a variety of issues. These
could be ecclesiastical (such as the response to iconoclasm, the excommunication
of Anastasius, or the Formosian clergy), or of more general concern, such as the
opposition to Leo III and other anti-papal cases on which the emperor was asked
to render judgement. The most detailed account of such an event is that given by
Liutprand, who told the story of the two synods of 962 and 963, which saw first
the return of John XII, then his deposition by Otto I.164 Liutprand set great store
by the alleged harmony between the emperor, the Romans, the clergy, and the
German courtiers, and the formalized proceedings as he reported them dealt
with these matters in what was meant to be a model of imperial rulership, at St
Peter’s in full view of all, and as a manifestation of concord; of course Liutprand’s
narrative was patently wide of the mark, as we can guess from subsequent events
which show just how lacking in concord the elites of the city were. The use made
of Ravenna on several occasions to welcome an emperor also led to several such
councils meeting there, whose purpose was to set right the affairs of Italy. The
most famous was that held by Charles the Bald in 877, as part of his new role as
emperor of Italy, in the presence of Pope John VIII, when issues dealing with both
Italian affairs and those of the Church of Ravenna were debated. In 882 a similar
council was held in the presence of Charles the Fat and, in 967, the council
brought together by the Emperor Otto I which dealt with general affairs as well as
the quarrel between Archbishop Peter IV and the deacon Rainerius.

163 LP II. 136 and 140. 164 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, chs. 1–22.
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454 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Assemblies were the political and social space in which ruler and ruled met, to
attempt a compromise, the finalization of a problem or a conflict, and generally to
achieve consensus. To that extent they too were major elements in terms of city
unity and identity, where justice could be seen to have been done and rights
wronged, in order to promote peace by those who held the power to do so.

The Public Space as a Place of Conflict:

Using the Emperor: the Factions in the City

In Rome
The traditional view has long been that the papacy remained attached to the
Eastern Empire of Byzantium against the Lombards, until it became obvious that
no help from Constantinople would be forthcoming, and it then moved away into
the Frankish alliance. Noble’s view—that the papacy became aware long before
that the West now had to go it alone and that, eventually, the popes as representa­
tives of St Peter became so respected in the West that it had no need of a new
Empire and could govern itself as its own state—has been shared by many his­tor­
ians in recent years. I believe there was a fundamental principle at stake, supported
within the papal circles themselves, that in the model of the world as conceived the
pope, ideally, needed an emperor. This was the unavoidable Constantine/Silvester
binomial, as we find it defined in the Constitutum Constantini and illustrated in
the triclinium of Leo III in the Lateran (indeed, one could call it the God/Cesar
argument of the Gospels). In what remains a fundamentally Roman-inherited
view of the world, society could not conceive of itself without an emperor; in this
context, the pope did not see himself as an independent ruler, even if he wanted to
have secular control over his own lands and resources.
One example which seems to me to illustrate this duality is the dating of papal
documents. Prior to the mid-eighth century, the issue did not arise: documents
were, of course, issued in the name of, and dated by, the years of the Eastern
emperor. The last one in Rome dates from 761, with a reference to both the
Byzantine emperor and Karolus defensor Romae. Following this, the popes from
Hadrian I onwards issued documents and dated them in their own name and by
regnal year of the pope, until the imperial title was revived under Charlemagne in
800. From then on, in keeping with the early medieval view of the relations
between popes and emperors, the model reverted to the use of the imperial title
and dating and continued to be so used as long as there was an emperor in Italy
(Carolingian, Italian, or Ottonian), though not if there was only a king, when it
reverted to the papal dating alone.165 While the popes used their dating, they

165 There were occasionally exceptions, as when we have Carolingian imperial dating alone in 822
with Louis and Lothar, in 850 with Lothar and Louis II, and in 897 with Lambert, followed by a period
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exercising power in the city: the public space 455

added to it that of the emperor, if there was one around; only rarely do we see a
deliberate choice to avoid the imperial dating when there is an emperor, unless it
was an ideological statement, as was the case with Crescentius in 979.166
In Chapter 2 I mentioned the succession of plots and rebellions aimed at exer­
cising power in Rome by some parts of its elite, mostly through control of the
papacy. Some were local Roman plots which eventually resolved themselves into
agreements through negotiations or elimination. Others had some imperial inter­
vention, from the Carolingians when they were at their most powerful until
Lothar, and intermittently thereafter, until the Ottonians once again represented
the new power in the city. I should like to highlight here a few examples of such
interaction with the emperors, in which, and through which, we can see the way
in which city elites attempted to use the imperial presence or imperial influence
to achieve their own aims in the city and, conversely, the way in which the
em­perors used internal infighting and dissention among the city elites to gain
more power and influence. I will not return to the actual events but only look at
how the reporting of these, and the vocabulary of the chroniclers, underline the
way in which the emperors were made to intervene on one side or the other.
A first example of such interaction is that of the Roman plot of 823, during
which the Emperor Louis the Pious was told that Theodore and Leo nomenclator
had been killed in the Lateran, because they were supporters of Lothar. Louis sent
his missi to investigate, since the pope was said to have been involved, but eventu­
ally seemed powerless to sort out whether he had been guilty or not.167 The
important part here is the follow-up. Louis sent Lothar to Rome, where he was
received by Pope Eugenius I, and undertook to order the affairs of the Roman
people—notably with the restitution of various confiscated estates belonging to
Roman nobles.168 Another two, later, ninth-century plots saw even more direct
use being made of the emperor’s authority, whether through the use of his missi as
judges or by coercion. In 868, the plot which led to Eleutherius first carrying off,
then killing, Pope Hadrian II’s daughter had the pope send envoys to Louis II,
whose own envoys subsequently returned to Rome and executed Eleutherius.169
In 878, ‘Lambert . . . and Adalbert . . . entered Rome with a large army, and, after
placing John [VIII], the Roman pontiff, under guard, forced the leading men of
the Romans to affirm their allegiance to Carloman with an oath’.170
One could argue that the whole Formosian quarrel may also have been partly a
way of having the supporters of the two imperial factions, the Spoletans and King

which has only papal dating until Otto I in 965; imperial dating alone would only occur rarely after
that (in 979, 981, and from 984 until 996), being usually joint with the pope; even Otto III kept the
joint dating in most cases, except in 996, 999, and 1001.

166 For example in the grants to SS Alessio e Bonifazio in 986 and 987; see SSAB nos. 2 and 3.
167 Astronomer II. 37/1; ARF 823. See Boshof, Ludwig der Fromme, pp. 135–50.
168 ARF 824. See Chapter 2, pp. 22–23.   169 ASB 868.   170 AF 878.
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456 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

Arnulf, fighting for control of the city through acceptance or rejection of Formosus’
promotion to the papacy for canonical reasons.171 After Berengar I’s death, the
rule of the Theophylacts and Alberic appears to have been sufficiently effective in
Rome, and no families attempted to make use of an external power, unless one
counts Marozia herself and her marriage to Hugh, who were both seen off the
scene by the princeps. John XII’s appeal to Otto I was the start of a new stage in
mediating internal problems through the play of imperial authority. While at first
it was no more than an understandable cry of help against Berengar II’s attack on
the city, John XII’s subsequent volte-face led to the start of an increasing Ottonian
stranglehold on papal elections, which in turn provoked the rebellious and
violent response of the leading aristocratic families led by the Crescentii, and par­
ticularly the clashes with Otto III.

In Venice and Ravenna

In Venice, too, one supported the Empire(s), or not, according to specific inter­
ests. The Venetian political scene allowed yet another permutation, which was
that of using one Empire against another, through claiming always to be part of
the more distant, or of the one other than that which laid claim to the city.
Traditional loyalty to the Eastern Empire was indisputable during the early stages
of its ascent, when Venice could not avoid following the orders of the exarch, for
example in helping Ravenna in 741, though it did not respond the second time
that an appeal was made in the name of the Empire by the pope in 750. Venice
needed the help of the Byzantine fleet when Charlemagne came too close to con­
quering it, at which point the people told Charles that the city belonged to the
Byzantine Empire. This was the last foray of the Byzantine fleet into the Adriatic,
with Nicephoras in charge of the fleet in 804/5. After that, the Eastern emperors
were no longer able, or willing, to intervene, so that Venice needed to defend its
trade. The help given to the Byzantines in the Exarchate first, then in southern
Italy, when ordered by the Eastern emperor, was always forthcoming, but it was
part of the common interests of both Empires, as well as of Venice itself, to defeat
the Slav pirates, then the Hungarians and the Saracens. Throughout the ninth and
the tenth centuries, there were constant attempts to defeat the pirates in the
Adriatic and the south of Italy by both the Eastern and the Carolingian emperors,
and Venice took part in joint operations against the Muslims, with heavy losses.
That Venice was part of the Byzantine Empire was still the doges’ own perception,
as well as that of the Byzantine emperor, in the eighth century. While Ravenna’s
defence had indeed been part of a Byzantine-oriented rescue, once it became
clear to the Venetians that what mattered was the sea side—that is, the Adriatic
itself and the coasts of Istria and Dalmatia—then the Venetian navy, increasingly

171 Chapter 2.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 457

powerful in its own right, fought to free up the above. It did so in conjunction
with whoever was leading the fight in Italy, mostly the Western emperors like
Lothar II, Louis II, or Berengar, the kings of Italy, and, finally, the Ottonians.
While recognizing in theory the authority of Byzantium, in practice Venice was
working with the closest powers relevant to itself. Venice’s real grounding was in
Italy, though it was keen to remain in the Byzantine orbit officially, but only to use
this association when necessary against the Western emperor and when it did not
cost the city anything except formal acknowledgement and, if possible, commer­
cial advantages in Constantinople.
How did the factions in the city attempt to use the emperors for their own
purposes, and how did the emperors attempt to use the Venetians? Here, too, the
easiest way is to take a few examples of such mutual dependency, especially in the
case of the attempted Carolingian conquest by Pepin and the attempted takeover
of the city by Otto II. In the first case, the conflict saw Pepin, Charlemagne,
Fortunatus of Grado, and the Doges Obelerius and Beatus opposed to the Galbaio
doges, the Byzantines, and all the other parties involved in early ninth-century
events. When Pepin attacked Venice, was the fight against him just a fight against
the Carolingians? To a certain extent, probably yes, since the Venetians would
have seen Pepin’s victory as a takeover of the city into the Carolingian/Italian
kingdom. Their only defence, understandably, would have been the traditional
alliance with Byzantium. But, while Byzantium would have lost most in losing
Venice, its last North Adriatic foothold in Italy, Venice too was worrying about
having a close(r) ruler, should Pepin win. The imperial card was useful in other
ways, when it benefited the city but also the ruling family. Obelerius and the
‘doges of Malamocco’ used the Carolingian alliance against rising rival families
like the Particiaci, expanding merchants as well as rulers, who needed a free hand
in their trade objectives with the East. Was the apparent Frankish alliance of
Obelerius later rejected by families like the Particiaci, who preferred the Byzantine
association, not just for ideological but also for trade purposes? As I suggested
earlier, and as shown by the changes of alliance of Obelerius and Beatus, it seems
likely that choosing one or the other imperial alliance was a matter, for the cur­
rent doge, of using whichever imperial power was most suitable to promote the
interests of the city and of the family at its helm.
The second example is the use made by Otto II and his entourage of the violent
clashes between the two families of the Coloprini and the Morosini, after Peter IV
Candiano’s death.172 This was the most blatant example of one family trying both
to gain revenge on another and to obtain the ducal function, dislodging the current
ruler. The Coloprini tried to use the Ottonians to help their own return and success
in the city, by offering Otto II a very large sum of money to lead him to blockade

172 JnD IV. 24—see above and Chapter 2.

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458 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

and capture Venice, as long as their leader, Stephen, became the next doge. Otto II
took up the opportunity, using the internal quarrels of the Venetian families, to
gain a foothold in the city.173 But putting the existence of the city itself at risk may
have been one step too far for a family to take, and it led to the unity of most of
the ruling families, including some of the remaining Coloprini, against the attack.
Otto II may not have entirely understood the complexity of the Venetian situation
and the intricacies of their political alliances, which we can guess at from the dif­
ficulties which John the Deacon seems to have had to explain the actions of Peter
I Orseolo in such a way as not to cast a dark shadow over the family of his master
and hero, Peter II. It was perhaps the greater fortune of Otto III, who also tried to
use his Venetian alliance, possibly in relation to his ambitions in central Europe
or even more likely in relation to his grand dream of a reconstituted Roman
Empire, to have had on the opposite side Peter II, a man who had succeeded in
managing a truce in the internal fighting of Venetian fam­ilies. One must recall
that Peter II was always very careful openly to balance out his obedience to the
Ottonian emperors with that to the Byzantine emperors, which is probably why a
high-profile Ottonian visit to Venice, even though officially set up by Otto III for
the purpose of worshipping the relics of St Mark, would have been received with
fear and opposition by the people of Venice, who, remembering Peter IV and
Otto II’s siege, might see it as too pro-Ottonian. This would also have been most
unwelcome for the Byzantine emperor. However power­ful and successful Venice
may have become, it was still officially under the control of the Byzantine emperor,
at this time a particularly successful and power­ful one himself—Basil II. Without
prescience, it would not have been possible at that moment to predict that the
Byzantine revival of the tenth century would not be permanent, and that
Constantinople would not reclaim stronger control over its dependencies. An
open and triumphal visit by the Western emperor, on that count too, would have
been unwise. And Peter II was anything but an unwise politician. In parallel with
his rapprochement with Otto III, he was pursuing a similar policy towards
Constantinople.
It could therefore be argued that if the existence and presence of the emperor
helped to create an identity for the city, this only worked in a positive way in
Ravenna—elsewhere, it was more of a force to unite against. Ravenna supported
the emperor because he was the emperor, and he in turn supported and con­
firmed its rights and possessions. In Rome, the papacy wanted an emperor to
protect it, but not too closely, while some of the ninth-century aristocracy pre­
ferred him to papal dominance in the city. Once they could eliminate the latter
for a while, the emperor was not essential: in fact, unless he stayed away, worked
with the pope, but did not try to rule over the secular elite of the city, everything

173 Chapter 2.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 459

would be done to chase him out of the city. Romanitas in Rome may have this
connotation among popes in the ninth century, and among foreign visitors and
writers rhapsodizing about the city on the basis of literary traditions. For Roman
families referring to the past of the city, belonging to an Empire was fine and
ne­ces­sary; having the emperor present was definitely not. In Venice too the
Empire was not relevant except as a form of either prestige or defence. As long as
the emperor was far away and reflected back the prestige of the city, through titles
or gifts, belonging to the Empire was acceptable. However, neither there nor in
Rome did the identity of the city as it was being shaped depend mainly on an
imperial connection.
The reverse of the coin to the use of public space as a backdrop for cohesion,
and the creation of city identity, was that it sometimes proved to be just the
op­pos­ite: a space of conflict, challenges, and open warfare. This was frequently
the case at election time, especially for popes and doges, and rebellions against
authority, which could lead to conspiracies and depositions, but also to factional
fighting and summary justice. Public space in the context of conflict has a double
function. The first is that some spaces, in view of their heavily symbolic function
in relation to normal key events in the city, also become, by the same token, the
key places for dissenting moments. Both sets of events increasingly occur in these
highly charged places of symbolic significance (the Lateran, Rialto), and that very
fact increases their legitimacy as places of power. The second function derives
from it up to a point. Conflict and its resolution, challenges, and changes have to
be public in order to exist: challenging, fighting, deposing, like electing, are car­
ried out in the public space. Not only are they successful or not for that reason;
they are also only legitimate as such and are overcome when public consensus has
been restored and is accepted to have been restored by all, in public.

Contested Elections
Election time was a moment in the life of the city which made it especially vul­
nerable. Imperial elections, which significantly took place in St Peter’s, were never
contested, and the only role of the people was to produce the required ac­clam­
ations, as they did in 800 with Charlemagne. Papal elections, on the other hand,
were more often contested than not, as we saw in Chapter 2, and the successful
candidate would be the one who controlled the Lateran complex, topographically
as well as politically. This was already the case with the first major clash at election
time on the death of Pope Paul, when Toto of Nepi put his brother Constantine
on the papal throne, in apparent violation of the agreement he had made with
the primicerius Christopher.174 When the priest Philip was elected as the new
pope, he was taken to the Lateran, where the customary banquet took place with

174 LP I. 90 ch.5.
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460 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

the Church hierarchy and the chief officers of the militia. At this point there was
no doubt that control of the Lateran, through the traditional moves of election
and banquet, constituted control of the papacy. On the election of Pope Benedict
III, another contest arose when, after the election but before the consecration, the
papal envoys had to send notice of it to the Frankish emperor.175 They were waylaid
by Arsenius Bishop of Orté, who was said to be plotting to put his own nephew
Anastasius on the papal throne. The plot, one recalls, consisted in tricking the
people of Rome to go out to meet the imperial envoys at the Milvian Bridge, while
Anastasius and his supporters went to St Peter’s first, then attempted to seize the
Lateran. Once again, seizing control of the Lateran was seen as the key to a suc­
cessful papal election. By the tenth century, things had changed. As a c­ entre of
actual papal power, rather than as a spiritual shrine and museum of the past, the
Lateran was in decline in relation to St Peter’s and the Vatican.176 St Peter’s, like
the Lateran previously, had also become the site of both conflicts and depositions.

Riots and Conspiracies

Various spaces were at various points privileged centres of public fighting,
notably the atrium of St Peter’s and Castel Sant’Angelo. The first of these spaces,
chronologically, was the Lateran complex—the palace, then the campus. A few
examples will be sufficient, recalling episodes already mentioned. The plot against
Pope Leo III in 799 during the Laetania Maior was set to ambush him close to
S. Silvestro.177 The ceremony to depose Leo also took place at S. Silvestro,178 and
he was then dragged away and imprisoned at S. Erasmo, from where he was
de­livered and brought to St Peter’s, clearly a safe place compared to the city itself.
Popes sometimes suffered public assassinations, as did their advisers. Pope John
X’s brother Peter, marchio of Rome, was accused of having helped the Hungarians,
after which he was killed by the Romans—plural presumably for several key figures,
‘in the Lateran’ allegedly with the agreement of Guy of Spoleto and Marozia, who
then imprisoned and killed John X himself. Boniface VII, when he returned from
Constantinople after the death of Benedict VII, imprisoned and killed Benedict
VII’s successor, had his naked body dragged through the streets and shown to the
people, then attached to the statue then known as that of ‘Constantine’, on the
Lateran piazza. The atrium or Paradisus at St Peter’s had its share of riots and
fighting—for example, for the coronation of 864—and at least one high official,
Gregory the superista, was killed at St Peter’s by a ‘colleague’.179 Otto I, on his
return to Rome after he was defied by the Prefect of the City and the decarcones
who had sent away John XIII, hanged Peter by the hair at the Lateran. The last,
and the most sensational, conflict of the tenth century was also played out in

175 LP I. 106 chs. 6–18. 176 Luchterhandt, ‘Vom Haus des Bischofs’, pp. 72–92.
177 LP I. 98 ch. 11. 178 Leo, MGH Ep III, no. 10.6; Alcuin, MGH Ep. II, no. 179.
179 LP II. 111; see Duchesne, Liber Pontificalis II, p. 225.
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exercising power in the city: the public space 461

public in a highly symbolic place: the siege by Otto III of Castel Sant’Angelo and
the execution of Crescentius II, with his head impaled on the walls of the castle
and his body thrown in the adjoining ditch.180
In Venice also conspiracies and depositions were played out in the public
space. One need only record the two examples of Peter IV Candiano, and of the
Morosini–Coloprini conflict under Doge Tribuno Memmo. Already when clash­
ing with his father, Peter III Candiano, the future Peter IV gathered his party, who
began a fight with their opponents ‘on the Rialto’, says John the Deacon; this is
unlikely to mean the actual bridge since John’s use of the term Rialto encompasses
all the area of the ducal palace—and presumably the piazza around it—as is also
suggested by the use of the formula ‘in Rialto’ as the equivalent of the ducal palace
and chancery location for ducal documents.181 The political street fight was evidently
at the topographical heart of Venetian power, and this is where it was settled. The
suggestion is reinforced by the consensus document signed by most of the
Venetian aristocracy under Peter II Orseolo, in which they committed themselves
to avoid creating disturbances and rioting ‘in the palace’. In Venice, Rialto and
the Palace became a form of shorthand for the place of public power. Peter IV’s
rule led to discontent so strong that many aristocratic families were prepared to
make extreme sacrifices to dislodge him, setting fire to the whole area across from
the palace in the hope and expectation that the wind would carry the fire there
and effectively force Doge Pietro IV to come out of his fortified residence. The
palace having become a fortress is itself key to the anger of the Venetian elites,
since they were thus denied access to it by what was felt to have become a despotic
government. The bodies of the dead doge and his son were taken in a small
boat to the market square—a sign of infamy through being treated like animal
carcasses—but from there, at the request of the monk John Gradenigo, they were
taken to the monastery of S. Ilario to be buried.182
Memmo’s fairly long period in power was dominated by the fight between the
two factions of the Coloprini and the Morosini. Dominic Morosini, an ‘innocent
bystander’, was captured and killed in S. Pietro’s square in Olivolo, and his nearly
naked body was transported in a small boat to S. Zaccaria. The murder had been
carried out by a faction of the Coloprini led by the head of the family, Stephen.
Faced with the desire for revenge of the Morosini, Stephen Coloprini left Venice
with his sons and some relatives and went to Otto II’s court, where he pushed the
emperor to attack Venice. After Stephen’s death, the two Empresses Theophano
and Adelaide obtained from Memmo agreement that the Coloprini should be
allowed to return to Venice unmolested, meaning that the doge should guarantee
their safety from the Morosini’s revenge. The conflict was, from the start, in

180 Thietmar III, ch. 30; JnD IV. 44.

181 See, for example, Cessi II. 36, 54, 61, and 81, and CV nos. 12, 20, and 33.
182 JnD IV. 13.
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462 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

the public space. When the Coloprini returned to Venice, pardoned by Memmo,
and three sons of Stephen Coloprini (of whom one was a cleric) went back from
the palace to their home on a boat, they were killed by four Morosini, and ‘their
bodies bloodied the waters of the canal’, until they were rescued by one of their men,
taken to their distraught mother and wives, and finally buried in S. Zaccaria.183
S. Zaccaria was an eminently public space of power, or at least its atrium was, as
shown by other conflicts—forcing the abdication of the doge (Tribuno), or killing
him—in addition to being the centre of political power through the Easter pro­
cession. Ultimately it would also become the necropolis of several doges and their
families, most notably Peter II’s son John, his wife, the Byzantine princess Maria,
and their son Basil, killed shortly after their arrival from Constantinople by a ‘great
pestilence’. It may be significant that, at least at this time, no other real places of
power were recognized as such in the city: the tight control of the pol­it­ical elite
and of the doge over the area of St Mark’s was total, as we can tell from the phrasing
of Peter II’s agreement with the aristocracy of the city not to foment trouble ‘in
the palace’—he does not even consider suggesting that they may be fomenting
trouble elsewhere in the city. What would be the use of this, since it would not be
effective anywhere else?
Ravenna also had its share of public fighting and rioting, as Agnellus’ story of
the fight between the Teguriensians and the Posterulans suggests. While this took
place before the period dealt with here, there is no reason to believe that it could
not have taken place at some other time, or that other such episodes did not. In
fact we know that, prior to that, when Archbishop Felix and the scribe Johannacius
had returned from Constantinople, where they had fallen foul of the Emperor
Justinian II, the crowd assembled and rejoiced at the arrival of the procession
bearing the head of Justinian II after his deposition. Other major fights of which
we know were the riot against the Dukes Deusdedit and John, the papal repre­
sentatives in the city, and the rebellion of the clergy against the ‘intruder’
Mainbertus. The episode of deacon Rainerius’ burning down of the archiepisco­
pal archive was another, though this was not a conflict between factions as much
as a rebellion against the Archbishop Peter IV on account of the perceived injust­
ice he had done, according to Rainerius, to his family. These were cases of rioting
or coups, but we are not told whether they were associated with a specific place
perceived as an embodiment of power, except perhaps in the latter case, which
was an attack on the archiepiscopal chancery.
Most of the examples mentioned are significant because of the association of
the episode with a specific place that had a symbolic meaning in the city. Whether
the conflict was set during a particular event such as a procession, in a particular
place such as the Lateran or the Rialto palace, or at a particular time of year—the

183 JnD IV. 28.

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exercising power in the city: the public space 463

important fact is that it happened in such a way as to either bring together, or

disturb, the order of things as it should have been, in the place where the events
had to happen, or where such events should not have taken place.

Conclusion: the Public Space—Space of Unity,

Space of Separation

I mentioned a variety of forms of separation within the public space, the most
obvious being growing attempts to create barriers between clergy and laity in
Roman churches. This was largely due to the implementation of Carolingian reli­
gious reforms, and the attempts to isolate the clergy as a special category, superior
to the laymen, as a kind of precursor of the movement later known as the eleventh-
century, or ‘Gregorian’, Church Reform. Such was Pope Paschal I’s intervention in
S. Maria Maggiore in particular: Leo III had given to the church the old ciborium
of St Peter’s, as well as other liturgical objects, statues, and silver gates for the
chancel. Paschal’s rearrangements were of a different kind: he remodelled the apse
and chancel in such a way as to move the episcopal cathedra back towards the
apse wall. The purpose of this, in a church which had the unusual feature of a
deambulatory behind the altar, was to remove the presence of laymen and women
from the deambulatory. Moving the cathedra to the top of the apex of the ambula­
tory meant elevating it, as well as the whole pavement of choir, allowing for the
building of the Carolingian-style crypt below the altar, just as Paschal was to do,
and for similar reasons of separation, in his other churches at S. Prassede and
Maria in Domnica.184
Paschal I’s intervention is revealing of the importance of hierarchy and cere­
monial order, highlighted through such elements as the podium for coronations,
or the altar/relics/cathedra axis. Separation of this kind was necessary within the
spaces, and at the times, of public manifestations of power. When the separation
moved on into the private or semi-private space, and the ruler enforced it in that
sphere in the West, this was not acceptable. Hugh and Marozia took up residence
in Castel Sant’Angelo, a fortified castle; Alberic and the Roman nobility resented
this. When Alberic took power, he moved back into his house. This was admittedly
a palace, but he was still primus inter pares, living among his aristocratic peers.
Like Augustus, whom he imitated in this, he understood that, politically and
ideologically, the polite pretence that he was ‘one of them’ would provide better
consensus, even though everybody knew that he was the one with the power.
Peter IV Candiano, with his guard of mercenaries and his attempt at fortifying

184 De Blaauw, Cultus et decor, pp. 382–94; see also De Blaauw, ‘Liturgical features’, pp. 321–37, and
De Blaauw, ‘Architettura e arredo’, pp. 52–61 esp. 57–61. For S. Maria Maggiore, see also Saxer, Sainte
Marie Majeure, and Gandolfo, ‘La Cattedra di Pasquale I’, pp. 55–67.
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464 rome, ravenna, and venice, 750–1000

himself in the palace, was another who made a bad decision in the eyes of
­contemporaries. Worst of all was Otto III, who insisted on using what he saw as the
Byzantine court ritual of separation of the emperor from everyone else in his own
court in physical terms at dinner. Thietmar implied that not only the Romans, but
possibly even his German courtiers, saw this display as, at best, ridiculous and, at
worst, outrageous.185 Charlemagne, for example, knew this, and never did create
such a separation from his peers. The lack of separation in the private sphere in
the West was a good thing in a ruler. Pope Stephen V had nobles and poor at his
table every day, and the archbishop of Ravenna ate with his clergy in the common
refectory, unless he had very distinguished guests for whom he had to have a
banquet.186 The visible hierarchy of power was acceptable and necessary at banquets,
but not in private.
The point of most of the ceremonies discussed in this chapter is that they were
meant to unite the city, community, or group. It was, therefore, especially bad if
disruption intervened to create disunity, as it did, for example, with the attack on
Leo III. Disruption could be accepted, or seen as inevitable, in certain circum­
stances, such as attacking the pope’s men in Ravenna, as a result of plots aimed at
various popes, or in a brawl in Rialto. Such events were unfortunate but could be
dealt with by ‘good’ rulers by creating consensus, as did Peter II Orseolo in get­
ting the Venetians’ agreement to avoid creating disturbances. In some cases dis­
ruption was factored in as part of the public event itself, for the gaiety of the
Laudes Cornomanianae, or by creating a symbolic replacement for real fights, as
fighting for fun was. The problem was when disruption of the unity in a public
place occurred deliberately at a time when the city should have been brought
together, as in the case of the fight with the emperor’s men at St Peter’s in 864, or
during the Laetania Maior procession in 799, or indeed set up during Mass, as the
Ravenna trap had been organized. The public space of power was meant to bring
the community together, while preserving the right order of things. Disruption to
it was bad. So was disruption to the order of things in the private or semi-public
sphere, where ruler and ruled were brought together on the same level; the ruler
who, like Otto III, through imperial pretensions based on a by-then alien
Byzantine ritual, separated people, rather than uniting them, became a tyrant,
even though he was the emperor.

185 Thietmar, IV. 47; on Otto III’s dining see Chapter 1, p. 37 and note 119.
186 LP I. 112, ch. 7; Agnellus, LP, ch. 165.
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6
Memory and the Construction
of City Identity

In this final chapter, I will draw together the evidence discussed so far by focusing
on the two key themes arising out of it—these are in effect the two main issues of
this book. The first of these is the continuity of the Roman tradition. What do
those three cities have in common that constitutes the heritage from their Roman/
Byzantine past? If there is such a common heritage, does it apply to all three and,
if it does not, to which one does it not apply, and why not? Is it the case that later
influences became paramount and overtook the ‘Roman’ character of any of the
cities—if so, when and how did this happen? Which ‘Roman’ features remained
little altered? Most important of all will be my attempt to understand how these
cities incorporated their past into the life of the community in the present—that
is between 750 and 1000—in such a way as to make it part of the city’s identity.
The second issue looks precisely at the components of this city identity, to see
whether it was made up of elements of the Roman tradition alone, whether these
were mixed with other features, and which, and whether the mix was the same in
all three cities; or whether the different parts composed a variety of end results,
each city mixing and matching to a different extent. Ultimately, looking at the
different proportions and results of the mix, what actually did create the specific
identity and city consciousness in each of the three? By the end of this chapter it
ought to be possible to see whether the original unifying element of the late
antique and Byzantine tradition still makes these cities comparable among them-
selves in 1000. Furthermore, the result should be of use for future scholars to
examine whether a Roman heritage makes these three cities similar to or different
from most Italian cities which had been entirely under Lombard, then
Carolingian, influence since the sixth–seventh century.
The first part of the chapter will bring together those elements which can be
identified as inherited from the Roman past, a past common to the traditions,
and functioning, of all three cities. As previously suggested, the notion of ‘Roman’
or ‘Byzantine’ in this context, when looked at in detail, has been generally related
to what is best defined as features of late antiquity, which remained in place in the
later sub-Roman kingdoms as well as in the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire.
Those which we can immediately identify are: anthroponomical practices (names
and surnames), social distinctions based on inherited late-Roman titles and func-
tions, the use of Roman law, a specific economic system of land cultivation and

Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000: Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present, and the Construction of City Identity.
Veronica West-Harling, Oxford University Press (2020). © Veronica West-Harling.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754206.001.0001
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466 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

ownership pattern, a set of devotions to certain saints, the stational worship,

­specific iconographical motifs, a set of rituals and symbols of authority, and, last
but certainly not least, the surrounding urban landscape and its immediate
impact on the inhabitants of the city. Not all features are found in all three cities;
some are missing from one or another of them. In the second section of the chap-
ter, I propose to examine the self-awareness of each community of its Roman
heritage and the use that it made of it in the surrounding urban landscape; indeed,
the extent to which some of these communities do not use and reuse, but essen-
tially construct, the Roman past as fundamental to their identity. A third section
then looks at the other key element of city identity, either superimposed upon or,
in some cases, replacing, the absent Roman past: the creation of a Christian past
and present, centred on the cult of a founding saint. Let us first look at the com-
mon features.

