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Some ambiguities of female inheritance ideology in the Renaissance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 November 2008

Thomas Kuehn
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Continuity and Change , Volume 2 , Issue 1 , May 1987 , pp. 11 - 36
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1987

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References

ENDNOTES

1 Jack, Goody, The development of the family and marriage in Europe (Cambridge, 1983), esp. 240–61Google Scholar. Goody's point is that vigorous action in the acquisition of new wealth or in the control of present resources was alone able to meet this threat. See also his Production and reproduction (Cambridge, 1976)Google Scholar and ‘Inheritance, property and women: some comparative considerations’, in Goody, J., Thirsk, J. and Thompson, E. P., eds., Family and inheritance: rural society in western Europe, 1200–1800 (Cambridge, 1976), 10–36Google Scholar. What I have called simply ‘dowry’, the dos of civil law, Goody terms ‘direct dowry’. This terminological precision allows him to make the point that what some historians have seen as a shift from ‘brideprice to dowry’ in medieval Europe was instead a shift in emphasis in a series of interlinked property transfers at marriage and at death, a point elegantly made by Christiane, Klapisch-Zuber, ‘Le complexe de Griselda: Dot et dons de mariage au Quattrocento’, Mélanges de l'Ecole Français de Rome 94 (1982); 7–43Google Scholar. However, in accordance with his more general position about the role of the Church in familial developments, Goody also rejects the link between this shift and the growth of agnatic kinship as ‘too specific’. Goody's approach to dowry has been carefully criticised by John, Comaroff, ‘Introduction’ in Comaroff, J. L., ed., The meaning of marriage payments (New York, 1980), 7–11.Google Scholar

2 Franco, Niccolai, La formazione del diritto successorio negli statuti comunali del territorio lombardo-losco (Milan, 1940).Google Scholar

3 These provisions largely coincided with those of civil and canon law. Cf. Gian, SavinoPene, Vidari, Ricerche sul diritto agli alimenti, L'obbligo ‘ex lege’ dei familiari nel periodo della Glossa e del commento (Turin, 1970).Google Scholar

4 Generally women were not allowed to inherit real property on intestacy. Such was the case in Florence, as revealed by a reading of the relevant statute below.

5 On the assimilation of the legitim and the Falcidian portion of Roman law on the part of medieval jurists and legislators, see Leicht, P. S., Storia del diritto italiano, Il dirilto privato, 2, Diritti reali e di successione (Millan, 1960), 258–62.Google Scholar

6 Quoted in Niccolai, 104–5. Niccolai took these statutory principles as indicative of the subordination of individuals to familial imperatives, a subordination that in turn served as a basis for subordination to communal political imperatives. For women this meant that marriage ‘broke every legal relation to her father's house; even every relation of succession’ (Ibid. 100). In contrast, on the legal effects of marriage, see my ‘Women, marriage, and Patria Polestas in late medieval Florence’, Tijdschrift voor Rechts-geschiedenis 49 (1981), 127–47CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Also, the statutory treatment of dowry in the context of inheritance shows that it was considered to operate as part of the process of property devolution. The dowry was not simply a form of compensation for a woman's contribution to her natal household – in contrast to the situation analysed by Rheubottom, D. B., ‘Dowry and wedding celebrations in Yugoslav Macedonia’, in Camaroff, , ed., The meaning of marriage payments (New York, 1980), 221–49.Google Scholar

