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Abstract:  The note aims to discuss the problem of the protection and of the control of local finances in the pre-Unitarian Italian States, in light of some recent contributions on the topic by Stefano Tabacchi and Alessandra Bulgarelli. In order to contextualize first the topic analyzed by two authors, I will briefly introduce the theme of the role played by the development of the so-called “modern State” and the crisis of local finances in the redefinition of the relationship between the State, the cities and the rural communities. As Tabacchi and Bulgarelli show, it was actually the combination of these elements that induced many European States to attempt to control the local finances; briefly, the problem of debts that between the end of sixteenth century and the end of the following one, griped the private and public wealth in many areas of the continent, and the consequences of this phenomenon on the State economy.

Keywords: Commons; Early Modern Italy; Public Finances; Modern State; Seventeenth Century’s Crisis