The Roman Past as Common Ground

Before the 730s certainly, and for many well after the end of the eighth century,
the issue of belonging to the Eastern Roman Empire was non-existent in
Byzantine Italy. It was a fact of life. It was only after the deep rift brought about by
tax demands and papal punishment for non-compliance, then iconoclasm, that
dissenting voices rebelled against the exarch and various local dukes in all three
cities. Eventually the popes themselves, who were the last to argue for Italy’s
­allegiance to the Empire, began their final drifting away towards the Frankish
­alliance. The most active popes in that respect, Stephen II and his brother Paul,
belonged to an aristocratic Roman family which had particularly close connec-
tions with the Greek emigration in Rome, the iconodule monks who were put in
charge of their house monastery and were by definition opponents of the icono-
clast emperors in charge. They were also the two popes whose family was the
most aggressively ‘maximalist’ in the words of Noble, in terms of strengthening
papal power in the face of expanding Lombard power up to the gates of Rome.
This is not to say that all families of the Roman aristocracy were supporting
Stephen and Paul’s stance. Pope Zacharias, for example, a Greek speaker, had
been much more moderate in his anti-imperial views. Similarly, throughout the
ninth century, while the Carolingians were unofficially in control of the city and
the popes were their close allies, one can sense, despite the obfuscations of the
Liber Pontificalis, which is not prone to highlighting dissention among the papal
entourage, that there was a credible opposition to Frankish power, as exemplified
by the conflict between the two magistri militum Daniel and Gratian.1 The Liber

1 LP I. 105, chs. 110–12; see Chapter 2.

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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 467

Pontificalis defines the conflict as one of aristocratic opposition to Frankish power

based on the hope and possible attempts at reviving Eastern imperial control over
at least Rome, if not the defunct Exarchate—these were the accusations put for-
ward by Louis II’s supporters against the superista Gratian. While the situation
appeared to remain at this stage of truce for the first half of the ninth century, it
would flare up once again after 850, partly as a result of increasing imperial inter-
est in southern Italy from both emperors. It would be debated acrimoniously in
an exchange of letters, of which only one half survives, between the Emperors
Louis II and Basil I.2 The argument of what German historians used to call the
Zweikaiserproblem is discussed in detail in this, possibly the most significant,
early document, likely to have been composed by Anastasius Bibliothecarius in
871 and presenting the polemic from the Western side. The argument presented
by Louis II for taking the title of imperator augustus Romanorum for the first time
(previous Carolingians had avoided this), and calling his ‘brother Emperor’
Michael III imperator novae Romae, was that of the translatio imperii to the
Franks, as a result of the Greeks’ unworthiness and heretical guilt. But the key
element of the discussion was the fact that Louis II argued for the historicity of
events—that is to say, the fact that things changed, people and empires evolved
under God’s guidance, which made it possible for such a translation of authority
to have happened to a new set of people (the pious Franks). Even more spe­cif­ic­
al­ly within the latter, such power had been passed on to a particular family (the
Carolingians) due to election by their peers and the consecration by St Peter
through his successor, the pope. The Byzantine understanding of Empire as an
immutable and unique cosmic reality in place for ever, indivisible, with a choice
of emperor by the senatus populusque Romanorum (and not by a set of Barbarian
warriors), and a right to rule because of it (the emperor as God and the people
representative was right, even though as a man he may have erred into heresy),
made it impossible to accept the arguments of change put forward in the West.
This position remained firm, as we saw from the dispute a century later between
Liutprand of Cremona and the Emperor Nikephorus, who invoked parallel argu-
ments against Otto I.
The second half of the ninth century, especially during the reigns of Popes
Nicholas and Hadrian II, was one of considerable rapprochement with the
Greeks, as a result of the end of the second iconoclastic period, the resolution of
the Photian schism, and Byzantine attempts to revive their spiritual and political
links with the Church of Rome. These attempts ultimately failed, but Pope

2 Henze, W. ed., MGH Ep. VII/5, pp. 385–94 for Louis II’s letter, esp. pp. 388–91 for the transfer of
the imperium; that of Basil I to Louis has been reconstructed from the first one by Dölger, F., in Regesta
der Kaiserurkunden des oströmischen Reiches I, Munich, p. 59. An important commentary on both is
Arnaldi, ‘Impero d’Occidente e Impero’, pp. 404–24. For a detailed study, see Peri, V., 1997,
‘Universalità culturale cristiana dei due sacri imperi romani’, in Europa medievale e mondo bizantino,
Rome, pp. 125–62, esp. 136–53; and W. Goez, Translatio imperii (Tübingen, 1958).
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468 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Nicholas in particular was very keen to see them succeed. The well-known
­cor­res­pond­ence between him and the Emperor Michael II is an indication both
of the importance of these attempts to both parties and of the seemingly impos-
sible task in view of the linguistic and cultural split between the two. This is only
too obviously attested by Michael II calling the Latin language barbarous, and
Nicholas replying that, for the emperor of the Romans, as he called himself, not to
understand Latin was ridiculous, and he ought to cease using this title.3
Apparently there was some continuation of pro-Byzantine inclinations, among at
least some Roman families, into the tenth century in relation to the Theophylact
family, and its alleged Byzantinophile stance. The issue has been even more ser­
ious­ly brought up in relation to the Crescentii, notably by Duchesne, who saw the
choice of John XVI and the presence of Nilus of Rossano in Rome as a central
element in the anti-German politics of the Crescentii.4 The position of Alberic
remains unclear. His main interest was in governing Rome, and not even Italy as
such—hence his rejection of a possible role as Hugh of Provence’s successor, had
his mother married him. It is possible that he did, at some point, envisage a
greater remit for his power or, at the very least, an increased legitimacy, when he
attempted to gain a Byzantine bride. After the Ottonians’ control over Rome as
emperors, in theory at least, the revival of the hope of greater Byzantine involve-
ment may have constituted part of the opposition package to the Ottonians.5 This
was certainly the case with Crescentius II, who deliberately cultivated this pol­it­
ical direction as a means of keeping Otto III out of the city, to the extent of impos-
ing his own Greek pope, John Philagathos, with disastrous results for both.
Whether there was some interest among the Roman aristocracy and popes, other
than of seeing Constantinople as a place of refuge when out of power, as it was
with the deacon Franco, later Pope Boniface VII (974–84/5), when he made all
the West too hot to hold him,6 remains to be seen.
It may be useful to remind ourselves that the fifth and sixth centuries, which
saw the end of the political and social world of Rome, with the senatorial class
leaving Rome for Ravenna first of all, then Ravenna for Constantinople, were
meant to see this move reversed by Justinian’s plan to revive the ‘Roman Empire’
with its army, social classes, taxes, administration, and law. Italy after Justinian
was visibly still Roman in its structures: a functioning state, which owned fiscal
land from which it received rents and, above all, took taxes from everyone to pay

3 Edited in MGH Ep. VI/4 no. 88 (28 Sept 865).

4 Duchesne, LP II; see, however, Sansterre, ‘Le monachisme bénédictin et le monachisme italo-grec
au Xe et dans la première moitié du XIe siècle: relations et distinctions’, 2006, in Spinelli, G., ed., Il
monachesimo italiano dall’età longobarda all’età ottoniana (secc. VIII–X). Atti del VII Convegno di studi
storici sull’Italia benedettina, Nonantola (Modena), 10–13 settembre 2003, Cesena: Centro storico bene-
dettino italiano, Italia benedettina, 27, pp. 97–118, and Spinelli, G., 1985, ‘Les coryphées des apôtres,
Rome et la papauté dans les ‘Vies’ des saints Nil et Barthélemy de Grottaferrata’, Byzantion, 55,
pp. 516–43, who supports the view of a limited exchange of real influence between them.
5 Duchesne, I primi tempi, pp. 130–55; Brezzi, Roma e l’Impero, p. 118. 6 LP II. 138.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 469

the army and civil servants, the highest of which was the exarch in Ravenna, and
the second after him the duke of Rome. These structures, with some adaptations,
such as a heightening of the role of the army and the gradual unification in the
upper strata of society of the civilian and military hierarchies, remained the fun-
damental social underpinning of Italian society until the mid-eighth century,
especially in Ravenna. Such structures, maintained in Ravenna, were under more
severe pressure in Rome, where the authority of the Byzantine deputy, the duke,
was less well established than that of the exarch in Ravenna, on account of Rome’s
other, stronger public authority figure, the pope. The papacy gradually absorbed
the secular state institutions and transformed them from the inside, amalgamat-
ing them with the papal administration at the Lateran. The case of the last official
duke, Theodotus, Pope Hadrian’s uncle, who, in effect, became the main function-
ary of the papal administration, the primicerius, illustrates this well. The pope
replaced the secular functions of the Empire with the papal ones. This was differ-
ent from Ravenna, where there remained a set of secular functions, often taken
over by the archbishop. These functions were not automatically subsumed into
his ecclesiastical power. Secular officials continued to function in Ravenna
throughout the ninth century, while in Rome they became appointees of the
popes until they were revived in the tenth century by the aristocracy. As Frankish
influence grew in Rome, its governing role, or rather that of the papal administra-
tion, became very closely intertwined with the functioning of the Carolingian
Empire until the mid-ninth century, to the extent that the papacy almost com-
pletely left aside its Eastern Roman/Byzantine connections, until Pope Nicholas
I re-established stronger links with Constantinople.7 His, and his immediate
successors’, control of the city from a position of strength led them to become
more involved with the Byzantine emperors, though this move was in fact a joint
effort of both popes and Carolingian emperor in the case of Louis II, linked to
common interests in the south of Italy. With the relative decline of Carolingian
power from Empire to diminished rival kingdoms, a few determined popes, espe-
cially Nicholas I and Hadrian II, ensured a strong political role for themselves in
Rome and tried to achieve a measure of political influence in the Frankish king-
doms, and to regain such influence in Constantinople. John VIII, who benefited
most from the uncertainties which followed Louis II’s death and became the arbi-
ter in terms of imperial succession, was the last significant papal figure, until he
was removed from power. Formosus was also given such an opportunity as
emperor-maker, but his rule was even more controversial. After his death, the
papacy became politically less influential, though Sergius III and John X played a
part in the events of Rome itself. For the first half of the tenth century, the wealth
of the Patrimonium and the Church of Rome was still at the disposal of the popes,

7 Scholz, Politik, pp. 157–263.

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470 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

but it was used to grant large estates to the Roman aristocracy. The main advantage,
which kept the papacy a central player, even when at its least effective in the tenth
century, was the pilgrims’ devotion to St Peter, made manifest and growing from
the seventh century onwards. They made extremely good use of the Christian
past of Rome as the key component of its present. This would become Rome’s
‘selling point’ and prestige element. Ravenna, by contrast, did not need to choose
between a Roman imperial tradition and a Frankish one—as far as it was con-
cerned, they were essentially similar, in so far as what mattered was that the city
should be associated with the Empire and emperor, whoever they were—this was
the core of its self-awareness of its allegiance. Venice had even less need to ag­on­ize
over such issues: it was officially part of the Byzantine Empire and had no prob-
lems with this, in so far as it was not expected to do anything about it, such as levy
taxes or have a direct Byzantine administrator. Venice had no Roman past; it had
a Roman (Eastern Roman) present, though only a very lightweight one.
Before bringing together the common elements of these cities, I should like to
recall one which was very definitely not present in any of the three: the use of
Greek. I mentioned in the Introduction the mistrust between Greek and Latin
speakers, whether at the level of emperors accused of not speaking the language
of the Romans (obviously perceived as Latin in the West), or of the dislike for
alleged Greek duplicity.8 In Chapter 3 I made the point about the limited amount
of Greek influence there was, even in Ravenna—just as in Rome, the saints, the
topography, the churches, the notariate, the names and vocabulary, and the
literary culture were all Latin.9 The dislike of the ‘Greeks’, and the ignorance of
Greek—not general in Italy since Greek was spoken in the Byzantine south—was
a first, if negative, element that the three cities had in common. The story of the
increasing division between the Greek and Latin worlds in the early Middle Ages
has been studied in detail previously, notably in relation to the Church of Rome,
the Italian move away from the use of Greek, except in the south, and the gradual
rise of hostile perceptions of the nefandissimi Graeci by the Italians.10 I will only
summarize the latter briefly here, by giving a few examples of such attitudes. One
such is the embassy of 839 to Louis the Pious: the Annals of St Bertin recount the
story of the envoys of the Emperor Theophilus to the court of Louis the Pious,
‘Russians’ for whom Theophilus requested safe passage from Louis throughout
his Empire, but suspected by Louis of being Byzantine spies.11 This is not a story
about Louis suspecting the Russians or Swedes as such—probably Vikings—but

8 Above, n. 3: letter of Pope Nicholas to the Emperor Michael; John the Deacon in Venice is
equally disparaging when he talks about the ‘cupidity of the Greeks’, and describes the bad behaviour
of Byzantine emperors; JnD I. 83 and IV. 1.
9 A. Guillou, ‘Demografia e società’, and T. S. Brown, ‘Ebrei e orientali’ in SR I. i, pp. 105–8 and
135–49.
10 CC nos 30, 63, 65, and 66. 11 ASB 839.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 471

rather of his attitude vis-à-vis Theophilus himself, whose hidden aim was
­suspected to be that of spying on the Carolingians.
Another example is the account of the Eighth Ecumenical Council, where the
papal envoys, one of whom was Anastasius Bibliothecarius, claim to have had to
contend with exceptionally underhand Greek practices. The Liber Pontificalis
mentions the Greeks’ refusal to insert the words of praise of the papal envoys for
‘[their] serene Cesar Louis II’, deleted from the Greek translation of the acts of the
council: ‘they deeply resent our Caesar’s imperial name’.12 The argument put for-
ward by the Greeks, that the meeting was a council and not an imperial lauding,
was perceived by the papal delegation to be disingenuous. The Greeks were
accused of further underhand procedures, and it was said that the ‘Latins’, that is
the papal legates, kept having to check the translation every time, to see that there
were no insertions or deletions from the Greek clergy, who were prone to tamper
with the documents, which the Latins had to keep hiding and the Greeks kept
trying to steal. The mistrust between the two was at its height, the Greeks being
furious that the signature of the papal envoys was said by them to be conditional
on the pope’s approval.13
The last two examples take us back to the reign of Pope Nicholas I, but they are
the most telling. One comes from the letter written by the pope to Hincmar
Archbishop of Rheims concerning Greek accusations about various ecclesiastical
practices, the filioque being one among many.14 The second, already mentioned
but absolutely key to our understanding, is in the letter written by the Emperor
Michael II and the response to it by Pope Nicholas,15 in which the emperor was
quoted as seeing Latin as ‘barbarous and Scythian’, while Pope Nicholas chal-
lenged him on his lack of knowledge of Latin, saying that one who did not know the
language of the Romans had no business calling himself emperor of the Romans.
Ultimately, the most obvious example of Italian hostility and lack of under-
standing comes from Liutprand of Cremona’s well-known report of his embassy
to Constantinople.16 The Emperor Nicephorus Phokas’s arguments against the
‘Franks’ were another version of his predecessor Michael’s, based on the lack of
refinement and ‘barbarian’ nature of the German emperor, and the fact that, while
pretending to the title of Romans, the inhabitants of the Langobardia minor are
nothing but rough ‘Lombards’. Liutprand, in turn, rejected the Greeks’ refusal to
accept Otto as his equal as an emperor, objected to their humiliating treatment of
his ambassadors, and boasted that the Germans were now the real military might,
while the Byzantines, so proud to call themselves Romans descending from
Romulus and Remus, hardly needed to boast about descending from brothers

12 LP I. 108, chs. 42–3. 13 LP I. 108, chs. 44–5.

14 ASB 867. 15 See above, n. 3.
16 Liutprand, ‘Embassy to Constantinople’, in The complete works of Liudprand of Cremona
(Washington D.C., 2007), ed. and tr. Squatriti, pp. 238–82. For a discussion of it see M. Oldoni and
P. Ariatta, Liutprando di Cremona. Italia e Bisanzio alle soglie dell’anno Mille (Novara, 1987).
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472 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

nourished by a prostitute, and guilty of fratricide. Beyond the exchange of insults,

and perhaps rather more significant, is Liutprand’s absence of understanding of
the Byzantine emperor’s apparent lack of majesty, due to his wearing antiquated
clothes—precisely one of the elements which would show the prestige and great
history of the imperial function in a Byzantine context, as opposed to the per-
ceived nouveau riche glitter of the Ottonian court, seen by Liutprand as a token of
its power and majesty. This argument, which could almost be imagined between
an Italian aristocrat and a Russian ‘mafioso’ today, is an indication, not only to us
but to contemporaries, of the gap perceived between the old traditions inherited
from the Roman Empire and the Western Germanic world, as seen by the
Byzantines—a cultural gap going even beyond the language difference between
Greek and Latin.
The cultural differences were there for all to see, language being the most obvi-
ous, and culture following in its wake. Language issues, as we saw in the case of
the Emperor Michael II and his court and clerics, who saw Latin as a less sophis-
ticated language and even as a defining factor when it came to the conversion of
the Bulgarians, were of some importance. The discussion of the knowledge and
use of Greek in Rome is long-standing. Some historians, notably Sansterre, have
long argued for a considerable role of Greek exiles there, and of their decisive
impact on Roman culture, especially monastic but also, more generally, in terms
of theological written culture.17 Others, like Noble, have argued that the lack of
Greek culture was not due to ignorance but to a determined effort to turn to Latin
as a matter of choice; Greek speakers were not rare, up to and including
Anastasius18, but it was a deliberate decision on the part of the papacy to empha-
size its Latin heritage,19 and subsequently the Carolingian additions to it. This
was the reason for the number of translations and attempts at dissemination of
Latin texts and traditions. Two such examples were the translation of Gregory the
Great’s Dialogues by a Greek monk under Pope Zacharias, and the Life of Gregory
the Great by John Immonides, produced in Lateran circles.20 I have to leave aside
the considerable debate about the Greek intellectual presence or otherwise in
Rome, which has been active for a long time and has a long historiography, and I
need only draw briefly on what seems to be its main conclusions, as argued by
Guillou, Cavalli, and Classen, though von Falkenhausen’s emphasis is rather more
positive.21 This is the suggestion that the Greek monks, and their culture, were

17 Sansterre, Les moines grecs, pp. 69–100, 113–62, and see Chapter 3.
18 For Anastasius generally and the vast literature on his work as a Greek scholar, see the
Introduction and Chapter 3.
19 T. F. X. Noble, ‘The intellectual culture of the early medieval papacy’, in Roma nell’Alto Medioevo,
Settimane 48 (2001), pp. 179–213; but see also Forrai, ‘The Sacred Nectar’.
20 F. Bertini, ‘Giovanni Immonide e la cultura a Roma nel secolo IX’, Roma nell’Alto Medioevo,
Settimane 48 (2001), pp. 879–919.
21 A. Guillou, ‘Bisanzio, Roma e l’Italia nell’alto medioevo’, in Bisanzio, Roma e l’Italia nell’alto
medioevo, Settimane 34 (1988), pp. 919–43; Classen, ‘Italien zwischen Byzantium’, pp. 919–63;
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 473

fairly limited to a few monasteries, some members of the papal court, and the
titles and hierarchy of the Lateran, as well as to a form of imitation in terms of
saints, icons, art, and institutions like the diaconiae. Fundamentally, though, there
was little Greek spoken, and Greek manuscripts in Rome were few and far
between, mostly prestige gifts rather than working copies. ‘New’ intellectual
works such as the Cena Cypriani by Immonides had been in reality introduced in
Rome at the time of Charles the Bald’s coronation, from a reworking of a late
antique text in Francia at the court of Lothar II.22 Increasingly, from the ninth
century onwards, the traditional Roman script was replaced by the Carolingian
Roman, of the kind seen in the remaining Life of Gregory, the translation by
Anastasius of the Acts of the Eighth Ecumenical Council, and the Dionysio
Hadriana collection, produced just before the 880s.23 Effectively, in cultural and
artistic terms, just as in political ones, Carolingian influence in the city became
dominant. The other such elements that I bring together in the next paragraphs
are a summing-up of topics already covered, so as to bring forward a picture of
what contemporaries would have regarded as key features inherited from a com-
mon Roman tradition.

Anthroponymy

Looking back at the examples used in my previous chapters, among the most
obvious common traits to all three communities are their names. In Chapter 3 I
concentrated on examining the evolution of names in Ravenna and the Romagna,
so as to follow the traces of immigration and eventual intermarriage between
‘Romans’ and Lombards and/or Franks. As we saw outlined in that chapter, the
changes which followed the appearance of non-Roman names within married
couples, and the naming choices of their children, highlighted a significant model

G. Cavallo, ‘Scuola, libri, pratiche intellettuali a Roma tra il V e il IX secolo’, in Arena et al., Crypta
Balbi, pp. 92–103, and G. Cavallo, ‘Interazione tra scrittura greca e scrittura latina a Roma tra VIII e
IX secolo’, in Miscellanea codicologica F. Masai dicata, ed. P. Cockshaw, M.-C. Garand, and P. Jodogne
(Ghent, 1979), pp. 23–9; V. Von Falkenhausen, ‘Roma greca. Greci e civiltà greca a Roma nel medio-
evo’, in Roma e il suo territorio nel medioevo. Le fonti scritte fra tradizione e innovazione, Atti del
Convegno internazionale di studi dell’Associazione italiana dei Paleografi e Diplomatisti (Roma, 25–29
ottobre 2012) (Spoleto, 2015), pp. 58–67; and see in the same volume the article by V. Pace, ‘Alla ricerca
di un’identità: affreschi, mosaici, tavole dipinte e libri a Roma fra VI e IX secolo’, pp. 490–8, on the
mutual influences regarding Byzantine iconography in three Roman MSS of the ninth century. On the
last theme, see also M. McCormick, ‘Byzantium and the Early Medieval West: Problems and
Opportunities’, in Europa medievale e mondo bizantino. Contatti effettivi e possibilità di studi compar-
ati. Tavola rotonda del XVIII congresso del CISH, Montréal, 29 agosto 1995, ed. G. Arnaldi and
G. Cavallo (Rome: ISIME Nuovi Studi Storici 40, 1997), pp. 1–17 and esp. the bibliography.

22 See Introduction, note 27.

23 Neil, ed., Seventh-Century Popes and Martyrs, pp. 67–8; Cavallo, ‘Scuola’, p. 98–103. See also
Leonardi, ‘Anastasio Bibliotecario e l’ottavo concilio ecumenico’, pp. 59–192.
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474 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

for the social and political changes in Ravenna and the old Exarchate.24 Like
Ravenna, Rome too had firmly preserved the use of names from the late antique
tradition, foremost among which were John, Stephen, Peter, Christopher, Sergius,
Theodore, Leo, and, going back even further, Hadrian, with Mary (Marozia),
Theodora, Agatha, or Cecilia for women. New ‘foreign’ names had come in, not­
ably in Ravenna, but they never challenged the supremacy of the traditional
Roman ones—on the contrary, some noblemen and noblewomen took over such
names, by subsuming their own non-Roman ones into a Roman ‘version’, for
example Rodelinda/Maria, Marina aka Adelberga/Marina, John Ermenfred/John
and Sigizo/Severus. Non-traditional late antique names were rarer still in Rome
itself, with the uncommon Ermengarda or Berta, though Alberic himself is a
characteristic example of a Frankish name for the son of an originally Frankish
aristocrat and a very traditional Roman maternal family. His mother, Marozia,
named her son after his father, and while she gave to the others the traditional
names of John, Constantine, and Sergius, she also called one daughter Berta. Such
a mix is similar to that we see in Ravenna, and can also be identified, to an even
greater extent, in northern Lazio and the Sabina, which was partly Lombard terri-
tory, and whose elite members had names such as Ingebald and Farulf.25 The
most striking case of isolationism, however, was that of Venice.
A well-known feature of the early Venetian tradition was the early use of the
double name, a Christian name plus a cognomen, which we see there as a fairly
standard practice well before it developed in the rest of Italy and the West.26
Venetian Christian names were those common throughout Italy, especially ex-
Byzantine Italy, where they were a continuation of late antique tradition: John and
its various forms (Johannis, Johannes, Johannicius), Dominic, Peter, Vitalis, Leo,
and Constantine.27 (See Plate 13.) If, and when, we find other unusually popular
names, the primary connection remained with the exarchal tradition, hence the
frequency of the names Vitalis, Ursus, Sergius, even Agnellus and Honestus, with
their Ravennate connotations.28 There was little change in the traditional pattern

24 See Chapter 2.
25 For Ravenna: Lazard, ‘Studio onomastico del Breviarium’, pp. 33–62; Cosentino, ‘Antroponimia’,
pp. 173–84, and ‘Viri honesti’, pp. 19–50; Schoolman, ‘Nobility’, pp. 224–30; Haubrichs, ‘The early
medieval naming-world of Ravenna’, pp. 253–95. For Rome: Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Società romana’,
p. 79 (approximately 20% of those in the charters between 900 and 1050, though Greek names, on the
other hand, went down from 25% to 12% during this period); Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Appunti
sull’onomastica’, pp. 261–8; Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Le trasformazioni onomastiche’, MEFREM 106, 2
(1994) pp. 595–640; E. Hubert, ‘Evolution generale de l’anthroponymie masculine a Rome du Xe au
XIIIe siecle’, MEFREM 107 (1995), pp. 513–34.
26 First to suggest this was L. A. Muratori, Antiquitates italicae medii aevi, vol. 3 (Milan, 1740),
col. 722; more recently, with extensive bibliography at p. 455 n. 20, see G. Folena, ‘Gli antichi
nomi di persona e la storia civile di Venezia’, AIVSLA 119 (1971), pp. 445–84. Other names were
also traditional ones, like Maurice, Agnellus and his son Justinian, Anastasius, Senator, Bonus,
Marinus, Pantaleon.
27 Ibid.; Niero, ‘Santi nell’onomastica’, pp. 113–14 and 117.
28 Candiani, ‘Antichi titoli’, pp. 101–2; and the list of bishops in Agnellus, LP.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 475

of Christian names in Venice, whose stock remained limited and close to those of
the Exarchate, that is the more conventional late antique ones.29 These constituted
pretty much the whole of the patrimony of names, not only in Rialto, but also on
the other islands, Malamocco, Torcello, or Murano.30 When it came to welcoming
saints, to dedicating churches to them or to venerating their relics, Venetian cul-
ture was open, if mainly towards its traditional areas of allegiance, the saints of
the old Exarchate and Romagna, as well as the Adriatic background, from Grado
and Altino to Treviso and Capodistria. On the other hand, when it came to
choosing names for their children, Venetians seem to have been extraordinarily
conservative and reluctant to move away from a very small patrimony of names
endlessly repeated, preserving a strong tradition of what had been originally late
antique names (but had become standard Italian names in Ravenna, Rome, and
increasingly in the Italian Regnum), with very little innovation or addition of any
Frankish names of the kind found in Veneto, Friuli, Istria, and in Romagna
itself.31 This may have been due to the perception that there was less need for such
differentiation as long as there was a clear distinction which could be made
through the cognomen. Possibly there may also have been an exceptionally strong
family naming policy, with specific names closely linked to specific families, and
one which, combined with the common use of a family name, preserved this
anthroponymical isolation in the duchy of Venice longer than elsewhere.

Law and the Notariate

Rome lived by Roman law, as defined by the late antique law codes of Theodosius
and Justinian.32 The Byzantine south of Italy used Roman law and, later, this was
supplemented by new elements of legislation as they were produced by the later

29 A very rough estimate of names from our existing sources would give something like, at the top,
147 Johns, 132 Dominics, 77 Peters, 33 Laurences, 27 Vitalians, 24 Ursus, 22 Stephens, 11 Maurus, and
9 Martins. The rest, in descending order, are about 5 each of Tribunus, Bonus, Badovarius, Andrew,
Leo, Maurice, and Paul, followed by 3 or 4 of Felix, Vigilius, Vitalis, and Magnus, and 1 or 2 of
Agnellus, Demetrius, and Vitus.
30 The other characteristic feature of Venetian anthroponymy—as it was for the cult of these figures
in the city—was the use of Old Testament names, e.g. Raphael priest and notary in 900, Daniel priest
and chancellor, the Heliadi family perhaps associated with the name Elias, and several Jeremiahs, one
a freedman of Doge Peter Orseolo in 979, and, rarer still, Moisè, who signed three documents in 977,
979, and 994, as the cognomen of one Dominic. For the placitum of 900 concerning S. Stefano of
Altino (Raphael) see Cessi, II. 25 and DV no. 7; Niero, ‘Santi nell’onomastica’, pp. 122 (Elias) and 120
(Jeremiah); see also Cessi, II. 59 and DV no. 24 for the 979 tithe. But Jeremiah also had a specific as­so­
ci­ation with Altino, where relics were supposed to have been kept and taken away when the original
exodus of the people of the city occurred. Cessi II. 56, 59, and DV nos 21, 24; Cessi II. 70.
31 Cosentino, ‘Antroponimia’, pp. 173–85. This was even true of the name Mark, which did not
come into use until the mid-tenth century, even then not very frequently; see V. West-Harling,
‘Esempi di antroponimi e toponomi nella zona adriatica e sub-alpina nel X secolo’, in Gasparri and
Gelichi, eds., Age of Affirmation, pp. 274–5.
32 Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 210–12; Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Società romana’, pp. 77–8, 83–91.
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476 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Byzantine Emperors Leo III and Constantine V (the Ecloga), and the reorganization
and translation of the Roman codes under Basil I and Leo VI.33 This was not the
case in Rome, where the main day-to-day legal collection in the tenth century was
the Summa Perusina, a short compendium of the great codes produced between
the mid-ninth and tenth century in either Rome or Ravenna, without any of the
subsequent additions or changes following the evolution of the Byzantine legal
system of the Middle Ages.34 Di Carpegna has shown that, in reality, at this stage
the difference between most aspects of Roman and Lombard law had become
almost insignificant, even though they continued to be invoked regu­lar­ly, more to
denote belonging to, and identification with, one or the other group, to mark a
strong sense of alterity and cultural differences in terms of self-perception, rather
than because the legislation was different.35 One example of a law case, presented
before Otto III in 999 in Rome, with one contender who spe­cif­ic­al­ly requested to
be judged by Lombard law, to which it claimed it belonged, was that between the
abbey of Farfa (an imperial abbey in the Sabina and thus part of the Lombard
political control) and SS Cosma e Damiano in Mica Aurea in 999.36 The Roman
law under discussion was the Summa.37 One major distinction between the two
legal systems was the greater freedom that women had with regard to property,
which they could not manage without the agreement of their legal male guardian
(father, husband, son, brother) in Lombard law. Roman law gave women greater
economic power, since they had equal resources and independence with regard to
selling and donating property in their own right.38 This economic freedom is
­evident in the number of transactions in which women are directly involved.
While according to Lombard law they could own and grant land either jointly
with their husbands or separately, Roman law allowed them also to acquire land

33 The Ecloga was published by L. Burgman, ed., Das Gesetzbuch Leons III. und Konstantinos’ V.
(Frankfurt, 1983); see also L. Brubaker and J. Haldon, Byzantium in the iconoclast era c. 680–850: a
history (Cambridge, 2015), pp. 286–93. On the absence of more recent Byzantine legislation in Rome
see G. Ferrari Dalle Spade, ‘Diritto matrimoniale secondo le Novelle di Leone il Filosofo’, in G. Ferrari
Dalle Spade, Scritti giuridici (Milan, 1953–6), I, pp. 99–116; G. Ferrari Dalle Spade, ‘I documenti greci
medioevali di diritto privato dell’Italia meridionale e le loro attinenze con quelli bizantini d’Oriente e
coi papiri greco egizi’, in G. Ferrari Dalle Spade, pp. 133–302 esp. 207–18; Cortese, E., 1998, Il diritto
nella storia medievale I. L’alto medioevo, Rome, p. 293, and P. S. Leicht, ‘Lineamenti del diritto a Roma
dal IX al XII secolo’, an Appendix to Brezzi, Roma e l’impero, pp. 561–2, as well as his major work,
Storia del diritto italiano. Il diritto privato. Diritto delle persone e di famiglie (Milan, 1941, 2nd edn
1960); and the vast A. Pertile, Storia del diritto italiano dalla caduta dell’impero romano alla codificazi-
one, 6 vols (Turin, 1891–1903), which remains the detailed foundation.
34 Summa Perusina = Adnotationes Codicum domini Justiniani, ed. F. Patetta, in Bullettino
dell’Istituto di diritto romano 12 (1900); Cortese, Il diritto, pp. 240–2. For the use of Roman law, see
Leicht, ‘Lineamenti’, pp. 559–92. Leicht suggests that the general absence of a professed legal system by
people probably means that they did live by Roman law (p. 563). He also gives some examples of
direct knowledge of the Institutiones, the Digest, the Novellae, and the Epitome (p. 565), and not only
of the Summa Perusina. See also G. Chiodi, ‘Roma e il diritto romano’, Roma fra Oriente e Occidente,
Settimane 49, Spoleto, pp. 1141–254.
35 Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Società romana’, pp. 77–8, 83–7. 36 RF no. 437.
37 MGH DD OIII, no. 339.
38 Di Carpegna Falconieri, ‘Società romana’, pp. 83–91 and Appendix.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 477

individually; thus, women transacting on their own is not unusual in Rome in

tenth–century charters.39
Similarly, in Ravenna we find numerous examples of grants and leases in which
women were the key players. There is, unfortunately, no direct evidence of legal
cases there, with the exception of the trial for incest of Duke Deusdedit and his
wife, Maria,40 and there is also no evidence of any legal text being explicitly men-
tioned in our sources, though there has been some claim that around 877 Ravenna
produced an enlarged copy of the Collectio Dionysiana, later sent by Pope John
VIII to Svatopluk of Moravia.41 While this remains uncertain, we at least need to
infer the existence of both some legal knowledge of the notaries and tabelliones,
and its implementation in everyday life, on the evidence of formulae as well as
legal ownership terms, in ninth- and tenth-century charters.42 We see persistence
of the traditions of Roman law by the notaries, therefore, but no innovations or
knowledge of post-Justinianic codes as in Rome, and no law school, as far as we
can tell. This was repeated in Venice. Venice, on the other hand, used the p
­ rin­ciple
of not leaving family landed property to women so as to avoid alienation and
break-up, and to keep the patrimony intact, and the law did not allow the disin-
heriting of sons.43 Limits posed on women’s ownership of property in Venice were
thus different from the rules of Roman law which we see implemented in Rome
and Ravenna.
Venice provides an example of a genuine mix: from the ninth century onwards,
it functioned under both Roman (Byzantine) and ‘Salic’ (Carolingian) law.44 The
Byzantine south of Italy used Roman law and, later, this was supplemented by
new elements of Byzantine legislation as they were produced by the later
Byzantine emperors such as the Macedonians Basil I and Leo VI; Venice did not
have these. For internal purposes, it used a much adapted version of Roman law,
but when there was a crossover into or exchanges with the terraferma, it had a
choice of which law to follow. In reality, whenever examples of legislation or of
everyday implementation of the law are found, they belong to the Lombard, then
Frankish-Carolingian, tradition.45 This applied to clauses regarding land grants

39 Ibid., pp. 90–2.

40 See Chapter 2; this was not a standard law case anyway, since the ‘crime’ was of an ecclesiastical
nature and therefore judged in the ecclesiastical courts according to canon law—even though there
was an issue of jurisdiction between pope and archbishop.
41 Savigni, ‘I papi e Ravenna’, p. 352.
42 S. Corcoran, ‘Roman law in Ravenna’, in Herrin and Nelson, Ravenna, pp. 190–7.
43 A. Bonnini, ‘Per “Divinam Inspirationem”: uomini e testamenti nella Venezia dei secoli IX–XII’,
Studi Veneziani n.s. 49 (2005), pp. 28–38.
44 Origo, p. 61. Rando, Una Chiesa di frontiera, pp. 54–60, 105–8. In this instance, it may well be
true since the Origo‘s line is usually that of highlighting the originality of Venice, and the use of
Lombard/Carolingian law would go against this. See also E. Besta, ‘L’ordinamento giudiziario del
dogado veneziano fino al 1300’, in Scritti storici in memoria di G. Monticolo (Padua, 1922).
45 Origo, p. 61; F. Ferrari delle Spade, ‘La legislazione dell’imperatore d’Oriente in Italia’, AIVSLA 96
(1937), pp. 186–697; R. Cessi, ‘Il diritto penale in Venezia prima del Mille’, Nuovo Archivio Veneto 33
(1917), pp. 5–23; L. Margetić, ‘Il Diritto’, in SV, pp. 677–92; and Besta, ‘L’ordinamento giudiziario del
dogado veneziano fino al 1300’.
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478 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

and sales, for example, when in 914 Count Ingelfred of Verona, son of Grimoald
and father of Aitengus, all of them from a Friuli family and ex Alemanorum genere
or vivente lege Allemanis, granted two curtes to the monastery of S. Zaccaria in
Venice after the deaths of his heirs.46 It also applied to the legal disputes between
Venetians and the inhabitants of imperial lands as defined in the Pactum Lotharii,
and was reiterated every time this was renewed. Even families as prestigious as
the Candiani or the Falier acknowledged living by Lombard law, as did their
neighbours in the Regnum, when they were dealing with property in Italy.47 The
dominance of Lombard and Frankish legal assumptions also applied to wills, as
did the restrictions placed on women’s disposing of property, and the system of
dowries. In Rome, Roman and Lombard rules had become almost inter­change­
able, and the donation types traditionally referred to with the words donatio pro
nuptias (Roman) and Morgengabe (Lombard) were very similar, though the
words, in each case, were preserved on account of being a declaration of belong-
ing and proof of Romanitas. In Venice, on the other hand, the Venetian repromissa,
the dowry remaining the wife’s property, as well as a specific form of pretium vir-
ginitatis, the ‘Monday gift’, were different from both donatio pro nuptias and
Morgengabe, perhaps reflecting a local custom.48 Carolingian legal practice was
equally reflected in the use of the vadia/vadimonium, the pledge within legal pro-
cedure, and also in the diplomatic formulae at the beginning and end of charters,
for which the Venetian chancery clearly used the forms developed by the
Carolingian chancery and maintained by the Italian kings: the privilege for
S. Stefano of Altino in 900 is a good illustration of this.49
One can thus draw two conclusions from the legal system across the three
­cities. The first concerns the evidence of Venice’s practical approach to its day-
to-day affairs. In the city that was technically a part of the Byzantine Empire,
much ordinary life was based on being able to function within the geographical
and political space which was the city network, the Italian kingdom, and the
Adriatic space, and thus on the flexible use of whichever legislation was most
appropriate for the circumstances. Mostly, this was Lombard rather than Roman
law. Issues of Romanitas were of little relevance there, unlike in Rome, where they
were at the root of the desire of the Romans to attach themselves, and to show it,
to the trad­ition of Roman law, even when the distinction between it and Lombard
law was imperceptible—it was the ideological belonging which was emphasized.
At the same time, one aspect of this distinction was used very effectively: the

46 Cessi II, no. 30; DV no. 8; see K. Modzelewski, ‘Le vicende della “pars dominica” nei beni fondi-
ari del monastero di S. Zaccaria di Venezia (s. X–XIV)’, Bollettino dell’Istituto di storia della società e
dello stato veneziano 4 (1962), pp. 42–79, esp. 42–9; on Count Ingelfred see Hlawitschka, Franken und
Alemannen, no. 99, pp. 209–11.
47 Margetić, ‘Il Diritto’, pp. 677–92. 48 Ibid., pp. 682–3.
49 Ibid., pp. 683–6; V. Lazzarini, ‘Un privilegio del Doge Pietro Tribuno per la badia di S. Stefano
d’Altino’, AIVSLA 68 (1909), p. 988.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 479

economic power given to women in Roman law was the basis on which a political
regime like that of the Theophylact family and its women, especially Marozia,
could have been set in place; without it, that regime could not have existed.
In terms of economic practices with regard to land division or cultivation and
leases, we also find some variation in the Roman heritage. Easiest of all is
Ravenna, where the maintenance of the traditional land division into massae,
fundi, and casali, with either emphyteutic or livello leases as the normal form of
rent from the coloni cultivating the land, remained almost unaltered into the
tenth century.50 Rome and its environs in Lazio, down to Campania and up to
Tuscia Romana, including the Patrimonium of St Peter and the domuscultae, also
had coloni, emphyteutic or livello leases, and fundi. In this respect, however, we
find during the period from the 740s to 816 a tendency to shift from the trad­
ition­al pattern of cultivation to one with a division between directly administered
demesne land and rented-out land and farms. Such issues were not relevant to the
Venetian terraferma possessions of the aristocracy and monasteries. Most
extended as far as the Veneto and Friuli, and their cultivation was fully in line
with Lombard, then Carolingian, classic practices of land tenure and cultivation:
direct cultivation of the demesne, and leases with corvees and payment in kind.51
Venice, therefore, was the most deeply involved with an agrarian economy fully
in accord with the most up-to-date forms of land use in Lombard and Carolingian
Italy, while at the same time, in its trade, it incorporated the traditions of Roman
then Byzantine practices.
The legal system was part of the self-definition of the elites as belonging to the
tradition of Romanitas, and it was used to appropriate the glory of the Roman
past. But it was also constructed, up to a point, by the particular literate elite
whose function was to define these markers for the actors on the political, social,
and economic stage: the notaries.52 All three cities had a considerable scribal elite
at the service of the ruler and the aristocracy and, in both Rome and Ravenna
(though not in Venice) the corporations of notaries were secular as well as eccle-
siastical. The notariate of Ravenna, whose records are the best, made up a power-
ful corporation, and one with considerable social prestige, using the title of consul

