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81-533: The Frisians were divided into four legal classes, to whom the law, or those transgressions of it that incurred set fines, applied. They were the nobles, the freemen, the serfs and slaves. The clergy are not mentioned in the Lex Frisionum as they were not liable to civil law. The Frisians received the title of freemen and were allowed to choose their own podestat or imperial governor. In the Lex Frisionum three districts of Frisia are clearly distinguished:

162-609: A podestà . Concerning Rome , with a history of civic violence, Gregorovius says that "in 1205 the Pope Innocent III changed the form of the civic government; the executive power lying henceforward in the hand of a single senator or podestà , who, directly or indirectly, was appointed by the pope". In Florence after 1180, the chief authority was transferred from the consuls to the podestà , and Milan and other cities were also ruled by these officials. The Republic of Genoa elected its first podestà in 1191,

243-491: A Brescian citizen, to quell the internal unrest that ravaged the capital of the Republic. There were, moreover, podestà in some of the cities of the adjoining Provence in southeastern France. An anonymous writer composed a short guide for the would-be podestà (although it would be unseemly to appear openly to run for the office), Oculus pastoralis , of about 1222; in six simple and brief chapters it guides

324-511: A governor was appointed to head the local government. In larger communes, the podestà was assisted by one or two vice-podestà nominated by the Ministry of Interior , in addition to a board of advisors ( consulta municipale ) nominated either by the local prefect or, in the major cities, by the Ministry of Interior. The decree was in effect from 21 April 1927 until 1945, when

405-591: A town . Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilities of a mayor as well as the means by which a mayor is elected or otherwise mandated. Depending on the system chosen, a mayor may be the chief executive officer of the municipal government, may simply chair a multi-member governing body with little or no independent power, or may play a solely ceremonial role. A mayor's duties and responsibilities may be to appoint and oversee municipal managers and employees, provide basic governmental services to constituents, and execute

486-703: A common podestà until 1453, when all Constantinople was conquered by the Ottoman Turks . The example of Italy in the matter of podestà was sometimes followed by cities and republics in Northern Europe in the Middle Ages, notably by such as had trade relations with Italy. The officers elected sometimes bore the title of podestà or podestat . Thus in East Frisia , there were podestà identical in name and functions to those of

567-498: A directly elected mayor of the Dublin Metropolitan Area . The 2019 local elections included plebiscites in three areas on directly elected mayors, of which that for Mayor of Limerick was passed, with the first direct election due as part of the 2024 local elections . In Italy, the mayor is called sindaco , or informally primo cittadino ('first citizen'). Every municipality ( Italian : comune ) has

648-714: A five-year term. Local administration elections for the new, consolidated municipalities and peripheries will henceforth be held together with the elections for the European Parliament . Local administration in Greece recently underwent extensive reform in two phases: the first phase, implemented in 1997 and commonly called the Kapodistrias Plan , consolidated the country's numerous municipalities and communities down to approximately 1000. The second phase, initially called Kapodistrias II but eventually called

729-542: A man of foreign birth their chief magistrate, giving him every power, authority and jurisdiction over the city, as well over criminal as over civil causes, and in times of war as well as in times of peace, calling him praetor as being above the others, or podestà , as having every authority and power over the city. Podestà were first more widely appointed by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa when he began to assert

810-567: A mayor may wear robes, a mayoral chain and a mace . Mayors have the title of His/Her Worship whilst holding the position. In councils where councillors are elected representing political parties, the mayor is normally the leader of the party receiving the most seats on council. In Queensland , the lord mayor and mayors are elected by popular vote at the general council election. Mayors in Bangladesh are elected every five years. They are very powerful in municipal government. The mayor

891-453: A mayor who represents the local government. The mayor is directly elected every five years by the inhabitants of the comune ; the mayor cannot serve for more than two consecutive terms, except in municipalities of up to 5,000 inhabitants, those having a three consecutive terms limit. The mayor is a member of the City council, the legislative body which checks the mayor's policy guidelines and

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972-480: A population bigger than 25,000 has one. The term Oberbürgermeister is not used in the three city-states, where the mayors are simultaneously head of state governments , but Regierender Bürgermeister ( Governing Mayor of Berlin ), Erster Bürgermeister ( First Mayor of the city-state of Hamburg ) and Präsident des Senats und Bürgermeister ( President of the Senate and Mayor of Bremen ) are used. However,

