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Example research essay topic: Divided Into Four City States - 1,034 words

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A Brief Comparison of Florence and Venice Florence and Venice were the economic powerhouses of the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance. While there are vast differences between the two great cities, there are also some striking similarities, the most outstanding being their devotion to commerce. To both the Florentine's and the Venetians, riches had an extraordinary significance. To be rich was to be honorable and to be poor was a disgrace (Hibbert Medici 32). The Florentine's had a saying that no one poor would ever find it easy to acquire honor and fame by means of his virtue; poverty throws virtue into the shadows and subjects it to a hidden and obscure misery. This idea was equally true in Venice.

Wealth and poverty were not only personal traits of esteem or disdain; they were thought to reflect on the Republics as a whole. Rich men were an honor and a glory to the entire Republic and it was a citizens patriotic duty, along with serving in the military when called, and serving in the government, to gain as much wealth as possible (Hibbert Venice 53). This civic attachment to wealth is the central likeness between the two city-states. [Florence] was a city of squares and towers, of busy, narrow, twisting streets, of fortress-like palaces convents, nunneries, [and] crowded tenements, all enclosed by a high brick and stone crenellated wall. (Hibbert Medici 20). By the 14 th century, over 50, 000 people lived within the citys ramparts; less than in Paris or Venice, but more than in most other European cities, including London.

For administrative purposes, Florence was divided into four districts called, quarter, which were in turn divided into four wards. Every quarter had its own distinct character and was generally distinguished by the trades that were carried on there (20 - 21). The city itself was a city of industry, and raw products flooded in from all over Europe to be finished, polished and dyed. Also, foreign governments routinely deposited large sums of money in Florence's immense banks, and many rulers and great Lords were known to be indebted to Florentine bankers (Hibbert Florence 29).

Theoretically, every member of the citys twenty-one guilds had a say in the city government. In truth, a few very powerful families exercised a great deal of influence in determining the views of the city leaders and what course the Republics policies would take. Thousands of ordinary workers, non-shop owners, laborers and peddlers were prevented, by law, from forming their own guilds and were left at the mercy of the merchants and the tradesmen. Of Florence's guilds, there were seven of key importance, and fourteen of nominal value.

Of the seven major guilds, that of the lawyers enjoyed the highest prestige; followed by the guilds of wool, silk, and cloth merchants. The Guild of the Bankers was the foremost competitor with these big-four for city power, but the bankers suffered ostensibly from the stigma of being moneylenders. The sixth guild encompassed many trades: doctors, apothecaries, shopkeepers, merchants who sold spices, dyes and medicines, and artists and artisans. Finally, the seventh guild looked after the interests of cloth dealers and craftsmen of fur and animal skins. The minor guilds tended to be those with members of relatively humble trades such as: butchers, tanners, leatherworker's, smiths, cooks, masons, innkeepers, tailors, and bakers (Hibbert Medici 25).

The actual government was formed this way: the names of all those guild members over age thirty who were eligible for election were placed in eight leather bags. Every two months there would be a public ceremony in which names were drawn out at random. Men who were known to be in debt were ineligible, as were those who had already served a recent term or were related to men whose names had been drawn. The citizens eventually selected were, for the next two months, known as Priori, and the government they constituted, the Signoria (Hibbert Medici 26).

There were never more than nine men in the Signoria, six of them represented the major guilds, two of them the minor guilds, and the ninth became the standard-bearer of the Republic. The Florentine's were immensely proud of their system which, compared to other city-states, was a stable and just democratic republic. In practice however, Florence wasnt democratic at all. The inequities are in the open. Not only were unskilled workers excluded from government, but those descending from Nobility were also barred from participating in the government (28). Furthermore, Florence imported great numbers of foreign household slaves who were considered property of their owners and enjoyed essentially no rights at all.

From around 1270 onward, the citys trades began to increase in great strides. Most Florentine merchants dealt in spices, dyes, hides, silk, cloth and taffeta, gold, and above all, in wool. Vast quantities of wool were imported every year from northern Europe and brought to Florence to be finished and dyed. Florentine dyes were considered faster, purer and of brighter color than any other found in Europe at the time. The legendary banks of Florence worked hand-in-hand with the citys textile industries, and they supplied capital and investment money for the merchants and insured their shipments and cargoes. The Florentine's were the inventory of double-entry book keeping and of the precursor to the cheque, and they were regarded for hundreds of years as the worlds leading experts in international finance (Hibbert Florence 24).

In 1252 the bankers of the city issued small gold coins that came to be known as Florins. The Florin rapidly gained universal confidence and was soon considered the standard of currency across Europe (Hibbert Medici 32). One hundred and sixty miles from Florence, sitting within a shallow lagoon on the edge of the Adriatic, lay Venice. From her birth, Venice showed an exclusively commercial character. The city began in ancient times, shortly before the fall of Rome, when people fled from barbarian hoards onto the shallow islands of the lagoon. Life on the barren islets was Spartan and her early people had to tax their ingenuity for survival.

They were able to thrive by producing salt from the marshes and by catching fish and exchanging their products with people on t...


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