Sartori is an ancient noble family of Italy. It was founded in 1295 in Vicenza, where they were feudatories attached to the episcopal vassalage. Before 1500, they were admitted to the civic patriciate. The family made their fortune mainly in the logging and timber trade, accumulating a huge financial and land holdings. From the 16th century on, they established their main headquarters in Bassano del Grappa, and launched other branches to other cities in Veneto, Trentino, Austria, and Brazil. The family is very prolific and branched, producing several outstanding members. The different branches of the family held many titles: they were feudal lords in Roana, Foza, Castegnero and Meledo Alto; nobles in Vicenza, Roana, Bassano del Grappa, Belluno and Primiero; patricians in Vicenza, Roana, Asiago, Lusiana, Foza, Asolo, Valstagna, Longarone and Bassano del Grappa. The surname can be spelled as Sartore, Sartor, or Sartorio.
Origin and overview The Sartori descend from Florentines who arrived in Vicenza along with Bishop Andrea dei Mozzi, a member of one of the most illustrious families of Florentine magnates in the Middle Ages who was transferred to Vicenza after being involved in a major scandal, whose nature is still poorly understood. Anyhow, he arrived in Vicenza in late 1295, but he was already ill and died in less than a year, probably in August 1296.
Before Andrea died, he distributed fiefs among some of his servants, including members of a family whose original surname is unknown, and who came to adopt the surname Sartori in Vicenza. The Sartori received fiefs in Roana, one of the Seven Communes situated on the Vicentine plateau that constituted a semi-independent federation that, although it was subject to the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Diocese of Vicenza and the civil administration of Vicenza, maintained a delegate in Asiago, the capital of the Federation. At the same time, the bishop enrolled them as vassals of the Episcopal Table, naturalizing them as Vincentian nobles, remaining under successive bishops. Abbot Modesto Bonato, historian of the Seven Communes, said that he found in the public records only a single tradition about the Vincentian Sartori that referred to a Florentine origin with initial settlement in Roana.
The names of the founders of the family are unknown. After the death of Bishop Mozzi, the family concentrated around his fief. Armed with a well-established social and economic base, the new Sartori prospered by acquiring new fiefdoms and vast areas of land on the Vincentian plateau around Roana, establishing new settlements successively in Enego, Foza, Gallio, Asiago, Lusiana and Valstagna, and later, down the valley of the Brenta River, where they established kinship ties with the principal families of the region. From the 15th century on, they are again present in the Vincentian urban headquarters, where they join the patriciate and some characters stand out; afterwards, they spread to many other communes in Veneto, being generally welcomed in the local patriciate. By the 16th century, the family had split into multiple branches and several of them had acquired great wealth, especially through logging and trading.Occhi, Katia. “Mercanti e traffici nel Canale di Brenta (1571-1702)”. In: Perco, D. & Varotto, M. (eds.). Uomini e paesaggi del Canale di Brenta. Cierre Edizioni, 2004, pp. 55-94Panciera. Walter. "Il porto fluviale e i commerci". In: Varanini, Gian Martia (ed.) Storia di Bassano del Grappa.Vol. I: Dalle origini al dominio veneziano. Comitato per La Storia di Bassano, 2013
However, by the mid-16th century, discussions were already beginning in Vicenza to exclude all those who practiced mechanical trades, such as commerce, from the civic nobility, restricting noble status only to the families participating in the council and to practitioners of a few particularly prestigious trades considered noble. This process culminated with the enactment of an act, in 1632, that reformed the entire ruling class and effectively restricted the conferral of nobility as had been proposed. From then on, merchants like the Sartori could keep their nobility as long as they obtained a special dispensation, but there is no sign that they made that request. From the end of the 18th century, the Vicenza group goes into decay, accentuated in the tumultuous and long period of the Napoleonic invasion and the wars of Italian unification in the 19th century, when the city was severely damaged. However, branches of other cities remained noble until the 19th century.
The history of the Sartori in Vicenza is poorly reconstructed due to a massive loss of documents from public and private archives during the Unification wars in the 19th century and World War II, and documents prior to 1501 are scarce, as the entire Council archive was lost in a fire.Navarrini, Roberto. "Antichi regimi". In: Marcadella, Giovanni & De Gregorio, Maria Luigia (orgs.). Guida generale degli Archivi di Stato. Archivio di Stato di Vicenza, s/d., p. 1332
Vicenza
Context
Since the 9th century, the bishops had ruled the city as an episcopal fief, despite it being nominally a secular county. When the Sartori arrived, the power of the bishops was declining, and the political system, through pressure from the emerging bourgeoisie supported by the party of the counts of Vicenza, was being rearticulated in a more democratic way, in the so-called "communal phase". The conflict between the bishops and the counts was endemic, but by the 13th century, the popular party had a clear advantage, accentuated by a series of incompetent or corrupt episcopal administrators. In this period of crisis, one of the strategies adopted by the bishops was to persuade supporters by granting fiefdoms and privileges, which did not always work out as intended; many benefited families started pursuing their own interests and vying for power.
