Giullare Solidarity, Florence, 1285

Abstract

In 1285 a group of giullari presented the city government of Florence with a petition. The petition, the contents of which are unknown, was rejected by the Special Council of the Commune. This article examines this record for what it reveals about the social position of entertainers in late medieval Florence. Consideration of the 1285 petition in light of corporate bodies formed by minstrels elsewhere in Europe, statutes regarding minstrels in other Italian cities, and evidence of ad hoc associations of Tuscan entertainers, sheds light on how the labour of giullari was viewed both by the performers themselves and by their fellow Florentines. Given the power dynamics unleashed by the adoption of guild-based structures of governance during Florence’s Secondo Popolo, the 1285 petition of the Florentine minstrels may well constitute the earliest evidence of an assertion of guild-like corporate identity by minstrels in medieval Europe.