Parma markets in medieval times

Historians believe that one of the most evident elements of city life continuity in the High Middle Ages was the persistence of commercial activity enabling the daily small-scale and financially modest exchange of basic goods and commodities manifested in the existence of markets.[1]

In the 11th century there is evidence of a market being held in the north-west area of Parma inside the walls. It was occupied by a large religious settlement consisting of two nuns’ monasteries, of San Bartolomeo and Sant’Alessandro,[2] which originally belonged to King Bernard’s widow and family. As happened in most monasteries after the spread of the Benedictine Rule, activities in the monasteries of Sant’Alessandro and San Bartolomeo were not confined to prayer and strictly spiritual works. Since the first half of the 10th century,[3] their assets were a curtis – a farming settlement – which means that in addition to the religious buildings there were others for productive activities. This must have attracted a certain amount of exchanges, facilitated by the favourable location of the religious complex. The Pons Lapidis (the most used bridge for crossing the river[4]) was located only a little further south than San Bartolomeo, and the road for Colorno (leading to the portus Parmisianus that is first documented in the 8th-century[5]) ran along the entire eastern side of the monasteries’ buildings. This had been one of the town’s main roads since Roman times.[6] The importance of the monastic settlement as an exchange centre finds confirmation in a donation by King Lotharius to our faithful and beloved Count Manfredo.[7] In addition to the many assets located in the Parma area and in other cities, the King donated to the Count the two monasteries of San Bartolomeo and Sant’Alessandro with their farming settlement and markets: cortem in Parma civitate cum duobus monasteriis ibidem hedificatis uno in honore Sancti Bartholomei, altero sancte Mariae et Sancti Alexandri cum mercatis et eorum omnibus pertinentis[8].

The evidence of the existence of those markets must be viewed in the context of the Carolingian period. There is ample evidence of numerous centres of exchange in every civitas and surrounding areas,[9] as in Italy medium and long distance trade never ceased completely, especially in cities that were already Roman and Romanized, and where a modest artisanal production carried on.[10]

With the economic growth of the 10th century and the development of trade over far greater distances, markets doubled in number; in the older ones, often dating from the High Middle Ages[11]

(if not later), the convergence of trade was rather limited, while the more recent markets were very busy and constantly expanding. Economic and legal historians have thoroughly analysed and compared urban and suburban markets, and we can refer to their conclusions. We know that a “vicinale market”, which only sold poor or basic commodities and was held weekly,[12] stood in sharp contrast to a “fair”, which took place on the occasion of a city’s major religious festivals and attracted mercatores of rare, precious or imported goods.[13] The minor weekly market, which usually kept the Roman denomination of forum, took place inside the city walls, while fairs, called nundinae, were generally held outside the walls.[14]

In Parma the market was held in the centre of town, at the intersection of the cardo and decumanus. Its existence was already documented in the early 11th century: in Bishop Sigefredo II’s confirmation of the Monastery of San Paolo’s assets two plots of land are also mentioned: de terra Sancti Petri apostoli que est constructa ad honorem ipsius prope forum ubi mercationes sine cessatione agebitur.[15] There can be no doubt about the place where these “ceaseless markets” were held: the Church of San Pietro is still extant on its ancient site (albeit with its facade turned the other way after Petitot’s 18th-century renovation).[16] If the name forum may, on the one hand, be interpreted simply as “market place”,[17] on the other it may refer to the ancient forum of the Roman city where, as in other cities, the custom of holding markets may have been established.

This would explain how, in Parma as well, the term forum in the Middle Ages continued to mean both the central square and the location of the regular market of basic goods and commodities.[18] This market, according to the document mentioned above, was held sine cessatione, ceaselessly, that is to say, continuously, not at long intervals or irregular intervals.[19] It was then a typical “vicinale market” for the supply of basic goods and tools to the city and countryside.

An important annual fair also took place in Parma in the Middle Ages: the fair of Sant’Ercolano, which was held for four days starting on the first Thursday in September. Its usual site was outside the walls and topographical and narrative sources[20] place it north of the civitas, near the road for Colorno, in the area of the Prato Regio, at least until the 13th century, when a chapter of the 1227 statutes decreed that it should be moved much nearer – teneatur facere fieri Feram sancti Herculiani in glarea Parmae a ponte lapidum inusum, a sero muro fovee civitatis, ita quod draparia et aliae mercimoniae ibi collocentur.[21]

The fair was therefore still held outside the city walls, but closer to its commercial centre, near the ancient markets of San Bartolomeo and Sant’Alessandro, in the new area created by the shifting of the riverbed following the floods of the second half of the 12th century.[22]

Over a century later the Duke of Parma, Bernabò Visconti, prohibited the holding of a large market outside Porta San Barnaba usually held on the 5th of September, the day of Saint Hercoliano… [23] From this it must be deduced, if the information in the document is correct, that either the earlier municipal dispositions were disregarded, or that the move concerned some of the goods (draparia et aliae mercimoniae), while a part of the fair continued to be held in the old Prato Regio area, outside of the San Barnaba Gate opening in the 12th-century walls. Though the first documents mentioning the Sant’Ercolano fair do not go further back than the first half of the 12th century,[24] it would not be unjustified to assume that, like other similar fairs,[25] its history goes back further than that.

