Encyclopaedk of the Social Sciences
of this attitude are that the reputation of his
work has suffered little from changes of fashion
in historical writing, that it has influenced all
subsequent research in related fields and that it
still stands as a model of minute investigation
in which the details are never allowed to obscure
the wider view.
F. M. STENTON
Consult: Report of the Lords' Committees, Appointed . . .
to I'ieiu the Public Records (London 1719); Ha/cltine,
II.D., "Thomas Mudox as Constitutional and Lepnl
Historian" in Line Quarterly Rerfcw, vol. xxxii (1916)
268-89, 352-72; Poole, R. L., The Exchequer in the
Twelfth Century, Oxford University, Ford Lectures,
1911 (Oxford 1912).
MAFFI, ANTONIO (1850-1912), Italian co-
operative leader. Maffi was born in Milan and
was self-educated. lie engaged in the printing
trade and achieved prominence through his abil-
propagandist and organizer. Inspired by
ities as
Mazzini's idea of "association and liberty" as
the solution of social problems, he argued for
cooperation and mutualism based upon educa-
tion, self-sacrifice and solidarity. lie condemned
the opposition of the ruling class to the peaceful
improvement of working class conditions, which
he regarded as the only real class struggle, advo-
cating cooperation and mutualism as a con-
structive remedy and opposing the Marxian idea
of class struggle. He helped to indoctrinate the
cooperative movement with a class collabora-
tionistphilosophy not challenged until 1920,
when the movement allied itself with socialism.
The first workman to be elected to the Italian
national Parliament, Mafli actively supported
ameliorative social legislation, especially in aid
of producers' cooperative societies, and was
largely responsible for a law empowering work-
men's associations to undertake contracts for
public works under very favorable conditions.
In 1886 he helped promote the first congress of
Italian cooperative societies, in which eminent
Italian and foreign cooperators took part. The
result was the founding of the Lega Naxionale
dcllc Cooperative, of which he was general sec-
retary and presiding genius until his death. He
organized the "triple alliance" of cooperatives,
mutualists and trade unions for joint legislative
action aiming at the legal and economic en-
franchisement of workers. Against the view held
by many socialists that cooperation was futile
he argued that by penetrating all economic and
social life and by affecting production, exchange
and legislation cooperation could provide a real
solution to social problems. His view of coop-
eration as a powerful instrument of international
peace and brotherhood became basic in the
International Cooperative Alliance, and he lived
to see right wing socialists converted to the
cooperative idea.
FELICE MANFREDI
Consult: II movimento cooperative in Italia, ed. by F.
Manfredi (Milan 1920).
MAFIA. The Sicilian word mafia is not found
in Italian writings before the nineteenth century.
Traina's Sicilian-Italian dictionary (1868) de-
fines as a neologism denoting any sign of
it
bravado, a bold show; Mortillarc/s dictionary
(1876), as a word of Picdmontesc origin equiva-
lent to gang (camorni). Neither definition is
exact. The word is employed by Sicilians in two
different although related senses: on the one
hand, it is used to denote an attitude which
until recently has been fairly widespread among
certain classes of Sicilians; on the other, it signi-
fies a number of small criminal bands.
Mafia describes the attitude which assumes
that recourse to legal authority in cases of per-
secution by private enemies is a symptom of
weakness, almost of cowardice. It is an exag-
geration of the sentiment, more or less common
in Latin countries, that appeal to law against
offenses involving personal insult, for instance
adultery, is unmanly and that the duel is the
proper means of recovering lost honor. Sicilian
circles affectedby mafiist psychology held that
many offenses must be avenged by personal
action or by that of relatives and friends. Com-
mon theft, for example, was considered a sign
of lack of respect indicating that the thief did
not fear vengeance.
The mafiist attitude, of which there were
many degrees, was common in western Sicily
and almost unknown in the eastern provinces,
particularly Messina and Syracuse. It was prac-
tically non-existent among educated people as
well as among the large class of sailors and fisher-
men and rare among all urban classes. It was
most firmly rooted among peasants and large
landowners.
By no means all people with such sentiments
were actual or potential criminals. The great
majority violated no law. When a person sharing
mafiist sentiments had relations with criminals
he was usually actuated by a desire to prevent
offenses against himself and not to commit them
against others. The most serious consequence
of such a tendency was the fact that refusal to
report offenses to constituted authorities, which
 Madox Mafia 37
would hav>e been contrary to the mafiist moral of its
difficulty. No woman or baby has been
law of omertd, prevented the capture of criminals kidnaped for a decade, and no kidnaped person
by the state and thus facilitated the formation has been killed for three or four. The police have
and activities of bands of malefactors. generally suspended efforts to discover the kid-
Mafia was never a vast association of male- napers until the victim has been freed. cosca A
factors with a hierarchy of leaders and ramifi- would often
through more or less veiled threats
cations throughout Sicily. In this respect it dif- induce a landowner to entrust the marketing of
fered sharply from the highly unified Neapolitan produce to one of its members or to lease his
Camorra, with which it had no
relationship ex- estate to persons in their confidence. In the first

