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Gradu in gradum semper antiquior de dicta domo aut familia de Prodis: A Contribution to the Research on the Patrician Family of Prodi from Bar
Savo Marković
Sažetak
Based on archival research and historiography, this study focuses on the patrician family of Prodi from Bar. The testament of nobleman Iohannes de Prodis, dating from 1494 and preserved in the State Archives of Dubrovnik, served as the starting point for a genealogical reconstruction of one of the most prominent aristocratic lineages in Bar during the 15th and 16th centuries. Transcribed and translated, the provisions of this testament bring into the focus the testator’s biography as well as a number of related aspects.
In addition to this document, data from the archival sources and scholarly literature allow for the completion of the picture of social conditions at the time, especially the cultural community whose members, with their ethnic and linguistic features, political patriotism, self-awareness, and assertion of their autonomy grown out of stratified traditions, were highly representative of the late medieval and early modern commune. Aspects of their identity are manifested not only in the modalities of power legitimization, but also in the religious sphere and the forms of social practices. The nobility’s awareness of continuity persisted in their ethical and religious principles, consolidated into customs and law. These principles also indirectly reveal the peculiar legal position of women at the time.
Having studied the family relations, biographies, and other facets of social stratification in these elite social groups and individuals across several generations, the author has performed a prosopographic analysis of their characteristics, complementing it with the use of an interdisciplinary and comparative approach. Since the patricians dominated the social and political life of cities in the European Mediterranean, it is also with the Prodis that the family’s vertical kinship system, ancestry, and economic power played a central role in shaping the mentality, class organization, and the form of regimen. Their identity as nobility came not only from their awareness of belonging to the kindred, but also from their subjective, individual experiences of their own ethnicity, from their pursuit of attention and fame, and from the symbiotic cultural processes that were taking place in the context of Venetization. The Prodis participated in the making of these strong and long-lasting social bonds that withstood all political changes and limits. The practices of fideicommissum and the fedeicommissary substitution, documented in the testament, reveal the family’s determination to preserve their patrimony as an important feature of their status and to prevent the decline of their estate.
As one of the most significant kindreds during the period of Venetian rule, with the testimonies they have left concerning their spiritual and urban heritage, the Prodi family illuminates the manifold components of communal life in the southern part of the eastern Adriatic coast. The published archival sources permit a number of church buildings in the Bar area to be cautiously dated and located and confirm the authenticity of metrology in the district. By shedding light on the meaning of certain toponyms, they bear witness to the fact that interaction between various civilisations had been taking place in Bar for a long time.
Ključne riječi
Bar; Dubrovnik; Middle Ages; patricians; identity; testament
Hrčak ID:
174123
URI
Datum izdavanja:
21.12.2016.
Posjeta: 1.609 *