Etudes médiévales

In Medieval and Early Modern Europe, foreigners cannot anymore be considered in the fringe of society or as a distinctive feature in the legal landscape. Their presence is regular, familiar and broadly and deeply socially spread. 
Since a decade, history of foreigners has been undergone an important revival and an acute attention paid on their diversity of origins, the way their presence is identified and the forms it takes, their social visibility and cultural representation, the possible indifference shown to them or the diversity of their social trajectories (from a sporadic presence to lightning upward mobility). Foreigners are usually defined by their cultural, political and legal features, i. e. a set of legal rights allowed in a specific area and related to a possible political protection. Their extraneity can allow and guarantee their privileges as well as restrict their practices. Due to the fact that every foreign community doesn’t enjoy the same privilegies in a same society, being a foreigner refers to pluralist legal and social reality that have to be contextualized and analysed. Hence, extraneity is an asymmetric whole of legal minorities in medieval and early modern societies, where being part of a minority is nothing but the norm. In that sense, extraneity is not necessary an obstacle to integration and being a foreigner could be the result of a political will to protect some local groups in marginalising or favouring some foreign communities as well as it could be the opportunity for the ruling class to weaken rival social groups in promoting foreigners as newcomers. Extraneity affects a huge part of the urban medieval and early modern societies.
Besides, the foreign legal status and social bonding have to connected. Social history tempts to observe foreigners according to the alliances and allegiances that they share, look for or cannot avoid. Consequently, naturalization is not necessary the accomplishment of the social integration, to the extend that a foreigner can be able to handle more legal liberties than local communities in order to make a place economically attractive. History of the social integration of foreigners depends on forbidden, possible, achieved or broken relationships between two minority groups respectively from the diversity of the “natural subjects” and the diversity of the foreigners. History of foreigners contrasts and allows figuring out the history of the society in which they actually evolved and are settled.
In order to multiply and cross the focuses, scholars working on a large European area, from the Atlantic to the Ottoman World and from Scandinavia to Mediterranean have been invited to present their works. The diversity of the materials (state, municipal, consular, notary, feudal or private sources…) as well as the variety of the contexts (free cities, city under the authority of a specific lord, free ports, rural areas…) help us to question the recent studies and to put a stress on the logics of the social integration and their limits.

In Medieval and Early Modern Europe, foreigners cannot anymore be considered in the fringe of society or as a distinctive feature in the legal landscape. Their presence is regular, familiar and socially deeply spread.
Since less than a decade, history of foreigners has been undergone an important revival related to studying their diversity of origins, the way their presence is identified, the concrete forms of their presence as well, their social visibility and cultural representation, the possible indifference shown to them or their irregular social trajectories (from a sporadic presence to lightning upward mobilities). Studying their social and historiographical invisibility seems even possible. Foreigners are defines by cultural, political and legal status, i. e. a set of legal rights allowed in a specific area and related to a possible political protection. Their extraneity can allow and guarantee their privileges as well as restrict their practices. Due to the fact that every foreign community doesn’t enjoy the same liberty in a same society, to be a foreigner refer to pluralist legal and social realities that have to be contextualized and analysed. Extraneity is an asymmetric whole of legal minorities in medieval and early modern societies, where minority is nothing but the norm. In that sense, extraneity is not necessary an obstacle to integration and being foreigner has to be understood according to the social and political framework of action of a particular group or of an individual. It could be the result of a political will to protect some local groups in marginalising or favouring some foreign communities as well as it could be the opportunity for the ruling sort to weaken rival social groups in promoting foreigners as newcomers. Hence, extraneity affects a huge part of the urban medieval and early modern societies.
Besides, the foreign legal status and social bounding have to be made out. Social history tempts to observe foreigners according to the social alliances they share and the protection under which they are put or they put themselves. Consequently, naturalization is not necessary the accomplishment of the social integration, to the extend that a foreigner can be able to handle more legal liberties than local communities in order to make a place attractive to them, unless that possibly arouses as many social bounds as conflicts. History of the social integration of foreigners depends on forbidden, possible, achieved or broken relationships between two minority groups respectively from the diversity of the “natural subjects” and the diversity of the foreigners. History of foreigners contrasts and allows figuring out the history of the society in which they actually evolved and are settled.
In order to multiply and cross the focuses, researchers and post-docs working on a large European area, from Atlantic to the Ottoman World and from Scandinavia to Mediterranean have been invited to present their works. The diversity of the materials (state, municipal, consular, notary, feudal or private sources...) as well as the variety of the contexts (free cities, city under the authority of a specific lord, free ports, rural areas...) help us to question the recent studies and to stress the logics of the social integration and their limits.