7 Manlio, Bellomo, Ricerche sui rapporti patrimoniali tra coniugi (Milan, 1961), esp. 165, 184–5.Google Scholar

8 Ibid. 182.

9 Cf. Paolo, Cammarosano, ‘Aspetti delle strutture familiari nelle città dell' Italia comunale (secoli xii–xiv)’, Sludi medievali, ser. 3, 16 (1975), 417–35Google Scholar; Diane, Owen Hughes, ‘From brideprice to dowry in Mediterranean Europe’. Journal of Family History 3 (1978); 262–96Google Scholar, and ‘Struttura familiare e sistemi di successione ereditaria nei testamenti dell' Europa medievale’, Quaderni storici 33 (1976), 929–52Google Scholar; Cinzio, Violante, ‘Quelques caractéristiques des structures familiales en Lombardie, Emilie et Toscane aux xie et xiie siècles’, in Georges, Duby and Jacques, Le Goff eds., Famille et parenté dans l' Occident médiéval, (Rome, 1978), 87–151Google Scholar; David, Herlihy and Christiane, Klapisch-Zuber, Les toscans et lews families (Paris, 1978), 532–33Google Scholar; John, Larner, Italy in the Age of Dante and Petrarch, 1216–1380 (London, 1980), 67–9Google Scholar; Cooper, J. P., ‘Patterns of inheritance and settlement by great landowners from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries’, in Family and Inheritance, 279–83Google Scholar; Julius, Kirshner and Anthony, Molho, ‘The dowry fund and the marriage market in early Quattrocento Florence’, Journal of Modern History 50 (1978), 403–38Google Scholar; Stanley, Chojnacki, ‘Dowries and kinsmen in early renaissance Venice’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History 4 (1975); 571–600Google Scholar; Francis, William Kent, Household and lineage in renaissance Florence: the family life of the Capponi, Ginori, and Rucellai (Princeton, 1977)Google Scholar; Roberto, Bizzocchi, ‘La dissoluzione di un clan familiare: I Buondelmonti di Firenzenei secoli xv e xvi’, Archivio storico italiano 140, (1982), 3–45.Google Scholar

10 I take my theoretical point of departure here from, among others, Pierre Bourdieu, Outline of a theory of practice, trans. Richard, Nice (Cambridge, 1977), esp 36–7Google Scholar, and his ‘Marriage strategies as strategies of social reproduction’, in Robert, Forster and Orest, Ranum ed., Family and Society (Baltimore, 1976), 117–44Google Scholar; Cohn, Bernard S., ‘History and anthropology: the state of play’, Comparative Studies in Society and History 22 (1980), 198–221CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Julius, Kirshner, Review of Family and inheritance: rural society in western Europe in, Journal of Modern History 50 (1978), 320–22.Google Scholar

11 On this maxim and its effects, see Manlio, Bellomo, Problemi di diritto familiare nell' etá dei comuni (Milan, 1968), 41–4Google Scholar; Kirshner, and Molho, , 435.Google Scholar

12 Anthony, Molho, ‘Visions of the Florentine family in the Renaissance’, Journal of Modern History 50 (1978), 310Google Scholar; Goody, 258Google Scholar; Stanley, Chojnacki, ‘Patrician women in early Renaissance Venice’, Studies in the Renaissance 21 (1974), 176–203Google Scholar. Goody has argued that western history was not marked by a replacement of patrilineal by bilateral inheritance, any more than the nuclear replaced the extended family, but that bilaterality was always present at the core of inheritance practices, even when most submerged in patrilineal emphasis and practices, as witnessed in the dos (Goody, 232–3).Google Scholar

13 Goody, 258Google Scholar, argues that dowry was both an instrument and a product of social stratification because a woman's father could prove he could support her. Indeed, a widow's father or brothers could be very eager to arrange her remarriage, indicating that they still possessed some right to control her body and her dowry. Cf. Christiane, Klapisch-Zuber, ‘La “mére cruelle”: Maternité, veuvage et dot dans la Florence des xive–xve siécles’, Annales 38 (1983), 1097–109.Google Scholar

14 I ignore here the distinctions between the different collections of statutes – those of the podesla, the Capitano, Mercanzia, the Ordinances of Justice, not to mention the twenty-one guilds.

15 An introduction to the statutes and judiciary in Florence, though with little attention to private litigation, can be found in Lauro, Marlines, Lawyers and Statecraft in Renaissance Florence (Princeton, 1968), 91–106, 130–4Google Scholar. An interesting perspective on the relationship between the learned ius commune and statutes is provided by Charles, Fried, ‘The Lex Aquilia as a source of law for Bartolus and Baldus’, American Journal of Legal History 4 (1960), 142–72Google Scholar. See also the works of Mario Sbriccoli, Manlio Bellomo and Luigi Lombardi cited below.

