Original scientific paper

Noble Family Ljubavac of Zadar in the Fourteenth Century

Branka Grbavac ; Department of Historical Research of the Institute of Historical and Social Sciences, Croatian Academy of Sciences and ArtsOdsjek za povijesne znanosti ZPDZ HAZU, Zagreb

Abstract

Based on the published and hitherto unpublished sources kept in the Državni arhiv u Zadru (the State Archive of Zadar), a reconstruction of the genealogy and history of the Ljubavac family of Zadar in the fourteenth century is presented in this article. The family originally belonged to the Croatian lesser nobility. During the fourteenth century, a branch of the family moved from Skradin to Zadar, and its members achieved enviable economic success there and became fully fledged citizens of the commune of Zadar. The first known member of the Zaratin branch of the family was George, who had three sons: Peter, James and Radoslav. Peter was very active in the economic life of the commune. He was occupied in naval trade, shipbuilding, trading in silk, and investments in trading societies, and particularly in the traffic of salt from his salt-pans on the isles of Ugljan and Pag. Besides Peter, other members of the family based their economic prosperity on clever economic management and the purchase of valuable landed estates. A particularly interesting economic strategy in buying landed estates is evident in the case of another George, son of James, who bought a number of estates in the county of Luka from Croatian noblemen of the Mogorović, Jamomet and Virević kindreds during the 1380s and 1390s, through which acts he aimed at strengthening his links to the area of his ancestry. The presence of the members of the Ljubavac family in the commune of Zadar is visible also through their intellectual agency, expressed through their holding of different civic offices: judges examiners, judges of the city courts or procurators of the Zaratin commune. However, the political position of the family within the city was different, most probably because of the stigma of their former connection to the Venetians, and they were rather inactive in the political life of Zadar: in other words, the members of the family did not hold any higher political positions. Their testaments, as analysed in the article, certainly provide sources for the history of the family. They clearly show the religious characteristics marking the family, among which certainly the most important is their preference for and inclination towards the Franciscan Order.

Keywords

the Middle Ages; Zadar; Dalmatia; the Ljubavac family; political history; economic history

Hrčak ID:

168180

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/168180

Publication date:

31.12.2015.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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