California Italian Studies

Political Humanism, of which Pontano’s De obedientia (1470) is one of the reference texts, possessed the rational and technical elements to outline the features of the Absolutist State with a refined theoretical apparatus. But it also had a secular and humanistic dimension that is lost in the subsequent developments of political theory, marked by the Reason of State and the return of the great military and ecclesiastical aristocracies. The main doctrinal axis on which hinges political humanism is the concept of organicism, namely the representation of society as an organic body inside which every member performs a specific function and the king is its visible representative, a reflection of the unitas that should be the basis for all social and political structure. In De obedientia’s fourth book, Pontano argues in favor of monarchy as the form of government that most closely meets the needs and issues of an organicist society and he outlines the features of the monarchical state. For this purpose, he uses the classical and medieval doctrine (mostly legal) to define the concept of obedience, and thus building it around the concepts of liberalitas and fides, and then loyalty to the sovereign and to the homeland, which is a real focal point in the construction of the new humanistic state. Finally, it tackles the problem of disobedience and rebellion, especially with reference to the great feudal lords.