Page 147 - Upland Families, Elites and Communities
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A Dynasty of Mayors and a Member of Parliament
hood correlates well with the fluctuations in the family’s social prestige
and reputation.
Conclusions
The chapter brought forth the family Černe so as to illuminate relations
between the family, kin and the village community in Tomaj over the long
run. While based in the field of family history, it went beyond it in order
to understand the construction of the village elite and the legitimacy of its
social power within the village community. To do so, it first presented the
long history of the Černes, an exceptionally successful family which man-
aged to hold positions of power for a very long time. In the second part, it
has drawn attention to the issue of godparenthood, seen as an instrument
inextricably linked to expressing and legitimizing the elite status and thus
social prestige acquired by its family members.
Over generations, individuals from a narrow circle of interrelated fami-
lies (and relatives) stemming from a common ancestor occupied the posi-
tion of mayor. The mayoral function enabled them to encroach on prof-
itable real estate and other deals and thus gain substantial wealth. The
combination of political and economic power facilitated the acquisition
of social prestige and, hence, the affirmation of their elite status in the
community. The status they obtained and transmitted across generations
was clearly not immutable. Morally and socially questionable deeds and
activities, such as debt recoveries coupled with land seizures of peasants’
holdings or not paying dowries, were pernicious to reputation and could
hamper one’s elevated status in the community. The case of Ivan Černe,
Tomaj’s mayor in the mid-eighteenth century who ultimately fell into the
inexorable wheel of court executions, attests to this. However, while the
impact of individual wrongdoings on the family as a whole was but tempo-
rary, the person who committed such acts bore a longer-lasting stigma. In
contrast, those who did not leave traces of questionable behaviours were
the most attractive as godfathers. This seems fully in line with the idea,
widespread throughout Europe, that the godchild inherited ‘the virtues
and shortcomings of the godparents’ (Alfani and Gourdon 2012a, 19).
The Černe family, as demonstrated in the chapter, managed to reaffirm
and even fortify its position as the eighteenth century came to a close. In
the nineteenth century, the family consolidated its status through the fig-
ure of Anton Černe, a mayor and a member of provincial and state parlia-
ments in Gorizia and Vienna. Yet, despite obtaining positions beyond the
village community and thus gaining unprecedented success in the realm of
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