The ‘Signorial Mutation’ and the Economic Change: Some Considerations Based on the Fate of Fiscal Estates in Tuscany

Abstract

The paper deals with the link between ‘seigniorial mutation’ (or feudal revolution) and economic transformations, with a specific focus on Tuscany. At the heart of this issue is the question of whether 11th-century economic growth may have been a fundamental precondition of ‘seigniorial mutation’. Focusing on the fate of fiscal estates in the region, the paper shows their patterns of circulation and redistribution, their slow and incomplete processes of appropriation and privatization, and the enduring ability of kings and marquises to control aristocracies through them into the late 11th century. This is a decisive key in explaining why the severe political crises marking the history of Tuscany in the 10th and 11th centuries did not give rise to a ‘seigniorial mutation’ until the clash between Henry IV and Gregory VII. Given the large population size achieved by the major fiscal centers and their complex economic articulation, it is finally suggested that the economic growth that occurred during the 11th century provided aristocracies and major churches with the economic and relational resources necessary to act outside the traditional circuit of the marquis’ court, aiming for a local, more intense, and long-lasting power: in short, to initiate the ‘feudal revolution’.