50 Toubert, Les Structures, I, pp. 449–549; Wickham, Medieval Rome, pp. 62–81, and before that,
‘La struttura’, pp. 181–237; for Ravenna, see A. Castagnetti, ‘Le strutture fondiarie ed agrarie’, in SR
II. 1, pp. 55–72, and Montanari, ‘Campagne e contadini’, pp. 597–607.
51 Rando, Una Chiesa di frontiera, pp. 54–60, 105–8.
52 F. Bougard, ‘Notaires d’élite, notaires de l’élite dans le royaume d’Italie’, in La culture du haut
moyen âge, une question d’élites?, ed. F. Bougard, R. Le Jan, and R. McKitterick (Turnhout, 2009), pp.
438–60 at 454–60. This is a topic much studied by Italian historians, and summarized in C. Carbonetti
Vendittelli, ‘Documentazione scritta e preminenza sociale’, in La nobiltà romana nel Medioevo, Atti del
Convegno internazionale, Roma 20–2 nov 2003, ed. Carocci, S., Rome: Coll. École française de Rome
359 (2006), pp. 323–43; C. Carbonetti Vendittelli, Il sistema documentario romano tra VII e XI secolo:
prassi, forme, tipologie della documentazione privata’, in L’héritage byzantin en Italie (VIIIe–XIIe siè-
cle), I, pp. 87–115; and in A. Meyer, ed., Studien zum italienischen Notariat vom 7. bis zum 13.
Jahrhundert (Tübingen: Bibliothek des Deutschen Historischen Instituts in Rom 92, 2000).
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480 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

or tribune (as it did in some cities of Lazio, such as Sutri and Tivoli, for example),
often passing on the function from father to son.53 The alternating urban notaries
of the Curia and those of the archiepiscopal court in the production of docu-
ments, however, seem, on the whole, rather random.
This was different in Rome, where one could conceivably see the choice of one
group over the other as significant of an ideological choice.54 Broadly speaking,
documents could be drafted and written by either a scribe calling himself a tabel-
lio Urbis Romae or by one calling himself a scribe of the Sancta Ecclesiae Romanae.
Between 750 and 1000, seventy-eight documents were produced by the former,
and forty-four by the latter. A detailed study of the documents and manuscript
hands could be revealing of who used which scribes, and which scribes were
favoured during particular decades. It is difficult to make any definite assertions
in view of the scarcity of documents from the rule of Alberic, which would have
given us a better sample in terms of numbers. But one can certainly suggest that,
whether in terms of who wrote, and how they did it in terms of style and lettering,
whether on parchment or in the form of inscriptions, there had been, from the
late eighth century onwards, for all of the elite a deliberate attempt to preserve or
imitate the practices of classical Rome through the written word.55
The other most characteristic elements of everyday life in Venice were the local
administration and its officers. A key element was the placitum, or concio, the
assembly, for which the first evidence goes back to the S. Stefano privilege in
900—though that text implies its existence before that, when it claims that the
original privilege was given to the monastery by Doge Ursus and his son John at
some unspecified date in the second half of the ninth century, in an assembly cum
episcopis et judicibus et populo Veneciarum, effectively defining the same kind of
meeting.56 The Lombard judicial assembly carried on, but with a new Carolingian
name, the placitum, and a few terminological changes, and was imposed, in this
Carolingian form, in both Rome and Venice. It is quite clear that the Italian placi-
tum was also increasingly, and certainly by the tenth century, an assembly of all
important people around the count, and had political as well as simply judicial
functions everywhere.57 The existence of the placitum is a clear sign of strong
Carolingian influence on Venetian political practice. But it was not the only insti-
tution with a Carolingian or Lombard name and role to have become of crucial
importance in the history of Venice. Key figures within it were the iudices or

53 Buzzi, ‘La curia’, and De Lorenzi, Storia del notariato, I, pp. 11–19. See also Chapter 2.
54 Carbonetti, ‘Tabellioni e scriniari’, pp. 77–155 at 83–111 and Appendix 2.
55 L. Cardin, ‘Scrivere per apparire: tentativi di autorappresentazione nell’epigrafia delle élites a
Roma tra VI e IX secolo’ in Bougard, Le Jan, and McKitterick, eds., La Culture du haut Moyen Âge, pp.
101–24.
56 Cessi II, no. 25, p. 35.
57 Gasparri, ‘Venezia fra l’Italia bizantina e il regno italico’, pp. 70–2.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 481

scabini, the latter being another office developed under the Carolingians.58 The
long-standing debate about whether the iudices were the descendants of the trib-
unes of eighth- and ninth-century Venice is not immediately relevant here;59 what
matters is the development of the function of iudex in parallel in mainland Italy
and Venice, pretty much at the same time as the rise of the power of the city elites
which took on increasing significance in the tenth century. Lastly, the gastaldi, a
Lombard term, became the standard name for the doge’s administrators, the first
example being that of the gastaldo at the head of a group of the doge’s men charged
with the earliest attempt to colonize and make parts of Dorsoduro habitable.60

The Saints and the Liturgy

Leaving aside here the two major patron saints, Peter and Mark, we need to be
reminded of the definite connection, in each city, of the most popular saints with
the city’s late antique history. This hardly needs mentioning for Rome and its
plethora of martyrs, including the most famous ones, which saw their cult tri-
umph far and wide—for example, St Laurence and St Clement. In Ravenna too
one finds the local bishops venerated, as well as other major saints of the late
antique world, notably St Martin and St Andrew. A decisive attempt was made by
the archbishops to revitalize the cult of St Apollinarius, first with the seventh-
century new Vita written at the height of the autocephaly quarrel, to support the
city’s case, then with a disputed translation of his relics to the city in 865, to save
them from Saracen attacks.61 Other attempts were made to enhance the cult of
the city’s bishops: Barbatianus, a totally invented saint with a ninth-century Vita;
Probus, through the production of a new Vita in the tenth century; and
Eleucadius, like Barbatianus, also with relic translations.62 Ravenna had a high
number of cults imported directly from Constantinople, like St Zacharias, directly
linked to the imperial palace. This cult was subsequently exported with great suc-
cess to Venice, together with others belonging to the Greek Byzantine trad­ition
(SS Theodore, Demetrius, Sergius, and Bacchus), and to the exarchal catchment
area in Romagna and the Pentapolis. Venice, like every other contemporary
entity, claimed a large group of relics from Rome, allegedly brought there by the

58 F. Bougard, La justice dans le royaume d’Italie de la fin du VIIIe au début du XIe siècle (Rome:
BEFAR 291, 1955), pp. 140–58 on the scabini, with a list in Appendix A, esp. for Istria, p. 354,
Cittanova, pp. 357–8, and Verona, pp. 369–70; and pp. 281–305 on the iudices; on the iudices see also
Rösch, Der Venezianische Adel, pp. 65–9, and Castagnetti, La società veneziana nel medioevo, pp.
89–94. On the evolution of various institutions in the sense of a greater similarity with Lombard ones,
see Gasparri, ‘Venezia fra i secoli VIII e IX’, pp. 13–7, and Toubert, Les Structures, pp. 1202–29.
59 Castagnetti, La società veneziana nel medioevo I, pp. 77–97.
60 Dorigo, Venezia Romanica, p. 29; on the gastaldi, see also Castagnetti, ‘Insediamenti’, pp. 592–6.
61 Verhoeven, The Early Christian Monuments, pp. 56–66.
62 Ibid., pp. 80–5, 87–93; Picard, Le souvenir des évêques, pp. 654–61.
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482 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

pope himself. But perhaps as telling as the saints themselves were other spe­cif­ic­al­ly
exarchal features, some of late antique origin, some of actual Byzantine style, such
as the cult of the Old Testament prophets.
We are told on two occasions that there was a Greek liturgy in Ravenna: one by
Agnellus, who used it as an explanation for the opposition to Archbishop Sergius
on his return from Rome—whether this was the real problem or not, it still means
that there was such a liturgical trend at the highest level of the clergy; and the
other as late as the late ninth century, when Charles the Bald in a letter specifically
forbade the use of some, unspecified ‘Greek’ (in reality Oriental) features of the
Ravennate liturgy.63 Such features were not present in Rome, except in the monas-
tic liturgy of the Greek/Oriental monasteries, where it was deliberately encour-
aged by the popes, for example at S. Silvestro by the founder Pope Paul, or at
S. Saba on the Aventine where, as in other Roman monasteries, there were many
Greek refugees. This was not the case, as far as we know, at SS Alessio e Bonifazio,
a pinnacle of aristocratic monastic reform and imperial patronage in the tenth
century. At any rate, even with the occasional use of Greek features, such as the
singing of the Creed in both languages as re-established briefly in the mid-ninth
century, according to Patriarch Photius,64 there never seems to have been any real
challenge to the Latin liturgy, especially after the Frankish reform returned it tri-
umphantly to Rome. There is no evidence in Venice of any Greek interests in
liturgical matters, and even when Greek saints’ days are occasionally celebrated in
the liturgy—though our evidence here does not predate the eleventh century—
these are also found in Latin martyrologies, like Bede’s and Usuard’s.65
Altogether, whether in terms of hagiography, liturgical practices, or liturgical
language, there is no doubt of the complete dominance of Latin traditions in all
three cities discussed. The clearest evidence for this is, of course, the continuing
success of the stational liturgy in Rome. This most characteristic of all liturgical—
and civic—manifestations remains one of the yardsticks of Romanitas, linking the
present to the glorious Christian past of the city, reminding the people of Rome of
the continuity of their history and their landmarks.66 Eventually, it would become
increasingly seen as a feature of the Church in Rome (as opposed to the Church of
Rome, with its grandees and prelates), bringing together the bishop and those with
functions of government and city administration. It is probable that it contributed

63 Agnellus, LP, ch. 154; Jacob, ‘Une lettre de Charles le Chauve’, pp. 415–22.
64 LP I. 106, ch. 32.
65 S. Tramontin, ‘Il “Kalendarium” Veneziano’, in Tramontin et al., Culto dei santi, pp. 275–327.
66 One needs to remember, of course, that Constantinople also had a stational liturgy; see Baldovin,
The urban character, ch. 5; A. Berger, ‘Imperial and ecclesiastical processions in Constantinople’, in
Byzantine Constantinople: monuments, topography and everyday life, ed. N. Necipoğlu (Leiden, 2001),
pp. 73–87; and L. Brubaker, ‘Topography and the creation of public space in early medieval
Constantinople’, in Topographies of Power, pp. 31–43—an indication of the extent to which such a
form of public worship was part of the late antique tradition that the two cities shared.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 483

more than any other feature in ordinary life, together with the surrounding
­landscape, to the rootedness of the Romans in their past.

Ideology

The Liber Pontificalis in the eighth century used the common concepts reflecting
life in a Roman/Byzantine city, with its functionaries and institutions as they had
evolved up to that point. This was the norm when discussing the dukes, the
adventus of the exarch, the scholae and the diaconiae, but not, for example, the
senate or the palatium—all terms which would come into use once again only in
the ninth century, as part of the revival of the traditional Roman vocabulary
found in literary sources. The word senatus was first reused under Pope Hadrian
in the Liber Pontificalis,67 and palatium in the ninth century. But the fascination
with antiquity among Frankish writers, who saw Rome through the eyes of their
classical texts, meant that, frequently, the most important influence in terms of
preservation of the imperial past were writers and poets from northern Europe.
Hence Regino’s claim that, when ‘Arnulf took the city by force [in 896], this had
been unheard of in previous centuries, because it had never happened except a
single time when, a long time before the birth of Christ, the Galli Senones had
done it under their leader Brennus’, and his repeatedly referring to the ‘senate’ to
describe the Roman primates.68 These were literary antiquarian expressions from
writers north of the Alps, who used their classical knowledge to define thus the
leading aristocratic figures in the city. For these men, such ideas were exotic and
perceived as part of the continuation of their classical readings, which they asso-
ciated with the city. They drove a whole set of ideological concepts and definitions
of Rome, which have been studied for decades by numerous twentieth-century
scholars, many of them German, fascinated by the Romidee and the Rommythos.
For contemporary visitors and pilgrims to Rome, the ‘myth of Rome’ had been
increasingly associated with St Peter, and the pope as the heir of St Peter, having
thus become a standard feature of Carolingian piety. For these ordinary pilgrims,
‘Rome’ was St Peter’s: they did not focus as much on the city itself, even if they
visited its churches and relics, as on the area of St Peter’s. This was a Rome reinter-
preted through the Christian prism, one which was of interest for its ruins and
monuments—its heritage value—but always in second place to the Rome of
St Peter and of the martyrs. The Petrine association continued for pilgrims later
on, including under the first two Ottonians, notwithstanding Otto III’s solitary
attempt to shift its focus again by dreaming of a revival of imperial Rome and a
return of the centre of government of a revived Roman Empire in Rome to the

67 LP I. 97, ch. 69. 68 Regino, 896.

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484 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Palatine. For scholars, and especially those among them who were trying to make
sense of the idea of Empire, Carolingian or Ottonian, there has been a repeated
attempt to set Rome within the context of its imperial past and present. Such per-
ceptions of Rome in the ninth and tenth centuries referred to a mix of aurea
Roma, Roma caput mundi, rerum suprema potestas, terrarium terror, fulmen quod
fulminat orbem,69 the city of St Peter, the capital of the Patrimonium of St Peter,
the city of Augustus and Trajan, the city of Constantine, and the capital of the
Christian Roman Empire, mistress of the nations, res publica Romanorum. For my
purpose, and however fascinating the topic has been in modern historiography,
the fact remains that most of these ideas were proposed by the creators of ideol-
ogy, papal or imperial, and by outsiders looking at the city and its associations
with the Roman Empire, the martyrs, and St Peter. With almost no exception,
they do not tell us what the Romans’ own perception of their city and its past
was—which is the concern of this book. For this, we will need to turn to other
sources, of which so far we have seen, for example, the understanding of Roman
law as a factor of identity. Before examining the two most important of these,
I need to mention perhaps the only contemporary text which, if not actually
written in Rome, does come closest to reflecting at least some late-ninth-century
non-papal views.
The Libellus de imperatoria potestate, written sometime between the last quarter
of the ninth and the beginning of the tenth century,70 possibly by someone
favourable to (Spoletan) imperial power in Rome, and strongly idealizing this
power, even in Carolingian form, against papal authority over the city, proclaims
with deliberate insistence the elements underpinning such power. The Libellus
exalts the harmony between aristocracy and emperor, asserting that the former
supported Lothar.71 Its understanding of the story of the adventus of Louis II in
Rome in 864 gives a completely different view of the event from those of both the
Annals of St Bertin and Erchempert. In the Annals of St Bertin,

when the pope heard about all this, he proclaimed for himself and for the
Romans a general fast with litanies, so that through the intercessions of the
apostles, God might make the emperor well-disposed and respectful towards
divine worship and the authority of the apostolic see. When the emperor had
reached Rome, and was staying near the church of St Peter, the clergy and ­people
of Rome, celebrating their fast with crosses and litanies, approached the tomb of
St Peter. As they began to climb the steps in front of St Peter’s basilica, they were
thrown to the ground by the emperor’s men, and beaten with all kinds of blows.
Their crosses and banners were smashed, and those who could escape simply
fled. There was a wonderful cross, most worthy of honour, which had been very

69 Gesta Berengarii, III, pp. 132–3; Eugenius; LiP, p. 191; see also Herbers, Leo IV, pp. 354–408.
70 For a full discussion of the LiP and its possible places of origin, see the Introduction.
71 LiP, p. 200.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 485

beautifully worked by Helena of holy memory: she had placed in the greatest of
gifts. This cross was smashed in all the uproar, and thrown into a pool of mud.72

Erchempert’s account claims that the events happened outside Rome, and that
when Louis II came across the sacerdotal procession sent to meet him, he had the
clergy beaten up and the crosses and other liturgical accoutrements trampled
underfoot.73 The Libellus’s version is totally different: as Louis II is about to travel
to Rome, where the people prepare joyfully to receive him for his adventus, Pope
Nicholas I (envious of the favour enjoyed by the Archbishop of Ravenna John as
an imperial advisor) tries to oppose this. Failing to do so, he brings together a
procession of monks and nuns from the city’s monasteries, to sing litanies against
‘bad rulers’, and to cross the emperor’s path as though by chance:

When they heard this, the king’s magnates humbly approached the pope and
asked him in a friendly manner to forbid such things. But since they were unable
to obtain anything from him, they went back, mournful. But one day, as some
warriors of the said prince had gone to Saint Paul and were coming back, it hap-
pened that they encountered these litanies. Impelled by the Ancient Enemy, the
warriors lapsed into fury, and, because they were faithful to their lord, took
vengeance against these people [i.e. the monks and the consecrated virgins],
striking them and beating them with the sticks they carried in their hands. The
others fled and threw away the crosses and the icons they carried . . . and many
were broken.74

The divergences are, of course, significant of the perception of the balance of

power between pope and emperor. But even leaving aside whose account is more
accurate in terms of what happened, or indeed, as Buc suggests, whether any of it
happened at all, as opposed to being a reflection of the power of the ritual, real or
imaginary, to influence events, what the Libellus’s version puts forward is an ideo­
logic­al point. This relates to the right of the emperor both to enter his city as its
supreme ruler (even though in this case the action involved takes place at St
Peter’s and S. Paolo), without open or underhand opposition from the pope, and
to punish those who, like the pope, go against the normal course of imperial rule,
itself supported by the populus.
The Libellus associates the emperor with the traditional symbols and mani­fest­
ations of power which ought to be his by right: the adventus, the acclamations, the
standard, the processions. These elements of imperial ritual were adopted by the

72 ASB 864; see P. Buc, ‘Text and Ritual in Ninth-Century Political Culture. Rome 864’, in Medieval
Concepts of the Past, ed. G. Althoff, J. Fried, and P. J. Geary (Cambridge, 2002), pp. 123–38 at 131–8;
and G. Althoff, 2003, Die Macht der Rituale. Symbolik und Herrschaft in Mittelalter (Darmstadt, 2003).
73 Erchempert, ed. G. Waitz, MGH SSRL p. 248: 33–40; Buc, ‘Text and Ritual’, p. 132.
74 LiP, p. 204, chs. 1–15; Buc, ‘Text and Ritual’, p. 133 (P. Buc’s translation).
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486 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

popes as part of the attempt, for a short while, during the period between the end
of the duchy of Rome and the coronation of Charlemagne, to act as substitutes for
the emperors in Rome. This was manifest through their titles, locus of govern-
ment at the Lateran palatium with its triclinia and symbolic iconography, dating,
and coinage, and symbolic clothing (red shoes, crown). The papal Mass and the
ritual of the papal court, imitating both the late antique and Byzantine imperial
and court ritual, were part of that same manifestation of Empire substitution by
the popes. Already in the ninth century, this was challenged by some of the elites,
for example the alleged pro-Frankish Lothar supporters, and the Libellus is a
mouthpiece for those for whom the tradition of imperial Rome meant the need
for an emperor to rule over it, and not the pope.
We have no way of comparing this to what happened in Ravenna, since we no
longer have a narrative source after the mid-ninth century. As far as one can tell
from Agnellus’ text, his perception seems to have been more akin to that of the
Roman Liber Pontificalis in the eighth century, with his use of cives or militia for
example, words which belonged comfortably to the vocabulary of Byzantine rule
rather than of the Roman classical past. In Ravenna, too, the need for an emperor
was uncontested as a principle—even by the archbishop, who may have seen him-
self as an ‘exarch’, that is to say as the emperor’s deputy, but not as a replacement
for him. However, for the Ravennati, the emperor had to be just that, and could
not be substituted by the pope. This was the basis of Ravenna’s support for any
emperor, and of its opposition to being part of the papal territories. The issue,
naturally, was not one which mattered to the doges. While they never claimed to
be anything but imperial appointees, and to be using the titles granted to them to
that effect by the emperors in Constantinople, at the same time they also used
symbols of power which, in a different place, could have been seen as symbols of
imperial authority, including the sceptre, the red socks and Byzantine hat, as well
as the seat and the umbrella which were normally associated with imperial power
in Constantinople.75 Once again we note here the difference between a revived
Roman imperial ritual and ‘traditions’, as they were the in ninth-century Rome,
and the lack of interest in such a renewed Romanitas in Venice, where the concept
only really existed in the context of the present ‘Eastern Roman’, that is to say
Byzantine, tradition, which was part of the political culture of the city anyway.

Titles and Social Status

I mentioned earlier the two key elements which enable us to get a little closer to
the perceptions of the populus in all three cities in the ninth and tenth centuries,

75 JnD III. 32; Pertusi, ‘Quedam Regalia Insignia’, pp. 3–121; Fasoli, ‘Liturgia’, pp. 529–61;
Ravegnani, ‘Dignità bizantine’, pp. 19–29; Ravegnani, ‘Insegne del potere’, pp. 829–46.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 487

because they are the only two kinds of evidence that allow for a (very small) voice
of the inhabitants of Rome, Ravenna, and Venice to be heard—a voice which is
not that of its ecclesiastical elite in the form of a narrative or ideological context.
This voice comes to us through sources which have no heavy ‘agenda’ to support,
in so far as they reflect everyday life on the ground, how at least some people
thought of themselves, and the way in which they perceived and described their
environment. The first kind of evidence to extract from these diplomatic sources,
charters, and court cases is the perception of the Romans or, at the very least, of the
Roman political and social elite and their notaries, of their own status and rank.
We recall from earlier the evolution of the titles used by the elite of the cities:
the late antique and Byzantine function titles of dux, magister militum, and trib-
une, all of which continued to exist in all three cities, with variations over time
and geography as to which was on the ascendant (dux), and also with regard to
the social categories defined by the titles. These titles were specifically associated
with the army and the military hierarchy which had prevailed after the Justinianic
reconquest. Venice, as a city of the Byzantine Empire, maintained these titles as
part of the Byzantine administrative hierarchy, though it did not only retain the
consul, tribune, and magister militum titles: other terms from the Roman past
were in use, as when Justinian Particiaco, for example, referred to his brother as a
senator.76 Ravenna used titles to define political and social pre-eminence. It also
maintained the use of consul—a courtesy title, not a function—and the forms of
address preserved from late antiquity: vir honestus, eminentissimus, clarissimus,
illustrissimus (vir). These titles were so prestigious that, when intermarriage with
Lombards, Franks, and others became common among members of the elite, the
non-Roman part of the couple took up and used the title of the spouse.
Rome was, not unexpectedly, the ultimate example as a polity where these titles
remained in use. They were not in frequent use in the ninth century, when the
Lateran ones dominated (primicerius, superista, iudex). We begin to see their
heavy usage in the tenth century, when a secular aristocratic government, evi-
dently very aware of the Roman imperial past, became predominant. This may be
because they were used as forms of self-definition by the people involved in some
form of written documentation, notably charters, whose survival rate is greater. It
may also be due to the fact that, unlike in Ravenna, where a secular elite as such
was still in place, working to govern the city with the archbishop, in Rome these
titles had been in decline in the ninth century. Their revival was a manifestation
of the need of the aristocratic elite to reassert its place by using the vocabulary of
classical Rome as an essential part of its self-awareness. For example, while trad­
ition­al titles such as late antique and Byzantine viri honesti and tribunes may have
survived in many towns in Lazio, such as Sutri,77 tenth-century Rome saw a

76 Cessi I, 53, and DV no. 4. 77 See, for example, SSCD nos 6 and 7.
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488 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

massive resurgence of antique Roman titles which had been absent in the eighth
and ninth centuries, especially consul and senator/senatrix. These were indeed
sometimes used a little erratically, but, from the time of Alberic, they became
more restricted and reserved to the actual governing elite in the city, sometimes
amplified as in magnificus vir Albericus, gloriosissimus princeps atque omnium
Romanorum senator, and Dominus Crescentius excellentissimus vir et omnium
Romanorum senator.78

Topography and Lifestyle

The second revealing feature is the topography and toponyms that people used.
The most accurate way to describe the evolution of the cityscape in both Rome
and Ravenna is to use Delogu’s concept of ‘controlled decay’79—naturally, as a
‘new’ city, this does not apply to Venice. Rome, in particular, saw the preservation
of existing structures in a conscious and deliberate way, in parallel with the evolu-
tion of life in the city, and the survival of settlement areas regrouped as the frame-
work of ecclesiastical government. Maintaining the Fora unencumbered and
practicable for traffic, and the main roads and urban lines between St Peter’s, the
Tiber, the Fora, S. Maria Maggiore, and the Lateran, was part of the control and
management of the classical past. The great monuments remained as landmarks,
though new streets, and sometimes new patterns of occupation, cut through
them. The monuments of the past were preserved into the Carolingian era, and
the area of the Fora—the Roman Forum with particular care—was not buried,
but preserved to its late antique level. The popes had never demolished classical
monuments, unless they were a risk, like the Temple of Concord, which was in
such a bad state that it threatened to collapse on top of the diaconia of SS Sergio e
Bacco, which had been built leaning into half of the arch of Septimus Severus. The
temple was then demolished and the diaconia rebuilt by Pope Hadrian I.80 Most
importantly, even when such churches and diaconiae were built in the Roman
Forum in the middle of classical complexes, it was nevertheless still clear to all
exactly what these monuments had been: when Stephen III was elected, his
­elect­ors met at the ‘Three Fates’, that is the three statues of the Sybils near the
Rostra in front of the Curia—perhaps not by chance the meeting place of Roman

78 Iohannes et Crescentius illustrissimi viri filiique domini Crescentii consulis et ducis qui dicitur de
Theodora in 988 see Regesta Hon. III, pp. cxx–cxxi; CVL 12632 [formerly ASV Indice 224]: Dominus
Crescentius excellentissimus vir et omnium Romanorum senator atq glorioso comes, p. 313;
Zimmermann, Papsturkunde I, no. 72 (a. 936) or no. 85 (a. 938): magnificus vir Albericus, gloriosissimus
princeps atque omnium Romanorum senator; SSAG no. 68: Albericus domini gratia humilis [later gloriosus]
princeps atq omnium Romanor senator in 945–62. See Schramm, Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio, pp. 57–63.
79 Delogu, ‘Solium imperii’, p. 86, ‘degrado urbano controllato’. 80 LP 97, ch. 90.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 489

re­pub­lic­an assemblies81—and, of course, the Itinerary of Einsiedeln is proof of this

clarity in the memory of the antique city, as we shall see shortly.
At the end of the eighth, and the beginning of the ninth, centuries, the public
and ceremonial spaces of the ancient city were still respected: they had been part
of the imperial fisc, and the popes only carried out repairs and restorations. The
half-century which saw the end of Eastern Roman imperial rule in the city
en­abled the popes, for the first time, to have access to, and then to take control of,
this huge area of property no longer belonging to the emperors. As a result, the
ninth century was a crucial period for change in the city, with the beginnings of
the encroachment of private space onto the public space of the Fora. Papal control
over the city space also meant, in effect, that this new ‘owner’ had the right to
demolish, or otherwise dispose of, its built environment. While until then the
monumental landscape of classical Rome had been in a reasonably good state of
preservation, the need to reinforce the city’s fortifications, and to rebuild the walls,
as well as to set up those of the Leonine City and to build and adorn churches, led
the popes to tear out the marble floors of the imperial Fora to reuse the marble.82
This spoliation, and the reuse of the monuments in the city centre, started the
decline of the monumental fabric of the imperial Fora, and allowed for the building
of large domus along the Via Sacra and the Vicus Jugarius, and of small wooden
houses, like that in the northern corner of the Atrium of Vesta, which remained
functional until the tenth century. The result was the rise in the ground levels in
that area in the ninth and tenth centuries, as well as the presence of artisans’
workshops in the area of Cannapara (cordwainers, hemp makers?), and of modest
houses in the Forum of Caesar. This infill with private housing in the Fora, as well
as newly established churches, including S. Maria Nova, and the use made by them
of still usable ruins, crypts, columns and arches, was nevertheless compounded
by the loss of maintenance of the area, no longer covered by marble. The resulting
development of a marshy terrain gradually led to an increasing abandonment of
the area by the eleventh century. Just as importantly, it also led to a gradual loss of
memory of many of the old road names and public areas, and to the loss of the
inscriptions which anchored the names of these buildings in the popular memory.
By the eleventh and the twelfth centuries, the knowledge of the ancient city, or at any
rate the correlation of monuments with their names, slowly became lost, and fancy
names were given to some of the temples in the twelfth century, such as the Templum
Dianae or Templum Palladis, Tomb of Remulus or Caesar, and Arch of Augustus.83

81 LP 96, ch. 11.

82 See Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Calcare ed altre tracce di cantiere’, pp. 335–44. More generally, see
R. Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Il paesaggio urbano altomedievale nei testi del Liber Pontificalis’, in Il Liber
Pontificalis e la Storia Materiale: Atti del colloquio internazionale, ed. H. Geertman, Assen:
Mededelingen Van Het Nederlands Instituut Te Rome 60–1, pp. 225–34.
83 See Chapter 5 note 53. One classic example of such a process is shown by the fact that, when the
popes began to tear up and reuse the marble from the imperial Fora, one of the pieces which they
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490 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

However, by the tenth century, even though they no longer bore any relation to
the historical reality, the association of temples and gods with appropriate Roman
names remained; the idea of the Roman past, even with its pagan temples now
memorials of a dead religion, was still used as a marker of identity, and the tem-
ples were still recognizable topographical landmarks. Some were names still in
use because they were so well known and easily identified, such as the Colosseum,
Trajan’s and Antoninus’s Columns, the She-wolf. More names than one might
expect did remain as part of the topographical canvas of the city, including those
of roads and streets, gates, cemeteries, as well as mausolea, baths, and even tem-
ples, especially those on which churches were built.84 Moreover, there was a
strong memory of such places associated with liturgical and hagiographical texts,
which were constant reminders of the places of martyrdom of the saints, the
names of the persecuting emperors, the festivals held in the tituli and basilicas
on the feast day of the saints and, last but definitely not least, the large number
of churches and chapels used year after year as bases for the stational liturgy
(thirty-nine altogether).85 Some were so significant, subliminally perhaps, that
they remained in the popular memory even when there was no longer any evi-
dence left above ground of that to which they referred: a good example of such a
deep-seated memory of something which had been of great significance in the
Roman collective past was the Palladium, the pagan shield of Minerva, which had
hung in the Temple of Vesta and had been linked to the very survival of the city;
this was preserved in the name of Sta Maria in Pallara on the Palatine.86 All the
sources lead one to argue that the Carolingian period provided the final break
with the inherited landscape from antiquity, not only through spoliations but also
through the fractioning of property and the creation of new networks, around which
future medieval contrade, such as that of Calcarario or Scorteclari, would emerge.
Even while, increasingly, the names of the old regions no longer sufficed to
identify a place in a recognizable manner, it is nonetheless significant that, when
it comes to the elites’ land transactions, their (together with the notaries’) way of
defining a particular piece of land is precisely through its localization in relation
to an ancient monument, wherever there was one available, such as the Terme
Alessandrine and the Colosseum. This gives us a property of which ‘one end is the
wall which is adjacent to X’s house, and the other wall is the one adjacent to Y’s
house, and the third one is the wall next to the temple of Z’. Such examples include
properties near the columpna maiure called Antoniniana, the campo de Agonis,

broke was the Forma Urbis, the very large marble map of the city—one more nail in the coffin of the
collective memory of the built environment in which most people in the city lived.
84 Hubert, Espace urbain, pp. 97–123. See also Esch, ‘L’uso dell’antico’, pp. 4, 14–6; and Lemaitre,
‘La presence de la Rome antique’, in Roma antica nel Medioevo, pp. 98–118.
85 Ibid., pp. 93–129, esp. 119–22, and the list of the stations in the Appendix pp. 126–9; V. Saxer, ‘Il
culto dei martiri romani durante il Medioevo centrale nelle basiliche Lateranense, Vaticana e
Liberiana’, in Roma antica nel Medioevo, pp. 131–201.
86 Fedele, ‘Una chiesa del Palatino’.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 491

the Horrea sub Aventino, the Therme Alexandrinas, and the Thermis Diocletianis,
areas called Arenula and Piscinula, the Via Sacra, the templum called Romuleum,
the church of S. Apollinare a templum Alexandrini, the arch qui dicitur militiorum,
and the Colosseum, used also to identify a person, like ‘Bonizo de Colossus’.87
This is how, in 982, at the time of Otto II, a land transaction of S. Maria Nova
was described:

Iohn archdeacon of diaconia of ‘S Maria quae appellatur Noba’, [leases to] Leo
presbiter diaconiae SS Cosme et Damiani in Via Sacra: . . . domum solarata
­tegulicia et scandolicia, una in integrum cum inferiora et superiora sua a solo et
usque a summo tecto, cum corticella sua et pergola atque scala marmorea ante
se, hortuo post se in qua sunt 13 arbores olibarum seu ceteras arbores pomarum.
Posito a Roma regio IV, non longe a Colossus in templum quod vocatur Romuleum,
inter affines ab uno latere domum de Romano ferrario, atque domum de Franco
et Sergio germanis, sive hortuo de heredes quondam Kalopetro, et a secundo
latere hortuo de Constantio presbitro et de suis consortibus, et a tertio latere
hortuo de Anna nobilissima puella and domum de Stephano herario, et a quarto
latere via publica.88

Even more detailed knowledge can be found in Stephen de Imiza‘s grant to SS

Andrea e Gregorio in Clivo Scauro in 975. He owned a large part of the eastern
Palatine, including ‘his’ templum called Septem Solis (Septizodium), as well as the
criptas in portico above it, the moenia palatii called Balneum Imperatoris between
the Circus (Maximus) and the arcum triumphale (of Constantine), all of which he
gave to SS Andrea e Gregorio, in the case of the temple for the monastery to
destroy it whenever it decided to do so89—but, significantly, the monastery did
not do so! The absence of the full names of the circus and the arch could be inter-
preted as proof of an end to the classical memory, but it can equally be interpreted
as an omission of something which is too obvious to all for it to be stated. Similar
usage is found in narrative sources, and Benedict of Soracte, for example, uses
references such the arcus qui dicitur militiorum or the church of S. Apollinare a
templum Alexandrini.90 In the tenth century, the Palatine had large areas of pri-
vate aristocratic property, often granted to monasteries. Thus, while no longer an
area of imperial power, there was an increasing interest in the Palatine on the part

87 Federici, ‘S. Silvestro de Capite’, pp. 265–92 (95 and 962) (‘columpna maiure marmorea’ called
‘Antonina, sculpita per omnia’); Zucchetti, LL, I, no. 279 for 958 charter, and RF, IV, no. 675 for 981
privilege (‘campum de Agonis’); SSAG I, no. 125 for 961 charter (‘sub Aventino in loco Orrea’); RF II no.
428 for 998 charter (‘iuxta thermas Alexandrinas’); Fedele, ‘Tabularium S. Praxedis’, no. 2 for 998–999
charter and (‘Thermis Diocletianis’); Lori Sanfilippo, ‘Le più antiche carte’, II, 65–97, no. 1 for 1000
charter (‘Thermas Diocletiana’s and ‘Arenulam’); SSAG, no. 68 for 945 charter (‘Piscinula’); SMN, no. 1
for 982 lease (‘Via Sacra; non longe a Colossus’); RS no. 118 for 966 charter (Bonizo a Colossus).
88 SMN no. 1 (982).
89 SSAG, no. 151 (975). 90 BenSor, pp. 151 and 170.
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492 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

of aristocratic families, especially the de Imiza, who already had a foothold in the
area in 975.91 The de Papa family of John de Papa de septem viis, that is around the
Septizodium, was another such aristocratic family.92
Rome in the period discussed here was thus at a moment of key transition
from the Roman imperial city, preserved for a long time intact, though decayed,
and the papal city, restored by the popes as part of the Renovatio agenda of the
Carolingians. Having first gone through the gradual Christianization of the city
itself, of its space and time, with buildings, stations, processions, and translations
of relics up to the ninth century, the city then began to develop along two major
lines. The first was the memory of the Christian city itself, with its saints (the
Virgin, St Laurence, St Clement), its churches; and its ceremonies; the second was
that created around the cult of St Peter and the pilgrimage, with the imperial
Renovatio pushed by the classicists who pursued the glory of the past as part of
the new, present Empire in the ninth century. The historic city of Rome, with its
‘old’ martyrs, rituals, and cityscape, became gradually eroded, pressed towards
unifying its liturgy on the Frankish model, for example, and losing its epigraphic
material, which, in turn, led to a gradual loss of topographical memory by the
eleventh century. But this had not yet happened in the tenth century, when the
memory was still preserved or, as we will see in the next section, deliberately
revived by the aristocratic elite. This was done through its use of names, titles, and
functions reminiscent of the Roman past, but also, crucially, through the appro-
priation of the places of power like the Fora and the Palatine, and of tools of
government, like the ruler’s building projects. These two different, and gradually
opposed, courses—the aristocratic self-perception of itself as a continuation of
the secular Roman city, and the Ottonian plans for the imperial Renovatio—put
the two groups on a collision course, exemplified by Crescentius II’s rebellion, for
whom opposition to Otto III became a factor of both group and city identity.
Many Romans followed the Crescentii, and they too thought that Rome with its
glorious past, aurea Roma, was one and the same with the city whose ruins they
could still see and identify, at least approximately, around them.
The most telling example of the awareness of the Romans, and not only of the
elite, of the significance of the Roman past, can be guessed at from the preserva-
tion of the toponyms of classical and imperial Rome, and the topo­graph­ic­al refer-
ences to its monuments. These were occasionally wrongly named, but still in a
style entirely consistent with Roman toponyms of temples and statues—the tem-
ple of Romulus for that of Venus and Rome, the statue of Constantine for Marcus
Aurelius—especially so in relation to the area of the Roman Forum, perceived as
the ultimate record of the history of the city. Another area had a similar function,
not only in terms of history now over, but as a real and living place of power,

