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Citizenship in Medieval Ioannina

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Citizenship in Medieval Ioannina Citizenship in historical perspective / edited by Steven G. Ellis, Guðmundur Hálfdanarson and Ann Katherine Isaacs (Transversal theme ; 1) 323.6 (21.) 1. Cittadinanza 2. Individuo e società I. Ellis, Steven II. Hálfdanarson, Guðmundur III. Isaacs, Ann Katherine CIP a cura del Sistema bibliotecario dell’Università di Pisa This volume is published thanks to the support of the Directorate General for Research of the European Commission, by the Sixth Framework Network of Excellence CLIOHRES.net under the contract CIT3-CT-2005-006164. The volume is solely the responsibility of the Network and the authors; the European Community cannot be held responsible for its contents or for any use which may be made of it. Volumes published (2006) I. Thematic Work Groups I. Public Power in Europe: Studies in Historical Transformations II. Power and Culture: Hegemony, Interaction and Dissent III. Religion, Ritual and Mythology. Aspects of Identity Formation in Europe IV. Professions and Social Identity. New European Historical Research on Work, Gender and Society V. Frontiers and Identities: Exploring the Research Area VI. Europe and the World in European Historiography II. Transversal Theme I. Citizenship in Historical Perspective III. Doctoral Dissertations I. F. Peyrou, La Comunidad de Ciudadanos. El Discurso Democrático-Republicano en España, 1840-1868 Cover: Ambrogio Lorenzetti (1285-1348 ca.), The Effects of Good Government in the City and the Countryside, fresco (central part), Palazzo Pubblico, Siena. © 1990. Photo Scala, Florence. © Copyright 2006 by Edizioni Plus – Pisa University Press Lungarno Pacinotti, 43 56126 Pisa Tel. 050 2212056 – Fax 050 2212945 [email protected] www.edizioniplus.it - Section “Biblioteca” ISBN 88-8492-406-5 Manager Claudia Napolitano Editing Francesca Petrucci Informatic assistance Michele Gasparello Citizenship in Medieval Ioannina Brendan Osswald University of Toulouse II - Le Mirail Ioannina est devenue après la chute de l’Empire byzantin en 1204 une des principales villes de l’Etat byzantin d’Epire, avant de devenir quasiment indépendante de 1319 à 1430, date de la conquête ottomane. Le problème de la citoyenneté s’y est posé avec acuité, dans la mesure où elle a d’une part continuellement été confrontée au problème des migrations, qu’il s’agisse de populations allogènes ou de réfugiés grecs, et où d’autre part son autonomie politique a posé le problème de la prise de décisions. La tradition byzantine d’avant 1204 était très accueillante envers les allogènes soucieux de s’intégrer à la communauté byzantine orthodoxe. Ioannina poursuivit cette politique, à la notable exception des Albanais qui, en raison de leur nombre, de leurs différences culturelles et de l’ambition de leurs chefs, furent constamment refoulés. En revanche, la pression albanaise conduisit la ville à inviter des princes étrangers à la gouverner en tant que Despotes, afin qu’ils apportent avec eux une aide militaire et diplomatique. C’est ainsi qu’un prince serbe et trois princes italiens régnèrent sur elle de 1367 à 1430. Chacun de ces princes amena avec lui des troupes ainsi que des courtisans allogènes. Un certain nombre de nouveaux venus, Grecs ou allogènes, ont ainsi pu jouer un rôle politique majeur à Ioannina. Le pouvoir dans la ville était réparti entre plusieurs catégories de citoyens: la catégorie supé- rieure, celle des archontes constituait le Sénat. Le peuple pouvait occasionnellement se réunir en assemblée, mais cette assemblée entérinait en général les décisions des archontes. Enfin, la catégorie des καστρηνοί est mal définie: il s’agissait à l’origine du nom donné aux habitants du κάστρον, mais on suppose que le terme prit un sens social et devint héréditaire, les habitants supposés originels se démarquant ainsi des nouveaux venus. Nos sources sont malheureusement peu loquaces et ne nous permettent pas de savoir précisé- ment quel était contexte juridique de la citoyenneté, ni même si un règlement précis l’enca- drait. Le plus probable est que les circonstances troublées ont conduit le Despote et les habi- tants de Ioannina à agir de façon pragmatique, voire arbitraire. Ioannina was a small Byzantine city until the Fourth Crusade, which provoked the col- lapse of the Byzantine Empire, replaced by a Latin Empire in Constantinople and three Greek rival empires in Nicaea, Trebizond and Epirus1. A large number of refugees fleeing from the Latin invaders came to Epirus2. Arta was then the official capital of Epirus, but Ioannina, which was a really small and insignificant city until 1204, quickly became as important as Arta and then, after the Turkish conquest, officially became the capital of Epirus – a status it still has today. Frontiers and Identities 98 Brendan Osswald We chose Ioannina as the topic of this case study regarding citizenship for two main rea- sons. First, foreigners played a particularly strong role in the city during the late