A la suite des travaux menés sur cette période par F. Melis et M. Tangheroni notamment, notre rencontre aura pour but d’explorer une période mal aimée des historiens, en partie, justement, du fait de sa réputation de « période de déclin ». Le renouveau actuel des recherches sur ce sujet, profitant d’un regain d’intérêt pour l’exploitation des sources de la pratique, conduit à une réévaluation de la « crise » pisane, et à une redéfinition des paramètres politiques, économiques et sociétaux qui ont marqué la période postérieure à la Grande peste . Cette rencontre aura donc pour but de déterminer de nouvelles orientations pour la définition de la « crise » et de son ampleur, ainsi que de la « réadaptation » de la société pisane après la Peste, à travers deux axes problématiques principaux :
1) les perspectives offertes par l’exploitation des sources de la pratique pour l’histoire sociale, économique et politique (archives notariales , archives des compagnies marchandes, archives des grands établissements pieux , archives de la curie et de la mensa archiépiscopale) et la possibilité de déceler, à travers leur examen, les changements profonds des cadres sociétaux,
2) dans la continuité du volume Firenze e Pisa dopo il 1406 (2010) , la mise en valeur des caractéristiques « pisanes » de l’adaptation de la société durant la crise, au sein du contexte toscan et dans une perspective comparatiste, notamment par rapport au très étudié « modèle » florentin.

I vagabondi – con gli infideli – sono forse i più emarginati ed esclusi nel Medioevo, ai margini delle margine. Se la parola esiste in latino (vagabundus), il suo uso in italiano (vagabundo o vagabondo) mostra un cambiamento importante del suo significato nel Trecento : dapprima neutra, la parola assume poi un senso negativo, di condanna della vita errante dei più poveri. La frequenza del uso della parola è massima alla metà del Trecento e al tramonto del secolo, periodi di congiuntura sfaverole.
Questa cronologia si potrebbe dunque fortemente collegare con l’evoluzione economica. Come individuato da B. Geremek, la condannazione dei vagabondi è strettamente legata al particolare e difficile contesto che succede alla Pesta Nera : in mancanza di forze di lavoro, il successo delle revendicazioni dei salariati per migliorare le loro condizioni spinge la reazione dei ceti agiati che vogliono condannare quei lavoratori e poveri che non lavorano abbastanza. Lo sgradimento dei vagabondi si accentua dunque quando la congiuntura è pessima (carestie, peste, disoccupazione, etc.), ma si deve anche contestualizzare nel deprezzamento del lavoro artigianale e della condizione di salariati dipendenti e, infine, nel rafforzamento delle disuguaglianze economiche e sociali.
Nel campo giudiziario, questa situazione si traduce nella grande presenza dei poveri, emarginati e vagabondi nelle condanne per i piccoli delitti. Costretti a rubare per sopravivvere, i più poveri sono anche condannati per il loro stile di vita. La loro infamia di fatto si convertisce in infamia di diritto quando vengono condannati dalla giustizia. Il condanno del furto si fa più duro non solo perché minaccia le regole del commercio, ma sopratutto perché rappresenta una sfida verso la proprietà dei ceti più agiati.
Nel campo politico, si deve collegare questa evoluzione con la costruzione dello Stato moderno, ossia degli Stati regionali o territoriali. La comparsa di nuovi tipi di cittadinanze collegato alla « patricializazione » dei ceti dirigenti abbassa di fatto la participazione dei cittadini e sopratutto introduce nuovi tipi di disuaguaglianze politiche e giuridiche. Il bisogno d’identificare meglio gli amici e nemici dei regimi communali o signorili, i controlli alle porte (libri di bollette), la riputazione e la fama difondata dagli abitanti e vicini, l’importanza della residenza fiscale sono alcuni degli istrumenti per controllare e distinguere tra i « buoni » (maestri spezializati) e i « cattivi » migranti (personne senza qualificazione e con pessimi comportamenti).
Alla fine, l’evoluzione delle mentalità verso i migranti e lavoratori poveri si collega con l’evoluzione più generale degli attegiamenti e delle rappresentazioni nei confronti della povertà, studiata da M. Mollat e rivalutata ultimamente da G. Todeschini sul piano delle teorie medievali. L’assistenza ai migranti più poveri si accompagna da un oggettivo morale di disciplinarizazzione dei comportamenti, che fa della gente qualunque una maggioranza a rischio, per la quale i vagabondi sono uno dei modelli negativi.