As a non-historian, it seems to me that there are similarities between the structure of the La Cosa Nostra and the nobility of the Florentine Republic.
I don't know much about either topic, but there seem to be some similarities to me. Mainly in how their structure and hierarchy is based around certain powerful families that rise and fall.
Is this merely a consequence of how power structures emerge, in general, or are there some actual links between the nobles of historical Italian trade republics and the modern Italian mafiosi?
I apologize if I have poorly framed my question. I really just noticed the slight similarities between the two and want a better understanding of the topic of how the structures and hierarchies of these organizations/nobility came about and if they are related in any way? (That is, are any of the current great mafia families descendants of one of those powerful republic families, and so on)
I don't know enough about the topic to pose my question in a more useful manner.
Context: I was watching a Person of Interest episode regarding NYC's La Cosa Nostra while reading this paper on the rise of the Medici.
The first thing you need to know is that La Cosa Nostra originates in Sicily. At its core, La Cosa Nostra is a mindset shared by many Sicilians that Sicilians should look after each other and stay with their own kind. This mindset seemed completely alien to many Italians until only recently (80s/90s), especially to northern Italians.
Sicily has historically been a poor region, until the late 1700s/early 1800s when it was discovered that citrus fruits helps with scurvy. Citrus fruits were suddenly in huge demand, and Sicily was the perfect place to grow limes, lemons and oranges. If I'm correct, at their height, a field growing citrus fruits was worth 40x as much as a field growing wheat in Sicily.
I see where you're coming from, but because La Cosa Nostra didn't become that prevalent until the 1800s and because La Cosa Nostra is really a 'Sicilian thing', it isn't really linked to historical Italian Republics.
I don't have the book to hand, but I got my information mainly from 'Cosa Nostra: A Story of the Sicilian Mafia' by John Dicke. This is my first answer here, so critique is encouraged!