16 Cf. Goody, 257Google Scholar. Note also the statistical evidence from Genoese wills mustered by Steven, Epstein, Wills and wealth in medieval Genoa, 1150–1250 (Cambridge, Mass., 1984), 81–3.Google Scholar

17 Cf. Cooper, 242.Google Scholar

18 In other words, juristic interpretation as a process contributes to the elaboration of substantive rules governing devolution and the pivotal position outlined by Comaroff in his ‘Introduction’ in The Meaning of Marriage Payments, 1–47.Google Scholar

19 Romolo, Caggese ed., Statuti delta repubblica fiorentina, 2, Statute del podesta dell' anno 1325 (Florence, 1921), 139–41Google Scholar; A[rchivio di] S[tato di] F[irenze] (hereafter ASF), Statuti 16 (Statute del podestà, 1355), fos 97v–98v; Statuta populi et communis Florentiae, anno salutis mccccxv (Freiburg, 1778–1781), 223–5Google Scholar. Cf. Niccolai, 95–6, 143Google Scholar. The revisions were commissioned from Tommaso da Gubbio in the first instance and from Paolo di Castro (1360–1441) and Bartolomeo Vulpi (1359–1435) in the second. Cf. Lauro, Marlines, Lawyers and statecraft in Renaissance Florence, 186.Google Scholar

20 I exclude here any discussion of changes in word order, verb tense or mood, or similar mailers.

21 The value of this fixed amount in lire was in sleady decline relative to the gold florin in the course of Ihe fourteenlh and fifleenlh centuries. Cf. tables in Richard, Goldthwaite, The Building of Renaissance Florence: an Economic and Social History (Ballimore, 1980), 429–30Google Scholar, and Ihe relevanl seclions of de la Roncière, Charles M., Prix et salaires a Florence au xive siècle (1280–1380) (Rome, 1982).Google Scholar

22 All versions gave special attenlion lo half-brothers and stepbrothers also.

23 Regarding usufruct and property law in general, see Paolo, Grossi, Le situazioni reali nell' esperienza giuridica medievale (Padua, 1968)Google Scholar, and ‘Usus facti: La nozione di proprieta nella inaugurazione dell' eta nuova’, Quaderni fiorentini per la storia del pensiero guiridico moderno 1 (1972), 287–355.Google Scholar

24 Here is language from 1355, wilh the addition of 1415 in brackets and the omission in italics: ‘El inlerium donee nuplui traderenlur debeanl habere alimenla de bonis patris, avi, vel proavi [vel cuiuslibet allerius ascendentis] de cuius successione ageretur. Si ex defuncla persona filius vel filii vel descendenles per lineam masculinam existanl. Si vero ipsefilius et filii seu descendentes non extent el superessenl frater velfratres vel filius vel filii ex fratre carnalibus defuncte per tune ipsa mulier habeat usumfruclum omnium bonorum tails patris avi vel proavi defunctl.’ Also ‘Si vero filius, vel filii, vel descendentes masculi non extarent, et superesset frater, vel fratres, vel filius, seu filii ex fratre, vel fratribus carnalibus [vel pater, vel avus paternus] defunctae personae, eo casu ipsa mulier donee vidua steterit debeat habere usumfructum omnium bononan [alimenta competentia et decentia in bonis] sui paths, avi, vel proavi [vel alterius ascendentis] mortui.’ This may have made more attractive to widows usufruct left them by husbands who died with concerns about care for their children. On this practice, cf. Klapisch, , ‘La mère cruelle’, 1100–1.Google Scholar

25 Bartolo's role is well described by Filippo Corsini in his consilium discussed below.

26 Bartolo to D. 38.17.2, 47 (Venice, 1580), fos 176va–vb: ‘In contrarium quod excludatur avus maternus videtur ratio statuti que videtur velle quod hereditas remaneat apud agnatos. Preterea et si excluditur proximior in gradu, sequens videtur excludi… sed agnati excludunt matrem et omnes agnatos ex forma statuti: ideo concludo quod sive mater sit mortua sive vivat quod agnati admittantur exclusa matre, et omnibus sequentibus in gradu. Etiam puto si diceret statutum extantibus masculis filia foemina non succedat, quid de nepote ex filia? Certe idem quod in filia per ea que supra dixi. Tene ista menti et sic de facto consului in civitate Florentie.’

27 See discussion of Deti's consilium below.

28 The following clause graced the end of the statute in 1325 but was omitted thereafter; And this statute is precise and basic [truncum] and may not be disposed of or interpreted; and if some word in this statute should be obscure it is to be understood according to the reading of the assembly [conventus]. This clause's removal demonstrates how hopeless it was to keep jurists's hands off such an important and troublesome statute.