1053-474: A term of four years. The daily duties of the mayor's office are restricted to local governance, and as such, it is responsible for the coordination of waste collection , upkeep of public spaces (e.g., parks, undeveloped urban parcels, streets), traffic light control, sewage, and most public utilities. In practice, most of its duties are centered on minor street repairs (new or large road projects, like overpasses, bridges, pedestrian crossings, etc. are handled by

1134-462: Is elected in a pair with a vice mayor through direct elections and is a political office. An exception is Special Capital Region of Jakarta , where mayoralty is a civil-service career position with limited authority and is designated by the governor . Their regions are called administration cities ( kota administrasi ). Before 1999, there were administrative cities ( kota administratif , [id] ) which were headed by administrative mayors. In Iran ,

1215-685: Is just a deputy responsible for a distinct task (e.g., welfare or construction works). Big cities are usually kreisfrei ('district-free'). That means that the city council also has the powers and duties of a rural district council. The leader of a rural district council is called Landrat ('land counsellor'). In that case, the chief mayor also has the duties and powers of a Landrat . There are also some German states that allow smaller cities to have an Oberbürgermeister as well. In Saarland , for instance, every city with more than 35,000 inhabitants has one, and in Saxony-Anhalt every city with

1296-732: Is still in use when referring to the top managers of the municipalities of Norway . The top elected official of the municipalities of Norway, on the other hand, has the title ordfører , which actually means 'word-bearer', i.e. 'chairperson' or 'president', an equivalent to the Swedish word ordförande . In Sweden borgmästare was a title of the senior judge of the courts of the cities, courts which were called rådhusrätt , literally 'town hall court', somewhat of an equivalent to an English magistrates' court . These courts were abolished in 1971. Until 1965, these mayor judges on historical grounds also performed some administrative functions in

1377-517: Is the highest-ranking official in municipal governments in Bangladesh. Every municipality in Brazil elects a mayor (Portuguese: prefeito/prefeita ) and a vice-mayor (Portuguese: vice-prefeito/vice-prefeita ) for a four-year term, acting as an executive officer with the city council (Portuguese: Câmara Municipal ) functioning with legislative powers. The mayor can be re-elected and manage

1458-485: Is the oldest printed version, which dates from 1557. In that year, the scholar Joannis Basilius Herold made a compilation of all Germanic laws from the time of Charlemagne, Originum ac Germanicarum Antiquitatum Libri... , printed by Heinrich Petri of Basel . Among them was printed the Lex Frisionum, but from what source, or how corrupted was Herold's text, is unknown; the title-page of his edition indicates that

1539-569: Is the practice in most Commonwealth countries, in Canada a mayor is addressed as His/Her Worship while holding office. In a few municipalities and townships in Ontario , the reeve is the elected head of the municipality, and the second-in-command is referred to as the deputy reeve . Historically, in some small townships , the title "reeve" was used instead of mayor. In some other municipalities, "mayor" and "reeve" were two separate offices, with

1620-702: Is the title of mayors in Italian -speaking municipalities of Graubünden in Switzerland , but it is not the case for the Canton of Ticino , which uses the title sindaco (the same currently in use throughout Italy). The term derives from the Latin word potestas ('power'). There is a similar derivation for the Arabic term سلطان sulṭān , originally meaning 'power' or 'authority'; it eventually became

1701-788: The Alcalde evolved during the Reconquista as new lands were settled by the expanding kingdoms of León and Castile . As fortified settlements in the area between the Douro and Tagus rivers became true urban centers, they gained, from their feudal lords or the kings of Leon and Castile, the right to have councils. Among the rights that these councils had was to elect a municipal judge ( iudex in Latin and juez in Spanish). These judges were assisted in their duties by various assistant judges, called alcaldes , whose number depended on

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1782-796: The Lex Frisionum . According to later tradition, it was Charlemagne who granted the Frisians the title of freemen and permitted them to choose their own podestat or imperial governor from among the chieftains, to organize and lead the defense of two of the three districts of Frisia, in Middle Frisia , from the Flie to the Lauwers and in East Frisia from the Lauwers to the Weser , later

