ABSTRACT
This chapter is an unusual one, in several respects. When the editors of this volume suggested using Philip Jones’ 1965 essay ‘Communes and Despots’ as some sort of starting point, inspiration or point of reference, it occurred to me that it might be worth taking that essay as itself the primary source for some sort of investigation, and to address not so much the history of latemedieval Italy as Philip Jones’ writing of it. You could say that I have wilfully misunderstood the editors’ suggestion: not taking ‘Communes and despots’ as my starting point, but taking the starting point of ‘Communes and Despots’.
