Between Urban Conflict and Civic Integration: Processions in Rome and Milan, ca. 1050–1150

This chapter examines the politics of processions in Rome and Milan, in a period of rapid demographic and commercial expansion. Drawing on contemporary order books by Benedetto in Rome and Beroldo in Milan, alongside narrative and material sources, it explores how the cities’ bishop-rulers mobilized liturgy to forge civic consensus, project their authority, and sacralize fragmented urban landscapes. In response to market growth, both churches innovated with new processional routes and popular gatherings. Yet urban expansion also rendered public ceremonial a volatile site of conflict: while Rome’s aristocratic factions ambushed papal corteges, Milan’s popular Patarine revolt violently disrupted and co-opted episcopal rituals. Conflicts over processional space thus became central to the politics of religious reform and the emerging communes.