We have noted the marked effects produced
on the development of a more popular feeling, by the changes
introduced by the great emperor of the Franks; which, by diminishing
the power of the local lords, accomplished a double benefit; on the
one hand by saving the people from the arbitrary rule of a feudal
superior; on the other, by causing the city to become more of a
dependence and more of a support to the state as a whole. And finally
we have left the city prepared, on the return of another dynasty of
native kings, to accept, at least in a large number of cases, the
domination of another kind of lord, a spiritual one; who was to serve
as a medium for breaking up the power of the old lords of the
_civitas_, and from whom it would be an easier task for the commune of
the future to wrest the power and the sovereignty which was to make it
a free and independent autonomy.
* * * * *
AUTHORITIES REFERRED TO IN THE TEXT AND FOOT-NOTES.
_Anastasius Bibliothecarius_: Vitae Romanorum Pontificum. v.
_Muratori_: Script. Rer. Ital., Tom. III., Pars I.
_Baluzii, Stephanus_: Capitular. Regum Francorum additae sunt
_Marculfi_ Monachi et aliorum formulae veteres. Parisiis, 1780. 2
vols. fol.
_Bethmann-Hollweg_: Schrift ueber den Ursprung der lombardischen
Staedtefreiheit.
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