Origine della Compagnia della Misericordia in Firenze

The Gonfalonier (in Italian: ''Gonfaloniere'') was the holder of a highly prestigious communal office in

medieval In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...

and

Renaissance Italy The Italian Renaissance ( it, Rinascimento ) was a period in Italian history covering the 15th and 16th centuries. The period is known for the initial development of the broader Renaissance culture that spread across Europe and marked the trans ...

, notably in

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany Regions of Italy, region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilan ...

and the

Papal States The Papal States ( ; it, Stato Pontificio, ), officially the State of the Church ( it, Stato della Chiesa, ; la, Status Ecclesiasticus;), were a series of territories in the Italian Peninsula under the direct sovereign rule of the pope fro ...

. The name derives from ''

gonfalone The gonfalon, gonfanon, gonfalone (from the early Italian ''confalone'') is a type of heraldic flag or banner, often pointed, swallow-tailed, or with several streamers, and suspended from a crossbar in an identical manner to the ancient Roman ...

'' (in English, gonfalon), the term used for the banners of such communes. In Florence, the office was known as

Gonfalonier of Justice Gonfaloniere of Justice () was a post in the government of medieval and early Renaissance Florence. Like Florence's Priori, it was introduced in 1293 when Giano Della Bella's Ordinances of Justice came into force. He was one of the nine citi ...

(''Gonfaloniere di Giustizia'') and was held by one of the nine citizens selected by the drawing lots every two months, who formed the city's government, or

Signoria A signoria () was the governing authority in many of the Italian city states during the Medieval and Renaissance periods. The word signoria comes from ''signore'' , or "lord"; an abstract noun meaning (roughly) "government; governing authority; ...

. In the papal states, it was known as

Gonfalonier of the Church The gonfalonier of the Church or papal gonfalonier ( it, Gonfaloniere della Chiesa, "standard-bearer"; la, Vexillifer Ecclesiæ) was a military and political office of the Papal States. Originating from the use of the Papal banner during comba ...

or Papal Gonfalonier. Other central and northern Italian communes, from

Spoleto Spoleto (, also , , ; la, Spoletum) is an ancient city in the Italian province of Perugia in east-central Umbria on a foothill of the Apennines. It is S. of Trevi, N. of Terni, SE of Perugia; SE of Florence; and N of Rome. History Spolet ...

to the

County of Savoy The County of Savoy (, ) was a State of the Holy Roman Empire which emerged, along with the free communes of Switzerland, from the collapse of the Burgundian Kingdom in the 11th century. It was the cradle of the future Savoyard state. Histor ...

, elected or appointed ''gonfalonieri.'' The

Bentivoglio family The Bentivoglio family ( Latin: ''Bentivoius'') was an Italian noble family that became the ''de facto'' rulers of Bologna and responsible for giving the city its political autonomy during the Renaissance, although their rule did not survive a c ...

Bologna Bologna (, , ; egl, label=Emilian language, Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 1 ...

aspired to this office during the sixteenth century. However, by the year 1622, when Artemisia Gentileschi painted a portrait of Pietro Gentile as a gonfaloniere of

, with the ''gonfalone'' in the background, the office had merely symbolic value.

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Portrait of Pietro Gentile as a gonfaloniere of Bologna
by Artemisia Gentileschi, 1622. {{Use dmy dates, date=March 2017 Heraldry * Italian Renaissance Positions of authority Political titles

See also

References

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