29 Bartolo to D. 38.4.1, 8, ed. cit., fo. 164rb.

30 Baldo to D. 28.2.29, 5 (Venice, 1577), fol. 66va: ‘Et hec faciunt ad quandam difficilem questionem super qua consului. Dictat statutum Florentiae quod filia dotata non succedit ab intestate existentibus filiis vel fratribus defuncti. Modo queritur, utrum si factum est testamentum, et est praeterita, utrum possit dicere testamentum nullum? Et videtur quod sic quia istud statutum disponit in casu testati. Ergo in casu intestati stamus iuri communi ut possit dicere testamentum nullum Bartolus tenet contra in 1. ulti. infra ad Treb. nam cum in testamento sint instituti venientes ab intestato quibus testator poterat tacite relinquere ab intestato moriendo… apparent quod nullam iniuriam fecit filiae et non culpandum si tactum induxit in conditionem expressam secundum Bartolum… quia cum ex legjbus, id est ex lege municipali filia sit exclusa, intelligo quod sit exclusa a iure civili, et pretorio, quia istud ius novum, quod est posterius iure civili, et pretorio, derogat, ar. C. de li. pre. <1.> maximum vitium, et dicendo contrarium sequeretur absurdum quod imputaretur patri, cur non decesserit intestatus, et lex reputat hoc absurdum.’ On a different issue, Baldo to D. 24.3.22, ed. cit., fol. lira: ‘Statute civitatis Florentiae cavetur quod non existentibus masculis succedant foeminae. Modo quaeritur si masculi sunt, utrum filiae succedant? Quidam dicunt quod sic: quia iste casus omissus. Cy. in d. civitate Florentiae consuluit contrarium…, et ista est veritas: quia videtur inducere tacitam prelatinonem masculorum…’

31 Biblioteca Nazionale di Firenze (hereafter BNF), Principale, II, iv, 435, fos. 71r–73v. Unfortunately no commentary on this statute survives in the later work of Tommaso Salvetti in BNF, Principale II, iv, 434.

32 Ibid., fo. 71v. Another revealing passage, which also indicates a change in language in the statute: ‘In § et nulla mulier. in ver. ex filio vel filiis. Not. de nepote ex filio, nee de nepote ex fratre prout loquebatur statutum antiquum, et ideo si extat nepos ex fratre non excluditur filia sed remanet dispositio iuris communis ut in aut. in subcessione et ita respondi Dominico ser Filippi. Alex.’ (Ibid., fo. 72v).

33 Ibid., fos. 71v–72r: ‘In § et si bona. in ver. etiam in avia. Scilicet materna, secus in paterna, que in totum excludit agnatum in vi gradu, ita consuluit d. Nellus in facto consanguinee ser Nicholai Galgani, quia in hac parte statuti est hodie per superiora, ubi loquitur de matre et non de patre. Sed not. quod hoc statutum vocat agnates masculos tantum et sic alios excludit ut per Bar. in 1. liberorum. Item dictum de avia habet locum etiam in paterna, in materna correctiva, ut in aut. matri et avie in prin. in favorem agnatorum masculorum emanavit et avia materna est sicut paterna, ideo eadem est ratio statuti, et ita respondi et ita reperio consuluisse d. Bartolomeus de Sali.’

34 Ibid., fo. 72v.

35 Ibid., fo. 72r.

36 Ibid., fo. 72v.

37 This was a more complex process than merely filling in interstices, for a prior process of interpretation was required, at least, to identify the presence of a gap in the statute's coverage.

38 The rapid decease of the husband, wife, and daughter would seem to indicate a plague, either that of 1390 or 1400. No precise date is given. The form of the statute referred to is that of 1355, so it must date from before the redaction of 1415. The consilium survives in a copy in BNF, Panciatichiano 138, fos. 165v–166v.