1863-523: The audiencias ; Alcaldes de la Casa y Corte de Su Majestad , who formed the highest tribunal in Castile and also managed the royal court; alcaldes mayores , a synonym for corregidor ; and alcaldes de barrio , who were roughly the equivalent of British parish constables . Because of this, the municipal alcalde was often referred to as an alcalde ordinario . Mayors in Armenia are

1944-550: The Kallikratis Plan , was implemented in 2010, further consolidated municipalities down to 370, and merged the country's 54 prefectures, which were disbanded in favour of the larger 13 regions. The Kallikratian municipalities were designed according to several guidelines; for example, each island (except Crete ) was incorporated into a single municipality, while the majority of small towns were consolidated so as to have an average municipal population of 25,000. In India ,

2025-749: The Lord Mayor of Sydney (Australia) , are elected. In Scotland the post holders are known as convenors, provosts , or lord provosts depending on the local authority. Since reforms introduced in 2000, a number of English local authorities have directly elected mayors who combine the "civic" mayor role with that of leader of the council and have significantly greater powers than either. Areas which now have directly elected mayors include cities, local government districts which cover several towns and rural areas, and since 2014 combined authority areas which include two or more local authority districts. The original Frankish mayors or majordomos were – like

2106-624: The mayor-council government in the United States. The chief executives of boroughs ( arrondissements ) in Quebec are termed mayors ( maires/mairesses in French). A borough mayor simultaneously serves as head of the borough council and as a regular councillor on the main city council. The scheduling of municipal elections in Canada varies by jurisdiction, as each province and territory has its own laws regarding municipal governance. As

2187-486: The "cow dung mayor" ( maer biswail ), was charged with overseeing the royal cattle. There were similar offices at the Scottish and Irish courts. The office of mayor in most modern English and Welsh boroughs and towns did not in the 20th century entail any important administrative duties and was generally regarded as an honor conferred for local distinction, long service on the council, or for past services. The mayor

2268-623: The 'Additions of the Wise Men' ( Additio sapientum ), ten subheadings from the judgements of Wiemar and of Saxmund of whom nothing is known, as well as sections from the Lex Thuringorum ("Law Code of the Thuringians ") to cover instances not previously covered. A noble's defense was to gather a specified number of " oath-helpers " willing to swear that the crime was not committed. The only trial by ordeal mentioned (twice) in

2349-518: The 12th and 13th centuries. This was probably due to their lesser concern (at the time) than other Italians in the affairs of the mainland. Afterwards, in a few cases, the term of office was extended to cover a period of years, or even a lifetime. They were confined in a luxury palace to keep them from being influenced by any of the local families. The architectural arrangement of the Palazzo Pubblico at Siena , built starting in 1297, evokes

2430-574: The 16th century in Sweden, king Gustav Vasa considerably centralised government and appointed the mayors directly. In 1693 king Charles XI accepted a compromise after repeated petitions from the Estate of the Burgesses over decades against the royal mayor appointments. The compromise was that the burgesses in a city could normally nominate a mayor under the supervision of the local governor. The nominee

2511-752: The Countship of Ostfriesland . The Italians probably became aware of the Frisian Potestaat, in Dutch "op poten staan" in English 'on legs standing', like for instance king Henry on his painting (Dutch: potestaat ; German: Potestat ; English: potestate ) during the Sixth Crusade in 1228. According to privileges that were falsely ascribed to the Carolingian era, the potestate

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2592-509: The Imperial Ghibelline faction – were led by podestàs . The Greek equivalent of a mayor is the demarch ( Greek : δήμαρχος , lit.   ' archon of the deme '). In Denmark all municipalities are led by a political official called borgmester , 'mayor'. The mayor of Copenhagen is however called overborgmester 'lord mayor'. In that city other mayors, borgmestre (plural), are subordinate to

2673-542: The Italian republics; sometimes each province had one, and sometimes the federal diet elected a podestà -general for the whole country, the term of office being for a limited period or for life. The concept of a local man empowered to represent the Holy Roman Emperor was also a feature of medieval Frisia . From apocryphal beginnings, important rights were granted or confirmed under the code of law known as

2754-423: The Lex Frisionum is the ordeal by boiling water. A stone had to be withdrawn from a seething cauldron: if the blisters were healed within three days, the man was innocent. On numismatic grounds based on the amounts of fines (compositio) and wergeld , the laws from the Lex Frisionum date from the first half of the 7th century at the latest. There are no surviving manuscripts of the Lex Frisionum. The only testimony