91 SSAG, no. 151. 92 SSAG, no. 151.

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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 493

which gained its legitimacy from having had brought into it the symbols of the
Roman past. This was the Campus Lateranensis, where three of the most significant
such symbols were gathered in one place: the statue of Marcus Aurelius, thought
to be of Constantine (the Christian imperial past); the hand and head of an
im­per­ial statue, truly of Constantine, holding the globe as a symbol of power;
and, most important of all, the She-wolf, symbol of the city itself, the ‘mother of
the Romans’.93 The statue thought to be of Constantine was closely associated
with the idea of justice and punishment, so that Pope John XIII had the Prefect of
the City Peter, who had been at the head of a conspiracy to have him exiled from
Rome, hung there by his hair, and under Pope John XIV (983–4), the body of
Pope Boniface VII was thrown at the foot of the statue ante caballum Constantini.94
The She-wolf was both a very potent symbol as part of the same consciousness of
Romanitas within the framework of justice-rendering by the judges of the city,
and of punishment for wrongdoing. The debate regarding the date of the She-wolf
statue, and the assumption that this may have been a different one from the
­present Capitoline Lupa, is of little significance in this context, since one such
artefact was said to have existed already in 799, as mentioned in connection with
Leo III in the Libellus de imperatoria potestate in the late ninth century, and it was
regarded as the ultimate symbol of Roman identity.95
Ravenna preserved many of the same elements in so far as it, too, had pre-
served much of its Roman topography, without the Carolingian and papal
Renovatio agenda. We saw in Chapter 4 how the city had kept most of the old
toponyms, as well as the monuments of late antiquity, except for the exarchal pal-
ace—the only part which had in effect been transformed through a complete
takeover of the public space by private housing and churches. As in Rome, the
people of Ravenna preserved the memory, not just of titles and functions, but also
of monuments, landmarks used to describe and place land and houses in sales
and leases. Also like Rome, the city kept the old roads, aqueducts, walls, gates,
and even baths: the Platea Maior was the old Via Popilia from Rimini to Adria;
the cursus publicus (the public road service) remained active towards northern
Italy, as we know from the fact that it was used by one Felix, a merchant who stole
the relics of St Severus and took them to Pavia in 836 (after which they finished
up in Mainz); and an aqueduct was restored by one Smaragdus at the end of the
ninth century.96 And it, too, continued to use the Roman symbolic terms for the

93 Liverani, ‘Monumenti di epoca classica’, pp. 106, 111–14, and Delle Rose, ‘Il Patriarchio’,
pp. 22–5, 33, and 49. Herklotz, ‘Der Campus Lateranensis’, pp. 17–33.
94 LP II, pp. 252 and 259; for the statue, see L. De Lachenal, ‘Il gruppo equestre del Marco Aurelio e
il Laterano. Ricerche per una storia della fortuna del monumento dall’età medievale sino al 1538’,
Bollettino d’Arte 61 (1990), pp. 1–52 and 62–3 (1991), pp. 1–56.
95 LiP, p. 199. On the discussion on the She-wolf as an artefact, see Rebaudo, ‘Libellus et Chronicon’,
and bibliography.
96 McCormick, Origins of the European Economy, pp. 287–8; Gelichi, ‘Il paesaggio urbano’,
pp. 157–65; Cirelli, ‘Ravenna—Rise of a Late Antique capital’, pp. 163–70; see also Chapter 4.
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494 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

built environment: the elite lived in the city in domus surrounded by (sometimes
on top of) ruins, with the same plan as the Roman domus of the Forum of Nerva.
As in Rome, these houses were also situated close to the great monuments of the
past, as was for example the domus of the Traversari close to S. Vitale. Their
­owners decorated these houses with marble capitals and columns, preserved
the mosaic floors, and, on occasion, the traditional domestic plan of the domus,
though it increasingly opened onto the platea, and, as in Rome, was frequently
still built with one storey. In any case the Roman terms of reference (brick and
stone residences, decoration, toponyms, public roads and platea, as well as the
names of the domus) all continued to be those of a (decayed) Roman city.97
We are beginning to know a little more of the lifestyle and domestic arrange-
ments in these cities. The archaeological evidence of ceramics in the form of
forumware in Rome, already studied in relation to the finds in the Crypta Balbi,
has been greatly enlarged by the recent excavations in the Piazza Madonna di
Loreto in Rome.98 The studies on the circulation and organization of pottery pro-
duction, the complex organization of the construction industry (quarrying, lime
kilns, and building sites), also used for epigraphy and plastering, metallurgy,
glassmaking, the manufacturing of rope and textiles, have revealed or confirmed
a successful industrial activity, mostly located in the area extending from the
imperial Fora to the Campus Martius, which corresponds to the zones of the
most dense population, as witnessed also by food consumption and burials.99
Also interesting are the issue of clothing and the deliberate use of the ‘Greek’, that
is Byzantine, style, when Charlemagne and Charles the Bald wanted to make a
point of their imperial role—Charlemagne with much reticence and only in Rome
on major occasions, Charles the Bald in an attempt to import the fashion by
favouring such manner of dress, which, according to his enemies, only led to his
courtiers’ ridicule.100 This would be repeated, though far more critically received,
with Otto III’s attempts to use Byzantine protocol at table in Rome. Such small
examples, coming from the world of writers north of the Alps, make it clear how
much such efforts were seen as alien and ‘wrong’ by non-Romans. Clumsy
attempts at Romanness were unsuccessful; the perception of the Roman heritage

97 Augenti, ‘Immaginare una comunità, costruire una tradizione’, pp. 200–1.

98 Delogu, ‘Solium imperii’, pp. 98–100; Romei, ‘Produzione e circolazione’, pp. 278–311; Vendittelli
and Ricci, ‘L’isolato della Crypta Balbi’, and Rascaglia and Russo ‘La ceramica medievale di Roma’,
pp. 279–308 and 127–42.
99 Meneghini, ‘Fori Imperiali’, pp. 143–52; Santangeli Valenzani, ‘Calcare ed altre tracce di can-
tiere’, pp. 335–54; Carletti, ‘Produzione epigrafica’, pp. 362–6; Guidobaldi and Guiglia, ‘I rivestimenti
pavimentali e parietali’, pp. 386–8; La Salvia, ‘Impianti metallurgici’, pp. 253–79; Saguì and Lepri, ‘La
produzione del vetro a Roma’, pp. 225–42; and also those by De Grossi Mazzorin, ‘Lo sfruttamento
degli animali domestici a Roma’, pp. 309–24; Pescucci, Porreca, and Catalano, ‘Vivere e lavorare al
centro di Roma’, pp. 325–34; all in Molinari, Santangeli Valenzani, and Spera eds., L’archeologia della
produzione, and also ‘Introduzione’, pp. 28–30.
100 AF 876.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 495

in Rome or Ravenna was ingrained, through one being in contact continuously

with the surrounding relics of that past.
So far, my contention has been one of examining a set of characteristic ­elem­ents
perceived to have been part of the political, social, economic, and cultural land-
scape inherited from the Roman past, and still relevant in the three cities that
I am studying. These elements, I have argued, could be placed in the general
­category of ‘preservation’ of an inherited past common to them, certainly a past
in which Romans and Ravennati took great pride.101 This was recognizably made
up of the same names, titles, and functions as those used during the period of
glory of imperial Rome, the conviction of living according to the same legal system
(and one which set apart the ‘Romans’ from the others, Lombards or Franks), the
use of the same traditions of land management, the similarity of the architectural
and artistic environment, as well as rituals and social rites, and the continuing
familiarity with the urban landscape and domestic arrangements in place for
­centuries. If it is true that many of these features were common and inherited
from this past, it is equally the case that, by the tenth century in particular, several
of them were no longer known though tradition but reconstructed or recreated as
part of that same desire to belong to the world of Romanitas.

Preserving and/or Constructing the Past:

Romanitas and Apostolic Succession

Romanitas

Before 750 Romanitas was not an issue. It was obvious that, since the emperor was
‘Roman’ (Eastern Roman, but this was not understood as being different), he
ruled over all three cities, and the Roman past was everywhere visible in Rome
and Ravenna through both physical remains and institutional continuity. As far
as the citizens of Rome were concerned, they basically lived in the same world as
that of Constantine, Gregory the Great, and Cassiodorus—give or take a few
‘Lombards at the gates’—though, admittedly, a rather dilapidated one. The funda-
mental change took place during the course of the eighth century, on account of
the papal and Frankish alliance, due to the combined Lombard threat to Rome,
and the issue of iconoclasm. In the first case, the long story of the papal move
away from the Eastern Empire, with its protracted ideological correspondence
and changes of alliance, has been briefly discussed—in so far as it touched on the
history of the city of Rome—in previous chapters. It is not possible within the
space available to do justice to the issue of iconoclasm in Italy—and, once again,

101 Arnaldi, ‘Rinascita, fine’, pp. 5–56.

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496 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

my concern is only with its immediate impact in Italy. Without returning to a

narrative of the events of the reigns of the popes of the second half of the eighth
century, it seems appropriate to discuss here the issue of whether the popes
­perceived their actions to be ‘history-making’ in the sense of proposing a deliberate
change which would lead to a total reorientation of western Europe and a break­
away from the Eastern Empire and its oikoumene, towards the ‘Barbarian’ king-
doms. The theme has been comprehensively debated. The reorientation of papal
policy has been seen for a long time, most notably by Ullmann, as part of some
kind of teleological evolution, which would lead the papacy to its fully fledged
incarnation as a papal state and power in medieval Europe.102 More recently, the
problem has been addressed from a different perspective, through the work of
Noble, who claimed that seeing the policies of the popes in relation to their future
role in western Europe was not appropriate. He suggested that, instead, they
should be viewed in their contemporary context of an attempt to create a pol­it­
ical, economic, and military entity, which would enable the popes to build up a
state, allow them independence, and guarantee their existence. Noble has inter-
preted both the actions and the rhetoric of the popes, from Gregory II onwards,
as a deliberate move, in a fully aware and single-minded way, towards achieving
this independence from external entities, creating a Respublica S. Petri, and
imposing it on the Franks.103 While I fully agree with his challenging of the teleo­
logic­al view of papal power, I would propose seeing papal actions much more as a
response to current events than as a deliberately enforced policy towards the cre­
ation of a papal state. The hesitations, contradictions, and tergiversations of most
popes from Gregory II to Paschal II seem to indicate less a deliberate and single-
minded approach than an attempt to make the best of the cards on the table and,
for a long time, not to cut out the lines of communication with the Empire in
Constantinople, in case one should be forced to go back to this line of defence.104
The vocabulary used by papal functionaries seems fairly explicit on that score.
When Pope Gregory III, in 740/1, wrote to the Patriarch of Grado Antoninus, and
to Doge Ursus, to ask them to help liberate Ravenna from the Lombards, he asked
them to do so ut at pristinum statum sanctae reipublicae et imperiali servicio

102 W. Ullmann, The Growth of Papal Government in the Middle Ages, 3rd edn (London, 1970).
103 I differ from Noble, Republic of St Peter, pp. 132–7, who, against Bertolini and Classen (see his
note 162 p. 132), attempts to prove that Hadrian saw himself, and acted, as an independent head of
state; the arguments put forward do not entirely convince and, in point of fact, one, which sees the
composition of the Constitutum Constantini at this period as proof of the Lateran’s independence,
could be interpreted in the opposite way: the interdependent binome pope-emperor, which it pro-
motes through the rule of Constantine and Silvester, could be read as a clear indication that the
papacy did not see itself functioning without an empire, even if was prepared to take over imperial
property and rule over Rome. My view is closer to the interpretation of Marazzi, ‘Aristocratie et
société’, pp. 97–104.
104 This view has been adumbrated by Arnaldi, ‘Il papato e l’ideologia del potere imperiale’,
pp. 341–407.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 497

dominorum . . . Leonis et Constantinis magnorum imperatorum.105 When Pope

Stephen III wrote to the bishops of Istria in 771/2 to order them to return to the
authority of the patriarch of Grado, which they had abandoned for that of
Aquileia, he spoke in defence of nostram Romanorum provinciam et exarchatum
Ravennatium.106 The fact that Hadrian I sent Afiarta to Ravenna, in order to have
him then sent on to Constantinople for trial, implies that this was still perceived
to be the normal procedure for dealing with major crimes; I am not convinced by
Noble’s ­argument that Hadrian had no choice because Desiderius would have used
this as a pretext to attack Rome, or that the Frankish kingdom was not secure
enough at this stage.107 For the papacy to imagine itself in the position of leading
an ‘independent’ state in the context of the second half of the eighth century, more
or less contemporaneously with the production and/or promotion of the so-called
‘Donation of Constantine’, predicated as this was on the two joint pillars of har-
mony between emperor and pope, would be inconsistent with the thinking and
actions of any of the popes between Gregory II and Hadrian I, let alone the much
more subservient Leo III. My understanding is that the papacy was not so much
determined to gain an ‘independent’ state as forced to navigate amidst rival
ideological and practical obligations, and it did so with as much success as it
could under the circumstances.
Arnaldi has shown very convincingly the evolution of papal ideology in
­relation to the Empire(s).108 His argument demonstrates the progress of papal
ideas at three times: the first, as defined by the writing of the Constitutum
Constantini, traditionally known as the ‘Donation of Constantine’ (produced
sometime between Popes Stephen II and Hadrian I, possibly under Pope Paul);
the synodic letter of Hadrian I to the Emperor Leo V; and the letter of Emperor
Louis II to the Emperor Basil I in 871, probably written by Anastasius
Bibliothecarius. The first had put forward the idea of imperial authority having

105 MGH Ep III no. 702. For the concept in Carolingian times see Y. Sassier, ‘L’utilisation d’un con-
cept romain aux temps carolingiens: La res publica aux IXe et Xe siècles’, Médiévales: Langue, Textes,
Histoire 15 (1988) pp. 17–29.
106 MGH Ep. III no. 715.
107 Noble, Republic of St Peter, p. 133; see now Hartmann, Hadrian I, pp. 157–94, on the issue of his
Byzantine policies.
108 Arnaldi, ‘Il papato e l’ideologia del potere imperiale’, pp. 341–407; and B. Luiselli, La formazione
della cultura europea occidentale (Rome, 2003), pp. 323–56. For the still ongoing debate about the
‘Donation of Constantine’, see the edition by H. Fuhrmann, in MGH Fontes Iuris Germanici X
(Hannover, 1968), and his discussion in H. Fuhrmann, ‘Konstantinische Schenkung und abendländisches
Kaisertum’, Deutsches Archiv für die Erforschung des Mittelalters 22 (1966), pp. 63–178; R.-J. Lönertz,
‘Constitutum Constantini. Destination, destinataires, date, auteur’, Medium Aevum 48 (1974), pp. 199–245
R.-J. Lönertz, ‘Le Constitutum Constantini e la basilique du Latran’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 69 (1976),
pp. 406–10; P. Llewellyn, ‘The popes and the constitution in the VIII century’, English Historical
Review 101 (1986), pp. 42–67; W. Pohlkamp, ‘Privilegium ecclesiae Romanae pontifici contulit. Zur
Vorgeschichte der Konstantinischen Schenkung’, in Falschungen in Mittelalter (Internationaler Kongress
der Monumenta Germaniae Historica, Munich 16–9 September 1986), II (Hanover, 1988), pp. 413–90;
J. Fried, Donation of Constantine and Constitutum Constantini. The Misinterpretation of a Fiction and
its Original Meaning (Berlin, 2007).
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498 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

been delegated to the popes once the emperors, after Constantine, had abandoned
Rome and the West; next came Hadrian I’s formulation, which saw the idea of
the two Empires coexisting; third came Anastasius’ final step, which was the sub-
straction by God of the Empire from the Greeks because of their heresy, and its
reassigning to the Franks, obedient to St Peter. This progression went on from the
imitatio imperii to the translatio imperii within one century, though the progres-
sion was certainly not more than a trend, and one with considerable variations,
not least in that Anastasius, for example, wrote as the mouthpiece of either pope,
or (Western) emperor (Louis II), without it being clear to which of the two the
translatio was made.
Before the issue of iconoclasm was finally resolved with the triumph of the
Roman position at the council of Constantinople in 843, the popes focused their
attention on another difficulty with the Greek patriarch. Pope Leo IV refused to
accept the deposition by the Patriarch Ignatius of two southern Italian bishops,
announced without any consultation with the pope.109 Pope Leo IV’s successor,
Benedict III, had more intense contacts with Constantinople: the Emperor
Michael III sent gifts to St Peter, including some ‘Greek-style’ chalice covers, and
Benedict was said to have imposed a new lectionary for reading during the sta-
tional processions, with dual Latin and Greek lessons, possibly an old practice
which had fallen out of usage in Rome by the ninth century and was revived by
him.110 This possible revival of Byzantine liturgical associations was believed by
the Patriarch Photius to have been meaningful, since he supported Benedict III,
believing that Leo IV had initiated, and Benedict III was continuing, the recita-
tion of the Byzantine Creed in Rome. What is, of course, revealing is that this
should have been happening in 855, after the death of Lothar, the last Carolingian
emperor to have ruled Italy as part of a perceived Carolingian unitary imperial
power. Faced with the more authoritarian and present, but also more often chal-
lenged, Emperor Louis II, the papacy may once again have wanted to leave its
options open with regard to the Eastern Empire. Pope Nicholas continued these
closer, if not always friendlier, links with Constantinople, and to him too the
Emperor Michael III sent gifts for St Peter with high functionaries like the
protospatarius.111 He also requested that the pope should send some envoys to
Constantinople, to sit in judgement in the case of the deposed Patriarch Ignatius
and the election in his place of Photius, during the council of 861.112 The problem

109 For the correspondence on this see MGH Ep. V nos 589, 607, and Jaffé, nos 2654 and 2661.
110 LP I. 106 ch. 32. 111 LP I. 107 ch. 18.
112 LP I. 107 chs. 38–42; ASB 864; The Patriarch Ignatius had resigned in 858 under pressure from
the Emperor Michael III (855–67), and been replaced by Photius. Pope Nicholas had at first approved,
but in 862 decided to support Ignatius and refused to acknowledge Photius, as did all his successors
until Formosus, who was more prepared to compromise, see A. Lapôtre, ‘Le pape Formose. Etude
critique sur les rapports du Saint-Siège avec Photius’, in his Etudes sur la papauté, I, pp. 1–120. On the
Photian schism, see the classic Dvornik, The Photian Schism, and D. S. White, Patriarch Photios of
Constantinople: his life, scholarly contributions, and correspondence together with a translation of
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 499

was not solved by the time of Nicholas’s death that year, and in 869 his successor,
Hadrian II, in turn sent envoys to Constantinople to the Emperor Basil I and his
sons Constantine and Leo, one of whom was Anastasius Bibliothecarius, librarian
of the Roman see, ‘a man learned in both Greek and in Latin’.113 Hadrian II also
had to reassure the Greek refugees in Rome, who had been protected by Nicholas
I, that the pope would not give way on Photius; the refugees seem to have been
worried that Emperor Louis II might be prepared to compromise on this with
Emperor Michael, in order to gain his support for fighting the Saracens in Italy.
Greek monks in Rome were among the most vehement opponents of the Eastern
emperor and were often found among the main supporters of the papacy.114 The
Eighth Ecumenical Council solved the schism arising from the deposition of
Ignatius and the ordination of Photius, but raised other issues. The first was the
role played by the conversion of the Bulgarians. The quarrel arose from the dis-
pute as to who had been the first to effect the conversion. The pope insisted that it
was the Roman missionaries, led by Bishop Formosus, who had been the authors
of the conversion, and that the Bulgarian king was later bribed by the Greeks to
give them rights of jurisdiction over the newly established Bulgarian Church.115
This intense diplomatic activity in Rome may imply that the papacy wanted to
regain great authority, and perhaps return to overall supremacy, over the Eastern
Churches. It may have had some success, because of the conflicting situation of
the two rival patriarchs, and, as a result, both patriarchs and emperors called on
Rome to adjudicate. This leads me to the second issue, which is the implication,
with the Photian schism, that both parties accepted having the Church of Rome
judge an ecclesiastical affair regarding the patriarchate of Constantinople, and
would accept its decisions, in the way that they had eventually accepted the
Roman position on iconoclasm. The question one may ask is why the emperors
thought it necessary to involve the pope, and were prepared to accept his judge-
ment, even as the Greek clergy resented it, complaining that the ‘Church of
Constantinople has been subjected to the power of Rome’116; perhaps it was so
that they could be absolved of any blame, as a result of supporting one side rather
than the other in Constantinople, by apportioning the blame to the pope instead.
If this explanation is plausible, it would once again show just how much relations
with Constantinople had been revived in the second half of the ninth century, not
only on the Roman, but also on the Byzantine, side. Having spent a century or so

fifty-two of his letters (Brookline, MA, 1981), and now K. Herbers, ‘Papst Nikolaus I. und Patriarch
Photios. Das Bild des byzantinischen Gegners in lateinischen Quellen’, in Die Begegnung des Westens
mit dem Osten. Kongreßakten des 4. Symposions des Mediävistenverbandes in Köln 1991 aus Anlaß des
1000. Todesjahres der Kaiserin Theophanu, ed. O. Engels and P. Schreiner (Sigmaringen, 2013), pp.
51–74.
113 ASB 872.
114 E. Patlagean, ‘Les moines grecs d’Italie et l’apologie des thèses pontificales (VIII–IXe siècles)’,
Studi medievali n.s. 5 (1964), pp. 579–602.
115 MGH Ep VI no. 4. 116 LP I. 108 ch. 44.
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500 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

apparently not being overconcerned by the breakdown of these relations, as a

result of their iconoclast position, and also simply by keeping their own affairs to
themselves, the Byzantine emperors seem to have decided that, if they had prob-
lems with their own Church, it was entirely legitimate and useful to invoke the
authority of the papacy as being supreme ruler also for the Eastern Empire, while
the papacy became happily involved once again in dealing with the Eastern
Church. This return to earlier times, at a period of increasingly perceived weakness
of the Carolingian Empire, seems to indicate that both actors treated the Frankish
Empire, if not as a parenthesis, at the very least as a period of breaking of the
­tradition of ‘normal’ relations between popes and Eastern emperors, to be resumed
as before. Such a view, if true, would further weaken the arguments about the papa-
cy’s attempt to create a sovereign position for itself fifty years earl­ier, by showing
how much it saw itself ideologically as still as part of the old im­per­ial order.
The drawing apart of the papacy and Constantinople in the eighth century was
due to several factors, of which it would be unwise to dismiss iconoclasm as a
simple pretext: the power of the anti-iconoclastic sentiment in Italy can be seen
only too well in the rebellion of various cities opposing it, to the extent of declar-
ing independence from the Empire on this score. While an important part of the
papal shift away from Byzantium was the perceived lack of military support for
the fight against the Lombards, it is probable that, in the earlier part of the century,
the popes, notably Gregory II and Gregory III, were also unhappy with Byzantine
attempts to regain more control over Italy through imperial reforms which would
place it in the same category as other Byzantine provinces, with less freedom of
movement in political and financial terms. Papal concerns vis-à-vis both Lombard
pressure on Rome and the implementation of iconoclasm grew, and led to the
Frankish rapprochement, since the Franks were both Catholic and respectful of
the authority of St Peter. The perception that the papacy wanted to create, and
succeeded in creating, an independent papal power to replace the Empire may be
slightly anachronistic: the evidence appears to suggest that the papacy’s aim and
necessity was to find an emperor who would represent the ‘power of Caesar’ on
earth, as a pendant to that of Christ. However, they clearly preferred an emperor
who, unlike the Byzantine one, did not see the pope as just another bishop but
one who would act like another Constantine to the pope’s Silvester. This was the
message put forward by the papacy, through the images at St Peter’s and the
Lateran, not to mention through the Constitutum Constantini, the main papal
ideological manifesto in the second half of the eighth century. This would explain
the popes’ reluctance to cut ties with Constantinople, as still shown by Pope
Hadrian I, a reluctance only overcome after 800. However, perhaps one needs to
reiterate that this was not necessarily seen as a permanent solution. While the
Carolingians dominated the scene until the mid-ninth century, this was the tacit
agreement in place; after their Empire began to break up, which corresponded
with the period of the end of Byzantine iconoclasm and a renewed Byzantine
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 501

interest in Italy after 850, the links once again became stronger. Issues such as the
conversion of Bulgaria and Moravia, and especially the Photian schism, which
eventually brought the Byzantine emperor to turn to the pope to adjudicate, led
to greater involvement on the part of Popes Nicholas I and Hadrian II with
Constantinople. Anastasius Bibliothecarius provided the most direct link, leading
to complaints from the Greek Church about excessive influence from Rome in
Byzantine affairs at the time of the Eighth Ecumenical Council. This situ­ation,
though the protagonists did not know it then, did not last long. By the time of
Pope John VIII’s reign, papal interest returned once again to Roman matters, and
successive popes in the tenth century were no longer sufficiently free to choose
their alliances in this way. The Ottonians would definitely put an end to this
independence.
From the mid-eighth century onwards, with the new alliance between the
Franks and the popes, the perception of the Roman past began to change. This
was not simply on account of the end of Byzantine administration and main­ten­
ance, now gone, and of the papacy’s control of the city, with which came also the
dismembering and reuse of the monuments of the past. It came precisely through
the papacy’s interest in the Roman past, stimulated by the Carolingians and
northern pilgrims there, notably the intellectuals who wrote with admiration of
Rome on the basis of their literary knowledge from the classics. This meant that
the Roman past, however admired, became just that—the past. As such, it had to
be preserved and restored as a heritage site, and admired as an outsider would do.
This was, effectively, what the popes began to do, with their restoration of
churches in the early Christian mould admired by the Carolingians, and with a
revival of these models. But one can only revive what is felt to be dead; and the
northern gaze on Rome was that of the admiring visitor from a different culture.
The popes, voluntarily or not, absorbed this view, and projected it back onto the
city, in its decoration and in its liturgy.117 There, they were expected to be the
fount of all knowledge, from which the Frankish Church would learn the ‘correct’
way of doing things. But the Church of Rome had been doing things in a variety
of ways in various churches, and had no unified ‘strategy’, as the Franks thought it
did. Here too, then, the Franks took what they could, but then, very deliberately,
‘improved’ it by creating a model to fit the ideals of the Carolingian reforms,
which had to be unified to the same standard throughout the Empire. By that
same token, this was brought back to Rome and imposed on the churches there,
together with a whole lot of Carolingian practices, such as liturgical festivals
(Rogation Days) and devotions (reading the Passiones of the saints, large

117 T. F. X. Noble, ‘Topography, celebration, and power: the making of a papal Rome in the eighth
and ninth centuries’, in F. Theuws and M. de Jong, Topographies of Power in the Early Middle Ages,
(Leiden, 2001), pp. 45–91. On the whole discussion about social history and cultural history, see the
Introduction.
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502 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

translations of relics), as well as the taking of an oath to the emperor. One must
not, however, imagine that the popes were not fully part of this perception, or did
not contribute themselves to the antiquarian and restoration interests in the city
and its Roman past. Men like Leo III, Paschal I, Anastasius, or indeed Pope John
VIII were the authors and movers behind this awareness of the past, as we saw
in Chapter 5.118 For the first time, the papacy was moulding Rome into a form
suggested to it by what had been originally an external factor of ‘Roman myth’.
Whether in so doing it made the ‘Roman’ environment a thing of the past—to be
revered and appreciated certainly, even reconstructed, but no longer the canvas of
everyday life for the citizens of Rome—is difficult to see for the ninth century,
since we have almost no secular Roman voices to enlighten us; the Romans who
write—Anastasius, Immonides, or the popes—are the clerical elite.
Whether the Roman aristocratic elites were in agreement with this or not in
the ninth century, they had no choice, since the pope was in charge not only of
the city but was also their direct ‘employer’, as it were: the important and wealthy
families in the city were part of the hierarchy of papal government at the Lateran.
They occasionally manifested opposition to specific popes at election times, or
attempted to dislodge them once in power—but, whenever this happened, we are
told about such events in the Liber Pontificalis and we are thus dependent on the
papal interpretation of this opposition, described as that of some ‘bad men’ as
individuals, rather than as the movement of a political or social group with a dif-
ferent agenda. It is only from the tenth century onwards—not coincidentally, the
moment when the writing of Liber Pontificalis practically peters out—that we
begin to perceive a clearer ‘policy’ of the members of the aristocratic elite with
regard to their view of Rome and its past (and, naturally, we cannot extrapolate
back from it, and assume that ninth-century families felt the same way).
The tenth-century secular aristocracy which dominated the city did behave
differently. It was far more inclined either to cling to the memories of the Roman
classical past or, in some cases, to construct such memories, if necessary, as a
foundation narrative for its own history, to which it connected itself. Just as the
ninth-century papacy, as a result of several centuries of pressure and veneration
from northern European pilgrims, had gradually become a European power, so,
as a contrast to this universality of its claims, the citizens of Rome refocused their
attention of the past of the city itself. This was not necessarily that of the ‘Roman
Empire’, and they tried to recreate it through the use of Roman titles, functions,
and style of government. With Alberic in particular, but also with members of his
entourage and later on with the Crescentii, the titles, ‘magistratures’ (Prefect of
the City), and coinage became the mark of a government which saw itself as
secular. Like the Libellus, they too attempted to redraw the lost line between the

118 See Chapter 5 and Arnaldi, Natale 875, pp. 9–106.

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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 503

functions of the ‘prince’ and those of the bishop, for example in the sphere of
public works or law enforcement. There was no direct conflict between the two
au­thor­ities. Alberic left theological debate and ecclesiastical discipline to the
popes—who were engaged in it, but mostly outside the city, as part of their
­universalist appeal119—and pilgrimages to St Peter’s tomb continued as success-
fully as before. But the running of the city was in the hands of the aristocratic
elite, who now appropriated its past. This applied to the topography: the spaces of
power of the Palatine and in the imperial Fora, the residential space of the
Aventine and the Via Lata, or on the Clivus Argentarius, around the edges of the
imperial Fora. It also applied to the methods of government by the ‘senate’ and
the Prefect of the City; the responsibility for urban development, economic
expansion, and coinage; the style and decoration of their palaces with spolia from
the Roman architecture of the past; and the trappings of representation in councils
or placita, the titles and the use of Roman law. This was not just an imitatio, it was
also a kind of Renovatio, but very different from that imposed by either the
Carolingians in the ninth century or Otto III in the tenth. For them, the Renovatio
could only be, fundamentally, that of Christian Rome, even when Otto III, the
ultimate reviver of the aurea Roma, attempted to recreate it through his plans for
a return to the Palatine.120
In many ways, Ravenna resembled Rome in its strong awareness of its Roman
past. Ravenna’s imperial past was, however, exclusively Christian, since it had
become a capital only in the fifth century. Like Rome, it too had a still visible
imperial cityscape, of which the inhabitants were clearly extremely proud, as
Agnellus shows. But Ravenna was different in two ways. Even as a Christian cap­
ital, the city had had a secular imperial government and administration still active
in the eighth century; unlike Rome, this had continued to function after the end
of the Exarchate in 750. It was partly recuperated by the archbishop who, like the
pope, also held political authority in Ravenna ‘as exarch’ (though the popes and
emperors disagreed in principle). However, unlike Rome, this secular govern-
ment of the city had not been completely subsumed into that of the archbishop,
and it had not disappeared. It was, if anything, reinforced during the period when
the papacy claimed to govern the city via its envoys, who were Ravennate aristo-
crats. There was thus a double hierarchy of power and city government, even

119 For example, Flodoard, Annals, 30C-E and 31, on Pope Agapitus II’s synod at Ingelheim with
Otto I and Roman synod of 950 regarding the affairs of the bishop of Ingelheim and Hugh the Great;
on the aristocratic role in the city, see P. Brezzi, ‘L’idea di Roma nell’alto medioevo’, Studi romani 7
(1959), pp. 511–23; P. Brezzi, ‘Roma medioevale: la realtà e l’idea’, Studi romani 30 (1982), pp. 16–29 at
16–23. For a list of texts relating to the admiration for Rome in the Ottonian period, see Schramm,
Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio, pp. 116–87, and Althoff, Otto III, pp. 114–25.
120 K. Görich, ‘Aurea Roma: Kaiser, Papst und Rom um das Jahr 1000’, in Rom—Nabel der Welt:
Macht, Glaube, Kultur von der Antike bis Heute, ed. J. Johrendt and R. Schmitz-Esser, Darmstadt,
2010, pp. 49–66, and S. Ensoli and E. La Rocca, eds., Aurea Roma. Dalla città pagana alla città cristi-
ana. Catalogo della mostra (Roma, 22 dicembre 2000–20 aprile 2001) (Rome, 2000).
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504 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

though the two were closely associated, because the people involved generally
came from the same families. In Ravenna, some of the trappings of power, espe-
cially the titles, the built domestic environment of the domus, and the style of land
exploitation in the territories of the Church of Ravenna, suggest the pursuance of
a Roman lifestyle, which continued without interruption into the tenth century.
Only gradually did it change to the extent of incorporating elements from the
Lombard–Frankish culture of the Italian kingdom, and then mostly at an individual
level, that is to say in the form of the migration of persons who intermarried with
the native population. We are aware of them through the increasingly frequent
number of Frankish names, and the definition of some p ­ eople as living according
to Lombard/Alaman/Frankish law. Fundamentally, despite this the order of
­society did not change: the economic and legal system remained Roman, and the
titles (consul, dux, clarissimus) continued to exist, embraced by the newcomers,
who identified themselves with this Roman trad­ition with enthusiasm.

The Apostolic Succession and the Other Founding Saints

The importance of the secular Roman past was especially strong in Ravenna in view
of its inability to create a proper city cult as an identifying factor. St Apollinarius
never acquired the prestige of St Peter, and could not act as a cement for the
inhabitants of Ravenna. We saw how bishops at various times tried to strengthen,
and indeed in some cases to create almost ab nihilo, cults of the founding bishops
of the city, in order to endow Ravenna with a pool of sanctity worthy of its status
as a capital. This was the case with the Passiones of St Apollinarius himself in the
mid-seventh century, that of St Barbatianus in the mid-ninth, and that of St
Probus in the tenth century, as well as those of SS Vitalian and Ursicinus, St
Severus, and St Eleucadius.121 None inflamed people’s imagination. What did,
however, was that which would become the main focus of city unity and historic
narrative: the fight against Rome. The long-sought-after, and briefly held, recog-
nition of the equality of the two sees, as a result of Ravenna’s past status as an
imperial capital, was over by 750. But Ravenna never forgot it, or forgave Rome
and the papacy for its successful removal. It continued to fight the popes and,
occasionally, succeeded in ignoring them. Most importantly, this opposition cre-
ated the focus for the discourse of city identity still in the tenth century.
Nobody in Rome (let alone outside it) rejected the fact that the city’s identity
was closely bound up with the cult of St Peter. The cult was present right from
after Peter’s martyrdom in the first century ad, and was subsequently shaped by
Constantine then Theodosius, and further again by Popes Damasus and Gregory

121 See Chapter 3 and the summary in Verhoeven, The Early Christian Monuments, pp. 56–93.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 505

the Great. From the seventh century onwards, it became the major attraction
for thousands of visitors, especially, though not solely, those from north of the
Alps. The papacy responded to this enthusiasm by taking up the challenge to
accommodate, impress, and generally look after them. The pilgrims’ presence in
the city was linked to the relics associated with specific cemeteries and churches,
but it was always more heavily associated with St Peter’s, and then the Leonine
City, than with Rome itself. The result is that we know relatively little about what
the ‘Romans’ who were not part of the Church themselves, and wrote little,
thought of it. Indirect evidence for the ninth century, and a little more for the
tenth, suggests that the cult of St Peter was not of equal importance to the inhabit-
ants of Rome as to the pilgrims. We saw earlier how, according to Notker (and
with all due caution in view of the source), the aristocratic elite which tried to
depose Leo III was said to be more respectful, and indeed more afraid, of St
Pancras than of St Peter.122 The evidence of church dedications, decoration, and relic
translations would suggest that devotion to the Virgin Mary, to the local martyrs,
especially St Laurence with his numerous churches and relics (as opposed to only
one for St Peter, for example), the stational liturgy, and even the not very frequent
use of the name of Peter could be read as signs of a very different devotional cli-
mate among the inhabitants of the city of Rome, compared to that of pilgrims to
the city. This view seems better defined in the tenth century. With the winding
down of the Liber Pontificalis, we know much less about the St Peter connection
and more about the way in which the core of the religious life of the city was
focused on the stations, the tituli, the diaconiae, which were the real devotional
spaces of worship for the Romans, and the major festivals (Assumption and the
Exaltation of the Cross), grounded in the areas of S. Maria Maggiore, the Lateran,
and the Roman Forum.123
For a long period in Rome, because the papacy took on the preservation of the
Roman past during and after Byzantine rule, ‘Roman’ equalled ‘Christian Roman’,
late antique, and Constantinian. This was certainly the case in the ninth century,
when the papacy responded to, and nurtured, the northern European veneration
for St Peter under the Carolingians. The popes began to recreate an early Christian
Rome as imagined by these visitors—it became, in Gantner’s elegant phrase, a
‘cultural broker’.124 As Rome became increasingly identified with St Peter in their
perception, and the papacy received its legitimacy from it for its far-reaching
European authority, so the model remained paramount until the tenth century
when, for the first time, we see the beginnings of an alternative idea of either
republican or Augustan Rome as a possible model.

