64 ON THE PROBABLE ORIGIN 
office was legislative, variously denominated 
consilium plenum, capitulum, and in Italy and 
France Parlamentum. 'The numbers of both 
varied; of the latter Barcelona affords an exam- 
ple of an assemblage amounting to one hundred, 
and at an earlier period two hundred. In Italy, 
from the early independence of the cities, the 
councils were subject to no controul; in the 
South of France the meetings of the parlamentum 
usually took place in the palace of the temporal 
or ecclesiastical lord, and therefore probably 
under his sanction. In the Italian towns each 
of the quarters named from the gates elected a 
certain number of members to the council, as 
they furnished a certain number to the army ; 
elsewhere, a division according to parishes 
answered the same purpose. The bishops, who 
in the older German cities had by this time ob- 
tained the feudal superiority, found it expedient 
not to resist the general demand of the cities 
for self-government, and the emperors were dis- 
posed to favour the citizens against their lords. 
Frederic the I. after granting a charter to Basel, 
recalled it (1235) and declared that he would 
erect no community without the consent of the 
bishop; but the bishop of Ratisbon having be- 
trayed him to the Pope, he a few years after 
(1245) revoked his revocation and re-established 
the rights of the citizens. 
