Citizenship was hereditary in those families by whom it had been once acquired, each republic having its own criterion of the right, and guarding it jealously against the encroachments of non-qualified persons.

In Florence, for example, the burgher must belong to one of the Arts.[1] In Venice his name must be inscribed upon the Golden Book.

The rivalries to which this system of municipal government gave rise were a chief source of internal weakness to the commonwealths.

Nor did the burghers see far enough or philosophically enough to recruit their numbers by a continuous admission of new members from the wealthy but unfranchised citizens.[2] This alone could have saved them from the death by dwindling and decay to which they were exposed.

The Italian conception of citizenship may be set forth in the words of one of their acutest critics, Donato Giannotti, who writes concerning the electors in a state:[3] 'Non dico tutti gli abitanti della terra, ma tutti quelli che hanno grado; cioe che hanno acquistato, o eglino o gli antichi loro, faculta d'ottenere i magistrate; e in somma che sono _participes imperandi et parendi_.' No Italian had any notion of representative government in our sense of the term.