Metadata: Fragments of registers' letters and ducal letters
Collection
- Country:
- Italy
- Holding institution:
- State Archive of Milan
- Holding institution (official language):
- Archivio di Stato di Milano
- Postal address:
- via Senato 10, 20121 Milano
- Phone number:
- +39 027742161
- Web address:
- http://www.archiviodistatomilano.beniculturali.it/
- Email:
- as-mi@beniculturali.it
- Reference number:
- 1, 3-6, 8-9
- Title:
- Fragments of registers' letters and ducal letters
- Title (official language):
- Frammenti Registri Missive e ducali
- Creator/accumulator:
- Ducal Chancellery
- Date(s):
- 1450-1487
- Date note:
- Jewish-related material dates from 1450-1451; 1468-1472; 1477; 1479; 1485; 1487
- Language:
- Italian
- Extent:
- 10 boxes
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
- The fonds consists of fragments of the registers of the shipping office of the ducal chancellery, which recorded the letters relating to the civil, chamber and military administration sent to the central authorities, district authorities and the municipalities belonging to the Duchy. There are some outgoing and receiving registers of some district authorities and some "oratori", who at the end of their mandate had to deposit the originals of the correspondence they had received and the minutes in the chancellery: these are the surviving fragments, probably, of a lost series.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The secret chancellery was the filter between the Duke’s will and the central and peripheral administrations of the Sforzas’ domain. The internal organisation of the office was regulated by Francesco Sforza when he came to power (1450). Cicco Simonetta, the Duke's first secretary, issued a series of provisions in 1453 to regulate the competences and duties of chancellors and scribes, and again in 1455 and 1456 to regulate the activity of ushers and registrars. All officials, before taking office, were required to make a solemn oath of allegiance to the person and the state of the Duke. They were entrusted with sending the ducal letters and taking care of the registers. Absolute discretion was demanded from the officers: those who revealed secrets of the office were punished with loss of the position as well as a life ban from any public office. Originally a single office, between 1450 and 1460 the Chancellery was divided into four distinct sections: the political chancellery (1450-1479), responsible for domestic and foreign political conduct; a benefit chancellery (1451), to which issues relating to the granting of ecclesiastical benefits were delegated; a judicial chancellery (1451), which dealt with criminal cases and drew up letters of grace ordered by the Duke; and finally the financial chancellery, which was in charge of controlling all the ducal revenues and expenses.
- Yerusha Network member:
- Contemporary Jewish Documentation Center - Milan