2835-609: The Ministry of Public Works (Spanish: Ministerio de Obras Públicas ), under the direct control of the central government. Subcontracting garbage collection and management, overseeing the use of public spaces, and arbitrating neighborhood land use disputes, which are managed by the National Property office (Spanish: Oficina de Bienes Nacionales ), is also controlled by the mayor's office. Water, electrical supply and public transportation coordination are handled by several central government offices, and as such, are not under

2916-730: The Welsh meiri – lords commanding the king's lands around the Merovingian courts in Austrasia , Burgundy , and Neustria . The mayorship of Paris eventually became hereditary in the Pippinids , who later established the Carolingian dynasty . In modern France , since the Revolution , a mayor ( maire ) and a number of mayoral adjuncts ( adjoints au maire ) are selected by the municipal council from among their number. Most of

2997-527: The administrative work is left in their hands, with the full council meeting comparatively infrequently. The model was copied throughout Europe in Britain's mayors, Italy's sindacos , most of the German states' burgomasters , and Portugal's presidents of the municipal chambers . In Medieval Italy , the city-states who did not consider themselves independent principalities or dukedoms – particularly those of

3078-536: The authority of the council between meetings. Mayoral decisions made between meetings are subject to council and may be confirmed or repealed if necessary. Mayors in Australia may be elected either directly through a ballot for the position of mayor at a local-government election, or alternatively may be elected from within the council at a meeting. The civic regalia and insignia of local government have basically remained unaltered for centuries. For ceremonial occasions

3159-524: The autonomous powers and functions of comuni (municipalities), including elected town councils and mayors . Instead, all comuni , except for Rome , were to be headed by a podestà , an authoritarian mayor with full executive and legislative powers. He was appointed by royal charter (in practice, by the National Fascist Party ) for a renewable five-year term (which could be revoked at any time with immediate effect). In Rome,

3240-441: The board of magistrates, in Swedish known collectively as magistrat . Until 1965 there were also municipal mayors ( kommunalborgmästare ), who had these non-political administrative roles in smaller cities without a magistrates' court or magistrat . This office was an invention of the 20th century as the smaller cities in Sweden during the first half of the 20th century subsequently lost their own courts and magistrates. In

3321-485: The chief officer of London, followed around 1190 by that of Winchester . Other boroughs adopted the title later. In the 19th century, the Municipal Corporations Act 1882 , Section 15, regulated the election of mayors. The mayor was to be a fit person elected annually on 9 November by the council of the borough from among the aldermen or councilors or persons qualified to be such. His term of office

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3402-477: The citizens or by the citizens' representatives, rather like the older consuls (but not collegial). The podestà exercised the supreme power in the city, both in peace and war, and in foreign and domestic matters alike; but their term of office lasted only about a year. In order to avoid the intense strife so common in Italian civic life, it soon became the custom to hire a stranger to fill this position. Venetians were in special demand for this purpose during

3483-422: The city for two consecutive terms. Mayoral elections in Brazil occur in two different ways: in municipalities with more than 200,000 inhabitants, the voting happens in a two-round system , like the presidential and gubernatorial elections. In municipalities with less than 200,000 inhabitants, the voting happens in a relative majority system (with only one round). The Brazilian system works similarly to

3564-417: The control of the mayor. Mayors ( maires ) are elected for a six-year term by the municipal council, whose members are elected by direct universal suffrage in local elections held every six years. In Germany, local government is regulated by state statutes. Nowadays only the mayors of the three city-states (Berlin, Hamburg and Bremen ) are still elected by the respective city-state parliaments. In all

3645-526: The council thought reasonable. These provisions have now been repealed. In medieval Wales, the Laws of Hywel Dda codified the mayor ( Latin : maior ; Welsh : maer ) as a position at the royal courts charged with administering the serfs of the king's lands . To maintain its dependence on and loyalty to the Crown, the position was forbidden to the leaders of the clan groups. A separate mayor, known as

3726-494: The entire system was abandoned with the return to democracy. Literally, this derived word means the office of a podestà or its term, but podesteria can also designate a district administered by a podestà within a larger state. In the Domini di Terraferma that the dogal Republic of Venice gradually established in the basin of the river Po, annexing various former principalities and self-governing cities, mostly in

