The Libro del Chiodo: sentenced to exile

The Libro del Chiodo is the name given to a magnificent parchment codex dating from the end of the fourteenth century and preserved in the State Archives of Florence, in the Collection on the Captains of the Guelf Party during the period of the Republic. The name by which it became known refers to a large nail attached at the back binding, while on the front are the words: Libro delle condanne delle famiglie ribelli del Comune di Firenze dal 1302 al 1379 detto del Chiodo (“Book of sentences against rebel families in the Commune of Florence from 1302 to 1379, known as the Libro del Chiodo”). The volume contains copies of the sentences pronounced against the Whites by the Commune of Florence between 18 January and 26 July 1302, to which are added the sentences of 1268 against the Ghibellines and other communal documents of various dates. The manuscript’s fame, however, is due to the fact that it contains the texts of the two sentences pronounced on 27 January and 10 March 1302 by the notary in the service of the podestà, Cante dei Gabrielli da Gubbio, against the Florentine Whites, including Dante Alighieri. The first sentence finds the poet and his associates guilty of mishandling public funds, condemning them in their absence to two years’ banishment, banning them from ever holding public office again, and issuing a fine of 5000 florins to be paid within three days, failing which their property was to be confiscated. The second sentence, of 10 March, also pronounced in their absence, and stating that they had not acted upon the previous sentence, reaffirmed their crime, condemning Dante and the other Whites to the stake if they were ever to return to Florence: “if any of these men should at any time enter inside the walls of the Commune of Florence, he shall be burned to death at the stake”[1].

[1] “si quis predictorum ullo tempore in fortiam dicti comunis [Florentie] perveneri[n]t talis perveniens ingne comburatur sic quod moriatur”.