Ciompi Revolt (1378): Florence's Wool Workers Rise Up

The Ciompi Revolt was an uprising of the poorest wool workers of Florence in the summer of 1378. On 22 July 1378 the Ciompi, who had no guild and therefore no political rights, seized the Palazzo della Signoria and placed one of their own, Michele di Lando, at the head of the government. Their victory was short-lived, but it remains one of the most famous workers’ revolts of medieval Europe.

Background: a city built on wool

Fourteenth-century Florence was one of Europe’s great industrial cities, and its wealth rested above all on woollen cloth. The industry was controlled by the Arte della Lana, the wool guild, whose merchant members owned the raw material and finished cloth and employed thousands of workers in dozens of separate processes.

Florentine politics was organised through guilds. Only members of recognised guilds could hold office, and the government, the Signoria, was drawn from them. The ciompi, a word probably derived from the sound of wooden clogs or from a term of abuse, were the carders, combers and other labourers at the bottom of the wool industry. They were forbidden to organise and were subject to the wool guild’s own police official, who could fine, imprison or flog them.

The Black Death of 1348 and later outbreaks killed perhaps half of the city’s people, disrupting the labour market. In the 1370s Florence fought the War of the Eight Saints against Pope Gregory XI, which brought heavy taxes and a papal interdict that hurt trade. Workers were also paid in debased copper coins while prices and rents rose.

The summer of 1378

The crisis began within the ruling class. In June 1378 Salvestro de’ Medici, the Gonfaloniere of Justice, proposed measures against the powerful Guelf Party, which had used accusations of disloyalty to exclude rivals from office. Guildsmen took to the streets, burning the houses of leading Guelf families.

The disorder gave the unguilded workers an opening. After the authorities arrested and interrogated some of their leaders, the Ciompi rose on 20 July. Armed crowds gathered, attacked the residence of the wool guild’s foreign official and presented petitions to the government.

On 22 July 1378 they forced their way into the Palazzo della Signoria. A wool carder named Michele di Lando, carrying the standard of justice, was proclaimed Gonfaloniere of Justice, the head of the republic.

The new regime

The new government created three new guilds: one for dyers and related trades, one for doublet makers and tailors, and one for the Ciompi themselves, sometimes called the “People of God”. Their members gained the right to hold office, sharing power with the existing major and minor guilds.

The workers’ petitions also sought an end to the hated disciplinary official, a moratorium on small debts, tax reforms and a guarantee that cloth production would be kept up so that there would be work.

The gains soon came under strain. Employers stopped production, food was scarce, and the radical Ciompi, organised at Santa Maria Novella under leaders known as the Eight Saints of the People of God, began pressing further demands in late August. The more moderate artisans and Michele di Lando himself turned against them.

Defeat and reaction

On 31 August 1378 armed guildsmen, with Michele di Lando at their head, attacked the Ciompi in the Piazza della Signoria and routed them. The Ciompi guild was abolished, and many of its members were exiled or fled.

The two other new guilds survived for a few more years in a regime led by the minor guilds. In January 1382 the wealthy elite regained power, abolished the new guilds and established an oligarchy dominated by families such as the Albizzi. That oligarchy ruled until the rise of the Medici, whose banking fortune would later make them masters of the city.

Myths and facts

The revolt is sometimes described as a proletarian revolution in the modern sense. Most historians are more cautious: the Ciompi sought inclusion in the guild system rather than its abolition, and their movement depended on divisions within the elite.

Another popular source is the stirring speech of an anonymous Ciompi leader in Machiavelli’s Florentine Histories. It is a literary invention written about 150 years later, not a record of real words.

Timeline

• 1348: The Black Death strikes Florence, killing perhaps half of its people.
• 1375–1378: Florence fights the War of the Eight Saints against the papacy.
• June 1378: Salvestro de’ Medici’s proposals spark riots by guildsmen.
• 20 July 1378: The Ciompi rise in arms.
• 22 July 1378: The Ciompi seize the Palazzo della Signoria; Michele di Lando becomes Gonfaloniere.
• 31 August 1378: Guildsmen led by Michele di Lando crush the Ciompi.
• January 1382: The elite regains power and abolishes the new guilds.

Why it matters

The Ciompi Revolt was one of several popular uprisings in late-medieval Europe, alongside the French Jacquerie and the English Peasants’ Revolt. It showed both the power and the fragility of workers who briefly forced their way into government in one of the richest cities of the age.