122 Notker I. 26. 123 Di Carpegna Falconieri, Il clero, passim.

124 C. Gantner, ‘The eighth-century papacy as cultural broker’, in The Resources of the Past in Early
Medieval Europe, ed. C. Gantner, R. McKitterick, and S. Meeder (Cambridge, 2009), pp. 245–61. See
also, in the same volume, the contribution of R. McKitterick, ‘Transformations of the Roman past and
Roman identity in the early Middle Ages’, pp. 225–44, esp. at 228–35.
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506 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

Unlike Rome and Ravenna, Venice had no Roman past, or, at least, it did not
start claiming one until later in the thirteenth century. Neither did it have an
apostolic cult of its origins. St Mark was an Apostle, but only by devious means
could he be associated with the area of the Venetiae in his lifetime. It was generally
accepted that his cult, however successful, was due to the translation of his relics
in 828, and not to his role as a Christian founder of the city. Venice did not have
much to identify with in terms of a Roman tradition, even though its rulers and
elite continued to use the traditional Byzantine titles of dux, tribune, and magister
militum. Lacking any of the other key elements on which to construct a narrative
of the past, Venice alone of the three cities deliberately constructed its identity on
the present.

Construction of the Present:

Patron Saint and/or Imperial Renovatio

Venice

Here we need to use to the maximum the testimony of John the Deacon. Whatever
debates there may be with regard to his account of events, there is no doubt that he
was the creator of the two factors which would effectively come to define Venice
in its own representation of itself: the cult of St Mark, and the attempt to present
itself as ‘different’ and totally independent of any external power and pressure. These
would come to be at the core of the Venetians’ perception of their city’s identity.125

125 Berto, JnD, Introduction; A. Carile, ‘Le origini di Venezia nella tradizione storiografica’, in
Storia della cultura veneta, I, Dalle origini al Trecento, ed. N. Pozza (Vicenza, 1976), pp. 135–66;
A. Carile, ‘La città di Venezia nasce delle cronache’, in Augenti ed., Le città italiane, pp. 137–49;
G. Fasoli, ‘Nascita di un mito. Il mito di Venezia nella storiografia’, in Studi in onore di Gioacchino
Volpe (Florence, 1958), pp. 447–79, and G. Fasoli, ‘I fondamenti della storiografia veneziana’, in La
storiografia veneziana fino al secolo XI: Aspetti e problemi (Florence, 1970), pp. 11–44, both repr. in
F. Bocchi, A. Carile, and A. I. Ivan, Scritti di Storia Medievale (Bologna,), pp. 445–52 and 499–527;
M. De Biasi, ‘Leggenda e storia nelle origini di Venezia’, Ateneo veneto 23 (1983), pp. 77–101;
G. Lorenzoni, ‘Origini di Venezia’, Arte medievale 1 (1983), pp. 39–48; G. Vespignani, ‘L’ideologia
politica veneziana e il problema delle origini’, Rivista di bizantinistica 1 (1991), 1 (Atti della Giornata
Internazionale di Studio Agostino Pertusi, 1979–1989. L’opera filologica e storica, Bologna 11 aprile
1989), pp. 181–91; and, in the same tradition, W. Dorigo, ‘Le origini di Venezia’, in Venezia e Bisanzio.
Aspetti della cultura artistica bizantina da Ravenna a Venezia (V–XIV secolo), ed. C. Rizzardi, (Venice,
2005) pp. 303–415. More recently, work had been done on the topic of Venice; see P. Fortini Brown
and A. Molho, The self-definition of the Venetian republic (Stuttgart, 1991); Crouzet-Pavan, Venise tri-
omphante, pp. 273–92; D. Rosand, Myths of Venice: the Figuration of a State (University of North
Carolina, 2001); and E. D’Amico, ‘Approaches and perspectives on the origins of Venice’, MAAR 62
(2017), pp. 209–30. See especially G. Dagron, ‘Le ‘mythe de Venise’ vu de Byzance’ in Il mito di
Venezia, ed. P. Schreiner (Venice: Centro Tedesco di Studi Veneziani, Veneziana 5, 2006), pp. 61–80,
who discusses the Adriatic component in the Venetian make-up; and G. Ortalli, ‘Venezia allo spec-
chio: costruire la propria immagine’, in La diversità visuale. Il fenomeno Venezia osservato dagli altri,
ed. U. Israel (Rome, 2008), pp. 201–19, who discusses the idea of ‘independence’ as formulated by
John the Deacon.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 507

While Venice had no Roman past, it was the only one of the three cities
which had a ‘Roman’ present, admittedly an ‘Eastern Roman’ one, that is to say
Byzantine, in so far as it was technically part of the Byzantine Empire. It did not
concern itself much with this fact, which could be an advantage (commercial or
diplomatic), or a constraint. John’s account made no more and no less of the
Byzantine Empire than it did of any other political power with which Venice was
involved. We know from other sources, or from a rather impressionistic account
in John’s text, that there was Byzantine intervention in Venice (the envoys present
in Venice to help build up the fleet, requests—according to John—but probably
orders in reality from the Eastern emperor for the Venetian fleet to help fight the
Saracens in the south of Italy, or indeed in the early eighth century a return to
Byzantine rule after the rebellion of the province when it chose its own duke).126
John’s account alone, however, would make it hard to see this as the habitual con-
tribution of a Byzantine city to the emperor, rather than as a gracious choice by an
independent equal power. From the point of view of the Venetians, it is likely that
Byzantine imperial power was accepted as a fact of life, acknowledged formally
with the doges’ official appointment, and that it had to be used as best one could
for the ultimate purpose of the city’s success, for example so as to obtain com-
mercial advantages in Constantinople. In other words, it was really not of any
major concern one way or the other, as something to be debated as part of a
Roman past, or indeed present. John’s purpose in stressing the independence and
difference agenda would help later on in the history of the city, to create the myth
of uniqueness and special status, as well as of the ‘gate between East and West’.
‘Byzantine Venice’ is a self-construct of the city, one which was to develop much
later in the thirteenth century. In our period, Venice’s political allegiance might be
to remote Constantinople, but its day-to-day connections were with its Adriatic
background, both in Italy and in Istria and Dalmatia, as well as with the Veneto,
Pavia, the north-eastern Alpine regions, and, beyond them, the Carolingian and
Ottonian world.
John’s success in setting the bases for the idea of ‘independent’ Venice was to be
matched only by his success in defining the unifying factor of Venice as the cult of
St Mark and, closely linked with it, of the secular power of the doge, uniting the

126 See Chapter 3. On the relations between Venice and Byzantium, especially from the Byzantine
end, see H. Antoniadis-Bibicu, ‘Note sur les relations de Byzance avec Venise. De la dépendance à
l’autonomie et à alliance: un point de vue byzantin’, Thesaurismata 1 (1962), pp. 162–78; P. Lamma,
‘Venezia nel giudizio delle fonti bizantine dal X al XII secolo’, Rivista storica italiana, 74 (1962), pp.
457–79; and J. Shepard, ‘Aspects of Byzantine Attitudes and Policy towards the West in the Tenth and
Eleventh Centuries’, in Byzantium and the West, c. 850–c. 1200. Proceedings of the XVIII Spring
Symposium of Byzantine Studies, Oxford 30th March-1st April 1984, ed. J. D. Howard-Johnston,
Byzantinische Forschungen, 13 (1988), pp. 67–118; as well as the other way around: C. Wickham,
‘Ninth-century Byzantium through Western eyes’, in Byzantium in the ninth Century: dead or alive?
Papers from the thirtieth Spring Symposium of Byzantine studies, Birmingham, March 1996, ed.
L. Brubaker (Aldershot, 1998), pp. 245–56.
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508 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

city around him and the saint, increasingly seen as one and the same thing. The
growing identification of the two, from the arrival of St Mark’s relics in 828,
received and honoured by the doge in the palace chapel, then newly built basilica,
set the ground for later chroniclers to take up the theme and to create an unbreakable
bond between the identity of Venice as a city and its patron, St Mark. It is possible,
indeed likely, that John was also giving voice to his patron, Peter II Orseolo’s,
views. This was the doge whose purpose was to unify the city and its unruly people
around the figure of a ‘good’ ruler, favoured in his rule by the patronage of St
Mark, consolidated around a space which was common to both—the ducal palace
and the public area around it on the Piazza—as the political and religious centre
of a successfully growing power. From then onwards, this binome, St Mark and
ducal power, was to become the hard core of Venetian city identity, so strong that
it has survived the centuries of both glory and ‘decline’, and the end of the
Venetian Republic, to remain in place even today.

Ravenna

The Ravenna elites’ self-awareness of their past was expressed through titles and a
lifestyle which, up to the end of the tenth century, remained both symbol and
reflection of real power. While Byzantine court titles had become increasingly
rare by the ninth century, unless they were gifted by the emperors to people they
had an interest in obliging, like the doges of Venice, these officially non-transferable
titles were preserved, sometimes even sold, showing the desire of the local aris-
tocracy to differentiate itself and to create a form of self-identity, different from
that of the Lombard or Frankish elites on the edges of the old Exarchate. However
‘real’ such titles may have been, there was, in this deliberate attempt at preserva-
tion of continuity with the past, a choice of using the traditional mani­fest­ation of
status, which also remained in the other late antique tradition of associating sta-
tus with living in the city and in a domus.127
The notion of Romanness in Ravenna, just as in Rome, did indeed contribute
to the city’s identity. But here it had to do so even more, because of the absence of
a powerful patron saint to rely on. With no such help, Romanitas took a different
form: the deliberate emphasis on the imperial element, not only in the glorious
past of the city but in its present too. Ravenna was always favourable to emperors,
whether Carolingian, Spoletan, or Ottonian. Based on the memory of its past as
an imperial capital, it was also constantly associated with the driving force of
Ravenna’s identity, which was its anti-papal stance. As a means to claim equal
status with Rome, the city welcomed and supported any emperor, hoping that

127 Brown, ‘The Aristocracy of Ravenna’, pp. 137–40.

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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 509

he would use it as a capital. Some emperors did, up to a point, though mostly,

to paraphrase Saxer, as a ‘capitale de secours’,128 when they could not control
Rome—never as an equal to it. Eventually, Ravenna became closely associated
with the Ottonians’ successors, and the archbishop became an important imperial
vassal—but not before the eleventh century. Nevertheless, one might conclude
that the city, which started its success story at the apex of the late antique world as
an imperial capital, was subsequently unable to achieve such status again, because
it lacked the anchor of either a powerful patron saint or an equally powerful ruler
on the wider European stage.

Rome

Rome is, as always, the most complex case to unravel. Here, past and present were
both Christian and ‘Roman’, the first dominating from the ninth century with the
cult of St Peter, and both remaining key factors throughout the tenth century.
Here too, as in Ravenna, the awareness of the Roman past among the elites was
made manifest through their titles, resurrected by Theophylact and Alberic as
part of their revival of classical Rome. Such titles and distinctions were self-
assumed, but they were acknowledged by others too; and people were addressed
as such, as we can see from a letter from Eugenius Vulgarius to someone of
importance in the Roman Church, calling him episcoporum venerantissimo . . . ac
senatori primo, and to one Geminus as consul—though Eugenius was definitely a
worshipper of the past, as one can tell from the way in which his definition of the
success of Pope Sergius III was that the pope was the man who had restored the
Rome of the Fabii and the Scipiones.129
The dual papal association of Rome with both classical scholarship and the
Petrine presence, imposed on the city by its vast numbers of pilgrims, was taken
up with eagerness, and effectiveness, by the papacy after its alliance with the fam-
ily of Pepin. It played a crucial role in the transformation of Rome, through the
projection put onto it by its visitors, into a city with a dual nature: that of the past,
exemplified by its visible monuments, which the papacy contributed to preserv-
ing and restoring for the benefit of visitors, and that of the present, the city of
St Peter. This was also a Rome whose association was above all with the idea
of Empire—Carolingian, then Ottonian.130 I have already discussed the use of
im­per­ial titles from Charlemagne to Otto III, as well as of symbols of power like
seals and coins. A large body of literature underlines various aspects of this transfer

128 Saxer, Sainte Marie Majeure, p. 124.

129 Eugenius Vulgarius’s Sylloga, ed. in Schramm, Kaiser, Rom und Renovatio, no. 33, pp. 52–3; see
Stella, ‘Roma antica nella poesia mediolatina’, p. 293; and for the letter to Sergius III, see the text in
MGH Poetae lat. IV, pp. 422–5.
130 See Chapter 5, and the very large bibliography on the subject.
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510 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

of power from old imperial Rome to Aachen (the poems De Karolo rege et Leone
papa,131 Moduin of Autun’s Ecloga, Ermoldus Niger, and the Life of Germanus of
Auxerre by Heiric) and the gradual disappearance of Rome as either a historic
place or a real present one, to be replaced by a universalist abstraction symbolizing
unity, legal, political, and military power.132 This was a Rome seen as an abstrac-
tion, from the outside, and is not of the most immediate concern here.
While at the top political level there was—sometimes—harmony between the
two powers, papal and imperial, this was rarely the case at ground level, where
ethnic and linguistic differences were commented upon. The Franks’ main, if not
only, interest in Rome was St Peter, and the devotion to the Prince of the Apostles
was at the core of Carolingian attitudes. Charlemagne ‘cared for St Peter’s church
more than for any other . . . [he] poured into its treasury a vast fortune in gold and
silver coinage and precious stones . . . too many gifts to record’.133 His lifetime’s
ambition was that, ‘by his own efforts and exertion, the city of Rome should
regain its former proud position’; he not only wanted the church of St Peter’s to be
safe ‘but by means of his wealth, more richly adorned and endowed than any
other’, says Notker.134 At the same time, he also tells us that Charlemagne’s visit to
Rome in 799 was due to the fact that the inhabitants had attacked Pope Leo III,
and he, Charles, came to Rome to ‘restore the Church, which was in a very bad
state indeed’,135 and that it ‘had always been the constant habit of the inhabitants
of Rome to oppose and be the constant enemies of every pope of any influence’.136
In 799 Alcuin also commented to Charles that, Rome being ‘in the grip of fratri-
cidal strife and incessantly poisoned by feuds, . . . your majesty has had to leave
your pleasant home in Germany to check this ruinous infection’,137 because ‘some
powerful Romans had entered into a vicious conspiracy against Leo’.138
Another anecdote by Notker mentions that Charlemagne, who had asked Pope
Stephen to send him teachers to Francia to teach the Frankish clergy Roman
practices, complained that the chanters, ‘like all Greeks and Romans, greatly envious
of the glory of the Franks, teach all different things’; so much so that, eventually,
Charlemagne protested to the pope, who told him that, if he were to send others,

131 Ed. L. von Padberg (Paderborn, 1999). See also P. Godman, Poets and Emperors. Frankish
Politics and Carolingian Poetry (Oxford, 1987), p. 86.
132 Stella, ‘Roma antica nella poesia mediolatina’, pp. 281–6. The has also been the subject of much
work; see, for example, M. Seidlmayer, ‘Rom und Romgedanke im Mittelalter’ (Cologne, 1965);
B. Kytzler,‘Roma aeterna’. Lateinische und griechische Romdichtung von der Antike bis in die Gegenwart
(Zurich, 1972), and B. Kytzler, Rom als Idee (Darmstadt, 1993); I. Baumgärtner, ‘Rombeherrschung
und Romerneuerung’, QFIAB 69 (1989), pp. 27–79; A. Giardina and A. Vauchez, Il mito di Roma. Da
Carlo Magno a Mussolini (Rome–Bari, 2000); J. Fried, ‘Römische Erinnerung. Zu den Anfängen und
frühen Wirkungen des christlichen Rommythos’, in Studien zur Geschichte des Mittelalters. Jürgen
Petersohn zum 65. Geburtstag (Stuttgart, 2000), pp. 1–41 and J. Fried, ‘Imperium Romanum. Das
römische Reich und der mittelalterliche Reichsgedanke’, Millennium 3 (2006), pp. 1–42; and L. Revell,
Ways of Being Roman. Discourses of Identity in the Roman West (Oxbow, 2015).
133 Einhard III. 27. 134 Notker III. 27. 135 Notker III. 28.
136 Notker I, 26. 137 Alcuin, letter 799, p. 114.
138 Astronomer II. 25. 1.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 511

they would do the same, and therefore suggested that Charles send his own men
to learn in Rome, provided they remained anonymous and blended in.139 As
usual with Notker, the story may have been made up, but what was Notker imply-
ing? Was he suggesting that the pope’s Roman understanding of the Franks was
that of barbarians whom one need not bother teaching? Or could it be that the
clergy available in Rome, especially in the Lateran, would have been, by and large,
less favourable to Pope Stephen II and his Frankish rapprochement, as we have
already been given to understand from the attitudes of the Roman aristocracy
hostile to Stephen and his brother Paul?140 The last word regarding the perception
of ethnic differences rests once again with Notker, whose views of the Roman
clergy’s personal habits are no improvement on his views of their political habits:
he clearly does not rate the deacon who follows the habit of the Italians, ‘perpetually
trying to resist nature’: ‘he takes baths, has his head closely shaved, polished skin,
cleaned nails, hair very short, linen underclothes and a snow-white shirt’.141
While northern views of the state of the Church of Rome and the Roman elites
was one of constant disharmony, these views were as yet nothing compared with
those regarding corruption in Rome. Examples abound, and one needs only quote
a few, such as the description of Pope Stephen IV’s election and consecration
without waiting for the agreement of the missi, with the pope ‘after consecration
send[ing] to the emperor deputies with an explanatory letter that he had been
pushed into the dignity by acclamation and popular choice, not by ambition’,142 or
the 865 Frankish synod at which ‘the two legates, corrupted by bribes, concealed
the pope’s letters and carried out none of the things that had been entrusted to
them by sacred authority . . . in order to give the impression that they had achieved
something, with the connivance of Hagano, a crafty and very greedy Italian
bishop’.143 Views did not seem to have changed that much by the time of John
VIII, who was openly accused of having crowned Charles the Bald emperor as a
result of a bribe.144As medievalists know, this is one of the longest-lasting and
often peddled clichés about Rome and the papacy, and it is instructive to see how
early it had already become so.145
It must not be imagined that the Romans were any less scathing about the
Franks, and they made frequent complaints about the armies of various em­perors,
like Lothar, Louis II, Arnulf, and others, who were perceived as lawless barbarians
(the Romans were much relieved to see the back of them), as we are repeatedly

139 Notker I, 10.

140 Chapter 2. On the links between the two, see the Introduction and L. Sarti, ‘Frankish Romanness
and Charlemagne’s Empire’, in Speculum 91/4 (2016), pp. 1040–58.
141 Notker I, 32. 142 Astronomer II. 26. 3.
143 ARF 865. 144 ASB 875–6; Regino 877.
145 See a recent recap of the origins of the cliché in C. Wickham, ‘The financing of Roman city
­pol­it­ics, 1050–1150’, in Europa e Italia. Studi in onore di Giorgio Chittolini. Europe and Italy. Studies in
honour of Giorgio Chittolini (Florence: Reti Medievali E-Book 15, 2011), pp. 437–53 (also at http://
www.ebook.retimedievali.it.); also on the general perception in medieval times, S. Carocci, Il nepo-
tismo nel medioevo. Papi, cardinali e famiglie nobili, (Rome, 1999).
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512 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

told in the Liber Pontificalis, by Benedict of Soracte, and even the Libellus de
imperatoria potestate. While some of the political leaders in the city may have
been keen to benefit from the Carolingian presence, not everyone was equally
happy about the alliance. On the whole the Carolingians did not, properly speaking,
put down roots in Rome. There was practically no Frankish presence in the city,
other than that of the occasional missi, who were based at St Peter’s anyway: for
the Franks, we recall, Rome effectively meant St Peter’s, and thus the Vatican area,
then the Leonine City. The main, if not only, contact which they would have had
with the Franks, other than the violent one of occasional sieges, was through the
pilgrimages to churches inside and outside the city, and the attempt to remove
relics from them. A perhaps characteristic Roman response to this was that of the
priest who kept assuring Einhard that the relics promised by him in Gaul would
be forthcoming, and kept putting off the Frankish group eager to gain such relics
with promises and procrastination.146 Carolingian influence was much stronger
in the Regnum Italiae, in terms of immigration, even in the old Exarchate; in
terms of institutions, notably through the placita, legal elements in contracts and
wills, administration through the counts and gastaldi; and in terms of coinage
and law, even as far as Venice.
The Rome of the present, and of St Peter, was to be compared and contrasted
not just with the idea of imperial Christian Rome, let alone republican pagan
Rome, but also with a Rome in decline. There was a clear understanding, outside
the city, that Rome had been great and no longer was. A large number of such
narratives flourished, some in the Carolingian world itself, which compared the
decline of Rome to contemporary times, for example in the parallel between the
wars of Louis the Pious’s sons by Florus of Lyon, and the decline of imperial
grand­eur in the past. Liutprand, in his fictionalized account of Alberic’s speech to
the Romans after his quarrel with Hugh, also made this point; no friend of
Alberic, he must nevertheless have thought it plausible for the princeps to have
said these things and be taken seriously—‘the dignity of the Roman city is led to
such depth of stupidity that it now obeys the command of a prostitute. For what is
more lurid and more debased than that the city of Rome should perish by the
impurity of one woman, and the one time slaves of the Romans, the Burgundians,
I mean, should rule the Romans?’147
Liutprand, famously, was one of the detractors of Rome—of the Rome of his
time, made up of ‘imbeciles, whose main occupation is to fish in the Tiber’, as
he claims in the speech which he puts into the mouth of Arnulf when he was
be­sieging the city, to raise the spirits of his soldiers by making them see that
the Romans they were fighting were not Pompey or Caesar, or any of those

146 Einhard, Translatio et Miracula.

147 Liutprand, Antapodosis, Bk. III, ch. 45, tr. in Squatriti.
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MEMORY AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF CITY IDENTITY 513

who had conquered their ancestors.148 For Liutprand, these brave old Romans
had left Rome long ago, and their power had been transmitted to Constantinople,
leaving behind only the riff-raff, incapable of fighting, or of living under the
authority of their betters—such as Otto I, for example, who had come to Rome
to save the Church.149
Such views, shared by northern writers who also used the old-time cliché of
the past greatness of Rome compared to its current weakness, have long defined,
for many scholars, the tenth century itself. Once again, the gaze of the outsiders,
for whom tenth-century Rome was synonymous with the weakness of the Church,
prevailed for centuries to come. There were some reasons for scholars to believe
this, on the grounds that some local writers also thought like this. The Libellus de
imperialis potestate says:

In earlier times the imperial ornament flourished in Rome, under the power of
which were various kingdoms and to which all these peoples bowed their heads.
It appointed consuls, who on a daily basis dispensed the government of the
kingdom through their counsel. Many offices were distributed, senators and
magistrates, to each in accordance with their competence for that particular
task’. (My translation.)150

And it follows this with a nostalgic yearning, when mentioning how, when
Lothar I was emperor in Rome, ‘according to custom power was greater, having
strong men from the city itself, with knowledge of ancient imperial law, suggest-
ing to Caesar and intimating to him that he should restore the ancient rule of the
emperors’.151
The famous text of the Invectiva, a pro-Formosan tract, begins with the invoca-
tion, O Roma, conditores tuos Romulum et Remum, and continues with the lamen-
tation, Ubi ergo, o Roma, tanta tua nobilitas? et antiqua tam invicta potestas?152
Rome had moved to nova Roma, Constantinople, while the other one, Roma

148 Ibid., Bk I, ch. 26.

149 G. Arnaldi, ‘Liutprando e l’idea di Roma nell’alto medioevo’, ASRSP 79 (1956), pp. 23–34; see
also G. Arnaldi, ‘Mito e realtà del secolo X romano e papale’, in Il secolo di Ferro, pp. 27–53; but the
same question is posed with a query by Arnaldi in ‘Liutprando di Cremona: un detrattore di Roma o
dei Romani?’, Studi romani 53 (2005), pp. 12–50.
150 LiP, p. 191: Priscis temporibus imperial decus effloruit Romae, sub cuius dominatione diversa
consistebant regna, et cui cunctae gentes propria submittebant colla. Constituit ergo consules, qui cotidiano
usu regni gubernacula consilio disponebant. Erant namque distributa officia per senatores et magistra-
tus, prout unicuique ministerium opere competebat.
151 LiP, p. 200: ubi et ampliori quadam usum est potestate, habens strenuos viros eius urbis, scientes
antiquam imperatorum consuetudinem, et intimantes Caesari, qui suggerebant illi, repetere antiquam
imperatorum dominationem.
152 For the Invectiva text, see Gesta Berengarii, p. 138 (‘O Rome, your founders Romulus and
Remus . . .’) and p. 145 (‘Where is now, o Rome, your great nobility? and your old and unconquered
power?’) (my translation). J. Benzinger, ‘ “Invectiva in Romam”. Romkritik im Mittelalter vom 9. bis
zum 12. Jht’, Historische Studien 404 (1968), Lübeck.
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514 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

vetusta, had fallen.153 As for Benedict of Soracte, his final lamentation about the
fate of Rome, ‘tantis genta oppressa et conculcata’, now under the Saxon yoke,
daughter after having been mother, holding the sceptre and supreme power over
kings, has become a well-known topos.154 Yet all was not lost. A Roman monk,
later bishop of Vercelli, Leo (998–1026), was the author of the hymn Sancta Maria
quid est?,155 rapidly in use for the feast of the Annunciation in the stational pro-
cession. This is a dialogue between pagan and Christian Rome, represented
respectively by an arator and a piscator: pagan Rome is not denied; it laments its
fate, comparing itself to a prostitute and a fox, but it is redeemed by Christian
Rome in the end.156 Leo was an Ottonian bishop in northern Italy, but he was one
of the first Romans who, other than the notaries, talked about, and to, the Roman
inhabitants of the city, whom we are only now beginning to know better, through
archives and archaeological excavations.
Despite the lamentations on the decline of Rome, it remains obvious that there
was, in practice, enough of the glory of Rome left on the ground to make it highly
visible and desirable to be associated with it, and proud of it, if one was a Roman
born and bred—maybe even to use elements of the (pagan) past as part of one’s
day-to-day life. This is precisely what led to Liutprand’s alleged scandalized atti-
tude towards John XII, who, according to him, was known to ‘invoke the names
of Jupiter, Venus and other demons when playing dice’, as the pope was accused of
doing at the synod which deposed him in 963.157 I would therefore suggest that
the importance of the actual, real presence of the traces of imperial Rome, visible
to the naked eye in the city—their impact in everyday life for reference purposes,
their being part of the mythical memory of the city through artefacts like the She-
wolf ‘mother of the Romans’, and the sheer long-term memory of the association
of power with words like senate, consul, princeps—were still part of the ideo­
logic­al mental landscape of the city, and its cultural memory, just as they were still
part of the actual urban landscape.158

153 Versus Romae, written in 878 in Ravenna or Naples, ed. in PLAC III p. 555; see Stella, ‘Roma
antica nella poesia mediolatina’, p. 281.
154 BenSor, p. 186.
155 PLAC V, p. 466; I. Fring, ‘Sancta Maria, quid est?’. . . Hymnus, Herrschlob und Ikonenkult im
Rom der Jahrtausendwende’, Analecta Sacri Ordinis Cisterciensis 52 (1996), pp. 224–50.
156 Stella, ‘Roma antica nella poesia mediolatina’, pp. 298–9.
157 Liutprand, Historia Ottonis, ch. 10, tr. Squatriti. See P. Chiesa, ‘Così si costruisce un mostro.
Giovanni XII nella cosiddetta Historia Ottonis di Liutprando di Cremona’, Faventia 21 (1999), pp.
496–523.
158 I disagree here with the views of Vauchez in his Conclusion in Roma antica nel Medioevo,
p. 469, who suggests that living in the middle of the ruins of the past does not mean that one under-
stands or appreciates this past. He uses the example of people who do so in Syria, using ruins because
they have nowhere else to go, but being totally indifferent to them—for him one needs to do some-
thing about ruins, not just live among them, for this to function as a real marker of the past. His
example, however, is one of people who live among the ruins of a civilization which is not theirs; we
are not talking about religion alone, but about the weight of communal memory accumulated and
transmitted orally by people who share the same ideological and cultural language, which was the case
in Rome and Ravenna.
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7
Concluding Thoughts

The story covered in this book is that of three (significant) Italian cities at a
­specific time over 250 years. They were chosen not necessarily because they were
three ‘capitals’ or because they were successful, but on account of their shared
heritage from the period of Byzantine control of central and northern Italy, in other
words because they seem to represent the last perceived forms of Roman govern-
ment and culture in Italy from Rome northwards. The questions asked were, fun-
damentally, twofold. First: did these three cities, with this shared cultural past,
continue to have features in common? Were such features, if shared with other
post-Byzantine cities such as Naples or Amalfi, but not with other Italian cities,
including the most important among their contemporaries such as Milan or Pavia,
definitely show them to have preserved a strong heritage from a Roman/Byzantine
tradition? Second: did this ‘Roman’ past remain ingrained in the cities’ physical
and mental habits in a way that was to lead them to develop in a different way
from the cities of Lombard tradition from the eleventh century onwards?
The first part of the answer must perforce look at the existence of a set of com-
mon features (institutional, political, social, economic, topographical) and of cul-
tural assumptions in terms of anthropology and cultural life (law, devotions and
rituals, art, ideology). The simple answer as to whether they shared some or most
of these in some form must definitely be yes. This has been made apparent from
such key elements as anthroponomical customs, the dominance of Roman law,
the social organization of the urban population according to the categories and
status inherited from the late antique (Roman) and Byzantine rule, the con­tinu­
ation of some forms of worship, and the vivid presence in two of these cities—
Rome and Ravenna—of the physical environment of the Roman city, in the form
of monuments, toponyms, and inscriptions. A majority of these features were also
to be found in other cities not studied here, especially Naples—which would
require an additional study for which there was no space in this book.
Having established that there was a strong common basis, it is now necessary
to point out the differences between the three cities, which are not inconsiderable.
The most immediately visible is that between Rome and Ravenna on the one hand
and Venice on the other—if one is to think of Venice in the form it acquired from
the ninth century onwards, rather than as the conglomerate of small terraferma
cities (Altino, Cittanova, Jesolo), ports (Grado), islands (Torcello, Malamocco,
Murano, Poveglia), and finally Rivoalto/Rialto itself, which originally formed the
Venetiae. The original Venetiae had a Roman past still decipherable and visible,

Rome, Ravenna and Venice, 750–1000: Byzantine Heritage, Imperial Present, and the Construction of City Identity.
Veronica West-Harling, Oxford University Press (2020). © Veronica West-Harling.
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780198754206.001.0001
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516 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

for example in Altino or Jesolo, which had been Roman settlements, but by
the ninth century their ruined houses were only used for new buildings, like the
monastery of S. Ilario. The Venice which triumphed from the ninth century
onwards, Rialto, had no Roman past and no Roman or even Byzantine physical
landscape, though it is very likely that Castello (that is, the ‘castle’) had indeed
been originally a Byzantine castrum. To all intents and purposes Venice was a
‘new’ city, with no landmarks from a Roman past. The obvious question one
might ask is why it should be one of the three cities discussed in this book. And
this is where we find the first significant distinction between the three. Venice,
which had no Roman past, unlike the other two, was the only one which, after
750, had a de facto ‘Roman’ present: it alone was still part of the Eastern Roman
or Byzantine Empire. Therefore, all the features mentioned above—names, legal
system, social status, and so on—were the result, not of a past structure, but of a
still present, current one. By contrast, the Romanness of the other two cities was,
in terms of political structures at any rate, a preservation of a past framework of
power rather than of a present condition—or perhaps an attempt to revive this
past for contemporary purposes. This distinction is absolutely crucial and impacts
in a considerable way on the everyday existence, as well as the ideological and
mental perceptions, in Rome and Ravenna. One could argue that this Romanness
was, to a certain extent, imaginary, constructed even by the elites of the two cities.
In Rome, it was at first a papal construct, which was produced under the influ-
ence of a foreign influence, that of the non-Italian, northern visitors to the city,
both intellectuals and pilgrims, who were steeped in the culture of classical Rome
and wanted to see its reality; the popes obliged by rebuilding, beautifying, and
offering to the gaze of the visitors the experience of a Rome admired from the
outside throughout the ninth century. Their efforts succeeded so well that, by the
tenth century, when the papacy itself was no longer in charge of the city, the secu-
lar elites which replaced it were determined to appropriate for themselves the
principles of government and society of classical and imperial Rome, and to
revive its secular government of the city, even as they were happy to leave ecclesi-
astical and devotional matters to the bishops. As we saw earlier, it was, by then,
too little too late, and the papacy, with the help of a revived Ottonian empire, was
to revitalize itself to the point of regaining the government of the city as well as
expanding its political power in the West.
Unlike Rome, Ravenna did maintain more of its late antique/Byzantine ­pol­it­ical
and social framework, and its bishop, unlike the pope, did not remain solely in
charge but had some form of secular administration by his side, if not working for
him, in the form of the dukes and magistri militum. But, far more importantly,
even though technically part of the papal patrimony as granted by Pepin III to the
papacy, and fighting every bit of the way papal attempts to enforce this grant,
Ravenna and its Church and territory were much closer to the Regnum Italiae and
in effect became a part of it in the tenth century. What this meant in terms of its
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Concluding Thoughts 517

society was much greater immigration and intermarriage with the old Lombard
and new Frankish population. While it preserved as much of the Roman heritage
as possible, for example in its social status (which newcomers were keen to
embrace and use) and economic structures, nevertheless the changes in names,
cultural features such as Carolingian architecture and style of worship, and legal
mix became more noticeable in the tenth century. In addition, Ravenna’s overall
perception of its imperial past was very different from that of Rome. Where the
papacy had first attempted to replace the Byzantine imperial power, then given
way to Carolingian imperial patronage, which found some support among the
aristocracy of the city in the ninth century though not in the tenth, Ravenna saw
imperial power, any imperial power, as working to its advantage and welcomed it.
The result was thus very different, especially in the tenth century when the
Ottonians were opposed in Rome but welcomed in Ravenna.
The ideological issues associated with imperial power and the Roman past
were absent in Venice, where there was no question of belonging, in theory, to the
Eastern Roman Empire of Constantinople. What was different too was not simply
the indifference of Venice towards the issue, but the fact that its technical as­so­ci­ation
with the empire, and not having to agonize over past or present Romanness and
imperial power, meant in effect that, even as it was officially the only Byzantine
city among the three, it was also in practice the most flexible in terms of changes,
when these proved necessary to evolve in synchronicity with its neighbours and
partners. It is in Venice that we have a complete mix of usage of Roman, Lombard,
and Frankish law, both Byzantine and Carolingian coinage, systems of land
exploitation which resemble those of the Lombard curtes, a Church and Benedictine
monasteries under the strong control of a secular ruler on the Carolingian model,
and architectural innovations from the Carolingian tradition such as the crypts
and Westwerke, even as, at the same time, the city has a very traditional attitude
towards maintaining Roman-style names, worshipping Byzantine exarchal saints,
and using Byzantine imperial symbols of power. One could see this as an example
of pragmatism, or one could suggest that, perhaps not having to defend or pre-
serve Romanness, Venice moved in parallel with the evolution of neighbouring
Italian cities in their contemporary development, except for its naming choices
and its saints.
Which brings me to my second key question: did the ‘Roman’ past, that is to
say the features we have defined as such, remain paramount in the physical and
mental habits of these cities in a way that was to lead them to develop differently
from the cities of Lombard tradition from the eleventh century onwards? It is not
easy to make a case based on the evidence of this study alone, when one would
need a parallel examination of what was happening in these other cities in the
same period, 750–1000, and beyond. Here, it will only be possible to give a few
pointers. Was Romanitas such a fundamental core of the identity of the city that it
would not allow for other factors to define it, or impact on its evolution? A partial
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518 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

answer has been given for Venice, but also for Ravenna, in its increasingly closer
relations with the Lombard Frankish, then Ottonian, and further on, German
imperial world of the eleventh century. In addition, in political and social terms at
any rate, it is impossible to avoid the fact that, by the twelfth century, all three
cities were convulsed by the same phenomenon as many other Italian cities at the
time, and saw the setting up of a commune which challenged or limited the power
of the traditional ruler (bishop and, in Venice, doge). The Roman form of this was
an attempt, once again, to appropriate the principles of classical republican Rome,
with the revival of the republican idea of government by the ‘senate’. This move-
ment was also contemporary with another resurgence of the Romanitas idea,
which led to a new spate of writings exalting the glorious past of the city and
its monuments. But these were written, as they had been in the ninth century,
by clerics in papal circles. We therefore come full circle to the question of city
identity and Romanitas, and whether the latter was the main element supporting
the former.
Rome’s past was ‘Roman’, republican, imperial, or Byzantine. But it was also
Christian. Before being the city of Caesar, Augustus, or Trajan, or of Cicero, the
Scipios, and so on, Rome was the city of Constantine, the first Christian
emperor—and, above all, it was the city of St Peter. Just as Venice rapidly became
the city of St Mark. And just as Ravenna did not succeed in becoming the city of
St Apollinarius. Here therefore was the other key factor in the construction of city
identity, especially in the case of Venice, where it was valid for all the people, not
only the elite, from the foundation of Rialto as the centre of power of the city
from the 830s onwards. This factor was the identifying permanent element in the
life of the city, its patron saint, preferably when it was also closely associated with
its ruling entity. Venice was a classic case of a successful coalescence around these
two unifying elements. Rome’s case was more complex, since St Peter made up the
identity of the city for non-Romans who flocked there on account of the Power of
the Keys, and who identified it with the pope, successor of the Apostle. Not all
Romans by any means did so, including those for whom Romanitas meant some-
thing else. For these, the memory in the first instance, but also the recreation of
the past through its symbols—the She-wolf, the senate, the prefect of the city, the
consuls, and so on—is one which carried through the centuries, appropriated by
various groups at various times but never gone from the collective consciousness,
as constantly recalled by the physical landscape in which all people of Rome lived.
If these ‘ordinary’ Romans were less fixated on St Peter, there were conscious of
the Christian past of the city with its martyrs, saints, and veneration of the Virgin,
as well as its local churches and priests.1 Ultimately, however, their perception of
Rome was not that which really triumphed: that was the Rome of St Peter and the

1 Di Carpegna Falconieri, Il clero, passim.

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Concluding Thoughts 519

popes, its bishops—an external view of Rome to begin with, but one which
increasingly became reflected back onto the city, until it became the core of its
identity in the later Middle Ages.
Romanitas and the common features associated with it was real, and worked,
to various degrees, as a factor of unity which remained in place on the ground
after 1000. But it did not do so in all three cities equally. Understandably perhaps,
it was by far at its most effective in Rome, where Romanitas ran in parallel with
the Christian past of St Peter and Constantine. At times, such as in the tenth and
again in the twelfth century, it triumphed over the latter, with the ideals of re­pub­
lic­an Rome taken up by the Commune, and a renewal of the admiration of eccle-
siastical authors as well as pilgrims for the glories of the Roman past. More
importantly, we know of this take-up of Romanitas by both aristocracy and
­middle classes because, for the first time in the eleventh century, we hear their
voice too among our sources. All the same, by the time of Innocent III, not to
mention Boniface VIII and the Jubilee of 1300, the dominant sound is that of
papal Rome and its central tenet, the power of St Peter. The identity of the city
had become predicated on St Peter.
The most successful recipe for success in terms of city identity was the power
of its patron saint. Venice’s is the classic example: Romanitas, or Byzantinism, was
of little consequence until it came to the fore in a major way—but that was a
Byzantinism of the present, when it set itself up as the substitute of Constantinople
after the Fourth Crusade. This became part of the city’s view of itself—never to
the extent that it was part of the way others saw it—but it never superseded its
self-consciousness of being bound up with the cult of St Mark and the doge. In
the case of Ravenna, the absence of a strong, unifying saint, which at first created
a different form of identity as anti-papal and pro-imperial, ultimately led to a lack
of a city-centred unifying factor. In the end the city’s prestige diminished on the
political scene after the eleventh century. One can hardly avoid a comparison
with Rome, for Ravenna too had pride in its past, its Roman vocabulary, and the
landscape of the Roman past all around it. Why did it not hold up in the same
way? It is not sufficient to suggest that it was because it had become too closely
involved with and drawn into the new world of Lombard Frankish influence, and
had less resilience than Rome in terms of ideological allegiance, just as in terms of
political allegiance: all three cities did, but Rome alone kept reinventing and
adapting its consciousness of Romanitas to the current political circumstances,
including an acceptance of the other city identifier, St Peter.
The Roman past and consciousness united the three cities in numerous ways in
their politics, society, and lifestyle until the eleventh century. It created a basis for
the way they evolved in the early Middle Ages, which made some elements of
their present specific and different from Italian cities which had not remained
part of the Italian Byzantine orbit for as long as these three did. Nevertheless, the
Roman past, even when it was as visible on the ground as it was in Rome, did not
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520 ROME, RAVENNA, AND VENICE, 750–1000

prevent the changes which the present imposed on these cities, or even influence
these changes as much as one might perhaps imagine. What made or broke a
strong Italian city identity, ultimately, for them as for other Italian cities, was a
strong axis of ruling power supported by the power of a saint. Such identification
was not linked to a Roman past, but to a Christian foundation—and in that
respect, cities with a strong Roman Byzantine tradition were no different from
those with a Lombard one.2

2 For example, A. M. Orselli, ‘Coscienza e immagini della città nelle fonti tra V e IX secolo’, in Early
Medieval Towns in the Western Mediterranean, ed. G. P. Brogiolo (Milan, 1997), pp. 9–16; also
M. Pellegrini, Vescovo e città. Una relazione nel medieoevo italiano (secoli II–XIV) (Milan, 2009).
 OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 15/04/20, SPi

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Index

Note: Figures and tables are indicated by an italic “f ”, “t”. Footnotes are indicated by “n.” following the
page numbers.

