The bishop’s hunters: service to the lord and social mobility in the Bergamo mountains in the 12th and 13th centuries
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.6093/1593-2214/12846Keywords:
Middle Ages, 12th-13th centuries, Lombardy, Bergamo valleys, social mobility, rural lordship, peasant vassals, huntingAbstract
Service to the lord in connection with the chivalric military sphere, that is, the maintenance of a horse, even a nag, and the obligation to participate in military expeditions, was a very effective channel of social mobility, capable of catapulting the holders of feuda scutiferi, feuda equi, feuda ronzini, etc., into the ranks of the milites. In some contexts, however, where the military dimension was not so predominant, hunting service to the lord could serve the same function as social ‘lift’. That is, here venatores had the same opportunities for social advancement that elsewhere were reserved for scutiferi. This also calls for a reconsideration of the importance of hunting both as an aristocratic status symbol and, more importantly, as a seigniorial prerogative, a fact that has partly escaped historiography, which is more attentive to other aspects of domination over men.
Downloads
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2025 Alma Poloni
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
RM Journal is an open access, online publication, with licence:
| CCPL Creative Commons Attribution |
The author retains the copyright of his work whilst granting anyone the possibility “to reproduce, distribute, publicly communicate, publicly exhibit, display, perform and recite the work”, provided that the author and the title of the journal are cited correctly. When submitting the text for publication the author is furthermore required to declare that the contents and the structure of the work are original and that it does not by any means compromise the rights of third parties nor the obligations connected to the safeguard of the moral and economic rights of other authors or other right holders, both for texts, images, photographs, tables, as well as for other parts which compose the contribution. The author furthermore declares that he/she is conscious of the sanctions prescribed by the penal code and by the Italian Criminal and Special Laws for false documents and the use false documents, and that therefore Reti Medievali is not liable to responsibilities of any nature, civil, administrative or penal, and that the author agrees to indemnify and hold Reti Medievali harmless from all requests and claims by third parties.