During the Middle Ages, the right to undertake enterprise, to participate in guilds and brotherhoods, to have access to justice, and to vote in the Council relied on the formal possession of the status of citizen. Anyone who was not a citizen remained on the margins of society. Naturally, over time, the citizen class underwent social stratification, forming a bourgeois patriciate enriched in commerce, manufacturing, and financial activity, which consolidated itself as the ruling class by monopolizing the main public offices. Citizenship was usually passed on hereditarily, but outsiders could acquire it by fulfilling certain conditions, including the payment of a fee, being resident in the city for some years, and having certain assets. The conditions varied from place to place and over time. In medieval Vicenza, citizenship was obtained with some ease, requiring only fixed residence in the city for ten years and the payment of the usual taxes.
These conditions, however, became more restrictive, and by the 15th century, it was necessary to be wealthy to obtain citizenship.Ongaro, Giulio. "Famiglie del contado in città: il caso scledense dei Bonagente e dei Dal Conte". In: Demo, E. & Savio, A. (eds.) Uomini del contado e Uomini di città nell'Italia settentrionale del XVI secolo. NDF Editore, 2017, pp. 282-304 In parallel, as the patrician bourgeoisie became politically and economically empowered, they began to claim recognition as noblemen, a demand reinforced by the performance of trades that, since the Middle Ages, had been considered noble, such as those of physician, diplomat, judge, jurisconsult, and notary. In 1430, merchant citizens also came to be considered noble by virtue of the notable public utility of their activities, and by the 16th century, citizenship in general was a status that conferred a clear aristocratic quality, only being granted to wealthy and notable families, a practice that had become common throughout northern Italy. The dignity of the citizens was positively enhanced by their participation in municipal administrative activities, and in particular in the council, an even more exclusive board, whose noble character was also recognized by the Republic of Venice, which had taken control of the city since 1404.
Characters
After their brief appearance in the time of Bishop Mozzi, the Sartori begin to make their presence felt in the city of Vicenza in the 15th century. Several characters can be cited. Venceslao was a preacher in 1431; Beltrame, in 1470, was authorized to rebuild the wall of the garden of the Church of Saint Corona, because it served as a support for one of the walls of his house; about this time, Bertoldo lived in Castegna, an obscure locality, probably Castegnero, 11 km. south of Vicenza, also spelled in ancient sources as Castegnerio, Castelnero or Castelniero, which would shortly thereafter be securely associated with the Valstagna/Vicenza branch. Bernardino, Gregorio's son, was attested in Vicenza in 1520 as a witness in a will; the notary Giovanni Giacomo Antonio, attested from 1537, made a will in 1560 leaving a bequest for the construction of a monumental sepulchre for himself and his sons Sebastiano, Bernardino and Flaminio in the New Church of Saint Blaise; the vir egregius (outstanding man) Vincenzo, a Vincentian nobleman, was cited in 1564 in Valdagno, and his son Girolamo resided in Magrè (Schio).
At this time, the family of Nicolò, descendant of a group established in Foza and Asiago and later in Valstagna, settles in the city, and obtained citizenship of Vicenza on July 27, 1581.Occhi, Katia. "La corsa al legno. Scambi commerciali tra Altopiano e pianura in età moderna". In: Rigoni, P. & Varotto, M. (eds.). Altopiano dei Sette Comuni (Immagini e territorio). Cierre Edizioni, 2009 At this time, his family, according to Sebastiano Rumor, was also known with the surname De Sartoris, accompanied by the toponym of Castegnerio. Shortly thereafter, a member of the family would be invested with a fief in Castegnero.
Nicolò held the title of dominus and was one of the richest merchants in the region. Corazzol said that his family was very rich, with a capital that reached tens of thousands of ducats, an immense fortune at the time. According to Occhi, his family owned the Melette, Sasso Rosso and Fontanelle mountains in Foza, the Astiago and Vallerana mountain pastures in the Valstagna area, the Miela and Vanzo mountains in the Gallina area, and had been logging in Enego, Foza, Valstagna, Cinte Tesino, Scurelle and Primiero since the early 16th century. His estate also included other lands, goods and privileges in Borgo, Cinte Tesino, Pieve Tesino, Castel Tesino, Grigno, Primiero, Scurelle, Telve, Ancarano, Campolongo sul Brenta, Enego, Fonzaso, Gallio, Marostica, Oliero, Tezze sul Brenta and Vallonara. Nicolò's business was divided between trading in coal, wool, timber and land, as well as operating a banking house. He had palaces in Valstagna, Angarano, Vicenza, and Bassano del Grappa, was arbitrator of disputes in Foza, and receiver of Valstagna. He married Susanna Camoli, a member of a family of great timber merchants of Primolano, an association which brought him great commercial benefits, and left descendants in Vicenza, but late in life, he moved to Bassano, where he also obtained citizenship in 1592, and in 1599, was received into the council, dying after 1617.Occhi, Katia. "Affari di famiglie: rapporti mercantili lungo il confine veneto-tirolese (secoli XVI-XVII)". In: Mélanges de l’École française de Rome - Italie et Méditerranée modernes et contemporaines, 2013; 125 (1) In that year, he left a bequest of £57 for the celebration of a daily mass and a De Profundis by the family grave in Bassano. His sons, Girolamo and Giulio, lived mainly in Bassano, while Sebastiano and Francesco made their wills in Vicenza respectively in 1624 and 1658.