Agricultural History Review, Volume 70 Part 1 (2022), p. 152

This lively and well-researched monograph surveys the legal and socio-economic conditions on an island located near Ragusa/Dubrovnik in the Adriatic sea. Coverage extends from 1420, when it voluntarily moved under Venetian overlordship, until the end of the fifteenth century. The Serenissima respected Korčula’s pre-existing statutory law and sent a comes as its sole representative to act as the supreme judge and mediator between local and central concerns. Typically serving for two years, these Venetians presided over a high court with six domestic judges (hearing cases from the whole island) and a complex constitution composed of the island’s eponymous town (governed by a set of civic officials and a large council made up local patricians) and four casalia (village districts), each with intricate administrative structures. Much of the information – exceptionally rich for the region – derives from jurisdictional proceedings, supplemented by notarial records, council minutes, deeds, wills and petitions. Following surveys of existing scholarship (as yet lacking such a detailed account for components of the Venetian stato da mar) and the historical background (tracing the growth of Ottoman influence in the Balkans), the core chapters deal with the island’s system of government, the profile of village society and the ‘special case’ of the shepherds. Three maps and eight photographs taken by the author provide helpful illustrations.

Drawing on an extensive conceptual review, the chosen approach combines micro-historical enquiry (to recover the personal contexts and networks of select individuals appearing in the sources) with an anthropological interest in the Lebenswelt of the islanders more generally (comprising elements like everyday routines, social customs, material culture and codes of honour). The analytical focus lies on the multi-layered notion of Gemeinschaft, understood here as the symbolic construct emerging out of the dynamics of social practice (p. 70). This definition encompasses a variety of manifestations, including not just the spatially circumscribed island universitas as a whole, the urban commune of Korčula in the narrower sense and the four rural districts of Blato, Čara, Smokvica and Žrnovo (each with shared responsibilities and collective capacity) but also a socio-professional subgroup like the shepherds. The latter resided in one of the villages but developed a distinct identity linked to seasonal labour patterns, contractual ties with animal owners from all over the island and collective interests often at variance with those of neighbours working in fields or vineyards. Court disputes reveal both overarching ties rooted in Korčula’s statutes, age-old customs and communal institutions on the one hand, and tensions between patricians and plebeians, peasants and vintners and shepherds and those with and without offices on the other. The biggest bone of contention was the damage inflicted on lands and crops by grazing: an inordinate amount of time and effort had to be invested to demarcate fields from pasture, identify transgressors, calculate losses, determine penalties and secure compensation. Illustrating the delicate balance between inclusion and inclusion, shepherds were often viewed with suspicion and considered less trustworthy than other villagers.

The argument offers numerous further insights along the way. One of the most notable is the substantial stake rural inhabitants held in the island’s public affairs. Town-based bodies stood at the pinnacle of the constitution, but each rural district had its own assembly, lower court and legal/fiscal officials plus four constables and a host of field and vineyard wardens, not to speak of ad-hoc additions for particular tasks. While all positions were filled by the large council, the personnel changed every six months, meaning that dozens of men obtained positions of responsibility in each village every year. On some occasions, furthermore, comes and court went on circuit to hear cases in the localities (there was a purpose-built loggia next to the church of All Saints at Blato; Figure 5); on countless others, communal officials exercised influence over proceedings held in town; sometimes, rural representatives even petitioned the Venetian doge or senate directly. The surviving volumes of records testify to a remarkable diffusion of at least basic literacy and multilingual capacity way beyond the city walls. Written notes transmitted specific information and instructions from centre to periphery and vice-versa. Alongside, we catch glimpses of oral exchange (e.g. in a series of lawsuits over public insults hurled at the newly wed couple of Marussiza and Radovanus de Craina on 20 August 1459) and the significance of material media (in the form of tally sticks used to record contractual agreements between animal owners and shepherds). In Korčula, therefore, popular participation was extensive and the urban-rural boundary porous indeed.

As acknowledged by the author (pp. 62–3), the biggest and most regrettable thematic gap is religion. The island had its own Roman Catholic bishop and it would have been fascinating to see how ecclesiastical dimensions intersected with the multiple forms of affiliations outlined above. Given an almost total loss of church records, the emerging narrative inevitably veers towards the secular, with very little to say on parochial organization, congregational worship, fraternity life and spiritual practices, all of which must have differentiated the experience of Gemeinschaft further. Stylistically, to move to a few quibbles, there are rather too many recapitulations of the same points, some over-elaborate passages packed with quotations (chapter 2) and tendencies to jump from micro-historical findings to generalizing conclusions (chapter 5).

Overall, Kümmeler offers an engaging journey into the world of a fifteenth-century island society. His concluding remarks point to wider comparative potential, be it with other areas along the Dalmatian coast (such as Poljica, where feudal structures lingered more strongly), the terraferma around Venice or case studies even further afield. Anyone interested in concepts of community, rural economies and town-country interactions will find Korčula a stimulating read.