Abstract

This paper aims to present one of the most impressive authors of the fourteenth century, Cynus of Pistoia. Starting from a joint examination of his work as a jurist and a poet, special attention is paid to his contribution to the doctrinal debates of his time on questions such as the role of the intellectual, the study of classical Roman law and its application to Cynus’s time, the universalistic ideal represented by mediaeval papacy and empire, and the development of the territorial monarchies and signorie that were contemporary with these latter.