The Politics of Ritual Kinship: Confraternities and Social Order in Early Modern Italy (Cambridge Studies in Italian History and Culture)

Confraternities were the most common form of organized religious life in medieval and early modern Europe. They were at once the lay face of the church, the spiritual heart of civic government, and the social kin who claimed the allegiance of peers and the obedience of subordinates. In this 1999 collection, fifteen scholars examine the development of confraternities in Italy, where they emerged first and had the greatest impact. Individual essays explore a common set of themes across Italy from the twelfth to the eighteenth centuries: the ubiquity of confraternities, social construction, and devotional ethos; their ritual culture and civic religion; their antagonistic and collaborative relations with both civic and ecclesiastical authorities; and their role in social welfare and social control of marginal groups. The authors demonstrate how the ritual kinship expressed in confraternities emerged in the Middle Ages and became a powerful force in 'civilizing' early modern Italian society. Between the twelfth and the eighteenth centuries Italians frequently joined "confraternities" that made them symbolic brothers and sisters to one another. These kin groups launched extensive charitable programs, directed civic and religious rituals, and socialized members in class and gender roles. These essays examine how medieval religious and political values shaped early ritual kinship, how sixteenth-century social change and religious reform transformed confraternities, and how these altered groups became key agents in achieving the more rigid social order of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. -- Amazon.com An examination of how lay religious confraternities in Italy shaped early ritual kinship. This 1999 book discusses how sixteenth-century social change and religious reform transformed confraternities, and how these altered groups became key agents in achieving the more rigid social order of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Since the 1960s lay confraternities in Italy, as elsewhere, have moved from the periphery of medieval religious history to a central place in mainstream studies of social-religious and cultural history up to the eighteenth century. Edited By Nicholas Terpstra. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 279-313) And Index.