3807-499: The fifteenth century, podesteria ( Venetian : podestarie ) were one of the intermediate levels of the hierarchical administrative organization, the highest ("provincial") level being the territorio (roughly a modern administrative region). After the other dogal republic, Genoa , was in 1273 granted control of Pera and Galata , commercial suburbs of Constantinople , by the Byzantine emperor, it governed them jointly by

3888-441: The head of the executive branch of municipal government . Mayors are often elected by the respective city council and serve for a five-year term. The mayor heads the community administration, nominates members of the administration to various posts, and oversees the municipal budget. In Australian councils, the mayor is generally the member of the council who acts as a ceremonial figurehead at official functions, as well as carrying

3969-675: The head of the municipal administration, particularly in the Italian-speaking territories of the Austrian Empire . The title was taken up again during the Fascist regime with the same meaning. The podestà 's office, its duration and the residence and the local jurisdiction were called podesteria , especially during the Middle Ages, and in later centuries, more rarely during the Fascist regime. Currently, podestà

4050-421: The highest executive official is not democratically elected, but is appointed to a public office by the city council, and is called simply kaupunginjohtaja 'city manager' or kunnanjohtaja 'municipal manager', depending on whether the municipality defines itself as a city. The term pormestari 'mayor', from Swedish borgmästare confusingly on historical grounds has referred to the highest official in

4131-678: The king ceased after 1720 (the so-called Age of Liberty ). On 16 October 1723, it was decided after a petition that the city should present three nominees, of whom the king (or the Council of the Realm) appointed one. This was kept as a rule from then on in all later regulations and was also kept as a tradition in the 1809 Instrument of Government ( § 31 ) until 1965. In Finland , there are two mayors, in Tampere and Pirkkala . Usually in Finland

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4212-535: The law governs all of Frisia, but West Frisia "between Zwin and Vlie " and East Frisia "between Lauwers and Weser " have certain stated exceptional provisions. At the partition treaty of Verdun (843) the whole of Frisia became part of Lotharingia ; at the treaty of Meersen (870) it was briefly divided between the kingdoms of the East Franks ( Austrasia ) and the West Franks ( Neustria ), but in 880

4293-422: The laws and ordinances passed by a municipal governing body (or mandated by a state, territorial or national governing body). Options for selection of a mayor include direct election by the public, or selection by an elected governing council or board. The term mayor shares a linguistic origin with the military rank of major , both ultimately derived from French majeur . In modern England and Wales,

4374-486: The lord mayor with different undertakings, like ministers to a prime minister. In other municipalities in Denmark there is only a single mayor. In Norway and Sweden the mayoral title borgermester / borgmästare has now been abolished. Norway abolished it in 1937 as a title of the non-political top manager of (city) municipalities and replaced it with the title rådmann (' alderman ' or ' magistrate '), which

4455-519: The material was drawn from the library (now dispersed) of the monastery of Fulda . The surviving version is apparently a rough draft, still retaining pagan elements, which doubtless would have been edited out in the finished version, which Charlemagne apparently contemplated assembling for each of the Germanic peoples in his empire. Podest%C3%A0 Podestà ( Italian: [podeˈsta] ), also potestate or podesta in English,

4536-873: The mayor is the executive manager of a city and is elected by the Islamic City Council. The mayor is elected for a four-year term. In the Republic of Ireland , the head of a borough corporation was called "mayor" from the Municipal Corporations (Ireland) Act 1840 until boroughs were abolished by the Local Government Reform Act 2014 . City council chairs are "mayor" (or "lord mayor" in the cases of Dublin and of Cork ). The Local Government Act 2001 allowed county councils to style their chairperson as "mayor" and some do so. Since 2000 there have been proposals for

4617-575: The mayor is the first citizen of a city and the head of municipal corporation which is a local government of cities with a population over one million. They have a number of roles, both ceremonial and functional. In most Indian states mayors are elected indirectly among the corporators (who are directly elected by the people of their respective wards ) of the municipal corporation, except in nine states: Bihar , Chhattisgarh , Haryana , Jharkhand , Madhya Pradesh , Odisha , Uttar Pradesh , Telangana and Uttarakhand , where mayors are elected directly by