Aachen Treaty (812) 20, 95, 240, 385 patricius 128, 176, 386
Adalbert, Frankish king 146 princeps 130, 145, 190–1, 386, 387
Adelheid (Otto I’s wife) 69 princeps Alberic Palace (Rome) 287, 290–1
Empress Adelheid 71, 86–7, 102–3, ‘Roman restoration’ 132–3
255–6, 259–60 ruling over Rome 128–36, 145–6, 167–70,
held prisoner by Berengar II 69 190–1, 456, 468
Agapitus II, Pope 86, 132 senator omnium Romanorum 69, 128,
Agazzi, M. 427–8 134, 386
Agnellus, Andrea 79, 80, 180, 381–2 titles 128, 130, 134, 386, 502–3
anti-Romanism/anti-papal stance 17, 81, 84, Alberic family (Rome) 66, 143
220–3, 437, 438 family and territorial control over Roman
iconoclasm 17, 221–2 topography 345
Liber Pontificalis (Ravenna) 9, 17, 215, Fora 290–1, 424
217–23 passim genealogy of the Theophylact/Alberic
see also Liber Pontificalis (Ravenna) family 129t
Agnellus Particiaco, Doge of Venice 95, 96, 98, reuse of ancient topography of power 423–4
240, 272–3 Via Lata 293, 296, 424
conspiracy against 252 Alcuin 122, 329, 510
St Mark’s Basilica 426 Altino (Venice) 41, 92, 262, 265, 515–16
see also Particiaco family Ammerman, A. J. 27, 425, 448–9
Aistulf, Lombard king 52–3, 66–7, 78–9, 178, Anastasius II, Emperor 49
180, 440 Anastasius Bibliothecarius 10, 116–17, 189, 332,
Basilica Petriana 284, 305 340, 460, 467, 497–8, 499
Basilica Ursiana 78–9, 394 869/70 VIII Ecumenical Council,
coins 390 Constantinople 14–15, 167, 175, 471,
collection of martyrs’ relics from 473, 501
cemeteries 303, 319, 320 Byzantine iconoclasm 14–15
Exarchate of Ravenna 78–9, 219, 220 excommunication 167, 174–5, 453
Ravenna 80–1, 219, 284 hagiographies 14–15
Theodoric’s Palace 284–5, 299 papal election 61–2, 118, 174, 175, 460
Alamans 2, 39 Andrea Dandolo, Doge of Venice 20
Alberic (Theophylact’s grandson) 69–71, 111, Andreadi family (Venice) 245, 246, 247,
115, 116, 125–8, 139, 140, 398, 474, 512 262, 263
Castel Sant’Angelo 290–1, 463–4 Andrew, magistri militum 201
coinage 390, 502–3 Andrew of Bergamo 12–13
death of 146, 170, 176, 191 Angilberga, Empress 57, 63, 65, 83, 85, 98
genealogy of the Theophylact/Alberic Anglo-Saxons 320, 329, 409, 410
family 129t coins 390
Leo VII, Pope, and 132, 342 Annals of Fulda 9, 62, 112
monastic reform 131, 183, 342–5, 355–6, Annales Regnum Francorum 55, 99–100,
363, 374 163, 238
palaces and monasteries built by 31 Annals of St Bertin 9, 12, 62, 64, 470–1, 484–5
papacy and 126–7, 145, 152, 170, 190 Hincmar of Rheims 9, 62, 64
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654 Index

Apollinarius, St 481–2 late antique artistic models and

Ravenna and 18, 86, 317, 318, 332, 481, techniques 28
504, 518 as manifestation and instrument of
relics 86, 318, 332 power 5–6, 275, 356, 363, 395
shrine of 335 North Adriatic art 32, 375–6, 380
Aquileia 375, 380 Ottonian artistic influence in Rome 31, 375
Aquileia, Patriarch of 93–4, 99, 244, 261, 265–6 post-exarchal art 376
Arabs/Muslims 46, 46f, 49 Ravenna 31–2, 375–6, 381–2
archaeology 8, 35–6 Ravenna/Rome/Venice comparison 395–7
Christian archaeology 24–5, 33–5 Ravennate influence on Venetian
Comacchio 26 art 379–80
Ravenna 26, 35 relic cults and pilgrimage 330–1
Rome 25–6, 34–5, 494 Rome 28–31
Venice 26–7, 425 Venice 32, 375–6
Archiepiscopal Palace (episcopium/episcopal wall paintings 28, 30–1
palace, Ravenna) 197, 216, 287, see also churches and basilicas: art and
288–300, 429 architecture; crypts; iconography; icons;
apses 288 metalwork; mosaics; sculptures
Domus Felicis 289 Astronomer 9, 162
Domus Ursiana 288 Augenti, A. 26, 36, 185, 283–4, 347
Domus Valeriana 288–9, 290 autocephaly (Church of Ravenna) 17, 74, 75–85,
reorientation of 290 318, 481
St Andrew chapel 289 see also Ravenna, Church of
triclinium Quinque accubitae 289 Auxilius 13
see also palaces Aventine (Rome) 6, 31, 423, 424, 503
Arduin of Ivrea, Marquess 72 area inhabited by rulers 290–1
Arians/Arian Church 31, 194, 288, 304, 306, Otto III and 72, 283–4
347–8, 396, 429, 431 urban economic area 185
aristocracy 5–6, 106–7
consensus of the aristocracy 131–2 Badoer family (Venice) 248–9
Frankish aristocracies 111, 208, 210, 226 Ballardini, A. 366
military aristocracy of the tribunes 108–9 Barbarians 39
opposition to Ottonians 71–4 Barbatianus, St 18, 318–19, 481, 504
patronage 5–6 Baronius, C., Cardinal 8
strife between families and groups 5 Basil I, Emperor 371, 385, 467, 476, 477,
see also elite; Ravennate elite; Roman elite; 497–8, 499
Venetian elite Basil II, Emperor 105–6, 257, 270, 449, 458
Arnaldi, G. 360, 497 Basilica Emilia 292, 294
Arnulf, Emperor 67–8, 101, 128 domus solarata 294, 344
Arsenius of Orté, Bishop 61–2, 63, 118, 151, Basilica Apostolorum see S. Pietro Maggiore
174, 181 Basilica Ursiana (Ravenna) 304
Arslan, E. A. 24 Aistulf, King, and 78–9, 394
art and architecture 8, 28–32 crypt of 318–19
Byzantine art 28, 371, 376, 381 Battle of Fontenoy 60, 83, 230, 392
Carolingian influence in Ravenna 31–2, Battle of Montefeltro 86
381–2, 396–7 Bauer, F. A. 30, 372
Carolingian influence in Rome 29–31, 123, Bavarians 2, 39
364–71, 396–7, 421 Beatus, Doge of Venice 94, 95, 96, 272–3
‘exarchal’ art 32 pro-Byzantine stance 238–9
frescoes 28, 30–1, 346, 370, 374–5 pro-Frankish policies 237–8
frescoes in St Peter’s Basilica 30, 411, ypatos 239
412, 421–2 Bellavitis, G. 425
iconoclasm and 28 Belluno 104, 106, 247, 270
ideology and 29, 31, 33–5, 37 Benedict III, Pope 61–2, 151, 179, 331–2
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Benedict V, Pope 71, 72, 152–3, 171 Calaon, D. 91n.200

Benedict VI, Pope 70, 138, 172 Caleolus/Caloleus 135, 136, 145–6, 423
Benedict VII, Pope 71, 72, 172, 460 Campania (Rome) 51–2
Benedict Campaninus 125–6, 132, 135–7, 139, Campus Lateranensis (Rome) 281, 421–2,
141, 146, 183, 296, 341 453, 493
monastery of SS Cosma e Damiano in Mica Laudes Cornomanniae 446–7
Aurea 136, 342 Lupa (She-wolf statue) 281, 393, 452, 493
Benedict of Soracte 12, 170, 385n.447, 434, papal ideology and display 448
452n.162, 491, 512, 514 symbols at 493
Chronicle 8–9 see also Lateran Palace
Benericetti, R. 8, 22, 210, 213–14 Campus Martius (Rome) 125, 403–4
Berardus 133, 143 area inhabited by Roman elite 292–3
Berengar I, King and Emperor 66, 68, 98, 101, industry 186, 494–5
227–8, 456 pilgrimage traffic 186–7
division of Rome between Guy I and 67 Terme Alessandrine 292–3
Berengar II, Frankish king 69–70, 73, 86, 98, urban economic area 185–7
102, 146, 254, 255 xenodochia 403
attacks on Rome by 152, 176, 456 Candiano, Vitalis, Patriarch of
John XII, Pope, and 69, 176 Grado 102, 256–9
Berengar family (Rome) 66, 69–70 see also Candiano family
Bernard, Frankish king 162 Candiano family (Venice) 241, 256, 270, 478
Berto, L. A. 20, 21, 239 ducal title 242
Bertolini, O. 277n.5, 360 see also Candiano, Vitalis; Peter I Candiano;
Betti, M. 226 Peter II Candiano; Peter III Candiano;
Bologna 3 Peter IV Candiano
Boniface VII 70, 71, 72, 170, 172, 460, 468 Carile, A. 35–6, 108, 109, 196, 199, 210, 234
deposition 172 Carloman, Frankish king 57, 65, 67, 159, 160
murder 172, 452–3, 493 Carmen de Aquilegia numquam restauranda 19
Bonizo (John), negociator 297 Carmen de Nuova Aquilegia 91, 99
Bonizo (Marinus), capitularius of the schola Carolingian emperors 6, 42t, 58, 65, 98, 422
negociatorum 214, 231 Angilberga, Empress (850–75) 57, 63, 65,
Bonoaldi family (Venice) 244, 246, 247, 249 83, 85, 98
Bougard, F. 122–3, 282 Guy (891–5) 67, 437
Brezzi, P. 360 Arnulf (896) 67–8, 101, 128
Brondolo, castrum at 236 Louis III (905) 68
Brown, T. S. 81, 108, 199, 234 Berengar I (915–24) 66, 68, 98, 101, 227–8, 456
Brühl, C. 283 see also Charlemagne, King and Emperor;
Bulgarians 167, 175, 264, 472, 499 Charles the Bald, Emperor; Charles the Fat,
Burgundians 2, 39 Emperor; Lambert, Emperor; Lothar I,
Buzzi, G. 197, 202, 203, 204t, 230, 234 King and Emperor; Louis II, King and
Byzantine, use of the term 1–2, 40 Emperor; Louis the Pious, Emperor
Byzantine Empire 2–3, 465 Carolingian Italy 46f, 54, 179, 265, 479
Byzantine influence in Roman art 28, 371 historiography 35, 37
coinage 389 Venice and 35
dating 387–9 Carolingians 2, 18, 19, 511–12
Eastern Roman Empire 1, 7, 46, 235, 250, art and architecture: influence in
466, 517 Ravenna 31–2, 381–2, 396–7
emperor’s clothing 394, 472, 494 art and architecture: influence in
Lombard kingdom and 40–1 Rome 29–31, 123, 364–71, 396–7, 421
papacy and 118n.51, 495–501 Carolingian law 477–8, 503, 512
Venice and 3, 36, 90, 104–6, 235–6, 238–9, Carolingian names 201, 211, 234, 246, 473,
250–1, 336, 456–8, 468–70, 478–9, 475, 504
507, 515–17 Carolingian-style crypts 32, 305, 308, 330–1,
Byzantine Italy 1–2, 37, 41–2, 45f, 46f 333, 376–7, 463
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Carolingians (cont.) Charlemagne, King and Emperor 2, 3, 20–1, 464

churches and basilicas, Carolingian influence assumption of Lombard crown 53
on 330–6, 364–71, 396 Charlemagne/Pope Leo III relationship 58–9,
city identity and 472–3 67, 161–2, 223, 434, 510
Codex Carolinus 21, 58 coronation as emperor 55, 162, 250,
coinage 273, 389–91, 397, 512 384, 434–5
dating 389 devotion to St Peter 329, 510
Frankish aristocracies 111, 208, 210, 226 gifts to St Peter’s Basilica 363, 364, 373,
Frankish dynasty 2, 65, 331 392n.480, 411–12, 510
Frankish/papal alliance (Quierzy alliance) 21, Hadrian I, Pope, and 54, 392n.480
52–3, 58, 78–9, 144–5, 149–50, 153, 157–8, iconography 364–5
409, 466–7, 495, 501, 509 as patricius Romanorum 58
iconography 365, 368–9, 397 Ravenna and 80–2, 222–3, 229, 284–5
imperial missi 53, 55, 56, 58, 67, 98, 161, Ravenna, spoliation of imperial palace by the
164, 511–12 missi 223, 285, 299, 382
influence in Roman liturgy 327–32, 446, Renovatio Romani Imperii 385, 492
492, 501 Roman liturgy 328–9, 510–11
intervention in papal affairs 58–62, 64–8, Rome and 29, 54, 58, 123, 327–9, 510–11
162–4, 173–4 Theodoric’s Palace 284–5, 299, 382
metalwork: Carolingian influence in titles 384–5
Rome 30, 412–13, 421 Vatican Palace 282, 407
papal intervention in Carolingian affairs 62–5 Venice and 80, 93–5, 235, 250–1, 269–70
Ravenna and 3, 7, 223 Charles the Bald, Emperor 2, 14, 15, 57, 63, 65,
Ravenna/Carolingians alliance 80–2, 210 83, 85, 331
Renovatio agenda 385, 492 coronation as emperor in Rome 57, 65, 511
Roman elite: Carolingian migration and philosopher-king 14
settlement 122–3, 145 Charles the Fat, Emperor 2, 57, 83, 101
Rome and 3, 54–65, 511–12 coronation as emperor in Rome 57, 65, 85
Vatican Palace 283 Charles Martel, Mayor of the Palace 2, 52
Venice 7, 93–9, 456–7 Christianity
Caroso, tribune 252–3, 262–3 Christian iconography 31
Castagnetti, A. 36 Christianization and appropriation of the
Castel Sant’Angelo (Rome) 187, 283, 369, 407, public space by the papacy 398, 399–422,
460, 463 430–1, 492
Alberic and 290–1, 463–4 Christian names 222, 474–5
Otto III and 71–2, 172–3, 461 city identity and Christian
Cavallo, G. 472–3 foundation 518–20
Ca’ Vendramin excavations (Venice) 27 state religion of the Roman Empire 39
Centro Interuniversitario per la Storia e see also churches and basilicas; papacy
l’Archeologia dell’Alto Medioevo Christopher, primicerius 117, 119, 148–9, 150,
(SAAME) 22 155–9, 217–18
Cessi, R. 8, 20, 22, 36, 247, 251 Sergius, Christopher’s son 117, 119, 150,
charity and charitable system 382–3, 395 155–6, 159, 217–18
diaconiae 302, 335, 340, 357–60, 383, 401 Chronicle of Otranto 79
as manifestation and instrument of Chronicon Altinate 20
power 356 Chronicon Gradense 20
monasteries 340, 357–60 churches and basilicas 5–6, 300–11
papacy 357–60, 382–3 Archbishops of Ravenna 304–5, 317, 335
pilgrimage to Rome 359, 383 ‘catalogue’ of Leo III 400
Ravenna, Church of 383 Christianization and appropriation of the
Rome 357–61, 383 public space by the papacy 398, 399–422,
Venice 383, 396 430–1, 492
Venice: hospice of St Mark 306–8, 383, 396, 429 churches built ad martyres 303, 319–20
see also diaconiae; domuscultae; xenodochia Doges of Venice 306–8, 316–17
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foundation of 301–10, 316–17 Circus Maximus (Rome) 25, 363

iconoclasm and 363 CISAM of Spoleto 24
names of 319 Cittanova Eracleia (Venice) 41, 91, 96,
papacy and 301–3, 335, 363–75 247, 248
power and 5–6, 275, 365–7, 383, 463 destruction of 238
Ravenna 304–6, 307f, 317–19, 332, 375–6, transfer as duchy capital from Cittanova to
381–3, 396 Malamocco 91–2, 236, 424
relics 301, 303, 311–12, 335–6, 400 transfer as duchy capital from Cittanova to
Romagna pievi 32, 214, 305, 332–3, 334, 376 Rialto 239, 240
Rome 301–4, 319–20, 330–1, 335, 383, 396, city identity 6, 465–514
400–1, 407 anthroponymy 465, 473–5
Rome/Ravenna/Venice comparison 335–6, apostolic succession and founding
396–7, 430–1 saints 504–6, 518–19
stational churches 439–40 Carolingian influence 472–3
stational liturgy and 335, 400, 439–40 ceremonies, processions, festivals 439–52
tituli 121, 182, 335, 399–400, 406, 439, 505 Christian foundation and 518–20
Venetian elite 308, 310, 335–6 construction of the present: patron saint 431,
Venice 306–8, 309f, 310, 312–17, 332–3, 466, 508–15, 518–19
376–81, 425–6 emperors and 6, 458, 466–71
Venice pievi 336, 379 Greek language and culture 470–3
see also churches and basilicas: art and ideology 483–6
architecture; churches and basilicas: Roman past, importance of 180, 191, 393,
dedications; relics 395–7, 423, 465–6, 487–8, 490–5,
churches and basilicas: art and architecture 502, 515
baptisteries 303, 306, 347, 378–9, 429 Lateran Palace 406
beautification of churches 363–5, 372, 383, Latin language and culture 472, 482
407, 421 Ravenna 468–70, 503–4, 507–9, 518–19
bell towers/campanile 314, 332, 334–5, Rome 509–14, 518–19
376, 396 saints and liturgy 481–3
building techniques in church restoration 29 symbols and 393
Carolingian influence on 330–6, 364–71, 396 titles and social status 465, 486–8
ciborium 31, 319, 366, 376, 382, 412, 463 topography and lifestyle 466, 488–95
liturgical furnishings 368, 380–1 Venice 431, 486, 506–8, 518–19
orientation of 330 see also law and the notariate; ‘Roman/
pavement 370–1 Byzantine’ common heritage; Romanitas
polygonal apse basilica 375–6 Classe (Ravenna) 26
presbytery/presbiterium 333, 366, 368, 383, 442 Classen, P. 384, 472
restoration of 301–4, 335, 363–5, 371, 373–4, clergy 463
396, 407 camerarius 230
reuse of materials 285, 293, 379–80, 401–2, celibacy and marriage 118
417, 501–2 monastic clergy 183, 254, 406
space and social hierarchy 368, 383, Ravenna 229
441–2, 463–4 Rome 181–4, 510–11
transformation of Roman monuments into scriniarii/notaries 182, 230
churches 302, 400n.3, 401–3, 417–18, 421 urban clergy 181–4
westwork/Westwerk 330, 333, 376, 396 see also clergy: Venice
see also crypts clergy: Venice 261–4
churches and basilicas: dedications 311–12, 331, Bishops of the Lagoon 261–4
336, 417, 505 Olivolo/Castello, bishops of 261–4, 306
Apollinarius, St 318 other clergy members 264–7
cult of Old Testament saints 314–15 regular clergy 266–7
cult of Ravenna saints 312–14, 316, secular clergy 265–6
317, 318–19 Torcello, bishops of 262–4, 306
Virgin Mary 305, 317, 417, 505 see also clergy
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658 Index

clothing Constitutio romana 58, 59, 60, 67, 164, 174

emperors 394–5, 472, 494 papal election 56
‘Greek’ style 494 Constitutum Constantini 149n.191, 282, 413,
papacy 394–5, 486 454, 497, 500
Ravenna, Archbishops of 486 Contarini family (Venice) 244, 245, 352
Codice Bavaro 200, 209, 216, 229 Corner, Flaminio 8, 20
coinage 7, 23–4 Cosentino, S. 108, 110, 210, 211, 234
Aistulf, King 390 Costambeys, M. 11
Alberic 390, 502–3 councils 83, 175, 453
Anglo-Saxon coins 390 680 Lateran Council 77
Byzantine aurei 389 680/1 VI Ecumenical Council,
Byzantine coins 389–91 Constantinople 77
Byzantine trimetallic system 389–90 787 Nicea Council 364
Carolingian coins 273, 389–91, 397, 512 843 Constantinople Council 498
Carolingian denarii 389–91, 397 869/70 VIII Ecumenical Council,
Carolingian monometallic system 389–90 Constantinople 14–15, 167, 175, 471, 473,
Carolingian reform of coinage 389–90 499, 501
iconography 389–90 iconoclasm 14, 499–500
Leo III, Pope 385 Crescentii family (Rome) 66, 74, 115, 125, 133,
Lombard coinage 78 135, 139, 140, 146, 170, 341, 398, 468, 502
minting 188, 195, 273, 391, 397 Crescentian period 138
Ottonian coins 391 papacy and 126–7, 133, 171–2, 191
papacy 389–90 Prefect of the City 130
Ravenna 82, 390 Crescentius, John (Crescentius II’s son) 72,
Rome 389–90, 502 138–9, 146
as statement of power 5, 356, 389, 395 Crescentius I de Teodora, illustrissimus vir 70,
Venice 7, 24, 27, 390–1, 517 72, 138, 171–2, 183
Collectio Dionysiana 477 monastery of SS Bonifazio e Alessio 140,
Colombi, E.: Translatio S. Marci 19, 91, 99, 333 172, 345–6
Coloprini family (Venice) 251 Sergia, illustrissima femina (Crescentius I’s
Coloprini/Morosini conflict 259–61, 266–7, wife) 138
457–8, 461 Crescentius II, omnium Romanorum senator 71,
Colosseum (Rome) 25, 125, 418, 419, 444, 133–5, 138–9, 467–8
490, 491 execution of 71–2, 146, 461
Comacchio 26, 37, 101, 102 rebellion against Otto III 13, 72, 173, 492
Concordia (Venice) 41, 262, 378 Crescentius a Caballo Marmoreo 138
Constans II, Emperor 76–7, 81, 432 Crouzet-Pavan, E. 21
Palatine Palace 276 Crypta Balbi excavations (Rome) 24–5,
Constantine I the Great, Emperor 39, 504, 185–6, 494–5
518, 519 coin repositories 24
Christianization of Rome 398 Crypta Balbi Museum 374
conversion to Christianity 39 crypts 30, 332, 335, 396
iconography 281, 320, 365, 411, 421, annular crypts 330, 366, 376
453, 492–3 Basilica Ursiana 318–19
St Peter’s original church 411 Carolingian-style crypts 32, 305, 308, 330–1,
Constantine II, Pope 119, 120, 122, 189, 338 333, 376–7, 463
deposition 155–8, 217–18 monastery of S. Zaccaria 377–8
Constantine IV, Emperor 77, 360–1 relic cult and pilgrimage 330
Constantine V, Emperor 51, 53, 363, 390, 476 St Mark’s Basilica 27, 333, 377–8
Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, St Peter’s Basilica 413–14, 434
Emperor 9, 21, 92 see also churches and basilicas: art and
De administrando imperii 21 architecture
Constantinople
capital of the Eastern Empire 1, 39 Dalmatia 94–5, 238
capital of the Roman Empire 39 conquest by Venice 103, 106–7, 449
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Damasius, Pope 408 Diehl, C. 108, 199

Dandolo family (Venice) 246, 352 Dogaletto di Mira (Venice) 27–8
Daniel, magister equitum 61, 116, 119, Doge’s Palace (ruling elite palace, Venice) 27,
165–6, 466–7 287, 355, 380, 395–6, 425, 427
dating 976 fire 22, 244, 257, 287, 428, 461
Anno Domini style 388 chapel 308, 426
Archbishops of Ravenna 388, 389 depicted as fortress 257, 288, 428–9
Byzantine imperial dating 387–9 Particiaco family 288, 424–5, 427
Carolingian dating 389 Peter I Orseolo, Doge 288, 427, 429
dating as statement of power 387–9, 397 power and 288, 298, 300, 427–8, 438
Ottonian dating 389 restoration 288
papal dating 387, 389, 454 St Mark’s Basilica 288
Venetian dating 388–9 St Mark’s relics 288, 300, 426–7, 508
Davis-Weyer, C. 370 see also Doges of Venice; palaces
De Blaauw, S. 423 Doges of Venice 89t, 199–200
de Imiza family (Rome) 109, 125–6, 138–43, churches and basilicas 306–8, 316–17
146, 191, 424 conflict between leading families for ducal
Ildebrand and Stephen 133, 137, 141, 341 power 192, 249–61, 272–4
John de Miccina 137 conspiracies and depositions 252–61,
Palatine Palace 283, 294, 299, 491–2 272–3
wealth 142 co-regent appointment 237
Delogu, P. 24–5, 185, 302, 360 election of 242, 252, 438
‘controlled decay’ 488 episcopal function 383
De Lorenzi, P. 230 families of 235–43, 273–4
de Meliosus family (Rome) 141, 143, 146, 181, monasteries and 354–5, 396
191, 346 monastery of S. Zaccaria, investiture of the
de Meliosus, Demetrius 133, 136, 137, 139, doge at 267, 394
141–2, 170 monastery of S. Zaccaria, mausoleum of
de Meliosus, John 135, 141 doges 267, 351, 462
de Papa family (Rome) 294, 424, 492 public space and power 398, 426–9
de Primicerius family (Rome) 139, 141, 143, 424 St Mark’s Basilica 425–7, 428–9, 431
de Primicerius, John 118, 131, 133, 134, 135, St Mark’s relics and 263, 288, 311–12, 393,
138–9, 141 426–8, 507–8
De Rossi, G. B. 24, 34, 399 seat of government in Rialto 5, 27
Desiderius, Lombard king 66–7, 150, 159 titulature 386–7
Rome and 54, 155–7, 160 trade and 270
Deusdedit, Doge of Venice 93, 236 see also under individual Doges’ names;
Deusdedit, dux and magister militum Doge’s Palace; Venetian elite
(Ravenna) 201, 207, 213, 216, 225, 299 Dominic Monegarius, Doge of Venice 93, 237
Maria dudum ducarissa, widow of and Dominic Ublatella, Archbishop of
nun 201, 205, 208, 214, 217, 225–7, 348 Ravenna 83, 85, 228
trial for incest 205, 226–7, 477 domuscultae 358, 360, 479
Deusdedit, magister militum (Venice) 235 Hadrian I, Pope 362
diaconiae 113–14, 301–4, 341–2, 420, 504–5 local aristocracy and 361
charitable system 302, 335, 340, 357–60, militiae 184
383, 401 papacy and 123–4, 163, 360–2
local aristocracy and 362 Zacharias, Pope 51, 123–4, 360, 362
location 401, 406 see also charity and charitable system
monasteries and 340 Duchesne, L. 34, 399, 468
papacy and 357–62 Duchi family (Ravenna) 81, 196, 202, 210,
Roman elite 114, 118, 121 228, 234
Rome 357–60, 403 ‘Duchi’ parentela 202
see also charity and charitable system; genealogy of the duchi 204t
pilgrimage to Rome Peter IV, Archbishop, and 203–5,
Di Carpegna Falconieri, T. 182, 340, 476 215–16, 228–9
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Duchi family, Gregory II’s branch Anastasius II (713–15) 49

(Ravenna) 202–3, 210 Constantine V (741–75) 51, 53, 363, 390, 476
Church of Ravenna and 215 Irene, Empress (797–802) 54, 362
genealogy of 204t Nicephorus I (802–11) 54, 82
Gregory II, dux 202, 210 Michael I Rhangabe (811–13) 385
Ingelrada (married to Martin, Countess) 202, Michael II (820–9) 468, 471, 472
207, 208, 210, 215, 217, 296 Basil I (867–86) 371, 385, 467, 476, 477,
Ingelrada (married to Teutgrim, Rainerius’ 497, 499
mother, ducarissa) 202, 208, 210 Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus
Ingelrada/Ingiza 203 (913–59) 9, 21, 92
Martin, comes 207, 210 Nicephorus Phokas (963–9) 70, 471
Peter (Martin and Ingelrada’s son) 211, 215 Basil II (976–1025) 105–6, 257, 270, 449, 458
Duchi Honesti (Ravenna) 205, 229, 234 see also Constans II, Emperor; Justinian,
Duchi Romualdi (Ravenna) 81, 203, 205, Emperor; Leo III, Emperor
234, 348 Einhard 9, 53n.15, 282, 325–6, 385, 402, 512
Duchi Sergi (Duchi family, Sergius I’s branch, Eleutherius 117, 189
Ravenna) 202, 203, 356 crimes against Pope Hadrian II 14, 118,
Church of Ravenna and 216 166–7, 455
genealogy of 204t execution of 14, 118, 167, 174, 455
monasteries and 217, 348 elite 4–5, 7, 38, 108–11
Sergius I 203, 207 Byzantine Greek military class 108–9, 144
Duchi Traversari (de Traversara, Ravenna) 203, civilian status among 110
205, 207, 222–3, 234, 296 dux/dukes 108–11, 112
Church of Ravenna and 216 Frankish aristocracies 111, 208, 210, 226
genealogy of 206t marriage and 111, 138, 205, 208
Duchi Traversari, Paul 198, 201–2, 206t, military-judicial-ecclesiastical
226, 348 establishment 108–9, 113–14
Duchi Traversari, Peter 198, 206t magistri militum 109
duchy of Benevento 40, 42, 45f, 46f, 113 numeri/militiae 109
duchy of Naples 45f optimates 110
duchy of Rome 42, 45f, 78, 173, 235, 486 residences: Ravenna/Rome/Venice
duchy of Spoleto 40, 42, 45f, 113, 155 comparison 299–300, 395–6
Duke of Benevento 42, 50, 52, 154 taxation 109
Duke of Benevento, Adelchi 57 titles 109
Duke of Rimini, Maurice 79 tribunes 17, 108–11
Duke of Rome, Martinus 154 viri honesti/possessores 109
Duke of Rome, Stephen 116 see also aristocracy; Ravennate elite; Roman
Duke of Rome, Theodotus, primicerius 114, 119, elite; Venetian elite
150, 189, 358, 469 Emilia 75, 193, 194, 225, 429
diaconia of S. Angelo in Pescheria 114, emperors
362, 403 city identity and 6, 458, 466–71
diaconia of S. Maria Antiqua 114, 362 clothing 394–5, 472, 494
primicerius et dux 114, 118 emperor and Rome 454–6, 459, 484–6
Duke of Spoleto, Alberic 85, 111, 127–8, 374 emperor and Venice and Ravenna 456–9, 486
relic/reliquary 374 life of the city and 6
Duke of Spoleto, Guy I 128, 152, 197 papacy as substitute/equal to the
division of Rome between Berengar and 67 emperor 421, 469, 485–6, 497–8, 501
Duke of Spoleto, Guy III 85, 227 Ravenna: adventus ceremonies and
Duke of Spoleto, Lambert 197–8, 223–4, 225 coronation 436–7
Duke of Spoleto, Trasamund 50, 116, 178, 188 Rome: adventus ceremonies and
Dukes of Spoleto, House of the 66, 83, 85, 190 coronation 432–6, 439–41
symbols 486
Eastern/Byzantine/Greek emperors 3, 6, 42t see also Eastern/Byzantine/Greek emperors;
Constantine IV (668–85) 77, 360 Carolingian emperors; Ottonian emperors;
Justinian II (685–95/705–11) 80, 462 Western (Roman) emperors
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epigraphy 23, 24, 185, 325, 494 Forum of Trajan (Rome) 25–6, 136, 145,
Erchempert 12–13, 484–5 296, 423
Eugenius II, Pope 10–12, 56, 59–60, 62, 163, 455 Frankish kings 42t
Eugenius Vulgarius 13, 509 Pepin III ‘the Short’ (751–68) 52, 78, 149, 320
Eutychius, patricius and last exarch 50, 79, 154, Bernard (812–7) 162
219, 363, 413 Carloman (877–9) 57, 65, 67, 159, 160
Exarchate of Ravenna 32, 41, 42, 45f, 233 Rudolf (922–6) 69, 98, 264, 388
754 restoration to the papacy 197 Hugh (926–47) 69, 98, 146, 388
Aistulf, King 78–9, 219, 220 Lothar II (947–50) 62–4, 98
Byzantine gold coins (nomismata) 193 Adalbert (950–62) 146
capital of Byzantine rule in Italy 75 see also Berengar II, Frankish king; Pepin,
capital of Justinian’s restored empire 41 Frankish king
end of 153, 193–4 Franks see Carolingians
‘exarchal’ art 32
incorporation into the Italian kingdom 227 Galbaio family (Venice) 238, 243, 249–50, 251,
Lombard expansion over 50, 209 272, 298, 457
militarization of society in 110 Gantner, C. 505
monasteries in 349f Gasparri, S. 19, 36, 37, 250, 432
names 111, 209–10 Geertman, H. 30, 338, 372
Roman elite and 153–5 Gelichi, S. 26, 27, 36, 426n.81
see also Ravenna George, Archbishop of Ravenna 17, 82, 83, 215,
216, 223, 230, 392
Falco, G. 170 George de Aventino, vestararius 117, 127, 167
Falier family (Venice) 241, 270, 478 Gerbert of Aurillac, Archbishop of Ravenna 88,
Fantuzzi, M., Count 8 89, 148, 195, 350
Farfa 186–7 Gesta Berengarii 9
abbey 340–1, 342–3 Goodson, C. 29–30, 303, 324–5, 366
charter register 12 Görich, K. 283
Fedele, P. 8, 23, 128, 169 Gothic Wars 40, 108
Felix, Archbishop of Ravenna 77, 462 Goths 39–40, 81, 429
Ferrari, G. 339 Gradenigo family (Venice) 241, 270
Flabianico family (Venice) 241, 352 Gradenigo, Dominic 263
Flodoard of Rheims 9, 12 Gradenigo, John, monk 461
Fonti per la Storia d’Italia 8, 22 Grado 93, 312–13, 315–16, 375–6, 379–80
Fora/Fori Imperiali (Rome) 25, 125, 344, 421, decline of 99–100, 426–7
423, 488–9, 503 Grado, Patriarchs of 90, 93–4, 261, 265–6
area inhabited by Roman elite 290–1, 424 Candiano, Vitalis 256
area inhabited by rulers 290–1, 299, 423–4 Fortunatus 94–5, 99, 237–8, 249–50, 261,
ground level 292, 423, 489 263, 266, 315, 380, 457
industry 186, 494 John 93–4, 237, 250, 308
spoliation and reuse of Vitalis 258
monuments 417–18, 489 Grand Canal (Venice) 27, 102, 249, 425–6,
Formosus, Pope 12, 148, 152, 174, 175, 427, 449
374, 469 Gratian, superista 61, 116, 117, 119, 165–6,
coronation of Guy and Lambert 67–8, 224, 467
83, 85, 128 Gratianus, dux 133, 141, 143
death and condemnation of 13, 445 Gratiosus, Archbishop of Ravenna 215, 223,
Formosian crisis 13, 67–8, 148, 153, 167–71, 229, 382
175–7, 227–8, 445–6, 456 Greek language and culture 364, 422, 434,
Formosian literature 13 470–3, 498–9
Roman elite and 67 city identity 470–3
‘Synod of the Corpse’ 67–8, 168, 445–6 Greek liturgy 332, 337, 482
Forum of Nerva (Rome) 24–6, 292 Greek monasteries 336–40, 347–8, 400
housing/domus solarata 25, 292–3, 294, 344, Greek monks 336–40, 402, 406, 472–3
418, 424, 494 Greek names 111, 210, 347
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Gregory I the Great, Pope 15, 113, 184, 408–9 Hucpold, comes palatii and signifer 210
monasteries 336–7 Hugh, Frankish king 69, 98, 146, 388
St Peter’s Basilica 411–14 Hugh of Parma, Bishop 73
Gregory II, Pope 46, 47, 93 Hungary/Hungarian attacks 101, 104, 152,
confiscation of southern Italian 244, 427
lands 49, 153–4
monasteries 337, 340 iconoclasm 28, 466
opposition to Emperor Leo III 49–50, Agnellus, Andrea 17, 221–2
153–4, 188 anti-iconoclastic sentiment in Italy 339, 364,
plots against 50–1, 153–4 367, 370, 500
restoration of churches 301 art and architecture 28
Gregory III, Pope 49n.5, 51–2, 155, 301–2 Byzantine iconoclasm 14, 51, 500
liturgy 327 Church of Ravenna 80, 221–2
monasteries 339, 340 churches and basilicas 363
Gregory IV, Pope 56, 60, 184, 280, 357 confiscation of southern Italian
S. Marco and 293, 367, 373 lands 49n.5, 50
St Mark’s Basilica 121 Constantine V, Emperor 51
translation of relics 325 councils and 14, 499–500
Gregory V, Pope 71, 72, 88, 172–3 Eugenius I, Pope 59
Gregory VII, Pope 146 heresy 11, 46
Gregory of Catino: Chronicon Farfense 12 iconography and 363–7, 369–70
Gregory the nomenclator 117, 122, 127, 167 imposition in Italy 11, 50, 154
Grisar, H. 322 Lateran Palace 34, 500
Guarino, Abbot of Cuxà 258 Leo III, Emperor 11, 49, 51, 188
Guidi, Counts of Romagna 88, 203, 216 papacy 11, 49–51, 363, 365–7, 370, 498–501
Guidi of Mogliana 210 Romanitas and 495–6
Guillou, A. 108, 472 taxation and 11, 49–50, 114
Gunther, Archbishop of Cologne 63 iconography 8, 365
Guy, Emperor 67, 437 Carolingian iconography 365, 368–9, 397
Charlemagne and 364–5
Hadrian I, Pope 10, 46, 80, 150, 189 Christian iconography 31
churches built or restored by 302–3 coinage 389–90
domuscultae 362 Constantine I and 281, 320, 365, 411, 421,
management of cemeteries 303, 337 453, 492–3
monasteries 338 iconoclasm and 363–7, 369–70
pro-Frankish policies 49, 54 ideology and 370–1, 421
St Peter’s Basilica 412–13, 433–4 papacy and 364–7, 369–70, 421
Hadrian II, Pope 57, 119, 151–2, 166, 174, 189, S. Maria Antiqua, church 28, 29, 369
467, 469 St Peter’s Basilica 141, 412, 421–2, 500
Byzantine empire and 501 validity of images for teaching purposes 369
Eleutherius’ crimes against 14, 118, see also ideology
166–7, 455 icons 370, 381, 444–5
Lothar II’s divorce 64 Acheiropoita/Acheropoita 180, 278–9, 322,
Hadrian III, Pope 101, 167 327, 372, 440, 443, 444, 445
Haussig, H. W. 218–19 Byzantine influence in Roman art 29
Herklotz, I. 29 papacy and 364
Henry II, Emperor 72, 106, 107 ideology
Hincmar of Rheims 471 art and 29, 31, 33–5, 37
Annals of St Bertin 9, 64 Carolingian Rome 29–30, 62, 370–1
historiography and current research 32–7 city identity and 483–6
Honestus, Archbishop of Ravenna 88, 205, 215, iconography and 370–1, 421
229, 318 ideological shifts 7
emphyteutic leases 232, 296–7 imperial ideology 7, 37, 62, 384, 517
Hubert, E. 24 Lateran Palace 29, 34–5, 500
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Index 663

