Porters, Beggars, and Noblemen: The Social Construction of Political Power in Sixteenth and Seventeenth-Century Rome

Abstract

Employing Norbert Elias’s notion of figuration and referring to models based on the relational nature of power (patron-client, entrepreneur and big-man relationships), this article highlights how the relationship between the elite and the lower classes played a crucial role in the establishment of local power in Rome. The high degree of social mobility amongst the Roman elite made the neighborhood a politically open space: an official list of the aristocracy’s members was not available until the eighteenth century, and the Statute of Rome (1580) simply defined eligible candidates for local offices as “illustrious men of the neighborhood.” In this context, strong territorial connections were key when it came to gaining local power. An interconnected network of relationships linked the lower classes and noble families vertically. Through judicial sources, notarial records, and account books, this article presents the highly personalized nature of exchanges between the elite and the lower classes in addition to the complex web of economic transactions and social relations which was essential to creating a local network of clients.