OF MODERN CORPORATIONS. 63 
the citizens, when they began to feel their power, 
was no longer to be subject to the ignorant or 
partial decision of a judge who knew nothing of 
law. The end of the 11th and beginning of the 
12th century was the time, when very general 
- efforts were made by the citizens for the reco- 
very of their lost rights in the South of France 
and in Lombardy. The consules who are men- 
tioned in their histories were originally only 
judges, ‘judices consules, as they are called at 
Verona; ‘consules justitie’ at Como. The 
right to fill city offices generally, but more espe- 
cially the consulate, was claimed to themselves 
by the old families, who possessing landed pro- 
perty and either following the profession of 
arms, or engaging only in the higher kinds of 
merchandise, formed a natural aristocracy in 
the cities. Besides Lombardy we find traces of 
this limitation in some of the towns of Provence; 
but it is most distinctly seen in the imperial 
towns of Germany, Ratisbon, Nuremburg, Augs 
burg, and above all Cologne, where the patri- 
cian houses maintained their exclusive elegibility 
till 1396. Along with the consules, whose office 
was soon extended from judging to administra- 
tion, two councils are commonly found, a smal- 
ler, the Credentia of the Italian cities, which 
was an executive body, and a larger, whose 