39 Ibid., fo. 165v: ‘Finaliter tamen dominus Genitor meus tenuit avum excludi et personas in statuto nominatas ad subcessionem vocari. Et ita preterea consuluit dominus meus Bar. ex comissione de civitate Florentie sibi facta, dicens quod dictum statutum non solum habet virtutem exclusivam matris et avie, ut verba expresse dicunt, ut persone agnatorum in statuto nominatorum ad subcessionem admictantur.’ And fo. 166r: ‘Sed hodie videtur clarum quod patruus excludit avum maternum propter addictionem que fuit facta statuto post consilium genitoris mei et domini Bar., ut patet in statuto ibi ‘et de anno mºcccºliº, indictione xiiii, die xii januarii citra…’

40 Which he had cited earlier as an analogy to the inclusion-exclusion process set up by the statute. Cf. my Emancipation in late medieval Florence (New Brunswick, 1982), 16.Google Scholar

41 The original consilium is preserved in BNF, Landau Finaly 98, fos. 89r–92v.

42 BNF, Principale, II, iv, 435, fo. 72r: ‘In ver. ex eis frater aut fratres. Intellige de fratre proprio, non autem de patrueli seu cugino quia ille est frater cum adictione et non simpliciter, ut per Bar. in I. Lutius § quesitum de leg. iii, unde respondi quod cum soror admictatur de iure comuni ad successionem ab intestate fratris per aut. cessante cum si. <non> predit ius succedendi per existentiam filii patrui magis defuncti qui erat frater patruelis patris defuncti nee per existentiam fratris patruelis illius qui decessit…’

43 Ibid., fol. 90r: ‘Statutum enim predictum est correptivum iuris communis quod ut supra dictum est inter cognates et agnatos ultimo loco nullam fecit differentiam, ergo non ample sed stripte debet intelligi ut quam minus potest corrigat ius commune…’ The statute thus ‘corrected’ civil law by altering it in accordance with a standard external to it.

44 Ibid., fo. 92v: ‘Puto clare tenendum quod ipsa debet habere quartam dimidie, non autem quartam respectu totius, cum nulla dispositio eius favore reperiatur que eius portionem augere videatur.’

45 Cf. Mario, Sbriccoli, L'Interpretazione dello statuto: Contribute allo studio deltafunzione del guiristi nell'età comunale (Milan, 1969), 212–64.Google Scholar

46 Because Prato had no statute governing female inheritance, the Florentine statute applied. On the relation between Florence's statutes and those of the towns subject to her, see Ibid. 220–45; also Giorgio, Chittolini, La formazione dello stato regionale e le istituzioni del contado: Secoli xiv e xv (Turin, 1979), 292–352.Google Scholar

47 The original of this consilium is contained in Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana (Hereafter BAY), Vat. Lat. 8067/1, fos 20r–29v. The dating revolves around Accolti's matriculation into the Arte dei Giudici e Notai (he being the last of the four to do so) and Buongirolami's death in 1454. For information on these men and the other Florentine jurists mentioned here, see Marlines, , Lawyers, 481–509.Google Scholar

48 BAV, Vat. 8067/1, fo. 22r: ‘Unde si diceremus quod ex alio capite statuti dum loquitur de causa testati reservatum fuisset matri ius dicendi nullum testamentum resultaret unum absurdum, videlicet quod mater ipsa rumperet testamentum et tamen testamento rupto ipsa non subcessisset…’

49 Ibid., fo. 26v: ‘Unde ex istis verbis constat quod fundamentum illius partis fuit excludere feminas ex testamento et a iure dicendi nullum quando essent instituti descendentes, alias frustra repetisset hoc declarans de quibus descendentibus intelligat itaque ex hiis verbis declaratur mens statuentis.’ Also fo. 27r: ‘Nam statutum in dicto ver. si vero testatus semper loquitur et disponit quando supersunt filii et alii descendentes, sed iste non est casus noster sed casus diversus non tactus a statuto quia testator decessit nullis superexistentibus descendentibus et per consequens remanet in dispositione iuris communis…’ This decision squares with the findings of Bartolo and Baldo mentioned above, in that they upheld a will against women when the venientes ab intestato were the designated heirs.

