THE NOBILITY AND THE ISLAND

About the book THE NOBILITY AND THE ISLAND

The medieval nobility of Rab is a part of the nobility existing in Dalmatian communes. However, in one very important element the position of the noblemen of Rab differed from what standard historiographical works on medieval Dalmatian communes describe as the structure of power in the region. The power in medieval Rab was througout the 14th century divided between nobles and commoners. The Great Council of the Commune of Rab consisted of both nobles and commoners and not, as comparative Dalmatian examples would suggest, only of nobles. Such a situation seems unusual for a commune originating from a Roman town (civitas), and seeks an explanation. What was the foundation of immanency of the nobility of Rab if not the membership in the Great Council, as in the cases of Dubrovnik, Split, Zadar or Trogir?. The book is a detailed survey of all social, cultural, and economic elements determining the elite of the island. It is based on the authors research of sources from various archives on the island of Rab itself as well as in numerous domestic and foreign institutions. The story of the medieval nobility of Rab starts in the early 19th century when the nobility of the former Venetian teritories was obligated to prove its noble status to the new sovereign, the emperor of Austria. The unusual fact that membership in the Great Council of Rab was for a long time not identical with noble status was an enormous obstacle to the case of proving that noblemen of Rab actually were nobility. Their misfortune deriving from the general misunderstanding of the immanency of nobility of their medieval ancestors is one of the keys to the solution of this difficult problem.