4698-505: The mayor retaining leadership powers while the reeve was equivalent to what other municipalities called an " at-large councillor". Today most municipalities in the province now designate their elected municipal government heads as mayors, but a small handful retain the position. This continues to be the case in the following municipalities and townships : The reeve is also the chief elected official in most of Alberta 's municipal districts . The elected heads of rural municipalities (RM) in

4779-402: The novice through the requirements of the office, the salary, the address of welcome given by the retiring podestà to the new one, the choice of counsellors, the handling of money accounts. The fifth chapter offers some model speeches on public occasions, such as the death of prominent citizens. A final chapter touches upon making war (in a paragraph), and the training of urban officials. In

4860-467: The number of parishes the town had. The title alcalde was borrowed from the Arabic al-qaḍi ( قاضي ), meaning 'the judge'. The word alcalde originally was used for simple judges, as in Andalusian Arabic . Only later was it applied to the presiding municipal magistrate. This early use continued to be reflected in its other uses, such as alcaldes del crimen , the judges in

4941-461: The other states the mayors are now elected directly by the EU citizens living in that area. The post of mayor may be said to be a professional one, the mayor being the head of the local government, and requiring, in order to be eligible, training in administration. In big cities (details are regulated by state statutes) the official title is Oberbürgermeister (mayor). In these cities, a "simple" mayor

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5022-480: The position of mayor descends from the feudal lord's bailiff or reeve ( see borough ). The chief magistrate of London bore the title of portreeve for considerably more than a century after the Norman Conquest . This official was elected by popular choice, a privilege secured from King John . By the beginning of the 12th century, the title of portreeve gave way to that of mayor as the designation of

5103-488: The provinces of Manitoba and Saskatchewan are also referred to as a reeve. The mayor of a municipality in the Dominican Republic is called indistinctly alcalde or síndico . The latter name is preferred to avoid confusing the title with the similar-sounding alcaide (lit. ' prison warden '). Such a person is the governor of the municipality whose township elected him (or her) by direct vote for

5184-495: The public. In Indonesia , mayor ( Indonesian : wali kota , formerly called walikotamadya and walikota ) is a regional head of a city or town. A mayor has the same level as a regent ( bupati ), head of a regency ( kabupaten ). Basically, a mayor has the duty and authority to lead the implementation of the policies established by the region along with the city council ( Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat Daerah Kota , DPRD Kota; formerly called Tier 2-DPRD ( DPRD Tingkat II )). A mayor

5265-438: The registry office and in the city courts (abolished in 1993) as in Sweden, not the city manager. In addition, pormestari is also an honorary title, which may be given for distinguished service in the post of the city manager. The city manager of Helsinki is called ylipormestari , which translates to 'chief mayor', for historical reasons. Furthermore, the term city manager may be seen translated as mayor . The office of

5346-421: The rights that his Imperial position gave him over the cities of northern Italy; at the second imperial diet at Roncaglia , November 1158, Frederick appointed in several major cities imperial podestà "as if having imperial power in that place". The elected consuls, which Frederick had claimed the right to ratify, began to designate directly. The business of the podestà was to enforce imperial rights. From

5427-711: The role of civic leader is taken by the chairman of the council, who undertakes exactly the same functions as a mayor of a district with borough status. Many major cities in the United Kingdom and throughout the Commonwealth have a lord mayor , a special recognition bestowed by the sovereign . Although the position is often ceremonial, with executive responsibilities under the control of an elected mayor, lord mayors in several Commonwealth cities including Belfast , Cardiff , Brisbane , and Dublin hold both ceremonial and executive duties. Some lord mayors, including

5508-421: The sixteenth century. The officials sent by the Italian republics to administer the affairs of dependent cities were also sometimes called podestà . Into the 20th century the cities of Trento and Trieste gave the name of podestà to their chief magistrate . The Fascist regime created its own version of the podestà figure. In February 1926, Mussolini's Senate issued a decree which abolished

5589-437: The start, this was very unpopular, and their often arbitrary behaviour was a factor in bringing about the formation of the Lombard League and the uprising against Frederick in 1167. Although the Emperor's experiment was short-lived, the podestà soon became important and common in northern Italy, making their appearance in most communes around the year 1200, with an essential difference. These officials were now appointed by

