Il ruolo delle universitates nella produzione normativa in Sicilia, secoli XIV-XV

Abstract

The present essay considers the respective role of the royal court and of the communities (universitates) in the local formation of normative systems in the Sicily of the late Middle Ages.It highlights how the communities’ relationship of subordination to the king did not preclude room for manoeuvre. Indeed, the universitates were able both to play a significant role in the production of norms, as the royal strategy of responding to requests from below was further refined, and gradually to obtain influence over royal policy regarding the local governments. We are concerned here with processes that are more in evidence during phases of political confrontation. Access to the various assemblies, the regulation of economic policy, the control of magistracies responsible for criminal jurisdiction etc., were all contexts in which the universitates could intervene and over which the king functioned as a regulatory authority.