50 Ibid., fos 28r–v.

51 Ibid. fos 29r–v: ‘Quod cum compilatores maxime novorum statutorum, qui fuerunt pratichi causidici, et sciebant dubia huiusmodi per prius sepe fuisse et non aliter ampliaverint quam in casu illo ut iacet statutum, et detraxerunt de statuto antique verba a negativa iurisdictionis rectorum de intelligendo verba dubia secundum intentionem conventi, per que patet eos voluisse intelligi proprie ut verba important et non aliter, prout etiam dictat statutum in ordinamentis iustitie…’

52 ASF, Carte strozziane, 3rd series, 41/14, fos 159r–169r, with the seals of Strozzi and Rucellai and a notation of the effect that Pepi and Amidei later signed the official copy. The case would seem to date from between 1500 (the year Rucellai matriculated into the Florentine guild) and 1513 (Pepi's death). On the fideicommissum, see Cooper, passim, and Leicht, P. S., II diritto privato, 2, 249–56.Google Scholar

53 Strozzi's notation ‘pro illis de Squarcialupis’ at the beginning of the consilium is a consistent indicator in his many surviving opinions that he was operating on behalf of one party.

54 Ibid., fos 164r–165r. Strozzi seems to have been consistent in his views on this issue. In his legal glossary (Carte strozziane, 3rd ser., 41/18 fo. 530r), on the basis of a consilium of Alessandro Tartagni da Imola, he said ‘onus dotandi pertinere ad patrem et non ad patruos’.

55 Ibid., fos 165r–v: ‘Sed adhuc casus noster est magis clams quia presuponitur quod he neptes non fuerunt nate neque concepte tempore mortis avi et sic non fuerant coniuncte neque cognite avo, quo casu minus dici debet avum teneri ad dotandum neptem natam post mortem suam. Considero enim quod iste neptes concepte et nate post mortem avi nullo modo dicuntur coniuncte ipsi avo neque ad eius hereditatem tanquam incognite illi avo quo minus non dum animax erant, id est, non dum concept.’

56 The civil law texts he alleges in support are § si proximior, 1. i, ff. unde cognati (D. 38.8.1, 8) and 1. titius, ff. de suis et legitimis (D. 38.16.6). D. 38.8.1, 8, dealing with inheritance by pretorian bonorum possessio allows inheritance by those in utero when the de cuius died: ‘sed hoc ita demum erit accipiendum, si hie qui in utero esse dicitur vivo eo de cuius bonorum possessione agitur fuit conceptus, nam si post mortem, neque obstabit alii neque ipse admittetur, quia non fuit proximus cognatus ei, quo vivo nondum animax fuerit.’ D. 38.16.6, a fragment of the jurisconsult Julian, discusses the man who is disinherited but whose son (the grandson), in turn, seeks the estate because he was born after the grandfather's death: ‘respondit: qui post mortem avi sui concipitur, is neque legitimam hereditatem eius tamquam suus heres neque bonorum possessionem tam-quam cognatus accipere potest, quia lex duodecim tabularum eum vocat ad hereditatem, qui moriente eo, de cuius bonis quaeritur, in rerum natura fuerit.’ In Strozzi's case, however, the girl's father was certainly not disinherited, and the impact of Ulpian's remarks in D. 38.8.1, 8 is to eliminate those who were not conceived by the de cuius and, therefore unrelated to him – again not the case here. These citations to Roman law are to Mommsen, T. H.. Kroll, W., Krueger, P. and Schoell, R. eds., Corpus iuris civilis, 3 vols. (Berlin, 1928–1929).Google Scholar

57 BNF, Magliabechiano xxix, 193, fos 182r–191r, the sealed original, also found in print in Filippo, Decio, Consilia, 2 vols. (Venice, 1575), cons. 383, 2, fos 42ra–43vaGoogle Scholar. Both Decio and Deti were teaching at Pisa when their consilia were rendered. According to Marlines, 505, Decio taught in Pisa 1484–9, most of the 1490s, 1500–1, and 1515–21. Deti taught there 1496 and subsequently, and again 1515–22 (Marlines, 488). Niccolini, the youngest of the three, matriculated into the Florentine guild in 1498 (Ibid. 497). I suspect that Piero may not have been very old at the time, so I tend to an earlier date, say about 1498. Piero later had several sons (birth dates from Tralie evidence supplied by David Herlihy); Rinieri (b. 1509), Claudio (b. 1512), Giambattista (b. 1515), Priore (b. 1517), Ruberto (b. 1518), and Piero (b. 1520).

