Abstract

From the very beginning of «Studia» created by communes, it was the commune itself which acted as mediator between professors and students. Political power intervened not only in the selection of professors, whose names were put forward by citizens’ assemblies and offered fixed-term contracts, but also in determining their stipends, which in large part came, if not exclusively, from city funds. Information on budgets and stipends is generally available from legal sources and registers of the financial magistrates. From these data, this paper proposes to inquire into and analyse the financial management of the «Studia» of Perugia and Siena by local government during the Late Middle Ages. Already researched from a comparative viewpoint by Paolo Nardi, for this study the two «Studia» were chosen for their underlying similarities at institutional level. This revealed a number of specificities, which, on the one hand, required a certain degree of caution when attempting to identify a common model, and on the other, contributed to a better understanding of relations between the universities, local political power and society.