cept that of similar criminal objectives. Mafia case small thefts by novices not associated with
consisted rather of many small autonomous asso- the cosca were prevented, a part of the produce
ciations, each active over a limited district. Each being appropriated as payment by the cosca
association was
a cosca (Sicilian dialect: tuft), itself. In the second case a rebate, often half the

generally having a membership of twelve to lease price, was extracted.

fifteen, although some were larger. There was In cattle rustling, the most common offense,
no election of chiefs, authority being wielded two cosche collaborated. Stolen oxen and sheep
by members long addicted to crime, who di- would be dispatched to a commune fifty or more
rected the movements of younger associates, kilometers away, secretly butchered and con-
superintended dealings with victims and divided sumed. Stolen horses and mules were sometimes
booty. Insubordination and especially misappro- sent as far as Tunis, where the maiiists had
priation of booty were considered violations of connections with Sicilian emigrants. Cosche also
mafiist honor and punished, sometimes with have had close relations with criminal bands in
death. The
relations between neighboring cosche the United States whose members were ex-
might be cordial or so antagonistic that diffi- mafiists. A from America to a notori-
letter sent
culties would have to be settled by shooting. ous Sicilian mafiist announced a murder com-
The great majority of mafiist murders grew out mitted during its transit. The murder of a New
of rivalry between cosche or members of one York City police lieutenant, Petrosino, at Pa-
cosca. While it is untrue that members of the lermo in 1909 was perpetrated in cooperation
various cosche used conventional words and ges- with mafiist criminals in America.
tures to recognize one another, they did have About 1878 Prefect of Police Malusardi, in

peculiar mannerisms, including pronunciations whom the minister of the interior vested author-
of certain words, frequent use of others, and a ity over all Sicily, exiled to the coastal island ,

certain furtive and shuffling expression. To any several hundred criminals against whom precise
experienced Sicilian these betrayed connection evidence was lacking. Later, however, the cosche
with a cosca. reorganized and perfected their methods of
The cosche engaged chiefly in cattle rustling, operation, and most of their members practise?!
extortion and occasional kidnaping for ransom. a trade from which they appeared to live. The
Often an ally of the cose a would offer to recover government was long powerless to stop their
stolen cattle for the owner, and
if such an crimes. Although the mafiist chiefs were fairly
offer were accepted the cattle would soon be w ell known, the police could offer no evidence
r

found wandering about the countryside and the
" '
friend' would be indemnified for his "ex-
penses" to the extent of a third or a half the
value of the cattle. In regions where agriculture
was intensive, a tribute system prevailed. Every
landowner or tenant paid to the cosca an annual
tax higher than the combined imposts of the
state, province and commune. Refusal to pay
was punished by destruction of trees and vines
and the slaughter of livestock. Letters demand-
but popular report. Few persons dared appear
against the criminals. Even when a chief could
be identified he could prove an alibi, and the
youths who actually had perpetrated offenses
were unknown. When the latter were arrested
they rarely informed on those who had ordered
them to commit an offense, for they would then
not only be condemned but would also forfeit
mafiist honor and the help customarily given by
the cosca to captives of the police. , (