58 BNF, Magliabechiano, xxix, 193, fo. 182v: ‘Ista dubitatio in terminis statuti florentini cessat propter verba statuti que ulterius procedendo expresse dicunt quod statutum intelligatur de filiis legittimis et naturalibus legittimo matrimonio natis, quo casu cum appareat de mente statuti indubitanter concludendum est quod filie a Petro legittimato non excluduntur…’

59 Ibid., fo. 187v: ‘Et conclude quod filie predicte a nepotibus ex fratre non succedentibus nullo modo excludantur quia privatio successionis facte propter masculos intelligitur casu quo masculi in quorum favorem fuit facta privatio admittantur, unde si alii instituti sint statutum non habet locum…‘

60 BNF, Magliabechiano xxix, 193, fos 1r–13v.

61 Ibid., fos 5r–6r.

62 Ibid., fo. 8v: ‘In terminis statuti pater non potest filiam impune preterire sed beneficio filii legittimi vel agnatorum.’

63 Ibid., fo. 190r: ‘et iste favor cessat ex quo agnati non admittuntur…exclusus privatur lucro quia illi non erat debita legitima sicut debetur filie de iure comuni et in casu nostro extranei vocati sunt contra mentem statuti quod voluit vocare agnatos filia exclusa.’

64 Bellomo, , Ricerche sui rapporti palrimoniali, 182–83.Google Scholar

65 Cf. Luigi, Lombardi, Saggio sui diritto giurisprudenziale (Milan, 1975), 1–199Google Scholar; Mario, Ascheri, ‘“Consilium sapientis”, perizia medica e “res iudicata”: Diritto dei “dottori” e istituzioni comunali’, Monumenta iuris canonici, ser. C, 6 (1980), 533–79Google Scholar. Recently Jacques, Pluss, ‘Baldus de Ubaldis of Perugia on Dominium over dotal property’, Tijdschrift voor Rechtsgeschiedenis 52 (1984), 399–411Google Scholar, has reconstructed an interesting example of interpretive flexibility within a doctrinal framework that made law truly operative in Italian cities. Interesting insights on the pervasive nature of ambiguity in law are offered by Alan, Watson, Sources of law, legal change, and ambiguity (Philadelphia, 1984).Google Scholar

66 In contrast to Sbriccoli, Interpretazione, and to a lesser degree Bellomo, Società e istituzioni in Italia dal medioevo agli inizi dell' età moderna, 3rd ed. (Catania, 1982).Google Scholar

67 In this connection stand the comments of Angelo degli Ubaldi (1325–1400) echoing the conclusion of Francesco di Bici degli Albergotti (d. 1376) that a mother was not excluded from inheritance to her daughter in favour of the child's paternal aunt: ‘Mater habet pro se ipsam rerum naturam, et summam aequitatem, et coniecturas quasdam: amita habet pro se primam statuti figuram, scilicet statuti, cui tenacissime inhaerent homines, et maxime rudes [whose interpretation earlier was characterised as ‘quaedam rudis et laicorum aequitas videtur quod bona redeant ad stirpem, a qua profluxerunt’], qui mundi maximam partem id dicunt esse astutiam et cavillationem: de quorum tamen verbis parum curandum est, dum tamen non devietur a tramite rationis. Quid ergo finaliter dicendum est? Respondeo, servetur practica et interpretatio consueta: quae si non apparet, mater habet aequitatem, amita verborum ruditatem.’ Cf. Angelo, degli Ubaldi, Consilia (Frankfurt, 1575), cons. 344 and 345, fos 245ra–247va (both his and Albergotti's), quotes on 247ra and rb.Google Scholar

68 Cf. Chojnacki, , ‘Patrician Women’, 187–93Google Scholar. Christiane, Klapisch-Zuber, ‘Déclin démo-graphique et structure du menage’, in Georges, Duby and Jacques, Le Goff eds., Famille et parenté dans l'Occident médiéval, (Rome, 1977), 255–68Google Scholar, argues that greater household complexity, based on patrilineal and patrilocal rules, made for greater subjection of wives and widows that coincided with a juridical antifeminism. But in actual operation legal institutions were not reticent about protecting women (as she herself notes, ‘La mère cruelle’, 1100), perhaps precisely because they were so closely ‘controlled’ by men. Also on legal control of women in Florence, see my ‘Cum consensu mundualdi: legal guardianship of women in Quattrocento Florence’, Viator 13 (1982), 309–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