liturgy and 326–36 John VIII, Pope 12, 57, 167, 174
Otto III: renovatio imperii romani 73–4, 130, emperor-making power 64–5, 174, 469, 511
283–4, 492, 503 intervention in Carolingian affairs 64
papal ideology in relation to Johannipolis 407, 420
Empire(s) 497–501 trial of opponents of 119, 122
Paschal I’s programme 303, 365–71, 373 John IX, Archbishop of Ravenna 85, 169,
relics 303, 324–5, 428 218, 228
S. Prassede, church 29, 34, 366–7, John IX, Pope 152, 168–9
369–70, 463 John X, Pope 85–6, 152, 169
S. Susanna, church 29, 34, 365 John XII, Pope 30–1, 169, 176
see also iconography death of 146
Immonides, John 14, 167 deposition of 70–1, 86, 137, 152–3,
Cena Cypriani 15, 473 170–1, 514
Liber Pontificalis 10, 14–15 Octavian (Alberic’s son) 69–71, 126–7,
Life of Gregory the Great 472 152–3, 169, 190–1, 434
Invectiva in Romam pro Formoso papa 9, 13, 513 Otto I and 69–71, 152, 169, 176, 456
Irene, Empress 54, 362 John XIII, Pope 70, 126, 153, 171–2, 493
Isaac, Exarch 92, 376 John XIV, Pope 172, 493
Istria 32, 244, 246, 376, 388 John XV, Pope 172
Italian kingdom 32, 57, 94, 478, 504 John XVI, Pope (John Philagathos) 72, 173, 468
incorporation of the old Exarchate into 227 John the Deacon 9, 13, 19–20, 27, 36, 94, 100,
Ravenna and 3, 197–8, 396 103, 506
takeover by the Carolingians 250 foundation myth of Venice 19
Venice and 457 Historia Veneticorum 18, 90, 233
Italians 2, 49, 50, 154, 155, 511 Peter II Orseolo 104
Italy (earliest Middle Ages) John & Maurice II Galbaius, Doges of Venice 93,
Fourth Century–750 39–41 237, 250
750–1000 41–2 John Particiaco, Doge of Venice 240, 263, 311–12
Byzantine sections of 2–3 conspiracy against 252
Italy in 750 45f exiles 240–1, 308, 393
Italy in 800 46f Malamocco, destruction of 252
Italy in 1000 47f St Mark’s Basilica 100, 308
Itinerary of Einsiedeln 16, 282, 321, 414–18, see also Particiaco family
415f, 423, 489 Justinian, Emperor 1, 40–1, 75, 468
see also pilgrimage itineraries 554 Pragmatic Sanction 40
‘restoration’ of Roman Empire 1, 40
Jesolo (Venice) 41, 101, 298, 515–16 Justinian II, Emperor 80, 462
excavations at 27 Justinian Particiaco, Doge of Venice 99–100,
Justinian Particiaco 353, 354, 379 240, 263, 272, 298, 351
John, Duke (Ravenna) 21, 85, 205, 225–6, 227 Jesolo 353, 354, 379
John II Badoer, Doge of Venice 101, St Mark’s Basilica 377
241–2, 438 see also Particiaco family
John V, Archbishop of Ravenna 218, 221
John VI, Archbishop of Ravenna 215, kings 6
222–3, 289 Italian kings 3, 98, 387, 478
John VII, Pope 113, 120, 276–8, 369, 402 see also Frankish kings; Lombard kings
moving the episcopium seat to the Kölmel 169, 175
Palatine 276–7 Krautheimer, R. 24, 29, 34, 302, 399
St Peter’s Basilica 277
John VIII, Archbishop of Ravenna 84–5, 197, Lambert, Emperor 57, 65
207, 223–6 coronation as emperor in Ravenna 67, 68,
anti-Roman/anti-papal stance 84, 223–5 83, 85, 437
confiscation of lands by 224–5 Ravenna, incorporation into the kingdom of
excommunication 196, 224 Italy 197
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Lanfranchi, L. 8, 22 restoration and redecoration of 30–1,

Langobardia minor 2, 235, 471 278–81, 363–4
Lanzoni, F. 332 S. Silvestro chapel 289
Largo Argentina (Rome) 25, 292–3 Stephen V, Pope 280–1
curtes 293, 294, 344 Zacharias, Pope 278–80, 302
late antiquity 397, 465–6, 493 see also Campus Lateranensis; palaces; Sancta
definition 40 Sanctorum
titles 487 Latin (language) 14, 364, 395, 422, 434, 470, 499
Ravenna 347, 431, 487 as barbarous language 468, 471, 472
Roman Church 399, 431 city identity 472, 482
Roman monasticism 358 dissemination of Latin texts and
Western Roman aristocracy 289 traditions 472
Lateran Basilica (Rome) 300, 436 Latin monasteries 337–40, 400
collapse of 281, 374 Latin names 210
modelling of the offices on those of Roman script/Carolingian Roman 473
St Peter’s 327 vocabulary 483
official cathedral of Rome 321 Lauer, P. 322
Philip, Pope, and 177, 436, 459–60 law and the notariate 475–81
pilgrimage to Rome 321 Carolingian law 477–8, 503, 512
restoration 30–1, 374 land division/lease 477–8, 479
St George’s relics 302 Lombard law 476–7, 478, 504
Lateran Palace (papal palace, Rome) 29, 276–7, Ravenna 479–80, 503
395–6, 505 Roman law 165, 452, 465–6, 475–9, 484, 503,
administration of justice 452 515, 517
basilica Iulia 276 Romanitas and 478–9
basilica of Pope Theodore 279 Rome 480
baths and Clodio aqueduct 279 scriniarii/notaries 182, 230
churches in the Lateran area 405 Summa Perusina 476
city identity 406 tabelliones (notaries) 182–3, 209, 213,
episcopium seat 277 230–1, 477
extension of 280 Venice 477–8, 480–1, 517
festivals 439–40 women 477, 479
from patriarchium to palatium 278 see also city identity
Gregory IV, Pope: triclinium 280 Lazard, S. 210
ideological programme 29, 34–5, 500 Lazio 24–5, 140, 142, 143, 189–90
influences on 278 leases
Lateran Piazza 29, 460 emphyteutic leases 115, 124–5, 141,
Leo III, Pope 279–80, 363–4 189, 479
Leo III: triclinia 29, 279–80, 289, 300, 454 livello leases 214, 232, 388, 479
Leo IV, Pope 280 papal leases 124–5
Liber Pontificalis 280 Ravenna 194–5, 198–201, 203, 477
looting and derelict of 280–1 Ravenna: emphyteutic leases 86, 110, 213–17,
macrona/hall of honour 279 232, 234, 296, 348
maintenance of 281 Roman elite 141–2, 189
mosaics 280, 365 women 477
paintings 280 Leo, bishop of Vercelli 514
papal administration 121–2, 126, 189, Leo, spatharius 221
410, 469 Leo I, Archbishop of Ravenna 79–80, 159,
papal education 121–2, 157 215–16, 217
papal elections and anti-Roman/anti-papal stance 222
enthronement 436, 459–60 Italiae exarchus 222
patriarchium 278, 279 Leo I, Pope 408
portico/Laubiae 281 Leo III, Emperor 47–50, 476
power and 278–80, 300, 436, 438–9 Gregory II, Pope, and 49–50, 153–4, 188
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iconoclasm 11, 49, 51, 188 official end of 11–12

taxation 11, 49, 153–4, 188 papacy/papal election 11, 16, 61–2, 120,
Leo III, Pope 55, 58 150–1, 158, 160–7 passim, 177
Charlemagne/Leo III relationship 58–9, 67, papal court and 16
161–2, 223, 434, 510 Roma/Ravenna’s Liber Pontificalis
churches built/restored by 29–30, comparison 16–18
302–4, 363–4 Libri Carolini 364, 453
coinage 385 liturgy
Filioque dispute with the Franks 58n.52, 364 Benedict III, Pope, and 328, 331–2
Lateran Palace 279–80, 363–4 Byzantine past 326, 331
Lateran Palace: triclinia 29, 279–80, 289, Carolingian influence in Roman
300, 454 liturgy 327–32, 446, 492, 501
liturgy 304, 327 cemeteries: vigils and masses in 327
monastery of S. Silvestro in Capite 338, 460 Charlemagne and Roman
plot during the Laetania Maior liturgy 328–9, 510–11
gathering 160–2, 338, 460 city identity 481–3
Roman elite and 55, 119–20, 160–2, 304 episcopal cathedra, position of 330–1
St Peter’s Basilica 411–14 Eucharistic liturgy 366, 440
Leo IV, Pope 11, 21, 56–7, 61, 64, 165, 174 Gelasian Sacramentary 329
Lateran Palace 280 Greek liturgy 332, 337, 482
restoration of churches 373–4 Gregory III, Pope, and 327
St Peter’s Basilica 411–14, 419–20 ideology and 326–36
SS Quattro Coronati 121 Leo III, Pope, and 304, 327
Leo V, Emperor 351, 369, 497 liturgical books 328–30, 446
Leo V, Pope 169 new celebrations 327
Leo VII, Pope 132, 342 Ordo I 330–1, 373
Leo VIII, Pope 72, 86, 169–71, 172 Ordo XLV 435
exile 152 Ravenna 332, 482
the protoscriniarius 70–1, 118, 148, 152, 169, relics and 325, 327
291, 424 ‘Romanization’ of Frankish
Leonine City (Rome) 404, 406, 408, 417, 512 liturgy 327–31, 446
Civitas Leoniana 408, 410 as source of information 7, 16
expansion of 5, 26 urban liturgy 398
industry 186 Venice 332, 448
Lothar I 165–6 see also stational liturgy
pilgrimage to Rome and 26, 186, 360, 505 Liutprand, Lombard king 50–2, 115, 116,
urban economic area 186 153, 154–5
Le Pogam, P. 283 Venice 91
Libellus de imperatoria potestate in urbe Roma 9, Liutprand of Cremona 12, 71, 137, 171,
13, 484–6, 493, 502–3, 512, 513 471, 512–13
Liber Diurnus 188, 432 Llewellyn, P. 360
Liber Pontificalis (Ravenna) 17 Lombard Italy 37, 42, 45f, 46f, 156, 199, 414, 452
Agnellus, Andrea 9, 17, 215, 217–23 passim Lombard kings 19, 22, 41, 42t, 50, 51, 53, 432
Roma/Ravenna’s Liber Pontificalis see also Aistulf, Lombard king; Desiderius,
comparison 16–18 Lombard king; Liutprand, Lombard king
Liber Pontificalis (Rome) 8, 16–18, 58–9, 91, 93, Lombards 2, 19
113, 115–16, 483, 486, 505 alliance with the Byzantines 51
Anastasius Bibliothecarius 10 Byzantine Empire and 41–2
authorship 11, 16, 18, 165 coinage 78
Carolingian control over Rome 61 duchies 40, 111
challenges 10–12 expansion of 40–1, 45–6, 53, 153
dating 10 Frankish aristocracies 111
Immonides, John 10, 14–15 Lombard law 476–7, 478, 504
Lateran clergy and 10, 165 Lombard names 113, 201, 211, 233
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Lombards (cont.) Marozia, senatrix Romanorum (Theophylact’s

papacy and 113, 153, 156–8, 495, 496–7, 500 daughter) 69, 290, 474
Ravenna and 7, 51–2, 78–81, 218–19, 221 married to Alberic, Duke of Spoleto 127, 128
Roman elite: Lombard expansion and married to Hugh, King of Italy 128, 463
migration 113, 160 papacy and 145
schola of 113 Marozia II, senatrix 117, 134–5, 136,
Venice and 7, 27, 41, 90–2, 94 139–40, 142
Lothar I, King and Emperor 11, 163, 455 Martin, Archbishop of Ravenna 223, 381–2
Constitutio romana 56, 59, 60, 164, 174 Mastalici family (Venice) 241, 244, 253, 310
Leo IV, Pope, and 165 Maurice, magister militum 92
Pactum Lotharii 19, 96, 100 Maurice Galbaio, Doge of Venice 93, 237, 250,
Roman elite and 124 263, 308
St Peter’s Basilica 57, 419 Mauroceni family (Venice) 244–8 passim,
Lothar II, Frankish king 62–4, 98 266–7, 270, 308, 310, 316
Louis II, King and Emperor 14, 497–8 Maurus, Archbishop of Ravenna 76–7
adventus of 484–6 Meneghini, R. 25
coronation as emperor in Rome 11, 12, 56, metalwork 25, 28, 30, 380
57, 64, 84, 166 Carolingian influence in Rome 30, 412–13, 421
involvement in Roman affairs 60–4, St Peter’s Basilica 412–13
166–7, 174 see also art and architecture
letter to the Emperor Michael III 14, 466 methodology 3–7, 515
punishment against Romans 56, 60, 67 actors 5
Ravenna 225 arguments 4, 6–7
Louis III, Emperor 68 power 5–6
Louis the Pious, Emperor 55, 95, 124, 455 questions 5–6, 515–20
817 Ordinatio Imperii 59 timeline and concordance: Doges, rulers of
839 embassy from Emperor Theophilus 470–1 Italy, Popes, Archbishops of Ravenna 43–4t
crowned at Rheims 55 see also sources
Ludovicianum 59, 162–3, 174 Michael I Rhangabe, Emperor 385
St Peter’s Basilica 412 Michael II, Emperor 468, 471, 472
Luchterhandt, M. 29, 366–7 Milan 3, 106, 515
Ludovicianum 59, 67, 158, 162–3, 174 imperial city 39
autonomy of the Patrimony of St Peter 55 Miller, D. H. 288
papal election 55 monasteries 5, 6, 336–56
abbesses 183–4, 216, 267, 348, 355, 394
Mainbertus 227, 462 abbots 183, 216, 342, 348
Malamocco 27, 91n.200, 92, 93, 248, 250–1 Archbishops of Ravenna 347
Obelerius’ rebellion and destruction of 252 Benedictine Rule 329, 336–7, 347–8, 354, 396
transfer as duchy capital from Cittanova to charitable role of 340, 357–60
Malamocco 91–2, 236, 424 diaconiae 340
transfer as duchy capital from Malamocco to Doges of Venice 354–5, 396
Rialto 27, 96, 308 foundation and restoration of 339–40
Marazzi, F. 24–5, 188, 189, 302, 360 Greek monasteries 336–40, 347–8, 400
Marini family, negotiatores (Ravenna) 231 Greek monks 336–40, 402, 406, 472–3
Mark, St Gregory I, Pope 336–7
Bonus and Rusticus 245, 269–70, 311–12 Gregory II, Pope 337, 340
cult of 431, 506–8 Gregory III, Pope 339, 340
Doges of Venice and 265–6, 507–8 Hadrian I, Pope 338
Doges of Venice and relics of 263, 288, Latin monasteries 337–40, 400
311–12, 393, 426–8, 507–8 Lazio 340–1, 363
Reichenau monastery 20–1, 312, 393 leases, grants and sales 140–1, 143, 183,
relics 20–1, 266, 269–70, 333, 376, 377 348, 355
Venice and 431, 507–8, 518, 519 liturgical role of 340
see also St Mark’s Basilica monastic clergy 183, 254, 406
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monastic reform 131, 145, 183, 342–5, 355–6, monastery of S. Stefano of Altino (Venice) 102,
363, 374, 482 244, 354, 388, 452, 478
monks 183, 340, 406 monastery of S. Zaccaria (Venice) 89, 93, 267,
nunneries 339, 347, 348, 351 298, 308, 312
nuns 183–4, 200, 217, 266, 267, 351, 394 Coloprini/Morosini conflict 266
papacy and 336–40, 345, 407 crypt 377–8
Paul, Pope 337, 338, 340 importance of 267, 351, 355, 394, 462–3
power and 5, 275, 355, 363, 395 investiture of the doge at 267, 394
Ravenna 346–50, 349f, 356, 396 Joanna (Peter IV’s ex-wife), abbess of 254,
Ravenna/Rome/Venice comparison 396 255, 256, 267, 351
Ravennate elite and 215–17, 347, 396 lands granted to 353
relics 351, 354 mausoleum of doges 267, 351, 462
roles of 355–6 murder of Doge Peter Tradonico 267, 351
Roman Church and 340–1 nuns 267, 351, 394
Roman elite and 126, 140–1, 143, 341, 342, relics 351
343f, 355–6 monastery of SS Alessio e Bonifacio (Rome) 23,
Rome 336–43, 407 140–1, 183, 341, 345–6, 482
Venetian elite and 267, 273, 310, 350–5, 396 as centre of learning 345–6
Venice 346–7 Crescentius I and 140, 172, 345–6
monastery of Brondolo (Venice) 92–3, 247, granting of the Tiber island to 135, 341
267, 354 ‘monastery palace’ 283
monastery of Pomposa (Ravenna) 104–5, 225, Otto II and 346
347, 350 Otto III and 341, 346
campanile at 334 monastery of SS Andrea e Gregorio
monastery of S. Agnese (Rome) 23, 340, 406 in Clivo Scauro (Rome) 15, 23, 341,
monastery of S. Andrea (Ravenna) 231, 347 342, 405
monastery of S. Giorgio (Venice) 22, 93, 352, 354 grants 137, 140–1, 143, 183, 491
Ravennate dukes and 217 monastery of SS Ciriaco e Nicola in Via Lata
Tribuno Memmo, Doge 267, 352 (Rome) 23, 140–1, 143, 342, 343, 374
monastery of S. Giovanni Battista (Torcello) 310 monastery of SS Cosma e Damiano in Mica
monastery of S. Ilario (Venice) 28, 92–3, 352, 354 Aurea (Rome) 23, 140–1, 341–2
monastery of S. Lorenzo (Venice) 22, 266–7, monastery of SS Ilario e Benedetto (Venice) 22,
272, 352–3, 355, 377–8 352, 353–4
monastery S. Maria de Aventino (S. Maria del monastery of Subiaco (Rome) 135, 136
Priorato, Rome) 290, 342, 374 Monegario family (Venice) 243, 253
monastery of S. Maria in Campus Martius Monegario, Dominic 93, 236–7
(Rome) 23, 404n.14, 406 Monetario, Dominic 252–3
monastery of S. Maria in Cereseo (Ravenna) 87, Monetario, John, tribune 241, 253
203, 213–14, 217, 297, 347, 348, 356 Monothelitism 77, 114, 278n.10, 337, 369, 409
monastery of S. Maria in Cyro (Rome) 140 Monumenta Germaniae Historica 8, 22
monastery of S. Maria in Palazzuolo Morosini family (Venice)
(Ravenna) 347, 349 Coloprini/Morosini conflict 259–61, 266–7,
monastery of S. Maria in Pallara (Rome) 278, 457–8, 461
283–4, 343, 374–5, 490 monastery of S. Zaccaria 267
frescoes 31 Morosini, Dominic 259–61, 266–7, 352, 354
synod held in 15, 283–4 mosaics 28, 30, 31, 378, 394, 421
monastery of S. Maria in Trastevere 340, 405–6 apse mosaics 280, 366, 371, 376, 382, 383
monastery of S. Michele of Brondolo (Venice) 22 Lateran Palace 280, 365
monastery of S. Servolo 99, 104–5, 238, 244, mosaic of Leo III’s Lateran triclinium 365
313, 352, 353, 354, 355 mosaics of Theodoric 382
monastery of S. Severo (Ravenna) 26, 349 St Peter’s Basilica 411, 412
monastery of S. Silvestro in Capite (SS Lorenzo e Vatican Palace 410
Silvestro, Rome) 23, 291, 337, 403, 406 see also art and architecture
Leo III, Pope, and 338, 460 Muratori, A. 8
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names Origo Civitatum Italiae Seu Venetiarum 20, 239,

Carolingian names 201, 211, 234, 246, 473, 247, 262, 310
475, 504 Origo De Gentis 91
Christian names 222, 474–5 Orseolo family (Venice) 243, 246, 247, 257
churches and basilicas 319 see also Otto Orseolo; Peter I Orseolo; Peter II
city identity: anthroponymy 465, 473–5 Orseolo; Ursus Orseolo
city identity, topography and 488–95 Ortalli, G. 36, 242–3, 250, 253, 259, 260
destruction of buildings and loss of Otto I, King and Emperor 68, 86
inscriptions 418, 489 coronation as emperor in Rome 69–70, 73
Exarchate of Ravenna 111, 209–10 intervention in papal affairs 69–70, 107,
Germanic names 111, 210 152–3, 171
Greek names 111, 210, 347 John XII, Pope, and 69–71, 152, 169,
imperial Roman past, importance of 492 176, 456
Latin names 210 marriage to Adelheid 69
Lombard names 113, 201, 211, 233 Peter IV Candiano and 255
mix of names 148–9, 232–3, 234, 246 placitum 72
public space 418, 423, 430 Otto II, Emperor 71, 72, 88, 107
Ravenna 6, 209–10, 232–3, 473–4, 504, 517 coronation as emperor in Rome 70, 73
Ravenna: female names 212 monastery of SS Alessio e Bonifacio 346
Rome 6, 148–9, 473–4, 489–90, 492 revenge on Peter IV’s murder 102–3, 258
Rome: female names 143n.179, 201, 473–4 Venice 102–3, 107, 256, 259, 274
Venice 6, 243–4, 245–8, 474–5, 517 Otto III, Emperor 13, 72–3, 107, 464
Venice: double name/cognomen 243, 253, Castel Sant’Angelo 71–2, 172–3, 461
474, 475 coronation as emperor in Rome 71
see also titles imperial self 73–4
Naples 3, 13, 515 intervention in papal affairs 71–2,
Nicephorus I, Emperor 54, 82 172–3, 468
Nicephorus Phokas, Emperor 70, 471 monastery of SS Alessio e Bonifacio 341, 346
Nicholas I, Pope 10, 14–15, 61–3, 64–5, 84–5, Palatine Palace 73, 283, 284, 287, 299, 503
166, 174, 177–8, 467–9, 470 Ravenna 81, 86, 88–9, 107, 381, 437
adventus of Louis II 485 rebellion and condemnation of Crescentius II
Byzantine empire and 501 by 13, 72, 173, 492
intervention in Carolingian affairs 62–3 renovatio imperii romani 73–4, 130, 283–4,
Lothar II’s divorce 62–4 492, 503
St Peter’s Basilica 413 Venice 104–5, 106, 251, 312, 392–3
Noble, T. F. X. 124, 360, 386, 466, 472, 496 titles 73–4, 386
Noheli family (Venice) 244, 245, 246, Ottonian emperors 6, 26, 42t, 66, 71–4
247, 352 Adelheid, Empress 71, 86–7, 102–3,
notaries see law and the notariate 255–6, 259–60
Notker 9, 12, 123, 416, 505, 510–11 Henry II 72, 106, 107
numismatics see coinage Theophano, Empress 70, 71, 87–8, 103,
259–60, 284, 348, 402, 461
Obelerius, Doge of Venice 94–6, 237, 272, 273 see also Otto I, King and Emperor; Otto II,
Byzantine alliance 238–9 Emperor; Otto III, Emperor
conspiracy against the Particiaco 250, Ottonians 12, 457
252, 457 artistic influence in Rome 31, 375
doges of Malamocco 237–8, 250, 457 Church of Ravenna and 195
execution 252 coinage 391
Frankish alliance 238, 250–1, 457 dating 389
spatarius 238 Ottonian Italy, historiography and current
Odo of Cluny 290, 342, 343, 356, 374 research 35, 37
Olivolo/Castello 94, 96–7, 272–3, 424–5, 448 Ottonian Palace (Ravenna) 286
bishops of 261–2, 263–5, 306 Ottonianum 87
cathedral of 308, 378 papacy and 170, 191, 455, 501
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Roman elite and 71–4 Christianization and appropriation of the

Venice 103, 104, 256 public space by the papacy 398, 399–422,
Otto Orseolo, Doge of Venice 105, 351 430–1, 492
see also Orseolo family churches and basilicas 301–3, 335, 363–75
clothing 394–5, 486
Pactum Lotharii 19, 97–100, 478 Codex Carolinus 21, 58
formulae 268 coinage 389–90
renewal 98, 103, 245, 264, 270, 271 confiscation of southern Italian lands by
slave trade 271 Byzantine emperor 49–51, 123–4,
Padua 3, 27 164, 197
palaces 276–87 corruption 511
as centres of power 5, 275 as ‘cultural broker’ 505
Rome/Ravenna/Venice comparison 395–7 diaconiae 357–62
see also palaces: episcopal; palaces: imperial; domuscultae 123–4, 163, 360–2
palaces: papal; palaces: ruling elite dual papal association of Rome 505, 509–10
palaces: episcopal education 121–2, 157
Patriarch’s Palace (Venice) 287–8 emperor-making role of 64–5, 174, 435n.119,
see also Archiepiscopal Palace 469, 511
palaces: imperial 396 expropriation and abuse by 123–4
Ottonian Palace (Ravenna) 286 iconoclasm 11, 49–51, 363, 365–7,
Valentinian Palace (Ravenna) 40, 285n.41 370, 498–501
see also Palatine Palace; Theodoric’s Palace iconography and 364–7, 369–70, 421
palaces: papal see Lateran Palace; Vatican Palace ideology in relation to Empire(s) 497–501
palaces: ruling elite 287–91, 395–6 intervention in Carolingian affairs 62–5
princeps Alberic Palace (Rome) 287, 290–1 leases 124–5
see also Doge’s Palace military expeditions 188
Palatine Palace (imperial palace, Rome) 31, 125, monasteries 336–40, 345, 407
276–8, 284, 286, 299, 395–6, 402–3, 503 non-Roman popes 148, 150, 157, 188
abandoned as palace 278, 294 papal dating 387, 389, 454
Christianizing the Palatine 277 papal letters 21, 224
churches in the Palatine area 403 papal state 65, 81, 131, 496
Constans II 276 pilgrimage to Rome 342, 362, 407–10, 421,
de Imiza family 283, 294, 299, 491–2 470, 505
diaconiae 403 possessio ceremony 279
Domus Augustana Flavia 276, 278, 403 power 420–2, 463–4, 469–70, 496–7
excavations at 277–8 role in running the city 418–22
John VII, Pope: moving the episcopium seat to Rome and 32–3, 41, 65–6, 148–9, 188–9,
the Palatine 276–7 505, 509–10
Otto III 73, 283, 284, 287, 299, 503 stational liturgy 440–1, 444
private aristocratic property at 491–2 as substitute/equal to the emperor 421, 469,
S. Cesario, palatine chapel 276, 402 485–6, 497–8, 501
S. Maria in Pallara 278, 294 symbols 485–6
transformation into churches and titulature 386
monasteries 278, 294, 402–3, 491–2 wealth 124–5, 144–5, 279n.14, 364–5, 372
Turris Chartularia 278 xenodochia and 358–60, 362, 408, 410, 420
see also palaces see also under individual Popes’ names;
Palestrina 142 Ludovicianum; papacy and rulers/elite;
Pandulf of Pisa, Cardinal 12 papal elections; Patrimonium of St Peter
Pani Ermini, L. 34, 399 papacy and rulers/elite
papacy 43–4t, 147t, 147–77, 188–9 Alberic 126–7, 145, 152, 170, 190
750–900 119–24, 148, 190–1 Byzantines 118n.51, 495–501
tenth century 126–7, 148–9 Carolingian intervention in papal
‘Adelspapsttum’ 126 affairs 58–62, 64–8, 162–4, 173–4
charity 357–60, 382–3 Crescentii family 126–7, 133, 171–2, 191
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670 Index

papacy and rulers/elite (cont.) Paul, Exarch 50, 119n.51, 154, 276, 403
Frankish/papal alliance (Quierzy alliance) 21, Paul I, Pope 53–4, 79, 119, 150, 178, 189,
52–3, 58, 78–9, 144–5, 149–50, 153, 157–8, 328, 466
409, 466–7, 495, 501, 509 monasteries 337, 338, 340
Lombards 113, 153, 156–8, 495, 496–7, 500 Ravenna and 220
Otto I 69–70, 107, 152–3, 171 St Peter’s Basilica 412
Otto III 71–2, 172–3, 468 Sergius, Archbishop of Ravenna, and 220–1
Ottonians 170, 191, 455, 501 translation of relics 303, 324
Roman elite 110–11, 114–15, 117–20, 126–7, Paul Afiarta, primicerius 113, 150, 156,
144–5, 147–77, 188–90, 502 157, 159–60
Roman elite/papacy struggles: conflicts, execution of 79, 159, 222, 234
depositions 55, 67–8, 137–8, 153–77, 189, sent to Ravenna for trial 159, 234, 497
455–6, 502 Paul the Deacon 18, 90–1
Theophylact family 145, 176 Paulicius, Doge of Venice 90, 91, 94
Tuscolani family 133 Pavia 3, 54, 82, 515
see also papacy; papal elections capital of Lombard kingdom 40, 42,
Papadopoli Aldobrandini, N. 23 50, 54, 154
papal elections 55, 56, 66 relics from 303
Anastasius Bibliothecarius and 61–2, 118, Pentapolis 41, 51, 193, 194
174, 175, 460 Lombard expansion over 51
Constitutio romana 56 Louis II 223
contested elections 459–60 monasteries in 349f
Lateran Palace 436, 459–60 papal control over 222
Liber Pontificalis 11, 16, 61–2, 120, 150–1, Pepin, King 53, 54, 94–5, 250
158, 160–7 passim, 177 attack on Venice by 20
Ludovicianum 55, 58 Pepin/Nicephorus peace treaty 82
populus: Rome 177–8 Pepin III ‘the Short’, Frankish king 52, 78,
Roman elite and papal contested elections 66, 149, 320
70–1, 111, 118–19, 149–53 Pertusi, A. 36, 251
Theophylact, superista and Peter, St
vestararius 120, 122 Charlemagne’s devotion to 329, 510
see also papacy; papacy and rulers/elite cult of 398, 408–10, 417, 431, 470, 483–4,
Paroli, L. 34 505, 509
Particiaco family (Doges of Venice) 92, 239 relics 409–10
conspiracy against 241, 252–3 Rome and 431, 483–4, 505, 509–10,
Doge’s Palace 288, 424–5, 427 512, 518–19
move to Rialto 27, 96–7, 239–40, 250, 253, tomb 281, 413–14, 436
272–3, 424–5 see also St Peter’s Basilica
wealth 239, 272 Peter I Candiano, Doge of Venice 242, 438
see also Agnellus Particiaco; John Particiaco; see also Candiano family
Justinian Particiaco; Ursus I Particiaco/ Peter I Orseolo, Doge of Venice 103, 243,
Badoer; Ursus II Badoer; Ursus Particiaco 258, 287–8
Paschal, primicerius 160–1 Doge’s Palace 288, 427, 429
Paschal I, Pope 56, 58, 163, 177 as monk 258
churches built or restored by 29, 303, plot against Peter IV 103, 258–9, 288
365–71, 463–4 St Mark’s Basilica 103, 308, 427, 429
ideological programme 303, 365–71, 373 see also Orseolo family
murder of Theodore, chief of Peter II Candiano, Doge of Venice 102, 243
notaries 59, 61, 163 see also Candiano family
plot/hostility against 124, 163, 304 Peter II Orseolo, Doge of Venice 18–19, 103–7,
translation of relics 303, 324, 368 243, 248, 258, 438, 449, 508
Vatican Palace 412 992 chrysobull 105, 270
Patlagean, E. 339 Bari, victory at 103, 106–7, 393
Patrimonium of St Peter 3, 123, 132, 140, conciliatory style 106–7, 261
479, 484 Dalmatia, conquest of 103, 106–7, 449
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Dalmaticorum dux 106 pilgrimage to Rome 26, 185, 186, 281, 383
death 1067 Anglo-Saxon pilgrims 326
family 107 beautification of St Peter’s, Roman Christian
gifts by 392–3 past and monuments 410
Otto III’s secret visit to Venice 104–5, 106, Campus Martius 186–7
251, 392–3 cult of St Peter 398, 408–10, 417, 431, 470,
pro-Ottonian stance 251 483–4, 505, 509
young ‘Otto’ as Otto III’s godson 105 Lateran Basilica 321
see also Orseolo family Leonine City 26, 186, 360, 505
Peter III Candiano, Doge of Venice 98, 102, 243, papacy and 342, 362, 407–10, 421, 470, 505
253–4, 255 pilgrimage ‘ad limina’ 408–410
see also Candiano family relics and 321, 324–6, 330, 409
Peter IV, Archbishop of Ravenna 86, 88, St Peter’s Basilica and 281, 321, 407, 414, 503
228–9, 318 Schola Francorum, Schola Langobardorum,
Duchi family and 203–5, 215–16, 228–9 Schola Frisonum 410
Ottonians and 228–9 Scholae Peregrinorum 410, 420
Peter IV Candiano, Doge of Venice 102, Schola Saxonum 410, 419
253–8, 463–4 shrines inside the city walls 321
976 Doge’s Palace fire 257, 428, 461 shrines outside in cemeteries 321
anti-slavery and anti-Muslim policies 254, see also diaconiae; xenodochia
257, 270, 271, 313 piracy 99, 100, 242–3, 448, 456
Berengar II and 255 placita (assemblies) 22, 72, 116, 310, 452, 480,
conspiracy against his father 253–4 503, 512
ecclesiastical policy and 254 942 placitum 135, 452
exile 102–3, 254 963 placitum 135, 137, 181–2
Joanna (Peter IV’s ex-wife) as abbess of 967 placitum 202
S. Zaccaria 254, 255, 256, 267, 351 973 placitum 198
married to Waldrada 102, 103, 255, 256, 257 994/5 placitum of Bertinoro 198
murder of 102–3, 256–8, 428–9 administration of justice 452
Otto I and 255 Platon, vir illustris 113, 403
Otto II’s revenge on Peter IV’s populus: Ravenna 486–7
murder 102–3, 258 cives 233
recall from Venice 254 merchants and artisans 231–3
see also Candiano family mixed marriage 232–3
Peter Tradonico, Doge of Venice 97–8, 100, 241 negociator 231–2
murder of 267, 351 schola negociatorum 231
Peter Tribuno, Doge of Venice 101–2, 242 populus: Rome 177–88, 486–7
Petriana Basilica (Ravenna) 284, 305 citizens 180
Petronax, Archbishop of Ravenna 83–4, 215, 318 definition of 177, 184
Philip, Pope 155–7, 160, 177, 436, 459–60 key words for 179–80
Photian schism 85, 166, 196, 467–8, 498–501 laity 180, 184
Photius, Patriarch 196, 332, 498–500 Liber Pontificalis 177–81, 184
Piazza Madonna di Loreto (Rome) 25, 185, 494 merchants and artisans 184–8
Pietrangeli, C. 29 militia 178–9, 184
Piétri, C. 399 papal elections 177–8
pievi plebs 180
Romagna pievi 32, 214, 305, 332–3, 334, 376 urban clergy 181–4
S. Giovanni del Tò 31–2, 376 viri honesti/femina honesta 110, 180, 181, 187
Venice pievi 336, 379 populus: Venice 267–72, 486–7
pilgrimage itineraries 9, 16 artisans 271
Codex Salisburgense 416 definition of 267–8
De Locis Sanctis 16, 321, 416 John the Deacon: Historia Veneticorum 233
Notitia Ecclesiarum Urbis Romae/Catalogue mediocres et minores 268
Salisburgense 16, 321, 416 merchants/negociatores 268–71, 273–4
see also Itinerary of Einsiedeln slaves 271–2
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672 Index