ing the deposit of a sum of money at a designated But the chief obstacle to legal action was the
place or its consignment to a designated mes- political influence of the mafiists, who in some
senger were a method generally used by novices. communes dominated political elections. This
Kidnaping of wealthy individuals for ransom power developed after the first important exten-
fell into disuse some twenty years ago because sion of the franchise in 1882 and increased after
 Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences
universal suifrage was adopted in 1912. The
poorest classes, now given the vote,
were hy no
means most largely represented in the cosche]
but because of ignorance and fear they yielded
most easily to rnafiist threats and supported can-
didates endorsed by mafiists. The coschc re-
quired their legislative tools to obtain for their
members permission to carry weapons, to inter-
cede with the police in their favor and to serve
them in other ways. The question of public
safety in Sicily was repeatedly discussed by the
chamber and all ministers of the interior in-
structed the prefects of police to make no com-
promise with crime. Most ministers, however,
also recommended support of the parliamentary
candidacy of a mafiist tool, and the prefects
often carried out the second instruction while
ignoring the first.
During recent years the mafiist attitude has
weakened. Immediately after the World War
the general confusion and the ambitions of the
younger members of the cosche to gain control
led to a recrudescence of mafiist activities and
a series of murders within the cosche. Beginning
about 1925, the Fascist government undertook
a rigorous war against the mafia. In this struggle
it was aided by the weakening of mafiist senti-
ments resulting from the wider diffusion of cul-
ture and of material comforts and the more
frequent contacts with the continent which fol-
lowed upon the improvement of transportation
^nd communication. The government pushed
the fight with vigor and success, inducing vic-
tims to give sufficient proof to bring about many
arrests and convictions. The Fascist system of
appointing members of the legislature prevents
rnafiist influence on elections. Today conditions
of public safety in Sicily may be considered
nor mill.
GAKTANO MOSCA
See: CAMORRA; BRIGANDAGE; GANGS.
Consult: Wcrmert, Gcor#, Die Intel Sicilien (Berlin
1905) ch. xxviii; Hcrz, llii^o, "Die Krirnin.ilitat der
Mafia" in Afonattsthrift fur Ktiminalpsychnlogie und
(1904-05) 385-96; Vaccaro,
Strafrethtireform, vol. i
An^elo, "La mafia*' in Archire* d'anthrupologie
criminelle, vol. xvi (1901) 49-65; IMosca, G., "Che
cosa e mafia" in Giornale dcgli economist!, 2nd ser.,
la
vol. xx (1900) 236-62; Bruno, Cesare, La Sicilia e la
mafia (Rome 1900); Cutrera, Antonino, La mafia c i
mafwsi Palermo 1900).
MAGDEBURG CENTURIATORS. The Mag-
deburg centuriators, of whom the leader and
organizer was Matthias Flacius Illyricus, were
the authors of the principal historical work pro-
duced by German Liitheranism in thei Reforma-
tion period. The Magdeburg Centuries were
planned by Matthias and other strict Lutherans
who had gathered in Magdeburg to meet the
crisis growing out of Emperor Charles v's at-
tempt to follow up his victory over the Protes-
tant Schmalkaldic League in 1547 and to rees-
tablish Catholicism throughout his entire realm.
The centuriators conceived the work as a com-
prehensive history of the church which should
demonstrate that the Lutheran doctrine was the
true doctrine and that the Roman papacy had
been created and developed by Antichrist. When
they had completed an exhaustive investigation
of sources in numerous libraries outside of Ger-
as well as within, they subjected the ma-
many
terial to historical criticism and then arranged
it by centuries (whence the name). Only the first
thirteen centuries of the Christian era were in-
cluded. The various Centuries were uniformly
divided into separate sections treating such sub-
jects as church doctrine, ritual, discipline
and
government, learning, heresies, persecutions and
martyrdoms. As a result of its arrangement the
work lacks internal unity. Its principal signifi-
cance for the development of historiography lies
in the fact that the centuriators appreciably aug-
mented the volume of hitherto known historical
materials and that they applied to the treatment
of this material the fundamental canons of hu-
manistic historical method. They manifested due
cognizance of the importance of social matters,
expounding the relations of the church to society
and to non-Christian religious associations as
well as to the state; they made exhaustive investi-
gations of the structure of the organizations
produced by the church; they evaluated the in-
fluence of the Christian precept of brotherly love
upon the practise of charity. Never before had
such questions been treated in a great and con-
nected church history. In estimating the intrinsic
value of the work, however, it must be remem-
bered that it was tendencious in the extreme.
The centuriators never permitted their canons
of historical criticism to lead them to a judgment
adverse to their position. Besides providing an
arsenal for Protestant apologists the Centuries
stimulated and influenced historical writing
among throughout Europe and
Protestants
evoked counterinterpretations from Catholics,
such as Baronius. They remained the standard
model for Protestant historiography down to the
eighteenth century.
KARL VOLKER
Works: The Centuries were first published as Ecdc-