69 Grossi, Situazioni reali. In the last analysis, even the jurists' ideas dissolve into tangled relationships whose historical nature remains obscure. As Julius Kirshner has warned, ‘consilia are constructed intertextually, that is, they are often little more than a concatenation of texts citing other texts; and they tend upon close examination to lose their historical specificity and disappear as discrete entities before one's eyes’ (Review of Mario, Ascheri, I consilia dei giuristi medievali in, Speculum 58 (1983), 842).Google Scholar

70 Kuehn, , Emancipation, 26–7, 139.Google Scholar

71 Cf. Antonio, Roselli, Tractatus legitimationum, in Tractalus universi iuris (Venice, 1584), fos 75va–90raGoogle Scholar; Génestal, R., Histoire de la légitimation des enfants naturels en droit canonique (Paris, 1905)Google Scholar; Henri, Regnault, La condition juridique du bâtardau moyen age (Pont Audemer, 1922)Google Scholar; Corrado, Pecorella, ‘Filiazione(storia)’, Enciclopedia del diritto 17 450–54Google Scholar; Anke, Leineweber, Die rechtliche Beziehung des nichtehelichen Kindes zu seinem Erzeuger in der Geschichte des Privatrechts (Königstein, 1978).Google Scholar

72 A point elegantly made by Sally, Falk Moore, Law as process (London, 1978), 149–80Google Scholar. Also Camaroff, John L. and Simon, Roberts, Rules and Processes: the cultural logic of dispute in an African context (Chicago, 1981), 175–215Google Scholar. On the other hand, I find that Goody's cross-cultural approach tends to take a construct-like agnation as universal and unchanging, though not constructs like lineage or family. Cf. not only his Development of marriage and the family and Production and reproduction but also his theoretical essay in Family and inheritance.

73 Cooper, , 296Google Scholar, suggests that the trend after 1300 was ‘towards emphasis on a narrow definition of lineage, in turn fortified by policies of restrictive marriage’, one aspect of which was ‘the preference of females over collateral males in inheritance.’ Also Richard, Goldthwaite, Private wealth in Renaissance Florence (Princeton, 1968)Google Scholar, but see also Cooper, , 279–80Google Scholar, and Kent, , Household and Lineage, 3–15Google Scholar, Herlihy, and Klapisch, , 511Google Scholar. There may indeed have been an increased emphasis on lineal succession, as in Bartolo's exclusion of the maternal line and the increased use of the fideicommissum. But this is a subject of other papers I hope to do in the future.

74 Cf. Comaroff, , ‘Introduction’, in The meaning of marriage payments, 34–5Google Scholar: ‘it is with reference to the devolutionary process… that members acquire their rank and location within fields of relationships, that the social definition of linkages between them are negotiated and expressed, and that segmentary alignments gain their manifest shape’. In a similar vein on the problem of succession, see his ‘Rules and rulers: political processes in a Tswana kingdom,’ Man, N.S. 13 (1978), 1–20.Google Scholar

75 A distinction between male and female senses of kinship is a valuable perspective raised by historians like Goody and Klapisch-Zuber, but see also Stanley, Chojnacki, ‘Dowries and kinsmen in early Renaissance Venice’, Journal of Interdisciplinary History 5 (1975), 571–600Google Scholar, and Stuard, Susan Mosher, ‘Women in charter and statute law: Medieval Ragusa/Dubrovnik’, in Susan, Mosher Stuard, ed., Women in Medieval Society, (Philadelphia, 1976), 199–208Google Scholar; Lauro, Marlines, ‘A way of looking at women in Renaissance Florence’, Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 4 (1974), 15–28.Google Scholar

76 Cf. Kuehn, ‘Cum consensu mundualdi.’

77 It should be pointed out as well that it is not certain from case materials, least of all from consilia, exactly who was the moving force behind any given party. Female litigants may have been the pawns of male relatives, and conversely men might have been acting along lines laid out by mothers; or men may have worked through other men or women through women.

78 In his recent Medieval households (Cambridge, Mass., 1985), 82–3Google Scholar, David Herlihy amplifies on Goody's insights to insist that the agnatic lineage began in the twelfth century to overlay but not to replace the cognatic kindred.