If the regular market was that of San Pietro, therefore the forum, and if the nundinae fair was that of Sant’Ercolano, what was the nature and function of the markets of San Bartolomeo and Sant’Alessandro? It is likely that as a result of the reorganization of monastic property that took place between the 8th and 9th centuries, and the consequent increase in production, the Parma monasteries, too, tried to secure a commercial outlet for the commodities and goods that their lands and men produced in excess. At first such markets were held in the countryside but later, precisely because of the abundance of goods the monasteries were producing, it was considered more convenient to hold these markets where demand was higher and therefore within the cities, which were not yet able to protect their regular markets.

As the monasteries of Sant’Alessandro and San Bartolomeo were already very wealthy in the 9th century,[26] and as there is evidence in the following century of regular trade at such monasteries,[27] it is likely that, in addition to the vicinale market of San Pietro (forum), there was at least another market in Parma that could be called “vicinale” or, according to the term used by Carli, “abbot’s market.”[28] While the market at San Pietro continued to take place in the following centuries and to be subject of meticulous regulations in the statutes,[29] no more mentions are found of the markets of San Bartolomeo and Sant’Alessandro.

[1] Max Weber believes that one of the essential features of the city is “the existence in the place of settlement of a regular rather than an occasional exchange of goods … that is, the existence of a market” (M. Weber, La città, Milan, 1979, p. 4).

[2] U. Benassi, Codice diplomatico parmense, Parma, 1910. II, pp. 101-106, year. 835.

[3] G. Drei, Le carte degli archivi parmensi dei secoli X-XI, Parma, 1928, I, doc. LV, p. 716, year 948.

[4] We do not know with any certainty when the other two bridges (Galeria and domina Egidia) were built; they were located respectively north and south of Pons Lapidis, and were made of wood until the 13th century.

According to tradition, not confirmed by any evidence, Pons de Galeria dates back to the times of Emperor Galerius (4th century). The Bridge of domina Egidia is first mentioned well into the Middle Ages. Historical records of the 9th and 10th centuries do not mention them (M. Corradi Cervi, I ponti di «Domina Egidia» e di «Galeria» sul torrente Parma, in “Aurea Parma”, 49 (1965), pp. 103-108). The fourth medieval bridge of Parma, called dei Salarii, is mentioned for the first time in a chapter of the 1259 Statues (Statuta, cit., I, p. 86).

[5] 74 The port that is called Parmisiano is named in the granting of privileges by Liutprand to Comacchio in May 10, 715. The document, published by L.M. Hartmann (Zur Wirtschaftsgeschichte Italiens im friihen Mittelalter, Gotha, 1904, pp. 123-124), is reproduced in the study by G. Fasoli, Navigazione fluviale. Porti e navi sul Po, in La navigazione mediterranea nell’alto medio evo, Atti XXV settimana di studio, Spoleto, 1978, II, pp. 606-607; also on navigation in the Po valley area in the Middle Ages: C. Violante, La società milanese nell’età precomunale, Bari, 1974, pp. 3-10. Two documents of the 11th century mention a Port Capitis Parmae (Drei, Il, doc. CLXV, pp. 367-368, year 1097): it was in the hands of the Parma church, which gave it in emphyteusis.

[6] In Carta dei ritrovamenti romani nella città di Parma (National Archaeological Museum, Parma), one can see numerous traces of Roman paving along the southern part of the current via Garibaldi.

[7] Count Manfredo was the first member of the second comital dynasty of Parma, called Bernardinga because it descended from Bernard, King of Italy (S. Pivano, op. cit., pp. 512-516). The monasteries of San Bartolomeo and Sant’Alessandro, with their appurtenances, which included the markets, remained in the hands of this family of the Imperial aristocracy in the 9th and 10th centuries.

[8] Drei, I, doc. LV, p. 176, year 948.

