Kings of the Street: Power, Community, and Ritual in Renaissance Florence

For more than a century the artisans and labourers of Renaissance Florence turned the city into their own 'empire' during times of public festivity. From the republic of the late 1400s through to the grand duchy of the early seventeenth century, up to forty brigades of men called the potenze, or powers, elected kings, carved out territories, and entered into a dialogue with citizens and with their Medici patrons. Through the story of the potenze, this book provides fresh insights into the dynamics of class and gender relations, and the nature of agency, in early modern Italy.