Rulers in the Metropolis: Areas of Conflict between Political Centrality and Urban Diversity in Pre-modernity, Annual International Conference of the University of Regensburg’s Forum Mittelalter, in cooperation with the DFG-funded research cluster 2337 “Metropolität in der Vormoderne”, Regensburg, November 12–14, 2020

For over ten years now, the University of Regensburg’s Forum Mittelalter, an interdisciplinary cen- tre for medieval studies, has organised international conferences pertaining to research on European urban history, and since 2018 has done so in cooperation with the DFG-funded research cluster 2337 “Metropolität in der Vormoderne”. In November 2020, the Forum’s conference will take place once again, this time with the theme: “Rulers in the metropolis: areas of conflict between political centrality and urban diversity in pre-modernity” (Regensburg, 12–14 Nov. 2020, chaired by Prof. Dr. Jörg Oberste).

Metropolises bundle meanings together. Within metropolitan self-conceptions and the ideas oth- ers have of these centres, we find across a wide range of media claims to prestige as locations of marked urbanity, centrality, or historicity. By articulating such claims of importance and jurisdiction, be that through their supraregional economic relevance or their function as religious, cultural, administrative, and/or political centres, great urban centres always mark out network hubs in pre-modern power structures. For this reason, the special social, demographic, and cultural dynamics of metropolises relying on forms of collective and participatory administration have always presented a challenge to monocratic systems of rule. Metropolises stand as foreign elements in both feudal theory and practice; here, one need only think of the great fault lines, for example, that manifest themselves in the relationship of large cities organised on a communal basis vis-à-vis a typical medieval kingdom.

At the same time, the unsuccessful attempts of the Capetians or the Hohenstaufens to suppress the communes of their territories, as well as the expanding power of the Italian city republics, point to the increasing pressure to adjust to the new political realities on the ground. Scholars bring this convergence to completion between the late twelfth and early fourteenth centuries, when canonists such as Rufinus, bishop of Assisi (around 1180), theologians such as William of Auvergne, the bishop of Paris (around 1230), or philosophers such as Bartholomew of Lucca, the disciple of Thomas Aquinas (around 1300), designated the political model of the commune as having an exemplary role in the created order. The question remains, however: at what junctures did metropolises and rulers clash in political practice, and what effects did such conflicts have on the self-image of the metropolises and on rulers’ organisation of their dominions?

From an historical point of view, the Ancient Greek poleis (whose foundational histories often go back to disputes with rulers), the Roman imperial residences and provincial centres with their manifold connections to the Eternal City, or the bonnes villes subject to the king in absolutist France all provide diverse investigative lenses for this field of research. Already in antiquity and in the Middle Ages, the term ‘metropolis’ stands in direct relation to a ruler or political centre: meanings range from the Ancient Greek understanding of it as a ‘mother city’ giving birth to colonial foundations in Attica, to that of the centre of an ecclesiastical diocese in religious language, to the designation as a political centre, a ruler’s residence, or even burial ground, such as appears in Latin sources since the early Middle Ages as an alternative urban designation (seen perhaps most famously in the elevation of the small town of Speyer to the status of metropolis Germaniae [cf. C. Ehlers, 1996]).

Within modern research, the undeniable functional relationship of urban centres to (their) rulers has prompted discussions on the concept of the capital city and its equation with ‘metropolis’ in the late Middle Ages (A. Sohn, 2002). Nevertheless, this perspective falls too short: the best-known examples of the centralisation of monarchic/monocratic administration in large and historically important cities are Paris (since the thirteenth century), London (at the end of the Middle Ages), and Rome (as papal seat). Having an eye on continuity with contemporary capital cities, however, should not lead one astray into misunderstanding these close, functional relations as constituting a genuine symbiosis. Precisely in the centres mentioned above, powerful communes and urban élites were ascending at the same time as rulers were promoting their claims on cities as being their capitals. On the one hand, these urban competitors for authority struggled with potentates over power in the latter’s capital cities; on the other hand, the communes and élites profited enormously from participation in the central institutions of rule, while the city’s economic activity itself, spurred on by the presence of the royal court, blossomed under the aegis of central political functions located there.

An analytical summary of the relationships between pre-modern rulers and metropolises, such as is the aim of the planned conference, offers numerous interdisciplinary perspectives:

• the representation of rulers in metropolitan architecture, the ordering of urban space and artistic works in the city
• personal networks between institutions pertaining to the ruler and to the city; communication structures and media for depicting such relationships
• conflicts and competition between rulers and metropolises, and especially overlapping and cooperative efforts in metropolitan administration
• the role of historical references (with their frequently ruler-based themes) for metropolitan claims to prestige/authority/validity
• historiographic/narrative, iconographic, or performative media as expression of urbano-communal and ruling interests in the aforementioned competitive relationships