Talk:Medieval commune

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This was an interesting article; I'd never heard of medieval communes of this sort before. Harkenbane 00:13, 10 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is an article worth keeping--the above user may have not heard the term because it's original research or otherwise unsubstantiated. This struck me as a candidate for merging or deletion. Paul 03:48, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

I wrote most of it and can provide citations. "Medieval commune" is just a way to disambig from "commune", which has many broader modern meanings. It can certainly justify its own article, the title doesnt impart original research, any more than "medieval science" is original research. Stbalbach 04:29, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps a good place to begin to take the bloom off one's perfect innocence in this area would be to Google "medieval commune" and read a little bit about the phenomenon called the "rise of the communes". Why not? ...but how could one actually arrive at any opinion one way or the other under the circumstances, one wonders? --Wetman 07:38, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Fair enuff, although I think the language of the article needs to be more encyclopedic. Also, there could probably be a more specific category for the article. I would attempt to fix the article but my knowledge of the subject is not extensive enough. Paul 18:59, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Since the communes of Central Italy and the Po valley arose about the same time as those in the Low Countries, to suggest priority would be invidious, and to divide the story in two would lose information, perhaps the normal heading "Medieval commune" as it appears in titles of articles etc could stand. --20:37, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Proposed edits

Making some changes, explaining rational here:

1. or with an entrepreneurial spirit - I think the word entrepreneurial contains modern assumptions that wouldnt hold true for the medieval period.
2. where examples provided Henri Pirenne with a thesis he too widely applied - this is an interesting aside and opinion that perhaps many (but not all) may agree with, but Im not sure Henri Pirenne's thesis, and the debates therein, is directly relevant to communes to warrant a mention. Perhaps theres some connection here im not aware if so it needs expansion.
3. re-ordering of sections (physical protection first) and integration of repeated origin material.

--Stbalbach 16:42, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

Another change: Removed the statement "England never saw much of the commune movement because it was by comparison a pretty well-run kingdom and did not need local protection forces" as being a general assumption with no basis; or an inaccurately expressed statement.SaraFist 05:24, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] That's only half of the story

A few assorted thoughts: This article seems to focus almost exclusively on the development of towns, and describes a "medieval commune" in very narrow terms ("allegiance of mutual defense"). It also seems to focus on the situation in northern Italy only. It completely neglects the development of medieval rural communes, which not so much arose out of defensive needs but equally from a need to collaborate to manage the commons. Besides, in times of a weak government, communes typically formed to ensure the safety on the roads (Landfriede) on their territory to enable commerce. Perhaps the most successful such medieval community was the one in the alpine valleys north of the St. Gotthard Pass: it later resulted in the formation of the Old Swiss Confederacy. But this is by far not the only one. See Städtebund for some communes amongst cities. Besides the Swiss, there were similar alpine, rural communes in Tyrol, but these got quenched by the House of Habsburg. Other such rural communes developed in the French Alps (Briançon), in the Pyrenees, in northern France (Forêt de Roumare), in northern Germany (Frisia and Dithmarschen), and also in Sweden and Norway. The colonization of the Walser also is related. The southern medieval communes most probably were influenced by the Italian precedent, where the communal movement was a rural affair very early on (it went well beyond the Lombard League of cities in the 12th century...), but the northern ones (and even the Swiss communes north of the St. Gotthard pass) may well have developed concurrently and independently from the Italian ones. And then one should not forget the Golden Bull of 1356, which effectively outlawed any such communes. Some key words to search for: Eidgenossenschaft, Bundesbrief (most hits for this term will be for the Swiss acts of allegiance, either the 1291 one or one of the later ones (there were many), but some hits will also be for acts of allegiance of communes in northern Germany), confederatione(s), conjuratione(s), universitas or universitates (the last three being latin terms used at that time to (self-)describe this form of self-government). Note, however, that only very few of these medieval rural communes ever attained reichsunmittelbarkeit (where they would have been subject only to the king/emperor); most still remained subjects of some more or less distant liege lord. Lupo 12:54, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

Lupo, I've simply pasted your notes into the article with minor cleanup. We can proceed from here. --04:08, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by Wetman (talk • contribs) .

Darn. It's not really encyclopedic language. I posted it here on talk because I don't really have the time to properly research this in depth, and just tacking on a section on "rural communes" doesn't really solve the problems of this article. It needs a thorough rewrite. For the time being, I have rephrased it some to make it read more like a real encyclopedia entry and moved the "search key words" to a "see also" section. Lupo 06:50, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Another useful search term is "communal movememnt", although most English-language hits will be for the town development. Lupo 09:10, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

The Dictionary of the Middle Ages article on this is 10 large double-columned pages long, there is a lot to say. I originally wrote the article for a "general audience" (general audience encyclopedia?) just to get a quick idea of what it is and why it was important, but I guess invariably we enter the realm of the specialists and the depths of detail, so I moved the 7-11 version to Simple (which someone has since tagged as being not simple enough *sigh*). The DMA is a good source, it's already been condensed into Encyclopedic form and vetted by the specialists - it does say there are not many general sources in English, most are specific studies in French and German. --Stbalbach 14:47, 24 April 2006 (UTC)

Wetman, why did you just revert my changes? Your revert replaced a clean text with my utterly unencyclopedic ramblings above again (which even directly address the reader, a big no-no for a good encyclopedia article) and furthermore removed two references. If that had been done by a less respected or known editor (say, an anon), it would have been considered plain vandalism. If you don't like the "see also", you should have rephrased and worked them into the text yourself. (I have done so now.) That revert was just despiseable. Lupo 07:01, 27 April 2006 (UTC) (P.S.: The direct question ("What did it mean for a commune member to defend another?") in the text should also be rephrased.):

I've made a mess, once again! --Wetman 08:40, 29 April 2006 (UTC)