[9] At the end of the 9th and 10th centuries numerous market rights were granted by sovereigns to the cities: Dupré Theseider, Problemi della città …, cit., p. 32

[10] Nowadays few historians share the thesis expounded by Pirenne in the 1930s according to which western urban life in this period collapsed due to the closing of Mediterranean trade routes following the Arab expansion: Pirenne, Le città del medioevo, Bari 1971; Id, Maometto e Carlomagno, Bari, 1939. On the current state of the debate about Pirenne’s theories, see Capitani’s introduction to the above-cited edition of Le città del medioevo.

[11] On markets in the Middle Ages in general: C. Verlinden, Mercati e fiere, in Storia economica Cambridge, cit., pp. 137 ff.

[12] G. Mengozzi, La città italiana nell’alto medio Evo, Florence, 1931, pp. 224-243; Violante (op. cit., pp. 19 ff.) analyzes the difference between rural and city markets.

[13] For practical reasons people chose to combine in the same day the duties of worship and the needs of trade. In spite of Charlemagne’s repeated prohibitions of all trading activities on Sundays and holy days, this custom was kept precisely because of its practical convenience, especially for the rural population.

[14] In the classical age a further distinction was made between “retail market» (macellum), «wholesale market» (forum) and «market held at long intervals» (nundinae): Carli, op. cit., p. 13.

[15] Drei, II, doc. VIII, p. 21: Drei dates the document, which contains no chronological references, to between 1005 and 1015.

[16] E. Guerra, A. Ghidiglia Quintavalle, La chiesa di San Pietro Apostolo, in Parma nella storia e nell’arte, Parma, 1948, pp. 10-30.

[17] On the meaning of the term forum in the Middle Ages see: G. Battisti. La terminologia urbana nel latino dell’alto medio evo con particolare riguardo all’Italia, in La città dell’alto medio evo, cit., pp. 649-651; G. B. Pellegrini, Attraverso la toponomastica urbana medioevale in Italia, in Topografia urbana …, cit., p. 426. On the use of the term in the Roman age: F. Castagnoli, Topografia e urbanistica in Roma antica, Bologna, 1969, p. 63.

[18] G. Mengozzi, La città italiana nell’alto medio Evo, Firenze, 1931, p. 236, n. 3.

[19] Schumann interprets “ceaselessly” in the sense of “daily market” and posits a chronological sequence, arguing that the feudal markets of San Bartolomeo and Sant’Alessandro were later replaced by the daily market in San Pietro square (Schumann, Authority and the Commune Parma 833-1133, Parma, 1973, p. 192).

[20] The denomination given to the monastery of San Francesco del Prato evokes the original location of Prato di Sant’Ercolano (or Prato Regio). Fra Salimbene wrote that the Friars built their monastery on the site where the old Parma market used to be held: Item eodem millesimo fratres Minores de Parma fecerunt pulcrum refectorium in Prato Sancti Herculani, ubi habitant et ubi antiquitus Parmenses nundinae faciebant… (year 1283, Salimbene De Adam, Cronica, edited by G. Scalia, Bari, 1966, I, p. 759).

[21] Statuta, Communis Parmae, Parma, 1856., I, p. 60 (year 1227).

[22] Nowadays the daily and weekly market are still held in Piazza della Ghiaia (Square of the Gravel), approximately in the same areas as the old Glarea (gravel) mentioned in the Statutes.

[23] B. Angeli, La historia della città di Parma et la descrittione del Fiume Parma, Parma, 1591, p. 194 (year 1365).

[24] In a document of 1173 Guilbertus de Prospera refers to the fair (“XL annos et plus vidit curaturam mercati S. Erculiani colligi per canonicos S. Marie et per episcopum Erculiani colligi per canonicos S. Marie et per episcopum (Drei, III, doc. 436, p. 351, year 1173): thus the evidence goes back to the first half of the 12th century.

[25] On medieval fairs in general: R. de Roover, L’organizzazione del commercio, in Storia economica Cambridge, cit., pp. 48-49.

[26] Benassi, doc. II, pp. 101-106, year. 833.

[27] Drei, I, doc. LV, pp. 175-178, year 948.

[28] Carli, op. cit., pp. 277-309.

[29] In the Statutes, several chapters are dedicated to regulations about the market in the what was called “Piazza del Comune”, decreeing what could be sold where and at what time, and where sellers could set up their wares: quid sit statutum in vendentes fruges, herbas et panem in platea Communis, et de porris ibi non vendendi; or Quid statutum sit contra ementes pullos et ova et alique sunt in Statuto, ante nonam, et ubi revenditores stare debeant, and again De revenditoribus non standi sub porticu sancti Petri et de pena contrafacientis (Statuta cit. I, pp.343-344, year 1255). More regulations in the following years demonstrate the commercial relevance of the old forum.