Middle Ages. Second, the history of the city is relatively well-known, especially when compared to Arta, the other main city of Epirus, thanks to two Greek Chronicles written in Ioan- nina, which give us a rich and vivid account of the historical events of these times, even if they unfortunately do not provide answers to all of our questions. These are theChronicle of Ioannina, useful for the events between 1341 and 1400, and the Chronicle of the Tocco, useful for the events between 1375 and 14223. We will make this study along two lines, looking first at the differences between local people and newcomers and, second, at dif- ferences between the classes of citizens. LOCALS AND NEWCOMERS The Byzantine Empire indeed preserved its Roman heritage accepting Caracalla’s Edict of 212 a.D., and so citizenship was not the exclusive property of an ethnic or geograph- ic group: all free men were citizens, so political rights were not the exclusive preserve of Greeks. Membership in the Byzantine élite was open to the other ethnic groups of the empire, and even to foreigners, although how the process of integration and naturalisation came about is still quite unclear4. As a matter of fact, throughout its long history, the abso- lute monarchy that was the Byzantine Empire needed the demographic and military sup- port of newcomers, and since there was no participation of the middle class in the upper levels of politics, there was no opposition to the extension of the number of citizens. So, the one and only necessary and sufficient requirement to become a fully-integrated Byzantine citizen after the 6th century was to be an Orthodox Christian, a member of the Christian society that the Empire represented, a terrestrial image of the Kingdom of Heaven. The Fourth Crusade and the subsequent events forced the contemporary inhabitants of Ioannina to pose some questions: if Epirus is cut off from the rest of the Empire, what does Roman5 citizenship mean, and since the city is peopled by a large number of refu- gees, how should they be considered? It is difficult to know what ethnic characteristics the refugees of 1204 possessed. Most of them were probably Greek, since the Crusaders invaded areas largely peopled by Greeks, but the very fact that our sources do not men- tion their ethnicity but only their religion shows that they were still catalogued according to the classical Byzantine frame of mind. The first rulers of Epirus aimed at restoring the Byzantine Empire, so the refugees were granted the right to settle and to benefit from full citizenship. Michael Comnenos, founder of the State of Epirus, invited them and gave them space to settle inside the city of Ioannina. This decision had ideological aims, since Michael wanted to be seen as a rescuer of the Byzantine people6; but there were also political, economical and military aims, as he hoped it would help him organize his State and strengthen his army. Since his power was strong, his decision was effective. But not all of the original inhabitants of Ioannina liked this policy and when Michael’s brother Theodore was defeated and captured by the Bulgarians in 1230, the inhabitants tried to expel the refugees7. Unfortunately, we do not know what happened then but the expul- sion probably never was completed, because Michael’s son, Michael II, took power and tried to follow the same general policy as his father, to whose memory he was very def- Citizenship in Medieval Ioannina 99 erential. This crisis also showed the difference between the will of the State and the will of the city. The situation was about to become more complicated with the collapse of all the centralized political authorities in the Balkans and the greater autonomy of the city of Ioannina. In 1261 the Empire of Nicaea took Constantinople back and restored the Byzantine Em- pire in its capital. This restoration did not make Epirus offer loyalty to the new Emperor, Michael Palaeologos, and the fragmentation of the former Byzantine space continued. When the Italian dynasty of the Orsini launched a coup, killed the last prince of the Com- nenos dynasty and took power in Epirus, the city of Ioannina rallied behind the Byzan- tine Empire, and in 1319 and 1321 it received two chrysobulls (a kind of privilege) from the Emperor Andronicus II that gave it substantial autonomy8. It must be noted that Jews were granted the same privileges as the other inhabitants of Ioannina, and that they were perhaps living inside the walls of the city9. At the same time, the city was supposed to refuse to be led by a foreigner to the Empire, and landlords were supposed to refuse to sell their properties to foreigners. But later, in the 1340s, the Serbian and Albanian invasions brought about the collapse of Byzantine domination in the Balkans, and made these deci- sions of no consequence. None of the invaders put the city under its yoke, so that Ioan- nina became a kind of independent City-State comparable to the Italian ones, but the city was too weak to remain isolated from foreigners.
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