5670-399: The struggle against the count of Holland. The title became well known outside of Friesland only with the installation of Albrecht of Saxony as hereditary potestate in 1498; the Frisians chose Jancko Douwama as their imperial stadtholder (1522). Mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a municipal government such as that of a city or

5751-436: The term Oberbürgermeister was used for the head of the state government of West Berlin until 1951 and was also used in East Berlin from 1948 to January 1991. Mayors ( δήμαρχοι , dēmarchoi , sing. δήμαρχος , dēmarchos ) in Greece were previously elected every four years in local elections and are the head of various municipal governments in which the state is divided. Starting in 2014, mayors are elected for

5832-601: The thirteenth century in Florence, in Orvieto (1251) and some other cities, a capitano del popolo ( lit.   ' captain of the people ' ) was chosen to look after the interests of the lower classes (to this day, the heads of government of the little independent republic of San Marino are still called " capitani "). In other ways the power of the podestà was reduced—they were confined more and more to judicial functions until they disappeared early in

5913-705: The title of the person holding power. The first documented usage of podestà was in Bologna in 1151, when it was applied to Guido di Ranieri di Sasso of Canossa, brought in from Faenza to be rettore e podestà , noted in numerous documents. Leander Albertus gives the particulars: The citizens, seeing that there often arose among them quarrels and altercations, whether from favoritism or friendship, from envy or hatred that one had against another, by which their republic suffered great harm, loss and detriment; therefore, they decided, after much deliberation, to provide against these disorders. And thus they began to create

5994-575: The uneasy relation of the commune with the podestà , who in Siena's case was a disinterested nobleman at the head of the judiciary. It provided a self-contained lodging round its own interior court for the podestà , separate but housed within the Palazzo Pubblico where the councillors and their committee of nine habitually met. During the later part of the twelfth and the whole of the thirteenth century, most Italian cities were governed by

6075-522: The whole country was reunited under Austrasia. The first twenty-two chapters of the Lex Frisionum are entirely concerned with schedules of fines ( compositio ) and wergeld , the compensations due victims or their kin, scheduled according to the social ranks of perpetrator and victim. Remarkably, the fine for killing a woman was exactly the same as for a man of the same rank, a feature of Frisian law that links it to Anglo-Saxon law, and stands apart from all other German codes. A further eleven chapters contain

6156-423: The word town is often dropped). The person is known as "mayor" regardless of gender; the partner of a mayor is sometimes known as the "mayoress". Since the 1974 local government reforms , mayors are also appointed to English local government districts which have borough status . This results in mayors of districts which include towns which also have separate mayors. In districts which do not have borough status,

6237-622: Was chosen by council and he must be able to slay knights. Apocryphal historical writings mention the potestate as early as the Viking Age . The only potestates chosen to lead Friesland between the Vlie and Lauwers were Juw Juwinga (1396) and Juw Dekema (1494), both were chosen by the Schieringers . However, in 1399 the districts of Westergo and Oostergo elected potestates, Haring Harinxma and Sjoerd Wiarda respectively, in

6318-404: Was expected to devote much of their time to civic, ceremonial, and representational functions, and to preside over meetings for the advancement of the public welfare. The administrative duties of mayors were to act as returning officer at parliamentary elections and to chair the meetings of the council. The mayor of a town council is officially known as "town mayor" (although in popular parlance,

6399-431: Was one year, but he was eligible for re-election. He might appoint a deputy to act during illness or absence, and such deputy must be either an alderman or councilor. A mayor who was absent from the borough for more than two months became disqualified and had to vacate his office. A mayor was ex officio a justice of the peace for the borough during his year of office and the following year. He received such remuneration as

6480-466: Was the name given to the holder of the highest civil office in the government of the cities of central and northern Italy during the Late Middle Ages . Sometimes, it meant the chief magistrate of a city-state, the counterpart to similar positions in other cities that went by other names, e.g. rettori ('rectors'). In the following centuries up to 1918, the term was used to designate

6561-554: Was then to be presented to and appointed by the king, but the king could appoint mayors directly in exceptional cases. This was codified in the Instrument of Government of 1720 and on 8 July the same year Riksrådet ("the Council of the Realm") decided, after a petition from the said Estate, that only the city could present nominees, not the king or anyone else. Thus the supervision of the local governor and directly appointed mayors by

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