Porticus of Octavia (Rome) 25 papacy’s role in running the city 418–22

power 6, 38 papal leases 124–5
art and architecture 5–6, 275, 356, 363, 395 pilgrimage to Rome 398, 408–10, 420
churches and basilicas 5–6, 275, 365–7, play fighting/public games 449–51
383, 463 power and 5, 6, 420–2, 426–9, 463–4
coinage 5, 356, 389, 395 public space as place of cohesion 399, 432–63
dating 387–9, 397 public space as place of conflict 399,
Doge’s Palace 288, 298, 300, 427–8, 438 432, 454–63
emblems of power: crown, sceptre, Ravenna 429–30, 436–8
sword 393–4 Ravenna: Regio of the Criminals 449–51
hierarchy of power 463–4 reuse of places of power 299, 396, 423–4
Lateran Palace 278–80, 300, 436, 438–9 riots and conspiracies 460–3
manifestations and instruments of 356–95 Roman old imperial public space 145
monasteries 5, 275, 355, 363, 395 Rome 432–6
objects of power: emblems, symbols, and Rome/Ravenna/Venice comparison 430–2,
gifts 391–5 438–9, 451–2
papacy 420–2, 463–4, 469–70, 496–7 spoliation and reuse of monuments of Roman
patronage and 5–6 city centre 417–18
public space and 5, 6, 420–2, 426–9, 463–4 Venice 398, 424–5, 438–9, 449–51
relics and 5, 121, 345, 431 see also liturgy; power; stational liturgy
reuse of places of power 299, 396
statements of 384–95 Rainerius, deacon of Ravenna 88, 134, 143, 201,
symbols and 275, 277–8 202, 438, 453, 462
titulature 356, 384–9 attack on archiepiscopal archives 215–16, 230
see also art and architecture; charity and Duchi family 215–16
charitable system; coinage; public rebellion against Archbishop Peter IV 202,
space; titles 215–16, 228
Probus, St 18, 319, 504 Rasi, P. 108
Life of St Probus 86, 318, 481 Rachis, King 52, 178
Provesi, C. 103n.242 Ravenna 2–3, 233–4
public space 38 730s Byzantine attack on 218
adventus ceremonies, coronations, oaths/ 750 Lombard conquest of 51–2, 218–19
promises, elections 432–9 Apollinarius, St and 18, 86, 317, 318, 332,
appropriation of the public space by laymen as 481, 504, 518
a political arena 398, 423–32 archeology 26, 35
assemblies: justice, rulership, defence 452–4 art and architecture 31–2, 375–6, 381–2
Christianization and appropriation of the Carolingians and 3, 7, 223
public space by the papacy 398, 399–422, Carolingians/Ravenna alliance 80–2, 210
430–1, 492 Charlemagne, Emperor, and 80–2, 222–3,
churches and basilicas: space and social 229, 284–5
hierarchy 368, 383, 441–2, 463–4 churches and basilicas 304–6, 307f, 317–19,
city identity: ceremonies, processions, 332, 375–6, 381–3, 396
festivals 439–52 coinage 82, 390
city walls 419–20 early medieval Ravenna 307f
contested elections 459–60 end of Byzantine rule 2–3
disruption in 464 historiography 35–7
Doges of Venice 398, 426–9 iconoclasm 80, 221–2
emperor and factions in Rome 454–6, 458–9 imperial capital 40–1, 74, 88–9, 504, 508–9
emperor and factions in Venice and imperial city 39
Ravenna 456–9 Italian kingdom and 3, 197–8, 396
hierarchies and categories of the city 16, law 479–80, 503
441–2, 449–51, 464 liturgy 332, 482
legitimacy and 459 Lombards and 7, 78–81, 221
names of places 418, 423, 430 monasteries 346–50, 349f, 356, 396
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names 6, 209–10, 212, 232–3, 473–4, 504, 517 Ottonians and 195
Otto III and 81, 86, 88–9, 107, 381, 437 pallium 75, 77
Ottonian alliance 85–9, 228–9 patrimony of 75–6, 84, 193–5, 213–14
Paul I, Pope 220 spoliations 381
public space 429–30, 436–8 subjection to Rome 80–2
public space: Regio of the Criminals 449–51 see also Ravenna, Archbishopric of
Ravennati 2 Ravennate elite 110–11, 193–235, 397
reconciliation with Rome 85–9 adventus ceremonies and coronation 436–7
Regnum Italicum 6, 356, 516–17 anthroponymy 209–13
relics 84, 317–19, 481 anti-Roman/anti-papal stance 220–2, 504,
Romanitas 508–9, 516–17, 519 508–9, 519
self-awareness of Ravenna’s past 86, 503, Church of Ravenna and 193–8, 205, 215–17,
504, 508 229, 233
sources on 8, 9, 17–18, 22 aristocracy of the Old Exarchate 196–8
symbols 393, 486 Byzantine forms of government 196
xenodochia 383 continuation of Byzantine elites 209
see also city identity; Exarchate of Ravenna; emperor and 458
populus: Ravenna; Ravenna, Archbishopric endogamy 226
of; Ravenna, Church of; Ravennate elite; exarchs 112
Ravennate elite: titles and functions Frankish aristocracies 111
Ravenna, Archbishopric of 74, 82–3, 503–4 Ravenna 194–5, 198–201, 203, 477
Archbishops 43–4t, 196t Ravenna: emphyteutic leases 86, 110, 213–17,
Archbishops: families and urban 232, 234, 296, 348
policies 215–29 marriage/mixed marriage 111, 205–8,
archiepiscopal Curia 230–1 210–12, 228, 234, 487, 517
archiepiscopal elections 217–18, 223, monasteries and 215–17, 347, 396
227, 437–8 papacy/elite struggles 80–2
churches and basilicas 304–5, 317, 335 plots and challenges to archiepiscopal
clothing 486 policies 218–19, 234–5
dating 388, 389 residences of 296–8, 493–4
elite plots and challenges to archiepiscopal riots and conspiracies 462
policies 218–19, 234 secular aristocracy 197, 233–4
episcopal mensa 197, 213, 230–1, 289 wealth 213–15, 234
Maximian of Pola 75, 84, 317 see also Ravennate elite: titles and functions;
Michael, scriniarius 79 Ravenna, Church of
private charters of 22 Ravennate elite: titles and functions 198–209,
residences of archbishops 296–7 234, 487, 504, 508
rights of justice 195 bandofori 200
running of the city 429 clarissimus/a 208–9
taking over the role of the exarch 194, combined use of titles 207–9
233, 486 consul 207–9, 487
titulature 386 counts 201
see also under individual Archbishops’ names draconarii 200
Ravenna, Church of ducarissa 203, 205
Ravenna, Church of dux/dukes 197, 199–200, 201–3, 205,
anti-Roman/anti-papal policies under the 207–8, 516
Carolingians 77–85, 220–2 exarchal titles 207
autocephaly 17, 74, 75–85, 318, 481 honestus vir/honesta femina 208–9
charity 383 magister militum 197, 199–202, 205, 207–8,
clergy 229–31 235, 516
elite and 193–8, 205, 215–17, 229, 233 tribunes 195, 199–201
iconoclasm 80, 221–2 vicarii 195
leases, emphyteutic 213–14 see also Ravennate elite; titles
leases, livello 214–15 Reekmans, L. 399
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674 Index

Regino of Prüm 9, 62, 64, 112, 483 art and architecture: Ravenna/Rome/Venice
Regnum Italiae 22, 65–74, 101, 210, 212, 234, comparison 395–7
255, 512, 516 churches and basilicas: Rome/Ravenna/
Ravenna 6, 356, 516–17 Venice comparison 335–6, 396–7, 430–1
relics differences between the three cities 515–17
Aistulf, King, and collection of martyrs’ relics elite residences: Ravenna/Rome/Venice
from cemeteries 303, 319, 320 comparison 299–300, 395–6
Andrew, St 317 palaces: Rome/Ravenna/Venice
Apollinarius, St 86, 318, 332 comparison 395–7
churches and basilicas 301, 303, 311–12, Romanitas/Roman past 517–20
335–6, 400 see also city identity
city identity and 301 Roman elite 110–11, 112–77, 179–80, 502–3
ideology and 303, 324–5, 428 750–900 119–25, 173–4, 191
liturgy and 325, 327 tenth century 125–40, 145, 176, 191
Maximian, Archbishop 317 aristocratic rule in Rome 65–74
monasteries 351, 354 Carolingian migration and
monks and 183 settlement 122–3, 145
Old and New Testament relics 323–4 churches/titulus and 121
Ottonians and 326 diaconiae 114, 118, 121
Pavia 303 dukes 112, 179
pilgrimage to Rome and 321, 324–6, 330, 409 ecclesiastical hierarchy 118
politics and 324–5, 345, 393 end of Byzantine power 110–11
power and 5, 121, 345, 431 endogamy 141
Ravenna 84, 317–19, 481 Exarchate of Ravenna and 153–5
Rome 303–4, 319–20, 345–6, 365–6, 367–8 exercitus 90, 113, 179, 189
St Peter’s Basilica 319, 409–10 Formosus, Pope, and 67
stational liturgy and 373, 441, 445–6 functions 188, 189
stealing of 282, 303, 320, 325–6 imperial Roman past, importance of 7,
as symbol 393 179–80, 191, 395–7, 423
translation of martyrs’ relics from cemeteries leases 141–2, 189
(Rome) 303, 320–1, 324, 335, 365–7 Leo III, Pope, and 55, 119–20, 160–2, 304
Venice 306, 311–12, 315–17, 335–6, 481–2 Lombard expansion and migration 113, 160
see also Mark, St; Sancta Sanctorum Lothar and 124
Reparatus, Archbishop of Ravenna 77 militia/military government/
Rialto (Venice) 248–9, 425–6 hierarchy 113–18, 153, 155, 188, 468–9
as centre of power 273, 424–5, 439, 518 monasteries and 126, 140–1, 143, 341, 342,
churches and basilicas 310, 316 343f, 355–6
as commercial hub 27, 236, 424–5 non-senatorial/ex-senatorial local
Doges of Venice at 5, 27 elite 112, 144
expansion of 92, 101 Ottonians and 71–4
Particiaco family move to 27, 96–7, 239–40, palatine judges 115, 116, 118
250, 253, 272–3, 424–5 papacy and 110–11, 114–15, 117–20, 126–7,
seat of the duchy 96–7, 424–5 144–5, 147–77, 188–90, 502
transfer as duchy capital from Cittanova/ Roman elite/papacy struggles: conflicts,
Malamocco to Rialto 27, 96, 239, 240, 308 depositions 55, 67–8, 137–8, 153–77, 189,
Rimini 79, 195, 200–1 455–6, 502
Rivoalto see Rialto papacy/elite struggles: contested elections 66,
Rizzardi, C. 288 70–1, 111, 118–19, 149–53
Rodoald, magistri militum 201, 211, 212–13 secular papal functionaries 121
Romagna 32, 35, 41,193 secular Roman aristocracy 14, 118
elite 209–10 senate 127, 161, 177–80, 190, 483, 503
Romagna pievi 32, 214, 305, 332–3, 334, 376 succession in power 191
‘Roman/Byzantine’ common heritage 1, 3–4, tax collection 109, 114, 188
6–7, 395–7, 465–6, 515 tribunes 108–9, 111, 179, 181, 189
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wealth 123–5, 140–6 Romanus, Archbishop of Ravenna 84, 85,

see also Roman elite: residences; Roman elite: 197, 225–7
titles and functions Rome 2–3, 32–4, 65–74
Roman elite: residences 292–6, 295f 410 attack and sacking by the Goths 40
curtes 293, 294, 344 888 division between Guy I and
domus solarata 26, 292, 294, 341, 344, Berengar 67
417–18, 424, 494 adventus ceremonies and coronation 432–6,
Roman elite: titles and functions 112, 128, 439–41, 484–6
130–1, 133–9, 188–9, 191, 487–8, 504 archeology 25–6, 34–5, 494
arcarius 116 art and architecture 28–31
bibliothecarius 118 Aurelian wall 406
comes/comitissa 134 Carolingians and 3, 54–65, 511–12
consul 133, 135, 179–80, 189, 191, 487 charity 357–61, 383
consul et dux 114, 115, 125, 133, 135 Charlemagne, Emperor, and 29, 54, 58, 123,
dux 133, 134, 189 327–9, 510–11
eminentissimus vir 133, 136 churches and basilicas 301–4, 319–20, 330–1,
nomenclator 117 335, 383, 396, 400–1, 407
optimates 110, 115, 190 coinage 389–90, 502
patricius 176, 191 decline of 512–14
Prefect of the City 70, 112, 117, 191, 502–3 early medieval Rome 24, 25, 34, 48f
primates 112, 114, 115, 133, 190, 483 emperor and 454–6, 459, 486
primicerius 114, 116–17, 487 end of Byzantine rule 2–3, 45–54
primus defensor 116 imperial capital 114–15, 436
princeps 130, 139 imperial Roman past, importance of 7,
protoscriniarius 116 179–80, 191, 393, 395–7, 423, 492–3
saccellarius 116 industry 25–6, 184–6, 494
scriniarius, cubicularius, mansionarius, law/Roman law 165, 452, 465–6, 475–80, 484,
claviger 117–18 503, 515, 517
secundicerius 116 Lombard crises 45–54
senator/senatrix 134, 139, 190, 483, 487–8 monasteries 336–43, 407
superista/magister militum 115–17, names 6, 148–9, 473–4, 489–90, 492
188–9, 488 names of women 143n.179, 201, 473–4
vestararius 117, 124–5 papacy and 32–3, 41, 65–6, 148–9, 188–9,
see also Roman elite; titles 505, 509–10
Roman Empire 39 Peter, St and 431, 483–4, 505, 509–10,
capital moved from Rome to 512, 518–19
Constantinople 39 population 184
division in Western and Eastern parts 39 public space 432–6
reunification of 40 relics 303–4, 319–20, 345–6, 365–6, 367–8
Roman Forum 277, 292, 401, 402, 423, 488, Romanitas 459, 515–16, 518–19
492, 505 Romans 1, 2
Romanitas 281, 423, 519 Saracen attacks and city fortification 11, 57,
city identity and 495–504, 518–19 61, 68, 166, 374, 407, 410, 419–20
Frankish/papal alliance and 495–7 sources on 8–9, 12, 15–16, 23
iconoclasm and 495–6 symbols 393, 485–6
law and 478–9 urban economic areas 184–7
Ravenna 508–9, 516–17, 519 see also city identity; Roman elite;
Roman law and 477–9 populus: Rome
‘Roman’ past and 517–20 Romuald, St 203, 207, 350
Rome 459, 515–16, 518–19 Rotfred, Count of Campania 171–2
stational liturgy and 482 Rovelli, A. 24
Venice 517, 519 Royal Frankish Annals 9, 20, 58, 94–5, 124
see also city identity; ‘Roman/Byzantine’ Rubeus, H. 223n.140
common heritage Rudolf, Frankish king 69, 98, 264, 388
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676 Index

Sabina 131–2 Platea Sancti Marci 427

S. Adriano at the Three Fates (church, plutei 379, 380
Rome) 303, 359, 421, 423, 443–4, 488 reconstruction of the first basilicas 376–7
S. Apollinare in Classe (basilica, Ravenna) 87, St Mark’s relics 20–1, 263, 266, 269, 288,
304–5, 346, 348, 375 311–12, 333, 377, 393, 426–8, 507–8
ciborium of St Eleucadius 31 Venice: shift of the centre south towards the
crypt 332 Grand Canal 27
S. Apollinare Nuovo (basilica, Ravenna) 87, S. Nicolò dei Mendicoli (church, Venice) 308,
304–5, 317, 318, 346, 349 334, 426
Apollinarius, St, body of 332 S. Paolo (basilica, Rome) 321
S. Croce (basilica, Rome) 321 St Peter’s Basilica (Rome) 411–14, 483
S. Giovanni in Laterano (basilica, Rome) 321 altar 411
S. Giovanni del Tò (church, Ravenna) 32, area around 407
333, 376 atrium 411–12, 422, 433–4, 460
S. Maria Antiqua (church, Rome) 24, 401, bell tower 334, 412
402, 403 Charlemagne, Emperor 329, 510
Domus Tiberiana 277–8 Charlemagne’s gifts to 363, 364, 373,
iconography 28, 29, 369 392n.480, 411–12, 510
John VII, Pope, and 277 ciborium 412
S. Maria in Campus Martius (church, Rome) 23, confessio 413–14, 421, 422, 433–5
404n.14, 406 consecration of new popes 436
S. Maria in Domnica (church, Rome) 366, 367, Constantine I and 411
401, 404, 405, 463 crypt 413–14, 434
S. Maria Formosa (church, Venice) 249, 306, doors 412
308n.132, 310, 448 festivals 439–40
S. Maria Maggiore (basilica, Rome) 321, 322, frescoes 30, 411, 412, 421–2
327, 339, 366, 400, 505 Gregory I, Pope 411–14
Paschal I, Pope 463 Hadrian I, Pope 412–13, 433–4
S. Maria Nova (diaconia) 23, 360, 443–4, 491 iconography 141, 412, 421–2, 500
S. Maria in Pallara (church, Rome) 31, 278, imperial coronation at 434–5, 437
294, 490 John VII, Pope, and 277
S. Maria in Via Lata (church, Rome) 31, Leo III, Pope 411–14
293, 403 Leo IV, Pope 411–14, 419–20
S. Maria Zobenigo (S. Maria del Giglio, church, Lothar I, Emperor 57, 419
Venice) 102, 308, 310, 427 Louis the Pious, Emperor 412
St Mark, hospice of (Venice) 306–8, 383, masses at 414
396, 429 metalwork 412–13
St Mark’s Basilica (Venice) 100, 306–8, 449 monumentalization of 413
976 fire 308, 377 mosaics 411, 412
Aachen model 308, 376–7 Nicholas I, Pope 413
Constantinople, imitation of 428 oaths/promises at 433–4, 435
Contarinian basilica 377 old St Peter’s 30
crypt 27, 333, 377–8 papal restorations and gifts 409–13
cult of St Mark 336, 431, 506 pilgrimage to 281, 321, 407, 414, 503
Doge’s Palace 288 podium 413, 435, 436
ducal power and 425–7, 428–9, 431 porphyry 412–13, 421, 422, 435
Gregory IV, Pope 121 redecoration and adornment 363–4, 374,
importance of 425–6 409–10, 412–13
Orseolo, Peter I, Doge 103, 308, 427, 429 St Peter’s relics 409–10
Particiaco, Agnellus, Doge 426 St Peter’s tomb 281, 413–14, 434, 435, 436
Particiaco, John, Doge 100, 308 Stephen II, Pope 334, 412
Particiaco, Justinian, Doge 377 wall 419–20
Pala d’Oro 103, 333 S. Pietro Maggiore (Basilica Apostolorum,
Piazza 27, 428, 449, 508 Ravenna) 304–5, 334, 376, 429
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S. Prassede (church, Rome) 23, 121, 366–7 Sergius I, Pope 80

annular crypt 121 Sergius II, Pope 57, 60, 150, 151, 164, 189
ideological programme 29, 34, 366–7, SS Silvestro e Martino 121
369–70, 463 Sergiusx III, Pope 13, 126, 128, 152, 169,
martyrs’ relics 324 176, 509
presbyterium 121 Sickel, A. von 169
S. Zeno chapel 366–7, 370, 376 slaves/slave trade
use of spolia from antiquity 121 Pactum Lotharii 271
S. Severo in Classe (basilica, Ravenna) 35, 347 Peter IV Candiano, anti-slavery policies 254,
S. Silvestro (area of) 120, 160–1, 291, 294 257, 270, 271, 313
S. Susanna (church, Rome) 303 Venice 271–2
ideological programme 29, 34, 365 Smith, J. M. H 322
SS Maria e Donato of Murano (Venice) 380 Società Romana di Storia Patria 8, 23
SS Nereo e Achilleo (church, Rome) 29, 365 sources 4–5
SS Sergio e Bacco (diaconia, Rome) 310, 319, archaeology 7, 23–8
359, 363, 488 art and architecture 7, 28–32
Sancta Sanctorum (chapel, Rome) 289, Byzantine sources 9, 12, 20–1
300, 321–4 challenges 9–12
Acheiropoita icon 180, 278–9, 322, 327, 372, diplomatic sources 8, 22–3
440, 443, 444, 445 documentary sources 22–3
building up of a papal treasure 372 editing of 8, 37
relic collection 278, 300, 321–4 Frankish sources 9, 12, 20–1
reliquaries 372 on elites 7–8, 16, 18
reliquary cross 372–3 hagiographies 9, 14–15
see also Lateran Palace letters 8, 21
Sansterre, J.-M. 277n.5, 338, 472 material culture 7–8, 23–8, 31
Santangeli Valenzani, R. 25, 283, 291–2, 294, narrative sources 8–22
302, 344 northern European sources 12, 16
Saracens 68 pilgrimage itineraries 9, 16
Rome, attacks on 11, 57, 61, 68, 166, 374, 407, Ravenna 8, 9, 17–18, 22
410, 419–20 Rome 8–9, 12, 15–16, 23
Venice and 19, 98, 99, 100–1 ritual/liturgy 7, 8, 16
Savigni, R. 223n.140 Venice 8, 18–21, 24
Saxer, V. 439, 509 see also methodology
Schism of the Three Chapters 75, 93 Spera, L. 277–8
Schoolman, E. 234 stational liturgy 16, 327–30, 439–452, 505
Schramm, P. E. 283–4, 384 Acheiropoita icon 180, 278–9, 322, 327, 440,
sculptures 29, 368, 379–80, 421 443, 444, 445
Lupa (She-wolf statue) 281, 393, 418, 452, architectural innovations 330
480, 493 Assumption procession 443–4, 445
Marcus Aurelius statue 281, 453, 492–3 Carolingians and 327–30
Theodoric statue 83, 299, 382, 393 churches and basilicas 335, 400, 439–40
see also art and architecture city identity 439–452
Sergius, Archbishop of Ravenna 197, 215, 216, Collecta 423, 440, 446
381, 482 Easter Monday procession 444, 448, 451
conflict with his clergy 220 Eucharistic liturgy 440
election of 217 festive procession 440, 443, 444
excommunication 17 hierarchies and categories of the
imprisoned in Rome 219 city 16, 441–2
lay status 13, 217 insignia and banners 441–2
quarrel with Pope Stephen II 17, Laetania Maior procession 160–2, 327, 338,
78–9, 219–20 445, 460, 464
rapprochement with Rome 219–21 Laudes Cornomanniae 446–7, 464
supporter of Ravenna autonomy 13 liturgical calendar 304, 442
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stational liturgy (cont.) 897 ‘Synod of the Corpse’ 67–8, 168, 445–6
ordines 16, 329 898 synod 169
papacy and 440–1, 444 962 synod 453
papal gifts of major liturgical items 327–30 963 synod 70, 86, 135, 136, 137, 138,
penitential procession 180, 440, 443, 445, 450 453, 514
processional route from the Lateran to the 1001 synod 15, 284
Vatican 404
relics and 373, 441, 445–6 taxation
Romanitas 482–3 elite and 109
tituli 439, 440, 451 iconoclasm and 11, 49–50, 114
Venice 448 Leo III, Emperor 11, 49, 153–4, 188
see also liturgy Roman elite 109, 114, 188
Stefania, senatrix 134, 141, 142, 346 Teodora III, senatrix 134
Stefania II, senatrix 171 Terme Alessandrine (Rome) 187, 292–3,
Stephen II, Pope 52, 117, 119, 188–9, 302, 466 341, 490
Great Litany procession 327 Thegan 9
papal/Frankish alliance 52, 78–9, 149–50, Theodora, vestararissa (Theophylact’s wife) 69,
219, 511 117, 127
St Peter’s Basilica 334, 412 Theodore, Archbishop of Ravenna 77
Stephen III, Pope 17, 93–4, 150, 156, 157, 159 Theodore, chief of notaries 59, 61, 163
pro-Frankish policies 49 Theodoric, King 40, 81
Stephen IV, Pope 55, 162, 189, 511 mausoleum/the Rotonda 306, 319n.191, 347
Stephen V, Pope 11–12, 120, 280–1, 464 Regisole statue 83, 299, 382, 393
Stephen VI, Pope 148 see also Theodoric’s Palace
death and condemnation of Pope Formosus Theodoric’s Palace (imperial palace,
by 13, 168 Ravenna) 26, 40, 304, 429, 430
deposition 168 Aistulf, King 284–5, 299
‘Synod of the Corpse’ 67–8, 168, 445–6 chapel 304
Subiaco (Rome) Charlemagne and 284–5, 299, 382
abbey 340, 343 mosaics 382
charter register 12 restoration 284
Suburra (Rome) 404, 406 S. Salvatore ad Calchis 285
symbols 275, 277, 391–5 spoliation by the missi 223, 285, 299, 382
Byzantine emblems and insignia 394–5 see also palaces
city identity 393 Theodosius, patricius 19, 100
emblems of power 393–5, 486 Theodosius I, Emperor 39, 475, 504
emperors and papacy 485–6 Theodotus, Duke of Rome/primicerius 114, 119,
Ravenna 393, 486 150, 189, 358, 469
relics 393 diaconia of S. Angelo in Pescheria 114,
reuse of imperial symbols 421 362, 403
Rome 393, 485–6 diaconia of S. Maria Antiqua 114, 362
Rome: Lupa (She-wolf statue) 281, 393, 418, primicerius et dux 114, 118
452, 480, 493 Theophanes 9
Venice 394, 438 Theophano, Empress 70, 71, 87–8, 103, 259–60,
see also clothing 284, 348, 402, 461
synods Theophylact, nomenclator 127–8
826 synod 164 Theophylact, superista and vestararius 115, 117,
827 synod 19, 93, 95, 99 125, 127, 131–6
853 synod 412 Aventine 290
862 synod 63 gloriosissimus dux 190
863 synod 63 papal election 120, 122
868 synod 83 ruling over Rome 68–9, 131–2, 169
877 synod 85, 264, 332, 453 senator Romanorum 190
882 synod 227 Theophylact II 133
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Theophylact family (Rome) 13, 66, 69, 86, 126, Toto of Nepi, Count 119, 150, 177, 189–90, 338,
145, 152, 398, 456 362, 459–60
family and territorial control over Roman Toubert, P. 132–3, 283, 361
topography 345 Tribuno Memmo, Doge of Venice 103, 259, 461
genealogy of the Theophylact/Alberic monastery of S. Giorgio and 266
family 129t S. Zaccaria and 259, 352
papacy and 145, 176 Trier 39, 382
reuse of ancient topography of power 423 Tuscolani family (Rome) 74, 135, 139, 146
Sabina and Tiburtinum 131 papacy and 133
titles of 128, 130, 133–5
Theutgaud, Archbishop of Metz 63 Ullmann, W. 496
Thietmar of Merseburg 9, 12, 73, 420, 464 Ursiana cathedral 304
titles 73, 108, 109, 198–209 Ursus, Doge of Venice 21, 52, 93, 235, 239
Alberic 128, 130, 134, 386, 502–3 Ursus I Particiaco/Badoer, Doge of
Archbishops of Ravenna 386 Venice 100–1, 102, 241–3, 249, 261, 287
Byzantine Greek military class 109–10 protospatarius 100, 241
Byzantine titles (ypatos, spatarius, see also Particiaco family
protospatarius) 198 Ursus II Badoer, Doge of Venice 102, 243
Charlemagne, Emperor 384–5 see also Particiaco family
city identity: titles and social Ursus Orseolo, Bishop of Torcello 107, 262,
status 465, 486–8 311, 378
Doges of Venice 386–7 see also Orseolo family
dux/dukes 109, 110 Ursus Particiaco, Bishop 263–4, 266, 269
emperor of the Romans/Imperator monastery of S. Lorenzo 263, 266, 272, 355
Romanorum 65, 73–4, 384–5, 468, 471 see also Particiaco family
late antiquity 487
magistri militum 19, 90, 109 Valentinian, Emperor 40
optimates 110 Valerius, Archbishop of Ravenna 215, 223
Otto III 73–4, 386 Vatican Basilica see St Peter’s Basilica
papal titulature 386 Vatican Museum 321–2, 372
patricius 73, 82, 386–7 Vatican Palace (papal palace, Rome) 5–6,
protospatarius 73, 100, 198, 387 410–11, 439
self-identity and 198 Carolingians and 283
Theophylact family 128, 130, 133–5 Charlemagne and 282, 407
titulature as statement of power 356, 384–9 Leo III, Pope 410
viri honesti 180 mosaics 410
see also names; Ravennate elite: titles and as St Peter’s city 282, 300
functions; Roman elite: titles and functions; triclinia 280, 410
Venetian elite: titles and functions wall 419–20
Tjäder, J-O. 210 see also palaces
topography 5 Venetiae 93, 236, 506, 515–16
city identity: topography and Venetian elite 111, 235–67
lifestyle 466, 488–95 Church and 265
imperial Roman past, importance of 492–3 churches and basilicas 308, 310, 335–6
Ravenna 488, 493 conflict between leading families for ducal
reuse of ancient topography of power 423 power 192, 249–61, 272–4
Roman monuments 488 conflict between old tribunician class and new
Rome 33, 345, 446, 488, 503 aristocracy 253
Torcello (Venice) 92 conflict between pro-Byzantine and
bishops of 262–4, 306 pro-Frankish families 249–51
Byzantine castrum 92 emperor and Venetian factions 456–8
cathedral of 262, 378 Gemino 244, 248, 249
as emporion mega 21, 92 Luprio 244, 249, 310
excavations at 26–7 marriage 242, 245, 256
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Venetian elite (cont.) magistri militum, government by 93

merchants as aristocrats 111, 268–71 Mark, St and 431, 507–8, 518, 519
migration from northern Italy 247 monasteries 346–7
monasteries and 267, 273, 310, 350–5, 396 myth of foundation 19, 90, 236, 438, 448
‘northern’/‘southern’ lagoons 237, 239, 273 names 6, 243–4, 245–8, 474–5, 517
residences of 300 names: double name/cognomen 243, 253,
riots and conspiracies 460–3 474, 475
supporting the ‘distant ruler’ rather than the naval power 98–101
local doge 251, 257 no Roman past 470, 506, 507, 516
trade 111, 272 Otto II 102–3, 107, 256, 259, 274
urban planning and development of the Otto III 104–5, 106, 251, 312, 392–3
city 248–9, 335–6 Ottonians and 103, 104, 256
urban violence 192, 234–5 public space 398, 424–5, 438–9, 449–51
wealth 239, 268–71 relics 306, 311–12, 315–17, 335–6, 481–2
see also Doges of Venice; Venetian elite: titles Romanitas 517, 519
and functions Saracens 19, 98, 99, 100–1
Venetian elite: titles and functions 487 shift of the centre south towards the Grand
dux/dukes 111, 243, 506 Canal 27, 41
iudices 268 sources on 8, 18–21, 24
magister militum 235, 236, 243, 506 symbols 394, 438
maiores 268 terraferma 36, 111, 236, 262, 269, 353–4, 379,
patricius 244 479, 515
primates 248, 268 trade 28, 91–2, 95–6, 103, 111, 269–73
tribunes 94, 111, 179, 199–201, 237, 240, uniqueness of 20
243–5, 248, 506 Venetians 2
see also Doges of Venice; Venetian Venice pievi 336, 379
elite; titles see also city identity; clergy: Venice; Doges of
Venice 2–3, 89–107 Venice; Pactum Lotharii; populus: Venice;
983 siege 102–4, 251, 258–9, 261, 273–4 Rialto; Venetian elite; Venetian elite: titles
archaeology 26–7, 425 and functions
art and architecture 32, 375–6 Verona 3, 223n.140
Byzantine Venetia 92 Vespignani, G. 199
Byzantine Empire and 3, 36, 90, 104–6, Via Lata (Rome) 31, 145, 503
235–6, 238–9, 250–1, 336, 456–8, 468–70, Alberic family 293, 296, 424
478–9, 507, 515–17 area inhabited by rulers 290–1
Carolingians and 7, 93–9, 456–7 Via Maior (Via Triomphalis, Rome) 404, 421
charity 383, 396 Vio, E. 333
Charlemagne, Emperor, and 80, 93–5, 235, Von Falkenhausen, V. 472–3
250–1, 269–70
churches and basilicas 306–8, 309f, 310, Waldrada (Empress Adelheid’s niece) 102, 103,
312–17, 332–3, 376–81, 425–6 255, 256, 257
coinage 7, 24, 27, 390–1, 517 Waldrada (Lothar II’s concubine and
dating 388–9 wife) 63, 64
Duchy of Venice 97f Western (Roman) emperors
festivals 448–9 Valentinian (364–75) 40
fires 22, 244 Theodosius I (379–95) 39, 475, 504
historiography 36 see also Constantine I the Great, Emperor
as independent entity 18–19, 91, 506 Wickham, C. 74, 125, 133, 137, 141–2, 169–70,
Italian kingdom 457 341n.265, 344, 346, 360–1, 419, 447
law 477–8, 480–1, 517 documentation of Rome 23
liturgy 332, 448 Medieval Rome 32
Lombards and 7, 27, 41, 90–2, 94 Roman people 181, 184, 185
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William of Malmesbury 16, 416 replaced by the scholae of the foreign

Wilpert, J. 322 pilgrims 362, 410
Wisskirchen, R. 366 see also charity and charitable system;
pilgrimage to Rome
xenodochia (residences for pilgrims) 335, 342,
357–8, 383 Zacharias, Pope 10–11, 53, 116, 178, 466
Campus Martius 403 domuscultae 51, 123–4, 360, 362
demographic expansion and 407 Lateran Palace 278–80, 302
papacy and 358–60, 362, 408, 410, 420 Zimmermann, H. 169
Ravenna 383 Zweikaiserproblem 467
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