The article considers the transformations that occurred in the social profile of the
“foreigner” and the “citizen” in three major Italian cities of the Renaissance, Rome,
Naples and Venice, in the time period from the early fifteenth century to the end of the
seventeenth century. The contribution intends, first of all, to reconsider the relevance
of the State in shaping these social figures, reacting to a certain
historiographical approach according to which social roles were determined principally
or exclusively in the context of social relations. Such figures, which in the Middle
Ages had an imprecise profile, were first defined gradually and then, between the
sixteenth and seventeeth centuries, lost their legal and social significance as a result of
some major changes, above all, the increased mobility of populations and pandemics.
On the horizon was the genesis of national and modern citizenship, a phenomenon for
which these changes represented fundamental prerequisites.
