The early Italian communes founded in the eleventh and twelfth
centuries used lot to select their magistrates. In the initial period
the methods for selecting members of the councils and other offices
were subject to constant experiment. Three procedures appear to
have been used most frequently: indirect election, that is, a system
whereby the first selection determined the personnel of the electors
who made the final choice; designation by the outgoing councilors
or officials; and finally sortition, often called "election by lot." "The
intention both of indirect election and of lot," writes Daniel Waley,
"was to hinder the domination of city politics by cliques, who might
prolong their control by securing the choice of members of their own faction."Throughout the history of the Italian city-republics,
the political scene was dominated by factionalism. But the phenomenon
of factions cannot be separated from the high value that
citizens attached to political office. Citizens ardently strove to reach
the "honors and benefits" of office, and the conflicts between
factions turned primarily on office-holding. The desire for office
may be seen in an idealized way as an expression of a certain idea of
human excellence: man fulfills his nature as a political animal by
holding office. But in more mundane terms, the consuming desire
for office fueled factional conflicts. The history of the Italian cityrepublics
can also be read as the bitter experience of the divisions
generated by the desire for public office.